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Speaking in Parliament on 18 December, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake pledged that under the leadership of his party, “we will never allow a situation like 2022-23 to reoccur in our country”. If AKD and the National People’s Power (NPP) intend to keep this promise, they will have to get a lot more serious about industrialising an economy dependant on services and remittances. It is regrettable that the President’s speech, while announcing welcome relief for the poor through tax cuts, allowances and subsidies, paid scant attention to increasing investment in the real economy. This is a deadly trap that centre-left governments often fall into. Naturally, the wretched conditions following economic collapse require immediate relief measures. However, long term increases in consumption can only be achieved through investment in the real economy. There have been a multitude of interpretations of the root causes of the economic crisis in 2022-23 which led to hours-long blackouts, acute shortages of fuel and cooking gas, a devaluation of the rupee, and soaring inflation. The mainstream explanation has focused almost exclusively on the Government’s budget deficit, and the Central Bank’s financing of it. The reality is that this crisis was a long time coming, rooted in the country’s fundamentally colonial economic structure that is dependent upon tourism, remittances, and low-value-added exports. Historically, a strong focus on value-added manufacturing has been the only way for countries to sustain rapid growth levels, develop indigenous technology, and uplift the living standards of the majority of people. The only exceptions to this rule are small countries that are either rich in natural resources (e.g. UAE, Qatar, etc.) or function as tax havens and centres for financial services (e.g. Luxembourg, Ireland, etc.). With a population of 22 million—comparable to Syria, Burkina Faso, or Chile—Sri Lanka is hardly a ‘small country’. Uplifting our large rural population requires industrialisation. In the lead up to the 2024 elections, one of the NPP’s most articulate voices for industrialisation was Chathuranga Abeysinghe, now serving as Deputy Minister of Industries and Entrepreneurship Development. Abeysinghe has often made sensible points about the need for state-ownership of energy and finance, combined with support for technology transfer and upgrading, to jump start the process of industrialisation. However, his eclectic choice of benchmarks countries, including India, China, Malaysia, and Vietnam, is confused at best. China and Vietnam are socialist countries ruled by a Communist Party. These countries derive legitimacy from the reproduction and growing productivity of an industrial working class. Meanwhile, India and Malaysia feature a relatively strong class of industrial capitalists, who have a vested interest in the perpetuation of interventionist industrial policies. Sri Lanka is unlike both of these, being a liberal democracy dominated by merchant capital (business interests invested in sectors such as trade, finance, and real estate). Setting on a path of industrialisation would necessarily bring any government in Sri Lanka on a collision course with the interests of merchant capital. There can be no industrialisation without tackling parasitic interests in the economy, including the likes of predatory financial services, agricultural middle-men, and import mafias. These domestic interests function as fronts for large-scale multinational companies which seek to keep countries in the Global South as captive markets. There may be ways to peacefully convert at least some factions of merchant capital into industrial capital. South Korea was able to convert its landlord class into an industrial capitalist class through extensive land reforms which redistributed land to the tiller while compensating the landlords with bonds that were reinvested in industry. The challenge for NPP policy makers is to devise incentive structures to direct investment into strategic manufacturing sectors that can deliver long term productivity gains. Industrialisation is no easy task. The interests opposed to it often cloak themselves in humanitarian concern for workers and the environment. Yet the reality is that industrialisation is most oppressive for a business class used to making easy money through trade, finance, real estate, and tourism. Operating a factory, managing scores of workers, competing with international standards, and innovating new products and process will demand much more from our private sector than they are used to. This is precisely why the State, helmed by a political party dedicated to the cause, is needed to drive this process. For better or worse, the NPP’s electoral campaign about corruption and system change captured the imagination of large swathes of the electorate, helping them win both the Presidency and a supermajority in Parliament. However, more work needs to be done to unravel the structural causes of so-called corruption and the exact nature of the system that holds Sri Lanka down. At Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, we recently published a dossier titled, “How Neoliberalism Has Wielded ‘Corruption’ to Privatise Life in Africa”. Here, we pointed out how the role of the private sector in corruption is avoided or minimised by official definitions of corruption. The biggest losses of revenue for countries in the Global South are not from petty bribery by government officials, but large-scale drain of finances through practices such as tax evasion, transfer pricing, and trade misinvoicing. In the case of Africa, investment into extractive sectors significantly increases the opportunity for private sector corruption and opaque pricing practices. In the case of Sri Lanka, it is our dependency on food and energy imports, and reliance on low value-added exports, that is conducive to private sector corruption. In such a pattern of (under)development, there is hardly any need for capitalists to reinvest profits into developing a domestic industrial ecosystem. If the NPP wants to fulfil its mandate of anti-corruption and modernisation of the country, and if it wants to prevent an economic crisis akin to what occurred in 2022, industrialisation is the only way forward. There is no alternative.MGP and Golden, Democrats who won in Trump country, have a plan for reducing polarization in CongressThe latest exhibit at the Pop Cult Museum at PD's Hot Shop in Qualicum Beach follows skateboarding through the decades, from early homemade boards in the 1930s right to the present day. traces the evolution of skate culture, as well as the boards themselves — and how new technology influences the activity and vice versa. While the first commercial boards began to appear in stores in the late 1950s, children had already been making their own skateboards for decades. “A kid, usually the boy in the family, would get into some trouble because he would essentially steal the sister’s roller skates, or take his own roller skates,” said owner Peter Ducommun, better known as PD. “What you would do is disassemble the roller skate and reassemble some of the components onto a wooden piece.” Skateboarding evolved by mimicking surfing and was referred to as "sidewalk surfing" for a time, but by the mid-60s it had begun to step out of the shadow of surfing, with Patti McGee appearing on the cover of magazine in 1965 (the exhibit includes a copy). For a lot of children, a skateboard or bicycle offers that first taste of freedom — being able to venture further from home without mom and dad. But with that freedom also came derision from the public — people angry at skateboarders for riding on the sidewalk or trespassing and skating up and down the sloped walls of an empty pool. “In the early days we were told it was wrong and we were bad,” said Ducommun, who began skateboarding in the early 1970s. “When you’re trying to tell somebody, and particularly a young person, that they’re doing something bad and they know they’re not, well that just makes you do it twice as much.” Wider skateboards found popularity in the 70s to provide more stability as skaters became more interested in riding up and down the sides empty pools. “We knew that a swimming pool would be like riding a wave because you’re going up the wall and coming down," Ducommun said. "That was the inspiration for what would become half pipes and then skate park bowls and all of that.” Ducommun's very first board from 1976 is part of the exhibit and can be spotted by a yin yang decal — this was the logo for Great North Country Skateboards, before the name change to Skull Skates, Canada's oldest skateboard company. Humour, irreverence and mockery all became a big part of skater culture, Ducommun said, and one way that was expressed was through skateboard decals. “Skateboarders, we like to mock,” he added. “Happy faces and bright colours, but it was all kind of mockery.” One piece in the exhibit takes aim at the idea of skateboarders competing for awards, including the recent inclusion into the Summer Olympics. Ducommun mounted the body of a decapitated doll onto a football trophy, with a skateboard wheel in place of a head. “It’s more like an art form or a lifestyle,” he said. Skateboarding continues to change and evolve as new generations of skaters are introduced to it. “Every time you think it can’t get any crazier, as far as tricks and techniques and styles of riding, it does," Ducommun said. "But the reason it does is that people are not starting from zero, they’re starting from that whole thing that’s been built.” With work set to begin soon on a new skatepark in Qualicum Beach, Ducommun is optimistic the activity will continue to grow and even attract people to visit the town and check out the new facility. “There’s a whole group of people ready to just come up and really embrace it.” will be at the Pop Cult Museum until March. PD's Hot Shop is located at 164 Second Ave.I'm A Celebrity winner Danny Jones breaks down in tears as he's crowned king of jungle
Iowa moves on without injured quarterback Brendan Sullivan when the Hawkeyes visit Maryland for a Big Ten Conference contest on Saturday afternoon. Former starter Cade McNamara is not ready to return from a concussion, so Iowa (6-4, 4-3) turns to former walk-on and fourth-stringer Jackson Stratton to lead the offense in College Park, Md. "Confident that he'll do a great job," Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz said of Stratton on his weekly radio show. "He stepped in, did a really nice job in our last ballgame. And he's got a good ability to throw the football, and he's learning every day. ... We'll go with him and see what we can do." Iowa had been on an upswing with Sullivan, who had sparked the Hawkeyes to convincing wins over Northwestern and Wisconsin before suffering an ankle injury in a 20-17 loss at UCLA on Nov. 8. Stratton came on in relief against the Bruins and completed 3 of 6 passes for 28 yards. Another storyline for Saturday is that Ferentz will be opposing his son, Brian Ferentz, an assistant at Maryland. Brian Ferentz was Iowa's offensive coordinator from 2017-23. "We've all got business to take care of on Saturday," Kirk Ferentz said. "I think his experience has been good and everything I know about it. As a parent, I'm glad he's with good people." Maryland (4-6, 1-6) needs a win to keep its hopes alive for a fourth straight bowl appearance under Mike Locksley. The Terrapins have dropped five of their last six games, all by at least 14 points, including a 31-17 loss at home to Rutgers last weekend. "It's been a challenging last few weeks to say the least," Locksley said. The challenge this week will be to stop Iowa running back Kaleb Johnson, who leads the Big Ten in rushing yards (1,328) and touchdowns (20), averaging 7.1 yards per carry. "With running backs, it's not always about speed. It's about power, vision and the ability to make something out of nothing," Locksley said. "This guy is a load and runs behind his pads." Maryland answers with quarterback Billy Edwards Jr., who leads the Big Ten in passing yards per game (285.5) and completions (268). His top target is Tai Felton, who leads the conference in catches (86) and receiving yards (1,040). --Field Level Media
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