Ending Aid Dependence by Yash Tandon

Author:Yash Tandon [Tandon, Yash]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Publisher: Independent Publishers Group
Published: 2008-11-01T06:00:00+00:00

The national project

What is the national project? Against the background of globalisation, some might see the national project as reverting to historical passion and sentimentality. That is not so. It is a serious practical and contemporary issue. The developing countries are in constant battle in the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and other UN agencies to try and defend their policy space against the forces of globalisation and trade and financial liberalisation. To give just but one example: in the WTO, the developing countries have succeeded (so far) in resisting pressure from the developed countries to negotiate the four so-called Singapore issues – competition policy, investment policy, government procurement, and trade facilitation. They have finally agreed on trade facilitation, but remain firm on the first three issues. At least in the multilateral negotiating forums, they are jealously guarding their right to determine policy (national space) in these three areas.

The national project, however, is not solely a nationalist strategy, but a strategy for local, national, regional and South – South self determination, independence, dignity and solidarity. It is the essential political basis for any strategies to end aid dependence. The national project is the continuation of the struggle for independence. It is a project that began before countries in the South got their independence from colonial rule, continued for several decades after political independence, and then, in the era of globalisation, it appeared to have died a sudden death. If it has died, it needs to be revived.

In the case of Africa and Asia, and up to the time of independence, the objective was clear and simple: it was to secure liberation from foreign domination. It was captured by the slogan of the time – self-determination. After independence, however, matters became complicated. People who fought and won independence, involving huge sacrifices (as in, for example, India, Indonesia and Kenya), and in some cases armed action and guerrilla struggles (as in, for example, Algeria, Zimbabwe, Angola and South Africa), began to ask their political leaders and intellectuals some critical questions: Where do we go from here? What now? What do we do with this hard won independence? There also came to the surface even more difficult questions about self-identity that had been subdued during the struggle for independence: Who are we as a ‘nation’? How do we forge nationhood out of disparate ethnic, racial, religious, linguistic, regional and sub-regional groupings? Countries in Latin America, who have enjoyed legal independence much longer than those in Asia and Africa, are also facing the same challenges. They are, as the Latinos are fond of saying, ‘too far from God and too close to the United States’. Also, in more recent times, the indigenous peoples are beginning to find a voice in the political arena, and are raising questions of identity and participation.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.