Palestine in the Middle East: Opposing Neoliberalism and US Power
July 15, 2008
Part 1 Part 2
Adam Hanieh
Over the last six months, the Palestinian economy has been radically transformed under a new plan drawn up by the Palestinian Authority (PA) called the Palestinian Reform and Development Plan (PRDP). Developed in close collaboration with institutions such as the World Bank and the British Department for International Development (DFID), the PRDP is currently being implemented in the West Bank where the Abu Mazen-led PA has effective control. It embraces the fundamental precepts of neoliberalism: a private sector-driven economic strategy in which the aim is to attract foreign investment and reduce public spending to a minimum.
Understanding the logic of this economic framework is critical to assessing the current juncture of the Palestinian struggle. The neoliberal vision underpinning these policies is a central corollary to the political direction promoted by the Israeli government, the Palestinian Authority (PA) and their US and European Union (EU) supporters. The aim, as the first part of this article explains, is to formalize a truncated network of Palestinian-controlled cantons and associated industrial zones, dependent upon the Israeli occupation, and through which a pool of cheap Palestinian labour is exploited by Israeli, Palestinian and other regional capitalist groups. The evolving institutional framework for the Palestinian economy not only incorporates the Israeli occupation into the way 'development' is conceived, but also acts to foster the culpability of Palestinian political and economic elites for how these structures operate.
Such an analysis, however, is only part of the story. The second part of this article argues that these changes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip cannot be fully understood without an appreciation of the regional framework of the Middle East. Over the last two decades, and particularly accelerating under the Bush administration, the US has pursued a policy of integrating its bases of support in the region within a single, neoliberal economic zone tied to the US through a series of bilateral trade agreements. This vision is aimed at promoting the free flow of capital and goods (but not necessarily labour) throughout the Middle East region. The region's markets will be dominated by US imports, while cheap labour, concentrated in economic 'free' zones owned by regional and international capital, will manufacture low-cost exports destined for markets in the US, EU, Israel and the Gulf.
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Part 1 Part 2
Adam Hanieh
Over the last six months, the Palestinian economy has been radically transformed under a new plan drawn up by the Palestinian Authority (PA) called the Palestinian Reform and Development Plan (PRDP). Developed in close collaboration with institutions such as the World Bank and the British Department for International Development (DFID), the PRDP is currently being implemented in the West Bank where the Abu Mazen-led PA has effective control. It embraces the fundamental precepts of neoliberalism: a private sector-driven economic strategy in which the aim is to attract foreign investment and reduce public spending to a minimum.
Understanding the logic of this economic framework is critical to assessing the current juncture of the Palestinian struggle. The neoliberal vision underpinning these policies is a central corollary to the political direction promoted by the Israeli government, the Palestinian Authority (PA) and their US and European Union (EU) supporters. The aim, as the first part of this article explains, is to formalize a truncated network of Palestinian-controlled cantons and associated industrial zones, dependent upon the Israeli occupation, and through which a pool of cheap Palestinian labour is exploited by Israeli, Palestinian and other regional capitalist groups. The evolving institutional framework for the Palestinian economy not only incorporates the Israeli occupation into the way 'development' is conceived, but also acts to foster the culpability of Palestinian political and economic elites for how these structures operate.
Such an analysis, however, is only part of the story. The second part of this article argues that these changes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip cannot be fully understood without an appreciation of the regional framework of the Middle East. Over the last two decades, and particularly accelerating under the Bush administration, the US has pursued a policy of integrating its bases of support in the region within a single, neoliberal economic zone tied to the US through a series of bilateral trade agreements. This vision is aimed at promoting the free flow of capital and goods (but not necessarily labour) throughout the Middle East region. The region's markets will be dominated by US imports, while cheap labour, concentrated in economic 'free' zones owned by regional and international capital, will manufacture low-cost exports destined for markets in the US, EU, Israel and the Gulf.
--MORE--