Do you think you can be a socialist and

[Swedes]

1. Pay for your child to be independently educated?
2. Buy a house in right catchment for the right school?
3. Feign religion to get your child into a faith school?
4. Object to a lottery system for school places with urban areas (ignoring all convenient environmental issues)?
5. Vote Tory? (because some people seem particularly confused)

Also- is it inappropriate to say here that I am rapidly becoming a policywonk fan?

Policywonk, most commentators on the developing world understand that the industrial revolutions in those countries are likely to be no less painful than it was here in the UK.

The question is whether the country post IR is better or worse for it, taken in the round.

I suppose the question might be that if you ask the worker in a GAP factory in China somewhere, whether they would rather work in the factory and be paid a pittance or go back to their subsistance farm what would they choose?

It is far from an easy question to answer but it is patronising in the extreme to try and make policy decisions in the developed world about what is best for those countries. A high degree of self-determination is important.

FWIW though, any corruption and exploitation by the developed world countries pales into insignificance when compared to the harm that corruption at the local level does. But that is part and parcel of the political systems that those coutries operate under and the decision to change those systems should be taken as locally as possible.

And I think in Victorian England we have a fairly good illustration of relatively unbridled capitalism, (albeit tempered by acts of altruism much more achievable in a low taxation society), with all its poverty and degradation kept in-country so to speak.

Spockster - No I am not bitter about my schooling. I know I could have done academically better, but to what end? For the majority of jobs an education is an education is an education.

I am hoping my child gets into the good primary school round here, but I am not going to worry if he goes to one of the others. Same with secondary.

Free market is a myth anyway, what with protectionist policies and price-fixing etc. etc.

I've lived in a much more capitalist society than the UK and it could be sickening. The endless need to BUY more no matter that someone was suffering at the other end. The little enclaves where those that could afford it lived their little existence and didn't even have to look at those suffering in their society cos they could just drive by it all. After all, if the poor just worked harder they too could "have it all", except it's just a myth. And healthcare, well as long as they have their private rooms and don't have to wait for any kind of treatment then it must be fine, except other people are paying with their health and lives.

bossykate - nooooo not a trot. Don't know if there's a name for what I am really (other than 'loud-mouthed'). Somewhere on the red-green spectrum, holding George Monbiot's coat.

Duchesse - ooh thank you!

Come on soapbox, you are being disingenuous surely. It's not possible to compare the IR in Britain with what is happening in developing countries today. The most obvious difference is that Britain, when industrialising, was nto required to 'compete in an open market' with countries with exponentially greater economic might.

'it is patronising in the extreme to try and make policy decisions in the developed world about what is best for those countries. A high degree of self-determination is important.' - do you know, in some ways I agree with you. Which is why it is such a (murderous) shame that the international financial institutions make it their business to direct policy to governments throughout the global South, and see fit to hobble industrial and social development in developing countries at every turn so that rich people in the west can get richer.

'any corruption and exploitation by the developed world countries pales into insignificance when compared to the harm that corruption at the local level does'

This is what people in the West tell themselves when they see television pictures of people starving to death. It is bullshit.

"Poverty of this kind and on this scale simply did not exist before capitalism was allowed to run riot. "

PW, you know I am your biggest fan, but that statement is not true, or not measurably true anyhow.

I would definitely do 1 and 2 and my conscience is clear. education is everything it opens doors, access to professional qualifications, Graduate/professional salaries are higher than non graduates. so qualms no sleep lost

Definitely not 3, or 4 or 5

Surprisingly

No
No
No
No

and

No

Most people in poor countries abroad hda a pretty bad life long before capitalism came anywhere near them, Western capitalism anyway. In a sense capitalism is within everyone as it's the natural order so I suppose rural china or those various tribes in Africa who have always taken slaves and traded them you might say already had their own brand of capitalism.

But if you can buy a better education than if your child went to the local state school and you can afford to do that but you choose not to because you quite fancy a nicer car or better shoes isn't that morally wrong?

Well yes I think so, but maybe some people just value education so much more than others.

I value education. I just value it for everyone.

You will see that I am consistent in wanting a first-class education for everyone. Unfortunately I am not empowered to cause it to be provided.

We need to be careful not to repeat mistakes like were made in Communist china in the cultural revolution - if your parents were educated you're sent to the fields and not given an education kind of thing to right the wrongs of the differences between people. That was very unfair and didn't work. It's like Mugabe giving land belonging to others to those who don't know how to farm it and thus the nation starves. If you're going to intervene in markets you have to do it well.

Labour's plan that if your parents went to university you disclose that on your UCAS form and it's held against you when you apply for university is exactly the same kind of thing. Perhaps there remain a few vestiges of socialism in the current administration.

PW - the process is alarmingly similar. First of all there is drift to the urban conurbations, then a need for those recently arrived to find accomodation (often having left their families behind) this accomodation will often be provided by employers and will be pretty crap. The pay will be relatively low. As time goes on then the balance of power shifts - the farmers start to demand more money for their crops as there is now a florishing urban market which needs to be supplied and gradually the shift to the city stops. The endless supply of labour tightens and wages are forced up - better working conditions are demanded in the process.

It is exactly the same process as was followed in the 'mills' of the IR in the UK.

Local corruption is a fact of life and to deny it is to totally misunderstand one of the major issues in the developing world. Local politics plays a huge part in working in the developing world as any aid relief agency (whislt watching those very same people that you talk about die before their eyes for the want of a sack of grain sitting in a warehouse with armed guards at the door) will tell you

It also depends on what you mean by "better".

I think my children get a "better" education at out local primary school than they would at any of the many private schools that surround us, even if they are not as advanced academically as they would be at some of them (I use the word some advisedly - in my experience, some private schools use the fact that they don't do SATS as a convenient way to avoid being "measured") There are far more lessons to be learned at school than the 3Rs.

I'm not denying any of that soapbox, but I note that you don't address the major issue: developing countries are being asked to compete in an open market with vastly stronger economies - economies, moreover, that have a stranglehold on the institutions that set the parameters of trade. This one fact makes all the other similarities meaningless IMO.

I'm not arguing that there is no corruption in developing countries, or that it does not affect the citizens of those countries. I am disagreeing with your contention that 'corruption and exploitation by the developed world countries pales into insignificance when compared to the harm that corruption at the local level does'.

I would disagree with that assertion too - it is a convenient way for western people to abnegate responsibility.

QC - I value education more than anything, apart from food and cuddles. I love learning myself, and the DC seem to have inherited that. My father also loved, and loves learning, but HIS father would not let him go to grammar school when he passed because the cost of the uniform would hav used up money that could have been better spent on beer and betting.
I went to a grammar school where I thrived, as did girls of ALL parts of our city, rich and poor, but which became a failing sink comp halfway through my schooling due to the 'scocialist principles' of that Labour w&&*^r who vowed to 'get rid of all the grammar schools.'
With my own DC I would be happy to send them to a atate school where learning is valued - and they have been to a state primary which I unreservedly recomend - but the only state SECONDARY school they could get into has the lowest score on value-added in the country. The headmistress openly stated recently that their 'intake is average but their results are below average'. The behaviour, as witnessed by local people is appallin - they even have a specific person there in the morning to deal with complaints from residents and show 'mug-shots' for them to identify the perps (vandalism mostly.)
So, as my parents made sacrifices for me to go to university, I am happy to pay for my DC to go to schools where learning is valued, and make no apology for it.

PW - surprisingly many of them compete very effectively in an open market because they have vastly lower wage costs (for now at least). You only have to look at the recent successes of countries like China and Indonesia and indeed India to see that. Manufacturing will probably continue to drift to developing countries for the next 10 years or so, at which point there will be a levelling out of the cheaper wage costs.

The fact is though that there the developing world is hugely dependent on the developed world for trade and yes, that puts them at a disadvantage in negotiating position. However, do not assume it is by any means a push over. One only has to try and do business with China, for example, to see how incredibly switched on they are and how they drive a very hard bargain indeed.

The banks are in any case, mostly global enterprises these days and are actually encouraged quite strongly to work with the developing world who need credit is huge amounts, to invest in infrastructure to get factories etc off the ground. On the flip side, banks write off billions and billions of debts from the developing world at the moment. I'm not saying they are acting altruistically at all, but one can;t help feeling that they are working on very low margins in the present environment, in the hope of making much more money in the future once the economies are more solid.

The point about corruption is that in countries where it is most prevalent, almost nothing can be done to better the lives of those who live there. As such, it is probably the biggest barrier to development in those countries. The problem with multi-nationals and banking is somewhat different, it is that development might happen too quickly and in ways which does not support the long term success of the countries in question. Although, there has been a major shift away from this type of behaviour in recent years, not least because most have switched to an ethos of employing local senior management only, which usually means that the needs of the local populations are not overlooked entirely. That always supposes that you don't end up with the local bent businessman running the show!

I value education. I have a PhD. So does my DH and he recently got a distinction in his MBA. My SIL is at Harvard and also has a PhD. Two of DTS godparents have PhDs and the other two have MSc. We all went to comps bar one who went to grammar and we all value education. We are all in well paid professional jobs.

To imply that people value other things more than education because they choose not to go private is insulting, absurd and says more about the narrow minded half-wits spouting such clap-trap than those to whom it is directed.

Soapbox - I notice that most of your examples are drawn from China, with a couple of quick references to India (a country in which there is poverty of the most abject kind). Of course, what you can't do is make any comforting arguments about the position in Africa.

I'm not talking about commercial banks, I'm talking about the WTO and associated international financial institutions. And as to corruption, again, I am not arguing that it is not a problem. I am referring back to your original argument that the position in developing countries is not the 'fault' of capitalism. It absolutely is.

Spokette - you can't have it both ways!

You can't say that all of the parents leaving private schools and moving into state schools, will 'lift up' state schools because they are more demanding and have higher standards, then say that it is unfair to say that private school parents value education more than state parents do.

If you feel that private parents value it no less or more than state school parents then the arguments for taking away the choice of educating privately fall away.

[Sorry about the state parents and private parents descriptors but I'm sure you know what I mean!]

Ah. I see I touched a nerve. Good.

See people from the outside only see what they want to see, which is rich people trying to put their children ahead of others, unfairly. Sometimes this view is simultaneously accompanied by moving house to get into a good catchment area.

On the inside, all I see is hard-working (ridiculously hard-working) people trying to ensure that their children get a decent education in a country where it should be freely available but isn't always.