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  • Pax Chaotica: A Re-evaluation of Post-WWII Economic and Political Order

    Pax Chaotica: A Re-evaluation of Post-WWII Economic and Political Order

    Paper delivered to the School of Politics and Government, Birkbeck College, University of London, London, UK, 2000

    “The strongest is never strong enough to maintain his mastery at all times unless he transforms his strength into right and obedience into duty…Yielding to force is an act of necessity, not of will; at the very most, it is an act of prudence (Rousseau 1762).” 

    By David South

    This paper analyses the following proposition: the key post-war institutions were neither an intended, nor an adequate, response to the economic and political challenges of the post-1945 world.

    There is ample evidence to show that the plethora of post-war institutions were  intended, and were a deliberate consequence of American policy-makers seeking to control the geo-political fallout of the most catastrophic conflict of human history, World War II.

    In many respects institutions such as the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were a sophisticated and modern approach to a new global order minus the old imperial powers. They were an act of significant imagination and inspiration drawn from a long tradition in asserting the rule of law over the rule of anarchy; the rights of the weak over the tyranny of the strong.

    However, these institutions have repeatedly failed to meet the economic and political challenges of the past 55 years. The commitment of the United States to these bodies tailed off after World War II, and America displayed a lack of will to mature them beyond a dependence on American initiative and action.

    There is substantial evidence to support the argument that the hegemony of Pax Americana over the last half century undermined the evolution of these institutions, sustaining a chaotic world order that has not delivered prolonged peace or prosperity for a large number of the world’s citizens and that these institutions were ill prepared to confront the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of the 1980s.

    This paper will explore the inadequacies of the global institutions to meet two key aspirations of the post-war world: conflict resolution and avoidance and economic prosperity based on free markets and democratic regimes.

    I will argue that, while this period avoided a major conflagration on the scale of the world wars, it was not a period of peace. Regional conflicts, costly both in terms of human life and of finance, plagued every one of the years since World War II. This has been called a period of Pax Americana (Knutsen 1999). I will argue that, rather than a period of global harmony and prosperity anchored by the American hegemon, it has been a period of Pax Chaotica, a “macabre dance of death in which the rulers of the superpowers mobilize their own populations to support harsh and brutal measures directed against victims within what they take to be their respective domains, where they are ‘protecting their legitimate interests,’” as Noam Chomsky describes it (Chomsky 1995: 207). Pax Chaotica is a period in which there is an illusion of stability offered by a hegemon, but in which the hegemon’s military, economic and moral superiority is unable to secure actual peace and prosperity in the world. The hegemon is out of balance, its military and economic superiority in predominance, while its moral superiority and credibility wanes and withers on the vine.

    I will analyse how adequate the global institutions were in the context of the concept of hegemony — in particular the hegemony of the United States, which has not relinquished this hegemony to the global institutions it initially set up. I will conclude that the 1990s has been a period of half measures, incremental attempts at bolstering the concept of international security by the community of nations, but that those attempts, as in the case of the Gulf War or in Kosovo, have been still under the direction of the United States.

    Making up a master plan: The deliberate development of the institutions

    The post-war master plan was comprehensive, and included the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (World Bank), the International Monetary Fund, the International Trade Organisation (superseded by the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade as the instrument of freer trade) and the United Nations. A clutch of security organisations was also established after the war, including NATO. As Knutsen aptly puts it:

    WITH MEMORIES OF THE INTERWAR RECESSION AND THE NEW DEAL FRESHLY IN MIND, ALREADY, IN THE FIRST YEARS OF THE WAR THEY BEGAN TO DESIGN STABILISING POSTWAR INSTITUTIONS OF INTERNATIONAL FINANCE AND TRADE — THE IBRD, THE IMF AND THE ITO. … THEY SOUGHT TO SET UP THE MOST IMPORTANT POSTWAR INSTITUTIONS BEFORE THE CONDITIONS OF PEACE WERE EVEN RAISED. THEY RUSHED THE CONFERENCES ON THE UN, IBRD, IMF AND ITO INTO SESSION BEFORE GERMANY AND JAPAN SURRENDERED. (KNUTSEN 1999: 203)

    The founding of the United Nations and the Bretton Woods institutions (the International Monetary Fund and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, later the World Bank) marked a turning point in world history. The United States had been attempting to exert greater control on the global order since the first 14 proposals of President Woodrow Wilson during World War I. As European powers declined at the beginning of the 20thcentury, liberal American policymakers saw an opportunity for the US to assert its hegemony over the world and re-write the rules of economic engagement along American lines. The two world wars only made the US wealthier and wealthier: in World War I, by providing armaments to both sides of the conflict; in World War II by joining with Canada as the armament and resource engine for the allied war effort.

    In many ways, the new institutions represented a forward-thinking and idealistic policy compared to a global order marked by imperial rivalries. It captured contemporary ideas on economic theory, projected a universalist Lockean ideal that all men from all nations are equal, and it was injected with the idealism and energy of the world’s largest democracy and the strongest market economy.

    Franklin Roosevelt, like Woodrow Wilson, saw America’s engagement in the world  war as a struggle to contain European-style militarism, imperialism and exclusive trade blocs. America’s aim, in both wars, was to preserve the conditions for liberal world order — for a democratic system of politics and an economic system based on free-market principles. Wilson and Roosevelt both sought to liberalize world trade. And they both sought to use America’s leading position in world politics to bring other countries into line with America’s policy. (Knutsen 1999: 193)

    These institutions ensured that the US had an influence on every facet of world affairs post World War II. It could merge its political and economic goals and ensure it had a stake in the recovery from the war. This played very well when it came to shoring up domestic support in the United States.

    Under a World Bank controlled by Americans, development assistance could be focused precisely where America’s core corporations saw the greatest opportunity. And so long as the recipients of America’s foreign aid used it to buy American exports core corporations could venture into global trade confident of receptive markets. Through such means, the playing field of global commerce was sufficiently tipped in America’s direction so that by the mid-1950s even the National Association of Manufacturers could be persuaded to support tariff reduction. (Reich 1992: 64)

    The institutions were philosophically strong, too. Learning from Machiavelli that human relations can be cynical, ruthless and riddled with power agendas, the United Nations offered a peaceful forum to resolve these disputes and a theoretically far more transparent alternative than what had come before. As Weber emphasised, modern states helped to promote capitalist development. With that in mind, the Bretton Woods institutions laid the groundwork for a global financial structure pegged to the US dollar and promoting an American view of free markets.

    Hegemony theory and Pax Americana

    I argue that these global institutions have shown themselves to be hampered and inadequate when faced with serious political and economic challenges. The root cause is a weakness that is most often cited as their strength: the United States.

    Hegemonic stability has been characterised by the emergence of successive dominant liberal powers (Gilpin 1987: 66). What Strange calls “structural power” is essential to the establishment of hegemony over world affairs, since it “confers the power to decide how things shall be done, the power to shape frameworks within which states relate to each other, relate to people, or relate to corporate enterprises (Strange 1998: 25).”

    The post-World War II global institutions are an excellent example of the intersection of politics and economy; institutions like the United Nations seek to wield influence in both the political sphere and the economic, most particularly through the Bretton Woods institutions. Hegemonic world order exists, Knutsen suggests, “when the major members of an international system agree on a code of norms, rules and laws which helps govern the behaviour of all. This agreement reflects the rhetorical skills of a particular great power (Knutsen 1999: 49).” This is what happened towards the end of World War II, as the United States wrote the new world order according to its own rules.

    As further evidence of US supremacy, the new global rules were constructed so as to force America’s superpower rivals, the USSR and China, to join “its” institutions, not the other way around (though Taiwan stood in for the People’s Republic in the United Nations, against the protests of the USSR, until 1971).

    The US became the hegemon because the Soviet Union had very little to offer, either in terms of economic assistance or of political freedoms.

    Historians now understand that potential clients encouraged the United States to become a hegemon at the end of World War II: the term “empire by invitation” has come to characterize what happened. The Soviet bid for postwar influence lacked any comparable legitimacy, and so quickly came up against a condition that creates major difficulties for hegemons, which is lack of consent. (Gaddis 1992: 177)

    Do as I say, not as I do: The rise and fall of the hegemon’s moral advantage

    A large part of the credibility of the US hegemony was bolstered by its moral advantage vis-à-vis other nations. A heady cocktail of democratic freedoms, economic success and military might led many other nations to believe the US and its institutions had got it right where others had failed.

    As Strange notes: “President Truman had followed up in his augural address to the Congress with the firm promise of American help to peoples seeking freedom and a better material life. Moral authority based on faith in American intentions powerfully reinforced its other sources of structural power (Strange 1994: 32).”

    Supporters of US hegemony, like John G. Ruggie, believe the hegemon must be liberal-minded. Otherwise:

    IF THE OTHER STATES BEGIN TO REGARD THE ACTIONS OF THE HEGEMON AS SELF-SERVING AND CONTRARY TO THEIR OWN POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC INTERESTS, THE HEGEMONIC SYSTEM WILL BE GREATLY WEAKENED. IT WILL ALSO DETERIORATE IF THE CITIZENRY OF THE HEGEMONIC POWER BELIEVES THAT OTHER STATES ARE CHEATING, OR IF THE COSTS OF LEADERSHIP BEGIN TO EXCEED THE PERCEIVED BENEFITS. (GILPIN 1987: 73)

    The US steadily weakened its credibility and moral advantage in both the areas of conflict resolution and avoidance, and in promoting economic prosperity.

    Conflict resolution and avoidance

    The US was seen as willing to distort global institutions to fight its ideological — and real — battles with the Soviet Union, and its proxies around the world. The US’s credibility as a promoter of peace and security was severely hampered by the Korean War, the Vietnam War and a dubious record of support for undemocratic regimes and guerrilla movements. These conflicts were intended to “contain” the Soviet Union and the spread of communism and to support regimes that were friendly to free markets. This was played out in a cynical cat-and-mouse game with the Soviet Union, where both sides avoided direct confrontation with each other and used third countries to wage their ideological battles.

    Gaddis takes an overly generous view of the Cold War high-wire act, but it is worth being reminded:

    BUT THE 1950S AND 1960S DID SEE A REMARKABLE SEQUENCE OF POTENTIALLY DANGEROUS CONFRONTATIONS — DIENBIENPHU, 1954; QUEMOY-MATSA, 1955; HUNGARY-SUEZ, 1956; LEBANON, 1958; BERLIN, 1958-59; THE U2 INCIDENT, 1960; CUBA, 1961; BERLIN, 1961; LAOS, 1961-62; THE CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, 1962 — EVERYONE OF WHICH WAS RESOLVED WITHOUT MAJOR MILITARY INVOLVEMENT BY EITHER SUPERPOWER. THE SAME COULD NOT BE SAID OF KOREA IN 1950, OR OF VIETNAM AND AFGHANISTAN LATER ON. (GADDIS 1992: 33)

    Other than actually being drawn in as a combatant, as in the case of the Korean War, the UN became more of a sideline observer and critic than a robust resolver of conflicts. The UN was critically flawed from the beginning and abrogated its commitment to collective security. It also proved ineffective when confronted with crisis. As Strange points out, one of the biggest weaknesses in the founding of the UN was the Charter. In Article 2, Paragraph 7, all matters of domestic consideration were the business of a state, and in Article 51 states were allowed to form alliances for individual or collective self-defence, “thus reopening the door to a security structure based on alliances and counter-alliance rather than on collective responsibilities for the maintenance of peace between states (Strange 1994: 52).”

    The UN was also hampered from developing a collective security maturity by the Security Council. The five permanent members used the veto to control resolutions, with the USSR and the US the most prolific abusers. The US had a total of 69 vetoes from 1945 to 1994; the USSR had 116.

    The fall of the Soviet Union at the end of the 1980s marked the beginning of a new period of instability in large parts of the world. The spotlight is once again on the UN to become an arbiter of conflict; once again it is most active when it is pushed by the United States to act when the US feels there is an interest to be served. This has been the case in the major UN missions in the 1990s, from the Gulf War (oil reserves), to the former Yugoslavia (European security). The UN proved to be ineffective where there was no naked US interest putting pressure on the organisation to act, as in the case of Rwanda. Strange remarks that this has had a demoralising effect on those who seek a security structure upholding international law and the universal rights of man.

    The fear that either the world organization would merely be the tool of one or other great power (as indeed it was the tool of the United States in the early 1950s) or that it would be ineffectual — as both the League and the UN have proved to be in the face of grave threats to international peace and order — have been enough to kill any realistic hopes of managing a transition from the present security structure to a multilateral or confederal one. (Strange 1994:52)

    Economic prosperity

    The second half of the 20th century has been hailed as a period of unprecedented global prosperity. Global gross national product rose from US $300 billion to US $2 trillion from 1945 to 1970 (Reich 1992: 64), though much of this was concentrated in a handful of countries. The major challenge of the 20th century has been the task of spreading prosperity around the world; to more evenly distribute the gains than can be reaped from advances in science and technology. The collapse of the colonial powers left large numbers of underdeveloped nations grappling with independence.

    With the collapse of the Bretton Woods arrangements in the early 1970s, and the emergence of deregulation in financial flows in the world, the US abrogated much of its responsibility for micro-managing global development. The market was now to do all the work, and being the modern age, rapid capital flows were to make the market work efficiently.

    Like the experience with conflict resolution and avoidance, the economic project has been mixed. A dependence on the market has not avoided a dependence on the economic fortunes of the global hegemon. As the US ship rises and sinks, so does the rest of the world. The Global economic system, Panic notes:

    WAS RUN BY THE DOMINANT ECONOMIC POWER AFTER THE SECOND WORLD WAR: THE UNITED STATES. IN THAT SENSE, ITS FORTUNES, LIKE THOSE OF THE CLASSICAL GOLD STANDARD, WERE DIRECTLY LINKED TO THOSE OF THE RELATIVE ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE AND POLICIES OF THE COUNTRY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE LARGEST SHARE OF WORLD INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION, TRADE, AND FINANCE AT THE TIME — PRECISELY THE OUTCOME THAT THOSE ATTENDING THE BRETTON WOODS CONFERENCE HAD BEEN ANXIOUS TO AVOID. (PANIC 1995: 46)

    By 1994, total world exports were more than 14 times greater than in 1950; output was five times greater than in 1950 (Dicken 1999: 24). But the economic achievements ring hollow if the well-being of the whole planet is taken into consideration. By 1995, 60 percent of the manufacturing in the world occurred in three countries — the United States, Japan and Germany (UNIDO 1996). While manufacturing in developing countries had quadrupled to 20 percent of global output, it was concentrated in a few developing countries with strong ties to the US.

    There is a direct connection between US interests and who does well economically. Western Europe was reconstructed rapidly with US money, and Germany became an industrial powerhouse again. The defeated Japan was restored as Asia’s wealthiest nation with American investment and advice. In 1945, 71 percent of world manufacturing was concentrated in four countries. Developed countries were host to 2/3 of foreign direct investment (Dicken 1999: 21). Most FDI is now concentrated in industrial, developed countries.

    There is a direct link between the failures of the UN and the global economy. The weakness of the international security arrangements also have an impact on economies. Vast sums of money are re-directed towards weapons purchases and away from human needs. For many smaller economies, this is a punishing drain on national resources and the funds are often borrowed from elsewhere. As Chomsky noted in the 1980s, “The fact is that both of the superpowers — and many lesser powers as well — are ruining their economies and threatening world peace, indeed human survival, by a mindless commitment to military production for themselves and for export (Chomsky 1995: 209).”

    There are concrete examples of developing countries that have achieved significant development gains, reaping the gains of peace and freer world trade. A group of 18 developing countries enjoyed growth rates in the 1990s of over five percent (DFID 2000: 66). This is attributed to more open trade policies compared to other developing countries (though many other countries have been equally open to trade, like Mongolia, but have not reaped the same benefits). China has enjoyed unprecedented growth, but it also has increasing rates of unemployment and violent unrest in its western regions. Sub-Saharan Africa’s 600 million population generates exports no greater than Malaysia’s 20 million (DFID 2000: 67).

    In regard to the World Trade Organization (WTO), the majority of its 140 members are developing countries. Not a perfect organisation, its agenda is dominated by a few wealthy nations, but the alternative of a world of bilateral trade deals hangs as a spectre if it fails. As the DFID report, Eliminating World Poverty: Making Globalisation Work for the Poor, points out:

    DESPITE PROGRESS OVER THE LAST 50 YEARS, DEVELOPED COUNTRIES MAINTAIN SIGNIFICANT TARIFF AND NON-TARIFF BARRIERS AGAINST THE EXPORTS OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES…TOTAL DEVELOPING COUNTRY GAINS FROM A 50 PER CENT CUT IN TARIFFS, BY BOTH DEVELOPED AND DEVELOPING COUNTRIES, WOULD BE IN THE ORDER OF $150 BILLION — AROUND THREE TIMES AID FLOWS. (DFID 2000: 69)

    Conclusion

    The postwar world order and the use of global institutions to build it, was a deliberate policy of the United States. It, however, proved only a half measure and the over-dependence on the United States ensured that these institutions were hampered when confronted with economic and political crises. As I have argued, a state of Pax Chaotica was the result.

    For Pax Chaotica to end, there needs to be a renewed effort by the United States to shore up global institutions and to develop a concrete plan to ensure that the global institutions become the global hegemon in every sense of the word. There have been incremental moves in this direction, including attempts to pay dues owed by the US to the UN.

    There needs to be a complete shift from the realist American interests of Pax Chaotica to the interests of the community of nations. In fact, there is an opportunity for a convergence of core American values — respect for individual liberty, freedom of expression, democracy — with the goals of the global institutions.

    As for international institutions, they must show themselves to not only be just, but also to be seen to be just. Institutions can no longer work in the shadows as they have in the past. Well-educated, wealthy protesters in Western countries will no doubt continue to demand transparency.

    In The Interests Of The Exploited?: The Role Of Development Pressure Groups In The UK

    A Steppe Back?: Economic Liberalisation And Poverty Reduction In Mongolia

    The Sweet Smell Of Failure: The World Bank And The Persistence Of Poverty

    DSC web address in green_mini (1)

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2017

  • A Local Drink Beats Global Competition

    A Local Drink Beats Global Competition

    By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

    SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

    For many decades, strong American and multinational food brands have penetrated markets in the South. This is a global business success story for those companies, but the downside has been the marginalizing of local alternatives. This not only reduces wealth-creating opportunities for local entrepreneurs, but also leads to products like sugary soda pops (http://tinyurl.com/yzwal98) pushing aside healthier, local alternatives like tea.

    But one company in Indonesia has been pioneering a healthy local drinks empire while also seeing off aggressive foreign rivals. Teh Botol Sosro, a tea drink in Indonesia bottled by family-owned business Sosro, was not only the first bottled tea brand in the country, but also in the world, it claims. The company started bottling the jasmine-flavoured black tea drink in the 1970s.

    The Indonesian company has shown that it is possible for local flavours to beat powerful international brands like Coca Cola in the battle for drinkers’ palates. While Coca Cola has tried to sell many bottled tea drinks in the Indonesian market, they have not been able to push aside the local product, The Teh Botol Sosro. Brewed by the Sinar Sosro company, it has captured 70 percent of the non-carbonated drinks market.

    It is a drink of cool, black, sweetened tea with a hint of jasmine. Invented by the Indonesian family of Sosrodjojos, Sosro (http://www.sosro.com/) was founded in central Java in the 1940s.

    Culturally, Indonesians have either coffee or tea with their meals. The brand’s marketing slogan plays on this: “Whatever you eat, you drink Teh Sosro.”

    The company has aggressively fought off competition not only from local rivals, but also from Coca Cola’s Frestea brand and Pepsi Cola’s Tekita. The company stayed sharp in its business strategy, never letting a rival product take hold. Just as a rival would introduce a new product, Sosro would reply with a new drink attuned to Indonesian tastes. This ability to not be complacent about the company’s success, and to use its knowledge of local tastes to always outsmart foreign competition, has kept the company where it is today.

    Sosro pioneered bottled drinking tea with its launch in 1970 and started with a dried tea only distributed in Central Java.

    The journey to cold, bottled tea is an amusing one. The company first wanted to promote its tea in Jakarta, the capital, by having public tastings. But by brewing the tea on the spot, the too-hot tea took too long to drink for impatient Jakartens. The solution was to not brew the tea on the spot, but instead to brew it off-site and deliver to markets in big pans on trucks. But the bad roads made this a bit of a mistake as well: the tea would spill on the journey.

    The ‘aha’ moment came when the idea arose to store the brewed tea in bottles. The bottles were eye-catching and have evolved in design over the years.

    The drink now comes in various packages, from a returnable glass bottle (220 ml) to a Tetra Pak (1 litre, 250 ml, and 200 ml) and a 230 ml pouch.

    The Botol Sosro (http://www.sosro.com/teh-botol-sosro.php) is not the company’s only product: it also brews Fruit Tea, The Botol Kotak and S-Tee. The economic benefits of these popular brands stay local, as Sosro gets the tea from PT Gunung Slamet, which operates three tea estates covering 1,587 hectares in Indonesia.

    Published: March 2010

    Resources

    1) Just Food is a web portal packed with the latest news on the global food industry and packed with events and special briefings to fill entrepreneurs in on the difficult issues and constantly shifting market demands. Website:http://www.just-food.com

    2) Brandchannel: The world’s only online exchange about branding, packed with resources, debates and contacts to help businesses intelligently build their brand. Website:http://www.brandchannel.com

    3) Small businesses looking to develop their brand can find plenty of free advice and resources here. Website: http://www.brandingstrategyinsider.com

    4) Growing Inclusive Markets, a web portal from UNDP packed with case studies, heat maps and strategies on how to use markets to help the poor. Website:http://www.growinginclusivemarkets.org

    5) Tea Genius: A website from Taiwan packed with information on tea, its health benefits and rituals. Website: http://www.teagenius.com/

    Cited

    As cited in Export Now: Five Keys to Entering New Markets by Frank Lavin and Peter Cohan (Wiley).

    Creative Commons License

    This work is licensed under a
    Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2022

  • From Special Report: NMM (New Media Markets) Spotlight On The Emergence Of Satellite Porn Channels In The UK

    From Special Report: NMM (New Media Markets) Spotlight On The Emergence Of Satellite Porn Channels In The UK

    October 26 1995

    Is the UK rushing to watch TV porn? 

    By David South

    Financial Times New Media Markets (London, UK), October 26, 1995

    ISSN: 02654717

    OCLC Number / Unique Identifier:1266447669

    The aspect of satellite and cable programming most feared by the British government when it pushed the development of new media in the mid-80s looks set to become firmly entrenched as a part of the emerging television era. 

    Next Wednesday, the USA’s most famous soft-pornography channel will arrive in the UK, almost certainly heralding a satellite porn war for the eyes of the British public. 

    The Home Office, which used to look after televsion, was worried that porn would be one shock too many for the British and would create havoc with British television laws. But the mores of the marketplace have changed the climate, although the Broadcasting Act and the Independent Television Commission (ITC) still create limits that are stricter than in most other countries. 

    Hard-core pornography – such as that shown on several continental channels which can be picked up in the UK – remains out of bounds, as evidenced by the Department of National Heritage’s recent proscription of the hard-core TV Erotica. 

    But the drawing of the line between hard-porn and soft-porn changes over time: the programming now permitted by the ITC is a lot stronger than many might have thought likely a few years ago. The porn channels have learned how to push the boundaries of acceptability and, with competition increasing, are likely to push their luck even further.

    Politicians, journalists and old-fashioned new-media programmers – for instance, the United Artists people who were dismayed at the decision of parent company TeleCommunications Inc to bring Playboy over to the UK – may believe that porn channels serve only to cheapen the quality of life. 

    But the supply side of the marketplace detects that there is a widespread demand for porn and (ironically) religion and so programmers will follow the demand by supplying suitable programming. 

    The soi-dissant “adult” channels estimate their potential audience at between 7 per cent and 30 per cent of cable and satellite homes – between 400,000 and 1.7 million homes at present penetration levels. 

    Their main target market is the consumer of “top shelf” magazines which range from the glossy, even glamorous Playboy to the more downmarket magazines of the “reader’s wives” variety.  According to the Campaign Against Pornography, the top six pornographic magazine titles sell about 2.5 million copies a month. Altogether, there are about 200 pornographic titles on sale in the UK. 

    Deric Botham, programmer at the recently-launched Television X – The Fantasy Channel  and a porn-industry veteran, estimates that the total UK sex industry – from videos and magazines to sex aids, but excluding prostitution – generates revenues of £4 billion a year, a figure which is difficult to substantiate but is equivalent to 10 times the investment in the UK film industry in 1994. 

    According to Botham, “our research shows that people want this thing and the majority of people want it to some degree.”

    The porn channels are finding it relatively easy to find satellite capacity, largely because they are forced by the rules to operate at a time of day (i.e. night) when most channels have quit their transponders and are only too happy to find someone to sub-lease them to. 

    According to Botham, “our research shows that people want this thing and the majority of people want it to some degree.”

    The first of the new porn channels will be the Playboy Channel, which likes to think of itself as being a cut above the others. The others, it claims, are for “sad, lonely men”. Playboy, on the other hand, is for “happy, heterosexual couples”. 

    The channel, probably the softest of the genre, will be launched on November 1 by Flextech, BSkyB and the US Playboy Channel. 

    It will be followed by the not-so-soft Penthouse which is being launched in the UK by a joint venture of Penthouse magazine owners General Media and Graff Pay-Per-View, which already owns the UK Adult Channel. 

    Two other channels have received licences from the ITC – David (Sunday Sport newspaper) Sullivan’s Babylon Blue and the Adam and Eve Channel. With the Adult Channel and Television X already broadcasting, there could be six porn channels on offer to UK viewers. 

    But two other channels are beamed into the UK for those willing to pay the cost of extra reception equipment: the continental pirates, Rendezvous and Eurotica. There is also the now-banned TV Erotica. 

    Cable and satellite was bound to be an attractive medium for the porn channels, given the possibility of encrypting the signal and imposing a subscription fee and, as a consequence, benefiting from the lighter regulation that has seemed likely. Sex-channel executives say that the ITC has become increasingly flexible in what it will allow. 

    Three other factors have fuelled would-be channels to turn to cable and satellite: 

    1.  The replacement of the independent high-street video store by big video superstores has robbed the porn industry of a key outlet. 
    2. New-media distribution should bring in consumers who are embarassed to hire a porn video from a shop. Yet buying a subscription to a porn channel may be a more embarassing act within the family environment. 
    3. The Adult Channel is regarded as demonstrating that there is an audience for porn in the UK: it is thought to have about 224,000 subscribers. 

    Cable and satellite has far more potential for the porn industry than the traditional-format channel. The prize, which will make everything worthwhile, is pay-per-view (ppv). Bill Furrelle, Playboy Channel’s sales director, said that he had been asked by several UK cable operators about providing a ppv service next year. The operators want Playboy, the Adult Channel and Adam and Eve to contribute to the Home Cinema ppv service which they hope to put together. 

    Do TV porn channels degrade and humiliate? 

    By David South

    Financial Times New Media Markets (London, UK), October 26, 1995

    Susan Sontag, the renowned American essayist, described pornography as a “crutch for the pyschologically deformed and brutalisation of the morally innocent.” The Campaign Against Pornography in the UK believes that pornography exploits women and children “in a degrading and humiliating way, often with the message that we enjoy this and want to be abused.”

    The campaign encourages its supporters to take direct action against any distributor of pornographic material as part of its wider campaign to put the industry out of business.

    The porn channels dismiss arguments that they degrade women and encourage male violence against women. Playboy managing director Rita Lewis argues that “women are happy to consume erotic imagery like pin-ups. Women are not hung-up by this anymore, they are not threatened by the fantasy women we show in our programming. We hope Playboy will lead to couples’ making love together.”

    Andrew Wren, financial director of the Adult Channel, also dismisses the link between pornographic programming and sexual violence. “I don’t think there is anything in programmes that would encourage men to go and rape. Women are interested in sex as men are.”

    Television X’s (Deric) Botham says that porn programmes are “a bit of titilation” in the fine, upstanding tradition of the British Carry On films. None the less, he admits that “I wouldn’t want my daughter to get involved in pornography.”

    He says that the women involved in the programmes, some of them housewives, are willing participants and enjoy the opportunity. “I don’t produce anything that is against the law. We speak to the individuals concerned. If you have a reluctant model, it doesn’t work – I just won’t buy the video.”

    The Campaign Against Pornography sees it all rather differently. Ann Mayne, a member of the campaign’s management committee, was particularly critical of two programmes on Television X – Shag Nasty and Mutley and Fly on the Wall.

    She said that Shag Nasty and Mutley, in which a presenter approaches women in the street or in supermarkets and offers them £25 to look at their knickers, or £50 to be filmed having sex with him, gave the message that women were simply objects and that it was acceptable to harass them.

    “It is complete prostitution of female sexuality,” she said. “Botham wants full-on, across-the-board prostitution of women. In his view, every woman must have a price.”

    Mayne said that Fly on the Wall, in which real-life couples are shown having sex, was an open invitation for men to coerce their partners into being filmed, possibly to the point of abuse.

    UK laws on satellite porn among toughest in Europe

    By David South

    Financial Times New Media Markets (London, UK), October 26, 1995

    UK regulations on what can be shown on sex channels are tougher than in most countries of the European Union. Channels such as the hard-core Swedish TV Erotica and the recently-launched French Rendezvous are licensed in their respective countries and transmit explicit scenes of sexual intercourse, straight and gay, featuring close-up shots of copulating genitals. 

    Graff Pay-Per-View, the experienced US sex channel operator, consciously decided to exclude the UK as a market for its hard-core Eurotica channel which is licensed in Denmark and, like the other hard-core channels, transmits via a Eutelsat satellite. But pirate smart cards for the channel, as for the other channels, are available in the UK in specialist satellite shops. 

    Graff’s seeming respect for the UK regulations may not be unconnected with the fact that it owns the Adult Channel and would be wary of upsetting the ITC. Broadcasting unacceptable material into the UK could provoke the ITC into seeing Graff as a body unfit to hold a licence, thereby threatening the Adult Channel. 

    The ITC’s guidelines on sexually explicit material state that representations of sexual intercourse can be shown only after 9pm and that “the portrayal of sexual behaviour, and of nudity, needs to be defensible in context and presented with tact and discretion.”

    There has been some relaxation of the rule. The ITC will, on an experimental basis, allow the watershed to be broken by a ppv or video-on-demand service. It is not, however, prepared to give this freedom to a porn channel, at least not in the early days, because it does not want to be seen to be licensing pornography. The relaxation will affect only general services. 

    The ITC will also monitor any ppv service to ensure that there are no cases of children accessing the programming before deciding if the programme code should be revised. 

    The transmission pf 18-rated films on terrestrial or new-media channels is not permitted before 10pm. Films with a 15-rating are not allowed before 9pm on terrestrial channels such as BSkyB’s Sky Movies or the Movie Channel. These are minimum requirements. Some 15-rated films, for instance those which show scenes of sexual intercourse or drug-taking, would not be deemed suitable for transmission even on an encrypted channel at 8pm. 

    In practice, the ITC does not permit depictions of erect penises, anal intercourse, close-ups of genitalia or ejaculation. 

    Where channels have overstepped the mark and gone abroad to get licences from less strict authorities – the late Red Hot Dutch and TV Erotica – the ITC has recommended that the channels be proscribed, action which has subsequently been taken by the Department of National Heritage. The ITC is now monitoring the Rendezvous channel, which shows a mix of gay and heterosexual hard-core pornography with graphic scenes of sexual intercourse. 

    The DNH issues proscription orders under Sections 177 and 178 of the Broadcasting Act. The orders make it a criminal offence to supply equipment to receive the channels or to market and advertise them. 

    The European Union directive on transfrontier broadcasting lays down that one country cannot prevent the reception of channels licensed by other European Union countries. However, it allows individual governments to take action against any broadcast which could damage the physical, mental or moral development of minors. 

    Playboy ‘is not for sad and lonely single men’

    By David South

    Financial Times New Media Markets (London, UK), October 26, 1995

    The Playboy Channel, due to launch in the UK on November 1, is trying to position itself as being a cut above the existing sex channels with which it will compete for subscribers. 

    The channel, which is running an advertising campaign costing more than £1.5 million, believes that its big budgets and slick production values will attract viewers who have hitherto been uninterested in so-called “adult” entertainment. It hopes to win an audience among women as well as men. 

    Managing director Rita Lewis dismisses the other sex channels as being aimed at people who are “a bit sad and on their own”. The channels promote “deviant” behaviour. 

    Playboy hopes to attract happy, heterosexual couples who will treat the channel as an aid to foreplay: “We hope Playboy will lead to couples’ making love,” said Lewis, who believes that women, as well as men “are happy to consume erotic imagery like pin-ups.”

    In the USA, according to Lewis, 70 per cent of the audience for the channel comprises couples. 

    “We hope Playboy will lead to couples’ making love,” said Lewis, who believes that women, as well as men “are happy to consume erotic imagery like pin-ups.”

    She said that the UK Playboy will run programmes that have more in common with programmes like Channel Four’s The Good Sex Guide. “These days, a whole bunch of people are sampling erotic programming like The Good Sex Guide. It is very sexy programming with mass-market appeal.”  

    Playboy’s movies would have a high standard of production, she said, very different from what she claims to be the cheap programming made for the other channels, often home videos and often shot with hand-held cameras. 

    Playboy’s programming will comprise sex films, interviews with “centrefold” models, documentaries on the sex industry and general-entertainment programming such as quiz shows. 

    The rival channels claim that Playboy will not be a big threat to them. The Adult Channel’s Wren says that all the new channels “hype the market, which helps us.” In any case, adult entertainment consumers have already been weaned on a harder mix of programming and do not want something that offers little more than what Channel Four shows. 

    The UK Playboy Channel, which is owned by UK programmer Flextech (51 per cent), British Sky Broadcasting (30 per cent) and Playboy Enterprises (19 per cent), will transmit from between midnight and 4am on the Bravo transponder on Astra 1c. 

    Read more on the 1990s sex economy here: From Special Report: Sexual Dealing: Today’s Sex Toys Are Credit Cards & Cash: A Report On The Sex-For-Money Revolution

    Special Report: Sexual Dealing: Today’s Sex Toys Are Credit Cards & Cash: A Report On The Sex-For-Money Revolution.

    Update: It is over 20 years since this Special Report was published. The Internet now plays a significant role in the growth of sex content and the sex industry and vice versa. Here is an interesting overview of the situation in 2020. The Internet is for Porn – It always was, it always will be.

    “One of the biggest and most interesting things happening in the consumer web right now is running almost completely under the radar. It has virtually zero Silicon Valley involvement. There are no boastful VCs getting rich. It is utterly absent from tech’s plethora of twitters, fora and media (at least, as they say, “on main”). Indeed, the true extent of its incredible success has gone almost completely unnoticed, even by its many, many, many customers.

    I’m talking, of course, about OnlyFans.”

    More from the Financial Times here:

    “Opinion Inside Business

    OnlyFans shows how the creator economy is shaping media 

    Porn is a kind of paradigm for broader changes for publishers and musical labels”

    https://www.ft.com/content/4be047b7-0517-403a-9374-c6ea317b1b7e?segmentid=acee4131-99c2-09d3-a635-873e61754ec6

    New Media Markets and Screen Finance were published by the Financial Times in the 1990s.

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2024

  • CASE STUDY 4: UN + UNDP Mongolia | 1997 – 1999

    CASE STUDY 4: UN + UNDP Mongolia | 1997 – 1999

    Expertise: Crisis leadership, mission leadership, strategy, communications, web strategy, digital media, crisis recovery, public health, Northeast Asia, UN system.  

    Location: Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia 1997 to 1999

    UN/UNDP Mongolia Communications Coordinator: David South

    Abstract

    “The transformation of Mongolia from a largely rural nomadic society of herdsmen to a community dominated by the increasingly ultra-globalized city of Ulan Bator, where almost a third of the population lives, is nothing short of astounding.“ The New Mongolia: From Gold Rush to Climate Change, Association for Asian Studies, Volume 18:3 (Winter 2013): Central Asia

    From 1997 to 1999, I served as the Communications Coordinator (head of communications) for the United Nations (UN)/United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) mission in Mongolia, founding and directing its UNDP Mongolia Communications Office. 

    About

    The question posed itself from the start of the assignment: In the middle of a major crisis, is it possible to recover quickly while simultaneously growing and modernizing the United Nations mission (this was the dawn of the digital revolution)? It was only possible by teaching and mentoring colleagues, offering leadership, vision, strategy, and practical actions to get there – all with a budget and mandate for two years.

    The mission had to tackle in particular, three, severe crises: the country’s turbulent transition from Communism to free markets and democracy, the social and economic crash this caused, and, later in 1997, the Asian Financial Crisis (Pomfret 2000)* – all combined with the political instability this exacerbated. Richard Pomfret said in 1994, “In 1991 Mongolia suffered one of the biggest peacetime economic collapses ever (Mongolia’s Economic Reforms: Background, Content and Prospects, Richard Pomfret, University of Adelaide, 1994).” From Curbing Corruption in Asia: A Comparative Study of Six Countries by Jon S. T. Quah: “The combined effect of these three shocks was devastating as ‘Mongolia suffered the most serious peacetime economic collapse any nation has faced during this century’. Indeed, Mongolia’s economic collapse ‘was possibly the greatest of all the (peaceful) formerly’” Communist countries.

    A dramatic decline in inflation paired with political and economic stabilisation allowed Mongolia to enjoy the fruits of the fast-growing economies of the 2000s. Source: Statista.

    https://www.statista.com/statistics/727562/inflation-rate-in-mongolia/

    https://www.statista.com/statistics/727562/inflation-rate-in-mongolia/

    During the last 16 years the financial and monetary system of our country saw the worst crisis in 1991-1994, there was a recovery in 1995-1997 and another crisis in 1997-1999. However, it has entered a stable stage since 2000.

    Mongolia at the Market
    Dedicated to the 60th Anniversary of the School of Economic Studies    , Editors: Chuluundorzh Khashchuluun, Namsrai Batnasan, Ni︠a︡msu̇rėngiĭn Batnasan, P. Luvsandorzh, LIT Verlag, 2012.

    From the World Bank: 1997: Stabilization at the heart of policy choices

    A resources “boomtown” throughout the 2000s. Source: Bloomberg. When I left in 1999, Mongolia’s PPP was US $8.8 bn; today (2021) it is US $42.4 bn.
    Graph from Migration under economic transition and changing climate in Mongolia, Journal of Arid Environments, Volume 185, February 2021. “Urbanization in Mongolia accounted for over 80% of all migration, mostly into the capital city Ulaanbaatar (UB), where nearly 70% of recent population growth was from migration.”
    As can be seen in this chart, Mongolia’s economic growth since 2000 has benefited greatly from its proximity to China.
    As this chart shows, increasing connectivity had a profound impact on living standards in Ukraine and Mongolia post-2000. The extreme turbulence Mongolia experienced in the 1990s – after the collapse of support mechanisms from the Soviet Union – calmed down as Mongolia integrated with the global economy, especially a booming China. Read about my work in Ukraine here: UN Ukraine Web Development Experience | 2000.
    The Economist: “Those free-trading Mongolians” was published Apr 24th 1997. I arrived in May of 1997 to find a country on the cusp of great and turbulent change.

    In this role, I pioneered innovative uses of the Internet and digital resources to communicate the UN’s work and Mongolia’s unfolding crises. The UN called this work a “role model” for the wider UN and country offices. A survey of United Nations country office websites in 2000 ranked the UN Mongolia website I launched in 1997 and oversaw for two years (1997-1999), third best in the world, saying: “A UN System site. A very nice, complete, professional site. Lots of information, easily accessible and well laid out. The information is comprehensive and up-to-date. This is a model of what a UNDP CO web site should be.” (http://www.scribd.com/doc/274319690/UNDP-Mongolia-United-Nations-2000-Survey-of-Country-Office-Websites)

    “The years 1998 and 1999 have been volatile ones for Mongolia, with revolving door governments, the assassination of a minister, emerging corruption, a banking scandal, in-fighting within the ruling Democratic Coalition, frequent paralysis within the Parliament, and disputes over the Constitution. Economically, the period was unstable and rife with controversies.” Mongolia in 1998 and 1999: Past, Present, and Future at the New Millennium by Sheldon R. Severinghaus, Asian Survey, Vol. 40, No. 1, A Survey of Asia in 1999 (Jan. – Feb., 2000). pp. 130-139 (Publisher: University of California)

    As part of a strategic plan to raise awareness of Mongolia’s development challenges and to spur action on meeting them, a Communications Office was established for the UN mission in 1997 – a structure that is commonplace in UN missions today. The Office also led on digital communications, marking many firsts, from the first digital photo and video library, the first online magazine, the first web portal, the first online newsletter, and many other firsts. It gathered numerous stories on resilience in a crisis, and documented in data and storytelling the country’s development challenges, while introducing a transparent way of working and communicating unprecedented for the time (the country was still recovering from the state secrecy of its years under Communism), and led on modernizing communications in the country. Acting as a strategic hub, the Communications Office and its dynamic and talented team, were able to leverage the existing budget to spur action on many fronts, including:

    UN/UNDP Mongolia Development Web Portal (www.un-mongolia.mn)

    I launched it in 1997 in the middle of a major crisis, and oversaw its expansion and development for two years. A pioneering digital resource, this award-winning United Nations Mongolia development web portal was singled out by UN headquarters in New York as an example of what a country office website should be like. It featured extensive resources in both Mongolian and English and also was home to the bilingual online magazine, Ger – Mongolia’s first web magazine. It can be viewed at www.archive.org and there is more at Wikipedia here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ger_(magazine).

    Media

    Working with journalists and media both within Mongolia and outside, the Communications Office was able to significantly raise awareness of Mongolia and its development challenges. This was reflected in a substantial increase in media coverage of the country and in the numerous books and other publications that emerged post-1997. The book In Their Own Words: Selected Writings by Journalists on Mongolia, 1997-1999 (ISBN 99929-5-043-9) published by UNDP Mongolia archived the stories by theme.  

    Ger Magazine

    Ger Magazine (the Mongolian word for home and traditional tent dwelling) was published as the country’s first e-magazine in 1998. There were four issues in total from 1998 to 2000. The launch issue was on the theme of youth in the transition. Mongolia was transitioning from Communism to free markets and democracy and this had been both an exhilarating time and a wrenching time for young people. The magazine drew on talented journalists from Mongolia and the handful of international journalists based there to create a mix of content, from stories about life adapting to free markets to stories on various aspects of Mongolian culture and life.

    The second issue of the magazine proved particularly effective and inspiring, with its modern life theme and cover story on a thriving Mongolian fashion scene.

    Archived issues of the magazine can be found at the Wayback Machine here: https://archive.org/. Just type in the UN Mongolia website address for the years 1997 to 1999: http://www.un-mongolia.mn.

    An online survey of the state of Mongolia’s media and its history (www.pressreference.com/Ma-No/Mongolia.html), had this to say: “An interesting variation from some of the other publications available is Ger Magazine (published online with guidance from the United Nations Development Program, UNDP), which is concerned with Mongolian youth in cultural transition. The name of the magazine is meant to be ironic because a ger is the Mongolian word for yurt—a yurt being traditional nomadic housing—but the magazine is about urbanization and globalization of Mongolian youth.”

    Blue Sky Bulletin

    The Blue Sky Bulletin newsletter was launched in 1997 initially as a simple, photocopied handout. It quickly founds its purpose and its audience, becoming a key way to communicate what was happening in the country and a crucial resource for the global development community, scholars, the media and anyone trying to figure out what was happening in a crazy and chaotic time. It eschewed the typical ‘grip and grin’ content found in many development newsletters and instead offered stories, data and insights useful to anyone seeking to understand Mongolia’s development challenges. The Blue Sky Bulletin was distributed via email and by post and proved to be a popular and oft-cited resource on the country. The quality of its production also paralleled Mongolia’s growing capacity to publish to international standards, as desktop publishing software became available and printers switched to modern print technologies. The Blue Sky Bulletin evolved from a rough, newsprint black and white publication to becoming a glossy, full-colour, bilingual newsletter distributed around Mongolia and the world. 

    Archived issues can be found online here:

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 1

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 2

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 3

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 4 

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 5

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 6

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 7

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 8

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 9

    Blue Sky Bulletin Issue 10

    Publishing

    MHDR 1997

    The Mongolian Human Development Report 1997 (MHDR), the country’s first, placed the story of the Mongolian people during the transition years (post-1989) at its heart, using photographs, stories and case studies to detail the bigger narrative at play.

    This groundbreaking Mongolian Human Development Report – the country’s first – went beyond just chronicling Mongolia’s state of development in statistics and graphs. Designed, laid out and published in Mongolia, the report broke with the practices of many other international organisations, who would publish outside of Mongolia – denying local companies much-needed work and the opportunity to develop their skills. The report’s costs helped to kick-start a publishing boom in the country and significantly raised standards in design and layout in the Mongolia. The foundations laid down by the project producing the report ushered in a new age in publishing for Mongolia.

    The report’s launch was innovative, not only being distributed for free across the country, but also part of a multimedia campaign including television programming, public posters, town hall meetings and a ‘roadshow’ featuring the report’s researchers and writers.

    The initial print run of 10,000 copies was doubled as demand for the report increased. To the surprise of many, once hearing about the free report, herders would travel to the capital, Ulaanbaatar, to pick up their copy. The report proved people cared passionately about the development of their country and that development concepts are not to be the secret domain of ‘development practitioners’. The report also became an English language learning tool as readers compared the Mongolian and English-language versions.

    You can read the report’s pdf here: http://www.mn.undp.org/content/mongolia/en/home/library/National-Human-Development-Reports/Mongolia-Human-Development-Report-1997.html 

    1997 saw the launch of the first human development report for Mongolia.

    Mongolian AIDS Bulletin

    UNDP acted swiftly to address a breaking HIV/AIDS crisis in 1997, offering a key lesson for others working in public health (the Ebola Crisis and global air pollution crisis both show those lessons have still yet to be fully absorbed).

    Assembled by a team of health experts after the Fourth International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific, the Mongolian AIDS Bulletin was published in 1997 in the middle of an HIV/AIDS crisis. It provided timely information and health resources in the Mongolian language and was distributed across the country.

    “Mongolia’s first AIDS Bulletin marked the beginning of the UNDP Response to HIV/AIDS/STDs Project back in the autumn of 1997. Over 5,000 copies of the magazine were distributed across the country, offering accurate information on the HIV/AIDS situation. The project has been pivotal in the formulation of a national information, education and communication (IEC) strategy, bringing together NGOs, donors, UN agencies and the government.”

    Source: YouandAids: The HIV/AIDS Portal for Asia Pacific

    Green Book

    In the Mongolian language, the Mongolian Green Book details effective ways to live in harmony with the environment while achieving development goals. Based on three years’ work in Mongolia – a Northeast Asian nation coping with desertification, mining, and climate change – the book presents tested strategies.  

    EPAP Handbook

    The Environmental Public Awareness Handbook was published in 1999 and features the case studies and lessons learned by UNDP’s Mongolian Environmental Public Awareness Programme (EPAP). The handbook draws on the close to 100 small environmental projects the Programme oversaw during a two-year period. These projects stretched across Mongolia, and operated in a time of great upheaval and social, economic and environmental distress. The handbook is intended for training purposes and the practice of public participation in environmental protection.

    In its 2007 Needs Assessment, the Government of Mongolia found the EPAP projects “had a wide impact on limiting many environmental problems. Successful projects such as the Dutch/UNDP funded Environmental Awareness Project (EPAP), which was actually a multitude of small pilot projects (most costing less than $5,000 each) which taught local populations easily and efficiently different ways of living and working that are low-impact on the environment.”

    Mongolia Updates 1997, 1998, 1999

    Mongolia Update 1998 detailed how the country was coping with its hyperinflation and the Asian economic crisis.

    The mission simultaneously had to deal with the 1997 Asian Crisis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_Asian_Financial_Crisis) and the worst peacetime economic collapse in post-WWII history (http://www.jstor.org/pss/153756).  

    Mongolia Update 1998 – Political Changes

    1998 proved a tumultuous year for Mongolia. The country’s existing economic crisis caused by the transition from Communism to free markets was made worse by the wider Asian Crisis. The government was destabilised, leading to an often-confusing revolving door of political figures. In order to help readers better understand the political changes in the country, a special edition of Mongolia Update was published that year.  

    UNDP Mongolia: The Guide

    The Guide, first published in 1997, provided a rolling update on UNDP’s programmes and projects in Mongolia during a turbulent time (1997-1999). The mission simultaneously had to deal with the 1997 Asian Crisis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_Asian_financial_crisis) and the worst peacetime economic collapse in post-WWII history.

    Each edition came with short project and context summaries, key staff contacts, and facts and figures on how the country was changing. For the first time, any member of the public could grasp what the UN was up to in the country and be able to contact the project staff. An unusual level of transparency at the time for a UN mission.

    Memoranda of Understanding

    Three Memoranda of Understanding were negotiated with the Mongolian Government to help focus efforts and aid the attainment of internationally-agreed resolutions. This was affirmed by a series of youth conferences, One World, held in 1998 and 1999.

    Strategy and Leadership in a Crisis

    The scale and gravity of the crisis that struck Mongolia in the early 1990s was only slowly shaken off by the late 1990s. The economic and social crisis brought on by the collapse of Communism and the ending of subsidies and supports from the Soviet Union, led to a sharp rise in job losses, poverty, hunger, and family and community breakdowns.

    The challenge was to find inspiring ways out of the crisis, while building confidence and hope. The sort of challenges confronted by the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office included:

    1) A food crisis: agricultural production was down sharply, and the traditional nomadic herding economy, while at peak herd, was failing to get the meat to markets and to a high enough standard to restore export levels to where they once were. As a result, a cross-border trading frenzy became the solution to falling domestic food production and availability.

    2) HIV/AIDS/STDs crisis.

    3) A major banking crisis.

    4) Both the Asian Financial Crisis and the Russia Crisis.

    5) An ongoing political crisis and an inability to form stable governments.

    UN Annual Reports

    Editor and designer. 1998 Report called by Under-Secretary-General Nafis Sadik “a clear, well-written, attractive and colourful report.”

    Click to access S-1096-0264-21-00003.pdf

    One of many documents from that time held in the United Nations Archives Search Engine. In this case, reporting on Mongolia’s follow-up to global conferences to then-Secretary-General Kofi A. Annan in 1999.
    Mongolia’s Follow-Up To The UN Global Conferences (1999) UNDP Mongolia Communications Office, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
    Production/Design Supervision: David South, UNDP Communications Coordinator; Proof Reading: N. Oyuntungalag, UNDP Communications Officer/David South (1999).

    Timeline 

    1997: Arrive in the capital of Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar, to undertake a two-year assignment with the United Nations mission. Quickly get to work founding the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office and pursuing a strategic communications approach with a busy online and offline bilingual publishing programme. Launch award-winning UN Mongolia Development Web Portal (www.un-mongolia.mn). Launch first Human Development Report Mongolia 1997, and a Mongolian AIDS Bulletin during crisis. Assist the Government of Canada to establish the first Honorary Consul in Ulaanbaatar on December 1, 1997 and the Canada Fund Mongolia.

    Canada Fund Mongolia

    1998: International media tours of the country, launching of Mongolia’s first online magazine, Ger, distribute globally a regular newsletter on Mongolia’s development challenges, Blue Sky Bulletin. Open United Nations Info Shop for the public. Assist the Government of Canada to connect with Canadians working with the United Nations in Mongolia during the first official visit by a Canadian Government Minister.

    1999: Launch a string of books documenting insights gleaned from the Mongolia development experience.  

    Testimonials

     “Mongolia is not an easy country to live in and David [South] showed a keen ability to adapt in difficult circumstances. He was sensitive to the local habits and cultures and was highly respected by his Mongolian colleagues. … David’s journalism background served him well in his position as Director of the Communications Unit. … A major accomplishment … was the establishment of the UNDP web site. He had the artistic flare, solid writing talent and organizational skills that made this a success. … we greatly appreciated the talents and contributions of David South to the work of UNDP in Mongolia.” Douglas Gardner, UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative Mongolia

    Impact 

    Micro

    • strategic communications approach including establishing the UN/UNDP Mongolia Communications Office and team and strategic communications plan
    • led on digital transformation, including use of digitial media (photo/video archive) and digital publishing (web site, online magazine and newsletter, etc.)
    • established and ran the United Nations Info Shop – a one-stop resource open to the public with archive of development publications and current periodicals and Internet access
    • began largest bilingual online and offline publishing programme in country – led on publishing and design modernisation
    • laid down the foundations for many UN initiatives in Mongolia that are still underway. Contributed to stabilizing the country in a turbulent time. Mongolia was briefly the fastest-growing economy in the world by 2011
    • championed transparency and access to information and media freedoms
    • oversaw a period in which Transparency International found lower levels of perceived corruption
    • managing editor for country’s first Human Development Report

    Macro

    • raised profile of country and its development challenges. Donor pledges rose 
    • 2 international media tours
    • strong relationship with Mongolian and international journalists
    • championed innovators in commnications
    • crisis response: AIDS, economy, political
    • country’s largest website and one of its first. Called “Godfather of the Mongolian web”
    • called a “role model” for the wider UN
    • led on new approach to UN communications in the digital age
    • design-led approach
    • transparent and timely updates
    • negotiated three Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs): youth, food security and nutrition, STDs/HIV/AIDS
    • One World youth conferences

    Publications

    David South Consulting Summary of Impact

    Environmental Public Awareness Handbook: Case Studies and Lessons Learned in Mongolia

    Ger Magazine: Modern Life Issue

    Ger Magazine: Youth Issue

    Human Development Report Mongolia 1997

    Mongolian Green Book

    Mongolia Update – Coverage of 1998 Political Changes

    Mongolia Update 1998

    Mongolian AIDS Bulletin

    Mongolian Rock and Pop Book

    Partnership for Progress: The United Nations Development Programme in Mongolia

    UNDP Mongolia Online Development Portal

    UNDP in Mongolia: The Guide 

    Stories

    Freedom of Expression: Introducing Investigative Journalism to Local Media in Mongolia

    Lamas Against AIDS

    Philippine Conference Tackles Asia’s AIDS Crisis

    Starting from Scratch: The Challenge of Transition

    UNDP Mongolia Partnership for Progress 1997 to 1999 Key Documents 

    A UNDP Success Story: Grassroots Environmental Campaign Mobilizes Thousands in Mongolia

    Citations

    The response by the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office has been cited in numerous articles, books, publications and stories. It has also contributed to the development of the human development concept and understanding of human resilience in a crisis and innovation in a crisis. 

    Book citations include:

    Dateline Mongolia: An American Journalist in Nomad’s Land by Michael Kohn, RDR Books, 2006

    Modern Mongolia: From Khans to Commissars to Capitalists by Morris Rossabi, University of California Press, 2005

    Wild East: Travels in the New Mongolia by Jill Lawless, ECW Press, 2000

    Paper citations include: 

    Paula L. W. Sabloff (2020) Buying into capitalism: Mongolians’ changing perceptions of capitalism in the transition years, Central Asian Survey, 39:4, 556-577, DOI: 10.1080/02634937.2020.1823819

    A more detailed list of citations can be found here: http://www.davidsouthconsulting.com/about/

    For research purposes, key documents were compiled together and published online here: https://books.google.ca/books?id=K76jBgAAQBAJ&dq=undp+mongolia+key+documents&source=gbs_navlinks_s

    This resource was praised for having: “Very useful references and original materials that documented UNDP Mongolia work. I needed to trace community-based development, and this book provided a valuable source.” Review on Google Books

    In 2001, the UN won the Nobel Peace Prize for “their work for a better organized and more peaceful world” and its communications innovations, with work such as that in Mongolia being cited as a contributing factor to the awarding of the Prize.

    The Nobel Peace Prize 2001 joint winners.

    In 2000, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were launched in a 15-year bid to use a focused approach to development centred around eight goals to accelerate improvements to human development. From 2000 to 2005, consulting work was undertaken in various UN missions (Mongolia, South Africa, Turkmenistan, Ukraine) to communicate the goals and to reshape communications activities around the goals.

    * Transition and Democracy in Mongolia by Richard Pomfret, Europe-Asia Studies, Vol. 52, No. 1 (Jan., 2000), pp. 149-160, published by Taylor & Francis, Ltd. (http://www.jstor.org/stable/153756?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents)

    The Milk of Kindness flows in a Peculiar Land A Steppe From Nowhere by Leslie Chang, The Asian Wall Street Journal, 15 August 1998

    Mongolia prepares for a magazine explosion by Jill Lawless, UB Post, 08-09-98

    Other Resources

    Letter from Mongolia: Herding instinct by Jill Lawless, The Guardian, 9 June 1999

    Connect with me on Devex here: https://www.devex.com/people/david-s-361357

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2025