left and organized labor” to plan in favor of business, at the expense
of workers and consumers.^26
Planning was thus dreamed by the left but implemented by the
right, in a market-conforming manner. In the South, new nations were
all encouraged by development economists and by the United Nations
to plan for a mixed economy, and most of them did, usually with the
stated objective of combining growth with social justice.^27 In practice,
however, as Canadian economist Ozay Mehmet observed, international
and domestic elites favored inequality, and planned for growth rather
than for equity, for industrialization rather than for rural develop-
ment, and for the benefit of asset-holding groups rather than for that
of income earners.^28
Similar oppositions between the left and the right manifested them-
selves in macro-economic management. John Maynard Keynes himself
did not foresee these tensions. In British politics, Keynes was a Liberal,
close to the center of the political spectrum. The economic approach
he proposed distanced itself from bothlaissez-faireand socialism and,
in his mind, was neither right nor left. The idea was to equip policy-
makers adequately, with the right theory and the instruments necessary
to regulate the business cycles and prevent both unemployment and
inflation. Keynes’ standpoint was that of the government, or more
precisely that of the Treasury, and he never doubted that once
understood, the best policies would prevail.^29
(^26) T. J. Pempel, “Japanese Foreign Economic Policy: The Domestic Bases for
International Behavior,” in Peter J. Katzenstein (ed.),Between Power and
Plenty: Foreign Economic Policies of Advanced Industrial States, Madison,
27 University of Wisconsin Press, 1978, pp. 141 and 183.
Richard Jolly, Louis Emmerij, Dharam Ghai, and Fre ́de ́ric Lapeyre,UN
Contributions to Development Thinking and Practice, Bloomington, Indiana
University Press, 2004, pp. 89–91; Ozay Mehmet,Economic Planning and
Social Justice in Developing Countries, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1978,
28 pp. 17 and 31.
Mehmet,Economic Planning and Social Justice, pp. 31 and 271. For
converging conclusions from quite distinct perspectives, see: Peter Evans,
Dependent Development: The Alliance of Multinational, State, and Local
Capital in Brazil, Princeton University Press, 1979, p. 288; and Robert
H. Bates,Markets and States in Tropical Africa: The Political Basis of
Agricultural Policies, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1981, p. 81.
(^29) Gilles Dostaler,Keynes et ses combats, Paris, Albin Michel, 2005, pp. 166–88;
Paul Diesing,Science and Ideology in the Policy Sciences, New York, Aldine,
1982, pp. 81–83.
114 Left and Right in Global Politics