Fernando Alcoforado*
This article aims to analyze the genesis of the wealth and poverty of nations and to point out solutions for poor nations to develop. There is an almost unanimous misconception that individual wealth results from the individual’s ability to achieve this goal and that people who do not achieve it are incapable. This thought also has a racist nature in attributing to white people a greater capacity than those of black or mixed race to become rich. Those who think like that do not realize that people of color or mestizo are among those socially marginalized, which is why they do not have the same opportunities for social advancement that whites have. This same thought is also extended to countries and/or peoples that have developed more than others. It is commonplace to attribute greater capacity to white peoples of European origin to promote the economic development of their countries.
This mistaken thought is explained by the fact that Europe was the cradle of the Renaissance, which originated in the 14th century in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, being in force until the 16th century, of the Commercial Revolution, which represents a great period of transformations that took place in Europe between the 16th and 18th century, the Scientific Revolution, which began in the 16th century and lasted until the 18th century, the Industrial Revolution, which began in England in the second half of the 18th century, spread around the world, causing great transformations and ensured the emergence of industry and consolidated the process of formation of capitalism in central capitalist countries. This misguided thinking can also be explained by attributing to white peoples of European origin a greater capacity to promote the economic development of their countries because some European countries followed by the United States have reached a high level of economic and social development as well higher than that of most countries in the world.
The world has been faced for many years with the existence of very few rich countries that present advanced economic and social development alongside the vast majority of poor countries with precarious economic and social development (Figure 1). In Figure 1, the countries in black are rich countries and the others are poor countries. The real explanation for the existence in the contemporary era of few rich nations and many poor nations lies in the fact that, according to the American sociologist Immanuel Wallerstein, the world economy is governed by a system, the capitalist world-system that is composed of a division between center, periphery and semiperiphery, which emerged in the 16th century at the beginning of the globalization process with the great navigations inaugurated with the discovery of America. The most developed countries in the world form the center of the world-system which form the organic core of the world capitalist economy, that is, the countries of Western Europe (Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Germany , Austria, Switzerland, France, United Kingdom and Italy), North America (United States and Canada), Oceania (Australia and New Zealand) and Japan. For Wallerstein, the center is the area of great technological development that produces complex products; the periphery is the area that supplies raw materials, agricultural products and cheap labor to the center. The economic exchange between periphery and center is unequal: the periphery has to sell its products cheaply while buying products from the center dearly. As for the semiperiphery, it is a region of intermediate development that functions as a center for the periphery and a periphery for the center (WALLERSTEIN, Immanuel. The modern world system – Vol. 1, 2, 3. Berkeley and Los Angelis: University of California Press, 2011).
The semiperiphery is characterized by Wallerstein as a necessary structural element for performing a stabilizing role between rich and poor countries in the international system similar to that of the middle class within the configuration of classes in a country. The semiperiphery would also assume a role, in the words of the Italian economist Giovanni Arrighi, of “systemic legitimacy”, showing the Periphery that there is the possibility of mobility within the international division of labor for those who are sufficiently “capable” and/or “well behaved”. According to Arrighi, the semiperipheral condition is described as one in which a significant number of national states such as Brazil remain permanently parked between central and peripheral conditions, and which, despite having undergone far-reaching social and economic transformations, continue to relatively late in important aspects [ARRIGHI, Giovanni. A ilusão do desenvolvimento) The illusion of development. Petrópolis: Vozes, 1997].
Figure 1- Map of the geographic distribution of the wealth of nations
Source: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/World-Map-of-the-wealth-distribution_fig2_343596559
The world-system theory had as its formulator Immanuel Wallerstein and as its main thinkers André Gunder Frank, Samir Amin, Giovanni Arrighi and Theotonio dos Santos, intellectuals linked to the “theory of dependence”, who claim that “dependence” expresses subordination of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries in relation to the central capitalist countries whose economic backwardness was not forged by their agrarian-exporting condition or by their pre-capitalist heritage, considered by some economists, but by the pattern of capitalist development dependent on the country and by its subordinate insertion in the world capitalism. In the understanding of Wallerstein and other thinkers linked to the “theory of dependence”, overcoming the underdevelopment of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries should result from the end of dependence and not from the modernization and industrialization of the economy as advocated, for example, by ECLAC (Commission Economics for Latin America) in the 1950s and by numerous Brazilian economists. The facts of reality confirm, for example, the mistake that Brazil’s development has been dependent on foreign capital and foreign technology adopted from 1955 onwards with the Juscelino Kubitscheck government and that this dependence has deepened with the adoption of the neoliberal economic model since 1990.
Many ask: what is the explanation for the central capitalist countries having reached a high level of economic and social development and the other countries not? There are several answers to this question. One of them is that the core capitalist countries have developed essential competences to promote economic, scientific and technological development. But the main answer is that the central capitalist countries accumulated a large volume of capital during colonialism from the 14th to the 17th centuries and imperialism from the 18th to the 20th centuries with the looting they carried out in the countries they dominated and also in the current stage of neoliberal globalization. During colonialism, many of them exercised political, economic, cultural and religious domination over the peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania. This domain was exercised through military force to explore, maintain and expand its territory. This practice took place without the consent of the colonized peoples, who with exploitation lost part of their assets (soil, natural resources, housing), in addition to suffering the practice of genocide of indigenous populations that resisted colonialist domination. Faced with resistance from indigenous peoples, many colonialist countries in the Americas adopted the slavery of Africans. In this way, the colonial power managed to develop at the expense of the exploitation of enslaved indigenous and African populations and of the riches taken from the exploited colonies, which became increasingly part of the exploiting empire and hostages to its orders.
England, France, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, Holland, Italy, among others were colonialist countries. Colonialism was the political, economic and cultural doctrine that supported the control exercised by a colonialist metropolis, through administrative and military imposition, over a colony. European colonialism demonstrated its strength by dominating many countries in the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania. This domination meant the expansion of the territory of the colonialist powers. England had an increase of 10 million km2 in its territory, France increased 9 million km2, Germany increased 2.5 million km2 and Belgium and Italy had an increase of 2 million km2 in their territory. Portugal, for example, had Brazil as colony with 8.5 million km2, in addition to territories in Africa and Asia.
Another explanation for why the central capitalist countries have reached a high level of economic and social development is the imperialism they exercised from the 2nd Industrial Revolution in 1850 until 1990, when neoliberal globalization was adopted. Imperialism represented the continuity of colonialism with the adoption of a policy of expansion and territorial, cultural and economic domination of a dominant nation over others. Unlike colonialism, in which the colonizer exercised his domination directly or through agents, in imperialism, domination was made economically and culturally to ensure that the capitalization of imperialist nations was expanded. The characteristics of imperialism are the following: 1) Dominant classes of the great capitalist powers use the imperialist State aiming at their expansion, mainly from the economic submission of other nations; 2) Dominant imperialist state exerts political, cultural or economic influence over dominated nations, whether formally or informally; 3) Action based on ethnocentric ideas and social Darwinism (superiority of the dominant peoples in relation to the dominated); 4) Process of expansion of the capitalism of the great powers; and, 5) Industrial capital merged with finance capital. The imperialist countries sought to obtain three resources from the dominated countries: 1) Sources of raw material and energy; 2) Domain of the consumer market; and, 3) Cheap labor.
United States, Japan, England, France, Germany, Belgium and Italy, in addition to other nations such as Portugal, Spain, tsarist Russia, etc., practiced imperialist policies. The influence of imperialism on the planet was such that continents such as Africa, Latin America and Asia still reap the negative consequences of this process of colonial and imperialist domination. At the end of the 19th century, the imperialist countries launched a race for the conquest of world power that unleashed great rivalry between them and was the main cause of the 1st and 2nd World War. The First and Second World War led to the end of colonialism that lost strength, thanks to the political emancipation of the former colonies, gave birth to US imperialism and also led to the end of German, Italian and Japanese imperialism.
Finally, the other explanation for why the core capitalist countries have reached a high level of economic and social development is the adoption of neoliberal globalization since 1990. Peripheral and semi-peripheral capitalist countries such as Brazil face problems of deindustrialization, rising unemployment, economic stagnation and public indebtedness growing. Neoliberal globalization has contributed to increasing the economic, financial and technological dependence of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries in the world. Neoliberal globalization has contributed to the existence of the chaos that dominates the world economy, which tends to worsen in the coming years. One fact is evident: the transformation from a peripheral or semi-peripheral capitalist country to the condition of a developed country is quite difficult to carry out, not only because of the global action imposed by international capital that, even not currently adopting the colonialism and imperialism of the past, still maintains hostages to the vast majority of national governments and the international political and economic bodies through which it control the world economy with the imposition of neoliberal globalization.
Another difficulty in transforming a peripheral or semi-peripheral capitalist country into a developed country was demonstrated by Arrighi in his work The illusion of development. Arrighi states that, after World War II, Japan and Italy were the only countries that moved from the condition of semi-peripheral countries of the world economy to that of members of the core of developed countries, and South Korea was the only country on the periphery of the world economy capitalist world-system that evolved to the condition of a semiperipheral country [ARRIGHI, Giovanni. A ilusão do desenvolvimento (The illusion of development). Petrópolis: Vozes, 1997). In the same way as South Korea, Brazil evolved from the condition of a peripheral to a semi-peripheral country from 1930 to 1980. The thesis that prevailed after the Second World War that it would be possible for all peripheral and semi-peripheral nations to reach the stage of high level of development enjoyed by the central capitalist countries, especially the United States, has not been realized. From the second half of the 20th century onwards, there were several attempts to promote economic and social development in several countries around the world that failed, either those within the framework of capitalism with national developmentalism adopted, for example, in Brazil and those with the implementation of the socialism.
In view of what has just been exposed, it is concluded that the wealth and development of central capitalist countries and the poverty and underdevelopment of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries are the sides of the same coin. They are interdependent processes. Rich nations, that is, the core capitalist countries, achieved the status of highly developed because they looted and continue to loot poor nations, that is, the peripheral and semi-peripheral capitalist countries. The underdevelopment of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries results from the relationship of economic and technological dependence and exploitation to which they are subjected in relation to the central capitalist countries. The gains of the central capitalist countries are largely the result of the losses of the peripheral and semi-peripheral countries. This relationship is similar to that between wealth and poverty among individuals. This means that with the model of capitalist society there is no way to avoid the relationship of dependence of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries in relation to central capitalist countries. The dependency relationship of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries will only come to an end with the disappearance of the capitalist world system and the adoption throughout the world of a new model of society that ensures economic and social progress for all countries and not just for a very few countries. This new model would require the existence of a world government to ensure the functioning of a new world order that guarantees equity in the development process of nations and the implementation of the Welfare State along the lines of that practiced in Scandinavian countries with the necessary adaptation to each country because it is the most successful social system ever implemented in the world.
I advocate the adoption of Keynesianism in economic planning that would operate, not only at the national level to achieve economic stability and full employment of factors in each country, but also at the global level to eliminate the global economic chaos that currently prevails with neoliberalism. Keynesianism should also be adopted at the planetary level in order to ensure economic stability and full employment of factors globally. With Keynesianism, there would be the coordination of Keynesian economic policies at a planetary level that would only be carried out with the existence of a world government. This would be the way to regulate the world economy to eliminate the chaos that characterizes neoliberal globalization. The elimination of chaos or attenuation of instability and uncertainty with its turbulence and its risks in the world economy will only be achieved with the existence of a world government that would act to ensure the coordination between the Keynesian economic policies adopted in each country. To be effective, the world government must adopt the Keynesian economic planning process that helps to eliminate instability and uncertainty with its turmoil and risks.
In addition to the adoption of a world government, each country should abandon the neoliberal economic model and replace it with social democracy along the Scandinavian lines, because it is the most successful model of society in the world, characterized by the combination of a broad Welfare State with rigid mechanisms to regulate market forces based on Keynesianism with the ability to put the economy on a dynamic trajectory. The Nordic or Scandinavian model of social democracy could best be described as a kind of middle ground between capitalism and socialism, being the attempt to fuse the most desirable elements of both into a “hybrid” system. The choice of Scandinavian social democracy as a model of society to be adopted is due to the fact that the UN World Happiness Report 2020 shows that the happiest nations in the world are concentrated in Northern Europe. The role of the State is decisive in order to develop the conditions to increase technical progress and make the process of capital accumulation viable in peripheral and semi-peripheral countries of the world economy.
In order to achieve the goals of creating a world government and implementing the Welfare State in each country, a World Forum for Peace and the Progress of Humanity must be constituted by the governments of peripheral and semi-peripheral countries and by organizations of the Society Civilian of these countries of the world. In this Forum, the objectives and strategies of a world movement for the constitution of a world government and the implementation of the Welfare State in each peripheral and semi-peripheral country would be debated and established, in order to make a world of peace and progress for all humanity a reality. Until these goals are achieved, it is urgent to adopt the national developmental economic model of selective opening of the Brazilian economy that would allow Brazil to assume the directions of its destiny, contrary to the neoliberal model that makes the country’s future dictated by market forces, all of them committed to international capital. The evils caused by neoliberalism in the world do not recommend the election, in Brazil, of candidates for the Presidency of the Republic and of parliamentarians who insist on maintaining the neoliberal economic model that contributed to the economic and social disaster in which the Brazilian nation is debating. Candidates with neoliberal programs must be repelled by true Brazilian patriots.
* Fernando Alcoforado, 82, awarded the medal of Engineering Merit of the CONFEA / CREA System, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor in Territorial Planning and Regional Development by the University of Barcelona, university professor and consultant in the areas of strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is author of the books Globalização (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1997), De Collor a FHC- O Brasil e a Nova (Des)ordem Mundial (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1998), Um Projeto para o Brasil (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2000), Os condicionantes do desenvolvimento do Estado da Bahia (Tese de doutorado. Universidade de Barcelona,http://www.tesisenred.net/handle/10803/1944, 2003), Globalização e Desenvolvimento (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2006), Bahia- Desenvolvimento do Século XVI ao Século XX e Objetivos Estratégicos na Era Contemporânea (EGBA, Salvador, 2008), The Necessary Conditions of the Economic and Social Development- The Case of the State of Bahia (VDM Verlag Dr. Müller Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG, Saarbrücken, Germany, 2010), Aquecimento Global e Catástrofe Planetária (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2010), Amazônia Sustentável- Para o progresso do Brasil e combate ao aquecimento global (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2011), Os Fatores Condicionantes do Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2012), Energia no Mundo e no Brasil- Energia e Mudança Climática Catastrófica no Século XXI (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2015), As Grandes Revoluções Científicas, Econômicas e Sociais que Mudaram o Mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2016), A Invenção de um novo Brasil (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2017), Esquerda x Direita e a sua convergência (Associação Baiana de Imprensa, Salvador, 2018), Como inventar o futuro para mudar o mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2019) and A humanidade ameaçada e as estratégias para sua sobrevivência (Editora Dialética, São Paulo, 2021) .
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