Naomi Klein - The Shock Doctrine

This is a scary book. Not because it's so thick, but because of the indepth analysis of how democracy can be put aside and a policy beneficial to only very few can be enforced. But it is also a book that gives hope, because it shows that in the end democracy wins. If only the people are strong enough to care. This book gives rice to a zillion thoughts and I could go on writing about this matter forever, but let me try making it short.

The book is about one man's ideas, Milton Friedman, who's thoughts for a long time were considered too extreme. In short his idea is called neo-liberalism, the belief that a totally free market would be the perfect market, and has been implemented with the help of his disciples, the Chicago Boys. It tells us how his thoughts are way too extreme for any democracy, so they were first tried in South-American autocracies (after the elected power had been eliminated). It tells us to cut taxes drastically and sell as much as possible, as fast as possible, of the country's resources to foreign interests. It worked very well, in making a small minority very rich, foreign (US) companies extremely rich and the common man left poor. The policy has also done wonders in China.

As the tactics were refined, and the beneficiaries got rich, new victims had to be found. It was noted that no democratic countries would swallow the bitter pill (no, not even the USA), so some kind of force was needed. Dictators worked well, as seen. War was efficient too. As natural disasters. Whenever a disaster struck, all that was needed was to turn up, offer money and let the victim, that was in chock, sign a contract that in the end made him poorer. The South-East Asian crisis was a result of the countries adopting to this policy (the countries that followed it the least were best off). It was also applied in Russia when the country needed money and marked the end of its move in a democratic direction. ANC in South Africa were fooled to swallow the pill as well and has led to that the black are now even poorer as they used to be. In short: It's bullshit.

The bad thing is that these thoughts have been fully adopted by the IMF, the World Bank and USAID and they have been able to force this dirt onto people not really wanting it. Democracy has been put aside. And only a very few have gained.

This might not be all that bad, after all. A democratically elected government could make it all right again. Or can they? In the case of eg South Africa this is clearly not the case. If they try to build more houses for the poor, the currency falls and the country gets problems. It is a slave under the market.

As if this wasn't enough, the disasters and wars in combination with the fact that the US government has outsourced most of its government (!) has lead to a situation where the market gains on war and terror. Earlier the stock markets used to fall when a war was reported. Now they rice. Because it means more business. A disaster economy has emerged and it feeds on death and terror. My own thought about this is that this might be a reason why nothing much is done about the climate threat. After all, imagine all the disaster that will be the result of a collapsed climate! It might be a bit dark, and I doubt very few are actually thinking that way, but it is how this system works. It's cheaper not to do anything, and besides, if something would happen there are shitloads of money to be made!

Note how the countries volontarily applying Friedman's thoughts and the institutions promoting them are not democratic. And in fact, a market is not democratic either. They used to be controlled by a democratic rule (governments) but is now getting so powerful it might become a threat to democracy.

I must note that I first read a book by Johan Norberg and Boris Benulic, "Allt om Naomi Kleins nakenchock" ("All about Naomi Klein's Nude Chock"), where they want to protect the idea of free markets. Norberg loves the market, and since I can fully see and understand its usefulness, I have read some of his books and can agree with him on many points. But he is like a car salesman, just simply a bit too much in his blind faith. So the book is crap, he totally misses the point.

Read this if you know Swedish and want to read more about these books.