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In 1838 in a period of unrest during the fledgling years of the Mexican Republic, a French pastry chef living in Mexico City had his shop destroyed by looting soldiers. Receiving no sympathy from the Mexican Government, he turned to his native France for assistance. Paris responded by demanding 600,000 Pesos from Mexico in compensation – a ludicous amount for a pastry shop – but along with claims of unpaid debts, a good excuse to start a war. That they did and with 30,000 troops in tow, France had its money within the year.

24 years later, the French returned to the shores of Mexico asking for more money and with designs on empire building. The outnumbered Mexican republicans scored a famous victory at the Battle of Puebla on the 5th of May 1862, now celebrated every year as Cinco de Mayo. The republic went on to lose control of the country, regaining it only after three years, with assistance from their northern neigbour, the United States, and a decline of French interest in the teritory.

Intervention in the affairs of a nation dressed up as “settling unpaid debts” was a popular pastime of the French republics and monarchies in the colonial era. Upon Haiti’s independence, the former occupier demanded payments to the French to compensate for lost revenues and slaves which were now part of an independent Haiti.

These are dark tales of a past age where European powers sailed the world, stuck flags on islands, grabbed what they wanted, and left what remained in tatters. Much of this age is mercifully over. Yet the practice of using national debt as an excuse for intervention is not.

Mexico is a poor country, with annual income per person at £6,988. It borrows money from rich countries to help lift its people out of poverty.

France is a rich country, with annual incoming per person at £19,750. It lends money to countries like Mexico both independently and through international organisations like the World Bank.

When poor countries can’t afford to service their borrowings anymore, often because of rising interest rates, rich countries like France, just as in 1862, don’t demand just their money back. Whilst before western lenders would turn up with a flotilla of ships, now they come with bankers and advisers, explaining how if they want to ever be able to borrow again they will do what they’re told: privatise public services, deregulate markets, and lower taxes – a process delicately termed “structural adjustment”. After two centuries of debt disputes, Mexico suffered perhaps its greatest defeat when, addled by debt given by western lenders, it signed up to a structural adjustment package in the 1980s.

Inequality has grown and provision of services has declined, yet, structural adjustment isn’t dead. Countries like France have marched in line behind this modern interventionalist banner both when Haiti required relief after its hurricane in 2009, and in the wake of the Greece’s recent budget crisis.

Mexico and France had the honour of playing the first two matches in the tournament on Friday. Mexico played firmly to draw 1-1 with a South African side that showed occasional, but unsustained vigour. France held a goalless draw with Uruguay which has been described by others as one of the dullest matches they have ever played. For their opening performances alone, Mexico deserve a victory at Polokwane this Thursday.

I urge you to support Mexico for another reason.

We don’t know much about what became of the pastry chef “Monsieur Remontel”, but it seems likely that any compensation he receieved for his flattened shop wouldn’t have made up for the devistation inflicted upon his neighborhood by the full scale French invasion force. Another victim of France imposing its will using debt collection as an excuse. Until countries like France stop using debt of a way to keep the world in check, poorer countries like Mexico will always suffer.

So let us hearltily support Mexico, in eager anticipation of a reenactment of its victory over its unscrupulous lender on Cinco de Mayo, and to many more such victories beyond!

Posted in: France, France-Mexico, Mexico

Views expressed here are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the World Development Movement.

Historically, home nations always do well in the World Cup. Six out of the seven World Cup winners have won on home soil and the host country has never failed to progress to the second round. South Africa, however, is the lowest ranking country to ever host a World Cup and at 83 is even behind New Zealand, generally seen as having no chance at all in the tournament.

It’s going to be very interesting to see how South Africa, cheered on by the fearsome vuvuzela, perform in this tough group A where Mexico and France must be seen as favourites. Despite their low ranking – Bafana Bafana (the Boys), as they’re called by the home crowd – have done very well in the run up to the World Cup, including beating Guatemala 5-0 and Denmark 1-0.

Mexico struggled in the early stages of the qualifications and Sven-Göran Ericsson was sacked as manager after a disappointing loss to Honduras. His replacement, Javier Aguirre, revived the team and they won four out of the five last matches to grab a World Cup place. An offensive team, Mexico recently beat Italy 2-1 and should really win this match.

In the Who Should I Cheer For rankings, Mexico is also clear favourite, being the 15th most supportable team, compared to South Africa in 28th place. Fairly evenly matched in terms of GDP per person, Mexico is far ahead in terms of low carbon emissions and maternal mortality rates and has the tournaments’s lowest military spending, at just 0.4% of GDP.  South Africa, on the other hand, is particularly strong when it comes to women in Government, with over 40%. Only Spain (with recent legislation stipulating a 50-50 split between men and women) does better in this area.

South Africa, despite succesfully defeating apartheid 20 years ago, has struggled with increasing levels of inequality and poverty, to the extent that it is now one of the world’s most unequal countries. According to War on Want, South Africa’s constitution, adopted in 1996 and based on the ANC’s Freedom Charter,  is one of the most progressive in the world and states that everyone has equal right to adequate housing, healthcare, food and water and a clean environment. Yet, despite these promises the legacy of apartheid remains – in Africa’s richest country 30% of South Africans don’t have access to electricity and 39% to water, for example.

How did this happen? Well, according to Naomi Klein in The Shock Doctrine, the years between Mandela’s release from prison in 1990 and the 1994 election ANC landslide victory saw long negotiations between the outgoing apartheid National Party and the ANC. The focus of these talks were the high-profile political summits between Mandela and de Klerk, in which the ANC won on almost every count being discussed. But there were also parallel, lower-key economic negotiations taking place, which the ANC (and the world) took a much smaller interest in.

As the political talks progressed and it was clear that parliament would fall into the hands of the ANC, South Africa’s elites started pouring their energy into the economic talks instead. According to Klein, South Africa’s whites had lost the political battle, but they would not give up so easily when it came to protecting their wealth and economic power.

Using a range of policy tools – international trade agreements and structural adjustment programmes, for example – the de Klerk government were able to hand control to ‘impartial experts’ – economists and experts from the IMF, the World Bank, GATT and the National Party. As Klein writes:

The plan was successfully executed under the noses of the ANC leaders, who were naturally preoccupied with winning the battle to control Parliament. In the process, the ANC failed to protect itself against a far more insidous strategy – in essence, an elaborate insurance plan aganst the economic clauses in the Freedom Charter ever becoming law in South Africa.

During the horse-trading that went on in these economic negotiations, the ANC negotiators also gave up things that would make the economic transformation of South Africa a possibility – often without knowing it. One such example was making the central bank independent – a fringe idea, even among right-wing US academics in 1994. And not only that, the newly independent bank wold be run by the man who ran it during apartheid, Chris Stals. The apartheid finance minister, Derek Keyes, would also remain in post.

One of the ANC’s economic advisors, Vishnu Padayachee, was asked by Klein if he thought that the negotiators had realised how much they had given up, he said: “Frankly, no. In the negotiations, something had to be given, and our side gave those things – I’ll give you this, you give me that”.

The ANC were simply outmanouvered on a number of economic issues that seemed less crucial at the time, but made the economic transformation outlined in the Freedom Charter impossible. Klein sums up the problems:

“Want to redistribute land? Impossible – at the last minute, the negotiators agreed to add a clause to the new constitution that protects all private property, making land reform virtually impossible. Want to create jobs for millions of unemployed workers? Can’t – hundreds of factories were actually about to close because the ANC had signed on to the GATT, the precursor to the World Trade Organisation, which made it illegal to subsidize the auto plants and textile factories. Want to get free AIDS drugs to the townships, where the disease is spreading with terrifying speed? That violates an intellectual property rights commitment under the WTO, which the ANC joined with no public debate  as a continuation of the GATT. Need money to build more and larger houses for the poor and to bring free electricity to the townships? Sorry, the budget is being eaten up servicing the massive debt, passed on quietly by the apartheid government. Print more money? Tell that to the apartheid-era head of the central bank. Free water for all? Not likely. The World Bank…is making private sector partnerships the service norm. Want to impose currency controls to guard against wild speculation? That would violate the $850 million IMF deal, signed, conveniently enough, right before the elections. Raise the minimum wage to close the apartheid income gap? Nope. The IMF deal promises ‘wage restraint’. And don’t even think about ignoring these commitments – any change will be evidence of dangerous national untrustworthiness, a lack of commitment to ‘reform’, an absence of a ‘rules-based system’. All of which will lead to currency crashes, aid cuts and capital flight. “

Patrick Bond, who worked as economic adviser in Mandela’s office during the early years of ANC’s rule (and wrote a recent blog post for WDM) recalls that the in-house quip in those years ‘Hey, we got the state, now where is the power’.

In this match, I hope that South Africa keeps it current form and beats Mexico. It would be great for the World Cup, great for South Africa and great for Africa generally. I’m cheering for South Africa.

Posted in: Mexico, South Africa, South Africa-Mexico

Views expressed here are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the World Development Movement.

Group A

South Africa

The host nation has had some great results recently, including beating Guatemala 5-0. Historically, home nations always do well, with six out of the seven World Cup champions winning on home turf. However, as the lowest-ranked country to ever host a World Cup, South Africa will struggle to make it past the first round.

In the run up to the World Cup, South Africa – 15th in the Who Should I Cheer For rankings – has received criticism over large numbers of evictions of vulnerable people to make room for World Cup infrastructure. War on Want is highlighting these issues through an interactive map of Cape Town.

Mexico

The attack-minded Mexicans, with Manchester United’s recent signing Javier Hernandez and Arsenal’s Carlos Vela, are one of the group favourites. Recent losses against England and The Netherlands have disappointed, but they beat Italy 2-1 in their last match before the World Cup.

Mexico, 28th in the Who Should I Cheer For rankings, spends the least on weapons out of all the countries in the World Cup. In the WDM office we are keen on the Zapatistas – a movement of indigenous people whose ideology, Zapatismo, is a combination of libertarian socialism, anarchism and traditional Mayan thought – with at least two staff members having been to visit them before starting at WDM.

The Zapatistas are vehemently opposed to neo-liberal globalisation, particularly the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) which has forced Mexico to end its crop subsidies while not placing similar conditions on the United States. NAFTA also forced Mexico to remove a section in its constitution which guaranteed indigenous people land rights. Their website is in Spanish but works quite well with Google translate if you don’t speak it.

Uruguay

The two-time World Cup winners also have an offensive team with Diego Forlan and Luis Suarez and beat Israel 4-1 in their last match before the World Cup. Only just qualifying after 1-0 win over Costa Rica in the South American play-off match, Uruguay is a bit of a wild card in this group.

Uruguay is the 21st most supportable team in the Who Should I Cheer For rankings and is one of only two countries – Slovakia being the other one – with no women at all in government. Uruguay will forever be remembered as the first ever nation to win the World Cup in 1930.

France

Les Bleus have a great team on paper and must be group favourites. However, they only just qualified through the controversial play off match against Ireland where the referee missed Thierry Henry’s handball.

France is the 18th most supportable team on the Who Should I Cheer For rankings and comes in middle of the table across all the indicators, although we at WDM think they should be shamed for falling short of the OECD’s aid target of 0.7% of GDP.

Group B

Greece

In the Greeks’ only previous appearance at a World Cup was 1994, they lost all their matches and didn’t score a single goal. But they did go on to win the European Championships in 2004. Theo Gekas of Bayer Leverkusen was the leading scorer in the European group stages of qualifying, scoring 10 goals.

It’s difficult to think about Greece at the moment without considering its economic crisis. Last month saw large protests as people feel that the harsh austerity measures imposed by the IMF will mainly affect the poor. Greece is 30th in the Who Should I Cheer For rankings, doing particularly badly on military spending. Perhaps that should be the first thing they cut?

Argentina

2010 sees the return of Maradona as manager of the team he infamously won with as a player in 1986. But will Lionel Messi be able to show the same brilliance that he’s shown all season for Barcelona – where he scored nearly 50 goals – in the World Cup? It remains to be seen. In Argentina – the birthplace of Che Guevara – the Church of Maradona was established in 1998 and now has over 100,000 worshippers.

Nigeria

The poorest country in the World Cup in terms of GDP per person but should have a reasonable chance of getting the second place, especially with new coach Lars Lagerbäck who took Sweden to five successive tournaments 2000 to 2008. Nigeria is the largest country in Africa in terms of population size – every fifth African is Nigerian.

South Korea

South Korea, who will probably be battling it out with Nigeria for the second place in this group, had an amazing run in 2002, beating Portugal in the groups stages before knocking out Spain and Italy on the way to the semi-finals. This year’s team also looks stronger than in 2006 where they got knocked out in the group stages.

South Korea also does badly in the Who Should I Cheer For rankings when it comes to military spending, perhaps countered by the fact that the head of the UN, Ban ki-moon is from the country.

Posted in: France, Group previews, Mexico, South Africa, Uruguay

Views expressed here are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the World Development Movement.