By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
The determining ideology in the “First World” defends the free movement of goods and capital but emphatically excludes the possibility of the labor force enjoying that same freedom. It condemns all governmental action in poor countries to protect their products from the effects of an unequal confrontation in the external market. However, it rejects the possibility of the international displacement of labor according to the same law of supply and demand that they claim for their own goods, capital and other factors of production.
In conditions of absolute freedom of movement of goods in the world market, the winner is the one who produces at the lowest cost.This can only be achieved with higher productivity, which is always the one to which the large corporations of developed countries have access through more efficient technology born of their financial superiority. This leaves the poor countries with cheap labor as their only resource to compete.
A genuinely liberal economic globalization, which upholds the principle of competitiveness and fixes in the market the possibilities of all parties, should include the freedom of movement of all factors of production. This would include the labor force, but this possibility is not even mentioned in neoliberal discourse.
In Latin America, the fundamental receiving pole of commercial exchanges, the United States, closes its borders to spontaneous immigration promoted by the laws of the market. It projects programs aimed at attracting immigrants with specific qualifications or political refugees (real or supposed) that suit its political purposes of domination, ignoring the obvious fact that the economy of the United States objectively needs labor, especially unskilled labor.
Such inconsistency reflects the will to avoid conflicts derived from competition between immigrants and their own workers, without forgetting the manifestations of xenophobia and discrimination against minorities that are manifested in that society, due to multiple historical factors.
From the point of view of the U.S. business which exploits immigrant labor, although their interests in the legal prohibition of immigrant income are affected, the continued income of undocumented workers – with depressed rights – solves their needs. The big losers are the undocumented, persecuted, mistreated and super-exploited immigrants. Emigration to the United States becomes the dominant fact of the regional migratory panorama.
But since the last decades of the 20th century, the Latin American and Caribbean migratory process, which from the time of the conquest until then had left a positive balance, has become negative. That is to say, more emigrants than immigrants.
In the 1980s, with the rise of neoliberalism promoted by Ronald Reagan’s government in the United States, Latin America, like the entire Third World, entered a new period. It is characterized by the effects of an unpayable foreign debt that hindered its development, aggravated by the rise of corruption, embezzlement and the discrediting of traditional politicians.
The collapse of the Soviet Union and the socialist system in Eastern Europe deprived the world’s underdeveloped countries of an alternative of economic and technical assistance, as well as relatively safe and advantageous markets.
The rich countries took advantage of the conjuncture to impose a neoliberal orientation on the objective trend towards globalization that technological advances determine for the economy of nations. They then reduced development assistance, forced the weakening of state apparatuses, the de-statification of natural resources and the privatization of state enterprises, preferably through their acquisition by U.S. corporations.
Thus, Latin America, which for centuries was a recipient of migration, became a region of emigrant outflow. Tens of millions of Latin Americans have been forced to emigrate in the last twenty years. All this has led to a sharp increase in inequalities and the concentration of wealth in a small number of people and entities in Third World countries.
England, when its fleet was the largest and most efficient in the world, demanded freedom of the seas without protection measures that would raise the competitiveness of the fleets of other countries. Today, the highly developed countries demand freedom of movement fpr their goods and capital, without barriers that protect the production of countries with less economic development. But they do not include that freedom for the workforce.
September 16, 2019. This article may be reproduced by quoting the newspaper POR ESTO as the source.
A CubaNews translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann. Zimbabwean President Receives Cuban Vice President Inés María Chapman Havana, Sep 15 (ACN) Emmerson Mnangagwa, President of Zimbabwe received in Harare the Cuban Vice President Inés María Chapman, who led her country’s delegation to the funeral of Robert Mugabe, founding father of that African nation. During the meeting, the Zimbabwean president highlighted the solid relations between his country and Cuba, reports a Prensa Latina dispatch. Mugabe was honored this Saturday with an official ceremony at the National Stadium in Harare, attended by heads of state and government of the African continent and personalities from other regions of the world. Mnangagwa thanked Cuba for sending a high-level representation to pay tribute to the Zimbabwean independence leader and recalled that thousands of professionals from this southern African nation were trained on the Caribbean island. He stressed that the historical leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, and Mugabe were like brothers, and ratified the friendship between Zimbabwe and Cuba, and his intention to continue consolidating it. Inés María Chapman, Vice-President of the Councils of State and Ministers of Cuba, expressed her condolences on the death of the former president of Zimbabwe, on behalf of Army General Raúl Castro, first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba, and President Miguel Díaz Canel Bermúdez. According to sources, the Cuban leader stressed Cuba’s willingness to continue developing and expanding bilateral relations, with emphasis on cooperation. In her words at the ceremony paying tribute to Mugabe, Chapman recalled that he was a dear friend of Cuba and Fidel Castro, and both shared countless moments ‘in the common struggle for the independence of our peoples and for the freedom and sovereignty of the African continent’. The vice-president stressed that her people had always been on Zimbabwe’s side in its struggle to achieve its definitive freedom from colonialism, which had a logical continuity after independence had been achieved ‘in the cooperation that we modestly offer to the construction of this nation’. In this regard, she revealed that about two thousand young Zimbabweans graduated in the most diverse specialties in Cuban universities. Hundreds of professionals from the island have passed through Zimbabwe to offer their knowledge, experience and thus contribute our grain of sand to the construction and development of this beautiful country. She also thanked that the Zimbabwean people and dear friend Mugabe were always on Cuba’s side “in our historic struggle against the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the Government of the United States against our country and in all the battles that the Cuban people have had to fight in the last 60 years”. The Cuban leader stated that Cubans will always remember “with affection and gratitude the presence of Mugabe in the funeral honors of Commander in Chief Fidel Castro Ruz, when all our people and friends of Cuba bid him farewell”. Chapman arrived in Harare on Friday as head of a delegation, also composed of Marcos Rodriguez, director general of Political Planning at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the ambassador of the Caribbean nation in this country, Carmelina Ramirez. The visitor was received at the capital’s airport by Zimbabwe’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Sibusiso Moyo.
Recibe Presidente de Zimbabwe a vicepresidenta cubana Inés María Chapman La Habana, 15 sep (ACN) Emmerson Mnangagwa, Presidente de Zimbabwe recibió en Harare a la vicepresidenta cubana Inés María Chapman, quien encabezó la delegación de su país a los funerales de Robert Mugabe, padre fundador de esa nación africana. Mugabe fue honrado este sábado con una ceremonia oficial en el Estadio Nacional de Harare, con asistencia de jefes de Estado y Gobierno del continente africano y personalidades de otras regiones del mundo. Mnangagwa agradeció a Cuba el envío de una representación de alto nivel para rendir tributo al líder de la independencia zimbabwense y recordó que en la isla caribeña se formaron miles de profesionales de esta nación de África Austral. Subrayó que el líder histórico de la Revolución cubana, Fidel Castro, y Mugabe eran como hermanos, y ratificó la amistad entre Zimbabwe y Cuba, y su intención de continuar consolidándola. Por su parte, la vicepresidenta de los consejos de Estado y de Ministros de Cuba Inés María Chapman transmitió las condolencias por el fallecimiento del expresidente de Zimbabwe del general de Ejército Raúl Castro, primer secretario del Partido Comunista de Cuba, y del presidente Miguel Díaz Canel Bermúdez. Según las fuentes, la dirigente cubana destacó la voluntad de Cuba de continuar desarrollando y ampliando las relaciones bilaterales, con énfasis en la cooperación. En sus palabras en la ceremonia de homenaje a Mugabe, Chapman recordó que fue un apreciado amigo de Cuba y de Fidel Castro, y ambos compartieron innumerables momentos ‘en la lucha común por la independencia de nuestros pueblos y por la libertad y soberanía del continente africano’. La vicepresidenta subrayó que su pueblo siempre estuvo al lado de Zimbabwe en su lucha por lograr su definitiva libertad del colonialismo, que tuvo una lógica continuidad después de lograda la independencia ‘en la cooperación que modestamente brindamos a la construcción de esta nación’. Al respecto reveló que cerca de dos mil jóvenes zimbabwenses se graduaron en las más diversas especialidades en las universidades cubanas y cientos de profesionales de la isla ‘han pasado por Zimbabwe para brindar sus conocimientos, experiencias y así aportar nuestro grano de arena a la construcción y desarrollo de este hermoso país’. Agradeció también que el pueblo zimbabwense y el querido amigo Mugabe estuvieron siempre al lado de Cuba ‘en nuestra histórica lucha contra el bloqueo económico, comercial y financiero impuesto por el Gobierno de Estados Unidos contra nuestro país y en todas las batallas que ha tenido que librar el pueblo cubano en los últimos 60 años’. La dirigente cubana manifestó que los cubanos siempre recordarán ‘con cariño y agradecimiento la presencia de Mugabe en las honras fúnebres del comandante en jefe Fidel Castro Ruz, cuando todo nuestro pueblo y los amigos de Cuba lo despedimos’. Chapman llegó el viernes a Harare al frente de una delegación, integrada también por Marcos Rodríguez, director general de Planeamiento Político del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores, y la embajadora de la nación caribeña en este país, Carmelina Ramírez. La visitante fue recibida en el aeropuerto capitalino por el ministro zimbabwense de Relaciones Exteriores y Comercio Internacional, Sibusiso Moyo.
Zimbabwean President Receives Cuban Vice President Inés María Chapman
cmb cmbRecibe Presidente de Zimbabwe a vicepresidenta cubana Inés María Chapman
En el encuentro el mandatario zimbabwense destacó las sólidas relaciones entre su país y Cuba, informa un despacho de Prensa Latina.
cmb cmb
You must be logged in to post a comment.