1814 



THE OBSTACLE OP POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC NATIONALISM ^^ 



Virulent political nationalism is perhaps the most obtrusive of the 

 obstacles. It is paradoxical that many of the nations which have 

 recently achieved political independence, but are economically and 

 technologically dependent on the rest of the world, are aggressively 

 asserting their sovereignty. Along with the emergence of ministates 

 with their collective tendency to create imbalances in the United 

 Nations and in other international forums or relationships, the trend 

 toward nationalism is in seeming conflict with the broader and longer- 

 range imperatives of interdependence. 



Sometimes accompanying this political nationalism, or an ingredient 

 of it, is a tendency toward a limited form of economic nationalism. 



One kind of economic nationalism follows Western economic and 

 industrial models but seeks to bend them to further advantage 

 through such devices as expropriation and nationalization of extractive 

 industries or formation of cartels to control the supply and price of 

 energy and mineral resources. Another rejects Western ideas of 

 progress and reflects distrust of Western industrial society and its 

 patterns of technology, development, and growth in general. *^^ A 

 point of view associated with the latter position was expressed by 

 Muhbub ul Haq, Director of Policy Planning and Program Review 

 for the World Bank; he maintained — 



. . . that the Third World must return to considering the needs of its land 

 and peoples first. . . . He said that the real question was not whether the Third 

 World had a future, but whether the industrialized Western world had a future. 

 In the next 25 years, he sees the economic, financial and cultural balance of 

 power shifting to the Third World.^® 



Economic nationalism of either kind may sometimes serve the 

 immediate interests of the country which adopts it. It runs counter, 

 however, to the purposes associated with proposals for worldwide 

 economic cooperation advanced by Secretar}^ of State Henry Kissinger 

 in his message to the United Nations General Assembly of September 1, 

 1975. 



U.S. PROPOSALS FOR GLOBAL ECONOMIC COOPERATION 



In the U.N. address that Ambassador Daniel P. Moynihan delivered 

 for him,^^* Mr. Kissinger said: "It is not enough to insure the minimal 

 economic security of the developing countries. Development is a 

 process of growth, of acceleration, of greater productivity, higher 

 living standards, and social change. This is a process requiring the 

 infusion of capital, technology, and managerial skills on a massive 

 scale." 



«> Professor Edgar S. Robinson of American University, who reviewed this essay in draft, comments in 

 a note to the associate project director (November 17, 1975): " 'Quickie nationalism,' as manifested in the 

 LDCs in the wake of imperialism's withdrawals, is rather doubtfully to be lumped together with 

 the lengthy, gradual evolution of nationalism in the West. The distinctive, diversified assertions of inde- 

 pendence characterizing many LDCs, frequently in spite of internal heterogeneity, have properties pecuUar 

 to them and not necessarily associated with such classic Western attributes as the consolidation of a middle 

 class [andl a matrix of urbanization. . . . Thus, 'nationalism' seems to be a catch-all caption somewhat 

 wanly endowed to convey the elements, flavor, and nuances of behavior in lands remote from its origins. . . . 

 I don't know what can be done to alleviate this conceptual problem . . . other than to stipulate its existence 

 as an 'alert' to the reader. We seem to be stuck with an emotionally taut, empiricallj slack, word." 



"2 It would probably be more accurate to say "seeks to reject." The course of outright rejection is, as a 

 practical matter, hardly open to any nation today. Nations can, however, resist economic penetration and 

 slow it down somewhat. This is a point closely related to the factor of cultural and psychological resistance 

 to interdependence, discussed below. 



"3 Thecla R. Fabian. "Does the Third World Have a Future?" (Report on a work session of the Second 

 General Assembly of the World Future Society, held in Washington, D.C., June 2-5, 1975). TA Update 

 (Newsletter of the International Society for Technology Assessment), vol. II no. 2, summer 1975. 



<M Henry A. Kissinger. "Global Consensus and Economic Development." Department of State, Bureau 

 of Public Aflairs, Office of Media Services. September 1, 1975. 



