Dear Editor,

Of course, like any other Jamaican, I too am happy for the achievements of our athletes. However, while I am glad for them, I am also sad for this country. Every time we have our athletes making these great accomplishments, we always hear the same talk about the need for us to translate this sort of achievement into other areas of national life. We have been saying this for years, but we haven’t done it. Why?

It is not impossible for relatively small countries to be great in serious respects, like science, technology and governance. We have several examples today. The relatively small states of Israel, North Korea, and South Korea have well-developed technological-industrial complexes that support advanced space and missile programmes that are very disproportionate to their sizes.

The small state of Israel is strong enough to hold off many larger states, like Iran and Syria, simply on account of its strong military-industrial complex. Poor North Korea is largely self-sufficient with one of the world’s largest armies. I mentioned these small countries with strong armies partly on account of the fact that in today’s world a strong military is all that matters.

However, even outside of military power, we have small countries punching more than their weight. Tiny Singapore, which is only a fraction of Jamaica’s size, is one of the world’s major shipbuilders, and is a major industrialised country.

Now, why is it that these countries could have achieved so much, but we can’t? Some will say that a small country like ours cannot be great. How is it that when it comes to sports, we don’t limit what we think we can achieve to our size; but when it comes to the things that really matter, like the sciences, technology, governance and military power, the first thing we say is that we are too small?

I think the reasons are obvious, and they include some very unpleasant truths. Entertainment achievements, like athletics and music, may require a lot of muscles, but they don’t require a lot of brains. If only we could devote as much effort into building up our intellectual capacity for national power the same way we do for our muscles for sports, we would be well on our way to true greatness. Alas, I fear that is just a dream!

If we could just find the formula to translate this determination that we have to be a great sports power into real national great power aspirations then we could do it!

Michael A Dingwall

michael_a_dingwall@hotmail.com