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I will not get involved with the biased opinions in this article other than to suggest at least CITING some of these assertions. I mean, c'mon, 2 references?
Dmjanssen ( talk) 01:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
3/4 of the Tiger economies: (South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore) are located in East Asia, not South East Asia. Corrected. Intranetusa ( talk) 15:18, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
As is my habit, I have expanded the stub of a book-related page into an entire article.
I have no desire to get involved in the whole capitalism/communism, pro/anti globalization pissing contest, and have asked that readers go to other articles to read/post on that topic. If there is a proper page for ideologues to visit, by all means, provide that link, please. -- L. 15:15, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Not sure what the nature of the capitalism/communism pissing contest might be but one should not assume that it is only communists or socialists who disagree with the theories put forth in the book and documentary. -- 137.226.115.196 17:15, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
Please spare me the holier than thou attitude and let’s try to be civil about this matter. You know my bias, but yours is also plane to see from the article you have been policing, and I am merely trying to restore some balance to it. I did not for instance attempt to modify the explanation of the arguments made by the authors, but merely the critics, and given my bias, I might be more qualified to do so than you, since you don’t seem to have any idea why (or who) might disagree with the book, if I may say.
By all means attempt to correct anything you see as "severly loaded language" but you basically cut out everything that would explain the nature and substance of the dispute between the critics of the book and documentary. For instance, you characterize the disagreement as one of prior ideology rather than explain the actual argument made by the critics. The left and even some libertarians and anarchists disagree with the thesis put forward in both book and documentary (I was in fact referring to the documentary, so stand corrected there) precisely because it is seen by them to omit (rather than dispute) facts of history, most of which are not in dispute by left or right (i.e. that those who claimed responsibility for 9/11 did not make any claim that they opposed "capitalism" or "globalism", but in fact said they were responding to American foreign policy and military action). I did not site this merely to piss or rehash the issue, but to demonstrate how the particular historical POV of the authors leads them to their thesis, a thesis that their critics, having a substantively different POV, therefore do not agree with. I did not try to prove which POV was right, and I clearly characterized the arguments made by "critics" as such.
I will rewrite my additions to identify where they refer to the documentary and where they refer to the book and/or general argument put forth by the authors, but I will first offer you the chance to put back some semblance of what I added with whatever modifications to perceived bias you deem appropriate. However, as is, I think your present edit is biased since it seems to suggest that criticisms of Commanding Heights are merely groundless and partisan, and that itself is ignorant and ideologically-biased.
-- 137.226.115.196 18:48, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
PS - Now I have an account. I feel so special. -- Betamod 18:55, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
Interesting that you mention the NPOV policy:
1-“The notion of "unbiased writing" that informs Wikipedia's policy is "presenting conflicting views without asserting them".”
This is what I was attempting to do by being clear that the critical views presented were just that, disagreements by critics with the arguments made in the book and its view on history.
2- “Bias need not be conscious. For example, beginners in a field often fail to realize that what sounds like common sense is actually biased in favor of one particular view.”
This is what I claim you are doing by not presenting (and now suppressing) the basic substance of why critics disagree with the authors of CH. You obviously believe that you are perfect and above all criticism but most reasonable people realize that they may be biased and so are open to discussion and negotiation. I do not claim to be perfect, but I am trying to present what I know of both the documentary, which aired in Canada, and for which there was significant press coverage all of which I watched and read. If you force me too, I will even dig up the specific sources and site them, which I think would be excessive, but I guess I will have to.
One example of your bias is that you label those who criticize the CH as communists and socialists. Do you really know that to be true? It seems more like a groundless assertion. Yet even pro free market capitalists and liberal press sources have been critical of CH. You seem to be suggesting that the reason for the disagreement due to ideological prejudice rather than rational analysis, or historical point of view. Maybe you did not intend it, but this choice of words shows your bias.
Ideology can not be transcended by pretending that one has none. Everyone has a limited POV and it is only through having our limited points of view challenged by others that we might get out from under our prejudices. Claims of infallible unbiasedness are a sure sign that precisely the opposite is true.
However, I remain open to being proven wrong.
Show me where I was asserting a give viewpoint in what I wrote. If you can’t then stop sitting on this page and let's come to a compromise. This article is not your private property.
-- Betamod 23:15, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
L.'s vitriolic attacks on Betamod provide evidence that he/she does indeed have an agenda. Anyone of any intelligence who claims not to have a bias on the issues discussed in "Commanding Heights" is either fooling himself/herself or outright lying. As human beings we of course have biases. The trick is trying not to let those biases show through in a venture such as this. Dirkmanley 16:03, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
If I were to write an unbiased article, I'm not sure I'd use this formulation: "Terrorists who oppose some effects of globalization attacked the World Trade Center and The Pentagon on September 11, 2001." without having sources to back up my claims.
I would neither say that "Terrorists, given instruments to do so through globalization, attacked the World Trade Centre" - but this sentence is just as correct. People who have a feeling of suppression has been given the posibility to reach those they believe are their suppressors through the ill-defined concept of globalization.
My claim is that the sentence in use in this article is biased in that it (within the context given by the article) implies that islamist terrorists and the anti-globalization-movement share common goals. Wether you support the anti-globalization-movement or islamism or not - this point stands out from the article as ridiculous.
The economies in Asia "collapsed?" They don't exist anymore?
The stock market went down, proving communism was right all along?
The Sept 11 attacks prove that socialists were right?
The anti-freedom movement is growing in strength, so that proves the authors were wrong? Didn't this book warn about this very thing?
I notice the article uses the word "roundly criticized" instead of just "criticised" - by who? SecretaryNotSure 16:12, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
The tagged sections effectively make the article a forum for a political discussion as none of the content apparently can be shown to be directly related to the subject, either the book or the DVD. Therefore I've moved them here and performed other minor cleanup on the article. For the same reason I removed the various links to general articles about various national economies which were unrelated to this subject. I would have put the countries in lex order but I presume the order given is that of the video. The book doesn't have that organization but I imagine the video does. 72.228.177.92 ( talk) 01:07, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
The book's espousal of capitalism put forward by neoliberal economists has been contested by a variety of critics, most notably Marxists, socialists, and the anti-globalization movement.
Because the book examines many countries after the end of World War II, critics also contend that the authors ignore the history of colonialism, as many of the countries they examine only became independent after the war.
Also, the authors do not fully examine Cold War politics, particularly the use of military force and the suppression of popular democratic, socialist, and nationalist movements in the developing world. One oft-cited example - they talk about the fall of Chilean leader Salvador Allende, as well as the subsequent rise of Augusto Pinochet, but omit any discussion of American pressure and clandestine activities in the military coup that toppled Allende.
Published in 1998, Yergin and Stanislaw have been criticized for failing to foresee and take account of problems that were in the making at the time. Some examples of things the book missed because of its date of publication:
The largest criticism leveled against the book is that it failed to foresee the massive corporate scandals that began a few years later. The authors quoted Kenneth Lay and cast him as an entrepreneur who was victimized by India's governmental regulations; not long afterwards, Lay's company Enron collapsed, and Lay was indicted on fraud charges. Because of this gaffe, when the documentary version of the book came out, critics began to attack it as nothing more than corporate propaganda. Many viewers of the PBS documentary film version posted their criticisms on the program's website (see link below).
Supporters of the book argue that the authors should not be blamed for not being able to foresee future events.
In the new edition of the book the authors take note of the attacks and criticisms, but pose them as an irrational reaction to globalization, and therefore do not modify their fundamental thesis.
The book's economic policy prescriptions are subject to debate as different people, including economists, contend whether or not the current crisis is or is not rooted in them.
The current financial crisis has led to a swing back to Keynesianism as the ideas of Milton Friedman, derided by some as Market fundamentalism are once again held in serious doubt. Defenders of Chicago School of economics tends to submit that the economic slumps following the deregulation and tax cuts for the well-off following the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush were caused by other policies, or assert that the policies they support were not to implemented fully.
1. The notion that "commanding heights" is a Leninist "shibboleth" is silly. "Commanding heights" refers to the idea of nationalizing vital large-scale industries; an idea common to all socialists and many social democrats. Lenin didn't just want the commanding heights; he wanted everything.
The reference used to bolster the "shibboleth" idea is totally inadequate. It consists of a Maoist speech referring to "commanding heights of the party and the army," not the economy. Even if it did refer to the economy, that is not enough to call something a "Leninist shibboleth." You would need a credible reference that actually says, "'Commanding heights' is a Leninst shibboleth," or at least something equivalent like "is classic Leninist jargon."
2. There is no reason to remove the specific funding of this documentary to the references section where it is less visible. The reader may decide whether the funding of a documentary on international capitalism by large international capitalists is relevant or not. EvanHarper ( talk) 20:26, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
"Commanding Heights" is a term derived from socialist/marxist theory/rhetoric and the redirect here isn't currently putting that in the correct historical context. I believe I had made edits here to address that and they seem to have been lost. 72.228.177.92 ( talk) 14:02, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
I am having trouble understanding what this means: "Bolivia was hit with hyperinflation as well. During the 1980s, economist Jeffrey Sachs was sent as a consultant and new President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada reined in inflation in the 1990s by severely cutting government spending. While Bolivia remained a very poor country, the authors argue that it is better off now because its inflation was curtailed. They also argue that Bolivia's example vindicates the bad reputation that free-market economics acquired in Chile as Bolivia's reforms came after a democratic election." Specifically the last sentence. I can sort of guess at what the sentence means, but there's got to be a better way to phrase it. Benevolent Prawn ( talk) 06:45, 7 September 2023 (UTC)
![]() | This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
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I will not get involved with the biased opinions in this article other than to suggest at least CITING some of these assertions. I mean, c'mon, 2 references?
Dmjanssen ( talk) 01:26, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
3/4 of the Tiger economies: (South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore) are located in East Asia, not South East Asia. Corrected. Intranetusa ( talk) 15:18, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
As is my habit, I have expanded the stub of a book-related page into an entire article.
I have no desire to get involved in the whole capitalism/communism, pro/anti globalization pissing contest, and have asked that readers go to other articles to read/post on that topic. If there is a proper page for ideologues to visit, by all means, provide that link, please. -- L. 15:15, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Not sure what the nature of the capitalism/communism pissing contest might be but one should not assume that it is only communists or socialists who disagree with the theories put forth in the book and documentary. -- 137.226.115.196 17:15, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
Please spare me the holier than thou attitude and let’s try to be civil about this matter. You know my bias, but yours is also plane to see from the article you have been policing, and I am merely trying to restore some balance to it. I did not for instance attempt to modify the explanation of the arguments made by the authors, but merely the critics, and given my bias, I might be more qualified to do so than you, since you don’t seem to have any idea why (or who) might disagree with the book, if I may say.
By all means attempt to correct anything you see as "severly loaded language" but you basically cut out everything that would explain the nature and substance of the dispute between the critics of the book and documentary. For instance, you characterize the disagreement as one of prior ideology rather than explain the actual argument made by the critics. The left and even some libertarians and anarchists disagree with the thesis put forward in both book and documentary (I was in fact referring to the documentary, so stand corrected there) precisely because it is seen by them to omit (rather than dispute) facts of history, most of which are not in dispute by left or right (i.e. that those who claimed responsibility for 9/11 did not make any claim that they opposed "capitalism" or "globalism", but in fact said they were responding to American foreign policy and military action). I did not site this merely to piss or rehash the issue, but to demonstrate how the particular historical POV of the authors leads them to their thesis, a thesis that their critics, having a substantively different POV, therefore do not agree with. I did not try to prove which POV was right, and I clearly characterized the arguments made by "critics" as such.
I will rewrite my additions to identify where they refer to the documentary and where they refer to the book and/or general argument put forth by the authors, but I will first offer you the chance to put back some semblance of what I added with whatever modifications to perceived bias you deem appropriate. However, as is, I think your present edit is biased since it seems to suggest that criticisms of Commanding Heights are merely groundless and partisan, and that itself is ignorant and ideologically-biased.
-- 137.226.115.196 18:48, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
PS - Now I have an account. I feel so special. -- Betamod 18:55, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
Interesting that you mention the NPOV policy:
1-“The notion of "unbiased writing" that informs Wikipedia's policy is "presenting conflicting views without asserting them".”
This is what I was attempting to do by being clear that the critical views presented were just that, disagreements by critics with the arguments made in the book and its view on history.
2- “Bias need not be conscious. For example, beginners in a field often fail to realize that what sounds like common sense is actually biased in favor of one particular view.”
This is what I claim you are doing by not presenting (and now suppressing) the basic substance of why critics disagree with the authors of CH. You obviously believe that you are perfect and above all criticism but most reasonable people realize that they may be biased and so are open to discussion and negotiation. I do not claim to be perfect, but I am trying to present what I know of both the documentary, which aired in Canada, and for which there was significant press coverage all of which I watched and read. If you force me too, I will even dig up the specific sources and site them, which I think would be excessive, but I guess I will have to.
One example of your bias is that you label those who criticize the CH as communists and socialists. Do you really know that to be true? It seems more like a groundless assertion. Yet even pro free market capitalists and liberal press sources have been critical of CH. You seem to be suggesting that the reason for the disagreement due to ideological prejudice rather than rational analysis, or historical point of view. Maybe you did not intend it, but this choice of words shows your bias.
Ideology can not be transcended by pretending that one has none. Everyone has a limited POV and it is only through having our limited points of view challenged by others that we might get out from under our prejudices. Claims of infallible unbiasedness are a sure sign that precisely the opposite is true.
However, I remain open to being proven wrong.
Show me where I was asserting a give viewpoint in what I wrote. If you can’t then stop sitting on this page and let's come to a compromise. This article is not your private property.
-- Betamod 23:15, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
L.'s vitriolic attacks on Betamod provide evidence that he/she does indeed have an agenda. Anyone of any intelligence who claims not to have a bias on the issues discussed in "Commanding Heights" is either fooling himself/herself or outright lying. As human beings we of course have biases. The trick is trying not to let those biases show through in a venture such as this. Dirkmanley 16:03, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
If I were to write an unbiased article, I'm not sure I'd use this formulation: "Terrorists who oppose some effects of globalization attacked the World Trade Center and The Pentagon on September 11, 2001." without having sources to back up my claims.
I would neither say that "Terrorists, given instruments to do so through globalization, attacked the World Trade Centre" - but this sentence is just as correct. People who have a feeling of suppression has been given the posibility to reach those they believe are their suppressors through the ill-defined concept of globalization.
My claim is that the sentence in use in this article is biased in that it (within the context given by the article) implies that islamist terrorists and the anti-globalization-movement share common goals. Wether you support the anti-globalization-movement or islamism or not - this point stands out from the article as ridiculous.
The economies in Asia "collapsed?" They don't exist anymore?
The stock market went down, proving communism was right all along?
The Sept 11 attacks prove that socialists were right?
The anti-freedom movement is growing in strength, so that proves the authors were wrong? Didn't this book warn about this very thing?
I notice the article uses the word "roundly criticized" instead of just "criticised" - by who? SecretaryNotSure 16:12, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
The tagged sections effectively make the article a forum for a political discussion as none of the content apparently can be shown to be directly related to the subject, either the book or the DVD. Therefore I've moved them here and performed other minor cleanup on the article. For the same reason I removed the various links to general articles about various national economies which were unrelated to this subject. I would have put the countries in lex order but I presume the order given is that of the video. The book doesn't have that organization but I imagine the video does. 72.228.177.92 ( talk) 01:07, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
The book's espousal of capitalism put forward by neoliberal economists has been contested by a variety of critics, most notably Marxists, socialists, and the anti-globalization movement.
Because the book examines many countries after the end of World War II, critics also contend that the authors ignore the history of colonialism, as many of the countries they examine only became independent after the war.
Also, the authors do not fully examine Cold War politics, particularly the use of military force and the suppression of popular democratic, socialist, and nationalist movements in the developing world. One oft-cited example - they talk about the fall of Chilean leader Salvador Allende, as well as the subsequent rise of Augusto Pinochet, but omit any discussion of American pressure and clandestine activities in the military coup that toppled Allende.
Published in 1998, Yergin and Stanislaw have been criticized for failing to foresee and take account of problems that were in the making at the time. Some examples of things the book missed because of its date of publication:
The largest criticism leveled against the book is that it failed to foresee the massive corporate scandals that began a few years later. The authors quoted Kenneth Lay and cast him as an entrepreneur who was victimized by India's governmental regulations; not long afterwards, Lay's company Enron collapsed, and Lay was indicted on fraud charges. Because of this gaffe, when the documentary version of the book came out, critics began to attack it as nothing more than corporate propaganda. Many viewers of the PBS documentary film version posted their criticisms on the program's website (see link below).
Supporters of the book argue that the authors should not be blamed for not being able to foresee future events.
In the new edition of the book the authors take note of the attacks and criticisms, but pose them as an irrational reaction to globalization, and therefore do not modify their fundamental thesis.
The book's economic policy prescriptions are subject to debate as different people, including economists, contend whether or not the current crisis is or is not rooted in them.
The current financial crisis has led to a swing back to Keynesianism as the ideas of Milton Friedman, derided by some as Market fundamentalism are once again held in serious doubt. Defenders of Chicago School of economics tends to submit that the economic slumps following the deregulation and tax cuts for the well-off following the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush were caused by other policies, or assert that the policies they support were not to implemented fully.
1. The notion that "commanding heights" is a Leninist "shibboleth" is silly. "Commanding heights" refers to the idea of nationalizing vital large-scale industries; an idea common to all socialists and many social democrats. Lenin didn't just want the commanding heights; he wanted everything.
The reference used to bolster the "shibboleth" idea is totally inadequate. It consists of a Maoist speech referring to "commanding heights of the party and the army," not the economy. Even if it did refer to the economy, that is not enough to call something a "Leninist shibboleth." You would need a credible reference that actually says, "'Commanding heights' is a Leninst shibboleth," or at least something equivalent like "is classic Leninist jargon."
2. There is no reason to remove the specific funding of this documentary to the references section where it is less visible. The reader may decide whether the funding of a documentary on international capitalism by large international capitalists is relevant or not. EvanHarper ( talk) 20:26, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
"Commanding Heights" is a term derived from socialist/marxist theory/rhetoric and the redirect here isn't currently putting that in the correct historical context. I believe I had made edits here to address that and they seem to have been lost. 72.228.177.92 ( talk) 14:02, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
I am having trouble understanding what this means: "Bolivia was hit with hyperinflation as well. During the 1980s, economist Jeffrey Sachs was sent as a consultant and new President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada reined in inflation in the 1990s by severely cutting government spending. While Bolivia remained a very poor country, the authors argue that it is better off now because its inflation was curtailed. They also argue that Bolivia's example vindicates the bad reputation that free-market economics acquired in Chile as Bolivia's reforms came after a democratic election." Specifically the last sentence. I can sort of guess at what the sentence means, but there's got to be a better way to phrase it. Benevolent Prawn ( talk) 06:45, 7 September 2023 (UTC)