{"id":153532,"date":"2025-12-07T16:20:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-07T23:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=153532"},"modified":"2025-12-07T16:20:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-07T23:20:08","slug":"sri-lanka-and-indias-fake-industrialization-cannot-rebuild-the-country","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2025\/12\/07\/sri-lanka-and-indias-fake-industrialization-cannot-rebuild-the-country\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka and India\u2019s Fake Industrialization Cannot Rebuild the\u00a0Country"},"content":{"rendered":"

e-Con e-News<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n
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blog: eesrilanka.wordpress.com<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Before you study the economics, study the economists!<\/em>\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

e-Con e-News 30 November \u2013 06 December 2025<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018In Sri Lanka, there was a loss of village pasture land,<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

& a denudation of forests which caused soil erosion<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

& the silting up of water courses & paddy fields<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 SBD de Silva, The Political Economy of Underdevelopment (1982)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Mahaveli<\/strong>\u2019s waters have been turned brown for almost 2 centuries now. The English genocides of the Sinhala people in 1818 & 1848 first turned those silvery waters crimson. Then the felling of the green trees to set up plantations in the highlands from the 1840s, sparked off incessant muddy erosion. The loss of green cover & the slaughter of animals, sent elephants barrelling down into the fields of the maritimes to do battle with cultivators. It was a matter of time before the mountains trembled and tumbled, in slow then the-more-rapid collapse, as we have wretchedly witnessed in the past weeks. The big tea exporters & tourist-importers, still unperturbed by deeper inquiry, shamelessly continue to depict the rolling green tea bushes shrouding the hills as the epitome of the pristine<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     A cacophony of voices of the usual experts & economists have followed to mute the screams accompanying this \u2018freshwater tsunami\u2019. Their dullard voices that have led the country and the merchant- & moneylender-run import-export plantation economy they uphold, into this deadly abyss, have now been appointed to \u2018rebuild\u2019 what they first destroyed, before nature decided to mimic them (see ee Who\u2019s Who<\/em><\/strong>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     These economists have long loved to promote city-state Singapore \u2013 parking lot & runway for imperialist multinational corporations (MNCs) stalking the Southeast Asian hinterland for human & other resources \u2013 as a model for Sri Lanka. Meanwhile, socialist Cuba<\/strong>, blockaded & besieged & impoverished for almost 70 years by the most powerful imperialist the world has ever had the misfortune to experience, was recently also struck by the worst hurricane (Melissa) in history, yet was able to evacuate & protect almost 1 million people, with no casualties!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

     There is another irony about the media promoting Singapore as a model. What they have witnessed of Singapore are the lavish shopping malls, and what the yearn for, is its \u2018rule of law\u2019 aka authoritarianism (even while harboring fugitive former Central banker Arjuna \u2018Royal College\u2019 Mahendran). Yet Singapore is a modern industrialized state, which abhors subsistence-wage-paying sweatshops, which in English Sri Lanka cutely comprise \u2018Free Trade Zones\u2019. Trading what?<\/em> Free for whom?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Why does India repeatedly fail to industrialise?\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Your business elites do not want serious industrialisation<\/strong>\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They still have very strong links with financial capital which<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

doesn\u2019t like industrialisation <\/strong>because, for them, the most<\/p>\n\n\n\n

important thing is the rate of return\u2026 if you want to develop<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

a serious industrial base,<\/strong> you need to go through<\/p>\n\n\n\n

a period when finance is repressed<\/strong>.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 Ha-Joon Chang (see ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This ee <\/em><\/strong>reproduces the Hindu Frontline<\/em> magazine\u2019s brilliant interview with Korean economist Ha-Joon Chang, based at London\u2019s SOAS University. While he focuses on India, he could well be speaking of Sri Lanka as well (again, check our Who\u2019s Who<\/em> in ee<\/em><\/strong>s past, for the links between merchants and moneylenders). Chang openly challenges all the sacred shibboleths of our pack of paid running-dog economists. He states boldly, \u2018Developing countries cannot develop with free trade\u2019<\/strong>. Even the arch imperialist US President Don Trump has openly declared so-called \u2018free trade\u2019 as undermining industrialization in his country. Chang recalls how US-colonized Korea banned Japanese cars, to enable infant industry protection<\/strong>. And while he declares there\u2019s  been \u2018no serious attempt to develop manufacturing in India\u2019, Chang yet believes India (and Sri Lanka?) can still pursue industrialisation to ensure prosperity: \u2018No country has obtained a high standard of living without a serious degree of industrialisation<\/em><\/strong>.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Around 2,000 non-fatal occupational accidents<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

occur in the country every year, with an additional<\/p>\n\n\n\n

60-80 fatal <\/strong>accidents. However, these numbers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

are a fraction<\/strong> of the reality.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

MNCs, and the states that guard them, have weaponized human rights, women\u2019s & sexuality issues. In this week\u2019s ee Focus<\/em><\/strong>, Shiran Illanperuma shows how Brandix (whose CEO was just appointed by the President to \u2018rebuild\u2019 Sri Lanka), oppresses and injures its mainly female workforce (while giving itself awards for \u2018gender equity\u2019 etc). Brandix, reporting almost $1billion in profits in 2021 and supposedly Sri Lanka\u2019s single-largest apparel exporter<\/strong>, supplies sexy \u2018Western brands such as Gap<\/em>, Marks & Spencer<\/em>, Next<\/em>, Victoria\u2019s Secret\u2019<\/em>. Brandix & other corporate employers refuse to acknowledge that addressing health issues would and should reduce the number of days lost. This would help their much-trumpeted yearning for productivity. But it turns out to be a question of class power. They would rather keep the workers down, divided & weak, even if it means they forego the profits of industrialisation and long-term modernization?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 <\/strong>How did a relatively weak China & the USSR defeat 2 of the most powerful armies in the world \u2013 fascist Germany & Japan, even as the USA & Europe were aiding the fascists (as they still do)? When Japan<\/strong> conquered Malaya<\/strong> & the Dutch East Indies<\/strong> in early 1942, England lost its primary sources<\/strong> of many war materials. The English turned to slaughter-tapping rubber in Sri Lanka, headquartering their South East Asia Command (SEAC)<\/strong> in Kandy<\/strong>, basing 10,000s of troops here. ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> continues Roy Singham\u2019s amazing account of how the English imperialists also turned to Africa, which supplied most of the allies\u2019 industrial diamonds, cobalt, and gold. The little-known statistics he reveals to us are mind-boggling<\/strong> (& referenced in almost overwhelming detail). The English conscripted 100,000s of Africans as forced labor, and military recruits. They implemented their \u2018colonial formula of maximum extraction with minimum concern for African lives<\/strong>\u2019. Congo\u2019s<\/strong> miners<\/strong> provided uranium for the atom bombs used on Hiroshima & Nagasaki<\/strong>, digging out the radioactive materials with their bare hands!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     After WW2 was ended, the Europeans broke their promise to unchain countries under colonial bondage. They even refused to pay many African veterans, murdering those who demanded their wages. Those colonized who had survived fascism upfront now \u2018clearly recognized who their real enemy\u2019 was. Liberation wars soon erupted throughout Africa, \u2018led & influenced by socialist movements & leaders who had long experienced the West\u2019s duplicity\u2019. Socialism was key<\/strong> to the superior strategies & mass mobilization<\/strong> required to defeat fascism. In the largest organized migration in history, the USSR led by Joseph Stalin was able to evacuate 10 million industrial workers<\/strong> & families, and over 1,500 factories, out of the path of human history\u2019s biggest invasion ever, by Germany. Meanwhile, China, \u2018weak but vast, progressive<\/strong>, and with time on its side<\/strong>\u2019 was able, with Mao Zedong & the Communist Party\u2019s leadership, to smash a Japan that was \u2018strong but small, isolated, & barbaric<\/strong>\u2019. \u2018Socialist leadership did not just mobilise the masses; it outthought<\/strong> & outfought<\/strong> its enemies\u2019 who had \u2018every material advantage\u2019. How the USA & England then resurrected a zombie Japan & much of Asia as colonized footstools is a story crying to be told on another day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Who controls the Congo<\/strong>, controls Africa<\/em>, said Mao Zedong. Who control Africa controls the world. We are inspired to add: Who controls Sri Lanka, controls the Indian Ocean, and who controls the Indian Ocean controls the world! Sri Lanka also has many vital historical & modern links to Africa, which the English media suppresses; instead disparaging Africa as a negative model for Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Many of us grew up hearing the story of Patrice Lumumba<\/strong>, leader of the Congo, who was murdered by the USA & Europe (2 years after they murdered SWRD Bandaranaike). Indeed, Rohana Wijeweera, the founder of the JVP (People\u2019s Liberation Front), the leading constituent party of the now ruling Jana Jathika Jana Balawegaya (JJB, aka National People\u2019s Power, NPP), was a student at the Patrice Lumumba Peoples\u2019 Friendship University in the USSR (this too, another story crying to be told).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     The Congo, one of the resource-richest countries in the world<\/strong>, seems at first to contradict SBD de Silva\u2019s division of the globe into settler & non-settler colonies. The Congo is mainly seen as a non-settler colony like Sri Lanka, dominated by a mining & plantation economy. Belgian corporate capital & expatriate groups controlled the Congo due to the large investments in those sectors, and thwarted fuller growth. The Congo had \u2018to purchase more than half of its materials from Belgium and to employ Belgians to the extent of 60% of its European personnel\u2019. Land, mining concessions, finance & the Congolese budget required the agreement of the Belgian Parliament. Yet \u2013 as this ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> continues Chapter 4 of SBD\u2019s classic \u2013 we learn how Congo\u2019s Katanga province resolves this riddle. The strong influence of Flemish settlers from Belgium in Katanga turns out to be the \u2018hinge on which the Congo\u2019s economy revolved\u2019. The local staff of the companies had interests and an outlook similar to those of settlers, developing a local identity<\/strong>. Even as there was an \u2018enormous outflow of profits & of payments for banking, transportation & insurance services\u2019, there was a high level of reinvestment in the home market<\/strong>, which complemented the banking sector, with local agriculture feeding the entire country. We here read of how they created one of the world\u2019s most advanced working classes, giving birth to one of the Congo\u2019s greatest treasures, stolen & cut down in the prime of his life \u2013 Patrice Lumumba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018ISB<\/strong> holders became the largest creditor group among foreign creditors<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(What happened to the Chinese debt trap<\/em>?<\/strong>)\u2026 In negotiations with<\/p>\n\n\n\n

the ISB holders both foreign & local, Sri Lankan authorities<\/p>\n\n\n\n

signed a non-disclosure agreement<\/strong>.\u2019 (see ee<\/em><\/strong> Random Notes<\/em><\/strong>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why has there been no righteous outcry about this<\/strong> non-disclosure agreement<\/em><\/strong>? It also turns out that jurisdiction over this debt was moved from New York (where a recent law claims to prevent shylocking), to London! There is no gnashing of teeth because most of the ISB holders are from the US, England, Europe, India & Japan. While those economists & media & politicians, who cry loudest about corruption<\/em> being Sri Lanka\u2019s greatest issue, are funded by these same imperialists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     ee Focus<\/em><\/strong> continues Gustavus Myers\u2019 1917 History of Tammany Hall<\/em>, which shows how the so-called exposers of corruption can be the most corrupt. The merchant media in Sri Lanka excels in making \u2018corruption\u2019 the greatest crime, rather than merchantry & usury. In this episode, Myers wonders how the Tammany organization \u2018steeped in corruption and graft should so ostentatiously pretend to be the exposer and punisher of infractions in an official who had defied its power\u2019 thus eliciting \u2018mockery, resentment and indignation\u2019. He shows how in the age of so-called \u2018muckraking\u2019, <\/strong>when corporations were \u2018more and more rigorously scrutinized by official bodies\u2019, some corporations received government contracts that included \u2018exemption from supervision\u2019. Non-disclosure?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

     While lobbyists are legalized and are the real power in all capitalist legislatures, Myers\u2019 recalls how the chief legislative lobbyist<\/strong> in New York state was the distributor of a \u2018Yellow Dog Fund<\/strong>\u2019, maintained to pay off politicians sitting on certain oversight committees (Hint! Hint!). The Tammany organization, which went after politicians they couldn\u2019t control, impeached a New York state governor for \u2018refusing to be its tool\u2019. He had foolishly tried to ensure worker safety on trains\u2026 And \u2018compel honest dealings on the New York Stock Exchange\u2019 (a tool of monopoly, see ee Quotes<\/em><\/strong>, Marx), refusing \u2018control of public schools to a religious denomination\u2019, repealing a \u2018notorious charter\u2019 given to a private corporation to distribute water, and defied bosses \u2013 big & little, by refusing to be \u2018a rubber stamp\u2019 to promote corporation-friendly legislation & appointments to public office. Foolish indeed!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Photographs, Philanthropy, Warships, Drug Busts & Media<\/strong> \u2013 With all this blabber about AI, cyber security, digitalization, big data, this & that, how is it that all this so-called science never warned us about the oncoming disaster? Apparently, they did \u2013 it was just not translated into common sense practice, which turns out to be not that common. As least for a merchant media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Isn\u2019t there something also corrupt about ensuring the media is available with flashing cameras to announce every donation and promise of philanthropy? And why send \u2018warships\u2019 to deliver aid? Nobody asks. We are instead treated to headlines like, the<\/em><\/strong> IMF is \u2018considering\u2019<\/em><\/strong>\u2026 the IMF is \u2018pledging\u2019<\/em><\/strong>. But how & when these promises even materialize, we are not told. Will we have to import their second-hand machines & then pay some more? Again, rather than us owing debt, shouldn\u2019t AI tell them, that after 500 years of European invasions, it is they who owe us?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Why does every embassy inform the media to be present, then bribe the media to report that they \u2018promised\u2019 such & such an amount? Why doesn\u2019t the government simply publish a list every day of the donations made by whom, in alphabetical order or by descending order of donations? And then there are the publicized drug busts. Isn\u2019t it suspicious that the customs or police officials have to have their photographs taken & published whenever they do their job? Again, why isn\u2019t there a simple list of how much the customs or police busted per day or per week? Why publish their photos? Doesn\u2019t this also risk criminals taking their revenge on such persons? Or, are they\u2026?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Then there are corporates & NGOs having photographs taken of themselves, as they hand over a cheque, which may bounce. Why do we have to have a large front-page headlined picture of a smiling white woman baring her white teeth, with her fashionista glasses over her head, announcing UNICEF\u2019s approximate numerals (275,000) of children gravely affected by the cyclone? How did they count so fast, when roads & rivers are still impassable? Did Elon Musk\u2019s satellites help? We know that NGOs have to compete for funds in such moments, or show how their philanthropy is in the picture. But our Buddhist culture dictates that claiming credit for merit negates. Or perhaps it\u2019s for tax avoidance purposes?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2022 AI & Labor<\/strong> \u2013 If Artificial Intelligence were really intelligent it would know that it is capitalists who are threatening labour and not the technology itself. AI, if it\u2019s really smart, would protest! If, it\u2019s truly intelligent it would make sure that no workers suffer such threats or consequences. It would explain how the capitalists could be replaced. However, we know that it is workers themselves who have to harness AI to do that. AI is not that smart by itself. Meanwhile, they are blaming industrialization for global warming. But what about global warring? How hot are these forever cold wars? And as for these US-funded thinktanks & NGOS like the \u2018Centre for a Smart Future\u2019 \u2013 well, we would just like a future!<\/strong> That would be really smart\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

_________<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Contents:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Sri Lanka and India\u2019s Fake Industrialization Cannot Rebuild the Country<\/a><\/blockquote>