Confessions of an EHM

I just got finished reading one of the most interesting books I’ve ever read. It’s called Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and presents a very different look upon the world. I highly recommend it for anybody interested in globalization, world politics, corporations, economics, etc. Now...time for a little background:
When I came to Honduras two years ago I started to get a little different twist on all the news articles that I was reading here in Honduras. I started to form a truly unique perspective on world leaders hailed by the US press or shamed by them. Latin America has a recent upswing of leftist leaders throughout the region including Chávez in Venezuela, Morales in Bolivia, Correa in Ecuador, Noriega in Nicaragua, Zelaya in Honduras, Funes in El Salvador, etc. I started to ask myself over the past two years, is it possible that in the US we are missing something? Why is there a sudden swing to the left here and is it a bad thing? All these figures are certainly painted in a bad light in the US. True, Chávez might be slightly crazy, and Morales has made some bizarre moves. None-the-less, there must be something to these leaders who keep getting elected (maybe it’s just corruption and I’m outta line here). Then I read in a Spanish paper several months back that Correa decided to stop paying back the national debt. About half the national income was put towards paying off past debts incurred through the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, etc. and he decided that they were mostly illegal and refused to pay them back. Correa was a man educated in Belgium and the US, fluent in Spanish, English, French, and Quechua (indigenous language in Ecuador), he has his PHD in economics from University of Illinois! This man is not crazy or dumb or even out of touch with reality a little bit. So why does he make this claim? Well, recent articles I read said that the country was forced into default on their loans in 2000 and large corporations and oil companies quickly swooped in buying bonds and taking control of the country. So Correa said that since they were forced into default the move was illegal and he’s paying back 35 cents on the dollar for all bonds bought after they went default. What is going on?!
So this is my state of mind when my friend Ty (who has been here 2 years with me) tells me that I should read Confessions of an EHM as it ties into a lot of Latin America, especially Ecuador. I was itching to read the book and as soon as he gave it to me I began to eat it up. The author, John Perkins, talks about his work as an EHM. In short he would go into a country and proclaim that with the economic growth that they will experience on a certain project they will be able to pay back the debt incurred from the loan to build it. They would help with the expectation that they would use US corporations to build the projects. His statistics would all be inflated. For example, instead of a consistent 6-8 percent increase in electrical use he might predict a 17-20 percent increase per year because the economy is prime for a boom! Of course this wasn’t true, but the country would buy into it and take the loan, use US corporations to complete the project, and then be in debt to the World Bank, IMF, etc. Since the growth would not be what was predicted (surprise) the country would not be able to pay back it’s loans. Thus the country would be in debt still, but would now owe more than just money to the corporations...they’d owe loyalty to the US. Granted, this is 250 pages summarized in a paragraph, so it’s ok if you don’t follow all this.
I got to thinking about Ecuador in all this. Is it possible that Correa is not so off his rocker? Is it possible that the government was taken advantage of and used in order for monetary value but also for a personal interest? A simple look at statistics can help take a look at this. From 1970 to 2000 Ecuador experienced some dramatic shifts. The “official” poverty level grew from 50 to 70 percent. The under or unemployed grew from 15 to 70 percent. Public debt increased from $240 million to $16 billion. National resources devoted to the poorest declined from 20 percent to 6 percent. So think about it, is Ecuador in a better position today than it was 30 years ago? Oh sure, the country has some vast oil reserves and is becoming an exporter of oil, but at what cost? Most of the oil is located under the Amazon and is only harvested at the expense of local tribes who are either exploited or ousted.
So as I sit here in my last two weeks in Honduras I ask myself what this all means. Is what I just read really true? Is this really happening? I can’t fully grasp my mind around all that is running through my head. There is so much corruption in the world and I don’t exclude the US in any of this. I wish that there were some way to wave a magical wand and just make socialism work across the globe. Instill in all of us a greater sense of altruism and selflessness that would lead to the elimination of poverty and hunger. For now I just sit here thinking....where do we even begin?