In their recently published paper, “The Curley Effect: The Economics of Shaping the Electorate” (Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Vol. 21(1), April 2005, pp. 1-19), Harvard economists Glaeser and Shleifer argue that democratic leaders can mix incendiary rhetoric and the redistributive powers of the state to encourage political opponents to emigrate, thereby shaping the electorate to their favor and allowing them to remain in office despite economic stagnation. To support their theoretical work, Glaeser and Shleifer review the political careers of Boston’s James Curley, Detroit’s Coleman Young, and Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe.While both Curley and Young are thankfully (shall we say) out-of-office, Mugabe continues to work overtime to prove the Curley Effect. Today’s Times of London reports on Mugabe’s “Operation Murambatsvina”–a government plan to force even more of Zimbabwe’s productive citizens to leave the country.
An excerpt:
EVERY morning Father Michael looks out of the window of his Harare parish house and sees an ever larger crowd of homeless families outside. “I feel helpless,” said the Jesuit priest, who was too terrified to give his real name.
“I keep telling them my little homilies, that the violent will not win, they will have to answer for what they have done, but I see a city ringed by fire.
“People who worked to look after their families — carpenters, metalworkers, street vendors and caterers — have been turned into beggars by their own government. This is a crime against humanity and all we can do is give them black plastic sheeting.”
[...]
Churches have become the only refuge for people who have lost everything. But priests have now been warned not to help by the government of President Robert Mugabe.
Harare has been turned into a refugee city with marauding bands of families pursued through the smoking rubble by police who move on anyone they find sleeping outside or still retaining a few possessions.
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For a local demonstration of the Curley Effect, wait till the military draft is reimposed. During the Viet Nam fiasco I was brainwashed by the domino theory. This time I would encourage (my) kids to go to Canada.
There will be no military draft, and the only congress people who have proposed one have been full-blown socialists, i.e. schumer. Capitalism is basically the only thing saving the world from complete genocide; money talks…
By the way, what an awesome way to demonstrate you’ll fight for something you believe in. “When things get tough, everybody run away!” I think you’ve been brainwashed by the weak and cowardice.
Andy fighting for something is futile. Far better
to disappear and live your life far away from trouble.This is a million times easier than changing the minds of fanatics.
“There will be no military draft”. And this is because there are no socialists in Washington? Advocates of peace and free markets are alive and thriving in Washington?
And would subscribing to the draft demonstrate one’s willingness to fight for what one believes? I think i would rather fight for someone’s right to freely choose not to fight and die for a lie, than to fight and die for a lie myself.
Bush laughs at the poor schmuck he sends to Iraq to die or be maimed for nothing. Does he think twice about it? Now there’s a funny thought. Does he care that there are no WMDs in Iraq? He thinks it’s a very funny joke. Literally. It is very funny to him that it was discovered he was lying about WMDs in Iraq. In the mean time, people are still sent to Iraq and come home all battered and damaged or dead. This is criminal. Only a politician can get away with sort of crime. And people talk of cowardice. It’s a question of applying some common sense to the facts.
Paul Edwards,
I’d be curious about your thoughts on WWII, or the Civil War? Does Afganistan fall into the same category as Iraq? Was Korea the same as Viet Nam? How about what happened in Somolia, Bosnia, Kosovo, or Rwanda? How about the recent tsunami relief efforts in the Indian Ocean? Where do you draw the line or are all of them unacceptable incursions?
Keith
Good questions Keith. I didn’t follow Afghanistan as closely as Iraq, but it doesn’t strike me as much different. Innocent people’s lives destroyed at the hands of the USG, pretending it has improved the lives of the pepole there. I didn’t study Korea although I assume that the USG had the same right to be killing Koreans as it had to kill Vietnamese. I don’t know that much about the other places you mention, other than I’m pretty sure the story is the same.
As to where i would personally draw the line, i would say let private individuals and organizations who wish to help others do so with their own resources and without the freedom to committ crimes and go unpunnished. This would ensure that the people doing the helping would be sincere, and those committing crimes would be dealt with properly.
My point is that not everybody, and I would bet far less than a majority of people in the world do not hold your sense of individual rights and respect. There are a lot of people in the world that believe might makes right and are more than happy to practice that belief on people that are less powerful. At some point we individualists need to recognize that fact and be willing to establish their own might to secure our own rights. I also think that once we’ve established our own might, its in our own interest to help the other individualists of the world. Its a periless path, no doubt, but the alternative is to accept the Hitlers, Stalins, bin Ladens, Robespierres, and others, ad infinitum, that oppress the individuals of the world, until they are ready to oppress us. No, we can’t police the world, but to use that as an excuse to nothing ever is simply inviting our own oppression. When is it acceptable to fight back? Only when attacked directly as an individual? Can you help defend your neighbor? What about somebody who lives down the street? Or across town? At what distance is it none of my business? I know its complicated and there are no perfect answers, but burying your head in the sand is not the answer either.
Keith
I appreciate where you’re coming from Keith. In my mind, i guess i’d say that our model of the world gets messed up when we assume our government has our sentiments when they execute their policies. For instance, how many innocent men women and children would you personally be willing to intentionally kill, in order to pursue and possibly capture say bin Laden? Judging by the way you write, i would say none. That is my number as well. Zero. What is the government’s number? That number is as yet unknown. Let’s just say it’s a big number. The problem is when we want good to be done, and we accept the premise that government will do it, instead we get atrocities committed in our names which we then need to rationalize.
Within the last couple of years it came to my attention that when it came to committing WWII war crimes, such as bombing and burning civilian communities, the Allies outperformed the enemy by a dramatic margin. Well, the pattern marches on. On the pretext of some 9/11 relation, how many Iraqis have died? The USG doesn’t keep count, but other estimates reach 100,000. Studying the details of Washington’s dirty foreign policy is both very depressing and leaves one with a lasting impression: these guys are a pack of lying murderers. It’s not a fun process of discovery.
Curley’s methods were not wasteful, my friends. If it’s waste your looking for try the BIG DIG aka: THE BIG PIG
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