I am reading this book in English, so I decided to abbreviate the main ideas in English too. Because it is something very complicated to translate it into Mongolian, despite the fact that I am understanding very well , it's a hard to find a right Mongolian word to display exact meaning.
1. So close yet so different
Actually if there is no point of studying past and history, if you're not gonna learn from the past mistakes and learn from the history. I find it useful to comprehend our similar traits in stages of failing and growing up as a country, by comparing with those countries which had been through our like situation and events.
So enjoyed reading this book very much. Plus I am spiced up this time's lesson with an interesting economics' a short video lecture relating to the topic.
The city of Nogales is cut in half by a fence. If you look at the north side of the fence , you will see Nigolas Arizona Santa Cruz County , average household is 30000 USD a year , the majority of the adults are at least high school graduates, population is healthy and have a high life expectancy by global standards. Health care system is just one of many services provided by government which is most taken for granted , such as electricity ,telephones , a sewage system , public health , a road network linking them to another cities and to rest of the US, law and order.On the other hand , in south of the fence , Nogales Sonaro ,residents live there live in a relatively prosperious part of Mexico , though average household is about one third that in Nogales , Arizona.The Most of population even don't have ahigh school education and many teenagers are not in a school, infant mortality possibility is high , public health care system is poor , and law and order are in worse condition.
Why Latin American countries such as Mexico came to this point ? We have to dig all through back t the history and what exactly happened here it is...
In early 14th century , first Spanish colonist ghost started twinkling on the Eastern seaboard of South America, Juan Diaz de Solis. i don't wanna mentio such a boring details of which year,what ship carried which things from S.A to Spain. Early history of colonism of Spain over South America suggests main traits which still has an effect on those countries' constitutional structure and mindset and general patterns of how a country begins to be colonized by a higher power or a high claimed forced power.
1. in late 14th century , Spanish colonism and expansion in South American territory has one significant goal which was to carry all the possible natural resource , which at that time , mainly was gold and silver.To make and keep indigenous people uneducated and far from elite circle.A need in a lot of mines and miners leads to slavery forced or forced by repressing kings of S.A.Shortly ,attempt of Spanish strategized colonialism in South America was success. They convinced the headquerters of country with money and privilege to have unequal political rights and centralized only in hands of those local elites who are under an indirect and direct control of Spanish colonists.
2. after a century , in late of 15th century,England joins late for the hunting game of colonialism in North America. To Jamestown.(Virginia Company refers collectively to two joint stock companies chartered by James I on 10 April 1606[1][2][3] with the purposes of establishing settlements on the coast of North America.[4] The two companies, called the "Virginia Company of London" (or the London Company) and the "Virginia Company of Plymouth") England's Virgina Company's goal is failed.As North America developed , english elites tried time and time again to set up institutions that would heavily restrict the economic and political rights for all but a privileged few of the inhabitants of the colony, just as Spanish did.yet in each case ,model broke down.
So Question is now why not North America didn't fall into the temptation but Mexico did ? because of what ?
Because political rights were evenly distributed in the constitutions of America just so distributed so no one could have capacity buy that political right from those or scratch that right from their hand. On the other hand , in Mexico political right was in hand of oligopoly. If you can convince them with money and fame , it was easy to steer their power into advantage of colonists.
The world was changing in the 1870's and 80 's , no exception for the Latin America. Industrial revolution 1 and 2 , a lot had changed , there are more opportunity for foreign trade, transportation , and industrialization. Mexico was also aware of that kind of change,few could have had a chance to get rich by exporting natural resources and raw materials to the North America and Western Europe.Opening up to the globalization led not to the similar results for Latin America.It led to a further divergence , shaped by the existing institutional differences.
to be continued
Actually when i read books which underline the problems in a society including crack dealing ,discrimination and intercultural difference, i get suddenly dispatched from the topic and disinterested because first of all, Mongolia is not that much diversified and even in diversified areas such as business environment and cultural exchange institutions , we are a kind of people who has a mere understanding of discrimination which was never such a big deal till it should be mentioned in books and mass media.We are all treated even in society , at least , in my surrounding i have grown up ,there was no such thing as discrimination.Second, Crack dealing , No way ! Not in my country ! maybe bad drinking habit and smoking has been a farther problem for adults than air pollution.You will find not a single trait of crack dealing there.But despite the facts that these exotic and far topics were not in my scale of interest, i still found the particular book quite intriguing.
Because the book build bridge and correlation between our daily basis issues with Economic development and reason why certain areas in a country shows underdevelopment in education and income.
It seemed to me like some of the cause- result is real struggle in my society so in order to prevent a negativeness , some of them could be applied maybe. Specifically when the topic comes to "the crime dropping explanation".... I couldn't understand second chapter very well, so i won't talk about it too much.
Here are the main chains of the cause and result mentioned in the book.
1.A raise in number of Child borns, in a poor environment with care of poor parents or single parent with low income and shallow education - a raise in probability of crime occurance - a lot of prosperity in a hidden side of economy which avoids tax and responsibility for compensation to cover caused disruption- economics development slows down.
Crime drop explanations :
Innovative policing strategies
Increased reliance on prisons , reliance on execution law
Changes in crack and other drug markets
Aging of population
tougher gun control law
strong economy - when situation gets better, there is tendency among criminals not to do what they usually do
increased number of police
increase use of capital punishment , concealed weapons , laws , gun paybacks , and others.
2. A Desire to show a better performance and give better result- Give teachers a higher incentive based on their students' performance and grade - teachers will want to have incentive one way or another-they cheat -better results- rotten inside school system - lower education - lower income - worse economic situation
Incenive - Moral hazard in a society
3. A good parenting - child's destiny dependes on it , if childs gonna be successful in life or gonna be criminal - again a good parenting will depending on parents' education and income . environment which could be supplied to child -environment the child is growing up
a good parenting - cultural difference - balck and white culture difference - because of education and income gap, to afford better or worse living condition and surrounding
4. Black community in USA , Black community's destiny is determined by surrounding and network of between them. No matter how hard you try to escape from the culture and pretend to be a white , networking between them and perception by white makes it difficult to give them normal job vacancies in society and pushes blacks to the option of mingling with black community again. On this topic , recently , i watched this movie so called " Blue Moonlight ". I found it interesting when topic and issue overlaps with the book i recently read. Plus, it is interesting because it is so far from me.
Black community simply offers blacks life which is so different and extreme dangerous related business such as crack dealing , buying and selling , fighting between black gangs , in order to be in highest level among themselves.Because this risky community business gives only to the higher executives benefits. That's why in every gang , food soldier who ends up selling and buying cocaine , crack and soon , standing in the street whole day , they still live together with their moms.That's why maybe young food soldier's biggest passion and ambition is to track up to the tops of their chain business.
5. It uncovers some intriguing facts such as positive correlation between number of pools and number of child death. In order to be a perfect parent , you have to be cautious and careful about your kid's school selection, environment , even kid's friends hanging out together and their surrounding.
Generally speaking , mass media sometimes overestimates some data by showing it like a tremendous main reason for the result.For instance , One might think that a right to own gun freely and legally might be reason of a high homicide, violent crime, burglary or pickpocket and danger for children. But actually while mass media was bubbling about it many times, statistic shows that owning pool behind your house or near from your house is the greatest danger for kids rather than owning a gun.
6. Name of blacks and name of white - CV - chance of getting job - gap of income in later ages and years of the life
Can you believe that someone who's in a charge of human resource can recognize your background just by seeing your name on the CV before calling you up for the interview. A lot of stereotype around the black community they say. But when it proves that stereotype is to be true , it is not longer stereotype , it is an easy measurement to sort out CV pool, to choose few which are standing out with their perfect name and background. At the same time, perfect background means you can trust on that person on some level. That's why black community stands alittle chance even after graduating from top universities. This book explains like that.
My general view on the book is well if i become Economics lecturer, i wouldn't recommend it as a literature. For Amuteur reader like me would pick it up naturally by coincidence and would enjoy reading it.
