Toward a Better World: Memoirs of a Life in International and Development Economics by Gerry Helleiner
| Date | 01 March 2019 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0020702019831409 |
| Author | Paul Kingston |
| Published date | 01 March 2019 |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
The narrative and geographic approach may be the reason that there is no single
argument that summarizes the book. This is not a work like that of Francis
Fukuyama or Thomas Piketty, both of whom sought to wrap up their arguments
in one great theory. That being said, the author does have definite viewpoints.
Throughout the work is an implicit argument which blames neo-liberalism and
what he sees as its version of globalism for many of the world’s ills. The agent
behind the neo-liberal agenda is, most of all, the United States, though Britain and
other Western powers share some of the blame. Still, it is the American ‘‘leviathan’’
which has since World War II interfered in nation after nation and imposed an
international economic order to further its own interests. Corrupt regimes have
been propped up and progressive ones undermined if it suited US interests. Even
what might be termed the grand international order that emerged at the end of the
war, or the aid efforts to poorer countries, are viewed skeptically as American/
Western devices to prop up globalization. At one point, looking at the right to
protect doctrine, Mason comments cynically that it really means ‘‘code for the right
to invade. Picture French Paras and American drones flying about with Jeffrey
Sachs and Bono hymning in the background about poverty’’ (193).
Of course, Mason finds many partners in this pattern. He reserves special scorn
and condemnation for the petty rulers, whether dictators or corrupt ‘‘democracies’’
that enrich themselves and their cronies at the expense of the people. The type
varies depending on the region and history, from the Shah of Iran to the military
dictators of Argentina to pretty much anyone in the Congo, at least after Patrice
Lumumba was murdered with the support of Belgium and the United States. The
Lumumba incident is important to Mason’s argument. Where the exception does
arise to these corrupt rulers, he argues, the major powers won’t hesitate to remove
them if necessary.
The result of Western intervention and a globalist-neo-liberal agenda leads
Mason to a pessimistic assessment of the state of the world. Rising inequality in
a wide range of nations, corruption and poverty, the harsh impact of neo-liberal
globalization, and the rise of Trumpism as the impact becomes apparent, all point
to a dubious future. I said there was no grand theory in the style of Fukuyama, but
there is certainly a tone. It is, as he says, ‘‘a long way from the America as the
terminus of world progress expressed in the ‘End of History’ thesis’’ (246).
Gerry Helleiner
Toward a Better World: Memoirs of a Life in International and Development Economics
Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018. 344 pp. $75.00 (cloth)
ISBN: 978-1-487-50221-8
Reviewed by: Paul Kingston (kingston@chass.utoronto.ca), University of Toronto
Toward a Better World is the professional autobiography of Gerry Helleiner,
a noted Canadian international development economist, a long-time professor of
Economics at the University of Toronto, and a recipient of the Order of Canada in
Book Reviews 177
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