Demon 21 - The corruption of demography as an instrument of US policy
(and some other Demons )
For the background to this paper, see
If you are short of time be sure to read George Kennan's policy statement
Figure 1 The population policy Lockstep. "Lockstep" is a method of marching in very close file, so that each person's advancing leg is under that of the person in front, such that if only one person breaks step, the whole squad falls over. The US demographer Jason Finkle used it when he pointed out there is now such a tight consensus on global population policy, that nobody in the figure dare step out of line and advocate any alternative policy. {36}The most notable feature of the consensus is that nobody here ever discusses demographic entrapment - it is totally taboo!
Since demography, development economics, and the UN agencies never discuss it, they are subject to this lockstep, and have therefore to be declared corrupt.
The world's greatest problems are population growth and global warming. If the South is to reduce its fertility the North will be expected to reduce its resource consumption. The taboo on entrapment therefore bears critically on both the world's greatest problems.
A previous paper{36} has argued that this lockstep is being 'policed' by the US Department of State, 'policing' being used in the sense of 'keeping in order' (OED). This paper takes that argument further, adds more evidence and argues that policing the lockstep requires a policy to keep demography corrupt. The presumed mechanism of this corruption, for which there is ample historical precedent (Evidence D below), is for the Department of State to indicate to senior US demographers that 'The recognition of entrapment would not be in the US interest', since if it were recognised, this would increase criticism of US resource consumption. 'Political correctness' and the withholding of government funds from dissenting institutions would then be sufficient to maintain the lockstep in the US. The US domination of demography gives it a head start in maintaining this political correctness in the rest of the world. Demography is a particularly US discipline, since most of the world's demographers were trained there. The US also dominates the UN agencies, so it is able to enforce the lockstep there also.
Active policing of the lockstep is only required during periods of high political tension over population, as at the as at the time of the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994. Only then do stern measures have to be taken to 'police' an active dissenter, such as myself - see below.
Strong evidence in support of this thesis is the reaction to it of some able and politically incorrect US citizens: "Of course, what else would you expect?" In some quarters, it is far from being outrageous, it is banal.
A Socratic dialogue. In a previous paper I discussed Earths's population problems with a Lady from Mars - Lady M. {13} That paper gave some of the evidence for the policing of the lockstep, the rest was considered unprintable. This paper gives it all. Lady M. returns to continue our discussion.
Conclusion. Breaking the lockstep followed by an massive 'about turn' in population policy is now required if more of the world is not to proceed to stunting, starvation and violence. In the resulting furore Northern lifestyles will come under increasing criticism, and can be expected to change and mitigate global warming. There is hope - the dialogue on 1-child families can be opened in Africa. This opportunity must be grasped.
Preamble. This paper is intensely political. Since politics is the operation of power in society, it is thus inevitably 'messy' and personal. If its thesis holds, and it is difficult to see how it cannot, it may well come to be considered as the most important paper since Malthus {132} which it restores to his rightful place. There's modesty for you (!!!) - but the demographers have left us non-demographers with an opportunity. That the US is very interested in keeping entrapment taboo - and therefore demography corrupt - there can be no doubt. See particularly my interview by the CIA below, and my reprimand by Sam Preston. What is arguable is the relative contribution of particular Demons under particular circumstances. On most occasions when the lockstep is applied, there is no means of knowing which combination of Demons is active and in what degree. However, I argue that the 21st Demon is crucial, since without the deliberate corruption of demography by the US government, the debate on entrapment would have opened long ago, and in the ensuing furore ('benign uproar') the other Demons would now be severely embattled.
Whatever you do, be sure to read it all and look at the evidence as a whole!
Everything suddenly fell into place!
In 1989 I started exploring the problems of communities in Africa exceeding the carrying capacities of their ecosystems. Only later did I learn that the technical term for this is 'demographic entrapment'. Initially, it seemed to be an incomprehensible dark cloud 'out there', which I could not get my arms around. A ragbag of interesting observations turned up, but nothing seemed to fit together until late 1996 - after 7 years work - when I read an analysis by McIntosh and Finkle {65}of what transpired at Cairo. To a participant at the conference it was a fascinating 'bazaar'- in which it was impossible to know what was going on.
They pointed out that Cairo "...failed adequately to address the issue of rapid population growth which many poor countries [for which read the trapped Ed.] still consider their first priority". And that "... the dominant decision makers ... saw no serious need to analyse the likely impact of the Cairo recommendations on rapid population growth in those regions where it still exists..."
They also pointed out "...that the United States, the Holy See and the women's rights movement [predominantly from the US] were the three most organized, best disciplined and most effective participants at the conference...", and that "...historically, the State Department has considered population in the light of US and global security...", and also that "...once formed, the US position was advanced with determination and skill through every available channel...".
Immediately, everything fitted together, and has continued to do so - including further evidence as this continues to come in. The US had rigged the Cairo conference. ('rig', to exert undue influence, OED)"
Lady M. "I don't like the terms 'policing' and 'rigging', they are much too emotive and tendentious. 'State Department' also needs clarifying".
Maurice King. "All terms are emotive in some degree, and these are the emotions that it is necessary to convey. If indeed one has had one's personal security threatened (see below), the 'keeping in order' is of rather a severe kind, and merits the term 'policing'. Only 'rig' adequately implies the consequences of richest 4.6% of the world population exerting undue pressure on the world's international conferences. This is primarily the pressure exerted by 'money', and is the result of the huge sums that are spent to influence the political process.
Although it might seem that the will of the American people is expressed in Congress, and the House of Representatives, the Department of State has a large measure of autonomy, which is independent of these, and indeed even of the President. When I refer to 'The Department of State', I mean a culture within it, which recruits new members sympathetic to its views, and maintains a broadly similar policy over the years. As new recruits rise in the bureaucracy, they maintain this policy.
Lady M. "I don't see why the US should want to police the lockstep. We need a motive and very strong evidence".
SUMMARY OF EVIDENCE FOR POLICING THE LOCKSTEP
For the details, see.
(A) A compelling motive - the need to prevent further criticism of US resource consumption.
(B) An awesome statement of that motive, by George Kennan in the late 1940s, with no reason to think that the motive has changed.
(C) A principal mechanism - the corruption of demography.
(D) At least three previous examples of The US Department of State orchestrating intellectual corruption in other spheres.
D 1 The manipulation of Western intelligentsia during the cold war, as described by Frances Stonor Saunders. 9D 2 The manipulation of US academia for the purpose of continuing the Viet Nam war, as described by Noam Chomsky. 10
D3 The infiltration of the media and the universities in order to promote neoliberal free market economics as described by Bernard Cassen.
D4 Philip Longman's article in the New Statesman arguing that population is no problem in Africa.
(E) Evidence of how demography is being corrupted.
E 1 My powerful 'telling off' by the US demographer Sam Preston in a British meetingE 2 The message conveyed to me by 'Uncle Pino' that my interest in demographic entrapment is prejudicial to my personal safety.
E 3 The approach by two people independently to the Editor of The Lancet advising him that our paper "A 1-child world", should not appear.
E 4 My interrogation by the CIA in Cairo in the person of Charles Cargille.
E 5 The corruption of the South Centre in Geneva.
E 6 Ellen M Brennan's refusal to allow me to listen to Jason Finkle's lecture.
E 7 Suppression of USAID's report when it indicated that Mali is demographically trapped.
E 8 Jack Bryant's reaction to entrapment.
E 9 Norbert Hirschorn's reactions at being accused of being a CIA observer at my lectures.
(F) The 'policing'/'political correctness' borderline
F1 Nils Daulaire dare not discuss it.
F2 Bill Foegy dare not discuss it.
F3 Craig Kuhl dare not get in touch
F4 Roger Shrimpton dare not discuss it.
(G)A long history of US political malfeasance, in which the corruption of demography would be in no way exceptional.(H) The complete lack of surprise by many 'liberal Americans' that their government might be corrupting demography and policing the lockstep, - indeed they would be surprised if it were not!
(I) The response to my lecture at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in February 2001 .
(J) Failure to finance the expected International Conference on Population and Development ICPD in 2004.
DETAILED EVIDENCE FOR POLICING THE LOCKSTEP
(A) A compelling motive
Maurice King. "We do not need to look far for a motive. With 4.6% of the world's people, the United States burns 23% of ifs fossil fuel. If the South is required to restrain its fertility, the North will be expected to restrain its resource consumption. The US is particularly vulnerable, since it has vast oil imports. This motive is likely to be so strong and so threatening, that the US might be assumed to be policing the lockstep, even if there was no evidence".
Lady M. "You have invented a motive. I want evidence of that motive".
(B) George Kennan's awesome policy statementMaurice King. "In 1948 George Kennan, head of the Department of State planning staff until 1950 wrote, in a document recently released under the 50-year rule:
"We have 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population... In this situation we cannot fail to be the at object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will commit us to maintain this position of disparity without possible detriment to our ultimate security. To do this we will have to dispense with sentimentality and day-dreaming, and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We had better not deceive ourselves that we can afford ...the luxury of altruism and world benefaction... The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are hampered by idealistic slogans the better..."{87}
One could hardly have a more succinct statement of motives than that!"
Lady M. "But how might it be doing the policing?"
Maurice King. "Primarily by the corruption of demography".
(C) Demography and development economics are corrupt
Lady M. "But, how could demography be corrupt?"
Maurice King. "Corrupt, it is! Intellectual corruption is not primarily a matter of money. In this case it is refusing to examine a problem, because it has disturbing ethical and political implications. 'Intellectual corruption' is not an ideal term, because it is more a lack of the necessary integrity and courage to fight the Demons, than of not being able to understand the problem.Jack Caldwell, will admit (privately) that most of Africa is trapped. Yet the Population and Development Review has never mentioned it, even to rubbish it. That journal is the flagship of demography - beautiful paper and printing, it even has a lovely smell - it just could not possibly be corrupt!! But corrupt it is. It is particularly important because it legitimises what it is proper for demographers to think.
Basia Zaba in the London School of Hygiene teaches that carrying capacity has no relevance for man. Yet a UN figure from Malawi (it may ruin his/her career if I mention his/her name) e-mails that: "I also think that the significance of the concept of 'carrying capacity' is already acknowledged in Malawi". Acknowledged in Malawi, but not in the London School of Hygiene - or Harvard, or Johns Hopkins!
I recently met an American graduate of Henry Moseley's Population Dynamics course at Johns Hopkins. He had never even heard the word 'demographic entrapment'.
The thought control of the taboo is so tight that John Cleland, Professor of Demography in the London School of Hygiene, thought that I had invented the term 'entrapment'. I didn't, but I did need to invent the term 'disentrapment'. The deputy editor of the journal Demography, Elizabeth Cooksey, had never heard of the term 'entrapment' either.
There is no escape from the conclusion that demography is now gravely corrupt. Demography is corrupt - not demographers. They, poor souls, dare not confront the demons, and upset the lockstep".
Lady M. "That very distinguished demographer, John Bongaarts, told me that he doesn't think that demographic entrapment is 'demographers work'. see Whose work is it then?"
Maurice King. "When I first began working on entrapment, Philip Payne, then of the London School of Hygiene, told me that he had long been trying to convince his demographer colleagues what a narrow subject they have - mostly just counting people, and trying to make the most of bad data."
"Although there are no tight boundaries to any of the social sciences, demographic entrapment should be the property of the development economists, who never discuss it either! see They think that because it's called 'demographic entrapment' it not their business. It has somehow fallen into a gap between the two disciplines. neither of which dare touch it."
Lady M. "OK, I give you that it is corrupt. But what is the mechanism? But how does the Department of State corrupt demographers? Why don't they corrupt themselves? Why do they need corrupting by the US Department of State?"
(D) This is not the first US attempt at deliberate intellectual corruption
Maurice King. "First, lets look at some historical examples. There have been at least three other systematic attempts at intellectual corruption and manipulation. Frances Stonor Saunders has described the way in which the US manipulated Western intelligentsia during the Cold War in the 1950s. Her book 'Who paid the Piper?' {49}has pages and pages of skulduggery by the CIA. Admittedly, the objectives of cultural imperialism at that time would seem trivial, by comparison with those of policing the lockstep now. Evidence D1Noam Chomsky has provided what would seem to be a most likely model for the corruption of demography, in his detailed analysis of how academia was corrupted, and national consensus obtained, so as to continue the Viet Nam war, against all logic. He convincingly demonstrated the connivance of the State Department, academia and the media. This was mostly the result of the interpenetration of elites - the senior people in these all these spheres knowing one another.{66}
In this case it would be Department of State talking to senior demographers, and these then setting the political correctness". Evidence D2.
The process continues. Bernard Cassen {94}writes that "...Neoliberal ideology was fabricated entirely in response to the interests of American finance, concerned to remove all obstacles to the world wide free movement of capital. A systematic drive to raise funds and infiltrate the universities and media was required in order for it to win intellectual hegemony - first in the United States, and then in the rest of the World.... Evidence D3
Philip Longman, Senior Fellow, at the right-wing Washington think-tank, The New America Foundation, wrote an article in the New Statesman (May 31st 2004) entitled Everywhere, even in Africa, the world is running out of children. Two angry letters in subsequent issues put him right about Africa, but the impression left in most readers' minds will be that population is no problem in Africa, despite Figure'X'. see There could hardly be a better example of US determination to enforce the lockstep, and keep the population debate at the lowest possible ebb, by spreading gross lies wherever possible. Evidence D4.
(E) Evidence for the US corrupting demography
Lady M. "I want to see some examples".
Maurice King. "My powerful 'telling off' by the US demographer Sam Preston in a British meeting. (November 1996) Evidence E1. The demographic journal, Population Studies, was having a meeting at the London School of Economics to celebrate its 25th anniversary of publication. Demographers were congratulating themselves on the success of the 'demographic transition theory', and were wondering if it was a theory or a model, etc. I got up and said that I was interested in its failures, and that I was going out to Uganda the following day, to lecture on the theme: "Are you demographically trapped, and if so what are you going to do about it?" In the event, my lectures were very well taken.
The powerful and distinguished US demographer, Sam Preston then got up and said in effect, in an attempt to rubbish me: "Maurice King lets sick children die", referring to my controversial first paper?. {55}The atmosphere was electric. Nobody, came to my support. However, at tea afterwards David Willey of the Optimum population Trust , came up to me. "Are you going to cut off my head?" I asked, "No!", he said, "I am going to crown it". I have just rung up David Willey, and he confirmed what Sam Preston had to say.
Note: In an overwhelmingly British meeting it was a US demographer who policed the lockstep, enforced the Hardinian taboo, corrupted demography, and supported US policy. No British demographer got up to support me. As Chomsky observed: "England is in many ways a very intellectually colonised country..." {66} The Australian demographer, Jack Caldwell was present. Although he had previously told me that the thinks that most of Africa is trapped, he said nothing. However, he did give me a very warm handshake afterwards. David Willey is not a demographer. One could hardly want a better example of 'policing' than this one.
'Uncle Pino': A digression on the word 'avuncular'. Pressure applied to The Lancet
Maurice King. "Let it be said at the outset, that I have the greatest respect for Guiseppe Benagiano - a lovely man. A large man in every way, generally known by his diminutive 'Pino', an eminent gynaecological endocrinologist, son of the papal dentist with strong Vatican connections, and powerful - "Just ask Pino to look in my direction, and my career is made", a subordinate once said.
When my wife joined WHO, and we moved to Geneva in 1993, Pino, then directing WHO's department of human reproduction, and Torre Godal, director of WHO's tropical diseases research program, asked me to give an unofficial seminar on entrapment - nothing was recorded! This was in 'Legitimate double think' {54} days, before my study of entrapment had got very far. Whereas it was 6 years before Tore Godal would discuss it again, Pino and I maintained a cordial and illuminating dialogue.
In June 1994 Charles Elliott and I wrote a paper which was then called A 1-child world, which I handed to Pino with permission to circulate it, which he did. When I met him later, he said "I have been told to warn you that your interest in demographic entrapment is detrimental to your personal safety". I asked him jokingly, if it would be the CIA or the Mafia,? "They have their methods!", he said. Later, I asked him if the warning came from North America? He turned away in embarrassment, saying nothing. I have a draft record I made at the time - Figure: The Critical Fax. In another letter to some one else, which I showed to Pino, I said that I had been warned in an 'avuncular manner' (uncle-like, unculus, Latin 'an uncle'). "I am not your uncle!", he said jokingly. I have much further correspondence in which we addressed one another as 'uncle' and nephew (Mio caro zio Pino... your caro nepote...) Evidence E2
Figure 2. The critical fax. Here is the draft of a fax that I sent a to Charles Elliott, who was Dean and Chaplain of Trinity Hall Cambridge, and a close collaborator.Alas, I a never preserved a copy of the definitive version. In fact, a late draft, is probably better evidence than a tidy final version. It recalls the pressure put upon The Lancet, not to publish it our paper, then called A 1-child world, and also the warning about my personal safety.
Lady M. "Does Uncle Pino Confirm this?"
Maurice King. "No!" However, I recently (1999) asked him: "How is it that I, who am older than you, address you as 'uncle?'" He had no reply".
"I attempted to discus entrapment with him yesterday (March 30th 2000) in Rome, where he is now il diretore of the Istituto Superiore di Sanita. He detonated irrationally - maximal benign uproar. His second in command, Ranieri Guerra, was present and can give you an account of our meeting. In running his istituto under present political conditions in Italy, Uncle Pino has so many impossible problems to deal with that entrapment is merely the last straw - 'acopia' - failure to cope, he has reached his limits - as we all would in his situation. Demons 9 and 10, the Catholic Church, must also cause grave problems. He may be frightened. The stakes in this issue are very high indeed - especially Demon 3, the market economy, etc. The Mafia are everywhere I was told. Those who displease the Mafia disappear and are said to end up in a barrel of concrete 50 fathoms down in the Mar Tirreno, or built into a motorway".
"It is also possible that he was told not to warn me, and thought that it would be in my best interests to do so".
Lady M."What did he say earlier (1977) when you told him that you that you thought that the lockstep was being policed".
Maurice King. "He looked at me for a moment, as if surprised, and then asked "What is the evidence?" So I gave it. He then thought for a moment and then said. "They will think you are a piece of ****." It would seem that he had passed on the warning to me about the threat to my personal security, without realising that it was part of a coordinated attempt at policing".
Lady M. "By exposing him in this way, do you think that you are threatening his 'personal security'?"
Maurice King. "Quite possibly, but no more so than I am threatening my own".
Lady M. "That may not be how he sees it! Who do you think he sent your paper a 1-child world to?"
Maurice King. "I assume that he sent it to top figures in US population and family planning circles, what I termed at that time in my fax to Charles Elliott, 'the American public health right' - it was before Jason Finkle had introduced the term 'lockstep', and in the days of my political innocence, before I realised that there were political influences keeping demography corrupt.".
It so happened that, in the year before the Cairo conference, in late 1993, I had, at Halfdan Mahler's suggestion, addressed an elitle little meeting in Paris to mark the founding of Populations et Equilibres. Nafis Sadik, Executive Director of UNFPA was there, so was Steve Sinding of Rockefeller, Victor Sidel, and Allan Rosenfeld of Cornell. I gave my account of entrapment as it was in 1993. Nafis Sadik expressed great enlightenment. However, I felt afterwards that I was - to the Americans - 'something the cat had brought in' - the very ultimate in 'not one of us'. I think that my lecture must have alerted the US population fraternity (and indirectly the Department of State), and it was to them that Uncle Pino had sent our paper, A 1-child world, {68}which elicited the threat to my personal safety".
Lady M. "I understand that you also discussed our paper with Robin Fox, then editor of The Lancet".
Maurice King. "I had previously sent it to Robin, who had rejected it. So I had sent it to The BMJ, and was privileged to discuss it at length, with Fiona Godlee, the assistant editor. Having seen her I had a hunch that I should make a call on The Lancet, which I did".The Critical Fax records the threat to my personal security. "Did it give you a frisson?" Robin asked. "Yes" I replied.
Robin said that two people had buttonholed him to the effect that it would be unwise to publish our paper, A 1-child world. {68}I imagined at the time that they represented the 'US public health right' and never dreamed that they might have had State Department connections. Evidence E3. However, Robin said that people usually came to see him with 'something clutched to their bosoms' (some paper). I said I did not then have the revised draft, but would send it in".
"Imogen Evans, who had the reputation of wearing the trousers in The Lancet at the time, was not there that day, because of a rail strike. When she returned, she said that The Lancet would not publish our full paper, but that we could have 500 words, for which we wrote Cairo damp squib, or Roman Candle? {67} which was so short that we could say nothing useful. I imagine that Imogen was motivated by the threats that out paper had for the feminist agenda - Demon 8".
"Meanwhile, I had said to The BMJ, that The Lancet appeared to be taking our paper A 1-child world- to which Richard Smith, its Editor, was rightly furious!!! It was eventually published in Health Policy and Planning, where the lady editor wanted its title changed, presumably again influenced by Demon 8, so it appeared as 'Does entrapment question the 2-child paradigm' {68} - and incited no interest whatever". I did however distribute it at the Cairo conference. Afterwards, as I passed through the airport departure lounge an American said that he thought that it was the best paper at the conference.
Lady M. What happened at Cairo?
Maurice King. In Cairo I was interviewed by Charles M Cargille of The Population and Family Association, which appears to have been a CIA a 'front outfit'. He invited me to address a fringe meeting at the Semiramis Hotel. When I got there, there was no fringe meeting. When I entered Cargille's room, a member of the US National Audubon society was being questioned behind a table in front of a video camera and being asked about what various things implied for the 'interests of the United States' - and looking very worried! When he had gone, I said to Charles Cargille: "I know exactly who you are". His jaw dropped, and the look on his face instantly gave the game away". We then had a long discussion on entrapment which he videoed. Evidence E 4.I recounted this subsequently to Alphonse MacDonald, the UNFPA Representative here in Geneva. "I know Charles Cargille", he replied. "I am not at all surprised".
Lady M. "I don't consider this any evidence at all, the CIA sweeps up information like a vacuum cleaner".
Maurice King. "It indicates that what I have to say about population - which should be entirely humanitarian - is sufficiently disturbing to the US for me to get a grilling by the CIA. The CIA has to be alerted; one does not fall into its net at random. Attention by the CIA is a good indicator as to what US political intentions really are. See also Evidence F1.
Three items taken together
Lady M. "Assuming that your interview by the CIA, the warning as to your personal safety, and the advice to The Lancet not to publish your paper are all truly reported, which they seem to be, why do you think that there are links between academia, the media (The Lancet) and the CIA (in Chomsky's Viet Nam war example, it was the Military rather than the CIA)?"
Maurice King. "It is economical in hypotheses - Occam's razor - to link them together if possible. One has to assume that the State Department and the CIA are closely linked, even if they are different organisations in different buildings. Both the warnings to The Lancet, and to Uncle Pino to pass on to me, would have come through academics, implying a State Department (or CIA) connection with academia. Academics would be most unlikely to generate these warnings spontaneously".
Lady M. "Why don't you think that your warning was because the pro-lifers might be after you. You are not very popular with them you know!"
Maurice King. "If so, the warning to The Lancet and my CIA interview would have to have arisen separately, since the pro-lifers are unlikely to have been responsible for either. Also, if the pro-lifers are the risk, why was I not told "Beware the screwball pro-lifers!"
The South Centre corrupted
Maurice King. "A friend suggested that I should visit the South Centre - which should be taking a great interest in entrapment. This was founded by the late Julius Nyerere to coordinate the political interests of the South, and was at that time (1998) run by Branlov Gosovic. Why a Middle European should be running the South Centre I never discovered. I got through to the junior staff and gave them the details of my entrapment website. When I phoned Gosovic he laughed like a drain, as if he knew exactly who I was, and had been expecting a visit. When I visited the centre, he refused to see me. His staff had got the wrong URL and had been unable to access the site!! He must therefore have learnt about entrapment from someone else. Who? I can think of no better explanation other than he had been 'bought off', corrupted by the CIA to avoid the true interests of the South". Evidence E5.
The UN Population Division corrupted
Maurice King. "The UN has a Population Division in addition to UNFPA. The Director Joe Chamie, and one of its senior staff Ellen M Brennan, are both US citizens. A friend had said "When you are in the States, why don't you talk to Jason Finkle?" Jason said: "I am giving three lectures at the UN Population Division on US population policy, why don't you come, since the lectures are public?". When Ellen M Brennan heard that I had been invited, she said: "No way - you are welcome at other lectures, but not to these!!". What was she afraid of? She suspected - correctly - that what I might hear would go on the web. I can only conclude that in respect of policing the lockstep, the US has corrupted the UN Population Division". Evidence E6.
The USAID report on the entrapment of Mali suppressed
Maurice King. "I was told that USAID did a study of Mali, and when this indicated the Mali was trapped, its report was suppressed. I was told this on good authority, but since I have not been able to confirm it, it is much weakest evidence. Evidence E7
Jack Bryant supports the US in the corruption of demography
Maurice King. "In the 1960s Jack and I both wrote books on the health of Africa,{62} {63} since when he has held a senior post in the US Department of Health and Human Services, and also chairs in public health in Bangkok and Karachi. More recently he has acted as a link between Washington and WHO. We have therefore known one another for nearly 40 years. He now finds himself on one side of the fence, defending the innocence of the US government in policing the lockstep, while I am on the other".
"In the late 1980s he wrote to me and said. "I have got to prepare a background paper for the WHO meeting in Riga. 'Halfway point towards Health for all by the Year 2000'. Have you any thoughts.?" I had been working on entrapment for about a year at the time, using my own code word for it 'Eldred's dilemma' - after Eldred Parry with whom I had discussed it. I replied that he had better get WHO to think about communities exceeding the carrying capacity of their ecosystems. "I will" he replied, "but not quite as you phrase it". In the event, the WHO report {69} contained a brief mention of it - the only time that UN agencies have ever mentioned entrapment".
"I met him in Karachi subsequently. He told me that what I was calling 'Eldred's dilemma' was actually called 'demographic entrapment' - the first time that I had heard the term. He had previously been lecturing about entrapment but had stopped. Beyond commending the principle of equity, he said nothing. I have met him many times since, but he has always been jokingly evasive. He has refused to discuss it, or to answer letters about it.
When I confronted him with George Kennan's statement above (Evidence B) he became very, very, angry - see above. He argued that things had changed since the 1940's. So I had to confront him with Evidence D1 and D2 from the 1950's and 1960's. When I asked him why I should be interviewed by the CIA, he had no explanation to give.
The only conclusion is that Jack knows all about entrapment, even to the point of having at one timelectured about it, but having taken an oath of loyalty to the US government, now feels compelled to stick to US policy, which is to corrupt demography by denying that entrapment exists. Whether he is merely being politically correct, or has been directly advised to keep silent on entrapment, I don't know. Evidence E 8.
More recently Jack e-mails "The world still needs your good ideas, keep it up". So quarrels can be made up!
Interestingly, Lester Brown wrote on entrapment on at least two occasions in the late 1980s,{71} and then stopped, although there are signs that he may be cautiously starting again. I conclude that the lockstep only became really tight in the late 1980s.
It is interesting to speculate on degrees of complicity and innocence in maintaining the taboo on entrapment - see.Norbert Hirschorn attends my lectures on behalf of the CIA?
Maurice King. "An American, Norbert Hirschorn, whom I first met in the 1970s appeared in my student lectures at the London School of Hygiene - uninvited. He was welcome. How did he know I was lecturing, what was he there for? I met him again recently, and greeted him as my 'CIA watcher'. He did not bat an eyelid. The normal reaction to a friendly false accusation would be: "Oh, come off it". Either complete passivity (Norbert) or great anger (Jack Bryant) are indications that the arrow has struck home. Hardly conclusive, but highly coherent. Evidence E9
(F) When does 'political correctness' become 'policing' ?
Lady M. "Can you draw an edge between where "political correctness" ends and "policing begins".
Maurice King "There are clear examples of each, with a grey area between them. 'Political correctness' is new term, first widely current in the 1980s. Although merely a label for sticking to the norms of a group, the sudden wide use of a new term suggests that there is a new reality underlying it - a powerful new conformism. Conformity seems to be getting tighter, with ever fewer people prepared to 'stick their necks out'".
For a senior, or moderately senior, UN or US civil servant to be seen talking to me publicly, is to prejudice their political correctness and their career - if not why do they give me such a wide berth? Since senior UN posts depend on getting US support, the upper reaches of the UN might in effect be the US civil service. I argue that 'political correctness' has now got to such ridiculous levels in UN/US circles that it has, in a real sense, become 'policing'. Here are some examples. None of the other Demons - the feminist agenda, or the Holy See, for example, could be having this effect. Demon 21 , fear of displeasing the US is surely the demon which is operating - powerfully contributing to policing the lockstep.
F1 Nils Dulaire dare not discuss entrapment. (1999) There is a splendid young (40) American, Nils Dulaire, the very best of America, bright, excellently trained and awesomely competent, whom I had, I think, previously just met.Anyway, when he was with USAID we had an exchange of e-mails in which he said that I was a common subject of conversation in USAID. I had the impression that he has no doubt about the reality of entrapment and the need for disentrapment. He e-mailed me to the effect that when he was next in Geneva, he would "...try to shake himself clear of his CIA mentors...(sic)" so that we could discuss entrapment. In the event he couldn't, and when we happened to meet in the WHO cafeteria, all I got was a charming little touch on the elbow.
F2 Harrison Spencer, formerly Dean of the London School was exceedingly cagey. (1997) Harrison is an American who had arrived from Tulane. Shortly after he had arrived I went to see him. He listened and said almost nothing. Entrapment is of such importance that the School should have taken a great interest in it. Why was he so silent and worried? Did he know that there is a US policy to taboo entrapment and to preserve the lockstep? This evidence has been criticised on the grounds that Harrison never said anything about anything!
F3, Bill Foegy dare not discuss it. (1992) He had been head of CDC in Atlanta, he invented the forked needle which made the eradication of smallpox possible, and is one of the aristocrats of US epidemiology. At that time he was also an aspirant for the top job in UNICEF. During one of his lectures at the London School he referred to my first paper {55}with some deference. I met him for a moment afterwards and said that I would like to discuss entrapment - anytime anywhere. He refused. He would appear to be genuinely torn between wanting to discuss entrapment on one hand, and a desire to preserve the lockstep on the other hand.
F4, Craig Kuhl dare not get even get in touch. Craig was with the US embassy in Geneva. We had discussed entrapment in the past. I understand that he holds me in high regard. At his farewell cocktail party I left him a copy of the lockstep paper, {36}knowing that he would have to circulate it in the Embassy. I heard afterwards that it caused much interest there! I also heard that he had tried to get in touch with me several times by frequenting the coffee shop where I used to go each morning. I had since changed my coffee shop, so we never met. Entrapment is so acutely sensitive politically, and the CIA so pervasive in US embassies, that he dare not phone or e-mail.
F5, Roger Shrimpton dare not even show that he knew me. Roger visited us as a student in Surabaya in 1975. Subsequently, he tried to get me a job in Brazil. Recently, he was very senior in UNICEF. In 1999 he was in Geneva at the ACCN/SCN meeting, chaired by Richard Jolly (see below). We had not met for 25 years. On the first day I handed papers on entrapment to various people, including him. On the following day, he dare not indicate that he knew me, even by looking in my direction in public!
Lady M. "In these examples you assume that it is only Demon 21 - ultimately the State Department - that is causing this reticence to discuss entrapment. Why not Demons 9 and 10 - the views of the Holy See, or Demon 6, the problems of 1-child families?Maurice King. "Because if it was, people would have had no compunction in saying so. Demon 21, the influence of the Department of State, would be the only one that would cause them to keep their mouths shut. If, for example, they had been worried about Demon 8, the implications of entrapment for the feminist agenda, they would have said so! To friends privately, they would probably have said anything".
E1 (Sam Preston), E2 (Uncle Pino's warning), E3 (the CIA in Cairo), E4 (the UN Population Division) are clear evidence of policing. Basia Zaba's refusal to discuss entrapment is clearly political correctness. In these F examples, especially F1 (Nils Daulaire) and F5 (Roger Shrimpton), political correctness is having a powerful effect in policing.
(G) A long history of US political malfeasance
Maurice King. "I heard on good authority that the only time when Jim Grant, lately Executive Director of UNICEF, was heard to utter the 'F-word' was when the US had done something particularly awful. It seems therefor that it can do things which are particularly awful - like policing the lockstep. See also, George Kennan, .
The complete lack of surprise - and indeed acceptance - by many US citizens (H)
Maurice King. "One of my wife's American friends, who was exceptionally able and well experienced in international health, had come to dinner. To begin with she had never heard of entrapment. After I had explained the policing of the lockstep, she remarked to the effect: "Of course, what else to you expect?". I have several times had a similar response from US citizens who are not in positions that require them to be politically correct. They take it for granted that the US should be policing the lockstep - indeed they would be surprised if it were not".
For example, in September 2003 I lectured in Kinshasa in French to a large meeting of Les chefs du Zone from all over the Congo. I presented some of the evidence for the activities of Demon 21' including 'The bloody good knee...'. Surprisingly, there was no taboo when discussing enttapment, and no'aggro' (anger, bad feeling). Unsurprisingly, there was much interest in Les Dèmons!
After the meeting several Americans with strong links to USAID said: "We are agree with your politics..."
(I) My lecture at Johns Hopkins in March 2002.
I spoke at a meeting entitled: The coming crunch: water and food and population. The title of my talk was: Disentrapment: A 1-child families better than starvation and violence ? I argued that Africa is trapped, that demography is corrupt, and that powerful US political interests in keeping it so. Nobody dissented from any of these assertions that, nor indeed it where they discussed. I had a very strong feeling that they were already well known. Senior figures in gave me a wide berth. I came away with the impression that I had 'hit the nail on the head'. Here are my overhead transparencies from that meeting.
Failure to finance the expected International Conference on Population and Development ICPD in 2004. (J)
An obvious way to maintain the taboo on demographic entrapment is to minimise the opportunities for discussing !!! There is no better opportunity for doing this than at the hitherto decennial international population conferences, such as the last one in Cairo in 1994. All discussion of entrapment was tightly taboo at Cairo. As will have become apparent from what has been said above about the CIA and pressure on The Lancet, this was only achieved with some difficulty, and required considerable political effort. Ten years later in 2004, with another billion people added to the world population, and the problems of 'overpopulation' (entrapment) seemingly impossible to avoid discussing, the obvious way to avoid doing so is simple - not to have fund the conference that will surely discuss them! Other reasons for not doing so will surely be advanced, but the decision not to take every opportunity to discuss the world's greatest problem - second only to global warming, and linked to it - is highly consistent with the thesis of policing the lockstep advanced here.
As to just how taboo entrapment was at Cairo, it is worth remembering that it took place in September 1994 five months after the Rwanda genocide the previous April, in which the demographic entrapment of both Hutus and Tutsis had played a major part. Each day during the week of the conference the world's most eminent demographers give a public lecture - The Distinguished Lecture Series - Paul Demeny, John Caldwell, Huda Zurayk, Massimo Livi-Baci, Thomas Homer-Dixon, and Marvelous Mhloyi. When each lecturer had finished, I asked: "What about Rwanda?" They all replied "Very difficult", or words to this effect - by which they meant very taboo!
Only demographers? Only the US?
Lady M. "Do you think that the Americans are the only people who do the corrupting?"
Maurice King. "No, they can be citizens of other countries in thrall to what is in effect the US power structure in senior levels in the UN agencies, and who are concerned about their career and their political correctness, and who dare not confront the demons, especially Demon 21".
"Peer pressure, Demon 17, can be very powerful - even between Englishmen! So can Demon 22, friendship. After I had published my first paper, I was written to by an old friend, now Sir Richard Jolly, then second at UNICEF, and until recently senior adviser to UNDP. He said, in effect: "For the sake of Auld Ang Syne, don't 'rock the boat', old chap". He was persuading me to remain 'one of us', and not do dissent. I have been rocking it for all I am worth ever since. Demon 22, friendship was doing its best".
Lady M. "Don't you think that some other people are rather happy that the US is doing the policing?"
Maurice King. "It think they probably are. It does not make breaking the lockstep any easier, and it certainly makes for a quiet life".
Lady M. "You seem to imagine that the senior demographers are all one huge club, and that they all know one another".
Maurice King. That is exactly what they are.
Uncle Pino. "...Personally, we do not believe the conspiratory theory..." {75}
Maurice King. "To label something 'a conspiratory theory' is to imply that it is a theory without evidence. This paper provides that evidence".
