One of the problems that rural Peruvians face with regard to their personal or family economic development is an issue of the accumulation of capital. If they can't save money, it's hard for them to make the investments they need to start small businesses and to get ahead, economically.
One of the common solutions advanced for this is micro-credit. This often seems to be an effective solution, but fails to address what sometimes seems to be one of the root causes of this failure to accumulate capital, which is the over-consumption of alcohol, a really serious problem in rural Peru.
Although there may be some deeper, culturally-sensitive solution to this problem (which sometimes seems to be brought on by the tendency of Peruvian indigenous people on place a high value on communal festivals and feasts, often organized around the Catholic ecclesiastical calendar and older Andean religious traditions), government may play a strong role in promoting the accumulation of capital at a community level, through the levy of taxes and the re-investment of those taxes into infrastructure and the promotion of productive activities.
In short, I think what I'm suggesting is that, although private investment may be a more efficient solution, communitarian socialism may be an effective solution to the problems of poor communities and rural social malaise such as these problems of alcoholism.
2 comments:
Interesting that this would also be the case in Peru as it is in Bolivia. It tends to be a gendered problem in Bolivia, especially when there are children involved. Men tend to be more inclined to alcoholism than women. Do you see that there too? -Denise-
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