Message-ID: <3381FE84.2F1A@interport.net> Date: Tue, 20 May 1997 12:41:56 -0700 From: Max Freund <mailto:mfreund@interport.net> Subject: Re: Boring To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
Lee,I'd say the average U.S. citizen doesn't think too much about the Third World, except when a situation there is an obvious humanitarian disaster, a threat to "our" interests (whether they're strategic or economic), or -- most of all -- when the "our boys" in the military are deployed and are put at risk. Obviously, these perceptions are susceptible to spin by government officials, corporations, humanitarian organizations, unions, advocacy groups, the big media themselves, and other interested parties. When the U.S. intervenes or exerts influence abroad, I'd say that people usually see it as a justified defense of our interests, a demonstration of traditional U.S. charity, or an attempt to promote "democracy" and "free-market economies" (or occasionally human rights) -- reasons against which it's difficult to argue.
That's not to say that nobody has an awareness of the interests at play or the history of things like CIA-sponsored coups, colonialism, etc. Many of us do and in some cases safely in the Cold-War past (like the Alpirez case in Guatemala, the '56 coup there, and now Mobutu's rise to power) the underground history is gaining legitimacy. It's a slow process, though, and when abuses are uncovered they're most often portrayed as isolated "failures," rather than systemic problems.
Similarly, it's interesting to see attempts to rationalize neocolonialism, like the recent New York Times article on how local elites in the Third World, the Japanese, and emerging industrial societies are "Americanizing" and are exploiting people in their own country or region. The Times, a liberal paper, tried to justify this as proof that we're no longer "ugly Americans" and can stop torturing outselves with guilt about exploitation and cultural imperialism. (What a relief -- we don't have a monopoly on ugliness!) I look forward to the day that a mainstream paper here looks at an issue like this in in terms of its roots in colonialism and general economic inequity, but I'm not holding my breath.
Does that begin to answer your question? I'd be interested in hearing what other people have to say.
--Max
resolve wrote: > On that note, I wonder if I might put a query to the list regarding the
> average American's perception of the US role in the 1st world/3rd world
> situation.
>
> At the risk of being shot by the CIA (: in Australian universities, it
> is reasonably widely taught that the US funds military coups,
> dictatorships, oppressive military forces which suppress workers to
> ensure an obedient, cheap labour force for the benefit of multi-national
> companies. I have spoken to a couple of Americans via the net who are
> under the impression that the US is a stabilising helping hand out there
> in the world, and who think that the third world should just get off
> their collective butts and work their way out of the dilemma they're in,
> whereas the reality appears to be that US forces, governmental and
> business, actually create a lot of the problems endured by the poorer
> nations.
>
> Is the slaughter and enslavement by Europeans of the various colonies
> taught over there? And the fact that the US perpetuates the inequalities
> founded in this way, by using their power to set up trade agreements and
> so on which exploit third world countries' resources and inhibit
> development?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Lee
> --
>
> http://www.squirrel.com.au/~resolve/ncpreport/
>
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