Spotting the Losers: Seven Signs of Non-Competitive States:

October 10, 2001 9:24 AM

Spotting the Losers: Seven Signs of Non-Competitive States: Nations and groups that will not be successful economically or diplomatically all share at least some of the following characteristics:
     Restrictions on the free flow of information
     Subjugation of women
     Inability to accept responsibility for individual or collective failure
     The extended family or clan as the basic unit of social organization
     Domination by a restrictive religion
     A low valuation of education
     Low prestige assigned to work

posted by Steven Den Beste (32 comments total)

Via InstaPundit.
posted by Steven Den Beste at 9:24 AM on October 10, 2001

Inability to accept responsibility for individual or collective failure
A low valuation of education

I dunno, wouldn't you call the U.S. successful?
posted by Hildago at 9:26 AM on October 10, 2001

could this be applied to individuals?

"I can't tell you about the way I treat my wife, but it's not my fault! My patriach made me do it - but at least I go to confession twice a day. Perhaps if I'd be different if I'd stayed at school, rather than getting this cr*p job."
posted by snowgum at 9:32 AM on October 10, 2001

A low valuation of education

I dunno, wouldn't you call the U.S. successful?

There's a fair bit of difference between having an arguably poor public system that ends up with the majority of students being functionally literate and many with post-secondary educations (like the US), and having no public school system or post-secondary institutes.
posted by cCranium at 9:33 AM on October 10, 2001

We've got seven non-competative states right here.
posted by thewittyname at 9:35 AM on October 10, 2001

The link's timing out on me: I'd like to know how it defines "success".
posted by holgate at 9:39 AM on October 10, 2001

(sorry, that's all supposed to be blockquoted. it's from the article, obviously.)
posted by rebeccablood at 9:45 AM on October 10, 2001

An excellent read - very good analysis. Particularly like this:Information-controlling governments and knowledge-denying religions cripple themselves and their subjects or adherents. If America's streets are not paved with gold, they are certainly littered with information. The availability of free, high-quality information, and a people's ability to discriminate between high- and low-quality data, are essential to economic development beyond the manufacturing level. Whether on our own soil or abroad, those segments of humanity that fear and reject knowledge of the world (and, often, of themselves) are condemned to failure, poverty, and bitterness.

Good treatment of sensitive subjects.
posted by yesster at 9:53 AM on October 10, 2001

bah. RAH RAH USA USA USA.

Peters' article fails to speak about *causation* of under-industrialized countries and rather speaks to characteristics (while trying to make these characteristics appear to have a causal relationship with industrialization.). In this manner, it makes it easy to fault the countries themselves and their cultures rather than looking for any particular reason other countries have not yet attained a 'level of living' that we have.

meanwhile, this fellow sketches out a couple of old colonialist ideals -- "If you want to guarantee an underdeveloped country's continued inability to perform competitively, grant it rich natural resources." Statements like these stink of the idea that it's *only* the 'civilized' that can make good use of another country's 'wasted' resources.

however, i will give Ralph Peters this, if he's slightly edited, his premise is entirely accurate:

"The invisible hand of the market has become an informal but uncompromising lawgiver. Globalization demands conformity to the practices of the global leaders, especially to those of the United States. If you do not conform--or innovate--you lose. If you try to quit the game, you lose even more profoundly. The rules of international competition, whether in the economic, cultural, or conventional military fields, grow ever more homogeneous. No government can afford practices that retard development [of labor or resources for use by international corporations]."

'development' and 'success' are such mean euphemisms.
posted by fishfucker at 9:54 AM on October 10, 2001

The extended family or clan as the basic unit of social organization.

Kinship causes problems with structural adjustment? Next you're going to tell me to stop exchanging like valuables!

(In case you couldn't tell I am being sarcastic.)
posted by rschram at 9:55 AM on October 10, 2001

sounds like walter lippmann's the good society.
posted by kliuless at 10:06 AM on October 10, 2001

Hilarious, thewittyname. At least we don't produce many soccer fans.
posted by MrMoonPie at 10:08 AM on October 10, 2001

fishfucker:

> 'development' and 'success' are such mean euphemisms.

You may (or may not, I dunno) be interested in Vidiahdur S. Naipaul's take on "development." (Naipaul was born in Trinidad in a Hindu family, and is probably the greatest English-language novelist now living.)

The central figure of the book is a young Iranian woman who does research work in Boston as a biologist. She is married to an American, and she might seem to be all right, well adapted. But when she goes back on a holiday to Tehran she loses her balance. She has some trouble with the bureaucracy. She can't get an exit visa; she begins to feel lost. She is disturbed by memories of her crowded, oppressive Iranian childhood, with its prurient sexual intimations; disturbed by what remains of her old family life; disturbed by the overgrown, thuggish city, full of “western" buildings. And that is interesting, that use of "western" rather than big: it is as though the strangeness of the outside world has come to Tehran itself...


Now, in her distress, she falls ill. She goes to a hospital. The doctor there understands her unhappiness. He too has spent some time in the United States; when he came back, he said, he soothed himself by visiting mosques and shrines for a month. He tells the young woman that her pain comes from an old ulcer. "What you have," he says, in his melancholy, seductive way, "is a western disease." And the research biologist eventually arrived at a decision. She will give up that Boston-imposed life of the intellect and meaningless work; she will turn her back on the American emptiness; she will stay in Iran and put on the veil. She will do as the doctor did; she will visit shrines and mosques. Having decided that, she becomes happier than she has ever been.

Immensely satisfying, that renunciation. But it is intellectually flawed: it assumes that there will continue to be people striving out there, in the stressed world, making drugs and medical equipment, to keep the Iranian doctor's hospital going.
posted by jfuller at 10:23 AM on October 10, 2001

A fascinating piece, but it leaves me asking "at what price success?" The whole article seems to be nothing but a justification of the 24/7 workaholic corporate culture that values nothing but ever-increasing productivity at the sacrifice of nearly every value of humanity. Even the factors that we choose to value negatively (subjugation of women in particular) are framed in terms of economic productivity.
posted by briank at 10:32 AM on October 10, 2001

The reason that many of the issues discussed in this piece are "framed in terms of economic productivity" is because it is about the only objective scale we have.

It is not saying that that is the ONLY value scale.

Using that scale is a useful exercise, leading to informative and provocative discussions. But nowhere in the piece is it claimed that the economic scale is the "only" or "true" or whatever other absolutist (and straw-man) indicator of value.
posted by yesster at 10:38 AM on October 10, 2001

If you try to quit the game, you lose even more profoundly.

Reversing the progress of industrialisation as suggested by Ivan Illich. "Makes Chomsky look like a republican."
posted by worldsystema at 10:47 AM on October 10, 2001

Cultural competition is Darwinian. "Success" is defined by the ability to survive, spread and dominate.
posted by Steven Den Beste at 10:52 AM on October 10, 2001

The problem with this article is that is based on an entirely American way of thinking. "America is succesful, therefore, countries that are not like America are failures!" This is so racist and classist it's ridiculous. First of all, many of the so called "failed" countries have been hamstrung by hundreds of years of western colonialism that destroyed their native culture, leaving the country's social structure disheveled, not to mention their financial situations. On top of that, who's o say these countries even want to be like America. It seems to me that a lot of them don't want to be a success if success means being like us.
posted by bob bisquick at 10:57 AM on October 10, 2001

The problem with this article is that is based on an entirely American way of thinking. "America is succesful, therefore, countries that are not like America are failures!" This is so racist and classist it's ridiculous. First of all, many of the so called "failed" countries have been hamstrung by hundreds of years of western colonialism that destroyed their native culture, leaving the country's social structure disheveled, not to mention their financial situations. On top of that, who's o say these countries even want to be like America. It seems to me that a lot of them don't want to be a success if success means being like us.
posted by bob bisquick at 10:58 AM on October 10, 2001

Sorry, the success of technology has out done itself!
posted by bob bisquick at 10:59 AM on October 10, 2001

there's also the idea of cultural cooperation (is group selection darwinian?) that has also survived, spread and, if not dominated, been accepted.
posted by kliuless at 10:59 AM on October 10, 2001

You know, when Osama on his video lamented "the tragedy of Andulusia" I realized how Osama, perverted criminal though he is, is really just making a stand against the onslaught of McNikesoft
Really, 1492 , the fall of Moorish Spain and Columbus' journey, is the start of McNikesoft's onslaught, the Western technological/capitalistic/old society- shattering behemoth that strides across the Earth today.
It's inevitable that this wave is going to break over the Middle East and wash away their traditional Islamic societies the same way serf and king have vanished.
I mean Osama uses TV, video, mikes, and the internet to get his message out. His cause is already lost.
There's something big going on-the final insectization of humanity or the rise of a superintelligence, however you see it, but the old ways are gone. We're all game show contestants now: "Osama-bin-Laden, come on down!"
posted by quercus at 11:00 AM on October 10, 2001

> Cultural competition is Darwinian. "Success" is defined by
> the ability to survive, spread and dominate.

Speaking as a biologist and a committed Darwinian, I have to dispute this. Darwinian evolution by natural selection is (as explained for the pros by Ernst Mayr and for the masses by Stephen Jay Gould) simply a more-or-less accurate tracking by genetic adaptation of the demands of an enviroment that itself varies essentially at random. There's no place for any idea of progress in Darwinian evolution.

We hope (and pray, some of us) that there's a place for progress in cultural evolution.
posted by jfuller at 11:04 AM on October 10, 2001

> There's something big going on-the final insectization of
> humanity or the rise of a superintelligence, however you
> see it,

Metaphors from what we already know, both of these. Humans aren't specialized enough to be worker ants (who never drink, never fuck, never call in sick, and never dream of alternative ways of life) and they don't communicate or cooperate well enough to be brain cells. Imagine every one of your brain cells trying to think for itself...
posted by jfuller at 11:29 AM on October 10, 2001

"It's inevitable that this wave is going to break over the Middle East and wash away their traditional Islamic societies the same way serf and king have vanished."

Or not. The Taliban did a good job of avoiding the wave. If they hadn't been so determined to protect Bin Laden, they'd still be avoiding it.

The Taliban and other Islamic fundamentalist movements don't want to "be successful economically or diplomatically." They want to live in a world (or at least a nation) without modern, western, capitalist, democratic success.

"No government can afford practices that retard development."

Oh ya? Just watch them. They'll produce something Americans find backward and cruel, but they'll be quite happy in their artificially maintained medieval bubble.
posted by y6y6y6 at 12:31 PM on October 10, 2001

y6cubed, i agree there is no direction to history, but this is the way to bet. Sure it won't happen tommorrow, it may take the entire 21st century, but it will happen.
5 million Muslims live in the U.S.-this is the model the Middle East will follow.
Arabic is an Indo-European language after all. (So is Farsi)
The prodigal son shall return. The Arabs invented algebra-a vital cog in the foundation of McNikesoft. Yes the Taliban et al. are Luddites with kalishnikoves and they will follow the Luddites into obscurity.
posted by quercus at 1:38 PM on October 10, 2001

This is so racist and classist it's ridiculous.

Not to mention short-sighted and overly-focused on information and economics while completely ignoring ethics and quality of life issues. Where was economics when the civil rights movement was going on? What about the dispersment of wealth? Is more money, more work, and this more spending and less free time something we should necessarily be proud of. There are alternatives to the American system of work/spend/sleep.

This is so 'America the Great' mixed with enough Ayn Rand to be poisonous.
posted by skallas at 2:30 PM on October 10, 2001

skallas: This is so 'America the Great' mixed with enough Ayn Rand to be poisonous.

Subsitute "poisonous" with "accurate & good." And, I might add, the Future of the World.
posted by davidmsc at 4:24 PM on October 10, 2001

Inability to accept responsibility for individual or collective failure
A low valuation of education

I dunno, wouldn't you call the U.S. successful?

If you consider the U.S. representative of these traits, I'd like to know what your controls are and which states you would consider more willing to accept responsibility and placing higher systemic value on education.
posted by lizs at 9:52 PM on October 10, 2001

Humans aren't specialized enough to be worker ants

True, but you raise an interesting point. Though on the level of survival we are generalized and highly flexible, in the higher domains of knowledge we are indeed becoming more and more specialized. Division of labor, academic pursuit, and indeed civilization itself are manifestations of specialization and cooperation in a very hive-like fashion, but on the level of progression instead of survival. A metahive, if you will. It's self perpetuating, with each successive generation requiting more specialization and becoming more dependant on their fellows as we turn more and more attention from survival to progress. It's an ingenious system, allowing the robustness of a generalized survival mechanism and the efficiency of collective production and specialization.

While I disagree with the assumption that other countries should strive to follow western progress, it is true that it will become increasingly difficult for them to interact with our system as anything other than raw material producers. What I wonder is could our system exist without the influx of cheap resources and labor that these countries provide in their current state? In other words, is the reason it gets more difficult for them to evolve complex societal structures because our structure is dependent on them and so they fall victim to a sort of cultural self-preservation instinct?

I'm unclear on the causal relationships of the traits listed to the economic situation of the countries exhibiting them. Most of the listed traits could be describes as survival mechanisms, for individuals and cultures. Is a non-competitive economy the result of survivalist preoccupation, or survivalist preoccupation the result of non-competitive economies?
posted by Nothing at 11:13 PM on October 10, 2001

davidmsc: [...]And, I might add, the Future of the World.

Actually, crystal balling the economic Future of the World is not as easy as once it was. Some of the basic paradigms may go into a five-speed tizzy.

Let's add some glassdarkly ingredients:
Glowbot Inc. introduces the Apple-A-Day serum cocktail - a delightful mix of nanobots and pharmaceuticals which cures and prevents all disease. A one-time shot with yearly boosters. Price? 69 cents, USD.
Dorian Grace Corp. unveils the Peter Pan Pill, which modulates the aging process, increasing lifespans to 170 years, most of which are wrinkle-free. Price? Free with a fill up.
Flintstone/Squibb markets Manna from Heaven - full nutrition from a super-modified rice cake. Price? Two bucks for a 6-month supply.

And then the fun will begin. Because actuarial tables and choice of entree's will no longer be critical measures of a society's success. When "the system" is no longer indispensable to the basic comfort, welfare and survival of its indentured servants, the fun will commence. Those will be interesting times.

Now? Now we are plodding, and boring, and beholden, and silly, and scared, and careful.
posted by Opus Dark at 2:33 AM on October 11, 2001