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Chapter 1
Introduction
The famous economic historian Karl Polanyi called the expansion of formal global
markets in his seminal book ‘The Great Transformation’(1944) a ‘satanic mill’that
would lead to the disembeddedness local communities and their informal econo-
mies. Polanyi’s framing of economic history as a struggle of ‘profit versus people’
has gained renewed attention in the 21st century.
Robert Kuttner, an American journalist and social policy expert, argues in a
recent essay in the New York Review of Books (Kuttner 2017) that austerity
policies in Europe and the renewed push for deregulation in the United States
would reaffirm what Polanyi criticized as “the utopian endeavour of economic
liberalism to set up a self-regulating market system”. This endeavour would crowd
out local culture and citizenship; lead to extreme inequality, and eventually trigger a
political counter-movement to restore human rights to ordinary people.
This book does not defend European austerity policies or the Trump adminis-
tration’s fondness for deregulation of the domestic economy—while simultaneously
rejecting multilateralism in the governance of the world trading system. It does also
not deny the countless corporate scandals before and after the global financial crisis
of 2007–2008 that ruined the lives of many ordinary people. Yet, it challenges the
popular narrative of global business as a sort of zero-sum game that merely thrives
at the expense of society and the environment. In a world characterized by a high
degree of economic interdependence, social and geographical mobility and trans-
boundary environmental and social challenges, global business cannot be regarded
anymore as something external and alien that is unrelated to our personal lives and
social networks. We are all directly or indirectly dependent on and also benefit from
its products, services and innovations as local producers as well as local consumers.
The global sustainability challenge of the 21st century is therefore not to get rid of
global business but to better harness its potential to contribute to local sustainable
development and inclusive growth.
Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) are the main players in global business and
probably the most scrutinized ones. The belief that their global operations are
completely detached from local cultural and social activities contradicts the fact that
©The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2018
P. Aerni, Global Business in Local Culture, SpringerBriefs in Economics,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03798-7_1
1
all economic relations, whether global or local, are based on prior social relations.
In other words, the local cultural dimension should not be pitched against the global
economic dimension but must instead be seen as its foundation. There is, of course,
corporate culture and there is local culture. However, these are not terms that
describe a steady state but represent dynamic processes that thrive on exchange.
Embedded foreign investments may contribute to a fruitful exchange by responding
to local concerns and by creating new local economic opportunities through eco-
nomic integration. If MNEs with a commitment to principled embeddedness
1
succeed in becoming an accepted and respected player in the local economy and
culture, these companies gain the necessary social capital to secure their long-term
license to operate. In other words, corporate social responsibility (CSR) is built into
the long-term interest of such firms. CSR thus ceases to be a separate section with a
separate agenda within the MNE. Instead, it becomes an integral part of an overall
business strategy designed to ensure the long-term survival of the company within
society.
The potential contribution of such MNEs to sustainable change in developing
economies is seldom appreciated because it runs counter to the stereotype that
MNEs merely privatize profits while socializing the costs in the regions where they
invest.
2
The general view that global companies do business at the expense of local
cultural and economic activities remains firmly entrenched in the sustainability
debate of affluent societies. It often leads to an exclusive concern for the defense of
the local, the search of a like-minded online and offline communities and the
withdrawal form an engaged political debate. The mentality tends to be captured by
the term ‘Not in my Backyard’(NIMBY), which has the unintended consequence
of encouraging cultural segregation rather than economic integration. Yet, the
bipolar view of the ‘bad’global and the ‘good’local that underpins this static and
defensive view of sustainability runs counter to the Sustainable Development Goals
1
‘principled embeddedness’stands for the corporate commitment of an MNE to follow its
self-imposed corporate responsibility principles worldwide, while, simultaneously, providing its
subsidiaries with sufficient autonomy to embed themselves into the local economy (see Aerni
2017b). In this sense, the term ‘principled’ensures that embeddedness is not indirectly endorsing
the undesirable type of embeddedness associated with local corruption and collusion (an
anti-corruption policy should be part of the CSR principles of a company).
2
There are certainly global companies that do indeed only care about profits no matter at what
social cost. Moreover, the so-called ‘paradise papers’, published on November 5, 2017 by the
International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) have once again unveiled tax evasion
practices by MNEs, especially in the mining sector, that may not be illegal but nevertheless
account for a significant loss of government revenues in countries where the resources are
extracted. Abusive tax practices by MNEs will be addressed briefly in Sect. 7.4.4. In view of the
ease to hack data in the age of the digital society and the enormous long-term costs resulting from
reputation loss associated with the detection and denouncing of extensive transfer pricing, MNEs
may think twice if it is worth to endanger their license to operate by taking the risk of making
extensive use of tax havens to optimize tax payments. Some MNEs may continue to engage in tax
evasion even if they cannot claim that national corporate taxation schemes would be abusive. But
it would be unfair to argue that they represent MNEs in general.
2 1 Introduction
(SDGs) who aim to promote inclusive growth (SDG 8) and, for that purpose, call
for a global partnership (SDG 17) to develop hybrid and tailor-made local solutions
to effectively address the significant global sustainability challenges of the 21st
century.
1.1 Karl Polanyi’sInfluence in the Globalization Debate
of the 21st Century
Economic globalization is primarily associated with the growth of multinational
enterprises (MNEs). They have their headquarters primarily in prosperous econo-
mies in North America, Europe, and Asia and focus increasingly on investing in
developing countries where land and labor are still relatively cheap.
Economists and political scientists who represent the school of ‘Embedded
Liberalism’(Ruggie 1982; Hays 2009; Rodrik 2011) and scholars in the field of
‘Corporate Social Responsibility’(CSR) (Scherer et al. 2006; Wettstein 2010)
regard this trend as potentially disruptive for traditional communities and their
locally embedded economic systems. Weak law enforcement capabilities in
developing countries would be unable to ensure the protection of human rights of
such communities and therefore public and private initiatives are required to
compensate affected communities through a generous welfare state or global CSR
initiatives, respectively.
The view that the primary task of governments is to tame unfettered market
forces is not necessarily wrong but incomplete and often accompanied by an ide-
ological agenda and vested interests in preserving the status quo. On the left wing of
the political spectrum, anti-globalization activists demand additional regulation
designed to minimize the social and environmental risks of global corporate
investment. On the other side of the political spectrum, right-wing nationalists
frame global economic integration and migration as threats to cultural identity and
national sovereignty. The recent political successes of the far right in North
America and Europe have been made possible because of the support of the ‘dis-
tributional losers’of globalization and the sedentary middle class that is concerned
about cultural and economic decline. These losers feel increasingly decoupled from
global economic change and no more represented by the left wing politicians that
have shifted their concerns from the domestic worker to ‘vulnerable minorities’
(Hopkin 2017; Pepinsky 2017; Reckwitz 2018). They ask for simple explanations
to complex problems, and political entrepreneurs, who play the role of epistemic
brokers, provide such explanations by using popular narratives of ‘good’and ‘evil’
forces, and by identifying plausible scapegoats (Aerni and Bernauer 2006).
Yet, the claim that an unfettered global economy is disrupting the local
economies in an unprecedented way does not correspond to today’s reality of mixed
economies with their subsidies and policy interventions to protect the domestic
economy from world trade (Rogers 2017). Such protectionist policies, especially
1 Introduction 3
when combined with non-tariff trade barriers, are often justified by the almost
unquestioned chauvinistic assumption that everything produced domestically is
automatically more sustainable and of better quality than substitutes produced
abroad. Such protectionist policies often favour potent incumbents in domestic
business. They primarily aim at preserving the status quo by arguing in favour of
protecting the ‘embedded’national economy, understood as a highly regulated
economic system that protects the local business against disruptive economic
change driven by entrepreneurship and innovation. For outsiders, within and
without the domestic economy, who do not benefit from the social network and the
political connections of incumbents in the resulting corporatist system, such an
‘embedded’economy is primarily characterized by nepotism (Schluep and Aerni
2016). It stifles their economic opportunities. Therefore, entrepreneurial outsiders
see economic globalization not just as a threat, but also an opportunity to weaken
the dominant position of incumbents in domestic economies and make space for
more economic freedom. The chances of such outsiders to find ways around
established networks and create new and scalable markets has increased with the
digital revolution and the rise of the global knowledge economy (Naam 2013). Yet,
public resentment against such agents of change persists, especially when they
become successful and grow big.
1.2 The Bipolar Mindset in Academia, Civil Society
and Government
The new opportunities offered by the global knowledge economy of the 21st
century require a critical re-evaluation of Polanyi’s dualist worldview that guided
his interpretation of economic history in the first half of the 20th century.
The re-evaluation of Polanyi takes place in the second, third and fourth chapter,
as well as Sect. 7.3 of the present book. It builds upon existing research in eco-
nomic history (Braudel 1982; Stehr 2008; Romer 2010; Bang 2016), economic
sociology (Granovetter 1985; Zafirovski 2002; Beckert 2007), and industrial policy
(Uzzi 1996; Meyer et al. 2011). This empirical research challenges the implicit
baseline assumption of the school of ‘embedded liberalism’, which is based on
Polanyi’s argument that the global expansion of the formal market system poses an
exclusive threat to locally embedded economic systems and human rights. The
claim of Polanyi’s contemporary disciples that the World Trade Organisation
(WTO) merely represents the interests of the global actors at the expense of local
interests is shown to be misguided in Chap. 2. After all, the WTO is a product of
compromise. It reflects the wish of its member states to participate in a rule-based
economy with ample policy space that also takes into account non-trade concerns
other than rent seeking protectionism. This policy space, incorporated in the dif-
ferent WTO Agreements, is especially significant for member states that belong to
the category of Least Developed Countries. Some global activists would object by
4 1 Introduction
pointing out that many interest groups were underrepresented in the negotiations of
the WTO Agreements. Indigenous people, for example, would feel threatened in
their cultural identity by the expansion of global business encouraged by the WTO.
Section 4.3 contradicts this view by pointing out that the local interests of
indigenous people are often misrepresented by the global civil society organizations
that claim to represent them on the global stage. After all, Article 21 of United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples from 2007 clearly
demands respect for the economic rights of indigenous people (right to ownership,
right to self-determination and economic development, equality before justice,
freedom from discrimination). It indicates that indigenous people are as much
interested in fair economic and cultural exchange as they are in cultural preserva-
tion. They are aware that their indigenous culture only remains attractive to the next
generation, if there is cultural renewal supported by selective economic integration.
Despite the lack of empirical evidence, the belief that the expansion of the
formal global economy goes at the expense of local people who defend their local
culture and natural environment has become very popular in contemporary affluent
societies since they are mainly interested in preserving the status quo, from which
they benefit. Since their material needs are well taken care of, they are largely
concerned with postmaterial needs, especially the search for identity and meaning.
In this context, the mythical accounts of ‘local people’versus ‘global profit’spread
via social media by well-known anti-globalization activists, such as Vandana Shiva,
resonate well with them. Their media-covered stories are often framed as a ‘David
versus Goliath’drama and, as such, provide meaning and orientation. The narrative
may sound simple and plausible, but it is highly misleading. After all, no
real profit-oriented economic activity is detached from individuals (people) and
their social networks (communities), as economic sociologists have pointed out in
their embeddedness research.
The embeddedness in social networks is especially crucial when a company
invests abroad. It must gain social capital in the region of investment by con-
tributing to the resolution of three major coordination problems: the problem of
value, the problem of competition and the problem of cooperation. Chapter 5points
out that foreign investors may only be able to secure their long-term license to
operate in the host country if these coordination problems are adequately addressed
in collaboration with local stakeholders.
Chapter 6looks at contemporary economic and development policies that are
still guided by the social science theories developed during the Cold War.
Structuralist and neomarxist theories, that were very popular in Human Geography
and Postcolonial Studies, implied for example that international trade must be, just
like conquering and subjecting countries, a zero-sum game that benefits the rich at
the expense of the poor. In turn, neoclassical economics, also a theory developed
during the Cold War period, only focuses on the relatively modest efficiency gains
from global trade while ignoring the welfare effects generated through the intro-
duction of new goods and services (Romer 1994). Moreover, welfare economics, a
branch of neoclassical economics, has an exclusive focus on internalizing the
1.2 The Bipolar Mindset in Academia, Civil Society and Government 5
negative externalities caused by private sector activities. The positive external
effects on society resulting from private sector investment in innovation are largely
ignored.
The expansion of the global economy after the Cold War has however signifi-
cantly benefited previous low-income countries, such as China. By carrying out the
institutional reforms necessary to embark on catch-up growth, China was less
focused on capturing efficiency gains from trade but on taking full advantage of the
economic opportunities resulting from the rise of the global knowledge economy.
The global knowledge economy is strongly linked to the ongoing digital revo-
lution that made the non-rival resource ‘knowledge’more widely available. Yet,
access to codified knowledge on the internet does not yet ensure development. The
more important part is investment in human capital to create the necessary tacit
knowledge (know-how) to make commercial use of codified knowledge. In this
context Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is very valuable because it combines
knowledge with know-how transfer into the local economy. These essential
ingredients of endogenous development increase the likelihood of imported phys-
ical goods to be eventually substituted by locally produced goods. Being a
non-tangible resource, knowledge in the form of instructions, recipes, and protocols
makes it possible to create a local good that is otherwise too costly to import—
provided that the country has invested in the business infrastructure and the human
skills and know-how of its people to take advantage of the new opportunities.
In this context, the effectiveness of Official Development Assistance (DA),
which was also invented during the Cold War to win over non-aligned developing
countries, is increasingly questioned. It is stuck in the classic view that development
aid must primarily protect rather than economically empower the poor (Easterly
2007; Deaton 2015). As such, DA tends to preserve unsustainable local structures
in low income countries rather than enable the highly needed structural change to
create new economic opportunities for the large and increasingly educated younger
generations in the developing world.
1.3 Acknowledging the Value of Companies Committed
to ‘Principled Embeddedness’
Chapters 7and 8argue that effective DA needs to build upon the principle of
cooperation, especially with the private sector, if its goal is to enable sustainable
change by reducing poverty through more economic opportunities and, simulta-
neously, improving the environment through sustainable intensification. Producing
more with less by making effective use of new platform technologies such as
information technology, nanotechnology, and biotechnology, is vital in view of
global population growth and increasing affluence in the 21st century. In this
context, the focus in public policy and CSR needs to shift from merely regulating
and avoiding the risks of FDI to harnessing its benefits for the poor and the
6 1 Introduction
environment. It must be based on the insight that investments of MNEs do not just
cause external costs for the local environment and society but may also generate
external social and environmental benefits, especially if the MNE is committed to
‘principled embeddedness’.
In this context, Chap. 7points out that the UN Guiding Principles on Business
and Human Rights (UNGP)
3
as well as various other international CSR guidelines
developed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development
(OECD) and the International Organisation for Standardization (ISO), should rec-
ognize that corporate responsibility cannot be limited to the requirement of doing
‘no harm’. After all, companies do not create value by merely avoiding risks but by
actually taking the risk to invest in a new market. MNEs that benefit the region in
which they operate should also be rewarded for doing ‘good,’not because they
want to be good corporate citizens but because doing so is in their long-term
interest.
A possible reason for the omission of the importance of local embeddedness in
current CSR strategies may be the influence of global retailers on the design of
sustainability standards in the food and agricultural sectors. Rather than informing
consumers about the efforts of the supplying global agribusiness companies to make
agriculture in developing countries more sustainable, they prefer to portray them-
selves as the most sustainable companies in the global food value chain.
Section 7.4.6 illustrates how they do so by informing consumers about their col-
laboration with reputation-enhancing environmental organizations, such as WWF.
In their marketing campaigns, they primarily aim at making consumers feel good
about themselves and confident about their retailer as a selfless defender of nature
and small-scale farming (Miller 2012; Aerni 2013a). The essential pillars of this
wellness sustainability are ‘organic’or ‘fair trade’premium products portrayed as
natural, healthy and fair and therefore a more ethical alternative to industrial
agriculture.
These claims are increasingly questioned based on insights gained from
empirical research (Makita and Tsuruta 2017; Huybrechts et al. 2017; Laufer 2014;
Lott 2015; Ramone 2013; Gilbert 2012; Henderson 2008). Even from an ethical
point of view, it is unclear whether these wellness premium products are the best
choice for consumers. There is increasing evidence from field research, that ‘fair
trade’and ‘organic’production in developing countries may help increase the
income of the immediate beneficiaries (e.g. members of the respective farm
cooperative) but discourage local entrepreneurship and innovation, the key ingre-
dients for homegrown development. Moreover, ‘fair trade’and ‘organic’cooper-
atives in low-income countries are controlled by retailers in high-income countries.
As such, they tend to be capital-intensive tropical food production sites subsidized
by foreign consumers and states, but in most cases, utterly disembedded from local
3
See http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Business/Pages/BusinessIndex.aspx (Accessed Sept 25
2018).
1.3 Acknowledging the Value of Companies Committed to ‘Principled Embeddedness’7
economic activities. As such, these niche markets for affluent consumers contribute
very little to structural change.
Finally, it is unclear whether ethical concerns indeed motivate consumer deci-
sions to buy organic or fair trade, or whether it is rather about treating oneself to a
premium product (Miller 2012). No one would probably be puzzled if the mar-
keting slogan for these ‘sustainable’products would be ‘because I am worth it’.
1.4 When MNEs Become Part of the Solution Rather
Than Part of the Problem
Whether FDI is indeed capable of generating profits by empowering rather than
exploiting people depends on the awareness of the MNE that its business does not
operate in a vacuum as well as on the respective domestic institutional setting.
Governments that want to force foreign investors to comply with local content
requirements may not be effective in achieving the desired outcome if they fail to
“do their homework.”This homework comprises domestic reforms and invest-
ments, not just in the domestic human capital stock and an institutional environment
that enables economic and technological change, but also in the physical and digital
infrastructure (UNCTAD 2017a).
Creating these favourable framework conditions helps reduce the uncertainty for
subsidiaries of MNEs to invest in the domestic economy.
The commitment to ‘principled embeddedness’in practice is illustrated in this
book in Sect. 7.4 using selected MNE case studies. In addition, Chap. 8uses
concrete case studies in Africa to highlight the importance of state and non-state
actors as intermediaries and catalysts who render local institutions and businesses
more responsive to MNEs prepared to source more of their services and products
locally and thus become more embedded.
These case studies are not meant to praise the selected MNEs for their local
business practices, but instead to point out that the long-term profit-motive may not
necessarily conflict with social and environmental objectives. The potential for
opportunism in large companies may be widespread despite increasing expenses on
compliance and due diligence processes (Chen and Soltes 2018). However, the
examples clearly show that globally active corporations may contribute to economic
empowerment and sustainable change in the regions of investment through a
strategy of principled embeddedness. This is particularly true for their presence in
many developing countries where they often offer an alternative to discriminating
traditional economic systems, in which social status and not individual merits
determine one’s chances to obtain a decent job in the formal economy (Martin
2012).
The ambitious young and educated majority in developing countries who are
stuck in persistent feudalist structures tend to become outsiders in their own society.
Lacking the necessary social connections to enter the formal economy as
8 1 Introduction
entrepreneurs, they often decide to migrate elsewhere in search for economic
opportunities. In this context, the growing number of economic refugees is a
symptom of failed domestic policies as well as misguided development assistance
(DA) that avoids productive collaboration with the private sector to create economic
opportunities for entrepreneurs in the formal domestic economy. The grievance of
the neglected young entrepreneurs has been identified as one of the main triggers of
the Arab spring (Martin 2012).
It is not surprising that Karl Polanyi never addressed this downside of traditional
economies in which land-owning insiders officially portray themselves as custo-
dians of the natural environment, traditional society, and local culture to strengthen
the legitimacy of their privileged economic and political position in society. It
would have conflicted with his binary thinking of the ‘bad’global versus the ‘good’
local. This binary thinking is however persistent because it offers a reduction of
complexity in an ever more complex society (Luhmann 1993). As a result, the
bipolar mindset continues to influence the funding priorities in development
cooperation, academic research and CSR strategies, despite the growing empirical
evidence that it aggravates rather than resolves the social and environmental sus-
tainability challenges of the 21st century. After all, focusing only on the ‘vulner-
able’, the presumably passive victims of change, and portraying the agents of
change, understood as foreign direct investors and local entrepreneurs who strive to
become their suppliers, as mere perpetrators, supports the interests of the incumbent
elite rather than the poor who aim to improve their economic situation. Incumbents,
after all, benefit from the status quo.
The concept of vulnerability treats the target population as passive victims who
need to be saved by ‘therapeutic entrepreneurs’supported by DA (Ecclestone
2017). These therapeutic entrepreneurs are assumed to be better educated and
therefore to know better what the vulnerable need. In most cases, these external
stakeholders are not aware that their interpretation of the local circumstances is in
most cases not informed by the local people and their concerns, but somewhat static
stereotypes and mythical stories that prevail in donor countries about the situation
of the poor in recipient countries. An issue that is extensively discussed in Chap. 4
as well as the concluding remarks of Chap. 9.
1.5 Of Myths and Movements
The view that entrepreneurs who try to take advantage of economic opportunities
are mere perpetrators who do not need any assistance proves to be one of the most
widespread myths in affluent societies. Why? Because, worldwide, the
self-employed, in most cases survival entrepreneurs, live in a much more precarious
state than those with formal employment. Moreover, this is not just true for daily
laborers without any formal education or training but also university graduates in
low-income countries who do not have the opportunity to enter into a family
1.4 When MNEs Become Part of the Solution Rather Than Part of the Problem 9
business and failed to obtain a well-paid job with a foreign NGO, an MNE or the
government after graduation (Aerni 2015b).
Since the human rights movement emerged from the labour rights movement,
the grievances of these entrepreneurs is not on its radar screen (Aerni 2015b). Yet,
survival entrepreneurs, especially if endowed with a good education and business
training, may be of great interest to foreign companies, which care about motivated
and qualified local partners and employees. More than anyone else, these compa-
nies give entrepreneurs in precarious situations a chance by investing in their skills
or the upgrade of their business. As such, MNEs may significantly contribute to
social mobility in traditional societies and the economic empowerment of outsiders.
MNEs in affluent societies are however hardly ever associated with economic
empowerment in developing economies. Instead, they are perceived as selfish
actors that care about shareholder value, competitive off-shore employment, tax
evasion schemes and monopoly power. This may be true for MNEs involved in
corporate crimes and malpractices. Hollywood movies and the media widely cover
these cases. However, empirical research indicates that the vast majority of MNEs
do not correspond to the negative stereotype of ‘Big Business’. The claim, for
example, that small businesses would account for a higher share of decent
employment, be more innovative and contribute more to the tax base of society has
mostly be rebutted (WTO 2016; Atkinson and Lind 2018).
Moreover, even though ‘big business’may spend more on political lobbying,
they seem to be less effective in achieving their goals than small businesses, who
generally pay less taxes and obtain much more government assistance (Atkinson
and Lind 2018). The reason for this outcome is that public opinion loves ‘small’
and hates ‘big’business; and politicians who care about re-election are careful
about not being associated with the ‘hated’ones. Alas, by asking for more regu-
lation of innovation-driven industries, the same politicians may inadvertently
strengthen the market position of large firms that, unlike small companies, have the
means to comply with additional costly regulation (Aerni 2015b). The rather arti-
ficial divide between small ‘good’firms and bad ‘large’firms leads to short-termism
in politics that is unable to address the long-term challenges of sustainable devel-
opment in a collaborative way. After all, small companies must become part of a
business ecosystem that also involves large companies, if they want to succeed.
Moreover, big companies are probably the largest investors in innovative small
companies (Atkinson and Lind 2018).
Given the urgency to move away from the unproductive binary mindset in
academia, civil society, and politics and to learn from the past when addressing the
global sustainability challenges of the 21st century, Chap. 9concludes by calling
for a paradigm shift in the theory and practice of international sustainable devel-
opment. This paradigm shift is reflected in SDG 8 on ‘Decent work and Economic
Growth’of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. The United
Nations Development Program (UNDP) considers this goal designed to promote
inclusive growth to be key for achieving most of the remaining Sustainable
Development Goals because improved incomes lift people out of poverty and
automatically improve access to essential human rights (e.g., the right to food, right
10 1 Introduction
to water, right to decent shelter, gender equality). As such, SDG 8 represents the
priority of poor people in developing countries who have not obtained formal
employment in the private sector and are therefore forced to make a living as
survival entrepreneurs. To understand why they value FDI if embedded in the local
economy, one has to listen directly to the poor in these countries rather than to the
anti-globalization activists who claim to talk on behalf of their interests. The
concluding remarks illustrate this by using a concrete example of good investigative
journalism. It listens and gives voice to the locals and, as such, takes local
knowledge and experience seriously. The example shows that, for the poor, it is
obvious, that poverty has no cause. It is merely the absence of prosperity, as the
interdisciplinary social scientist Jane Jacobs noticed. Alas, concerned people in
affluent societies still regard their prosperity as being rooted in poverty elsewhere. It
is important they realize that economic exchange, unlike war, is not a zero-sum
game.
1.5 Of Myths and Movements 11
