The Hungry World: America's Cold War Battle against Poverty in Asia
The Hungry World: America's Cold War Battle against Poverty in Asia
复制标题
饥饿的世界：美国在冷战时期对抗亚洲贫困的斗争
DOI：
10.1525/gfc.2012.12.1.112
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发表时间：
2010
期刊：
影响因子：
3.2
通讯作者：
Nick Cullather
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Nick Cullather
粮食是冷战时期争夺亚洲的一个重要阵地。“共产主义走到哪里，饥饿就跟到哪里”是美国国家建设者的口号，他们分散到农村，改变河流，改造村庄，引进拖拉机，化学品和基因，使数百万人消费的农作物成倍增加。这场“绿色革命”被认为避免了马尔萨斯式的饥荒，拯救了数十亿人的生命，并启动了亚洲的经济复苏。博诺和比尔·盖茨称赞它是振兴非洲经济的典范。但这个科学胜利的故事掩盖了半个世纪的政治斗争，从阿富汗高地到湄公河三角洲的稻田，一场通过改变人们饮食和种植食物的方式来改变农村社会的运动。将亚洲带入富足时代的雄心与将饥饿作为战争根源的发展理论一起增长。科学农业是将农民塑造成具有现代态度、忠诚和生育习惯的公民的工具。但当时的粮食政策和今天一样备受争议。肯尼迪和约翰逊设想的是堪萨斯式的农业综合企业，由战略性的小村庄守卫，而英迪拉·甘地、马科斯和苏哈托则将自己的进步愿景铭刻在这片土地上。在这场有史以来代价最高和最持久的发展努力中，出现了争夺资源和特征的斗争，这是该区域今天的特征。随着奥巴马复兴凯恩斯主义和反叛乱的失落艺术，这些巨大项目的历史为当今养活饥饿世界的使命提供了痛苦而重要的教训。
Food was a critical front in the Cold War battle for Asia. “Where Communism goes, hunger follows” was the slogan of American nation builders who fanned out into the countryside to divert rivers, remodel villages, and introduce tractors, chemicals, and genes to multiply the crops consumed by millions. This “green revolution” has been credited with averting Malthusian famines, saving billions of lives, and jump-starting Asia’s economic revival. Bono and Bill Gates hail it as a model for revitalizing Africa’s economy. But this tale of science triumphant conceals a half century of political struggle from the Afghan highlands to the rice paddies of the Mekong Delta, a campaign to transform rural societies by changing the way people eat and grow food. The ambition to lead Asia into an age of plenty grew alongside development theories that targeted hunger as a root cause of war. Scientific agriculture was an instrument for molding peasants into citizens with modern attitudes, loyalties, and reproductive habits. But food policies were as contested then as they are today. While Kennedy and Johnson envisioned Kansas-style agribusiness guarded by strategic hamlets, Indira Gandhi, Marcos, and Suharto inscribed their own visions of progress onto the land. Out of this campaign, the costliest and most sustained effort for development ever undertaken, emerged the struggles for resources and identity that define the region today. As Obama revives the lost arts of Keynesianism and counter-insurgency, the history of these colossal projects reveals bitter and important lessons for today’s missions to feed a hungry world.