LETTERS
Book, Baran's
Lewis Coser's review of Paul Baran's Political Economy of Growth is tendentious, misleading, and sciolistic. I say this only after re-reading both Coser's review and Baran's book. Invective...
...Weinberg believes that Baran's views are "more or less" reflected in the writings of the Bank of India, Gunnar Myrdal, the UN Commission on Latin America, etc...
...Baran does indeed discuss population factors but only in order to dismiss a concern with them as typical of neoMalthusian ignoramuses...
...I hope this "trend" means that some more concrete political articles will appear...
...DISSENT has enriched us deeply on many scores, keeping us in touch with the thought and outlook of old friends and introducing us to new ones .. . F. & Y. D., Detroit [ED...
...Coser asserts that "Baran shows supreme disregard" for population factors, the role of cultural factors, and several more...
...The fact that totaitarian Russia includes nuclear testing among the crimes against humanity perpetrated within its border can not excuse further tests by the United States...
...continued from page 2 Coser: "Such disregard for the lives, the cultures, the traditions, the moral conditions of the majority of mankind who live today in underdeveloped countries is the mark of the totalitarian spirit...
...The "more or less" is delightful...
...witness Baran's discussion of population factors on pages 64-66, 68, and 237-248...
...Invective may be invigorating...
...yet one looks in vain for any evidence that Professor Baran has ever consulted it...
...What of Baran's call for faster industrialization with its almost certain concomitant of sharpened social conflict...
...Here are only a few of the scholars in the field whose works Baran uses: Colin Clark, Schumpeter, Steindl, Kalecki, Kuznets, Mrs...
...We hope therefore that Indian socialists will not adopt either the "Eastern" or the "Western Way," but rather a specifically Indian way...
...As to enterpreneurial talent, concern with this factor is dismissed by Baran as one of a "random assortment of profound-sounding but highly superficial reflections...
...And, it may be hazarded, the moral condition of these peoples is vast impatience with the traditional slow pace of life...
...It is out of regard for their own lives—finally —that these peoples are rising...
...Mr...
...As to the short run, there is silence...
...HELEN KLASTER WURS 88...
...The book is essentially an argument for socialist economic planning which Baran believes to be the most solid and humane basis for national economic development...
...prompted my subscription...
...This judgment ignores several elementary facts of life in underdeveloped countries...
...I continue to maintain that Baran ignores the bulk of the specialized literature on underdeveloped areas that has grown up in recent years...
...And it is a difficult responsibility...
...and (3) an awareness of the place of the work in the literature of the field...
...worse, he cultivates the opposite impression...
...But an adequate review of his book requires: (1) an objective presentation of his general argument...
...As for Hoselitz, he is himself well-enough able to judge whether Baran's failure to refer to him reflects the narrowness of Baran's research...
...Perhaps it is...
...We, as citizens of the United States, hereby petition our government to stop all testing of nuclear weapons now...
...He must above all be well informed on the subject matter discussed...
...Unfortunately, Coser is illinformed...
...Both the narrow doctrinaire simplifications of the Right and the Left, and the lack of courage of the Middle of the political spectrum have left me discouraged...
...it is not a substitute for analysis...
...for the excessive consumption of the upper classes, unproductive hoardings, and the maintenance of a vast bureaucracy and military establishment, as well as withdrawals of foreign capital, the underdeveloped countries could attain high, indeed very high, rates of growth...
...N.S., Chicago...
...Just what is revealed about the argument in Baran's book by the following phrases by Coser: "crude propogandist's brief," "Stalinoid obscurantism," "claustrophobia," "the "Fathers," "pious mumblings...
...I cite these sources not in an attempt to establish innocence by association...
...To him "economic development" will in the long run take care of any difficulties that rising birth rates might create...
...Has this become suddenly suspect...
...Hans Neisser is quoted in one (1) footnote which refers to an article entitled "Stability in Late Capitalism...
...That they are attempting to do so is shown by Asoka Mehta's articles in the 1955 Spring and Summer issues of DISSENT...
...And despite Coser's allegation to the contrary, Baran cites a number of these and others in a favorable way...
...Surely Baran's failure to cite Lewis' work re fleets a legitimate difference of opinion with Coser...
...D.K., Columbus...
...2) an impersonal evaluation of that argument...
...One instance, at least, of Baran's non-ignoring of cultural factors is his discussion of entrepreneurial talent, on pages 234-237...
...Instead, Mr...
...In view of these discussions, and many others in the book, it is correct to summarize Baran's prescription as: "Just soak the rich...
...DISSENT] is an articulate voice of non-sectarian, honest and yet responsible radicalism...
...does Mr...
...On the pages indicated by Mr...
...and things will get moving along...
...As a social scientist Coser has a special responsibility while writing for a non-technical publication...
...Although for years America and Russia have had enough atomic weapons to destroy each other along with the rest of the world, all attempts to end bomb tests by international agreement have failed...
...Harrington and Thomas added to list of editors...
...F.P...
...Now new H-bomb tests are planned and the global health menace is critical...
...Sometimes the publication seems a bit overloaded with excessively abstract theoretical treatises...
...He points out private economic monopoly—wherever it exists—as the basic obstacle to that development...
...Baran's book would be a good start...
...The point is not that these authorities are also concerned with problems of capital hoarding, excessive consumption of the upper class, etc...
...an underdeveloped country...
...Of course, highly specialized analyses are a very necessary part of this magazine...
...I intend to use [Kolko article and reply, winter and summer issues] for a discussion group...
...Page 89) . Accentuate Positive Edi tors: I should like to express my pleasure that such socialists as Norman Thomas and Herman Singer are joining DISSENT...
...Baran for ignoring the specialized literature on underdeveloped countries...
...To continued on page 87 2 LETTERS...
...Many specialists will disagree with Co ser's judgment of the first as "the fore most British expert in this area...
...It very effectively cut through so much of the fruitless verbiage of Sovietology...
...The point is simply that they do not, to my knowledge, assert that the specified underdeveloped countries "could attain high, indeed very high, rates of growth" if only these problems could be solved...
...Box 144, G.P.O., N.Y.C...
...Shall we bid them wait several more centuries...
...yet, this is a reviewer's first obligation...
...Weinberg trying to kid...
...A PETITION TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES "As a result of nuclear tests held thus far, radioactive poisons, the most potent and insidious known, have been spread throughout earth, air and sea...
...Coser has not evaluated the book in its own terms...
...It should rather be said that the disregard lies with Coser...
...Simon Kuznets, for example, is a foremost expert on the United States economy...
...W.K., Evanston, Ill...
...Coser tells us how he himself detests communism and how prejudiced Baran is, in the process revealing how little Coser knows about the political economy of growth...
...Whom is Mr...
...Baran's thesis is not fairly summarized by Coser...
...As for Professors Lewis and Hoselitz...
...Ypsilanti, Mich...
...Weinberg consider the U.S...
...As to some of the more general issues raised in this debate, the reader is referred to George Eckstein's notes in this issue...
...Weinberg's concluding rhetorical flourish: "Where is life cheaper today—in India or in the industrialized West...
...One might as well assert that Ricardo's views are "more or less" reflected in the writings of Marx...
...The task for socialists therefore is to combat with all their energy an intellectual tendency which 87 praises the "Eastern Way" and advances it as a model for underdeveloped countries...
...NOTE: We get scores and scores of letters like those excerpted above...
...There's no point in going through the whole list, these examples will have to suffice...
...Nuclear Testing The world-wide damage caused by nuclear bomb testing is now a matter of general knowledge, and the time for action to end the continuation of tests is at hand...
...but it does seem to this reader that the time may have come to "accentuate the positive" more, and to offer a rather larger per cent of articles which include actual suggestions for solving problems...
...Now Mr...
...That helps too...
...Cosers refers to "an utterly absurd notion" of Baran's that—in Coser's words— were it not...
...Coser, for example, declares: "A vast specialized literature has grown up...
...Natural resources, allegedly also ignored by Baran, are discussed by him on pages 186-188 and 232 ., 234...
...The New York Committee to Halt Nuclear Testing, a newly formed non-partisan citizens' group, consequently wishes to submit the following petition to the President, and asks the aid of readers in circulating it...
...Your magazine was a refreshing revelation...
...Increasingly, people in these countries are changing perspectives: Where is life cheaper today—in India or in the industrialized West...
...It is established that these substances permeate all living things, and can cause genetic damage, besides cancer of the blood and bone...
...It is nonsense, according to Coser, to apply this conception to countries like India...
...ANN HUBBELL Posies . am very impressed by breadth and scope of material...
...I have been pleasantly surprised with your spring issue...
...This declaration is fantastic...
...Clearly, Coser is angry...
...N. Kaldor is quoted in one footnote which refers to an article published in 1935 entitled "Market Imperfection and Excess Capa city"—hardly a problem for underdeveloped countries...
...but as it happens Baran quotes most of them not in connection with his discussion of underdeveloped countries, which starts on p. 134, but earlier in the book (this is easy to check with the index) . Baran could hardly have quoted many of these scholars in connection with the specialized problems of underdeveloped areas since they have not contributed in this field...
...Weinberg, Baran does not discuss the problem of differential natural resources but rather the impact of foreign enterprise on the production patterns of underdeveloped areas—a different matter altogether...
...I suppose few will call attention to your article now that Zhukov has gone—it might cause a crisis in the industry of journalistic Soviet prophets...
...after all, Baran is putting forward a theory to account for some new features of the world economy, features that were not anticipated by Karl Marx, for example...
...Robinson, Neisser, Viner, Domar, Kaldor, Nurske, Wilbert E. Moore, Frankel, Singer, Myint...
...Weinberg gives an impressive list of scholars whom Baran allegedly used...
...Cultures are being reshaped more after western models...
...rather, to spur DISSENT readers to discover for themselves whether or not Baran's notion is truly absurd...
...But Coser will undoubtedly be surprised to hear that Baran's "absurd notion" is reflected, more or less, in the writings of non-Stalinoid authorities such as Wadia and Merchant, the Bank of India, Gunnar Myrdal, and the United Nations Commission on Latin America...
...The answer would seem quite obvious: "It is cheaper in India than in the West but not as cheap as in the totalitarian East, in Mao's China for example...
...Of course they are...
...MEYER WEINBERG LEWIS COSER replies: I criticized Mr...
...Interested persons should communicate with the Committee at P.O...
...I know nothing about Baran's "intellectual and moral courage...
...Finally, Mr...
...And, like those above, most come with one or more subs, and often with a little something extra...
...R.W., Buffalo I enjoyed Mr...
...but about what...
...Pachter's article in the Fall DISSENT...
...MRS...
Vol. 5 • January 1958 • No. 1
