Day: March 14, 2010

Charter Cities by Paul Romer: well meant neo-colonialism

Charter Cities, modelled after Hong Kong or Shanghai, can foster development in third world countries, suggests eminent scientist Paul Romer. Basically, Neo-colonialism: a piece of land in a third world country is given to a first world country to create a charter city to establish the rule of law. That city then has the best of both worlds:

  1. a secure legal system for investors, and
  2. access to third world cheap labor.

There will be no democracy, voting is with feet: if you like the system you can go there. If you don’t like it, don’t go there.

Sources:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/article7009691.ece
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/29/can-charter-cities-change-the-world-a-qa-with-paul-romer/
http://www.chartercities.org/concept
http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/soziales/0,1518,668449,00.html
Spiegel article comments (very creative and intelligent)

Human-Stupidity comments” on Charter Cities

  1. Very creative idea countering conventional human stupidity.
    • countering the anti-colonialism dogma: poor nations have proven already that they cannot get efficient administration. So an efficient administration bound by British, Canadian, German law is being provided
    • countering the “democracy dogma”: inhabitans of the charter cites do not vote, they can vote with their feet only to come or to leave. Democracy in poor third world nations has shown to be rife with populism and voting for corrupt politicians.
    • Billions in developing aid that is funnelled into corrupt nations could be applied more safely in
  2. There still are stupidities in Romer’s suggestion. Devil’s Advocate thinks Romer is optimistic in several points or does not dare to face certain facts.
    • colonial powers in the past were world powers without qualms to use their might.
      • Most third world nations would not tolerate a successful rich foreign city on their soil for 99 years. Either a populist president would invade it, or use threats to get concessions. Or
      • it could not be defended against marauding gangs Somali Style, or
      • invasion by the poorest of the poor with no skills, slum style.
      • Romer’s suggestion to use toothless nations like Canada or Germany might backfire. Cuba is more likely to respect Guantanamo in US hands then governed by Canada. Of course, even a world power might not  be willing to militarily defend a charter city that does not bring power,status or exploitation profits like original colonies
    • Modern democracies’ laws might not be a viable example. Modern democracies are rife with welfare freeloaders, criminals exploiting human rights, unskilled immigration overload etc. Devil’s Advocate enjoyed the suggestion of a Spiegel reader to allow China to set up a Charter City in Germany.
    • I barely dare to mention racial differences because now I lose 95% of my readers who subscribe to the unproven but firmly defended credo that “all races are equal”, or worse, “races don’t exist”.  All successful examples like Hong Kong were in Asia, with highly intelligent and socially well behaved Asians. Respectable research (discredited by political correctness) on racial differences shows that Asians are most intelligent, closely follwed by whites, and, unfortunately blacks trailing. So a model like this might have serious difficulties in Africa, especially if these intrinsic problems of genetic propensity to lower intelligence, less respect for order and more violence are not taken into consideration. This was pointed out by Nobel Prize winner James Watson who got shunned for telling scientific truth. I believe that the Paul Romer’s model can be successfully applied to Africa, but chances for success are greater when the model is based on scientific truth and not on well meant fiction.

Human Stupidity wishes success to Paul Romer’s Charter Cities. A refreshing idea against conventional stupidity.

Racial differences in intelligence: James Watson, Nobel Prize winning geneticist persecuted for scientific truth

One of the world’s most eminent scientists was embroiled in an extraordinary row last night [2007] after he claimed that black people were less intelligent than white people and the idea that “equal powers of reason” were shared across racial groups was a delusion.

James Watson, a Nobel Prize winner for his part in the unraveling of DNA who now runs one of America’s leading scientific research institutions, drew widespread condemnation for comments he made ahead of his arrival in Britain today for a speaking tour at venues including the Science Museum in London. [ …]

Anti-racism campaigners called for Dr Watson’s remarks to be looked at in the context of racial hatred laws. A spokesman for the 1990 Trust, a black human rights group, said: “It is astonishing that a man of such distinction should make comments that seem to perpetuate racism in this way. It amounts to fuelling bigotry and we would like it to be looked at for grounds of legal complaint.”

Source of this and following quotes:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/fury-at-dna-pioneers-theory-africans-are-less-intelligent-than-westerners-394898.html

Right: the law decides whether the truth can be said by an eminent scientist. Human Stupidity, Dogmatism and political correctness in its pure form. Like the pope who would prohibit Galileo to show proof that the earth is round and moves.

But Galileo was counterintuitive: we all see that the earth does not move. But there is a wealth of intuitive anecdotal evidence in favor of difference between the races

  • medieval sailors reported primitive tribes in Africa, but highly developed civilizations in Asia. That was right before white colonialism, which could not be blamed for the differences
  • African Nations, even experimental nations like Liberia, for some reason never function and prosper. So Dr. Watson’s sincere concern is justified.
  • In the US, states, cities and districts with high percentage of blacks tend to have more crime and poverty.
  • Second and third generation kids of war fugitives from Korea or Vietnam in the US do not need any affirmative action. On the contrary, Asians are taking over the nation’s top Universities. So why do 10th generation Blacks need affirmative action, and even that seems not to work?

Dr Watson told The Sunday Times that he was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really”. He said there was a natural desire that all human beings should be equal but “people who have to deal with black employees find this not true”.
His views are also reflected in a book published next week, in which he writes: “There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so.”
The furore echoes the controversy created in the 1990s by The Bell Curve, a book co-authored by the American political scientist Charles Murray, which suggested differences in IQ were genetic and discussed the implications of a racial divide in intelligence. The work was heavily criticised across the world, in particular by leading scientists who described it as a work of “scientific racism”. […]

Especially by leading sociologists who invent such gems like “race does not exist” or “race is only skin deep”. Any child can disprove the first statement, and any forensic expert can tell you the race of a person by a single bone. An expert on race and intelligence  J.P. Rushton’s comments on Watson on NPR

It is important to state that Dr. Watson is not a racist. There is no glee: “hey, we have proven white supremacy”.  No, he is sorry for the results, but true scientists are interested in reporting the truth, not what people want to hear. And he is truly concerned about finding the right policy for Africa. Obviously the last century of Africa policy has not yielded good results.

Keith Vaz, the Labour chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, said: “It is sad to see a scientist of such achievement making such baseless, unscientific and extremely offensive comments. I am sure the scientific community will roundly reject what appear to be Dr Watson’s personal prejudices.

Actually, the scientific proof for the “Bell Curve” is overwhelming. And with the overwheliming anecdotal evidence cited above there should better be some good scientific proof for Keith Vaz unfounded statements.