A failure of imagination: R.G. Casey and Australian plans for counter-subversion in Asia, 1954-1956

This article is a study of some aspects of the non-military response of the Menzies government to the decolonisation of the European empires and the cold war in Asia. In the mid-1950s R.G. Casey, the Minister for External Affairs, was given responsibility by the cabinet to develop a programme of Colombo Plan - educational, cultural, propaganda, intelligence and political initiatives - which the Menzies government hoped would influence the outcome of the cold war in Asia. This article suggests that an examination of these government initiatives reveals some important insights into the nature of the Menzies government's understanding of and response to the revolutionary changes which swept through Asia in the decade after the Second World War.     

Excursions into political economy of health

S.M. Hillier and J. A. Jewell, Health Care and Traditional Medicine in China 1800–1982, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1983. Pp.xix + 452; £25.00.

D. Banerji, Poverty, Class and Health Culture in India (Vol.1), New Delhi: Prachi Prakashan, 1982. Pp.x + 309; Rs.100.

W.A. Zaman, Public Participation in Development and Health Programs: Lessons from Rural Bangladesh, London and New York: University Press of America, 1984. Pp.xix + 291; £15.15. (paperback).

J.K. van Ginneken and A.S. Muller (eds.), Maternal and Child Health in Rural Kenya: An Epidemiological Study, Beckenham, Kent: Croom Helm, 1984. Pp.viii + 373; £15.95.

The expression ‘political economy of health’ has quite different implications to scholars working within differing paradigms. The range of interpretations is apparent from an overview of work in this field in recent years. Two studies of singular importance for the student of health politics and health care in Asia are singled out for detailed review: one on China, the other on India. The reviewer also raises the question as to how far health education has been seen in the radical tradition as contributory towards the process of politicisation in peasant societies: here the literature is more scattered and a deeper analysis would be well repaid.     

The war‐making state and privatisation

States, created with the central purpose of defending national independence, resist the process of macro‐economic reform since it appears to limit their power to pursue this aim. The states of the former Centrally Planned Economies were marked out by their extreme subordination to the military drive, so the resistance to reshaping the ‘war‐making state’ into a ‘market‐facilitating state’ is considerable. The transition tends to be halted where the old structures of central control are ended without markets supplying alternative imperatives — a ‘rent‐seeking state’ is created. These themes are examined in relationship to privatisation of state owned enterprises in four countries: Russia, China, Vietnam and the Ukraine.     

Mobilising against Globalisation: Attac and the French Intellectuals

Contemporary France has witnessed the rise of an anti-globalisation movement that has mobilised with considerable intensity and force on a national and international stage. This article examines the role of Attac, the leading French organisation against neo-liberal globalisation, focusing on its impact within mainstream political life. Attac has been characterised by unparalleled success within formal politics, gaining access to key institutions of government and developing alliances with parties on both the Left and Right. It will be argued here that the political success of Attac is linked to the place of intellectual elites within it, who hold positions of power and influence within political, university and media circles. This is an organisation in which intellectuals play a pre-eminent role, placing their own knowledge and expertise at the service of a political cause.     

Obituaries: Lady Delia Pilcher

The New York-born journalist and travel writer Francis Nichols (1879-1904) is best known for his travels through early 20^th-century China. However, his attempt in 1903-4 to travel through Tibet to Lhasa ahead of the Younghusband Mission, and thus to become the first westerner to reach the city, has been forgotten, partly on account of his death in the field and the loss of his diary. From new research in recently-catalogued documents and letters in the archives of the American Geographical Society (AGS), the author has compiled an account of Nichols’ mission to Lhasa, including the support he received from US backers, including the AGS, his travels in China, Tibet and India, and his relations with Younghusband and the British. Although Nichols was unable to reach Lhasa, the author observes that he should be credited as the first American to travel from India into the Chumbi valley in southern Tibet and across the Tibetan plateau from Phari to the town of Gyantse, 120 miles south-west of Lhasa.