The Economist (US) back issues from October 1998:
Colombia's drug-bedevilled hopes of peace.(the U.S.' anti-drug policies may thwart President Andres Pastrana's attempt at bringing peace to Colombia)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... BOGOTAThe United States made life hard for Colombia's recently departed president. It may be about to do the same for its new one.IT WAS never going to be easy for President Andres Pastrana to fulfil his election promise of bringing peace to Colombia after nearly four ...
The cold winds blow: Chile.(Chile's economy slows down)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... SANTIAGO"I'VE just lost several years' work," laments a depressed company executive. Like many Chileans, he invested in his firm's shares, but has seen them drop by a fifth over the past two months, eating away his savings. Despite a recent rally, Chile's main share index is a ...
Welcome to paradise, Jamaica-style. (gang warfare in Jamaica)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... PORT OF SPAIN"DADDY, oh daddy. Me can't leave me father here so," cries an eight-year-old girl. Daddy lies dead in the road. Out buying groceries, he was one of more than half-a-dozen people killed or badly wounded during riots last week in Kingston, Jamaica's capital. In three ...
Echoes of a shooting: Mexico.(some call for investigation into Tlatelolco massacre on July 23, 1968, in Plaza de las Tres Culturas, Mexico City, Mexico)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... MEXICO CITYThe truth has yet to emerge about a massacre of Mexican students 30 years ago.IN 1968, he was a schoolboy aged 16, a sympathetic but diffident observer of the student protests that, in Mexico as elsewhere, swept up an idealistic, angry and eventually ...
Malaysia's nasty bruising. (government firing of former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim angers many Malays)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... KUALA LUMPURThe persecution of the sacked deputy prime minister looks worrying.NEVER before have the quiet, tree-lined roads around the courthouse in Petaling Jaya, a suburb of Kuala Lumpur, seen anything like this: scores of police lorries, a few water cannon, armed ...
Wooing or waiting? Taiwan and China. (China and Taiwan will hold official talks starting October 14, 1998)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... TAIPEIAT LAST the Chinese and the Taiwanese are to talk again. Jaw, jaw, in Winston Churchill's phrase, now seems to be preferred to war, war, which the two sides came close to in 1996. Previous talks were called off in mid-1995. Since then so many hopes have been dashed for a ...
Unhappy returns: Cambodia. (Cambodian election results still being analyzed)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... PHNOM PENHTWO months after sponsoring a general election to settle Cambodia's political stalemate, foreign governments are still no closer to achieving their main ambition, which is to leave Cambodia alone and let its contesting parties get on with running the country. Earlier ...
A phoenix arises: The Philippines. (President Joseph Estrada used the reopening of Philippine Airlines for personal public relations purposes)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... MANILATHE employees who lit candles and prayed for deliverance as Philippine Airlines was given its last rites are wrong if they believe the expected resurrection of the national flag-carrier is a miracle. But there is a miraculous quality to the way Joseph Estrada, the country's ...
Can they arrange a cold war? India and Pakistan.(India and Pakistan signing the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty will not necessarily spell peace)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... DELHI AND ISLAMABADEven talks, and signatures on the test-ban treaty, will leave the region nervous.HOW good is the news that India and Pakistan are prepared to talk to each other and, eventually, to sign a treaty banning nuclear-weapons testing? Anyone who thinks this ...
A continent goes to war.(much of Africa is at war with no immediate end in sight)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... Four conflicts at the heart of Africa could suck in all the neighbours.WAR now consumes Africa from the Horn to Namibia. Nearly a third of sub-Saharan Africa's 42 countries are embroiled in international or civil wars, and more and more African rulers are seeking military ...
A diplomatic casualty.(Southern African Development Community may be scuttled in wake of Congo's war)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... ONE of the victims of Congo's war may be the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Set up in 1980 to reduce the region's economic dependency on apartheid South Africa, it later embraced majority-ruled South Africa and, in 1995, set about acquiring a new political and security role ....
The cost of Kabila: Congo.(President Laurent Kabila is enjoying domestic popularity, but doubts linger about the economy)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... KINSHASASAVED by his neighbours, Angola, Zimbabwe and Namibia, Laurent Kabila has survived as president of Congo. But the cost has been immense: $5 billion, according to Congo's government. The economy, barely reviving after Mr Kabila's first year in power, has been severely ...
As good as it gets? Ghana.(Ghana's booming economy shows signs of trouble)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... ACCRAIT DOES not produce much. It doesn't even have enough electricity to keep all its lights on. But Ghana is an African success story-one of a handful of countries in the continent that is not ravaged by civil war or prone to coups or collapse. Accra, once a dreary capital, has ...
The lifting of an unliftable fatwa: Iran.(religious death sentence on author Salman Rushdie lifted, but not accepted by everybody)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... TEHRANTHE foreign policy of Iran has, for years, been all but paralysed by two taboos: talking about better relations with America, the "Great Satan", and revoking the fatwa-the religious death sentence-passed on Salman Rushdie, the British novelist who in 1989 outraged Islamic ...
Thank Allah for gulfies.(citizens of Gulf states are vacationing in other Arab countries)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... BEIRUTALL across the Levant and Egypt, locals are heaving a sigh of relief. In the mountain resort of Broumanna, above Beirut, the midnight traffic jams have disappeared. In Bloudan, near Damascus, the population is diminishing to 5,000 from its summer high of 80,000. Men in ...
Gerhard Schroder's task. (Chancellor Gerhard Schroder's main political challenge may come from his own party)(Germany's Election)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... BONNGermany's much-needed reform will depend on who calls the shots within the new government.THE oddest thing about the German election result is the number of grins it has induced. You would expect the triumphant left to be euphoric, especially the Social Democratic ...
Welcome, whoever you are: Germany and the European Union. (Europe curious about political vision of Chancellor Gerhard Schroder)(Germany's Election)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... BRUSSELSThe European Union's other leaders are itching to see what Mr Schroder is made of-and what he wants to make of Europe.THE ostensible reason for the European Union's heads of government to meet for two days next month in Austria is for an informal chat about "the ...
Oil that motor. (the French fear Chancellor Gerhard Schroder will not pay them enough attention)(Germany's Election)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... PARISThe French fear that Gerhard Schroder may pay them too little attention.HELMUT KOHL is said once to have told France's late president, Francois Mitterrand, that he would be Germany's "last pro-European chancellor". That is exactly what many French now fear. Not ...
Oskar Lafontaine's commanding German presence.(chairman of Germany's Social Democratic Party)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... HE WAS not amused. Oskar Lafontaine, chairman of Germany's Social Democratic Party drummed his fingers on the table, then twice leaned over with whispers of advice to the speaker on his left answering journalists' questions. Nothing odd in that-except that the person being so peremptorily ...
A continental drift - to the left: Europe.(leftist political parties in control around Europe, but they do not have a common agenda)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... Left-of-centre parties have swept to power across the European Union. But that does not mean they can agree on what they stand for."THIS whole election result has been a tremendous triumph," gushed Tony Blair, Britain's prime minister, after the victory of Gerhard Schroder's Social ...
How do they survive? Russia.(ordinary Russian citizens are surviving despite economic collapse)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... BARKIDespite Russia's economic collapse, most ordinary Russians are managing to survive, but not thanks to any help from their government."CRISIS, what crisis?" says Boris scornfully, scratching the back of a gigantic pig. Nearby, two teenage daughters are energetically ...
Slovakia's strongman bows out.(Vladimir Meciar may loose power)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... BRATISLAVAVLADIMIR MECIAR, the backward-looking bully who has been running Slovakia since its "velvet divorce" from the Czech Republic five years ago, says he will bow out, after the bloody nose Slovakia's voters gave him in a general election last weekend. But until a new ...
The sabres are rattling: Kosovo.(North Atlantic Treaty Organization may have to intervene in Kosovo, Yugoslavia)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... PRISTINAThe stakes in Serbia's rebellious province are getting even higher.WITHIN a few weeks, NATO could find itself virtually at war with a country of 11m people, whose armed forces, albeit in severe decline, were once among the most formidable in Europe. Such, at ...
Euro-worries: Greece.(Greek government may fire finance minister Yannos Papantoniou, which makes some worry that Greece will not be ready for the euro)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... ATHENSTHE ancient Greeks called it fthonos, a sort of jealousy that makes people try to unseat their more successful rivals. It is still around. The latest victim may be Yannos Papantoniou, the bouncy Socialist finance minister trying to drag Greece into Europe's single currency ...
Blair's power politics: Tony Blair's grip on the Labour Party depends as much on new party rules as on the power of his ideas.
Oct 03, 1998 ... BLACKPOOLTony Blair's grip on the Labour Party depends as much on new party rules as on the power of his ideas.EVEN his critics conceded it was a bravura performance. Tony Blair, prime minister and Labour Party leader, deservedly won a standing ovation for a speech to ...
Identity crisis: the Tory conference will highlight a growing debate about English identity.(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... The Tory conference will highlight a growing debate about English identity.AT THE last general election the Conservative Party was wiped out in Scotland and Wales. As the party gathers next week for its annual conference, to be staged in Bournemouth, a terribly English place, it ...
Hague, Hezza and Europe.(Tory leader William Hague denies party xenophobia)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... WILLIAM HAGUE, the Tory leader, will be at great pains at his party conference to deny the accusation that his party is slipping into nationalism or xenophobia. Mr Hague's foes say that his decision to ask party members to support a policy ruling out British membership of the single European ...
Unsocialist realism.(Labour Party appraisal of Tony Blair)(Brief Article)(Column)
Oct 03, 1998 ... THE news from Germany was welcome in Blackpool. Labour greeted Gerhard SchrCoder's victory, and the addition of the SPD to the growing band of centre-left governments in Europe, as further evidence that history is on its side. But as Tony Blair demonstrated in a dazzling speech, he is ...
Hitachi's snail-like progress.(firm announces first loss in 50 years)
Oct 03, 1998 ... TOKYOAccording to its boss, "Hitachi is a microcosm of Japanese society." Bad news, then, that the firm is about to report its first loss in five decades.AS GOES Hitachi, so goes Japan. Making everything from microchips to toasters, television sets, bullet trains and ...
Japan's bell curve.(thriving telemarketing industry)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... TOKYOEVEN as corporate Japan slides deeper into the mire, telemarketing is finding its feet. Everywhere there are signs of distress: companies are cutting operations, deregulation is opening markets and foreign competitors are appearing. Telemarketing thrives on all three. ...
Coups and coupes.(European automobile industry)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... PARISTHERE is nothing like a booming market to put the colour back into the cheeks of Europe's pallid car industry and persuade even its weaker members that they can take on the world. In the first half of this year sales were about 7% above the same period in 1997. Even a sharp ...
We have the technology.(discussion of leading telecommunications companies)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... MURRAY HILL, NEW JERSEY, AND TORONTOWho will dominate telecoms infrastructure, reinvented telephone-equipment firms such as Lucent and Nortel, or a data-networking giant like Cisco?RICH McGINN, chief executive of Lucent Technologies, is going shopping. With a stockmarket ...
Red Hat trick.(Linux operating system may pose serious threat to Microsoft dominance)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... SAN FRANCISCOIT HARDLY seems a promising idea: you sell an industrial-strength computer operating system for $50, provide customers with 90 days of free technical support for the installation and allow them to copy the program as many times as they want.But that is ...
All at sea: if any industry thrived on Asia's export-driven miracle, it was shipping. Now a shake-out seems inevitable.
Oct 03, 1998 ... HONG KONGIf any industry thrived on Asia's export-driven miracle, it was shipping. Now a shake-out seems inevitable."WE ARE", laments an executive of a large shipping company, "absolutely at the sharp end of world trade." And being at the sharp end is proving painful. To ...
The numbers are up.(Italian lottery)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... MID-AFTERNOON on Saturdays is siesta time, and the Cofani brothers' bar and lottery counter in Rome's Torrino suburb usually has just an occasional customer calling for a cup of coffee. But last month sleep was far from anybody's mind as punters queued to put their money into SuperEnalotto, ...
A hard life for bulls.(Abby Cohen and employer Goldman Sachs have opposing views of corporate profits)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... Abby Cohen is Wall Street's most prominent bull. Does her firm's decision to pull its flotation condemn her or pay her a sneaking compliment?IF ANYONE deserves credit for correctly calling the course of America's stockmarkets in the 1990s, it is Abby Joseph Cohen. As share prices ...
Long-term sickness?(analysis of health of major banking institutions)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... NEW YORKThe rescue of Long-Term Capital Management raises disturbing questions about the health of America's and the world's leading banks.LIKE the Titanic, Long-Term Capital Management was supposed to be unsinkable. The hedge fund's dramatic downfall and bail-out last ...
Hedge funds: a guide.(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... PARIAHS of world finance they may be, but not all hedge funds are of the gung-ho, hugely leveraged type epitomised by Long-Term Capital Management (LTCM). They come in many different guises, some of a more common-or-garden variety. Lumping them together, understandable though it is given the ...
Turning on the tap.(impact of September 1998 interest rate reduction)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... ONLY a few weeks ago, any cut in American interest rates would have sent Wall Street into seventh heaven. But after America's Federal Reserve reduced rates by a quarter of a percentage point on September 29th, share prices fell sharply. The markets had wanted something more substantial. Too ...
Don't wait up.(International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings likely to lead to promises of financial reform)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... WASHINGTON, DCThere will be much talk of new global financial architecture at next week's annual IMF and World Bank meetings. It will not lead to muchNOBODY wants to be seen fiddling while markets burn. So it is no surprise that world leaders are full of plans for global ...
Fire down below.(Japanese banking industry)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... TOKYOSUCH are the ills tormenting Japan's financial system that pain in one limb causes instant suffering elsewhere. On September 27th Japan Leasing-an affiliate of the crippled Long-Term Credit Bank (LTCB)-filed for court protection with $16 billion of unpaid debts. That might be ...
A cold, but not a flu.(investments in South Africa)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... JOHANNESBURGTHE challenge for South Africa is to reassure jittery investors that not all emerging markets are dangerous, unstable places in which your money can disappear in a flash. The roots of South Africa's recent economic woes lie largely beyond the government's control. It is ...
When countries go bust: although the analogy can be taken too far, corporate bankruptcy does have lessons for countries in financial distress.(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... Although the analogy can be taken too far, corporate bankruptcy does have lessons for countries in financial distress.IT IS universally accepted that well-functioning economies need well-designed bankruptcy procedures. When advising ex-communist or other emerging-market countries ...
Time for another round. (trade talks)(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998; ... AT A birthday party in Geneva, revellers are celebrating the 50th anniversary of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), and a local television crew is making a documentary about the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the GATT's successor. The film might have featured grey-suited ...
Why trade is good for you: a short tour of economic theory.(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... ECONOMISTS are usually accused of three sins: an inability to agree among themselves; stating the obvious; and giving bad advice. In the field of international trade, they would be right to plead not guilty to all three. If there is one proposition with which virtually all economists agree, ...
An angelic mix. (what makes Los Angeles an economic success)(A Survey of World Trade)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... ECONOMIC theory strips the world of its complications in the hope of making sense of it. Real life is a lot messier, but economic theory can still help to explain it. Take a look, by way of illustration, at the trading activities of one city, Los Angeles, and the forces that have shaped it. ...
Border battles: conventional trade barriers are coming down, but not quickly enough.(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... THROUGHOUT eight rounds of GATT talks, tariffs were trade negotiators' staple fare (see table 4, next page). Only in the sixth, the Kennedy round, did the diplomats even begin to add other trade barriers to their diet. After half a century at the table, you would think, they must have made ...
Trade by any other name: does the WTO need special rules for foreign direct investment?(World Trade Organization)(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... THE growth of international trade is not the only, or even the most impressive, measure of recent global economic integration. Between 1990 and 1997 the value of goods crossing international borders grew by just under 60% in dollar terms, whereas foreign direct investment (FDI) over the same ...
Commerce and contestability: the marriage of trade and trustbusting.(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... SUSPENDING disbelief, suppose that the world's governments had abolished all barriers to international trade, and allowed foreign investors to set up businesses on the same terms as their own people. Would free trade have arrived?Probably not. Some markets would still not be open ...
The wired trade organisation.(A Survey of World Trade)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... THROUGHOUT history, international trade has been helped by all manner of technical advances, from the development of the tea clipper to the invention of powered flight and the telecommunications revolution. The last of these, and especially the Internet, could have a huge effect on trade in ...
Alphabetti spaghetti: are regional trade agreements a good idea?(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... DRIVING around the ever-spreading factories of Tijuana, Enrique Mier y Teran points to one foreign-owned plant after another: JVC, Sony, Messer Griesheim, all making goods for the American market. Then he stops between two factories. The one on the right, he explains, can export TVs ...
Turtle wars: greenery and globalisation do not mix.(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... CESAR LUNA leafs through photographs of a "border reality trip" to Tijuana. Corroding drums of chemicals litter an industrial site open to the elements. There is nothing to keep children out, says Mr Luna, a campaigner with the Environmental Health Coalition in San Diego. Water runs down an ...
Brothers in arms: how not to enforce labour standards.(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... A FORMER World Bank economist recounts a field trip to Morocco. Her guide led her through the medina to watch people working in miserable conditions, buffing up pots for the tourist trade. Next, they ducked into a workshop lit by a single weak lamp where two men were making moulds from dirt ....
The wages of fear: are poor countries pinching the rich ones' jobs?(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... UNTIL the recent jitters, the 1990s seemed to be a golden age for America's economy. Growth was high, inflation and unemployment low. All the same, though, plenty of Americans were wondering why the economy's health was not reflected in their pay packets. Indeed, many Americans have seen ...
Slow road to fast-track: does it matter?(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... WHEN Bill Clinton addressed the WTO in Geneva last May, he issued an invitation to trade ministers: next year, come to America. Some governments hope that this meeting, due to start on November 30th 1999, will be the overture to a new round of global trade talks. The European Union's Sir ...
India's hesitation: the trouble with free trade.(A Survey of World Trade)
Oct 03, 1998 ... IT IS not only in America and other rich countries that free trade is politically contentious. In developing countries the arguments against free trade often sound very similar to those in the rich world. Hot competition from foreigners, fear both rich and poor countries, will pre-empt sales ...
Seconds out: for the next round. (future trade talks)(A Survey of World Trade)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... WHEN Peter Sutherland, the GATT's last director-general, brought down the gavel on the Uruguay round in December 1993, some people wondered whether there would ever be another such all-encompassing round of trade talks. The thought may have been prompted by jaw-ache after more than seven ...
Germany switches. (Gerhard Schroder wins general election)(includes other European news)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... The Social Democrats, led by Gerhard Schroder, easily won a general election, ousting-after 16 years-Helmut Kohl and his Christian Democrats. Mr Schroder began negotiating with the Greens to form a ruling coalition.Mr Kohl said he would step down as the Christian Democrats' leader ...
Cut. (House approves tax cut)(includes other U.S. and Latin American news)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... In America's budget debate, the House of Representatives approved a tax cut of $80 billion to be paid for with projected budget surpluses.Lawyers for Bill Clinton and Paula Jones began negotiations over dropping her sexual-harassment case against the president.California ...
Abused. (court appearance by Anwar Ibrahim in Malaysia)(includes other Asian news)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... Anwar Ibrahim, the former deputy prime minister of Malaysia, appeared in court accused of corruption and sexual misconduct. His face was badly bruised, apparently from a beating while in detention. Mr Anwar was arrested after leading a big anti-government demonstration.More than ...
Inching forward. (meeting on West Bank withdrawal in Washington, D.C.)(includes other Middle Eastern and African news)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian leader, and Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, met Bill Clinton in Washington and discussed a compromise plan for Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank. They agreed to further talks this month.Iran rebuffed an American offer of formal ...
In your dreams. (interest rate cut fails to halt stock market decline)(includes other international business news)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... The long-awaited event happened-but the decision by America's Federal Reserve to shave its key short-term interest rate by 0.25% to 5.25%, the first drop in nearly three years, was not enough for investors hoping for a bigger cut. Stockmarkets almost everywhere slid, though shares in closely ...
Nightmare. (Nikkei stock average continues to decline)(includes other international business news)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... In Tokyo, the Nikkei stock average slumped 5% to a fresh 12-year low of 13,172. Not only did the government fail to prop it up on the last day of the fiscal half, but a credit-rating agency, Moody's, slashed the long-term debt rating of Nomura Securities, Japan's top brokerage, from A1 to ...
Ambitions. (AT&T may purchase IBM's Global Network)(includes other international business news)(Brief Article)
Oct 03, 1998 ... IBM's Global Network, which it slipped on to the market in August, has, as expected, attracted the eye of AT&T, which is in talks with Big Blue over a purchase that could cost up to $4 billion but provide the telecoms giant with a ready-made data-transmission unit.Cable & Wireless ...
Handle with care.(Federal Reserve rescue of Long-Term Capital Management L.P. is latest financial bailout)(Brief Article)(Editorial)(Cover Story)
Oct 03, 1998 ... IT IS time to worry about banks again. They may look tall and solid, but they remain a danger to themselves and others. The world's top economic policymakers, gathering in Washington, DC, this weekend for the annual meetings of the IMF and the World Bank, will contemplate this with ...