The Shock Doctrine

I have been an admirer of the journalist Naomi Klein ever since she published her invective against globalism, No Logo, several years ago. I appreciate her watchdog role in the media as well as her comprehensive research and reporting. Her latest book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism is a damning account of the role Friedmanian free market ideas destroyed several economies and lead to the persecution of thousands of people from South America to South Africa. She systematically shows how Milton Friedman’s liaise faire free market principals pushed by the neocons out of the University of Chicago in the 70s lead to the overthrow of the democratically elected Allende in Chile and put the autocrat Pinochet in power. He eliminated the opposition by torture, disappearances, strike busting, and privatized the nationally owned businesses so the at the elite would reap the wealth. This was the first “free market” capitalist model combined with violent autocratic policies that would plague South America and then migrate to places as disparate as South Africa, Poland, and Russia. So the idea of stepping in during a time of confusion and chaos and wrecking havoc with the economy became the means for implementing unfair economic practices that insure that the elites would get rich at he expense of their country that be manifest in the Iraq war, the reclamation of beachfront property from fishermen in countries hit by the tsunami (Sri Lanka, Thailand, India, etc.), and the neo conservative polices in New Orleans after the hurricane in which school vouches were encouraged and housing projected remained closed to the poor. It is a damning analysis of free market capitalism, which is a companion indictment of the current economic crisis-taking place. I used to think that Henry Kissinger was the greatest criminal of the past 40 years, but now I think Milton Friedman’s economic policies may have caused more collective harm than Kissinger’s foreign polices.