Jour de l’Armistice
Taking part this Nicholas Kristof column (which I like), Daniel Davies of Crooked Timber makes one point which I will concede:
It’s not fair to portray all opponents of neoliberalism as not caring about the Third World; neither is it fair to portray them all as being ignorant either of conditions in Third World economies of of economic theory.
Absolutely true. But free-traders and free-marketers in general get portrayed that way all the time, and it’s not fair to them either.
Thus, I propose a truce on these terms:
We hereby assume, barring overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that those with whom we disagree about economic issues
1. care about the poor,
2. are aware of and sympathetic to their plight,
3. are aware of economic theory, and
4. have very little in common with the people who ran Germany from 1933 to 1945.
Acceptance of and adherence to these four premises will promote constructive economic debate. Can it be done?