Reduced Inequalities

The environment industry, which includes a wide range of products and services relating to the monitoring, treatment, control and management of industrial and domestic pollution, has grown rapidly during the 1980s and 1990s as a response to environmental regulations. Due to the relatively early application of these regulations in the United States, Europe and Japan, these areas have become competitive producers and exporters of environmental products and services. As the industrial sector has developed, environmental awareness has been raised and competition and international trade in the environment industry have expanded.

This article contends that the rapid development of Latin America and the Caribbean - a region rich in natural resources- will depend on how fast it learns to industrialize and process its natural resources and to develop the necessary suppliers of inputs, engineering services and equipment for this. Consequently, this will not be a form of development based on the mere extraction of natural resources, as at present, but rather one based on the processing of such resources and the development of the activities that naturally tend to spring up and concentrate around this base (production complexes or clusters).

This article studies the effect of the stabilization of fiscal expenditure and the anti-cyclical use of taxes as stabilization variables in the Chilean economy, through the calibration of a basic macro-economic model adapted to the actual conditions of that economy. The results show that some 25% of the variability of economic growth could be eliminated by obviating fiscal cyclical impulses through constant growth of public investment and consumption and through anti-cyclical taxes. On the one hand, it is proposed that a system of stabilization of the growth of fiscal expenditure should be established, through a system of rules and degrees of flexibility subject to specific clauses.

First of all, I would like to express my satisfaction at being here in Central America, and to thank our hosts warmly and sincerely for their support. The United Nations in general and the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean in particular owe a great deal to Costa Rica for its unwavering support over the years, especially since President Jose Figueres Olsen assumed office. Our gratitude is also due to this country for its important contributions to intraregional cooperation and especially to Central American integration. This occasion demonstrates again the unfailingly constructive contribution which President Figueres and his Administration have made to strengthening our relationship of interdependence.

This article looks at the strengths and weaknesses of the policies proposed in the Argentine National Multi-year Science and Technology Plan, 1998-2000, within the conceptual framework of the National Innovation System (NIS) approach. In the light of a severe diagnosis of the weaknesses of Argentine efforts in this field, the new public policies are designed to promote the interaction of the many agents and institutions involved in those efforts, to change the rules governing the allocation of public resources to research, to promote strategic plans and evaluation mechanisms in public bodies in this field, and to induce greater voluntary spending by the private sector through fiscal credits for technological research and development and a Technological Advisers Programme, in order to give better attention to the demands of small and medium-sized enterprises. However, there are very profound and severe shortcomings in the ability of the Argentine financial system to provide finance for longterm investments in intangible assets, in the capacity of the educational system to link up with the needs of the production sector, and in the ability of the scientific institutions to interact with the educational system and the production sector. Although these shortcomings are mentioned in the Plan, they are not given the amount of attention needed to begin to reverse them. The long and frustrating past history of science and technology policies in the country, which have registered more failures than successes, and the partial success of the laissez-faire policy applied in the 1990s, which was considered to be a good policy by most of domestic and foreign big business, militate against the success of the initiatives under way. At the same time, and in spite of its stimulating suggestions, the approach taken by the NIS reflects serious ambiguities in its normative and conceptual aspects which limit its practical applicability.

The World Summit for Social Development, held in Copenhagen on 11 and 12 March 1995, brought up once more the ideals which gave rise to the United Nations at the San Francisco Conference and which have since been reasserted in many forums of the Organization. The maintenance of peace and security, although an irreplaceable element in the peaceful coexistence of nations, was not the only objective of that Conference, however: it also sought to lay the foundations for a form of coexistence which would make possible more harmonious development. The United Nations Charter which emerged from that meeting was the clear expression of a humanistic spirit and of the quest for democratic ideals and values which made human beings the centre of governments’ concern.

This article analyses defence and security spending (DSS) in Colombia, on the assumption that in order to gain a better idea of the effect of such spending on economic growth and the public finances it would be desirable to analyse its internal composition, since this would make it possible to infer its impact on the production of defence and security. In order to do this, various theories on the repercussions of military expenditure are reviewed and defence and security spending in Colombia is analysed on the basis of information from the Office of the Comptroller-General of the Republic. The efficiency of spending on the armed forces and the National Police is then examined, especially as regards the relations between combat and support and attack and defence, and it is shown that the military forces need to be reorganized. In the conclusions, various ways of securing savings on the defence budget are proposed. The most important of these are connected with personnel management, as payroll expenses represent 73% of total spending. The proposals made in this respect are to modify the system of pay and allowances, increase the retirement age, reduce the number of personnel and restructure the proportions between combat forces and support and administrative personnel.

In the present article the author continues and expands the critical analysis of peripheral capitalism which he began in another that was published in the first issue of this Review. His central contention is that in peripheral societies the development process — whereby the accumulation of capital in the form of goods and training of human resources makes it possible to step up the productivity of the labour force and thus to increase the total product— is not carried out with the necessary efficiency at the social and even, in many cases, at the economic level.

Governments now have very wide experience in promoting development and achieving better levels of income by means of macroeconomic and sectoral policies. Nevertheless, their experience is limited and they have not been very successful in guaranteeing the environmental sustainability of the projects they undertake and, thus helping to assure income sources.

There is an obvious imbalance between the magnitude of women’s contribution to Latin American and Caribbean economies and the scope of actions and policies aimed at women. The same imbalance is seen between women’s contribution and the benefits they receive through their participation in regional development.

This article analyses the current interna) and external situation of the various countries of Latin America and poses the question of whether this situation closes the door on the growth prospects of the region in the 1990s or, on the contrary, creates conditions and opportunities for the restoration of growth.

Equity has been a publicly endorsed norm since the achievement of Independence. Various researches have demonstrated, however, that in spite of this ethical and legal commitment, highly concentrated patterns of distribution of income, wealth and power, as well as inequitable access to State services, still persist in the region.

The intention of this article is to provide certain guidelines and experiences in an area that has been characterized by a good deal of complexity and confusion. Numerous business publications have presented the ease in favour of debt/equity conversion (DEC) programmes, usually from a simplified and orthodox macroeconomic perspective which justifies them in terms of the potentiai double benefit of both reducing the existing external debt (and therefore future debt service) and increasing investment (and therefore future growth) in struggling developing countries.

This article presents a detailed analysis of the situation of the Argentine telephone system prior to 1990 and evaluates the process of its subsequent privatization. Its main conclusion is that the previous situation of a State quasi-monopoly will probably end in a private oligopoly.

At the present time, Central American society is faced with the task of simultaneously furthering a process of market liberalization and the development and consolidation of political systems of a liberal-democratic nature. Reconciling the market economic project with the democratic political project in the conditions of social polarization prevailing in the region is of course a colossal task. In it, Central American entrepreneurs will have a vitally important role to play, not only as economic but also as political actors. For them to be able to contribute to the quest for a just and effective balance between the market and democracy, profound changes must take place in the thinking which guides the actions of entrepreneurs in Central America, and hence also in the content and orientation of management training programmes in the region.

This article analyses the experiences of a group of Latin American and Caribbean countries with high inflows of external capital in 1992-1996 and places them within the context of the capital movements which have taken place in the region since 1977. Over the last two decades, capital flows to the region have been marked by their great variability: periods of high inflows of capital have alternated with periods of low inflows. In the three-year period 1992-1994, there was a heavy inflow of capital which was concentrated in a few countries, was more volatile because its composition changed in the direction of portfolio investments, and continued to be high in 1995-1996 in some countries.

This article takes stock of the situation caused by the Asian financial crisis and analyses the various proposals made for dealing with it so as to avoid its repetition; it is concluded that financial globalization has destabilized the potentially favourable effects of the process of opening up to international trade and productive investment. It notes that while the 1997 financial crisis did not have the deflationary consequences of the 1929 crisis, thanks to the institutional changes made when policy-makers reacted to it, the generalization of export-led growth strategies tends to repeat situations of over-production, further aggravated by the volatility of international capital flows. There is now a feeling that the twenty-first century should mark a dual turning-point: on the one hand, a better balance should be sought between domestic growth and outward-looking policies, and on the other hand –and above all– a number of reforms designed to avoid further great financial crises should be put into effect. A debate is currently under way on the relative merits of various options in this respect: negotiation of a new international system; a Brady Plan for banks; stricter application of prudential regulations; greater transparency of short-term capital movements; the expansion of new options markets, or even the establishment of a Tobin Tax. It would be dangerous to make major structural changes in the productive and social organization of the world’s economies solely in response to the pressures of the international financial markets. Lastly, the formation of regional integration areas represents a middle way between internationalization in all directions and a protectionist withdrawal behind national frontiers. At all events, notable changes may be expected compared with the 1990s.

This article analyses the systems of regulation of the natural gas market in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia and Mexico, which are the Latin American countries that have made most progress in this field, and it also presents some information on countries which had not yet defined their regulatory systems at the time of writing, such as Peru and Venezuela. First of all, it describes the situation of the natural gas industry worldwide and defines Latin America’s place in it. It then studies the changes that have taken place in natural gas regulation systems in the region in the 1990s, especially with regard to the treatment given to exploration and production, and industrial processing, transport and marketing. The main features of the natural gas markets in the countries studied are then described, as well as the systems adopted for restructuring the industry, with special emphasis on the role of natural gas in regional energy integration. Finally, the article analyses the main features of natural gas regulation and the principles underlying it; the structure and powers of the regulatory bodies; the mechanisms for fixing the prices of extraction, transport and distribution; the different forms of subsidies, and the tax regime.

This article analyses the reduction of labour costs as a factor which helps to raise the competitiveness of industrial enterprises. It first reviews non-wage labour costs, both for workers with permanent contracts and those with only temporary contracts, or with no contracts at all, in order to show the differences that exist in non-wage labour costs according to the type of contract of the workers or their unregistered status, and the impact of these differences on the labour costs for each type of worker and the average labour costs. It then goes on to consider the evolution of labour costs in industry and the different levels they assume according to the deflator used, because of the changes in relative prices which accompanied the early years of the economic and trade openness process which has taken place in the region. It then analyses the evolution of labour costs in industry by type of contract and the changes in the average labour costs in the sector brought about by the dual strategy of reducing non-wage labour costs and changing the contract structure of industrial employment; describes the effect of exchange-rate lag on average labour costs and competitiveness, and calculates how the latter would have evolved if there had not been such a lag. Finally, some proposals are made for raising the competitiveness of labour in the countries of the region.

Social capital means the set of norms, institutions and organizations that promote trust and cooperation among persons in communities and also in wider society. In those formulations of the social capital paradigm (and of the neoinstitutional economics on which they are partly based) which focus on its collective manifestations, it is claimed that stable relationships based on trust and cooperation can reduce transaction costs, produce public goods and facilitate the constitution of social actors and even of sound civil societies. Community social capital is a particular form of social capital which comprises the informal content of institutions that aim to contribute to the common good. Even some of the foundational authors of the social capital paradigm have doubts about the feasibility of creating such capital in groups where it does not already exist. The peasant communities of Chiquimula (Guatemala) covered by the anti-poverty “Support Project for Small-scale Producers of Zacapa and Chiquimula” (PROZACHI) displayed a relatively individualistic culture of dependence and domination yet at the same time had a broad and dynamic repertoire of various norms, including some which could serve as a symbolic support for solidary and reciprocal practices. Chiquimula seemed to lack social capital institutions, but with the recovery of institutional practices of the past and the emergence of new contexts and opportunities for developing new group strategies it has been possible to create social capital in these communities, with external support and training, and thus turn an excluded sector into a social actor on the micro-regional scene.

The objective of this paper is to calculate a simple integrated macro-model for the Caribbean subregion. Using a homogeneous data set that runs from 1980 to 1991 for a sample of 12 countries in the subregion and a fairly simple model with non-controversial specifications for the structural relationships, we generate a representative and consistent group of estimates for a given set of parameters in pooled and individual country estimations.

The current celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the United Nations is a suitable moment for reflection and analysis of the Organization’s role in promoting, guaranteeing and defending human rights.