Revista Mensual y Gratuita
Nº101, enero 2012
Development
Protecting ourselves from the lashes of the global crisis
Southern Hemisphere countries have not generated the contemporary crisis, nor are they dealing with its most destructive effects but we must protect ourselves from its lashes that may affect the development trajectory. Several governments seek to adopt measures that reinforce the lines of defense without sacrificing the course towards an organic growth with social and productive inclusion. The challenges are not minor and every policy is in fact perfectible; it becomes necessary to protect those flanks that might be most exposed as soon as possible and with all the effectiveness the situation calls for.
Adjustment or transformation
In the current global circumstances, ‘adjustment’ and ‘transformation’ represent very different socioeconomic options. The ‘adjustment’ implemented by the European countries is focused on restoring the pre-crisis dynamic by reducing their humongous fiscal deficit and high indebtedness level. On their part, the rest of the countries face profound change processes; some copying the way affluent countries work, others seeking to transform the dynamic responsible for the contemporary economic concentration. Known road that one of “adjustment”; diverse trajectories always under construction transformation’s are.
Facing the crisis without cutting down on employment
Facing a crisis, it is a big mistake to use employment as an adjustment variable for ethical, economical, social and political reasons. However, in a huge segment of companies and public organizations of almost all the world, the first, not the last, answer has been to cut down on employment. Other more effective and less destructive ways of facing a crisis and adjusting the course to a more sustainable development are needed.
It is inequality, although not only that
Inequality, direct result of the accelerated process of economic concentration, lies in the basis of the crisis that currently strikes affluent countries. Its impact transcends the ethic, the unfair and projects itself to be a major factor of systemic instability. It is true, inequality and concentration are gripping our future, although they are not the only aspects that are necessary to transform.
Is the world burning?
Let us say this clearly: the world is burning but not only because of the great global crisis that is hitting wealthy countries and threatens to spread to the rest of the planet, but also because of other crises that arose from the same causal matrix, although longer- standing, associated to rampant inequality; the painful lagging behind of communities deprived of their own voices, of healthcare, of food, of shelter, of safety; the existence of hundreds of millions of victims of injustice, greed, and fundamentalism; the grievance inflicted on their own privacy and significance.
Neither trickle down, nor spillover
Water covers nearly three-quarters of the earth’s surface and the poor represent a similar percentage of the world’s population (To set the record straight, I do not use the term “poor” just to refer to indigent people, but to all those who are not able to reach the minimum “human development” level as defined by the United Nations). Maybe this is the ultimate cause of a rather striking trend: nearly always, discourses about poverty resort to water-related metaphors. From the elementary realization that poverty is an acute form of the lack of liquidity, to the very fact that more than a century ago it was an English shipbuilder that became a perceptive social critic, Charles Booth, the first to talk about a “poverty line”, extrapolating this concept from the floating line of the vessels he built.
Eye-opener: systemic instability grows with concentration
The vertiginous global process of concentration of assets and income, and the resulting growth in social inequality, is one of the main factors that account for systemic instability affecting global safety and sustainable development of nations. The situations become untenable and finally explode when the measures adopted to deal with the problems caused by concentration, instead of solving them, make the problems worse. It hurts to realize the uselessness of the efforts and the transformations that could have been accomplished with such funds.
Growing and Distributing at the Same Time
Some maintain that sustained growth is the best strategy to ensure general well-being and reduce inequity and poverty. This insistently repeated claim hides half-truths and other critical issues: the point is that sometimes it is true, and many others, it isn’t, depending on the type of growth pursued.
People Franchises
How can the low-income population take advantage of sustainable economic activities? How can the excluded and unemployed join promising activities? How can the involvement of socially and environmentally responsible players be secured at the bottom of the social pyramid? Inclusive ventures offer some answers to these questions, and their implementation is achieved through several business engineering tools among which people franchises stand out.
Europe: More Unequal, Recessive Adjustment?
The economic troubles in several European countries are addressed, once again, with formulas that seek to “calm down” financial markets. They are aimed at putting public accounts back in shape and reducing over-borrowing. The result, however, are unequal, recessive adjustments. Is this the only possible "exit", or are there other choices?
What's new
Ways to Donate
12/08/2010
Adjusting the course: Getting out of the crisis towards sustainable development
Opinion Sur Collection
18/04/2010
New E-books
Introducing three new additions to our collection
23/09/2009
Getting out of the Crisis towards a sustainable development
STORM: The ways of the crisis and the ways out of it
International Crisis: Adjusting the Course and Improving the Systemic Functioning
