Originally published at: The failed promises of exporting American-style capitalism | Boing Boing
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Yep. Hopefully that was just assumed?
I mean, just how great, democratic, freedom loving and so on can a country that sits on such rotten foundations (slavery and its unresolved aftershocks being another) actually be?
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IIRC McDonald’s decision to open a franchise in Moscow in 1990 did bring about the fall of the Soviet Union the following year, but unfortunately the company’s presence in Russia didn’t survive the Putin regime.
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Acting as left hand to the State Department’s right:
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Shipments never late
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Probably, considering that the scope of the book is post-WWII Cold War era policy. It is an unfortunate fact that not every book by a historian focused on a particular period has to relitigate all of the history that came before it.
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This quote really resonates with me, because I’ve always felt that the American institutes of power understand that capitalism is successful, but they don’t understand why.
They seem to have this blind spot for what actually makes good capitalism- strong government, fair regulation, anti-trust enforcement, and social safety nets. Without those things, you always end up with wealth inequality (thus no customers) and monopolies (the end of the competition that makes capitalism good).
When they try to set up American capitalism somewhere else, like Afghanistan, it always ends up being a Capitalism Cargo Cult. They bring the trappings of car dealerships and fast food, but neglect that it’s actually strong, functional government institutions that matter.
America’s institutions stopped functioning long ago and it has been coasting on inertia. However the people in charge look at the current situation and think those failing systems were never necessary because everything is still great after they’re gone.
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/s, if not obvious.
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Still. People believe that shit, so I’ll leave up my gif, as a historian who focuses on the Cold War, it drives me nuts…
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“How can anyone claim we lost the Vietnam War when there’s a McDonald’s in Ho Chi Minh City?”
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When George W Bush overthrew Saddam Hussein the Americans decided to reinvigorate the Iraqi economy by deregulating everything, ignoring all the things that businesses needed to function like water, electricity, telecommunications, banking, security, etc. They abolished import duties, killing off the last surviving remnants of Iraqi industry and flooding the market with cheap imports from Iran.
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Well, it seems that the whole point wasn’t to tear down Iraq and rebuild a better one, it was to stop Saddam from challenging the hegemony of the almighty dollar, and further enrich corporate fat cats in the process so, Mission Accomplished, aye?
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Yes, I know you are mocking this sort of thing , but it was interesting when I was in Vietnam (including Ho Chi Minh City) in 2018 that besides the typical US chains they had a lot of their own chains serving coffee, fast food, and so on. And a lot of their clientele didn’t seem to be tourists but the Vietnamese themselves. Like China they seem to be embracing commerce while still retaining the authoritarian rule of their Communist Party.
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I dunno, Cargil has been doing great by this policy since the 1950’s. Great book on the private company that follows the Public Policy https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt18fs5jp
Again, whitewashing British imperialism in order to criticize American imperialism is not the win you think it is.
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Slightly off topic but @Mindysan33 might find this interesting - In 1986/87 the Irish company Aer Rianta (now Aer Rianta International) opened the first duty free shop in Moscow Airport.
That was the earliest signal that I was aware of, that things might be about to change in the Soviet Union.
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That is interesting!
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