Part one of this essay has recently been presented in the Sunday Observer. Part two continues the examination of the student experience in the Department of Economics in the period from about 1978 to 1981. This overlaps in part with the closing years of the first Michael Manley Administration (1972-1980).

Colin Bullock

The early 1980s also saw the departure of outstanding lecturers in the Bachelor of Science in Economics (Econ) programme. In this regard, Professor Al Francis has been noted in Part one.

Colin Bullock, who guided students authoritatively through macroeconomic theory, entered the heartland of the economic technocracy, becoming, among other things, a deputy governor of the Bank of Jamaica, financial secretary, and director general of the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ).

He also served as a senior advisor in the Ministry of Finance at the inception of Jamaica’s recent economic recovery programme under the auspices of the International Monterary Fund (IMF), started during the Portia Simpson Miller Administration. Bullock returned to The University of West Indies (UWI), Mona, at various points in his career.

Although Bullock was a technical economist of the first order, he is perhaps best remembered by his students for his openness and understanding. He freely and calmly gave valuable advice and guidance to all who passed his way in the academy. And he believed fervently in fairness. On one occasion, in the macroeconomic theory final examination for 1980, he noticed at the start of the examination that the paper offered to students was actually different from what had been agreed by the examiners across the three UWI campuses.

He promptly intervened, provided additional questions on a supplemental paper, and ensured that students had a fair shot at issues they had covered from the syllabus. That syllabus required detailed knowledge of theories of inflation in the Caribbean, the Keynesian multiplier, national income relationships (Y = C+I+G+X–M), aspects of the Lewis growth model and balance of payments considerations in small, open, import-dependent economies.

Other departures

Three other lecturers who departed around about the early 1980s from the Economics Department were Dwight Venner, Compton Bourne and David Wong. Venner left Mona for the Eastern Caribbean, there to have a long and distinguished run as the head of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank. At Mona, he had taught monetary economics in 1981, a final-year course which built largely on the micro- and macroeconomic theory courses in the second year of the BSc (Econ) degree.

Among other things, monetary economics required students to consider issues pertaining to the money stock in the economy, interest rates and the balance of payments, the functions of money, the role of the central bank and commercial banks, and the place of non-bank financial intermediaries.

Monetary Economics

Two questions from the 1981 monetary economics final examination exemplify what the student was expected to master:

(a) “’The determination of the money stock in an open, underdeveloped economy is inextricably bound up with the state of the balance of payments.’ Discuss.”

(b) “’Central banks in the Caribbean are ill-equipped to deal with the structural problems which face the economies.’ Discuss.”

After leaving Mona, Professor Bourne assumed senior positions within the UWI hierarchy, and became president of the Caribbean Development Bank. His teaching at UWI included work in monetary economics and agricultural economics.

In the latter, emphasis was placed on issues pertaining to land reform, access to credit for small farmers, marketing of produce, agriculture as an engine of economic growth, mechanisation, and the place of sugar and bananas in Caribbean agriculture. Agricultural economics also embraced linear programming, the Cobb-Douglas Production Function, and various questions concerning the elasticity of demand and supply for goods.

Micro and International

David Wong left UWI, Mona, and went on to become a professor in the California State University system. Wong at Mona was noted for his mathematical abilities, philosophical inclinations and analytical sophistication.

As the lecturer responsible for microeconomic theory, he took us through consumer demand using indifference curves, the elements of supply, profit maximisation, market equilibrium, Pareto optimality, and other questions. Wong was notably inclined to set challenging examination papers, but to prepare students to flourish in them. His departure represented a notable loss to Mona Economics.

For international economics, which was a favourite for both BSc (Econ) students and others, the lecturer in 1981 was the cosmopolitan Wilberne Persaud. Persaud was given over to precision in analysis and speech: he once denied having a “battle” over an academic point, by noting that it was, if anything, only a “skirmish”. And in the final-year examination for 1981, students were asked to consider whether the idea of “transfer of technology” should really be considered as a “transplant of technology”, a question flowing presumably from Persaud’s language-sensitive pen.

Exam questions

The international economics paper also concentrated on trade and development policies for the Caribbean, balance of payments issues, devaluation, flexible and fixed exchange rate regimes, multinational corporations in developing countries, and the role of producer associations in the context of the “New International Economic Order.” But while the course was known for its practical content, it had an important theoretical foundation. So, for example, another question from the 1981 paper read as follows:

“The Heckscher-Ohlin factor proportions theorem does not advance much beyond Ricardian comparative advantage. Consider this statement in conjunction with rationalisations of the Leontief paradox.”

In the examination room, the bleary-eyed student will normally have neither the time nor the inclination to appreciate the structure of examination questions, but, in retrospect, questions such as the foregoing provided appropriate challenges to students, and did so with elegant, concise wording.

Critics

During the course of the three-year BSc (Econ) programme which began in 1978, critics sometimes sought to take on the department. At least one newspaper columnist implied in The Gleaner that “the Faculty of Economics” at Mona was not practical in its approaches to major economic issues facing Jamaican society. And, the governor of a Caribbean Central Bank sought to indulge in more than a skirmish when he declared that UWI economists were producing “common and garden” work. The view was also put abroad that students in economics were learning only about Marxist principles, and so, would lack the means to operate optimally in a mixed economy or one which remained fully on capitalist foundations.

No evidence

This is not the place to undertake a full assessment of these criticisms, but it should be noted that some contemporaneous criticisms were more of the order of throwaway lines than efforts at careful analysis. This is certainly true of the Gleaner critique just noted.

As to the central bank criticism, no evidence was presented; and shortly after the criticism, members of the Department of Economics became leaders at technically-based public sector institutions, including central banks, planning institutions and an international producer organisation. It is easy to argue that “common and garden” work is not often rewarded by recruitment in the way that occurred in the 1980s for denizens of the Department of Economics.

Radicalism

The criticism about the degree of exposure to Marxism is ultimately to be addressed with empirical evidence. There was, to be sure, significant exposure to Marxist principles in the first year of the programme; but there was exposure to other approaches as well. And, in years two and three, emphasis shifted to mathematical and statistical concepts as well as to detailed analysis of Caribbean economic challenges. The tools for this analysis were almost invariably neoclassical implements.

Some of the presentations by lecturers in years two and three were radical in the sense that they critically assessed orthodox positions from the United States and Britain, but this was to be expected at the university level and, in any event, the critical assessments by lecturers were built on a clear understanding of the conventional wisdom. In about 1981, Sir Arthur Lewis, Economics Nobel Prize Winner, gave a seminar at Mona to UWI lecturers and students. The students were quite comfortable with the exposition (on terms of trade), given their foundations and exposure.

Maldistribution

On the point of radicalism, some lecturers and tutors in economics were unquestionably, and justifiably, aggrieved about the level of poverty and income inequality in post-Independence Jamaica. From the 1960s, Jamaica’s Gini coefficient suggested that the country’s income distribution was so skewed we could claim the dubious distinction of being one of the most unequal society’s in the world.

This problem of maldistribution was generally recognised, but, as Lenin might have noted, lecturers and students were pressed to identify “what is to be done?” Some UWI economists noted above, with others including Norman Girvan, George Beckford, Michael Witter and Mark Figueroa— through publications and presentations — were on the forefront of advocating fundamental change and development which would bring benefits to the majority of the Jamaican people. Meanwhile, upstairs to the Department of Economics, Trevor Munroe, Rupert Lewis and some other lecturers offered Marxist transformation as the solution to inequality, by way of the Workers’ Liberation League and then the Workers’ Party of Jamaica.

Manley/Seaga

The political forces in the wider society provided important context. For the PNP — with Michael Manley at the helm — the solutions to Jamaica’s challenges, circa 1978, were to be found in a mixed economy, built on a democratic socialist foundation: emphasis was to be placed on egalitarianism, fairness in the allocation of resources, and the provision of opportunities for all, including especially persons who had traditionally been dispossessed by history.

These social objectives were to be driven in part by State intervention. At the international level, Jamaica was active in the Non-aligned Movement, and Manley emerged as a leading advocate for the New International Economic Order.

In contrast, the JLP — led by Edward Seaga — supported the free market, and maintained that the PNP’s brand of socialism was intended to take the country into Marxism. For the JLP, Jamaica was part of the capitalist system, our traditional alliances had served the country well, and the economic growth which the country had achieved particularly in the decade from 1962 was testimony to the virtues of free enterprise. Milton Friedman should rule.

True, there were inequalities to be addressed, as was implicit in Mr Seaga’s “haves and haves not” speech from an earlier time; but these were to be addressed by an economic growth model with a “trickle down” effect. Neoclassical economic principles, as practised by the IMF, were to provide guidance. And Jamaican nationalism should prevail over socialist internationalism.

The student, like the rest of Jamaican society, was faced with choices. Some lecturers did not hide their ideological orientation, but they were committed to intellectual enquiry, rigorous analysis and a willingness to challenge conventional wisdom.

Strong

The BSc (Econ) 1978 programme was not perfect. It was very strong and carefully structured, but, quite naturally, there were gaps. In brief, it tended to presuppose that graduates would go on to serve in the public sector: there could have been greater exposure to the economics of private enterprise. Students, too, could have been given more systematic guidance on the economics of Jamaican industries such as bauxite production and tourism.

Also, in a society with political foundations built on trade unionism, there could have been greater exposure to the economics of trade unions. In addition, students could have been encouraged to place some of their economic rules against the backdrop of the law. To borrow a current term, economics and law should not be placed in silos; their points of interaction should be highlighted at all levels of scholarship.

Over the years, some of the peoplr who benefited from exposure to UWI economics from the late 1970s have proceeded to outstanding careers in public service (eg at the PIOJ, Statistical Institute of Jamaica , and at UWI itself). They have been to apply their technical and mathematical skills and to build on, or challenge, concepts advanced by their distinguished teachers.

Ambassador Stephen Vasciannie is Professor of International Law at the UWI, Mona.