Doha Dead

The Doha round of trade talks designed to create a global pact to liberalize trade for the benefit of developing countries, born in the Qatari capital in 2001, has died. Its death knell was a disagreement between the United States on one hand, and China and India on the other.

The debate was over "special safeguard mechanisms," a method by which developing countries would be able to impose tariffs on imports if those imports have a heavily detrimental effect on the developing country's economy or security.

The United States held the view that China and India were asking for too low a level of imports necessary to trigger the mechanism. China and India held the view that the United States was asking for too large an amount of imports to be exported to their countries before the mechanism could be triggered. They could not agree on the level, and so Doha--which was already on shaky ground--basically collapsed.

LINKS

"Trade talks failure ends Doha dreams" "Can trade marathon reach finish?" European Union Commission World Trade Organization Voice of America article on the topic

This outcome, the failure to conclude a worldwide trade agreement is bad. The developed world was prepared to reduce much of their subsidies to farmers, thus making things a little more fair to farmers in poor countries who would have difficulty competing with developed-world farmers even without those farmers being handed money with which to produce more farming products. They should have cut all unnecessary subsidies altogether, but at least they were willing to do that.

Developing countries, particularly China and India, should have done more to permit an opening of their markets to services from the developed world. In China's case, they should have opened up to the manufacturing and industrial sectors, too.

While globalization has definitely not been perfect, and many people have lost their jobs to overseas workers willing to do the same work for less pay, globalization has also been responsible for the developing world, notably China, being able to drag hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, and bring their countries closer to 'developed' status. For the developed world, it has brought cheap and affordable products that even the poor could buy, and thus increased the standard of living in advanced countries.

Africa, the least developed inhabited continent, will still have a huge market (the developing and developed worlds) for the continent's raw commodities. However, Doha held the hope that African farmers would be able to sell more to other countries, and therefore be given more incentive to develop and advance their agriculture, which would then cause African farmers to produce enough food for their own countries, foreigners, provide more jobs to unemployed Africans, and help Africa develop. Starvation and underdevelopment and even war could have been averted in Africa if Africans could have taken advantage of the opportunities offered by the Doha pact. Additionally, Doha could have also helped Africa cultivate its industrial, manufacturing, and service sectors.

The United States has not won by the death of Doha. Neither has India or China.

They, and the world, have all lost.

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Found this article interesting? Check out:
History: The Roadmap to the Future.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Africa.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Asia.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Europe.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Latin America.

Or:
The Science Fiction Channel + Technorium.
The Vegetarian Diaries + Biologeel.

Review of "How not to do an American accent"

This blog post is a review about the BBC article linked to here. It seems that there is some demand in the world to be able to create and use an American accent. How interesting and flattering--though it should not be flattering. Somewhat ironically, the expert in the article helps people, such as Americans, form a British accent, not an American one. Reverse engineering?

Anyway, apparently, compared to Britons, Americans speak with wide mouths and smiles, with the tongue high in the mouth. Guessing that translates into Britons, compared to Americans, speaking with narrow and slack mouths, and the article suggests that Britons' standard tongue placement is on the aveolar ridge behind the teeth.

Many Americans would want to be able to use a British accent. The BBC should make an article for them.

While it's interesting that some people would want to pick up an American accent, it is not all that surprising, given the impact of American films, television, and the power the United States wields in the world. Still, from an American point of view, an American accent is just plain ol' normal, while the 'typical' British accent has a connotation of being cultured and sophisticated. For the Britons out there angry that the 'bad guys' in a lot of American movies have British accents, it is--at least partially--because Americans tend to associate British accents with acculturation. If you'll notice, oftentimes those bad guys are quite upper crust and part of high society.

You'll also notice that sophisticated 'good guys' also frequently have a British accent--or an attempt at one. Meanwhile, the 'ordinary' characters, usually including the the protagonist, tend to have American accents because: a) the film is American, and b) the American accent is taken to be the accent of the 'common people.'

Take Star Wars, for instance. The Imperial officials tend to have British accents, but so does Obi-Wan Kenobi, Threepio, Crix Madine, and Mon Mothma. Meanwhile, Han Solo and Luke Skywalker have American accents. Leia does a 180. In A New Hope, the accent is British. In the following film, the accent turns American. A similar thing occurs with Amidala. When stately, they have a British accent. When just ordinary folk, they have an American accent.

Figure this is just another manifestation of the mutual love fest many Americans and Britons have with each others' cultures.

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Found this article interesting? Check out:
History: The Roadmap to the Future.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Africa.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Asia.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Europe.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Latin America.

Or:
The Science Fiction Channel + Technorium.
The Vegetarian Diaries + Biologeel.

Mysterious Indian Tribe in Utah

The Amerindians were settled in the area around AD500.

Above is an interesting video from Scientific American Frontiers (via hulu.com) about a recently discovered region of the American state of Utah with loads of archaeological sites of an Amerindian tribe the mysteriously almost vanished by AD1300, over 200 years before the arrival of Europeans. The Amerindians vanished, but their granaries and cliff art remain, and are intriguingly situated in inaccessible locations, particularly odd for the granaries, used to store maize.

As the episode is one of the first filmings of the site for ordinary people, the video is especially interesting, as is seeing some of what this tribe of Amerindians accomplished before disappearing from the archaeological record.

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Found this article interesting? Check out:
History: The Roadmap to the Future.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Africa.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Asia.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Europe.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Latin America.

Or:
The Science Fiction Channel + Technorium.
The Vegetarian Diaries + Biologeel.

Rule Americana: How American Culture Is Assimilating the World.

In light of tomorrow's anniversary of Independence Day, it seems fitting to write about how American culture, or Americana, has had an enormous impact on the world. Not by giving people something to entertain themselves or to merely view as a curiosity. As something which has changed their worldview, values, and standards, hopefully for the good of the world.

Toy Story exhibits American culture.

Firstly, the realm of entertainment. American music has swept across the planet, and rock, jazz, rap, and hip-hop can be heard in practically any country on Earth. American literature, although more subdued, also has a strong representation in the world's bookstores.

Arguably, however, it is the visual media of American television and movies which has had the greatest impact disseminating American values to peoples flung far and wide. For almost every movie that is crass, vulgar, crude, or just pathetically pathetic, there is a movie or television show which is a jewel of crystallized and concentrated Americana. And whether by design or accident, these shows and films are often targeted at the young.

Of course there is that junk load of low quality movies that appear in theaters around Christmas, but for the large part, American children's movies, are actually extraordinarily rich. Foremost among the companies responsible for this is Disney, which is still the foundation of the children's movie business. However, it is joined by others such as Dreamworks, Paramount, and Fox, too.

One of the most common features of many of these films and shows is formation of a family or community from a diverse spread of beings. This is extraordinarily common, and reflects the American view that a single, unified nation--a real race--can be formed out of people not bound by blood or ancestry, but by people with a common goal, although they might be otherwise quite diverse. Shrek has an ogre, an ogre-human hybrid that is the child of a human and a frog, and a talking donkey, with an extended gang including: a dragon, dragon-donkey babies, pigs, a wolf, a gingerbread cookie, a wooden puppet, and blind mice. Ice Age groups together a mammoth, a sloth, a saber-toothed tiger, and a human infant. Toy Story has a community of toys containing a cowboy, a spaceman, a slinky dog, an etch-a-sketch, and a potato head. Star Wars has a backwater peasant who can use the Force, a princess-senator-rebel (who happens to be the twin of the peasant), a drug smuggler, his ex-slave, former hero, Wookiee partner, an uptight etiquette droid, and a plucky and salty mechanic droid.

Along with lumping together these disparate parts which make the whole greater than the sum of their parts, the individuals in all of these films each bring to their 'nation' their own strengths and talents--or not. In Ice Age, Sid (the sloth) brings no discernible talent to the group, but is still part of the group and not ostracized. In Firefly, River Tam starts out as a mentally disabled invalid, yet the other members of the crew grow attached to her. So while individuals with a unique or special talent are an advantage to the nation, they aren't the only people worth being part of the nation.

Further enshrined in American film is the concept of "All for one and one for all," especially the "all for one" part--as opposed to China, where the emphasis is on the "one for all" portion. In the sequel to Toy Story, a rescue mission is sent out to retrieve Woody after he is stolen--while trying to rescue Wheezy. The crew of Firefly protects River from the authorities. In Star Wars, Leia, Lando, Chewbacca, Luke, and the droids set out to free Han from Jabba's Palace, where he is frozen in carbonite. Saving Private Ryan is an adult film which explores this concept.

However, it is not only American art which infuses the increasingly homogenized global civilization with American values. Also influencing the world is the United States' politics.

Take this current Presidential election contest, for instance. If Barack Obama wins, and his Presidency is deemed a success, the ramifications for the world would be huge--although unfortunately Obama has foolish views on abortion, Iraq, and free trade. Nations where one 'racial' group is in charge while others are lower on the social ladder would be faced with the fact that the most powerful--in terms of economy, military, and culture--nation on Earth had chosen a member of their 'lower caste' to lead them, and he was a success. Ordinary people in those countries would have to wonder whether or not the 'lower castes' in their own countries, whether they be ainu, Roma, aborigine, 'black', or Amerindian, etc. should be so casually dismissed as failures. People from those oppressed groups would be given hope that a member of their group could ascend the rungs of power in their countries.

A 'black' American President could have enormous repercussions worldwide.

And not only those 'racially' heterogeneous countries would be affected. Even homogeneous societies such as Korea would be impacted.

They would see a majority group that they view as being higher in the racial strata, 'whites', voluntarily trusting and choosing a member of a group they view as being lower in the racial strata, 'blacks', to represent them to the world. That would throw their racist preconceptions into flux. If 'white' people have confidence in a 'black' man as the leader of the free world, then should Asians, Middle Easterners, etc. look at 'blacks' less derogatorily?

But among the greatest of the cultural endowments the United States has already bestowed on the world is the one which is considered to have burst into flame--even if it wasn't the first spark--on the fourth day of July in 1776. The thirteen British colonies which on that day declared themselves to be independent states from Britain, were the first colonies in modern history to declare their independence, fight for their independence, and win their independence. The United States set the model for the independence of Latin America and the Caribbean, which freed those states from European rule. The United States continued to be looked up to by subjugated colonies as a source of hope in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, even as the United States partook in empire itself. Its representative political standards influenced the development of Western Europe--and were aspirations for Soviet-ruled Eastern Europe in the Cold War.

Long live American values.

On July 4, 1776, the people of the thirteen new states comprising the United States of America chose to free themselves from the rule of a British king and decide their own futures. The people of New Spain were Spanish subjects. The people of Brazil were Portugeuse subjects. The people of British North America (Canada) were British subjects.

The people of the United States, the first sovereign states in the Americas, were no longer British, nor were they subjects to an earthly king. They could not be Spanish subjects, Portuguese subjects, British subjects, French subjects, Dutch subjects, etc. They had severed their ties to Europe, and now they were tied only to the land of this continent. They were not European subjects any more.

They were American citizens. And they changed the world.

Rule Americana. Long live the United States of America.

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Found this article interesting? Check out:
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Africa.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Asia.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Europe.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Latin America.

Or:
The Science Fiction Channel + Technorium.
The Vegetarian Diaries.

Tag this post with:
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Found this article interesting? Check out:
History: The Roadmap to the Future.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Africa.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Asia.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Europe.
History: The Roadmap to the Future--Latin America.

Or:
The Science Fiction Channel + Technorium.
The Vegetarian Diaries + Biologeel.