		Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 16 - 22 July 1998 Issue No.386
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875		Current issue \| Previous issue \| Site map

The only option

By Abdel Moneim Said *

I was happy to be asked to participate in the Al-Ahram delegation, led by Ibrahim Nafie, to the Far East. This was for a number of reasons, first among them, perhaps, the fact I wanted at first hand to find out whether what I had believed about the Asian tigers and their economic miracle, and whether it might be reproduced in Egypt, were indeed true. Following the crisis which engulfed those economies, such questions gained in pertinence.

I set myself the task of seeking opinions both from the governments involved and the opposition about the validity of integrating in international markets. The answers I received -- from the economic minister in Islamabad, the Indian Finance minister, the editor-in-chief of The Street Times in Singapore, the Indonesian President and his opposition counterpart -- were strikingly similar. Everyone I spoke to agreed that there is no option, for peoples and nations, but to integrate in the international economic order.

Only in China did I receive a different emphasis in reply, largely because Chinese officials preferred to use the phrase "enhancing the process of economic reform". But when quizzed about the meaning of this phrase, it turned out to be nothing other than a neat sobriquet for integration.

What surprised me most, though, is that I heard not a single voice complaining of international conspiracies or undue pressure exerted by the IMF. Everybody agreed that the crisis, in essence, was internal. The remedy, they agreed, was more rigorous regulatory practices and greater transparency. They all pointed, however, to problems within the international monetary system, problems that require international efforts at regulation on a par with GATT and WTO agreements.

As they face their greatest crisis since World War II, East Asian voices remain unanimous: There is no option but to integrate.

*The writer of this week's Soapbox is the director of Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies