Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism

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All this is, of course, not to deny that a certain degree of de-politicization of the resource allocation process may be necessary. For one thing, unless the resource allocation process is at least, to a degree, accepted as ‘objective’ by the members of the society, the political legitimacy of the economic system itself may be threatened. Moreover, high costs would be incurred in search and bargaining activities if every allocative decision is regarded as potentially contestable, as was the case in the ex-communist countries. However, this is not the same as arguing, as the neo-liberals do, that no market under any circumstance should be subject to political modifications, because, in the final analysis, there is no market that can be really free from politics.

Chapter 9

1

The quote is from Japan Times, 18 August 1915.

2

S. Gulick (1903), Evolution of the Japanese (Fleming H. Revell, New York), p. 117.

3

Gulick (1903), p. 82.

4

D. Etounga-Manguelle (2000), ‘Does Africa Need a Cultural Adjustment Program?’ in L. Harrison & S. Huntington (eds.), Culture Matters – How Values Shape Human Progress (Basic Books, New York), p. 69.

5

B. Webb (1984), The Diary of Beatrice Webb: The Power to Alter Things, vol. 3, edited by N. MacKenzie and J. MacKenzie (Virago/LSE, London), p. 160.

6

Webb (1984), p. 166.

7

S. Webb & B. Webb (1978), The Letters of Sidney and Beatrice Webb, edited by N.MacKenzie and J.MacKenzie (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge), p. 375.

8

Webb & Webb (1978), p. 375. When Webb visited Korea, it had been just annexed by Japan in 1910.

9

T. Hodgskin (1820), Travels in the North of Germany: describing the present state of the social and political institutions, the agriculture, manufactures, commerce, education, arts and manners in that country, particularly in the kingdom of Hannover, vol, I (Archbald, Edinburgh), p.50, n. 2.

10

For example, Hodgskin (1820) has a section entitled ‘the causes of German indolence’ in p.59.

11

M. Shelly (1843), Rambles in Germany and Italy, vol. 1 (Edward Monkton, London), p. 276.

12

D. Landes (1998), The Wealth and Poverty of Nations (Abacus, London), p. 281.

13

John Russell (1828), A Tour in Germany, vol. 1 (Archibald Constable &Co, Edinburgh), p. 394.

14

John Buckingham (1841), Belgium, the Rhine, Switzerland and Holland: The Autumnal Tour, vol. I (Peter Jackson, London), p. 290.

15

S. Whitman (1898), Teuton Studies (Chapman, London), p. 39, no. 20, quoting John McPherson.

16

Etounga-Manguelle (2000), p. 75.

17

Sir Arthur Brooke Faulkner (1833), Visit to Germany and the Low Countries, vol. 2 (Richard Bentley, London), p. 57.

18

Faulkner (1833), p. 155.