• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 1907 0

economic hope for developing and post-socialist countries lies in some form of market-generated growth. Second, the best political hope for these countries lies in some form of democracy, with constitutional constraints, tailored to local realities. And third, avoiding ethnic oppression and bloodshed must be a constant priority. But if these goals are to be achieved—if global free market democracy is to be peaceably sustainable—then the problem of market-dominant minorities, however unsettling, must be confronted head-on. The answer is not to swing from one wishful panacea to another, for example by scapegoating democracy and glorifying markets, or vice versa.

Rather, the next several sections will address the following specific topics: (1) the possibility of “leveling the playing field” between market-dominant minorities and the impoverished “indigenous” majorities around them; (2) ways of giving the poor, frustrated majorities of the world a greater stake in global markets; (3) ways of promoting liberal rather than illiberal democracies; and (4) approaches that market-dominant minorities themselves might take to forestall majority-based, often murderous ethnonationalist backlashes. If we stop peddling cure-alls—both to ourselves and others—and instead candidly address the biases and dangers inherent in both markets and democracy, there is in many cases room for optimism.

Leveling the Playing Field:

Addressing the Causes of Market Dominance

The first, most obvious step is to isolate, where possible, and to address, where appropriate, the causes of the market dominance of certain groups. In South Africa, for example, expanding educational opportunities for the black majority—relegated for more than seventy years to inferior Bantu schooling—is properly a national priority and should be vigorously supported by the international community to the extent that it has an interest in promoting the stability of a democratic South Africa. Throughout Latin America as well, the market dominance of the European-blooded elite reflects at least in part centuries of subjugation, exclusion, and corrupt, oligarchic rule. Educational reform and equalization of opportunities for the region’s poor indigenous-blooded majorities are imperative if global markets are to benefit more than just a handful of cosmopolitan elites.

Similarly, to the extent that political favoritism has contributed to the astounding wealth of certain market-dominant minorities, eliminating such favoritism would plainly be a step in the right direction. The monopolies awarded by indigenous leaders, always in exchange for kickbacks, to outsider market-dominant minorities not only are inefficient, but fuel invidious group stereotypes and aggravate ethnic resentment.

On the other hand, we have to be realistic. The truth is that the underlying causes of market dominance are poorly understood, difficult to reduce to tangible factors, and in any event highly intractable. Research, for example, suggests that additional educational spending, if not accompanied by major socioeconomic reforms, produces depressingly few benefits.

9 (Educating girls, however, might have a significant indirect payoff: Research results are strong that young women with more education have smaller families, and population pressures exacerbate all the problems of poor countries, including those related to market-dominant minorities.) Likewise, while political favoritism is a frequent, exacerbating problem in societies with a market-dominant minority, such favoritism tends to be more the consequence than the cause of market dominance. Most market-dominant minorities, whether the Bamiléké in Cameroon or Indians in Fiji, are disproportionately economically successful at every level of society, including small traders, retailers, and shopkeepers with no political connections whatsoever. Further, many market-dominant minorities have been successful notwithstanding long histories of official discrimination against them. This is certainly true of the Chinese in Southeast Asia, Lebanese in West Africa,