There is no equating PPP/C’s policies with neoliberalism
Kindly permit me to respond to Dr. Gary Girdhari’s “Dr. Persaud seems to be acting as a spokesman for someone or an entity” (Stabroek News, 4/11, 2022). I will focus more on the substantive positions but ignore rhetorical performances such as “Is Dr. Persaud dancing to the tune of Jagdeo’s (and the PPP) orchestra?” It is fair that writers ground complex arguments in the work of noted authorities. In making his claims Dr. Girdhari invokes Joseph Stiglitz, Thomas Piketty, Hayek, Amartya Sen, and Jeffrey Sachs. Without any measure of either insult or compunction, I am afraid these big names were either not read in any depth, or simply misused. Let us begin with Sachs.
Girdhari is unaware that Sachs was a world-renowned champion of neoliberalism before his “bleeding heart” (a la Angelina Jolie and Bono) style saviour capitalism.
Michael Busch captured the early Sachs thus – “the young economist fashioned his unique brand of shock therapy — a free market fundamentalism of privatization, deregulation, and government subsidyslashing for commodities such as oil…” And further, “despite massive policy failures in countries that followed his advice, Sachs has successfully avoided accepting any responsibility for suboptimal outcomes of his theory.” Busch poignantly surmised “No crisis would be complete without Jeffrey Sachs two cents” (Busch, 22 January 2012). Girdhari points to Piketty but says absolutely nothing about his work or relevance to my own arguments. For Piketty, the problem with capitalism is that the long-term rate of return to capital will continue to outstrip the rate of growth and, therefore, by implication the return to labour.
Embedded wealth thus imperils democracy because of the logic of self-reproducing structural inequality. Note that Piketty does not confine his argument to FDI which is what I focused on in my piece. It is fashionable to refer to von Hayek when critiquing free-market capitalism and its neoliberal forms. In fact, Hayek is known less for his economics and more for The Road to Serfdom. Yet, in that book, Hayek warms about monopoly capital as much as he does about organized labour. As noted by Hans-Herman Hoppe, Hayek wanted “the assurance of a certain minimum income for everyone”; and government should “distribute its expenditure over time in such a manner that it will step in when private investment flags” (Hoppe, 4/10/2011). Hayek resonates with the right-wing because of his association with Milton Freidman at the University of Chicago, and for his founding of the Mont Pelerin Society which was the ‘central committee’ of Reaganism-Thatcherism.
As for Stiglitz, he sounds more like Bharrat Jagdeo, Irfaan Ali, or Ashni Singh. Here is Stiglitz – “Spending money on needed investments in infrastructure, education, [and] technology will yield double dividends. It will increase incomes today while laying the foundations for future employment and economic growth. Investments in energy efficiency will pay triple dividends yielding environmental benefits in addition to the short- and longrun economic benefits” (Stiglitz, 10/13/2008). The only big-name left is Amartya Sen. Sen and Mahbub ul Haq founded the Human Security approach with its quintessential articulation in the 1994 Human Development Report. I can say categorically that Girdhari’s belief that I “favor Big Oil,” and by implication that I do not know about things such as the HDI, is anemic. The policies of the PPP/C cannot be called neoliberal by anyone who knows anything about neoliberalism.
As a matter of policy the PPP supports the following – free house lots and free building materials to some; graduated mortgage rates’ policy, subsidized homes for “young professionals”; annual cash subsidies to students; top up payments to pensioners; awarding of contracts through flexible criteria for small or new contractors, titles to squatters; upcoming free university education; subsidies to farmers and fisherfolks; cash payments to sugar workers previously laid off by APNUAFC neoliberal policy; free medical care (but with significant private services); top-up subsidies in health care such as for dialysis patients. The list goes on and on, but the point is, there is nothing resembling neoliberalism here. Finally, concerning oil, Guyana now has the most innovative and robust ‘Local Content’ legislation in the world. Neoliberals will not like that.