Socially things are quite lively as well. i met another chappie who said that I could bring records to an event he works on, and I may be playing an art festival in January. I love these networks of people.. it really is how things get done. Not that merit is irrelevant, but it's really as much or more about culture. We understand each other (in this context anyway.. when I talk about school the music people tend to glaze over a lot).

I'm still not easting quite right. Food is so expensive, but packing a lunch takes planning, and I've been drinking coffee for breakfast or lunch too much. But until I get more exercise I'm not going to fret about it. this Sunday I'm heading out to buy a cheap used (i.e. stolen) bicycle. independence!!

10/7/99 Okay I had my first class today where I really felt 'this is it!' Historic Analysis of Economic Change. the most amusing thing was a little bit at the end of the lecture: "Things Economists Tend not to Worry About"

• Convincing both historians and economists.
  
• Interrogating sources/ Worrying how data is constructed.
  
• Technical Limits to Economics
  
• Taking Institutions Seriously

Two nights ago, I watched a lot of BBC television. Several documentaries, plus some news. It was interesting infuriating, and strangely interrelated. The first doc. was part of a series on WWII, specifically the German invasion of Russia. It had a lot of interview with elderly men who had been soldiaers in the Soviet Army or in the Nazi army. It was quite weird to see all the old men with the subtitles talking and laughing, who had been in the SS.. It made me feel strange. And the resonating phrase was: "at the time, that's what we believed was correct, but of course now we know differently". As though i can be a nazi (an SS oficer, too, not a rankandfile conscript farmer from some village) and whoops it's just an error in my thinking which I can fix. I do believe that the challenge of history and art is often to explain how ordinary people can do terrible things, but i don't thing that means they get to be ordinary people again very easily afterwards. And it doesn't make the terrible things ordinary. and i know these guys may not have had it easily, but it was hard to take the twinkle-eyed shrugging going on, it made my stomach hurt.
Then there was a documentary on the 1982 Toxteth(Liverpool) riots. which was fascinating and wicked annoying because the filmmakers were obviously really excited to use every single AVID trick they could and it seriously interfered with the information ("ooh.. stop motion! color treatments! text and image! fast-forward! ominous music! I'm suprised they didn't start morphing people). Like many riots in the 70s and 80s in the states, these riots were in a poor mixed-race community, inspired by unemployment, lack of external investment, and terrible policing. Especially the familiar (to us bostonians and many others) "stop and search" policy. The Police Commissioner at the time had this trenchant comment, before the riots: "this is a criminal community and it will be policed accordingly." An earthworm (if asked) would have predicted riots to follow in the months or years after this statement. The riots lasted for over three days but included interesting moments of organization, such as: police were attacked, but when a nursing home was threatened by flames, the fighting stopped and people evacuated the building in 25 minutes, allowing ambulances in (but no cops) and riding shotgun with the ambulances, and protecting the building from looters. A representative from Thatcher's government arrived to view the scene. A current interview with him has this jerk implying that as he viewed the rubble he thought it was engineered to challenge the Tory administration. This particular rightwing logic and self-involvedness, as if nobody has motives independent of rightwing concerns. The locals elected a militant labor city council was elected, but they did not have a race-conscious critique. Like many old, and unfortunately some not-so-old lefties, they believed that class was the overarching concern. While recognizing the very real truth that white people participated in the riots and felt persecuted by the police and penalized for living in Toxteth, they ignored the fact that police pursued racist policies, and black youth were overhwelmingly targeted. the council appointed a Black Londoner (this is liverpool, remember) as their community liason. he did not believe there was a racial component. this caused further animosity. A former member of that council says that appointing that man was the gravest tactical error that could have been committed, and their concern with 'not focusing overly on race' (when in government has that been the problem --too much attention to race?) although "at the time, seemed like a good idea, looking back it was a mistake." strange echoes.
then the news, in which that vicious but approaching doddery Thatcher said "all our problems have come from Europe and all our solutions have come from the English-speaking nations." somehow reminded me of "this is a criminal community it will be policed accordingly." this conservative logic: 1)We have a problem dealing with these people, 2)therefore they are A Problem. I can't even write more about it right now. it's just too infuriating. suffice to say i have resumed my habit of yelling at the tv.

10/6 So I'm somewhat back.. I've been here over a month, with numerous computer access problems etc. etc. Once again, I'm going to have to archive my past month's history for ya, so you can catchup. But for now I'll start a point zero THIS MINUTE. bang. zoom.

I'm sitting in a student computer room before my third class this week begins at 2:30. I'm in a bit of a dilemma, because the main course I had wanted to take here: History of Economic Thought: is not being offered this year. So of the three courses that I take as a MSc student, one of them is going to be totally out-of-the-blue.

I looked at an Econ class (not econhist), Economics of Regional and Urban Planning. First session seemed a little dry, a little ahistorical. The class is for the Regional and Urban Planning program, a very policy and right-now-oriented course. Came off as practical, 'applied' economics...the historian in me kicks up a fuss. Example: prof summarized by saying we want to study how to choose the best allocation of given resources. This is called static optimization of resources. Not what I'm most interested in. Sure, all resources are static at any given moment in time, but over time one can develop them, right? I'm interested in how one can make policy to overcome scarcities over time. or something. One really interesting thing was the real difference between this english prof's summary of economic approaches and the way american profs do it: she describe three schools of thought: mainstream, conservative and marxist. (She said) the mainstream school's goal is maximising social welfare. This is SO different from what my profs in the states have said! most profs I have had and read talk about the objective being stimulating economic growth, or increasing efficiency. Mentioning social welfare brands you as kind of wussy or out-there, or pinko, or at least not as much of a 'real' economist. She also said in passing "since we know that markets are imperfect," unfortunately, many american profs don't seem to take this for granted. those are the people she characterized as "conservatives" --milton friedman, the u of chicago school.

Interestingly, my german friend couldn't believe this about american economists. Of course, Germany has one of the longest traditions of social welfare policy. And the US tradition is totally different. He couldn't believe that there was a cultural difference. "those are just bad economists" he said. But economics is written and theorized within a cultural context. And considering America is a maverick nation in many ways compared to Europe and Britain too, most specifically in relation to welfare issues. And I grew up in it so it's been demonstrated to me. To many people the reality of no socialized medicine is just as unbelievable. but there you have the mindset that doesnot take maximising social welfare as its goal. It is the rule more than the exception. sigh..

The urban studies course didn't seem like it would be really difficult, but I was already itching to look at case studies, or at how things change over time, which may not be the way the course will go.. so I headed to another class to check it out.

Sub-Saharan African Economic Development in Historical Perspective. This prof was lots more user-friendly, and using a historical approach as well, so it was more intrinsically interesting. He talked a little about the main stream of discussion on africa being in terms of africa's poverty and what can be done about it, how even positive issues are raised against that backdrop. He problematised that approach a little, exploring some problems with comparing GDP across different nations (in a nutshell, average income per person doesn't reflect what prices are like in different countries, i.e. a dollar in mozambique buys lot more than a dollar in the US), and mentioned the PPP (purchasing power index) which adjusts for relative prices. Pointed out that using the PPP makes the situation in african nations look a little less dire, but that they are still clearly much poorer than (as he put it ) "the countries which African nations woudl like to be compared with." which is an interesteing to put it. Howerver, he didn't go on to mention the HDI (Human Development Index) developed by the World Bank, which measures other things like access to clean water, literacy, nutrition, etc., which further problematises the way people think about development.. I wondered if he was saving that for later, if he didn't want to appear too radical? As I perused his 20-page course description/reading list, I didn't find much on gender.. When I raised this he said that he had tried to incorporate it into the course (which is fine, cool even, except that i only found about five articles out of a 15-page list), and that I was free to bring in my own readings. Which I could do, but I'm kind of sick of being gender queen. I don't want it to be my pet project. Plus I have never taken an African History class.
I'm having trouble imagining what kind of thesis these courses could lead to. It's weird to feel backed into something outside my field. I somehow thought a MSc would be a chance for me to extend and deepen knowledge on a topic I know I'm interestd in..

laterJust went to the Latin American Development course and it's the one for me. Still weird to be working on something I have no background in.. But The professor seems tough but fair, and he requires a lot of moment-by-moment participation. You HAVE to write a one-page response to the week's reading and bring it to the secretary the day before or bring enough copies for the class or he won't let you in the door. he does the work to match it. And the first three weeks are discussing and defining economic growth and economic development, and what their relationships are. Right up my alley, yo. The class is really different from all the others I've been in, which have been really white and mostly quite young (many straight out of undergrad), the people I met in other classes from Latin/South America were mostly very european-looking. this class is maybe 75-80% Latin/South American. Many of them have worked in government or finance or somewhere else and then decided to go for Masters'. Plus the one African American guy in the MSc Economic History program (the only one at the meeting anyway) was there. Interesting.. The class on Africa and the class on urban planning were really really caucasian. I wonder if this course is seen as useful for business purposes, because of the many financial/business links to Latin/South America (as opposed to Africa, which is not seen so much as a business-friendly)? Hmmm. Oh and you can go here for my last month's experiences..