For what it’s worth, I didn’t mean to come off as being hostile to the idea that EA should pay more attention to the exploitation of poor countries. I really just don’t know much about this area—for example I’ve never before heard the idea that France has an extractive relationship with former colonies that use the French currency. Maybe to you, “neoliberalism” is a very clear-cut concept. But personally, I would have a hard time telling apart which loans are good and which are ill-intentioned debt traps. (Is the IMF mostly good and Belt-And-Road mostly bad? Or probably they are both bad? Or maybe it depends on a country-by-country basis?) So to me, sadly, the concept of “neoliberalism” really is vague.
By the way, I also don’t think of myself as “woke”, I actually consider myself pretty “anti-woke”. So, I think you are probably picturing some kind of “generic member of the elite who loves wokeness”, but I’m not that guy!
I actually share your frustration at the ways that people (journalists, leaders, rich people, but also ordinary folks) focus on exaggerated culture-war issues instead of paying attention to the things that are objectively most important—things like like growth and wellbeing of the developing world, or existential risk, or etc.
“People should feel ashamed to think that this is OK. To turn a blind eye to this is as bad as to be a normal innocent german citizen during WW2.”
Yes, sadly I think this is true for a lot of things. I feel this way sometimes about the vast scale of animal suffering. I feel this way about how our institutions and leaders are some mix of hostile and incompetent. About the unfairness of society, of the universe, the arbitrary circumstances of people’s birth. About how little we do to protect the long-term future of human civilization and the planet Earth. I sometimes feel like I am a normal innocent german citizen turning a blind eye, not just to one WW2, but to like five different WW2s that my nation is committing at the same time. But I just don’t know what to do about that fact. I try to do what I can on the margin. Participating in EA and learning more about different problems (like this French currency thing you mentioned, which I will read more about) is a way for me to try and understand how I might be able to take action to help.
I guess I don’t have much more to say, except: I feel like I’m ultimately on your side. I feel like we both want to make the world a better and fairer place, and a less hypocritical place where people and nations do a better job living up to their stated ideals.
I think that the EA movement would actually be pretty interested to hear a more detailed, specific outline of what an “anti-colonialist” agenda would look like—what types of modern-day exploitation are holding back poor countries the most? How should loans and other agreements be designed so they are less predatory, more mutually beneficial? Etc. I think you’re probably right that ultimately, efforts towards the right kind of big geopolitical / systemic changes will be more effective than a micro focus on things like antimalarial bednets. But, besides the idea of charter cities, right now I don’t have a good picture of what any of those changes might look like. I wish I did!
For what it’s worth, I didn’t mean to come off as being hostile to the idea that EA should pay more attention to the exploitation of poor countries. I really just don’t know much about this area—for example I’ve never before heard the idea that France has an extractive relationship with former colonies that use the French currency. Maybe to you, “neoliberalism” is a very clear-cut concept. But personally, I would have a hard time telling apart which loans are good and which are ill-intentioned debt traps. (Is the IMF mostly good and Belt-And-Road mostly bad? Or probably they are both bad? Or maybe it depends on a country-by-country basis?) So to me, sadly, the concept of “neoliberalism” really is vague.
By the way, I also don’t think of myself as “woke”, I actually consider myself pretty “anti-woke”. So, I think you are probably picturing some kind of “generic member of the elite who loves wokeness”, but I’m not that guy!
I actually share your frustration at the ways that people (journalists, leaders, rich people, but also ordinary folks) focus on exaggerated culture-war issues instead of paying attention to the things that are objectively most important—things like like growth and wellbeing of the developing world, or existential risk, or etc.
“People should feel ashamed to think that this is OK. To turn a blind eye to this is as bad as to be a normal innocent german citizen during WW2.”
Yes, sadly I think this is true for a lot of things. I feel this way sometimes about the vast scale of animal suffering. I feel this way about how our institutions and leaders are some mix of hostile and incompetent. About the unfairness of society, of the universe, the arbitrary circumstances of people’s birth. About how little we do to protect the long-term future of human civilization and the planet Earth. I sometimes feel like I am a normal innocent german citizen turning a blind eye, not just to one WW2, but to like five different WW2s that my nation is committing at the same time. But I just don’t know what to do about that fact. I try to do what I can on the margin. Participating in EA and learning more about different problems (like this French currency thing you mentioned, which I will read more about) is a way for me to try and understand how I might be able to take action to help.
I guess I don’t have much more to say, except: I feel like I’m ultimately on your side. I feel like we both want to make the world a better and fairer place, and a less hypocritical place where people and nations do a better job living up to their stated ideals.
I think that the EA movement would actually be pretty interested to hear a more detailed, specific outline of what an “anti-colonialist” agenda would look like—what types of modern-day exploitation are holding back poor countries the most? How should loans and other agreements be designed so they are less predatory, more mutually beneficial? Etc. I think you’re probably right that ultimately, efforts towards the right kind of big geopolitical / systemic changes will be more effective than a micro focus on things like antimalarial bednets. But, besides the idea of charter cities, right now I don’t have a good picture of what any of those changes might look like. I wish I did!