This is a bit of a soap-box of mine, and no doubt many readers of this post will be familiar with my rant on this, but for one reason or another, it's come to the forefront again.
For whatever reason, Alaskan politics seem to show the same links between pro-conservation policy and the left wing. Of course, in Alaska, nobody is really anti-oil, so it's mostly a question of how quickly to drill and how much to tax Exxon.
This isn't even interesting to most people--of course conservatives are anti-environment, right? Except it really doesn't make much sense, when you think about ideology, history, and so on.
First off, the Republican party was the party of conservation right from the get-go (almost literally... Ulysses S. Grant created our first national park in the US), and was strongly associated with conservation right on through. For example, Teddy Roosevelt was a strong conservationist (created the Forest Service, for example). And even as recently as the 1970s, Republicans were pro-environment (Richard Nixon, after all, created the EPA).
Further, conservatism and conservation are ideologically compatible. If we assume that frugality and living within our means is a key conservative value--and you can question this when you look at which recent presidents have run up the deficits and which have cut them, but most Republicans would argue that fiscal conservatism is a key component of their ideology--it's hard to see how conservation of resources is any different. Oil, coal, timber, fish... these are all resources that can't be used up too fast, or they go away, in just the same way as government revenues can't be spent too quickly without creating problems. Frugality in resource use is not very different from frugality in government spending.
Nor is it clear that anti-conservationism is a key value of important Republican demographics. Commercial and sport-fishermen and hunters are more often Republican than not, and these are groups that have important reasons to be pro-conservation (though their discourse sounds a little different from that of the average member of the Sierra Club). And even though there are many conflicts between users of public lands, snowmobilers and off-roaders all favor more public land for recreational purposes. These groups also tend towards conservatism.
Which, of course, raises an interesting empirical question--why exactly are republican politicians so anti-conservation? But that is a question for another time.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Saturday, June 16, 2012
Small Arms and Civil Wars
Okay, so I know that I've kind of been on this gun kick recently. I'll be over it soon. Sorry.
But in the meantime...
There's sort of this long-running debate in Political Science between people who think that grievances are an important cause of civil wars, and there's another group of people who think that civil wars are all about opportunity--that there are always grievances in any society that are strong enough to cause a civil war, but they only break out when rebellion is likely to be successful. This is characterized (caricatured?) as the "Greed v. Grievance" debate.
So, I'll go on record here in saying that I think grievances matter, and there are places where grievances are stronger than others, and there are places where there are more grievances than others, and I suspect that will eventually be shown to be associated with civil war outbreak. Or I could be wrong. Whatever.
Setting that aside, there's pretty good evidence that factors which lower the cost of rebellion, or increase the rewards to rebellion, are associated with civil war outbreak and duration. So, where it's easy to start and fight a rebellion because you've got favorable terrain (mountains, jungle), you get more and longer wars. Also, when you can pay for your rebellion easily because you've got "high value, low weight goods" (cocaine, diamonds, shrunken heads) you get more and longer civil wars. So, Colombia has the FARC (cocaine, jungle), and Afghanistan has... well... you know, like the whole Afghani population (mountains, opium poppies).
It occurs to me that one of the major costs of an irregular rebellion (a guerilla war) is probably small arms and ammunition. When we talk about the Viet Cong, or the FARC, or the Afghani Taliban these days, we're not talking about armies with tanks and jets and artillery. Or uniforms. Or even very nice clothes, or food, a lot of times. We're talking about dudes with rifles and rocket propelled grenades, and maybe a mortar or something.
Anyways, if high-value, low weight goods make it more likely that you'll get a civil war because you can buy guns, won't it also be more likely that you'll get a civil war because those guns are cheaper?
If that's true, won't it also be true that you'll get more civil war where you've got more small arms?
So, basically, I'm wondering if civil war is going to be more or less costly in the future, if this dynamic is true. There are a lot of people making guns these days. But the truth is, there are probably going to be fewer small arms on the global arms market in the future than there have been for the last fifty years or so. It's no coincidence that when we think of a guerilla fighter, we think of a guy with an AK rifle. That's because the Russians and Chinese basically relied on the same grand strategy for defense, which was something along the lines of "if we have more guys with guns, we'll win." Basically because they knew that, in terms of population, there aren't too many other places that could compete with them.
And of course, everybody else knew that too. So the US didn't have an enormous standing army like the Russians did. Instead, we made lots of nuclear weapons and other sophisticated technology.
Anyways, a lot of those AK rifles have been banging around out there in the mountains and jungle for a long time now. Some of them, like 65 years. And those rifles are pretty tough, but they're getting old. And a lot of them are wearing out, and don't work very well anymore. As time goes on, that's going to be the case more and more. Because the Chinese and the Russians no longer are keeping up the huge ground armies they once were, and they're not making as many guns as they were, I think.
Or am I wrong? Are there more rather than less guns out there these days? Or is this whole idea silly?
But in the meantime...
There's sort of this long-running debate in Political Science between people who think that grievances are an important cause of civil wars, and there's another group of people who think that civil wars are all about opportunity--that there are always grievances in any society that are strong enough to cause a civil war, but they only break out when rebellion is likely to be successful. This is characterized (caricatured?) as the "Greed v. Grievance" debate.
So, I'll go on record here in saying that I think grievances matter, and there are places where grievances are stronger than others, and there are places where there are more grievances than others, and I suspect that will eventually be shown to be associated with civil war outbreak. Or I could be wrong. Whatever.
Setting that aside, there's pretty good evidence that factors which lower the cost of rebellion, or increase the rewards to rebellion, are associated with civil war outbreak and duration. So, where it's easy to start and fight a rebellion because you've got favorable terrain (mountains, jungle), you get more and longer wars. Also, when you can pay for your rebellion easily because you've got "high value, low weight goods" (cocaine, diamonds, shrunken heads) you get more and longer civil wars. So, Colombia has the FARC (cocaine, jungle), and Afghanistan has... well... you know, like the whole Afghani population (mountains, opium poppies).
It occurs to me that one of the major costs of an irregular rebellion (a guerilla war) is probably small arms and ammunition. When we talk about the Viet Cong, or the FARC, or the Afghani Taliban these days, we're not talking about armies with tanks and jets and artillery. Or uniforms. Or even very nice clothes, or food, a lot of times. We're talking about dudes with rifles and rocket propelled grenades, and maybe a mortar or something.
Anyways, if high-value, low weight goods make it more likely that you'll get a civil war because you can buy guns, won't it also be more likely that you'll get a civil war because those guns are cheaper?
If that's true, won't it also be true that you'll get more civil war where you've got more small arms?
So, basically, I'm wondering if civil war is going to be more or less costly in the future, if this dynamic is true. There are a lot of people making guns these days. But the truth is, there are probably going to be fewer small arms on the global arms market in the future than there have been for the last fifty years or so. It's no coincidence that when we think of a guerilla fighter, we think of a guy with an AK rifle. That's because the Russians and Chinese basically relied on the same grand strategy for defense, which was something along the lines of "if we have more guys with guns, we'll win." Basically because they knew that, in terms of population, there aren't too many other places that could compete with them.
And of course, everybody else knew that too. So the US didn't have an enormous standing army like the Russians did. Instead, we made lots of nuclear weapons and other sophisticated technology.
Anyways, a lot of those AK rifles have been banging around out there in the mountains and jungle for a long time now. Some of them, like 65 years. And those rifles are pretty tough, but they're getting old. And a lot of them are wearing out, and don't work very well anymore. As time goes on, that's going to be the case more and more. Because the Chinese and the Russians no longer are keeping up the huge ground armies they once were, and they're not making as many guns as they were, I think.
Or am I wrong? Are there more rather than less guns out there these days? Or is this whole idea silly?
Friday, June 15, 2012
Couple of Random Thoughts
1. Changed where I'm staying in Kampala. It was a little too far away from the action (and by "the action," I mean this one café that I really like). Also, the "hot water" I was paying for was not reliable (By "not reliable", I mean nonexistent. Hell, I felt lucky when I didn't have to bathe with a bucket and a cup.) Prostitues coming to the door didn't help, either. Or the maintenance dudes coming in without warning when I was walking around with no pants on. So yeah. New place. A little bit more expensive. But, there's free wi-fi. Which appears to be working at the moment. And even though I'm now in the heart of the city, it's a lot quieter. Except when the evangelical church in the building is having services.
But at least pentecostals here sing on key. Unlike Guatemala.
And "a little more expensive" is still like $15 a day. I can afford that. I'm an assistant professor.
2. For the last couple of days, I've been drinking this locally manufactured instant coffee. Don't ask my why I'm drinking instant coffee in a place with such excellent local beans. But the stuff doesn't taste too bad for instant, but man, it is weak on the caffeine. Although it almost makes up for it by coming out of a package that looks like homage to Mao and the CCP.
3. A couple of days ago, I tweeted about the security guard I saw with the street sweeper. That is, the fully-automatic 12 gauge shotgun manufactured in the 1980s, called the "Street Sweeper." Most of the security guards and police here are armed with old Russian rifles (AKs and SKSes), with the occasional (really beat up) pump shotgun thrown in for good measure. And every once in a while you see some guy with an old M-16. But today I saw a security guard with a genuine Springfield 1903-A3 bolt action rifle. That was unexpected.
Mostly, the security guards with guns make me nervous. Those Kalashnikovs are fully automatic, and I have no illusions that those guys know how to operate them, let alone handle them on full-auto. In a crowded city with hundreds or maybe thousands of people in the immediate vicinity at any moment, any security guarding that involves a magazine full of 7.62x39 is not going to be good news.
Okay, I know that there are a lot of Ugandans who have been soldiers. In fact, there are a huge number of military contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan that mostly hire East Africans. Still. It's freaking scary. Does Barclays bank really want those guys lighting the whole city up when somebody comes calling with their own assault rifle?
When I was walking into the new lodging today, one security guard was heading off his shift, and handing the 12GA pump over to another guy. Which apparently involves reading the serial number and writing it down in a book. Which, of course, you do while holding the shotgun horizontally, pointed at the little shop at the back of the building, right? At least his finger wasn't on the trigger. I hope he didn't have a round in the chamber. Actually, I kind of hope he didn't have any ammunition at all.
On the amusing side, many of these old AKs and SKSes still have the spike bayonets attached. I will leave it to your imagination how that would work.
4. There's another Westsail 32 in Juneau, up on Craigslist. A little tempting.
But at least pentecostals here sing on key. Unlike Guatemala.
And "a little more expensive" is still like $15 a day. I can afford that. I'm an assistant professor.
2. For the last couple of days, I've been drinking this locally manufactured instant coffee. Don't ask my why I'm drinking instant coffee in a place with such excellent local beans. But the stuff doesn't taste too bad for instant, but man, it is weak on the caffeine. Although it almost makes up for it by coming out of a package that looks like homage to Mao and the CCP.
3. A couple of days ago, I tweeted about the security guard I saw with the street sweeper. That is, the fully-automatic 12 gauge shotgun manufactured in the 1980s, called the "Street Sweeper." Most of the security guards and police here are armed with old Russian rifles (AKs and SKSes), with the occasional (really beat up) pump shotgun thrown in for good measure. And every once in a while you see some guy with an old M-16. But today I saw a security guard with a genuine Springfield 1903-A3 bolt action rifle. That was unexpected.
Mostly, the security guards with guns make me nervous. Those Kalashnikovs are fully automatic, and I have no illusions that those guys know how to operate them, let alone handle them on full-auto. In a crowded city with hundreds or maybe thousands of people in the immediate vicinity at any moment, any security guarding that involves a magazine full of 7.62x39 is not going to be good news.
Okay, I know that there are a lot of Ugandans who have been soldiers. In fact, there are a huge number of military contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan that mostly hire East Africans. Still. It's freaking scary. Does Barclays bank really want those guys lighting the whole city up when somebody comes calling with their own assault rifle?
When I was walking into the new lodging today, one security guard was heading off his shift, and handing the 12GA pump over to another guy. Which apparently involves reading the serial number and writing it down in a book. Which, of course, you do while holding the shotgun horizontally, pointed at the little shop at the back of the building, right? At least his finger wasn't on the trigger. I hope he didn't have a round in the chamber. Actually, I kind of hope he didn't have any ammunition at all.
On the amusing side, many of these old AKs and SKSes still have the spike bayonets attached. I will leave it to your imagination how that would work.
4. There's another Westsail 32 in Juneau, up on Craigslist. A little tempting.
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
A Ugandan Bookstore
Very quickly after I arrived in Uganda, I had gone through my recreational reading. And although I do a lot of reading on my phone these days, you can't exactly haul out the iPhone in your average Ugandan greasy spoon without attracting a lot of attention. As I'm alone most of the time here, and therefore spend a lot of time reading while I wait for my food to arrive, I took a hike down to the "biggest bookstore in Uganda" to pick up some new reading material.
"Aristoc," this bookstore, is probably about the size of the smallest bookstore in Juneau, smells mustier than my folks' basement, and requires a security pat-down to enter that rivals the one you apparently receive when visiting the Dalai Lama. Those people who complain about airline screening procedures in the US have never visited a Ugandan bookstore, supermarket, or tourist café.
One advantage, by the way of being a white guy with an ostentatious moustache in a place like this is that, after the first couple times of checking your bag, they recognize you and just wave you through. So, tip to potential terrorists: two words. Handlebar. Moustache.
Surprisingly, the bookstore is filled with (what else?) titles in Political Science and Economics on development, state-building, and civil war. Sachs, Easterly, Huntington... All the popular junk, plus enormous tomes like "The Solder and the State." That's the first sign that there are too many aid workers in this city. Second sign is that the people in the forestry department at Makerere University refer to my teaching stats as "capacity building," but that's another story.
Had a hard time locating the non-Civil War Africa books (sorry, IR folks. Not my cup of tea) and ultimately picked up V.S. Naipaul's The Masque of Africa, which is sub-titled, Glimpses of African Belief. Naipaul clearly doesn't have a good understanding of the way oil distorts economies and has a weird thing about not wanting to pay cash when there are religious connotations to an activity, but the book is interesting and engaging, if a bit depressing.
Sort of focuses my attention on religion here. Will blog more about that later.
"Aristoc," this bookstore, is probably about the size of the smallest bookstore in Juneau, smells mustier than my folks' basement, and requires a security pat-down to enter that rivals the one you apparently receive when visiting the Dalai Lama. Those people who complain about airline screening procedures in the US have never visited a Ugandan bookstore, supermarket, or tourist café.
One advantage, by the way of being a white guy with an ostentatious moustache in a place like this is that, after the first couple times of checking your bag, they recognize you and just wave you through. So, tip to potential terrorists: two words. Handlebar. Moustache.
Surprisingly, the bookstore is filled with (what else?) titles in Political Science and Economics on development, state-building, and civil war. Sachs, Easterly, Huntington... All the popular junk, plus enormous tomes like "The Solder and the State." That's the first sign that there are too many aid workers in this city. Second sign is that the people in the forestry department at Makerere University refer to my teaching stats as "capacity building," but that's another story.
Had a hard time locating the non-Civil War Africa books (sorry, IR folks. Not my cup of tea) and ultimately picked up V.S. Naipaul's The Masque of Africa, which is sub-titled, Glimpses of African Belief. Naipaul clearly doesn't have a good understanding of the way oil distorts economies and has a weird thing about not wanting to pay cash when there are religious connotations to an activity, but the book is interesting and engaging, if a bit depressing.
Sort of focuses my attention on religion here. Will blog more about that later.
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Some thoughts on Elinor Ostrom
Just heard about the passing of Elinor Ostrom, one of the greatest minds of our day. Only met her once. I am happy to report that at least I wore my good suit that day! I knew she was not well, but it never occurred to me that she wouldn't be around at some point. I always assumed I would bump into her again at some point.
My meeting--I was introduced by my PhD advisor--was brief, but memorable. It involved a fawning group of political scientists (most of them accomplished scholars in their own right, but who reminded me of eager elementary school kids trying to get their teacher's attention), an exploding LCD projector, and a purple sweatsuit. She gave a talk which started out poorly, weighted down by powerpoint slides, that made a sudden and remarkable turn for the better when, in a flash of light and a puff of smoke, the projector bulb popped, forcing her to riff the rest of the talk. Which went from terrible drudgery to deeply entertaining.
When Krister, my advisor, told her what I was working on, she said, "You're doing very important work." I said, "I'm glad, but mostly I'm just having a lot of fun." She smiled and said, "I've been doing this for forty (did she say forty?) years, and that's what's kept me going."
Ostrom is commonly described as the scholar who recognized that common property--what we call common pool resources--which are things which can be used up but which anyone can extract--could be effectively managed by small-scale, informal governance arrangements that do not require the heavy hand of the state, or the creation of property rights. That is her most well recognized insight, but more important than that, perhaps, is that she spawned a large, well-organized research program that has succeeded in disentangling much that was mysterious about why people often fail to conserve their resources.
Ostrom's most famous work is her book, Governing the Commons. But her CV would stretch to the moon and back seven times.
A sad day, but her students, friends, and colleagues continue her work through the institutions and norms she fostered.
My meeting--I was introduced by my PhD advisor--was brief, but memorable. It involved a fawning group of political scientists (most of them accomplished scholars in their own right, but who reminded me of eager elementary school kids trying to get their teacher's attention), an exploding LCD projector, and a purple sweatsuit. She gave a talk which started out poorly, weighted down by powerpoint slides, that made a sudden and remarkable turn for the better when, in a flash of light and a puff of smoke, the projector bulb popped, forcing her to riff the rest of the talk. Which went from terrible drudgery to deeply entertaining.
When Krister, my advisor, told her what I was working on, she said, "You're doing very important work." I said, "I'm glad, but mostly I'm just having a lot of fun." She smiled and said, "I've been doing this for forty (did she say forty?) years, and that's what's kept me going."
Ostrom is commonly described as the scholar who recognized that common property--what we call common pool resources--which are things which can be used up but which anyone can extract--could be effectively managed by small-scale, informal governance arrangements that do not require the heavy hand of the state, or the creation of property rights. That is her most well recognized insight, but more important than that, perhaps, is that she spawned a large, well-organized research program that has succeeded in disentangling much that was mysterious about why people often fail to conserve their resources.
Ostrom's most famous work is her book, Governing the Commons. But her CV would stretch to the moon and back seven times.
A sad day, but her students, friends, and colleagues continue her work through the institutions and norms she fostered.
Friday, June 8, 2012
Education Policy and Dutch Disease
So, as I tell my students, Dutch disease is not carried by windmills and wooden shoes…
In related news, Anchorage is, by at least one (admittedly pretty strange) measure of intelligence, one of the most intelligent cities in the country. See here and also here.
Leaving aside for a moment the weird measure of "braininess," which troubled me less once I read that it correlates well with levels of education and other, similar, more typical measures, this brings me some hope for Alaska.
Although I am no economist, I believe there are strong reasons to believe that Alaska faces what is called "Dutch disease." This is an economic phenomenon by which economies with valuable resources experience a gradual economic decline in their non-resource extraction sectors. The reason is that, as they export oil (could also be gold, diamonds, cocaine… whatever…) all of this money flows into the local economy. Some money flowing in is good, but if you get too much coming in, the inflow of currency tends to drive up prices for other economic inputs, including raw materials and labor. This inflation makes it difficult for non-oil industry firms (for example) to stay in business.
Take, for example, Alaska's tech industry. There is no Alaskan tech industry, you say? Well, of course, that's correct! Why is that? Alaska has much to offer tech firms, including a stunning outdoor environment (smart people love the outdoors), a location which is, paradoxically, very close by air to most Northern cities, and beautiful summer days with endless sunlight.
Also, we have icefog. But forget that for a minute…
Because there is so much cash in the Alaskan economy (because of cash inflows from oil), prices for everything are very high up here. This makes it hard for tech firms located in Alaska to attract talented people (they have to pay them more to keep them, because the cost of living is so high), and when they do attract them, they're so expensive that whatever goods or services the firm is producing get sold for higher than their competitors.
Ultimately, they leave the state, or they go out of business.
This idea is counterintuitive, because it seems like, if you've got oil, your economy should be doing better, not worse. But Dutch disease has been documented in a number of economies around the world, including in the Netherlands, after the Dutch discovered oil in the North Sea in the 1970s.
If I'm right (and I'm no economist, so I certainly could be wrong), what do we do about it?
Well, I think the answer is, "for the moment, not much."
Because we're so far away from so many places, most conventional industries (manufacturing, etc.) are probably not what we can do well. Nor is agriculture, and there probably isn't enough non-oil resources to keep our economy humming once our oil starts to run low. So the options that are left to us are high value-added industries. Banking, technology, engineering, etc. Stuff that requires really smart, educated people. But even these industries aren't going to take off until the oil is gone, and that won't be for a while, probably. Ten years at a minimum, probably much longer.
Fortunately, we've done some smart things with our money--we've got all this money squirreled away in the Alaska Permanent Fund and the Constitutional Budget Reserve, and if we're smart about it, that should help us have a soft landing when our oil gets cut off.
In the meantime, the best thing we can be doing is investing in things that will help us develop and attract a smart, educated workforce once the oil slows down and the symptoms of Dutch Disease start to go away. As an individual with a vested interest in sinking more money into the Alaska higher education system (so take this with a grain of salt, perhaps), we should be spending more on the University system, and we should be seeking to reform our secondary and primary schools so that we're no longer middle of the pack (compared to other US states) when it comes to math, reading, and science testing scores. We want to be at the top. This may mean more spending, but as a former high school and middle school teacher, it doubtless also means introducing stronger incentives for teachers to do a good job. Things like vouchers, merit bonuses, and greater supervision by administrators. And if those things are too controversial, any other evidence-based reforms that have been shown to improve student achievement!
Private Security and the State
One of the interesting things that I notice here in Kampala is the prevalence of agents of the government (like police and the military) playing a role doing the kinds of things you normally think of police doing. Like policing. And hanging around. No donuts here, but there do seem to be a lot of police checking their cell phones all the time.
I'm still sort of getting ahold of all the uniforms here and what uniform is associated with which organization, and my observations are purely impressionistic, but it seems to me that there are many fewer private security officials here in Uganda when compared to Latin America. Especially when compared to middle class and upper class neighborhoods in cities like Guatemala City, Lima, and La Paz. There, every city block, coffee shop, bank, and grocery store seems to have its own private security firms. Here, you see some of that, but you don't see (for example) private security guards driving around in cruisers that are not distinguishable from police cars.
Latin Americanists have often framed the rise of private security as a problem: private security as a response to the State's inability to control crime. And because only the rich can afford private security, it means that the poor are hit harder by crime (which is typically the case anyways, but this is just widening the class gap). Of course, that may be true--although it's also an empirical assertion that I've never seen tested.
However, the absence of private security here makes me wonder if that story is only part of the picture. Maybe Kampala has so few private security firms because the state is unwilling to permit the possible threat to power that private police forces might create. Does the absence of private security reflect the state's tendencies to resist pluralism and democracy?
I'm still sort of getting ahold of all the uniforms here and what uniform is associated with which organization, and my observations are purely impressionistic, but it seems to me that there are many fewer private security officials here in Uganda when compared to Latin America. Especially when compared to middle class and upper class neighborhoods in cities like Guatemala City, Lima, and La Paz. There, every city block, coffee shop, bank, and grocery store seems to have its own private security firms. Here, you see some of that, but you don't see (for example) private security guards driving around in cruisers that are not distinguishable from police cars.
Latin Americanists have often framed the rise of private security as a problem: private security as a response to the State's inability to control crime. And because only the rich can afford private security, it means that the poor are hit harder by crime (which is typically the case anyways, but this is just widening the class gap). Of course, that may be true--although it's also an empirical assertion that I've never seen tested.
However, the absence of private security here makes me wonder if that story is only part of the picture. Maybe Kampala has so few private security firms because the state is unwilling to permit the possible threat to power that private police forces might create. Does the absence of private security reflect the state's tendencies to resist pluralism and democracy?
Thursday, June 7, 2012
Gold!
The BBC is reporting a "gold rush" by independent miners in the Amazonian lowlands, and something similar seems to be going on in Nome, Alaska.
Although Alaskans often believe themselves to be on the global periphery--Alaskans define their identity in part through their remoteness from the rest of the US, and indeed from the rest of the world--Alaska often finds itself in the middle of global economic and political currents. A good example is the current commodity boon that is driving up the prices of things like oil, copper, gold, and other resources. Similar dynamics drove the 1898 gold rush, and other resource-based industries in the state throughout its history. We may be far away from the source of this boom (economic development in places like China, India, South America, and even here in Africa), but globalization brought the effects to Alaska in the 19th century, and they continue to bring them in the 21st.
As an Alaskan conservationist, what to do? On the one hand, I'm no big fan of mining, in Peru, Alaska, or anywhere else. I don't like the environmental costs. Of course, I use metal stuff (and other stuff that's mined). So it's a little inconsistent to be opposed to mining across the board.
Intuitively, I sort of like the idea of wildcat miners--like those in Peru who are seeking precious metals in the lowlands. These guys are typically poor and under-capitalized, and they really could use a hand. I hate to see the Peruvian government cracking down on activities that might make poor people richer.
On the other hand, these "artisanal" miners are a total environmental disaster--a major cause of water contamination and deforestation, and they hurt other local people in those areas where they operate, but they also hurt the rest of us (for example, by preventing rainforest carbon sequestration).
Alaskan mining isn't great (and you won't hear me advocating for Pebble mine any time soon), but I often wonder if it's better to permit or encourage mining in places where governments are more able to regulate environmentally risky practices.
By the same token, I wonder if it's better to have large mining firms operating large, well-capitalized mines (which can remain safer and less environmentally harmful more easily) than having lots of wildcat miners dumping heavy metals into the Amazon in a very dispersed way that's very, very difficult to regulate. Large mining firms are not saints, and they have certainly seen their share of environmental and human disasters, but my suspicion is that poor, unregulated, independent miners are even less interested in public health and environmental conservation than firms like Anaconda, Rio Tinto, and Barrick. And they're more decentralized, harder to regulate and control, and they care less about international concerns for health and conservation.
Although Alaskans often believe themselves to be on the global periphery--Alaskans define their identity in part through their remoteness from the rest of the US, and indeed from the rest of the world--Alaska often finds itself in the middle of global economic and political currents. A good example is the current commodity boon that is driving up the prices of things like oil, copper, gold, and other resources. Similar dynamics drove the 1898 gold rush, and other resource-based industries in the state throughout its history. We may be far away from the source of this boom (economic development in places like China, India, South America, and even here in Africa), but globalization brought the effects to Alaska in the 19th century, and they continue to bring them in the 21st.
As an Alaskan conservationist, what to do? On the one hand, I'm no big fan of mining, in Peru, Alaska, or anywhere else. I don't like the environmental costs. Of course, I use metal stuff (and other stuff that's mined). So it's a little inconsistent to be opposed to mining across the board.
Intuitively, I sort of like the idea of wildcat miners--like those in Peru who are seeking precious metals in the lowlands. These guys are typically poor and under-capitalized, and they really could use a hand. I hate to see the Peruvian government cracking down on activities that might make poor people richer.
On the other hand, these "artisanal" miners are a total environmental disaster--a major cause of water contamination and deforestation, and they hurt other local people in those areas where they operate, but they also hurt the rest of us (for example, by preventing rainforest carbon sequestration).
Alaskan mining isn't great (and you won't hear me advocating for Pebble mine any time soon), but I often wonder if it's better to permit or encourage mining in places where governments are more able to regulate environmentally risky practices.
By the same token, I wonder if it's better to have large mining firms operating large, well-capitalized mines (which can remain safer and less environmentally harmful more easily) than having lots of wildcat miners dumping heavy metals into the Amazon in a very dispersed way that's very, very difficult to regulate. Large mining firms are not saints, and they have certainly seen their share of environmental and human disasters, but my suspicion is that poor, unregulated, independent miners are even less interested in public health and environmental conservation than firms like Anaconda, Rio Tinto, and Barrick. And they're more decentralized, harder to regulate and control, and they care less about international concerns for health and conservation.
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Dress and Modernization
In my office in Colorado, I started keeping a collection of pictures of ugly political scientists. To see who's on the board, you'll have to come to my office in Alaska now, but I will note that it's easy to find pictures of poorly dressed academics.
One of the scholars who I longed to get a picture of to post was Ron Inglehart, who is sort of a famous scholar of economic development and culture (famous in the nerdy world of Poli. Sci., at least). Although Inglehart is not himself particularly ugly, he does have a reputation for having an enormous head. That is not to say that he is arrogant, just that the size of his head is quite large, physically. Fun fact. More importantly, he also has not-particularly-impressive, Amish-like facial hair. Truthfully, I would place my moustache in the top .1% of Political Science facial hair. Not that that's saying much.
Inglehart has made a career out of publishing a series of books and a long list of articles that argue that economic development and values are intrinsically linked--that particular types of social values tend to produce economic growth, but also, economic development (or rather, the stages of economic development) tend to produce different types of economic growth and types of economic activity more generally.
Basically, there are three types of values that favor particular types of economic activity. These are called "traditional" values, "materialist" values, and "post-materialist" values. One way of thinking about traditional values is that they are inherently risk-averse and conservative. People who hold these types of values tend to resist change and innovation, because they fear the risks that come with it.
When societies have traditional values in abundance, they tend to be poor and stay poor (so goes Inglehart's argument). Once they start to develop values that encourage risk-taking and the accumulation of wealth, that's when they start to develop. Inglehart would argue that the Latin American countries have these types of values--materialist values--in abundance these days, and so do India and China, and that is one of the reasons why the economies of these places are growing so fast.
Once countries develop to a certain point, they start to experience diminishing returns from economic development and wealth, and at that point, people start to develop post-materialist values, where they are worried more about quality of life, and less about income. Maybe Boulder, Colorado, and Denmark are places where post-materialist values are particularly common.
Anyways, it strikes me as relevant that places that I would consider likely settings for a lot of materialist values--places like Lima, La Paz, Santiago, and now Kampala, are places where people really make an effort to dress up. It's hard to believe how many guys wear jackets and ties here! While other places that are more developed--Europe, the US, Canada--are often very fashionable, but the fashion is much less formal. For example, in the US, cell phone salesmen wear polo shirts, while they often wear three-piece suits in Latin America, and there are hardly any t-shirts visible on the street here. Is dress an outward sign of materialism? I don't mean this in a pejorative way--Lord only knows that they need some material things here!
I'm not aware of any economists that take Inglehart's account of economic development seriously, so all this needs to be taken with a grain of salt, but perhaps it is a good sign for Uganda's economic development that people dress so nicely? And perhaps there is a way to forecast economic growth based on ties and jackets? Conversely, perhaps Alaska is headed for the economic trash heap, as we are evidently the US' largest fashion emergency.
All of that said, I miss my Xtra Tufs.
One of the scholars who I longed to get a picture of to post was Ron Inglehart, who is sort of a famous scholar of economic development and culture (famous in the nerdy world of Poli. Sci., at least). Although Inglehart is not himself particularly ugly, he does have a reputation for having an enormous head. That is not to say that he is arrogant, just that the size of his head is quite large, physically. Fun fact. More importantly, he also has not-particularly-impressive, Amish-like facial hair. Truthfully, I would place my moustache in the top .1% of Political Science facial hair. Not that that's saying much.
Inglehart has made a career out of publishing a series of books and a long list of articles that argue that economic development and values are intrinsically linked--that particular types of social values tend to produce economic growth, but also, economic development (or rather, the stages of economic development) tend to produce different types of economic growth and types of economic activity more generally.
Basically, there are three types of values that favor particular types of economic activity. These are called "traditional" values, "materialist" values, and "post-materialist" values. One way of thinking about traditional values is that they are inherently risk-averse and conservative. People who hold these types of values tend to resist change and innovation, because they fear the risks that come with it.
When societies have traditional values in abundance, they tend to be poor and stay poor (so goes Inglehart's argument). Once they start to develop values that encourage risk-taking and the accumulation of wealth, that's when they start to develop. Inglehart would argue that the Latin American countries have these types of values--materialist values--in abundance these days, and so do India and China, and that is one of the reasons why the economies of these places are growing so fast.
Once countries develop to a certain point, they start to experience diminishing returns from economic development and wealth, and at that point, people start to develop post-materialist values, where they are worried more about quality of life, and less about income. Maybe Boulder, Colorado, and Denmark are places where post-materialist values are particularly common.
Anyways, it strikes me as relevant that places that I would consider likely settings for a lot of materialist values--places like Lima, La Paz, Santiago, and now Kampala, are places where people really make an effort to dress up. It's hard to believe how many guys wear jackets and ties here! While other places that are more developed--Europe, the US, Canada--are often very fashionable, but the fashion is much less formal. For example, in the US, cell phone salesmen wear polo shirts, while they often wear three-piece suits in Latin America, and there are hardly any t-shirts visible on the street here. Is dress an outward sign of materialism? I don't mean this in a pejorative way--Lord only knows that they need some material things here!
I'm not aware of any economists that take Inglehart's account of economic development seriously, so all this needs to be taken with a grain of salt, but perhaps it is a good sign for Uganda's economic development that people dress so nicely? And perhaps there is a way to forecast economic growth based on ties and jackets? Conversely, perhaps Alaska is headed for the economic trash heap, as we are evidently the US' largest fashion emergency.
All of that said, I miss my Xtra Tufs.
Monday, June 4, 2012
Traffic and Coordination Games
When I teach my students about collective action--cooperation--I teach about two basic types of problem, one which is easy and which is hard. For you political scientists out there, you know these real well:
The hard one is the so-called "prisoners' dilemma," in which two individuals both have an incentive to cheat one another rather than cooperating, because they'll both be better off, no matter what the other person does. I won't belabor this, because there are a million places you can look up "prisoners' dilemma" if you're not familiar with it, including, I'm sure, wikipedia.
But the other kind of problem is a simpler coordination problem sometimes called "the battle of the sexes," in which cooperation is always better than cheating, because cooperation always brings about better results. The story:
A man and a woman go on a date. She wants to see Must Love Dogs, and he wants to see Grosse Pointe Blank. OK, bad example, because Grosse Pointe Blank is a romantic comedy about professional killers, and it has Dan Aykroyd. So everybody wins. But still.
If they split up, date's off, which sucks. And even though the guy gets more pleasure out of seeing professional killers and the gal gets more pleasure out of seeing the chick flick, they can relatively easily decide on one of the other, because they'd both rather go on a date together than be losers and go to separate movies.
Obviously, this is a stylized explanation of a (common) problem. But another example that I often use of the same kind of problem is having people in a country decide what side of the road to drive on. If they all pick the same side, they're good. If they pick different sides, they have accidents, and maybe die. So the Brits and their colonies (like Uganda) drive on the left, and everybody drives on the right. And it works great.
Except you don't have to spend too long in places like Uganda to realize that it isn't such a simple coordination game, because in Uganda, the side of the road they really drive on is the wherever-they-damn-please side. Everybody would be better off if everybody could stick to their lane and drive on the correct (left) side of the road, but people drive on the left, right, the median, the sidewalk, whatever. The only place they don't drive is through the enormous potholes that are deep enough to swallow 18-wheelers hauling doubles.
I don't know if there's a point to this. Just that the example I usually use to illustrate this dynamic is wrong. Which sort of suggests that even simple acts of cooperation and collective action are often pretty difficult, contrary to our expectations.
The hard one is the so-called "prisoners' dilemma," in which two individuals both have an incentive to cheat one another rather than cooperating, because they'll both be better off, no matter what the other person does. I won't belabor this, because there are a million places you can look up "prisoners' dilemma" if you're not familiar with it, including, I'm sure, wikipedia.
But the other kind of problem is a simpler coordination problem sometimes called "the battle of the sexes," in which cooperation is always better than cheating, because cooperation always brings about better results. The story:
A man and a woman go on a date. She wants to see Must Love Dogs, and he wants to see Grosse Pointe Blank. OK, bad example, because Grosse Pointe Blank is a romantic comedy about professional killers, and it has Dan Aykroyd. So everybody wins. But still.
If they split up, date's off, which sucks. And even though the guy gets more pleasure out of seeing professional killers and the gal gets more pleasure out of seeing the chick flick, they can relatively easily decide on one of the other, because they'd both rather go on a date together than be losers and go to separate movies.
Obviously, this is a stylized explanation of a (common) problem. But another example that I often use of the same kind of problem is having people in a country decide what side of the road to drive on. If they all pick the same side, they're good. If they pick different sides, they have accidents, and maybe die. So the Brits and their colonies (like Uganda) drive on the left, and everybody drives on the right. And it works great.
Except you don't have to spend too long in places like Uganda to realize that it isn't such a simple coordination game, because in Uganda, the side of the road they really drive on is the wherever-they-damn-please side. Everybody would be better off if everybody could stick to their lane and drive on the correct (left) side of the road, but people drive on the left, right, the median, the sidewalk, whatever. The only place they don't drive is through the enormous potholes that are deep enough to swallow 18-wheelers hauling doubles.
I don't know if there's a point to this. Just that the example I usually use to illustrate this dynamic is wrong. Which sort of suggests that even simple acts of cooperation and collective action are often pretty difficult, contrary to our expectations.
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