April 1981

Although it is so commonplace today, flying is still the stuff of fantasy-specially with artists. Mickey Patel's collage has fun with the evolution of flying, freely mixing religion with comics, mythology with ornithology, images of insects with winged insignia of all kinds.

April 1981

SPAN 2 Freedom From Terror

by Michael Novak

4 U.S. Denounces Apartheid in South Africa

by Richard Schifter

5 To Promote the General Welfare

by Sandy Greenberg

9 . Growing Up Engaged

by John Holt

12

OhAmerica!

by Manish Nandy

16

Holly, Colorado

by A va Marie Betz

19

Dynamics of Rural Development: _An [~dian Experience Aruna Dasgupta Interviews Bunker Roy

An American

View

G. Rangaswami Talks With Jerome Klement

26

The Making of SPAN

32

Environment vs. Development

by Richard Carpenter and William Matthews

36

The True Dreams of Mankind

43 On the Lighter Side

44

_ Tools for Living

45 "We Can No Longer Procrastinate"

by President Ronald Reagan

Editorial Staff

Photo Editor

Art Staff Chief of Production

Aruna Dasgupta, Manu Sahi, Nirmal Sharma, Murari Saha.

Rocqu~ Fernandes Avinash Pasricha

B. Roy Choudhury, Kanti Roy Awtar S. Marwaha

Photographs: Front cover-Jim Houghton, reprinted from Psychology Today magazine Š 1979 Ziff Davis Publishing Company. 5-8-courtesy Department of Health & Human Services except 7 top left and center right by David Cupp and 7 top right courtesy National Institute of Health.

II top-Matt Bradley. 16-l8-Brian Payne. 19top and center-R.N. Khanna; bottom-Avinash Pasricha. 20-25-Avinash Pasricha except 22 bottom and 24 by Sanjeev Prakash. 26-31-Avinash Pasricha and R.N. Khanna; 29 bottom right-Gopi Gajwani. 32-33-Kamal Sahai. 36-from book: Tantra Art: published by Ravi Kumar. 39-Michael Mauney. Inside back cover and back cover-Dr. Jean Lorre, Science Photo Library, London.

by the International

Published Marg.

New Delhi

Communication

in this magazine

do not necessarily

Printed

Mehta

by H.K.

Use of SPAN articles write

10

2 rupees

the Editor.

75 paise.

WIth new address

Agency.

11000 I. on behalf of the American

reflect the views or policies

at Thomson

Press (India)

in other publications Price of magazine:

For change

of address.

to Circulation

Manager.

110001. See change

of address

American

Embassy.

Limited,

is encouraged, one year's

24 Kasturba

of the United

Faridabad.

Slates

Magazine.

(12 issues).

Government.

For permission,

21 rupees;

from a recent¡SPAN 24 Kasturba

Gandhi expressed

Har~ana.

except when copyrighted.

subscription

send an old address SPAN

Center.

Nev. Delhi. The opinions

Gandhi

single copy.

envelope

along

Marg. New Ddhl

form on page 48b.

Front cover: Defiant and angry, this girl symbolizes a generation growing up alienated from reality.

The answer lies in engaging young people in meaningful work.

See pages 9-11.

Back cover: This computerenhanced image of a galaxy is the result of a new technique that reveals a startling dimension of the universe. See also page 49.

The lovely young girl on the cover of this issue of SPANis sulking not for the reason she (or her parents) may think--because she may have been denied permission to stay out after 10 o'clock at night during the school week. Not so, says John Holt, an iconoclastic educator. The girl is both angry and peevish because, like many other young people of her generation, life does not sufficiently engage her; she is alienated from the real world of work.

Mr. Holt charges that under contemporary educational system young people are "cribb'd, cabined and confined." Because they have no chance to do real,' meaningful work, they feel that life is meaningless for them. Mr. Holt offers some novel suggestions about steps that can be taken to remedy these troubles of the young that plague so many societies. Reality is the key: "Reality is the best, the fairest, the most patient of all teachers. " ~~~~

In his economic message to the American people, President. Ronald Reagan deals very much with the real world and with a real problem that besets almost every country in the world nowadays: inflation, and the unemployment and underproduction that accompany it. He paints a somber picture. But Presidetl.t Reagan believes that it. is within the power of the American people to change it; that the~e is nothing wrong with American internal strenqth, because there has been no breakdown in the human, technological, and natural resources on which the American economy is built.

"The trouble isnotinyour set-the Based on this confidence, the plan President President actually said that."

Reagan offers would do three things: .

• It would redu·ce the growth in government spending and taxing • • It would reform and eliminate regulations that are unnecessary and counterproductive • • It would encourage a consistent monetary policy aimed at maintaining the value of the dollar.

Despite the severe cut in Federal spending he proposes, President Reagan assures the American people that his government will continue to fulfill the obligations that spring from the national conscience--toward the povertystricken, the disabled, the elderly, and those with true needs. The social security net of programs they depend on will be exempt from financial cuts.

The economic program President Reagan proposes is radical in many respects. But he feels the changes are necessary: "The people are watching and waiting. They don't demand miracles, but they do expect us to act." And 'he ends by inviting the American people: "Let us act together." '. ~-"k..~~ 7:.i Mircea Eliade is a world-famous historian of religion who began his intellectual.career in India az:1dhas been a. professor at the University of Chicago for the last 20 years • In a wide-ranging interview, he describes his interest in alchemy, as well as in myths and symbols, with specific reference to insights he developed during his Indian experience. He has some cogent things to say about the current American interest in oriental philosophy -- and on the potential of small groups of idealistic young people for human and 'spiritual renewal •.

All in all, an illuminating interview with one of the seminal thinkers of our age.

--M.P.

. Speaking before the U.N. Commission on Human Rights during its recent debate on terrorism, the U.S. delegate called on the world body to take concrete steps "to deny to terrorists the benefits of their' acts." "Freedom from terror," he said, "is the first and fundamental human right. If one does not have integrity of .lifeand limb, what other rights are left?"

1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 .1976 1977 1978

Victims: The Casualties Mount DEATHS FROM INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM TOTAL IN 12 YEARS: 2,689

1979 The Secretary of State of the United States, Alexander Haig, in his very first press conference reaffirmed the commitment of the people of the United States to the human rights on which the American Republic is founded-human rights on which the universal Declaration of Human Rights of the UN. was modeled.

But the new Secretary of State went further and was more precise. One aspect of human rights to which the new American administration will give priority attention is that form of International terrorism which is aimed at destroying basic human rjghts of life, liberty and security of the person.

We believe that the agenda item before us, which includes ideologies and practices based on terror, may lead to useful discussion, because it recognizes the new threat from international terrorism. However, the re~olution before us is not even as comprehensive-or as true to realityas the original resolution initiated by the third committee and approved by the United Nations General Assembly, in requesting the Commission on Human Rights to study the matter further.

The experience of many nations shows. convincingly that the fascism vanquished in 1945isnot the only, and certainly not the major, source of terror in the world community today. By terror is meant violent acts against innocent civilians and ordinary institutions of daily life: markets, buses, restaurants, hotels, schools. There are many sources of such terror. .

To understand the American concern with organized international terror,

is essential to understand the words of James Madison, one of the architects of the American Constitution and its Bill of Rights.

Human rights, Madison forthrightly saw, are not established by writing words on paper or by moving air with one's lips.

Human rights are established by building specific types of institutions of quite exact design. Human rights are established, further, when such institutions come to live through organized, articulate, free, law-abiding interests-through free associations of every sort among a free people. Human rights are not words.

They are realized not merely by empty shells of institution~. They are made real by active, free, organized and competitive interests under due process.

Anyone in the world can utter the words "human rights." Anyone may claim to justify most hideous aggression by mouthing noble words. Villains seldom claim to be villains. They invariably claim to be idealists.

The test of human rights, therefore, lies not in words. The test of human rights lies in the functioning of institutions of free association, free speech, open and organized public dissent.

Furthermore, the enemies of human rights h~~ finally grasped Madison's insight iri~~how human rights actually are made real.

They have grasped this insight not in order to realize it within their own societies, where it is absent, but to destroy it in other societies, where it has been embodied.

They have discovered that by welldesigned murder, kidnappings, and bombings they can destroy the institutions, persons and interests that give human rights reality. In this way, they strike two blows against human rights at once.

They injure the integrity of life or limb of innocent civilians, diplomats and public officials. Worse, they gravely damage the instItutlons that embody human rights.

They try to force defenders of existing human rights to abandon them in selfdefense.

Terrorism has reached epidemic proportions. It knows no boundaries. Countries of every continent have had to face increasing levels of violence. Hundreds of innocent people are deliberately killed each year, thousands are maimed.

These threats to human rights are now leveled at all of us. We in our persons, as diplomats, no longer live without fear.

Members of free societies may no longer be able to trust our fellow citizens, among whom enemies of human rights take cover, but must take increasing security precautions.

Meanwhile, some governments more exposed to international terror, some goverpments which are new, some governments whose institutions are fragile and whose organized personnel are relatively few, are targeted.

There are many evidences in scholarly writings today that terrorism has changed its nature. Sometimes in the past, we have thought of terror, practices of terror and ideologies of terror, as individualistic, wild, insane, ideologically if not demoni-

Methods: How Attacks Occurred International Incidents by Type (and percentages of total), 1968-79

1,588 (47.6%) Explosivebombing Incendiarybombing 456 (13. 7%) .

Kidnapping _263 (7.9%) Assassination_ 246 (7.4%) Armed attack .188 (5.5%) Letter bombing 186(5.5%) Hijacking "100 (3.0%) Theft break-in.

78 (2.3%) Note: Percentages do not Barricadeand hostage.

73 (2.2°/~) add due to rounding.

'Sniping .71 (2.1%) Basic'data: Central Intelligence Agency Other forms of attack 1187 (2.6%)

The American hostages' long ordeal-444 days in captivity in Iran-ended on January 20. Here:, a blindfolded hostage isparaded by his captors.

cally inspired, as in the novels of Dostoevski.

Sometimes we have thought of tre organized terror of the totalitarian state apparatus, such as that which Adolf Hitler self-consciously practiced upon the people of Nazi Germany and such as that which Soviet Premier Nikita Khruschev in his speech to the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union accused Joseph Stalin of practicing.

The new terrorism is different from both these models. It can arise from deep and profound grievances in many societies.

But it is also exported cynically by other states for their own national interests and purposes. Like all forms of terror, the new terror victimizes the innocent.

Yet, the new terrorism has three novel characteristics: it is intentionally designed to destroy existing human rights institutions; it is often internationally supported; and it operates upon peoples abroad as well as within the context of a single society.

This terrorism often seeks to justify

itself by proclaiming as its goal a more just society. But terrorism cannot be just, or justifiable, if it chooses as its means attacks upon innocent civilians or other atrocities which lower its moral standing to the abysmal level the terrorist usually attributes to his foes. ,This subject may be approached, and must be approached, calmly, objectively, dispassionately. All nations must be concerned about the training camps for rings of international terrorists, about the weapons, the passports and funds which make it possible for the terrorist to survive.

Unfortunately many states, while criticizing the use of violence, themselves provide arms, training, funding and logis. tical support to terrorist groups. They accept the logic of the proposition that the ends justify the means-that in the name of a cause' ignoble methods may be used.

The U.N. Commission on Human Rights has a particular obligation to speak out against those who use terrorist violence and against those who support and condone it. All nations have a common interest in condemning and outlawing this violent phenomenon. No world order can be built on the backs of the victims of terrorism. For how shall terrorism once u,nleashed by all against all ever be contained?

Concrete and effective measures must be developed, therefore, to deny to terrorists the benefits of their acts. Nations must not give in to blackmail and must take firm steps to sanction those who violate the basic norms of international behavior.

All nations have a right to live'free from fear. Free from fear means, first of all, feedom from terror.

Freedom from terror is, the first and fundamental human right. If one does not have integrity of life and limb, what other rights are left?

Where there is only terror, a Hobbesian state of nature exists-a war of all against all, murder from every side. Human rights cannot exist without orderly institutions and due procedures.

In the years to come, the U.S. Government will have more to say-and to doon this subject. The resolution before the U.N. Commission on Human Rights is like an arrow directed at an important target. Alas, the resolution falls short, and far off to one side, of the bullseye.

0

U~S. DENOUNCES

APARTHEID IN SOUTH AFRICA

The United States has consistently made known its abhorrence of the practice of apartheid by the Government of South Africa. As long as the South African Government pursues actively and as a matter of policy the maintenance ofa system of apartheid, it is not possible for the United States to develop the type of relationship with South Africa that it would wish.

The American people have dedicated great effort to achieving justice in our own land for all our citizens. We must add, though, that we have reason to question the motivations of those who mount criticism of the human rights record of other countries when at home their own systems of government fail to observe even minimal standards of human rights.

As a people, Americans know well the legacy of racial discrirriination. The United States has struggled to extend equal rights under the law to all of its citizens, and to work toward assuring that all be accorded equal opportunity. We have recognized publi~ly the racial differences which have divided us, and we are overcoming them.

As a people, we will continue to assure that all our citizens be guaranteed the sacred rights enshrined in our own Bill of Rights. We will work with other states to share our experience, in an effort to convince those who now say that equality is unattainable that that objectiv~-the objective of equality-is necessary and inevitable.

This U.N. Commission on Human Rights will later be called upon to consider ways of protecting basic human rights of dissidents in repressive societies who are themselves advocates of human rights.

The South African Government is one of the most serious offenders in this respect.

In South Africa, the ability of persons to express their views, or their opposition to the political or economic policies imposed upon them, is strictly curtailed by law and enforced through the practice of banning. There are currently 152 banned men and women in South Africa. It is the view of the United States that banning is a fundamental violation of human rights.

Banning is contrary to the most essential democratic political rights and only contributes to a cycle of violence and repression.

In his addreSSto the U.N. Commission on Human Rights during its debate on South Africa in Geneva recently, the U.S. representative said: "The Uni'ted States abhors apartheid ... not only because the system of apartheid offends fundamental values, but because any system which seeks by law and policy to keep 85 percent of its people i!1a subordinate position is unworkable and doomed to failure."

The momentum and dynamic of change in South Africa is already underway and is irreversible. Everyone who has an interest in this process of change-or evolution-must ensure that opportunities are seized. In the final analysis, there are no political obstacles that cannot be overcome by political means. Such evolutionary change is essential not for the world but for all-and I emphasize allpersons in South Africa as well.

The United States holds apartheid in abhorrence. Yet, as in other matters, we also hold violence and terrorism in abhorrence. The peaceful extension of human rights institutions to all, on the basis of equality, is always preferable to the violent¡destruction of such institutions.

As we. look to the future; we can all agree that evolutionary change is necessary, not only because the system of apartheid offends fundamental values, but because any sys~emwhich seeks by law and policy to keep 85 percent of its people in a subordinate position is unworkable and doomed to failure. But how do we then seek to encourage those in South Africa who support this course to gain and hold the initiative?

Strident rhetoric and the calls for

radical actions are not useful in this undertaking. If there is no dialogue, the international community will not be heard within South Africa. Confrontational rhetoric might encourage those prone to violence or further alienate those in South Africa who hold steadfastly to the status quo.

Neither of these groups will enjoy our support, for all they do is exacerbate the problem, increase the suffering. We cannot and will not aid or abet terrorism or terrorists, nor will we assist those who consistently stand in the way of change.

We should consider the fact that there are those in every nation who stand for change which will benefit all citizens of their society. At times, they must swim against the tide of events and at times undergo personal sacrifice as a result.

There are voices in South Africa among all its racial groups which must be heard, those who call for evolutionary, dynamic change. Will we turn our backs on those people and take the easy way out-by relying on unconstructive criticism? Will it serve the purposes of the people of South Africa or the principles of the United Nations to constantly speak against abuses of human rights without attempting to encourage a process of change and to support those who are seeking constructive change?

We ask others to consider our position, and to join us in working toward the solutions which we can all agree must take place in South Africa so that a government in Pretoria, representing all its citizens, can take its place as a respected member of the international community.

There are a good many of us who understand the scars which racism leaves on a society an<,lon individuals. We understand the need to speak out of a depth of feeling. At the same time, in an international forum such as the United Nations we must ultimately focus on the results we seek to achieve, on the attainment of a better life for South Africans of all races, a brighter future for children yet unborn.

Deep down in our hearts,' we know that these results can best be achieved by appeals to reason and a vigorous concerted effort in support of those who counsel rationality, huma.n brotherhood, and progress.

0

We, the people o[thc United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice. insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

-

PREAMBLE

OF THE UNITED

TO

THE

CONSTITUTION

STATES

Concern for the well-being of its citizens is woven into the very fiber of the United States. In 1785 land was set aside by the Continental Congress to support public education; today the U.S. Department of Education is the newest of the cabinet-level governmental agencies, operating more than 120 separate programs. In 1798 the first marine hospital was established to care for merchant seamen-the forerunner of today's Public Health Service, whose six component agencies givedirection to the United States quest for better health. In 1887 the Federal Government opened a one-room laboratory for ~esearch into disease. The seed planted there has grown into the National Institutes of Health, the world's largest medical research center, underwriting about 40 percent of all biomedical research done in the United States.

Stemming from a belief that social justice is not realized unless the nation provides adequate care for all of i~s citizens, social welfare programs in the United States range far and wide in providing that care.

TO PROMOTE THE GENERAL WELFARE Millions of Americans have been touched in some way by one or more of the comprehensive services available through social welfare programs. Help comes in myriad forms-individually, voluntarily, through private organizations or through government agencies. Above, a woman seeks counseling on child care.

In earlier days, the family, church or synagogue, community and local charity were the mainstays in providing for people in need. That tradition is still strong, as myriad private organizations and voluntary groups give of their services today.

The 20th century has seen the growth of large-scale governmental programs to support the disadvantaged and to contribute to the national well-being. Millions of Americans are touched in some ways by one or more of the comprehensive, farreaching services.

The principal Federal agency responsible for overseeing essential services is the Department of Health and Human Services, which administers more than 300 individual programs.

The Social Security Administration, the world's largest income provides maintenance program, monthly benefits to more than 35

million retired or disabled workers and their families or survivors. In addition, nearly 4.5 million aged, blind or disabled persons receive supplemental income.

Under the Social Security Administration's Aid to Families With Dependent Children program, cash welfare payments are made to more than 10 million individuals having little or no other income.

The program's cost is shared by the states.

Two major health care programs -Medicare and Medicaid-are administered by the Health Care Financing Administration, helping to pay hospital and medical bills for some 47 million Americans. The states also help fund Medicaid.

The special concerns of American Indians, Alaska Natives and Native Hawaiia?s are the focus of the Administration for Native Americans. Economic and social self-

sufficiency is promoted through financial grants.

Physicians, chemists, nutritionists, pharmacologists and microbiologists of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) contribute to regulating consumer products available in the United States. FDA is charged with assuring that foods, drugs, medical devices and cosmetics are safe, sanitary and properly labeled.

Programs to prevent or reduce the problems associated with alcoholism, dangerous drug use or mental illness are the responsibility of the Alcohol, Drug Abuse and Mental Health Administration.

These are all a part of the Department of Health and Human Services.

The food stamp program, administered by the Department of Agriculture, enables low-income families to buy more and varied foods and improve their diet.

Rent subsidy programs to help

lower income families afford decent housing, mortgage insurance programs to help families become horne owners, antidiscrimination in housing programs, and programs to aid neighborhood rehabilitation are some of the responsibilities of the Department of Housing and. Urban Developmen t.

Unemployment insurance, veterans benefits, prison rehabilitation programs, day care, special education, civil rights and equal opportunity programs, job training, emergency health care-the list of available programs and services goes on and on.

Reflecting the public belief that poverty is unacceptable, and the long tradition of helping one another, Americans continue to work-individually, voluntarily, through private organizations, through their governments~to insure a better life 0 for their fellow citizens.

Left: A patient's lung is tested at the National Institute of Health, which is charged with improving the health of Americans. Below: The hot meal for the handicapped woman in the wheelchair is provided and delivered to her home by "Meals on Wheels," a voluntary organization.

Bottom: This young man, who has been laid off from his job in an auto firm, is among the 97 percent of American workers covered by unemployment insurance, which is administered by the states through local offices.

Left: Using special equipment, a teacher helps a student with learning disabilities in one of the numerous institutions geared to meet specific, unique educational needs. Above: An American¡ Indian woman of the Navaho tribe learns to drive on a simulator

at a local community college. There are several schemes to help such minorities enter the mainstream of American life. Top: A young volunteer provides company and support to an elderly man; services for the aged are an important part of social welfare activities.

Today, young people are more cynical than ever about the world of work.

Are we doing anything about it? No. Can we do anything about it? Yes.

GROIING UP h~~~~~~~:~:~n~~:e IN GAG I 0

edI~n ~~~~~d~~eb~~~ than then, Paul Goodman asked (italics his): "But the question is what it means to

grow up into such a fact as 'During my b JOHN productive years J will spend eight hours a Y day doing what is no good.'" Later, in an essay printed in a collection of his works entitled Nature Heals, he wrote:

"Brought up in a world where they cannot see the relation between activity and achievement, adolescents believe that everything is done with mirrors, tests are passed by tricks, achievement is due to pull, goods are known by their packages, and a man is esteemed according to his front. The delinquents who cannot read and quit school, and thereby becoming still less able to take part in such regular activity as is available, show a lot of sense and life when they strike out directly for the rewards of activity, money, glamor, and notoriety .... And it is curious and profoundly instructive how they regress, politically, to a feudal and band-and-chieftain law that is more comprehensible to them. The code of a street gang has many an article in common with the Code of Alfred the Great.

"It is disheartening indeed to be with a group of young fellows who are in a sober mood and who simply do not know what they want to do with themselves in life. Doctor, lawyer, beggar-man, thief? rich man, poor man?~they simply do not know an ambition and cannot fantasize one. But it is not true that they don't care; their 'so what?' is vulnerable, their eyes terribly balked and imploring. (I say 'it is disheartening: and I mean that the tears roll down my cheeks; and I who am an anarchist and a pacifist feel that they will be happier when they are all in the army.)"

Paul Goodman was writing here about poor boys in the United States. But even in the more hopeful sixties it was just about as true of affluent youth. In those days I often spoke to high school assemblies, mostly in rich suburbs. I usually talked about the difference between jobs, careers, and work. A job, I said, was something that you did for money, something that someone else told you to do and paid you for doing, something you would probably not have done otherwise but did only to get the money. A career was a kind of ladder of jobs. If you did your first job reasonably well for a while, your boss might give you a new job, maybe slightly more interesting or at least not so hard-dirty-dangerous. In this job, you might not be

<

~~:s~~ ~~ ~~~~eas~:;a;~:~~~~~, ~~h~ ~~~~ control of your own work; and you would probably be paid a little more money. Then, HOLT if you did that job okay for a while, your boss might then give you a slightly better job, and so on. This adds up to what is called "a career."

By "work" I meant and still mean something very different, what people used to call a "vocation" or "calling" ~something so worth doing for its own sake that you would gladly choose to do it even if you didn't need or get any money from it. I added that to find our work, in this sense, is one of the most important and difficult tasks that we have in life, and that even if we find our work once we may later have to look for it again, since work that is right for us at one stage of our life may not be right for us at the next. But the vital question, "What do I really want to do? What do I think is most worth doing?" is not one that the schools (or any other adults) will often urge us or help us to ask; on the whole, they feel it is their business only to prepare us for employment~jobs or careers, high or low. So we will have to find out for ourselves what work needs to be done and is being done out there in the world, and where and how we will take part in it.

As I said this, I looked at the faces of my hearers to sense how they felt about what I was saying. What I saw, and usually heard in the question periods that followed, made me feel that most of these students were thinking, "This guy must have just come from Mars." Work worth doing? Work that you would do even if you didn't need money, that you would do for nothing?

For most of these young people, it was not just impossi,ble, it was unimaginable. They did not know, hardly even knew of, any people who felt that way about their work. Work was something that you did for external rewards--a little pay, if you were like most people, or wealth, power, or fame if you were among the lucky few.

Among all those young people, there was never, anywhere, a hopeful, positive, enthusiastic response to what I said. I cannot remember even one among all those students, the most favored young people of the (then, at least) most favored nation in the world, who said or later wrote to me, "Mr. Holt, here's what I care about; how can I find a way to work at it?"

Today, more than 10 years later, the situation is, if anything,

worse. Young people, though they may be too scared to be rebels and for the sake of good jobs and future security may hustle for good grades, are even more alienated, cynical, and hopeless than they were a decade ago.

Are we doing anything about it? No. Schools talk a lot about "job training" and "career orientation," but none of it gives the least idea that there is any reason for working except to get money.

Could we do anything about it? Yes. But there is no quick mass solution. What we need is to find ways for young people first to hear about and then to meet and work with those adults who really care about their work. One problem here is that very few young people will work with even these adults unless they are paid. But most people doing skillful and useful work can't afford to hire young part-time apprentices, least of all ones who will not be with them for long. Of course, someone else-the government or foundations, say-might pay them, but then the activity tends to become fake. When young people know that they are not being paid by the people they work for, they know that their work is not really needed or valued and so tend not to value it themselves.

One organization in the United States that does very important work, and that quite a few people work for without pay for just that reason, had a number of government-paid students working on its staff a couple of summers ago. The senior managers found the arrangement more trouble than it was worth. Someone had to spend a lot of time showing these young workers what to do and how to do it, and then had to watch them to make sure they did it. In fact, they had to be watched to be sure that, in ignorance or mischief or malice, they did not actually do harm.

This experience was probably fairly typical.

Suppose, instead, young people were given room and board while they did volunteer work for organizations they chose themselves. Probably only a minority of students would do such work, and even then they would have to get school credit for it.

(Otherwise, few would be willing to choose it or be allowed to do it by their parents.) The danger would be that this might attract many young people who were doing this work only to get out of school. And even the serious volunteers might think, "If we were really valuable to these people, they would pay us."

Would establishment of a National Youth Service Corps help young people find the right kinds of jobs? The proposal has been around for a few years now in the United States. In its latest form, outlined in a new report from the Charles F. Kettering Foundation, all 18-year-olds would have to register with the corps, which would inform them about jobs open to them.

Perhaps such an agency can help, if it taps into the kids' own enthusiasms. But requiring them to register is not a good idea.

It suggests more bureaucratic standards imposed from above.

Many U.S. high school students now work at part-time jobs anywhere from 10 to 30 hours a week, according to a study done in Connecticut. Is this a good thing? Yes. Does it help these young people to find work worth doing in their adult lives? Hardly at all. For one thing, most of the jobs they do are dull; for another, the enterprises they work for seldom serve any very useful or worthy purpose. Thus, though the young eat a lot of junk food, they know in their hearts that it is junk and can hardly take much pride in making and selling it. For another, the adults whom they meet in their jobs tend to be themselves alienated from work; that is, most of these older people work just for money and only as well as they have to, so

that the young have no good examples.

We are told by Sheila Cole [author of Working Kids on Working] that students who work at part-time jobs are less interested in schoolwork, have less time for it, and get lower grades. Does this mean that working at part-time jobs is a bad thing? No. Most school time is wasted time; anythi'ng learned there could be learned in a fraction of that time. When children are sick or injured and cannot go to school, the schools send tutors to their homes, and only a few hours of this tutoring a week is enough to have students keep up with their classes. The rest of what they do in school and in their homework is pure busywork; they are kept busy to keep them out of trouble and out of the adults' hair.

If students with part-time jobs get lower grades, it may be not so much because they know less but because the schools lower their grade for being late or absent or for missing homework. As one working student told Sheila Cole (italics added), "In junior high school I would miss three periods after lunch.

It was hard to keep up because what you missed you couldn't get. They wouldn't tell you." This business of lowering grades for attendance reasons is common school practice; indeed, many schools boast that it is an effective way "to keep the students in school." In other words, the schools go out of their way to penalize students for working for money. They could just as easily reward them, but fear that if they did they would lose many of their own customers.

In any case, most of what little students do learn in school they quickly forget and rarely use. Few students could pass last year's school tests, and few adults could pass any school tests. These young people's part-time jobs, like the rest of their lives, may have little meaning or purpose. But no part of their lives is more meaningless and wasted than the time they spend in school or on school tasks. Their schooling should be understood as a kind of life tax which they have to pay in order to gain entry into various levels of society-the more the tax (in theory, at least), the higher the level.

But if working for subminimum wages at unskilled jobs does nothing to help students find worthy life work, and takes time and attention away from schoolwork, how then can it be a good use of students' time?

In the first place, we can learn much from even the most seemingly dull and unskilled work. At one time or another, sometimes in helping friends, sometimes as an unavoidable part of work I had chosen, I have done such "unskilled" jobs as making file cards, stuffing envelopes, wrapping packages, washing dishes, shoveling manure or snow, breaking up a hardpacked dirt barn floor with pick and shovel, mixing cement, cutting hay, splitting wood, stacking hay bales, hauling seaweed, and digging holes for trees. In all of these I found great interest and pleasure in looking for and finding better ways to do the work. One of my duties in my first job was to make and keep membership files on 3 x 5 cards. When I began, all the cards had the names and addresses right in the middle. I found with great pleasure that by putting that information on one line, at the very top of the card, I could read many cards at once by fanning them out a little. This was only the first of hundreds of mini-inventions that I have made and still make while doing "dull" work. Nothing makes life more interesting or better sharpens the wits than giving close attention and thought to small and concrete things, and except in those dreadful jobs where you do nothing except watch-security guards, parking-

Children should be encouraged to take pride in doing even dull and unskilled work like wrapping packages, cutting hay and washing dishes.

lot attendants, and the like--almost any job, at least for a while, has some food for that kind of thought.

Of course, as I said, I was usually doing these jobs because, in one way or another, I had chosen to. Also, I knew I was not going to have to do them forever, and I had enough control of my work so that if I did find a better way to do a task, I could then do it that way. Many people, perhaps most people, are not so lucky.

In the second place, students working for money are to some degree being useful, if not to the world at large, at least to someone. Young people are rarely able to feel useful and needed, and for most of them it is both necessary and helpful.

In the third place, work gives young people a chance to get some money without having to beg from their parents. Though begging is bad, having no money is even worse. In a moneybased and money-worshipping society, to be without money is to have no dignity, no rights, no place in the world. Young people today feel badly enough about themselves as it is. With no money and no way to get it, they feel even worse. The fact that they spend their money quickly and often foolishly is beside

the point. In any,case, it is adults who, with expensive advertising and promotion, persuade them to do that.

In the fourth place, young people can escape at work from the intolerable double-bind situation in which they live most of the rest of their lives, which is that they are constantly bossed, threatened, humiliated, insulted, punished, and even hurt by people who claim to have their best interests at heart. The girl hustling cheap food at a drive-in is at least not told that the drive-in is there for her benefit. She is working for the drive-in, not it for her. Of course, she is paid, but probably much less than her work is worth (otherwise they would fire her). No one tells her that the drive-in gives a damn about her, or that she should be grateful for all it does for her. She is in a clear, unambiguous relationship with her bosses and customers.

And real work has another benefit. Peter Marin, the educator and social critic, once said, in a fine phrase, that the schools are full of "artificial rituals of act and consequence." Not the drive-in. Whatever it tells her to do, there is a reason, usually one she can see and understand, that she has to do it that way and not some other way. It is not just a matter of adult whim but of reality; this really is how the ice cream machine or cash register actually works. Reality is the best, the fairest and most patient of all teachers; people who will not learn from that teacher (and there do seem to be quite a few) will certainly not learn from any other. But work, particularly manual and lowlevel work, usually brings us into very close contact with some part of reality. The people at the top may put any kind of lies or nonsense they want into the letters they dictate, but the people who have to type those letters have to get them right.

When we talk about young people's alienation from work, we must remember that we are talking about a problem that would not exist if we had not created it. The human animal is by its very nature not just an inquiring, thinking, dreaming, playing animal, but also a working animal. It is in our nature to want to shape the world around us, to make things and do things, and to want to do them as well as we can. We have only to watch little children at play to see how diligently and carefully they work at most of what they have chosen to do. We do not have to teach them to work, any more than we have to teach them to learn. But when, in school or even at home, we begin to train children to do what we want in order to get our rewards, we slowly destroy their capacity for pride and pleasure in work.

Every time we reward a child for doing something we want, whether with a word of praise or a smile or a kiss or a gold star, we bring that child one step closer to the day when he or she will work only for rewards. This is all the more so when, as in school, the tasks are themselves dull and meaningless.

The experience of many people in many fields, most recently computers, shows that children from very early ages can do and love to do precise and skillful work. We need to ask ourselves how we can make it possible for more adults to do skilled and worthy work, and then, how we can make it possible for children, even when quite young ... to do so. This is not a quick or easy task. All the more reason to get to work on it.

0 John Holt is the editor of Growing Without Schooling, a bimonthly magazine about home education: He is also the author of several books, among them, Escape from Childhood and What Do I Do Monday?

"America, forever you elude me." "America, you amaze me." "America, you intrigue me."

"America, you bewilder me." "America, you impress me." That's how Manish Nandy reacts to the United States in this amusing, sometimes irreverent, sometimes laudatory account of his life there.

The chic Frenchwoman who stepped into the Boeing at Paris and occupied the seat next to me spread a pleasantly distracting aura of perfume. I ¡was on my way to the United States for the first time, and a sense of anticipation made it hard to concentrate on the Fodor guide I had bought at Calcutta airport. And presently my neighbor started talking.

"Excusez-moi," she asked in French, "I hope I'm not in the nonsmoking area ?"

"No, you're not," I said, thankful for my years of apprenticeship with the Alliance Francaise. "In fact, I'll keep you company."

I lit my cigarette as well as hers.

When the Air France stewardess brought the meal, I commented on how I enjoyed French cuisine. She didn't. ¡'That's tough, for a French person not to like French food," I said.

"But I'm not French!"

"No?" I was nearly incredulous.

"Je suis Americaine."

"Why the devil then are we talking in French for so long?" I swore in confusion.

That was my first lesson about the United States, long before I reached its shores. Americans can be anywhere and anything. You never know, so you never stereotype.

America, forever you elude me!

My family subscribed to Newsweek, Time and a half-dozen other American journals; in college I studied U.S. history and constitution, and outside I wolfed down Updike, Albee and Lowell. Yet, on first immersion in U.S. life, my reaction was one of unmitigated surprise. Dazed, I realized that my world of Luce and Lowell was quite different from the America I was experiencing.

Sheer size was one element in that surprise. As the Polish gardener in the office I later joined saId, "Anything they

make anywhere, folks here make it bigger." You arrive at an airport and get promptly lost, sucked into the vast maw of a confusing apparatus.

You get into a car and find it so huge you could almost think of living in it. The road you are on is frighteningly large, with eight lines of vehicles zooming by in maniacal fury, and towering stores and offices crowd round you in overpowering sizes.

With bulk comes bounty. A superlative profusion of goods. The bigger, the better?

Sure, pal, but also the more, the merrier.

Anything you need in 10 varieties or perversely want in 20, you get in two hundred varieties. Every time I walked into a Macy's or Bloomingdale's, I was amazed at the staggering abundance of goods of every kind: shirts and skirts, watches and latches, perfumes and pizzas.

Before I could name it, they had it. But I was even more dumbfounded by the street-corner supermarket, a Giant cornucopia of 10 brands of underarm spray and 20 types of inviting cakemix.

But the supreme marvel no doubt are the fast food chains-Gino's, Hardee's and McDonald's. ] was used to waiting 30 minutes for the most pedestrian meal: it took my breath away to find a freckled teen-ager conjuring up in three minutes straight a trayful of calories, hamburger, cherry pie, milkshake and all. Vive Ie junk food! Vive Ie American speed! I left my plastic seat in the assembly-line restaurant f111111y convinced I had discovered the pulsebeat of U.S. immigration.

Speed was very visibly a part of American life.

I was overnight transported to a society where everybody rushed pellmell-even if he was only going home to relax. Relaxation too was often amazingly strenuous. An international center I worked for was located in a pretty, 120-hectare wooded area, with nature paths and excellent walkways, and on sunny days I was

tempted to take a stroll at lunchtime. I encountered several joggers, but never another stroller. Nonplussed, I asked a colleague and I admired her for being able to tell me with a completely straight face, "You see, they don't have the time.

They're trying to get all the relaxation they can out of that hour."

America is nothing if not comfortable.

The degree of comfort for the populace was truly stunning for me. I felt almost totally protected from the inclemencies of weather. The houses I lived in were heated in winter, air-conditioned in summer. So were the cars I used, the buses I took, the drugstores I frequented. Telephones in every room, lest I need to stir unnecessarily; push buttons instead of dials to save me the extraordinary effort of dialling. Clothes for the mildest variation of weather; instant dinners cooked at lightning speed; typewriters self-eorrecting; automobiles that are automatic.

And the supreme comfort? r did not have to pay in cash for whatever] bought. I simply waved a plastic card.

America. you amaze me.

America is also a land where, I soon discovered. curious things abound. Three of those I haven't still got used to.

As an Indian, the first thing I looked for on my office desk was a glass of water.

No sign of it. It took me a little while to discover that Americans have niches in the office wall which house little water fountains. You simply put your head in the niche and drink the water right from the fountain, without using a glass or your palm. Very hygienic doubtless, but there were problems. ] would put my finger on a button to get the water jet going, then as r lowered my head to receive the water, the finger pressure would involuntarily increase and I would get an embarrassing splash all over my face.

Electric switches were another set of

adversaries. Having learnt over three decades to move a switch lever down to get the lights on, it annoyed the hell out of me to find that I had put a whole conference room in darkness in a misguided attempt to turn on something.

Worse still, some switches moved left and right instead of up and down, violatingwhat to me seemed a sacred rule.

But the most confusing of all was that most innocent of all gadgets, a water tap-or, as Americans would have it, faucet. All my life I had turned little wheels anticlockwise to make the water flow and done the reverse to shut it off.

Now I had to master those strange contraptions that stood in the place of plain, pedestrian taps and seemed to sneer at me.

The basin in my apartment had what looked like a car gear lever, and evidently I "drove" very poorly, for it was only by accident that I could ever get a drop out of the nozzle. My college mate in the World Bank had a massive globe in the same spot which had to be maneuvered' at different angles, both to get hot or cold water and to control the flow. Every time I tried to wash my hands, I ended up with scalded fingers.

Strange country, inscrutable practices.

In New York City, you can't let a suitcase out of your sight for a minute; it will disappear as fast as in Chowpatty or Howrah. In a town in the Midwest I lived in for a while, people habitually leave their car keys in the cars and consider it a bother to lock the house for a mere two-hour visit to the market. Barely 15 minutes' drive away, a storekeeper in the local supermarket complained of extensive shoplifting by affluent housewives.

Every other American is superbly at home with mechanical things, oiling his bike or repairing her eggbeater casually over the weekend. A local exhibition of inventors displayed a mind-boggling collection of 83 types of mousetraps, each a shining tribute

to Yankee ingenuity. Yet the .Federal Government's Department ofTransportation estimates that a full one-third of all car repair bills Americans pay are spuriousthe mechanic is inept or the repairs unnecessary. I evoked impatient honking if I blocked a highway lane by driving below 100 k.p.h.-though the speed limit was 88 k.p.h. Yet my friends sat patiently through half-hour television features interrupted by 20 commercials of cars, coats and contraceptives. A curious kaleidoscope.

Curious too is the American system of credit. If yeu closely follow Polonius' advice of never being a borrower, you are going to be found uncreditworthy. You are expected to live beyond your means, borrow and buy. If you have done so and paid up reasonably in time, you will be rewarded with pretty little pieces of plastic, - "credit cards" -to enable you to borrow even more. And curiouser is what you can do with those little cards. You can do what I did: practically buy up the store-everything from food to furniture, art to antiques, jigs to jewelry-till the bill collector catches up with you America, you intrigue me. ~~~ Yet America confused me too.

As a student of economics, as a practitioner of management, I visualized the United States at the pinnacle of economic development, with vast and growing industries and a massive service sector. That was true, but so was a large number of skilled unemployed, who survived on unemployment compensation and went humiliatedly from employer to employer, encountering a selection process as tainted by prejudice, cronyism and she~r red tape as in the much less developed countries.

If they were a fringe, how could a rich and efficient society tolerate this inhuman fringe?

It is an efficient society; trains and

planes move on time, goods are delivered.

But it harbors a bureaucracy which is the most spendthrift in the world and, by many accounts, one of the most incompetent. It is a rich society, but in all its major cities it lets fester large pockets of abysmal poverty where a stranger dare not walk in daylight for fear of being mugged and robbed. It is a marvelously clean society, where an Indian is thankful for hygienic food and filtered water, dust-free rooms and deodorized toilets. But the next moment the Indian is confused by dirty low-eost housing, squalid subways and filthy ghettoes where broken bottles litter the streets and garbage piles stink.

It is a remarkably humane society, too.

Some of the kindest and most generous people I have ever met are Americans, from Peggy in Minneapolis, who begged for Mother Teresa's address, to Paul in Dallas, who sent checks indiscriminately to every welfare agency in the world, from Mac, who lent me a car for weeks when I didn't have one, to Karlaine and Earl, who took me along to parties where they were invited but I wasn't.

Yet I also think of the little schoolboy in Wheaton who was knocked by car after car till he was reduced to gory nothing, because not a driver would stop for his sake. Americans blithely disregard the daily carnage on their roads-execution by "automotion" -and I read with incomprehension that the last Christmas season Ford and General Motors had achieved a better body count of Americans than the Viet Minh had in a whole war.

Stand outside any grocery store, in Chicago, Seattle or San Francisco, and you will see the pathetic sight of withered, wrinkled people in their 60s and 70s painfully pushing home trolley carts laden with their purchases. Alone and helpless.

At the same time, there are neat, wellmaintained homes for the elderly. The

:l!J('; .

. .I

I

contrast between private indifference and public thoughtfulness is baffiing. As baffling, for example, as the stark contrast between the private and public means of transport: on the one hand, an endless array of shining cars, of every conceivable cost, comfort and contour, and on the other, a handful of buses, with infrequent service, limited routes and expensive tickets. No wonder Americans have a shortage of fuel. But it is some wonder that things remain just the same while their leaders cry hoarse about saving fuel!

America, you bewilder me. ~~~ What are the things in the United States that, in the end, left the strongest impression on me?

One surely was the invincible dignity of Everyman. Call it arrogance, call it brashness, call it whatever you like, you had to reckon with the fact that the meanest of the land could and would stand up to you, if he felt you were being overbearing. It didn't matter whether he cleaned the floor or gathered garbage, like lanky Len in my office or big Butch in my Reston neighborhood; he knew what he was worth: the respect of a person. Len could ask for a lift without feeling selfconscious, and Butch would offer a cigarette without a second thought.

Nowhere in the world is blue collar so reconcilable with blue blood, junk job so far from junk status. Among my friends, lawyers, academics and managers, there was none who hadn't earlier worked as a messenger boy, dishwasher or waiter.

There is even planned reversion: Jerry, who headed a university department, now drives a taxi at night to be able to sustain his interest in painting during the day.

Manual labor is a part of everyone's life.

My neighbor, career diplomat Ed, stripped to the waist on the¡ brighter Sunday mornings and lovingly hosed and polished his blue Toyota. Doctor Paul cooked his

food, judge Rich polished shoes. Truly, a country where the white-collar world knows how the other half lives.

A different kind of half to watch: the women. Never make the mistake of saying the sexist "girls" or the quaint "ladies."

The United States perhaps is the first modern society where more women work in offices and factories than at home, and the economic clout counts. They are better educated, infinitely more independent and are experimenting boldly with options which will send a chill down many a male spine. Totally without male help, they are running organizations, rearing children capably, leading hugely successful professional lives, and even conducting liaisons-with other women! The ones I knew, Margaret, Carlene and Jeanne, aren't simply asking for rights, they are asserting them.

The other thing that took my breath away was the staggering bounty of educational opportunities. Not just schools and universities and standard courses.

But thousands of educational programs, of all kinds, at all levels, long and brief, expensive and cheap, formal and nonformal, and¡ everywhere. Sitting in Boston, you can learn about Jain communities in western India or how to paddle a kayak like the Eskimos. There is no excuse for ignorance. Every local library is swarming with scores of avid kids, checking on everything from neutrons to necrophilia, tetanus to Tamerlane, materials management to Madeiran madrigals.

But the deepest impression I retain is also a broader one: of a vibrant, living people, restless and relentless, uninhibited and unfearing, searching for every pleasure and every adventure, exploring every mortal issue, constantly questing for'every answer to every question that troubled the human mind. Tactless and naIve, but also tenacious and fresh, they would stop at nothing, and there was nothing they

111//1' II I

would not dare. They hunger for facts, their voracious appetite for the concrete is never sated. That is why their media are the best. Their press, networks and journals daily tear down the sacred and the sanctimonious. For them there is no sacred cow and everything is fair game: judges and tycoons, congressmen and corporation presidents, the Pope and the president's wife. It is all slightly fearsome. But it is also thrilling, dramatic, reassuring. And it is the last hope for living free.

America, you impress me. ~~~ But all these thoughts and reactions were in the months and years ahead, yet to come on that sultry afternoon my Boeing landed at John F. Kennedy Airport with a sharp jolt. And then I was jostling ahead with a motley crowd of summer tourists, getting into lines, going up and down stairs, riding on escalators, showing papers, answering questions, and finally entering the reception area.

All around me people were greeting people, talking, laughing, hugging. My French-looking, French-talking neighbor ran across an all-American crew-cut GI type and promptly burst into the purest Yankese. Amid the hubbub, I stood aside, a little tired, lost, expectant.

And, then, there was a sudden swirl of long blonde hair, a familiar flash of twinkling blue eyes, a dizzy blur of the world's sweetest sounds, smells and sensations. Next moment, the bright overhead lights of Kennedy Airport were going round and round, as were a pair of slender arms across my neck. Found! I was no longer tired or lost; I was home, I was home.

0 America, I love you!

About the Author: Manish Nandy is a management consultant and adviser to the Steel Authority of India Ltd. He has written four books and contributed to Indian and international journals.

Top: Donald Seufer, a third-generation rancher, surveys his winter crop; thanks to the early settlers, most of once dry Holly is green today.

Above, center: Kenny and Pearl Reyman operate one of Holly's two grocery stores.

Above: Tony Garcia, seen here with fellow Lion Club members, is of Mexican descent. A member of the town council, he is a symbol of the changes that have come to Holly since the early days when Mexicans were discriminated against. Right: One of Holly's most popular events is the annual horse racing season, held every spring forfive weeks at Gateway Downs, the home-made track on the town's outskirts.

called the Great American Desert.

The town was started in 1871 by Hiram S. Holly. The earliest settlers realized that wa ter was the key to their future, and they dug olly is small-tow.n America with a distinctive western flavor. Take away a irrigation ditches and drilled deep wells to 'water their fields. Now green fields cover most few modern developments like cars of the valley. and paved streets, add some wooden sideStrangers to Holly, who come from larger walks and hitching posts for horses, and you'd have a perfect setting for one of the cities, invariably ask, "What do you do for hundreds of Western movies that Hollywood entertainment here?" The answer is that when Holly people want a good time they churns out.

Community spirit is the But Holly isn't a movie set, though it is "get together." rooted in that Old West tradition as much as hallmark of social activity. During the school any place in the United States. It's a 1980s year, from late August to mid-May, the secondary school is the town's social center, town, a village really. Less than 1,000 persons live in Holly itself, with maybe another 500 and the attractions are football and basketball games, other student sports events, bake on surrounding farms and cattle ranches, and most of them live here by choice. It's a sales, band and choir concerts and club rural place, a farming community, and the meetings. The last time anyone counted, there were 65 different kinds of social clubs people live in the slow rhythm of the seasons. in this town of less than 1,000 people.

Everyone in town knows everyone else. They As in many small towns in the United say it's a good place to raise children. There's States, people band together to get things a Mexican-American flavor here too-about done. There is a lot of civic work done by 15 percent of the town. community volunteers. The fire department, Viewed from far above the earth, Holly and for example, is all volunteer.

Secondary other small towns would look like brown school students initiated a cleanup drive, earthenware beads strung out along the brown twine of the dry Arkansas riverbed picking up trash, tidying up the whole town and creating a small park as a result. In 1974 in summer. In the spring, when the water the townspeople decided they needed a comes tumbling down from the melting community' medical building, with an office snowfields of the Rocky Mountains to the for the town's sole doctor, and room for a west, the river is full and everything turns an dentist's office. And, more importantly, they emerald green. Sometimes the river becomes decided to take action. In 18 months of a raging, damaging flood. bake sales, auctions, private donations and Agriculture is the basis of life in the Arkansas valley. Economy, industry, society hard work, they raised the needed $60,000. and everyday conversation revolve around Another favored kind of social event is the farming and ranching. One of the main topics potluck, or covered dish, supper. Often the entire community is invited, and each family is water-either the presence of it or, more brings along a prepared dish, usually a commonly, its scarcity. casserole baked in a covered dish. Swapping Holly isn't like the small, rural communities in the eastern states, where there is plenty recipes is part of the fun. of rainfall, the grass is lush and trees cover As the seasons turn in Holly, there are three large comm unity affaics that attract the hills. Holly is on the high plains, where the visitors from miles around. One is the annual great prairies of the Midwest begin to rise to horse-racing season that takes place each meet the towering Rocky Mountains.

The town is 1,021 meters above sea level, and it spring for five weeks at Gateway Downs, the home-built track on the outskirts of town. is the lowest place in Colorado.

Left to In late June there is the Holly Old Time itself it is a very old country, sometimes Fiddlers' Contest, and on the last weekend Below: An elderly couple enjoy ice cream on a hot in September there is the Holly Fair, a summer day in Holly. Right: Reflecting the countrywide harvest festival that began back small town's peace is the quiet, uncrowded expanse in 1900. For that, the town virtually shuts of Main Street, the business center.

H

down and there is dancing and festivity in the streets for three days.

The fairs are the high times in Holly, but the rest of the year things can get pretty slow.

Opportunities are limited in such a small place, and young people often move away, lured by the bright lights, the pace and excitement of the big cities. They go away to college, learn a profession and never return. But that is changing now. The character of family life is changing too. Families of 10 to 12 children used to be common, but two or three is more usual now. As a result, Holly's population stays pretty much the same.

While some of Holly's sons and daughters move on to larger things, more and more are coming back these days. "If you want to get away from city life, this is the town to do it in," says John Contreras. He's 26, a father of two and a third-generation Hollyite who tried college and construction work in several cities before returning to work on his hometown newspaper, The Holly Chieftain. "Holly is mellow," he says. "it doesn't have the rush of city life."

Asked why he lives in such a remote little place, Rella Ann Steele, 30 years old and a trust officer at the Dank, says, "I like the friendly community and country town. I like the fact that when anybody is in trouble, the whole town pitches in to help. When Big H Lumber Company burned and they had a cleanup, the community turned out to clear away the mess and rebuild the building so a business would not have to close down."

"It's home," says Kenny Reyman, who owns one of the two grocery stores in town with his wife, Pearl. He was 18 and she was 14 when they married-young by average U.S. statistics but not uncommon in rural communities.

They like raising their three children here. Says Pearl, "Here you know their friends, you know their friends' families, you know what kind of people they're running around with. Basically, I think Holly has a lot of good points. We don't have much crime, we don't have pollution .... " "And when you need some help," adds 0 Kenny, "it's here. People care."

About the Author: A va Marie Betz is the editor of The Holly Chieftain. She has served as a Peace Corps volunteer in the African state of Lesotho.

BYIDlICSOr RURALBEVELOPIIIIT Despite differences in definition and priority, the United States and India approach rural problems with a similar purpose. Both countries, as the following interviews reveal, are intent on improving the quality of life of an important segment of their population through a variety of programs.

An Indian Experience

An American View

ARUNA DASGUPTA INTERVIEWS BUNKER ROY

G. RANGASWAMI TALKS WITH JEROME KLEMENT

ARUNA DASGUPTA: A lot of Indian rural experts are full of praise for your venture in Tilonia in Rajasthan. What exactly is it-and what's so special about it?

BUNKER ROY: The Social Work Research Centre (SWRC) is a rural service program with a difference-in fact, with many differences. It offers an integrated appr.oach to rural development -which is the only real approach there should be when you are thinking in terms of villagers. For instance, the villager is not only a farmer, he's probably also an artisan-say, a potter-in the off-crop months. For him his whole life, all aspects of it are integrated. It's not only water that's important, or health, or employment-it's all three.

The trouble is that most people drawing up rural development plans think in compartmentalized ways. We at SWRC try to think like the villager-our projects provide all the basic services that he and his family need from one village base. And what is most important, we don't offer it as charity. The villager realizes its worth because we make him pay for it. We've made that clear from the very beginning.

DASGUPTA: When was that? How, when and why did you start the center?

ROY: Way back in 1972 I was working on a rural project in Ajmer when I began to realize that none of these piecemeal projects were of any lasting value for a villager. I was keen to start a different kind of rural scheme. A friend of mine told me about Tilonia. He said there were buildings there which were once used for a Methodist hospital and were now lying deserted.

We managed to convince the Rajasthan Government to give them to us, at a nominal rent of Re. 1a month. Tilonia is a village of about 1,600 in one of the eight panchayat samitis of Ajmerthe Silora Panchayat Samiti. It serves as our base for providing servicesto about 100villages covering 1,300 square kilometers.

DASGUPT A: You have a very urbanized, what people call elitist, background-Doon School, St. Stephen's College. How did you get interested in rural development?

ROY: Well, I did some work during the Bihar famine in 1966-67 while I was doing B.A. in English from St. Stephen's College in Delhi. That's how it all started.

DASGUPTA: But for a lot of people it just remains a glamorous pastime- and then they go back to their urban lives.

ROY: Look, I'm doing this because I like doing it. People have all sorts of career choices. This is mine. [And his wife's tooAruna Roy left her IAS job to join her husband in Tilonia.]

After graduating I heard about a job with a relief service organization in Ajmer and I took it up. My first job was digging wells. [ had to handle compressors and explosives, maintain tractors, go down a well. It was an entirely new experience for me. After that I wanted to keep on working in a rural area. I wanted to start something small, but as a result of the rural exposure you want to do a lot. There's so much to be done. And it can be done.

DASGUPT A: Did your elitist background help-or hinder?

G. RANGASWAMI: Mr. Klement, you have visited several parts of India and seen some aspects of our rural development program.

Can you tell us how rural development in the United States compares with what is being done in India?

JEROME KLEMENT: The basic purpose of rural development in the United States is not very different from what it is in India.

We're both concerned with the problems of people; we're concerned with how people can help themselves. But in the United States our definition of rural is very different from yours; it means any place that has a population of less than 50,000 people-this covers about 30 percent of our population, and it includes many small towns. I live in a town in Texas with a population of about 48,000, and though it has become fairly urbanized and has undergone massive development in the past 10 years, it is very definitely rural.

Then, when we talk about rural development in the United States, we're not talking so much about agricultural development as you in India seem to be. In India much of the focus on rural development appears to be on agricultural development. Agriculture is a very small part of rural America, unlike rural India. So while rural development in the U.S. does mean agricultural development, it also means much more. It is concerned with the quality of life in rural areasand that includes farms and ranches, communities and villages, small towns.

RANGASWAMI: Well, in India nearly 75 percent of our people live in rural areas, and are dependent on agriculture. Of our 180 million working class, 150 million are employed in agriculture and related areas.

So India's rural development programs have to be aimed primarily at target groups which consist of small and marginal farmers.

But apart from that, rural development has some broad-based objectives-economic growth, employment opportunities, eradication of poverty, elimination of social injustice-which are not necessarily related to agriculture. For example, we have a rural Minimum Needs Program which incorporates elementary and adult education; health, water supply, roads, electrification, housing,

(Continued on paKe 21)

Jerome Klement (above) is a rural development specialist with the Farmers Home Administration, an agency of the u.s. Department of Agriculture. G. Rangaswami (top) is an agricultural adviser with the Indian Planning Commission.

Bunker Roy is the founder and director of the Social Work and Research Centre in Tilonia, Rajasthan.

(Continued onpage 21)

PHOTOGRAPHS BY AVINASH PASRICHA

The Social Work and Research Centre's projects emphasize self-help. The villagers have to pay, even if only a nominal charge, for services such as the installation of hand pumps (below) or the use of the center's equipment for drilling and locating wells (right). Employment schemes have helped enhance incomes and revive

old crafts-like the making of colorful shoes (right), leather bags (below, center) and patchwork quilts (bottomj, which are sold in cities

, An Indian Experience continuedfrom

page 19

ROY: I think my background helped. I had to meet a lot of people-the bureaucracy, big industry, international organizations-for support. With my kind of education, I like to think I can get my point across better. But of course, it has its disadvantages too. Initially we got branded as an elitist organization-it was like a stigma. There are also people who don't take you seriously if you are from an urbanized background.

And initially a lot of people with me were from my circle. Many of them are interested in this sort of work.

DASGUPTA: But do they stay on '!

ROY: Generally they do, though for some when the romance wears off and the honeymoon is over, there's a sharp dip in interest! Some people have this very romanticized view of village work. They think the villagers are all simple, genial people.

That's not the case. They're just as sharp as anyone else. And you have to adjust accordingly. Now only about 20-25 percent of our workers are from so-called elitist backgrounds.

DASGUPT A: How do you attract all these workers?

ROY: We do not want to attract them with any ideology; we do not think they should be Marxist or Gandhian or Sarvodaya workers. And we do not want people who feel they will be doing something great. We want to attract them as professionals. It's like any other job-the only difference being that the environment is rural.

DASGUPTA: But do you pay them professional salaries?

ROY: Certainly not as much as they get in a city, but definitely enough to keep them going. For example, we pay a doctor Rs. 600 with all expenses paid. So, in effect, that Rs. 600 is pocket money.

In Delhi he may not be able to save that much a month on a salary of Rs. 2,000. Everyone who works for us gets food, living accommodation, medical facilities, provident fund.

DASGUPTA: All this must require a lot of money. How is the project financed?

ROY: Initially, funds were a problem, because everyone thought I was too young-I was 26 in 1972-and couldn't be taken seriously, But my college connection helped me get a grant from the Dorabjee Tata Trust. Then once I proved myself, the government doors also opened up. Now about 50 to 60 percent of our funds come from the government through various ministries.

Then there are private sources-Oxfam, Ford Foundation, Action Aid in West Germany, Swissaid, the corporate sector, big firms. They will give money for specific programs. I sincerely feel that if anyone is seriously interested in doing good rural development work in India and can prove himself, he can get the funds.

DASGUPTA: How did you go about proving yourself?

ROY: We didn't start with a very traditional approach to rural development. We had some basic objectives in mind which were all different from other rural projects. First, we wanted to involve young people in rural development. Not just any young people but young professionals-teachers, doctors, engineers. We now have 400 young people-including professionals, paraprofessionals and village-level workers-located in the 400 villages spread over four states. Second, we wanted to get the community interested in its own development, so that eventually our professionals would leave the village and let the villagers take some of their functions. This sort of mobilization is very important for rural development to succeed and not become a mere social help project. So, in addition to providing a service, our professional also has to train a villager to take his place. Thirdly, we wanted to provide institutional support especially to the marginal and small farmers, scheduled castes, Harijans, agri(Continued on page 23)

BeloM': School dropouts at Titania attend a night school run by the center.

Bottom: One of the weavers who have benefited from SWRC's program of self-employment.

environmental improvement, nutntlOn. KLEMENT: About 40 percent of the American poor also live in rural areas and they face the same problems. Rural areas have poorer housing, fewer doctors, and generally lack the range of community services and facilities which people expect in the United States regardless of where they live.

The major problem is providing economic opportunities and gainful employment with adequate income in rural areas. It was a lack of this that led, in the 1950s and 1960s, to the problem India is facing todaypeople started leaving rural areas and going to the city to seek employment.

But the trend has now been reversed as more and more income-producing opportunities are being made available in rural areas-projects for health, education ....

RANGASWAMI: Who develops these projects? In India we have a national plan for rural development which is implemented through the state governments.

What is the role of the U.S. Federal Government in rural developmen t?

KLEMENT: We do not have a national program for rural development. The planning process for development occurs basically at the local level-the city, community or town and then at the county level; some states also have plans for rural development.

There is a Federal policy and some programs have been developed at the national level or there may be Federal legislation on some specific program-but from there these programs are delivered directly to the local units of government and to the people in these communities.

You see, there are several other departments of the Federal Government that implement their programs through the state governments, as happens in India.

But one of the strengths of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which has been recognized worldwide, is this delivery system, which goes from the top straight down to the people. Conceptually it is a "bottoms up" program.

We define rural development as the ability of the people themselves to come 'together to decide what they want their community to become. The U.S. Government's role in the development process is threefold: to provide information; to provide technical assistance and help to develop the organizational capability; and to provide resources.

The Federal Government's assistance has helped improve the quality of life in many rural areas-communities that did not have water now have it because of a loan program made available through the Federal Government; communities that didn't have health (Continued on page 25)

â&#x20AC;˘

Now nine years old, the Social Work and Research Centre continues 10 expand both in the range of its services and in the number of people it caters to. Water remains a top priority. The center has helped provide water for drinking and farming purposes through the instal/at ion of hand pumps and tube wells (top). The SWRC's heaiIh care program includes

TB eradication: above, center, a dOClOrexamine's a TB patient, one of about 100 served in 160 villages. The rural employment program helps weavers (above) with marketing and credit facilities through a bank (right) or any other lending institutiOn. Loans are also arranged to help people from the poorest communities becomejinancially

independent .. the woman at far right is tending to a poultry farm which the SWRC helped her establish.

The center's workers also introduce the women tofamily planning, health, child care and literacy in informal classes (lOp). Along more formal lines, nine night schools, like the one above, cater 10 some 600 students.

An Indian Experience continued from page 21.

cultural laborers. Programs meant for them normally don't reach them, they don't know how to get the benefits being earmarked for them. Our workers help identify such government projects and ensure that the benefits reach the poorest villagers.

DASGUPT A: What kind of services do you provide?

ROY: Agriculture extension, preventive and curative health, education for dropout kids, employment for rural women. I think we cover practically everything a villager needs.

DASGUPTA: Did you start it as an integrated program?

ROY: We built it up gradually. The major problem in Rajasthan is water. So we hired a geologist and a geophysicist and started with a groundwater survey. This unit is still in operation and serves individual farmers and organizations for location of wells.

This was later backed up by a water development unit, which has the sophisticated machinery needed for drilling tube wells.

We started with this water service and built our other services around it-the health component by giving clean drinking water, the education component to teach how to use that water.

Those were the three services we began with-water, health, education. From there we moved into agriculture. In fact, right now our most successful project is that of identifying and helping the very poor farmers who have been allotted land by the government but don't have the resources to make it productive.

DASGUPTA: Could you describe this program in some detailas an example of the exact way you work with the villagers?

ROY: It is an example of how we learnt to adapt our services to the actual needs of the community.. Our agricultural activities initially included technical advice to farmers, distribution of inputs like seeds, fertilizers, chemicals and pesticides.¡ We organized demonstrations and training camps in which we exposed the farmers to new techniques in agricultural operations.

But gradually we realized that this program was only helping the big farmers, those who could pay for it. Besides, it was heavily biased toward irrigation and thus meant for those who had the resources to adapt to new techniques.

Now we cater exclusively almost to the needs of the small and marginal farmers, the scheduled castes and backward classes and Harijans who' have been allotted land. And if you start thinking in terms of the rural poor, then you realize that things like technology and ecology are nonissues. The number of people who put in hand pumps or use high-yielding varieties is very small compared to those doing traditional cultivation.

Most villagers can't or won't accept new technology ... and I don't see anything wrong in a farmer going to a water diviner instead of a geologist.

DASGUPT A: There must be government schemes for poor villagers ....

ROY: Of course there are-the government has allotted land to' them. In 1975-1976 there was a massive land reform drive. It's a very good scheme, but it didn't always work out well for the smaller farmers. Either the land was bad or there were other problems. An outside agency like the SWRC is essential to help the poor benefit from such schemes.

DASGUPTA: How did you go about it?

ROY: Well, we first identified the 1,000 agricultural laborers in our block who had been allotted iand, that is one hectare or less, by the government. We found that 40 percent of them were involved in land dffiputes. Of the remaining 60 percent, many don't even know where their land is. Some have been given land (Continued on page 24 )

An Indian Experience continuedfrom

page 23

on the side of a hill, on top of a mountain, in the middle of a sand dune or a river or on the national highway. The land is usually very poor, full of rocks or stones. How does this poor man make it fit for cultivation? He is an agricultural laborer who gets Rs. 5 a day for cleaning someone else's land. He may need Rs. 400-500 for cleaning his land; how does he get that? So we get a grant from the Ministry of Agriculture to pay him a minimum wage to clean his land. Most people don't realize these problems.

DASGUPTA: They assume that once the land has been allotted that's the end of the ~ Children playing on a swing in Titania. poor farmer's problem?

ROY: Exactly. And that's not the case at all.

He needs so much more. He has to build a water conservation level worker isn't only a health worker. He has to also do seasonal barrier to keep water on that land, he has to dig a well. He needs work in the agriculture extension sphere-find out how many to get his soil tested. You can't expect him to go to Jaipur or farmers need seeds, fertilizers, etc. Then in the evening he may some big town just for that. He probably hasn't been to the next have to conduct ad ult ed ucation classes. You see, it's all multivillage. Then if he needs some loans, he has to sign so many purpose work. papers, meet so many officials, get certificates from the patwari, DASGUPTA: But your education work isn't only limited to what these village-level workers do, is it? the tehsildar and so many others. This poor man who is illiterate and too scared to walk into an office, how can he go through ROY: No, we have a primary evening school for dropouts. There it all? So most of them just give up. are government schools operating in the morning, but many children can't attend them because they may have to tend cattle DASGUPTA: Is all your work in this sphere only helping the or do some such work. We get about 50 students in each village villager liaise with the government? for these schools. They are run on very professional lines, with ROY: No, we have our own facilities and programs for soil testthe teachers initially trained by the National Centre for Eduing, well drilling, etc. We have soil chemists, the latest instruments.

In some cases we've also given loans to the small farmers to cational Research and Training (NCERT). to help free them from help them buy draught animals-mainly DASGUPTA: Do you also have vocational education? continued dependence on the tractors or bullocks of the big ROY: Only within our employment program, which is a part of landowners or, in the long run, of the center. The loans are on the government's TRYSEM (Training of Rural Youth for Self easy, interest-free terms-and this too is rare. Usually we arrange Employment) program. We get the women to make handicraft loans through agricultural or commercial banks. items, train them in weaving, in making durries, chappals. The DASGUPT A: What do you do in the health, education and chappals are actually made by the men in the leather unit, and employment projects? the women do the embroidery on them. The earnings from all ROY: We serve about 50,000 people in 40 villages through the this supplement the family income. main hospital, 3 subdispensaries, 3 doctors, 2 compounders, We put the money into a bank account for them and give 3 nurses, IS traditional dais and 38 village-level health workers. them the passbooks. If you give them cash, it just disappears.

The health program includes immunization of children, prenatal There is a lot of grumbling about the bank accounts, but when and postnatal care, family planning, TB eradication. We have the money comes in handy at a marriage or some other cere5 balwadis serving 200 children. We have had 5 or 6 eye camps. mony, they're quite pleased! The employment program for men We first opened a dispensary in Tilonia itself in 1973; then is for the local craftsmen. Many of them, unable to find a market another one in Chota-Narena in 1975. Other villagers too for their goods, had diversified into other occupations.

Our wanted their own subdispensaries, but we told them that all we employment program began by identifying not only. their skills would do was train a health worker in each village. We now train but also sources of credit available, development of appropriate these workers in Tilonia for about 15 days in simple anatomy, technology, redesigning of traditional products where necessary, and surgery, identification of symptoms, family planning, help in marketing the goods. The emphasis has been totally on self-employment and learning. hygiene, sanitation, etc. Each village-level worker has to visit the We have so far been acting as the middleman, but are now center once a week, and the doctor visits each village once a trying to put the artisans into direct contact with the buyers. fortnight. A bout 80 percent of the cases can be cured at the We've formed them into a cooperative and they do the buying subcenters, and the 20 percent that need hospitalization can make and selling themselves. The program has also helped in giving use of our ambulance.

DASGUPTA: But bow much and what exactly are the villagesome of the craftsmen-particularly the leather workers belonging to the chamar community--a sense of dignity in their trade. level workers supposed to do? Is theirs a door-to-door service or do people come to them?

And, after some initial hesitation on their part, we've trained them to use more modern and more economical training methods.

ROY: They have some door-ta-door work. birth and death But the weavers have been more unwilling to change their recording, follow-up on patients' treatments.

But the village(Continued on page 42)

services or employment opportullltles now havethem because of Federal assistancebut the programs usually originate locally.

RANGASWAMI: So there can be no uniformity of programs in different parts of thecountry-or of a state. Are the programs location specific, with each community decidingwhat it wants to undertake?

KLEMENT: Yes, that's generally true. It is not possible to have a rural development program with a national thrust. Just as in India, American rural areas differ by region.

New England is different from the area in Texas where I come from, which in turn is different from the southeast. And these are all different from the wide open spaces of the west where there are mountains and plains, such as in California and Colorado.

Each of these has a unique kind of problem.

R~~GASW AMI: That means most of your programs are ad hoc. In India we have continuous ongoing programs aimed at certain problem areas, and they have long-range targets. For example, we have specific programscovering small farmers, drought-prone areas, tribals, hill areas, deserts. Then there are programs like Antyodaya or help for thepoorest, Food for Work, Food for Nutrition, Training of Rural Youth for Self Employment, Minor Irrigation, Integrated Rural Development.

Under each of these specificobjectives, areas of operation, targets and time frame, financial outlays, etc. are worked out. But one problem we face is that implementation being in the hands of the powerful-whether it is the panchayat or any other unit-it often results in the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.

KLEMENT: We have the same problem.

That is why the Federal agencies working with small towns and communities in the development process have now been specially directed to give high priority to the targeting of Federal resources to disadvantaged people and distressed people in rural areas. They are charged with identifying the group of poorest, the most disadvantaged people who are not being serviced by the programs. They must develop outreach programs to reach them and develop strategies to implement them. We have to make sure that our programs are reaching the people they are meant for.

RANGASW AMI: What special programs do you have for them?

KLEMENT: How to involve them in participating and organizing such development is a basic problem. I see some movement toward this-some outside social worker making an effort-but I don't knowhow effective it is. But we do have special programs,

apart from r~gular community programs.

For example, my office-Farmers Home Administration - provides housing assistance for people below a certain income level.

There are similar schemes for health, etc.

One big program is the food stamp program, which too is implemented through the Department of Agriculture.

It provides a series of stamps for the individual family or person; he has to contribute just 20 percent to the cost of any food he wants to buy. The stamps represent the Federal Government's 80 percent contribution.

But of course, the risk is that people who are getting these stamps know little about nutrition and buy junk food with it. ...

RANGASWAMI: Apart from these, I believe there are some innovative concepts in rural development to help American communities with limited resources-like the shared city manager. Could you tell us about that?

KLEMENT: The shared city manager-or circuit rider-is a new concept to provide management assistance to small towns and communities which cannot afford it. Several counties or cities or communities get together to maintain a city manager, and they share the cost and benefits. Another new development is the "council of government," where various local units of government that don't have the resources to do what they want combine forces. Such councils are emerging as a major means of rural development planning and implementation.

They provide services which cross over county lines and will assist towns and cities.

RANGASWAMI: You may know that India has pinned a lot of hope on the cooperative movement.

It has its advantages and disadvantages, but it seems to be gaining momentum because that's one way of bringing uniform benefits to all the people in a particular rural area. Do you have a cooperative movement in the United States?

KLEMENT: Yes, the cooperative movement in the United States has been a dynamic factor in agricultural development and in helping the American farmers and American agriculture become what they are today.

The movement continues to be very strong, particularly throughout the major farm belt of the midwest. The dairy cooperatives, in particular, have done tremendous things for the dairy industry. They have provided a marketing system, a lobbying system and a whole range of services for the dairy farmer.

The other major cooperative movement, that developed in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, is the rural electric cooperatives which helped bring electricity to almost all of rural America.

These cooperatives continue to operate,

and are a strong force in the communities.

Many of them have even branched out into other kinds of economic development.

RANGASW AMI: Finally, can you talk about the "back to the country" movement?

A lot of people in urban America are opting for rural areas. You yourself have moved from Washington, D.C., to Temple, Texas.

What made you and your wife give up all the facilities of an urban life for a rural one?

KLEMENT: The U.S. Department of Agriculture did a survey sometime ago and found that 65 percent of American population living in cities would prefer to live in a more rural area! My wife and I are both from rural areas, but my work has taken us to many major cities, and for 10 years we were in Washington, D.C. As the family grew we saw the pressures of urban life affecting the way we lived, our values ... so we decided to change our lifestyles and move to a rural area. I requested a transfer and moved to Texas. It has been a very satisfying experience. We don't have the hustle and bustle of city life, we feel that we belong-in a big city you often feel lost. Here we see a whole lot of different values influencing the children and we like that, it's important to us.

RANGASW AMI: But hadn't you got used to certain types of facilities, don't you feel you're missing something now?

KLEMENT: I don't think we've given up anything! Yes, what I did give up was an hour's drive to and from work every day and standing in lines everywhere ....

We don't quite have the cultural opportunities in rural Texas that we had in Washington, D.C., we don't have quite that communication, the transportation network ... but we do have all the conveniences of a big home, an automobile and things like that.

RANGASW AM I: But if this trend continues, it will lead more to an urbanization of rural areas than a return to rural areas. And then the problems of urban areas-like pollution -will come to the rural areas. Shouldn't the rural setup be maintained?

KLEMENT: Yes, it should. And what you have said of providing urbanization or urban services to rural areas is occurringbecause that's part of the way we judge the quality of life. But even after providing these services there is a certain quality in rural life that's not available in cities. And rural development programs have to plan for development keeping that in mind. Otherwise the growth will be haphazard and sprawling. [ guess that's the concept of rural development we want to foster-providing urban services ¡to rural areas in a planned way, without transferring the urban problems.

0

In November 1960, when the first issue of SPAN came out, it was offered "as a span from America to India with the hope that SPAN may help to bridge the distances between our lands with mutual understanding, appreciation, and respect." In the 21 years since, over 24,000,000 copies of the magazine have rolled out to readers all over India.

SPAN staffers are often asked how and where the magazine is prepared.

This month we take you behind the scenes to show you how SPAN is put together.

Bimonthly story and picture conferences (right, above) are held to determine SPAN's contents, about 60 percent of which are selectedfrom leading American publications (below).

At right, art work is checked in the art studio before being sent to the press.

SPAN is prepared and distributed entirely in India under the aegis of the U.S. International Communication Agency (lCA) by a staff that, with the exception of the editor, is all-lndian.

The paper is manufactured in India; so is the ink. We find many of our articles (some 60 percent) in American publications; others we commission from Indian authors or prepare ourselves.

Our chief function is to serve as a span between the people of India and the people of the United States-a bridge of information about American society. The magazine tries to provide a forum where Indians and Americans can exchange thoughts and opinions about relations between the two countries. That is what a lawyer would call SPAN's "brief."

With that brief, SPAN editors scan American sources for articles and graphics (photographs, cartoons, paintings)material that will be of interest here. Suggested material makes

1. Senior editor and reference librarian of the American Library in Delhi research a SPAN article. 2. Data analyst scans computerized mailing list. 3. Copies being bound at Thomson Press. 4. SPAN stall at the 4th World Book Fair held in New Delhi last year. 5. Artist and documentation unit chief select photos of the Reagan inauguration.

the rounds and is evaluat.ed. Fortnightly story-picture conferences are held, where SPAN's editors and artists join before a large eight-month story board. (lnciJentally, SPAN's editorial, art, and production sections work closely together at every stage of the operation.) The board lists the kind of themes SPAN aims to cover-North-South relations, energy, the arts .... Here articles and graphics are tentatively assigned to future issues-sometimes as much as six months in advance. A typical exchange: Managing Editor: "Expanding World Use of Coal" from Foreign Affairs is good.

Photo Editor: We just did a coal story a year ago. And aren't we doing too many of these energy stories?

Senior Editor: This isn't the typical energy option story-it's much more solid and discusses the economics and politics of the coal situation.

Assistant Managing Editor: How about an Indian sidebar?

Editor: That's a good idea. Let's try to get a person from the field rather than a journalist.

Art Director: What aboUt pictures? Such stories don't work and don't appeal to the general reader unless they are illustrated well.

Assistant Editor: We can research in the library and see which magazines have carried good pictures that we can order.

Editor: Fine. Meanwhile, let's commission the Indian story and tentatively chalk this story up for November 81.

SPAN usually has some 100-odd articles to choose frem. The "lead time" is four months. Thus at any given time, the SPAN staff is working on three issues in different stages of readiness.

As you read this issue in early April, for example, the final proofs for the May issue are being checked; the June issue text is being edited and the graphic material and layouts are being prepared; meanwhile, the contents of the July issue are being chalked out to attain that perfect mix. And, of course, all the while new stories are being evaluated and ordered for issues many months away. The present issue was planned in the first week in Januaryall but the eight pages (or two forms) at the beginning and end of the "book." These deal with topical, usually political material and are "late closing"; they go to the printer three weeks before publication.

Story/pic conferences provide a rough outline of material available for publication in different issues. Actually deciding what will go into a particular issue and where it will appear - "p~gination" -is an exercise in itself. Editors and artists take account of the special requirements of the month in view (such events as a U.S. presidential election or the international coverage of an eclipse in India); they study the material available to insure a good mix of the light and the serious, the informative and the entertaining, of text and graphics. They edit discussions between Indian and American authorities on subjects where dialogue is called for (e.g., nuclear nonproliferation).

Once the material is paginated, a table of contents is drawn up, describing this material, and is shown to the publisher for his concurrence. The publisher usually upholds the principle of the freedom of the press, with minor qualifications.

At this point the actual preparation of the issue begins.

Each editor is assigned particular stories to edit; copies of the material are passed on to the art studio. The art director reads every text and discusses the layout with the particular editor concerned before taking up the design work. Finally, a mutually agreed-on layout is presented to the editor for his okay. The photo editor also reads texts, and may suggest additional photos, or take them himself. Once the layout "flats" are ready, each editor writes captions and subheads for his (Text continued on page 31)

I. Editorial staffers reading proofs-with a haffery of dictionaries and reference books around them. 2. Assistant art director composes a headline on the phototypositor. 3. Artist takes out material from the story racks.

4. Senior editor edits an article on the Wang word processor.

5. Publisher (left) and editor study the photographs seiectedfor this issue's cover.

6. Production manager (second from right) checks color reproductions with Thomson Press staff.

7. Photo editor shoots the lead picture for this story.

MAKING continued

OF SPAN

1. Managing editor, editor, assistant managing editor and art director examine layouts of an issue on the display board. 2. Editor meets with subscribers in Jaipur to get their views

on SPAN. 3. Editor and assistant managing editor go through the pasteup dummy before sending it to the press. 4. American expert Robert Scalapino and Indian expert Mira Sinha discuss the Asian political scene jar a program videotaped

by USICA's audio-visual unit and later reproduced in an edited form in SPAN. 5. Some of the charts used to help organize the flow of work-pagination, table of contents, deadline chart.

spAN MARCH

§\

!.?fAME

FC lFC(Haa::tw.qItl)AO CIlblWRdug_

F,.",

= KC

...•

1Zf'6

OlAAT

"

OEADLINE

Of

"".

12/" V ••

KC/jS/NKS

1/12

KC/JS"""':S

vu

"cj}S/!«S

II' IfU

lfU

KC~

1/1'

KOIJSll"-S

'" '1'

lfI2

l/H

lC.C~S

If'

VU

j:;CI1S/NKS

If'

If'

I~'

12/;.

If' lfl'

'"

12131 12/31

U/31

'"

vn

"'"

'"

XG/Jsp....M$

REA

6. Assistant editor and artists discuss layouts.

7. Art director makes a sketch to illustrate a story. 8. US/CA's photo lab chief shoots a negative for SPAN. 9. Photo editor checks his

camera lenses before an assignment. 10. Editorial assistant types captions.

11. A rt director and production manager mark corrections on the color proofs of the March /98/ issue.

stories, and circulates them for refinement and approval. (All material edited or written by an editor is checked by two other persons.) SPAN has recently acquired a word processor, which is linked with a central Wang mini-computer installed for the use of the entire leA in New Delhi. An editor can sit at the word processor and type out a subhead, which appears on the screen in the exact measure required. Words, even whole sentences, can be moved backward and forward, above and below; insertions and deletions can be made instantly at the touch of a button, until the exact length and size of the caption is achieved. The wonders of modern technology!

The art studio has its share of technology, with its own¡ "headliner," a machine that produces headings in many sizes and types. The studio also has access to the leA photo lab, which produces prints of photographs in whatever size the layout may require, often improving black-and-white originals while copying.

In the meantime, edited typescripts are checked for style by

SPAN proofreaders-an exacting duo, who often intimidate editors with their knowledge of usage and their battery of dictionaries. They are then sent to Thomson Press in Faridabad, whence they return in galley proofs, are checked again, and are cut up to be readied for the "dummy" mockup of the entire magazine.

The progress of text and artwork to and from the press is carefully noted on a board that indicates the production schedule.

At this stage, enter the production manager. He is the person who has the paper manufactured to his specifications, approves the ink, and sees to it that problems that arise at the press are promptly resolved, and that SPAN appears on"time. He is responsible for quality control of the production.

And it is he who appears the last week of the month with advance copies of the latest issue. SPAN staffers turn over the pages, uttering ohs and ahs of approval and disapproval in a kind of mini-postmortem. A few days later there will be a fullscale postmortem analysis of the issue's triumphs and failings.

Copies of the issue will be mailed out to SPAN readers from Faridabad. Thomson Press will have been supplied by the leA Wang mini-computer with printouts of the SPAN recipients and their' addresses -all 75-80,000 of them.

It is with these readers that the final judgment as to the success or failure of each issue lies. They have not hesitated to tell usand we expect they will continue to do so.

-J.S.

EPA stinks," one Asian official bluntly proclaimed at a recent environment conference in Honolulu. His remark, uncharacteristic of multinational exchanges in its clarity and conciseness, referred to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the keystone of U.S. laws and regulations protecting the quality of the natural environment.

American proposals to apply this law to the activities of Federal agencies operating overseas (such as the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID] and the Export-Import Bank) have generated complex arguments, both within the United States and in foreign countries.

Despite a decade of polite recognition among nations of environmental problems, developing countries retain an underlying suspicion that hi~h environmental quality is only obtained at the expense of vitally needed economic development. In these countries, basic human needs for food, shelter, jobs, and health care must be met through vigorous exploitation of natural systems-forests, fisheries, wildlife habitats, and crop and grazing lands. But NEPA procedures for the preparation and review of Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) have the reputation of being unwieldy, expensive, time-eonsum ing, and a barrier to economic development. The intensive public participation and legal maneuvering characteristic of U.S. environmental controversies are also inappropriate to the cultures and governmental styles of many nations.

Consequently, some view any unilateral U.S. evaluation of the acceptability of the impacts on a foreign landscape from U.S.-financed projects or equipment as "environmental imperialism." Although the natural environment's response to human intervention is governed all over the world by the same natural laws, the acceptable quality or allowable degree of degradation in each country may be quite dependent on different values and standards of living.

Egypt's Aswan dam provides a sharp example. The dam produces electricity and irrigation water at some cost to human health (caused by the spread of schistosomiasis) and to ecosystems (Mediterranean fisheries and downstream agricultural lands). Environmentalists have deplored these unwanted adverse consequences, but Egyptian opinion ranks the projects as a significant net social benefit.

The international principles underlying the U.S. move to assess environmental impact overseas seem clear enough. The U.N. Conference on the Human Environment held in 1972 in Stockholm agreed that "states have the responsibility to insure that activities within their jurisdiction or control do not cause damages to the environment of other states or areas beyond the limits of national jurisdiction." Former President Jimmy Carter, in his 1977environmental message, expressed U.S. support for that understanding by declaring that "environment protection does not stop at national boundaries." But the U.S. National Environmental Policy Act, passed by Congress in 1969, permits differing interpretations regarding its extraterritorial implications.

NEPA is somewhat ambiguous in its language, broadly referring to the "worldwide and long-range character of environmental problems." The law.requires Federal agencies to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement ( EIS) on major projects significantly -affecting'the quality of the "human environment."

The EIS must contain: • The environmental impact of the proposed action; • Any adverse environmental effects which cannot be avoided should the proposal be implemented;

N

• AlteJ;Ilativesto the proposed action; • The relationship between local short-term uses of man's environment and the maintenance and enhancement of longterm productivity; and • Any irreversible and irretrievable commitments of resources which would be involved in the proposed action.

In addition, the EIS must be made widely available, with adequate time and opportunity for public comment. The document is to be fully considered along with social, economic, and engineering information in the final decisionmaking on the proposed project. Under NEP A, the adequacy of the EIS may be challenged by public interest groups in the courts, and the project may be delayed by judicial injunction until administrative procedures have been complied with.

In practice, the proper weighing of environmental values in the act of balancing international, national, and private interests in the development arena is often difficult. To what extent does the U.I)ited States have the right and responsibility to assess, report and recommend regarding its environmental impact on foreign territory? Some recent examples illustrate the complexity of the problem, which is rarely a simple case of environment versus development.

• Certain developing countries, such as Sierra Leone, have actively sought revenues for disposing of toxic chemical and commercial industrial wastes from U.S. sources. In economic terms, remote, uninhabited areas in other countries may be preferred storage sites because of the high costs, long delays, and strict standards involved in constructing disposal facilities in the United States. But the long-term hazards to human health and ecosystems in these receiving countries are not now known.

• Some nations have willingly continued to import products that are banned or under suspicion in the United States. The insecticide, DDT, the sweetener, Cyclamate, and the textile fire retardant, Tris, are a few examples where foreign risk assessment (to the extent that one is made) appears to have reached a different conclusion from that in the United States.

• Marijuana plants growing in Mexico were sprayed with Paraquat herbicide provided by the United States in a cooperative program to reduce the quantity of this illegal substance. Though the Mexican Government voiced no objections-in fact, it had approved the program-the U.S. National Association for the Reform of Marijuana Laws sued the State Department for not; preparing an EIS for the project.

• The Philippines Government wanted a nuclear electricitygenerating plant and, in 1976, the U.S. Export-Import Bank agreed to loans and loan guarantees of over $600 million to help finance the venture. No independent, objective analysis of the plant location was made. Later revelation of an earthquake hazard at the chosen site was a determinant in the suspension of the project. In May 1980, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission voted not to conduct a safety study of the plant-in deference to the sovereignty of the Philippines Government in deciding whether to continue to build the plant.

The debate over how to handle these novel, international environmental issues is multifaceted.

In some instances, lawsuits have been filed to clarify responsibilities. For example, USAID, at the request'of foreign governments, was exporting pesticide chemicals such as DDT and Aldrin/Dieldrin, to protect human health from insect-borne diseases (e.g., malaria) and to combat crop losses from insects and competitive weeds. A commodity list of available pesticides

was provided to developing countries, but no analysis of their possible adverse consequences was included. After a lawsuit

by U.S. environmental groups, the agency agreed in 1975 to ensure that the environmental consequences of proposed AIDfinanced activities are identified and properly analyzed. In significant cases, a full EIS is pr~pared and shared with the host country government and other interested parties.

An ambitious proposal pushed by an ardent environmentalist coalition in the United States since 1970 has argued for worldwide application of an environmental impact assessment requirement enforced by the United Nations. A U.S. Senate resolution to that effect has been introduced in several recent congresses but never enacted.

The commercial exporting interests in the United States have strongly contested any environmental analysis requirement as a condition for Federal permits, licenses or loan guarantees.

They argue that international competition for foreign sales is already intense, and U.S. balance of trade should not be further jeopardized by delays and costs that would accompany environmental regulations. Other industrialized countries, they point out, have generally adopted EIS requirements for their domestic governmental activities but not for their impact abroad.

In June 1978, hearings were held by the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Resource Protection on a bill that would have exempted from compliance with NEPA..any of the Export-Import Bank's activities overseas which did not affect U.S. territory. The testimony at these hearings served to motivate the executive branch to prepare uniform guidelines rather than face the possibility of a piecemeal approach to the problem by each Federal agency.

The U.S. State Department, for its part, is concerned because international affairs are characterized by delicate negotiations, confidentiality, and respect for other nations' security, priorities and decisionmaking procedures-all of which might be adversely affected by an environmental review that intruded upon another nation's sovereignty.

In fact, less developed countries are increasingly aware of their dependence on a healthy renewable resource base for continued economic growth. Many Asian and Pacific nations have developed formal and informal environmental assessment arrangements of 'their own. Still, they regard as anathema anything that delays urgent development projects, and at least some of the countries think the EIS procedure needlessly complicates and extends an already lengthy process of project planning, grant and loan applications, and approvals.

Foreign governments are also concerned about the NEPA provision making Environment Impact Statements available for public comment both in the United States and the host country.

They are afraid that the political use of environmental information might affect their internal policies.

A third problem is that Environment Impact Statements are most often performed by expatriate technicians (because of the lack of host country professionals). Thus the cultural biases of the developed countries tend to filter into the inevitable value judgments that comprise a part of the environmental studies.

Fortunately, discussions regarding these various points of viewhave taken place openly in the United States and in various inteI1lationalforums. As a result, a compromise plan for applying NEPA overseas which reflects the concerns of different Federal agencies, business groups, environmentalists and the developing countries was implemented by President Carter. The -plan is embodied in an executive order signed in January 1979, entitled

"Environmental, Effects Abroad of Major Federal Actions."

President Carter's executive order requires that an environmental impact statement, a multilateral study, or a concise review of environmental issues be prepared and reviewed by the Federal agencies before making decisions on actions significantly affecting: • The environment of the "global commons" such as the world's oceans or Antarctica. A full-scale, formal EIS with public comment is required before such activities as deep-sea mining, offshore oil drilling, or fishing on a massive scale are undertaken.

• The environment of a foreign nation not participating with the United States in the development activity. For example, U.S.-financed power plants in another nation emitting sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides might cause acidic precipitation (acid rain) to fall on a third nation. In such cases, the Federal agency may determine to undertake a bilateral or multilateral study, or perform a concise review of available information and share it with affected parties.

• The environment of a foreign nation when the international activity involves radioactive materials, toxic chemicals, or an effluent prohibited or strictly regulated by U.S. law. All pertinent information must be shared and the implications studied jointly.

• Natural or ecological resources in the participating nation that are designated to be of global importance by the president or international agreement. Endangered species of plants and animals, or cultural and historical treasures, would come under this category. An EIS or less formal study may be undertaken cooperatively, as appropriate.

The intention of the order was "to further environmental objectives consistent with the foreign policy and national security policy of the United States." Consequently, emergency operations and military actions are obviously exempted.

The executive order defined "environment" in a strict senseas the natural and physical environment -and excluded social, economic, and other environments. The intention was to avoid the imposition of U.S. cultural values insofar as possible. President Carter gave the U.S. Department of State the authority to "coordinate all communications by agencies with foreign governments concerning environmental agreements and other arrangements in implementation of this order." Thus, the importance of respect for foreign sovereignty in natural resources and the environment was underscored.

Will this comJ'romise work? It appears that most nations want practical, constructive information about the consequences to the environment of technological change. Environmental assessments are welcome to that extent. What is not wanted is delay or value-dependent arguments about aesthetics or other amenities that get in the way of producing food, shelter and jobs.

As a matter of fact, the American public also seems to be becoming impatient with excessive environmental zeal that may interfere with energy supplies and deepen the economic recession.

The executive order may help resolve the international tension between U.S. environmental policy and other nations, uses of their own natural resources and environments. In the process, a more acceptable balance between the often conflicting objectives of environmentalists, businessmen and government agencies in all countries may be struck.

0 About the Autbors: Richard Carpenter and William Matthews are research "associate and director, respectively, ()f the~t-West Center's Environment and Policy Institute, Honolulu, Hawaii.

It was in India that Mircea Eliade, philosopher, poet, historian of religion, novelist and Chicago University professor, had his early insights into the meaning of myth and symbol. "The huge problem of the present day is the total desacralization, both of the cosmos and of human society."

25 minutes, and then 20 minutes, I wasn't getting enough sleep any more, and I started having dizzy spells. So I was compelled to stop ... reluctantly, because I felt I had so many things to read, so EHade: Yes, that was in 1932. I had just many foreign languages to learn. come back to Bucharest after spending I was fascinated by the sciences-entosome years in India studying the philos- mology, botany, chemistry, and already by the roots of chemistry, meaning alophy of yoga. I was an academic assistant at the university, but I was also a writer, chemy. What fascinated me was the unity of matter, and also its transformation into and I won first prize in a literary competition, which led to the publication of my energy. So when I learned from my reading book Maitreyi. It was a novel of exotic that the dream of the alchemists had been love (subsequently published in France the transmutation of matter into gold, I under the title of La Nuit bengali), and was interested to see how and why. And much to the publisher's surprise and my I very soon discovered the mythic dimenown it was enormously successful. So at sion of transmutation. Because the tradithe age of 21 I became famous: the tional science of alchemy works not only Romanian papers wrote about me, I upon the matter under transmutation, was recognized in the street, and so on. but also on the soul. The alchemist But it was quite easy to shine in a pro- who sought to make gold transmuted vincial culture where nearly everybody himself in his researches, so that gold, knew everybody else-not at all the way in alchemy, is not only a metal but alsoit is in Paris or New York. That was a and primarily-the symbol of perfection, veryimportant experience for me, because of freedom, of immortality. This is per1found out what it meant "to be admired" fectly clear from the alchemists' writings. whileI was still fairly young.

We are a very long way from objectivity in the modern scientific sense of the Was that your first literary effort? word.

Eliade: Not quite. When I was 14 or 15 In Chinese alchemy, for example, which I had written some travel pieces, stories is very important, the alchemist also of adventures in the Danube delta and the dreams of making gold, but it is not Carpathians. In particular I'd written a something which really involves him. very autobiographical book called The The alchemist in China was principally Story of a Short-Sighted Adolescent, beseeking the elixir of long life. The alchecause I was already very short-sighted and mist's laboratory is like the yogi who I had a complex about being ugly and does exercises in order to master both unlovable. I published only a -few frag- his body and his spirit. ments from that book, and then nothing till very much later. I also published What happens in the mind of an adolescent articles about insects, and when I was who- studies chemistry and finds himself led still a schoolboy I wrote a short essay on to alcliemy] entitled "How I Discovered the Philos- Eliade: What fascinated me was mastery opher's Stone." over time, since insofar as the alchemist transforms his ore in the course of a few You were at secondary school at the time. months or a few days, he thereby takes When did youfind time to write? the place of nature, and so manages EHade: I wrote at nighttime, and I'd to speed up time. worked out a technique to shorten my In the pre-alchemy of primitive societies, sleeping hours, which involved reducing in fact, ore was considered as an embryo them by five minutes each night. When contained inside the belly of mother I had managed to gain an hour-for earth. And these same societies believed instance, when I had got my sleep down that it took two or three thousand years from six hours to five- I would keep up for the ore-iron, for example-to be that rhythm for a month; and then I turned into gold. Hence the alchemist, would go on from there. But when I once he takes the place of the work of went from 4 hours 30 minutes to 4 hours nature, is accelerating time.

Question: Although

you are a "my thologue," a specialist in comparative religious history, you have written several novels, and it was one of these which made you famous when you were still a young man.

But, on the other hand, terrible consequences spring from this, because in the 19th century, with the birth of organic chemistry and biology, man becomes the master of time, and also bears the enormous responsibility and burden of it. All techniques, all knowledge, and all action once had a sacred aspect.

When alchemy became chemistry, this was lost. Nowadays we work in the laboratory as we work in the factory. The transhistoric and transcendental meanings have disappeared. Modern science no longer aims any further than knowledge, mastery over matter. Its goal is different. That is a new phenomenon, and a very serious one.

Yet the alchemists remain the great precursors of modern science?

Eliade: Yes, of wurse. They worked with minerals and plants, so it was the alchemists who paved the way for the sciences. Alchemy became not only chemistry but also botany and medicine.

There is a continuity.

But what has utterly changed in our own time is the universal attitude which characterizes the archaic stage of cultures.

Once, all human activities-agriculture, mineralogy, metallurgy, medicine-were modeled on the creation of the world, on cosmogony. Always the same question was asked: how Being came into Being, how the world came into Being. Not only in theory, but in practical applications too.

In Tibet, for example, when someone is ill, the lama who comes to tend him begins by reciting the cosmogonic myth, then the myth of the origin of illness, and then the myth of the first shaman who cured the sick. The patient is thus projected into the dawn of time, before the creation; he symbolically re-enacts the whole process of creation. And he is restored, he is healed, because the great healer has literally succeeded in taking the illness away.

This means that traditional man, in primitive cultures, does not believe in his own ability to mend things. He does not dare to mend them because there is no model-mending is complicated and it can be dangerous. He is only sure of doing right if each time he tries to mend he symbolically re-creates the world. To

the extent that alchemy already acts upon matter, it denotes the shift from one system to the other.

How do you explain the current popular interest in alchemy? What accounts for its surprising comeback in our scientific industrial society?

Eliade: Twenty-five years ago, alchemy was considered as a kind of prechemistry or protochemistry, an elementary, embryonic chemistry. That was the viewpoint of science historians. Today, because of our renewed interest in myths and symbols, and also because of certain translations of alchemical texts which have finally become accessible, we see things quite differently.

The attraction exerted by alchemy in the United States, England, France and Germany derives from its fantastic power over the imagination. As we read the alchemical texts, and look at their powerful illustrations, we are fascinated, even if we do not always understand them.

It is this formidable power of fascination which seems to me to explain the current success of alchemy. Gaston Bachelard was right when he said that the nocturnal life of the spirit possessed a primordial importance compared with the diurnal life represented by knowledge. Le regime nocturne de Nsprit is perhaps the most significant thing about alchemy.

Is it not possible to explain our interest in myths and symbols by the decline of spirituality in our modern civilization? And in conjunction with that, by man's need for spirituality?

Eliade: It is certainly no secret to anybody that we are going through a spiritual crisis in the Western world: the desacralizing of the cosmos, and of the churches, and of human relationships. This creates a void which each person tries to fill, in the practice of yoga, in Zen, or in alchemy, but without going to the roots of his own religion, and that is a very odd phenomenon.

Once it was the priest or the rabbi who gave the answers and prescribed the books to read. Now, conversely, it is the Christian or the Jew who is often the most completely cut off from his own tradition, and he makes no attempt to try to come closer to it or understand it.

Yet I also believe that it is the longest road that leads to home. The immense Western fascination with yoga, Zen, and alchemy expresses the new freedom of each individual to seek out his own path among the vast variety of beliefs which mankind has produced. In my opinion that is the roundabout way whereby we

shall someday be restored to qur own spiritual and religious beginnings.

taking leave of time. These two ways run altogether parallel to each other.

You yourself spent several years in India when you were young. Would you be the person you are if you had not lived in the Far East?

Eliade: It is true that I took that detour myself. When I left for India I was 21 years old. At that time I was deeply interested in philosophy, and it was then a great adventure for a Westerner to go to the Far East. I chose India for two reasons: Indian thought, and specially the peasant culture which had remained intact there.

It was my Indian experiences that made me truly understand the gesture made by a Greek or Romanian peasant when he kneels and crosses himself before an icon.

Before my stay in India I was rather disturbed by the fetishistic side of such an action, and I thought that "true religion" was first of all contemplation and meditation, like any Christian who sees himself as an enlightened believer.

But when I saw the extraordinary importance of symbolism for the Indian people, I realized that until then I had very much underestimated the existential scope of symbol and image.

Are you yourself not deeply involved in this problem? Does the writer, scholar sortir and philosopher in you "cherche du temps," have his own longing to escape from time?

Eliade: Yes. and undoubtedly because my whole generation, from the Marxists to Sartre, was dominated by the discovery of history and historicity, and this is bound up with the extent to which man is a creature who lives in irreversible historical time. But personally I am opposed to such an act of reduction, not that I am afraid of history but because man also lives in a nonhistorical timethe time of dreams, the time of the imagination, and the like.

In particular I do not see why we should exclude cosmic time, which is not irreversible but cyclic, and very important for the human race, which is also a part of the cosmos-something which too often tends to be overlooked. I simply wish to say that you cannot ignore what the whole world lives and knows-the rhythm of alternating day and night, the constantly repeated cycle of the seasons. These are human experiences of a cosmological type, in which time truly is cyclical. To take them into account does not involve some escapist flight from history but openness to a wonderful transcendence of a thoroughly concrete kind, which makes possible communication with nature, animals, and plants.

Was there any experience which particularly caught your attention in that context?

Eliade: Yes, what struck me most was the veneration of women known for their great chastity for the god Shiva, who is symbolized by the lingam, the male sexual organ. The phallus is immediately identifiable, and it is not possible for anyone to fail to recognize it at a glance. But it is also the symbol of a god at the same time as the clear expression of his fertility, as creator of the world. Well, those women were capable of making a total distinction between object and symbol, as if the object were suddenly blotted out. It was very impressive.

What is the comparison you make between the alchemist and the yogi?

Eliade: The yogi works on his own physiology, for example on his breathing; he tries to maintain a "stable and agreeable" posture, as Patanjali puts it. Through ascesis practised on his own body he achieves a refinement of matter exactly comparable with the alchemist who "tortures" metals-that is the expression used-and purifies them in his laboratory.

In both cases a state of complete spiritual autonomy is reached in the end, because the spirit is no longer conditioned by psychophysiology or by the external material world. In both cases we are dealing with

a

Do you go so far as seeing this openness to the cosmos as also meaning openness to the Whole, "une overture vers le Tout"?

Eliade: Yes, that's it! Because openness to the COSmOS also means being open to the deep meaning of everything. Take springtime: it does not merely amount to the time when the plants grow. Any adolescent feels in his bones and flesh that there is something more than that in springtimea renewal, a rebirth. It is the same with the sacred tree in some primitive religions.

The sacredness of the tree does not come from the naIve minds of a bunch of wretched natives who fell to worshipping it for no good reason; it comes from the symbolism of the leaves that fall in the autumn and grow again each spring. L'arbre .sacre is a marvelous expression of the mystery of the continuous creation of the cosmos.

That is why I readily speak of a "cosmic religion" in which the sacred is revealed through phenomena that bind us to the cosmos, and not solely through man, as in Judaism and Christianity, with a

ongm of the kangaroo. At a certain moment a superhuman being created the kangaroo, in Australia. When they want to hunt the kangaroo, Australian tribes ritually repeat the myth; and a few days afterwards, kangaroos appear in the region. This myth very probably dates from the Paleolithic age.

It is the same in agriculture. If the harvest is threatened by drought, there is somebody to recite the cosmogonic myth, then the myth of the origin of agriculture, and so on. That is the great function of myth in traditional societies, where myth is something living. It is the keystone of cultural, social and religious life.

Through your different examples it seems as if myth is also a kind of procedure, a technique which can ensure the proper outcome of a given operation.

Eliade: Absolutely. The Polynesians are considered the best navigators in the world because we know that they used to cover distances of thousands of kilometers in their rudimentary canoes. Now behind this exceptional efficiency lay a myth which was told on the occasion of each expedition on the high seas. From the existential viewpoint this is very important. Imagine those seamen in a storm. If they repeated the lesson of the myth of the origin of navigation exactly, in every detail, they were sure that nothing could happen to them.

It is quite conceivable that they were perfectly relaxed even in the midst of the direst dangers, which would give them an extra chance of success, and it is not a negligible factor. And if, in spite of everything, there was a wreck, the cause was very easy to understand: they had not stuck faithfully enough to the myth, the model.

You have been studying myths for many long years. What is a myth, then, and how does it function in ancient and modern societies?

Eliade: An elementary definition of myth might be that it tells a sacred story.

The myth is a sacred narrative, because the people in that narrative are always superhuman.

The cosmogonic myth, for example, is the story of the creation of the world by a god or gods. The myth of the origin of a plant or the origin of man is the narrative which explains how this or that plant or how mankind came into being. And the same goes for the origin

of death, the origin of an institution, of agriculture.

Something happened in mythic time: There was an event, and after that event came death, a particular social institution, or agriculture. As for the myth of the origin of death, it is perfectly clear, especially in African mythology. God had decided to allow men to live a long time, but men committed a crime, and because of that crime man is mortal. Myth always retraces the circumstances in which a particular condition came into being.

But what exactly

is the function

of myth?

Eliade: It has an exemplary value. It is a transhistoric model. One of the most characteristic cases is the myth of the

Do Greek myths still have the same rigor, the same effectiveness of behavior?

Eliade: The difficulty is that at a certain moment the whole of Greek Olympian mythology was rewritten by the poets and mythologists, who interpreted certain fundamental mythic themes'in their own way. All those adventures of Zeus not only mating with his wife Hera but also transforming himself in order to seduce various local goddesses are reinvented versions of the central myth of the god of the atmosphere uniting with the earth goddess. The Greek myths are less significant than those of primitive societies, because they are very adulterated.

And today ... do great myths still exist in our scientific and industrial society?

Eliade: Yes, there are at least two. Or

rather there have been at least two, because they are dead, or dying.

The first is the myth of everlasting progress, linked to the effects of science and technology, which was current all through the positivistic 19th century, and which has been considerably weakened by the terrible slaughter of the two World Wars. Until 1914, the West believed in an all-powerful technology capable of delivering the world from its bondage.

Nowadays, nobody has any great belief in that. Atomic physicists, for example, are all pessimists. They do not dare to believe in the impossibility of nuclear war. They doubt whether man as a species can still be saved, even if they don't say so out loud. But on the other hand if you tell the man in the street that one day the oil will run out, he puts his trust in the scientists-they're "bound to find something" to replace it.

But why has the myth of everlasting progress not survived the state of crisis created by two World Wars;: Eliade: I feel that it is because people believed that all progress was to be equated solely with the development of technology. The originators of the myth were, in the 18th century, the Encyclopedists, then came Auguste Comte, and the brilliant creators of organic chemistry who achieved the first syntheses of matter (such as fat, or milk). It was on the basis of stunning discoveries of that kind that people came to believe in progress. But on the other hand none of the great prophets of progress were mystics, in the sense that science and technology were supposed to help people to become better. It was soon obvious that neither their confidence nor their optimism was capable of changing human nature. The myth of everlasting progress acted at what we might call a purely secular level, which explains why it was killed by the first great historical crisis.

And the second myth of our society? ideology. It is quite clear that there was a messianic myth inseparable from the thinking of Marx: class struggle interpreted as an apocalyptic battle between the forces of good and evil, to be followed by the victory of the forces of good, from which there emerges the classless society-paradise on earth, in fact. At the beginning of the Bolshevik Revolution there were some workers so convinced that communism would transform the world that 'they worked as many as 18 hours a day in the factories to hasten the process. Such a Eliade: The communist

tremendous physical effort was only possible where work had a messianic, millenarian meaning, implying that the revolution was to be the saving of mankind.

But doesn't the rise of dissidence in the U.S.S.R. indicate that the Marxist myth is already dying there?

Eliade: Yes. Fatally wounded by the Gulag, without a doubt. Yet unlike the myth of progress, the Marxist myth possesses all the features of a religion, because it gives (or used to give) an overall meaning to human life, and justifies (or used to justify) the world and history.

Is myth prior to religion? Can it arise or survive without religion or outside of religion?

Eliade: Obviously not. And' in any case the Marxist vision is perhaps more "sublime" than religious.. . . But spiritual values are directly linked with certain very crucial historic events, and they are

When I saw the extraordinary importance of symbolism for the Indian people, I realized ... the existential scope of symbol and image. not even conceivable without or before those events. Let me give just a single basic example, that of the appearance of agriculture.

Mankind is more than two million years old, while agriculture appeared about 15 or 16 thousand years ago.

During those two million years, man was the hunter, and his wife was the fruit picker or seed gatherer. This had farreaching consequences. The hunter knew only two seasons, winter and summer, which correspond to the periods during which wild animals give birth. He was interested only in game, so much so that he created a protector for it, Ie seigneur desfauves, the lord of the beasts, who was also his own protector. And the important thing was.to preserve the skeleton, because from the bones the lord of the beasts could always re-create the animal.

But agriculture discovered the fertility of seed and the fertilization of the earth, and that was to change everything. Not only the nomadic existence being replaced by fixed settlements, which have multi~ plied the human population a hundredfold in a few thousand years, but also the kinds of religious belief.

It was the appearance of agriculture which gave us the symbolic assimilation of the earth with woman, the earth mother

who must be impregnated by the sky god, so that the fertility of the soil is interpreted as the outcome of that marriage. Woman thus took on great religious and social importance, and it even seems that when agriculture began, the ownership of the land was hers. A cycle was instituted: animal fecundity/plant fecundity, rain/moon, sky god/earth goddess, death and resurrection.

Mort et resurrection: the seed which makes a new plant grow each spring was a great discovery for man. It was this which engendered the hope that the cosmic circle was repeated in the human race.

Such a concept is unthinkable before the Neolithic period. All the great religions of the world extend the discoveries of the Neolithic. The religious and spiritual consequences of the appearance of agriculture are considerable.

That may be true of agrarian SOCIetIes, but is this type of belief or religion still possible in ourpresent society?

Eliade: The agrarian religions have survived for a very long time. Subsequently they were integrated with urban cultures, in which the town symbolically becomes the emblem and center of the world.

That was until the end of the Middle Ages. But the huge problem of the present day is the total desacralization both of the cosmos and of human society. This has never previously occurred in history.

Do you believe that this desacralization is irreversible?

Eliade: Oh no! I have been teaching in

the United States for years, as you know.

I have had the opportunity, for example, to observe the "hippie movement" at close range and to follow its effects among my own students in Chicago.

Well, with the hippies it is quite clear that they have rediscovered something which had been thought of as lost since the days of the prophets: "cosmic religiosity"! And at the same time the meaning of life as a sacramental epiphany, as something more precious than it was for their parents, whom they see as representing the old Establishment.

Their valorization of nudity and sexuality is of a ritual not a physiological type. In love they have discovered not an orgiastic pleasure but a deliverance from their own feelings of inferiority and guilt. In the same way, music, poverty and serenity possess, for them, a spiritual value. They have rediscovered nature as an epiphany of the sacred.

Yes, bUI don'l you have the feeling "hippie movement" is in decline?

1he

Ih(/I

Eliade: I'm not so sure. The people who went through that movement are now 10 years older. They have gone into the libraries where they have since discovered religious texts whose very existence was previously unknown to them. They have gone into the primary schools, where they have discovered the creative spontaneity of the child. Something has persisted, and been strengthened. Whereas they were more like a protest movement to begin with: streaking naked in the street or going in for "free love" was mainly considered a good way to annoy parents and teachers.

So you believe in the potential groups for human and spiritual

of small renewal?

EHade: Without anticipating the future, all the same I do profoundly believe that.

For example, people in Europe have no idea of the way the American civil rights movement has given a new sense of religion to the young people who took part in it for ethical and political reasons.

Living alongside each other, the marches, the songs, the difficulties encountered have transfigured some of them. They have moved on from the social to the religious. That could not be predicted at the start.

You mean that certain movements believed to be political today are already "transpoliticaf' movements which herald a religious revival?

EHade: Once again, but without wanting to anticipate the event, I do not doubt it for a moment. When it started, Christianity was not considered a religion but a kind of atheism; and that was only to be expected, since the Christians refused to offer up sacrifices to the Roman gods.

We ought not to try to identify nascent religious structures with what they later became, namely great universal religions.

Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, and Islam began as a number of little cells, for generations. It is highly possible that something analogous is happening now. But maybe not in the traditional Judaeo-Christian sense which is usually recognized, or in a form already known.

In what form, then?

EHade: What is utterly new, I believe, is that we are now condemned to culture, by which I mean that the oral traditions on which the old civilizations were once built have practically vanished, just like the occult traditions, so that now we can only gain our initiation through the written word. We are a bit like the educated people of the late Hellenistic world.

We know, for example, that the great

treatises of the Corpus Hermeticum (written between the 3rd century B.C. and die 2nd century A.D.) were reputed to contain the secret of the supreme gnosis, an esoteric science which ensured salvation.

The simple fact of reading, pondering, and understanding these texts amounted to an "initiation." This new type of individual and purely spiritual "initiation," made possible by careful reading and meditation on an esoteric text, developed in the imperial era, and particularly after the triumph of Christianity. It resulted partly from the prestige enjoyed by "holy books" reputed to be of divine origin, and partly-after the 5th century A.D.-from the disappearance of the mysteries and the eclipse of other secret organizations.

In the perspective of this new model of initiation, the transmission of esoteric doctrines no longer implies a "chain of initiation." The sacred text can be forgotten for centuries, but it only needs to be rediscovered by a competent reader for its message to become intelligible and immediate once again. That is what happened with the Corpus Hermeticum, which was rediscovered and translated into Latin in the 15th century by Marsilio Ficino. But today the phenomenon is more extensive and more profound. We know practically all the sacred texts of all the religions-they are all accessible to us. The situation is unprecedented in the history of mankind.

Aren't you at least a little afraid that these texts will cancel each other out, and make any return of religious faith impossible?

Eliade: Absolutely not, because the work of hermeneutics is a matter of deciphering the meaning of the phenomenon which we call the religious phenomenon. I believe that the job of the religious historian goe~ beyond scholarship proper-and beyond any other kind of history, whether art, law or languagebecause here we are in the presence of spiritual positions as they have been lived out from the time of the Paleolithic hunters all the way to the present day.

All existential situations, all the crises, hopes, and despairs of man are reflected by religion. At these different stages and phases of history, it is the human spirit as a whole which we ultimately rediscover and study. For that reason I believe that history of religion is a privileged discipline which has a more serious meaning than any other historical discipline.

What exactly neutics" ?

do you mean by "herme-

Eliade: It is the study of the sense, mean-

ing, or meanings which given religious ideas or phenomena have had in the course of time. We are dealing here with a hemieneutique totale, since it sets out to decipher and clarify all man's encounters with the sacn;d, from prehistory to our own time. By their very nature, religious facts constitute a subject matter which calls for thought and creative study, of the kind devoted by men like Montesquieu, Herder, and Hegel to the study of human institutions and their history. A true, creative hermeneutics changes people; it is more than a process of investigation, it is also a spiritual technique which can change the very fabric of existence. A good book about the history of religions ought to have an eye-opening effect on the reader.

By presenting and analyzing Australian, African or Oceanian myths and ritualsor commenting on Zoroastrian hymns, Taoist texts, or shamanic mythologies and techniques-the religious historian lays bare existential situations unknown or unimaginable to a modern reader; and the meeting with these "foreign" spiritual worlds is bound to have repercussions. Remember the 20th century's rencontre' with African sculpture and masks. These are more than simple cultural discoveries, they are creative encounters.

But are these "myths"

fiction

or reality?

Eliade: Reality for members of traditional societies, where the myths are still alive, and where they are the basis and justification of all human behavior and activity-fiction for the rest. That goes equally for Christianity. The Nativity, the Passion, the Death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ are a "holy story," une histoire sainte, for Christians, and consequently a true story, sharing the same ontological conditions as myths in traditional societies.

May we in conclusion return to your more purely literary activities? How many novels have you written?

Eliade: Ten or more, I think.

How does the Romanian bestseller writer in you get on with the American professor?

Can artist and scholar coexist?

Eliade: The scientific imagination is not very far removed from the artistic. My scientific books nearly all express the true dreams of mankind. The two tendencies are, for me, very much at home with each other.

D Mircea Eliade has written, among other books, The Myth of Eternal

Return,

and Mysteries, and From

Myths, Dreams

Primitives

to Zen.

ON THE LIGHTER SIDE

"You"l/ be out a/here in no time-one way or the other."

Reprinted with permission from Science Digest. Copyright

© 1979 The Hearst Corporation. All rights reserved.

TOOLS rOB

LIVING

The United States, home of big industry, also abounds in entrepreneurs who supply the market with simple, useful devices that make life easier and more comfortable.

Unlike the feather duster, this remarkable lambswool duster actually attracts and holds dust like a magnet.

The static charge in the lambswool causes all dust

literally to lea.p off surfaces where it has accumulated, making this just the thing for dusting bric-a-brac, china, crystal, pictures and other fragile items. Its magnetic qualities also are perfect for gathering cobwebs from the tops of windows or from ceiling corners. When the duster is soiled, it is simply washed in warm soapy water, and left to dry.

PREPARED

DENTAL FIRST AID

One of the most frustrating experiences while you are hanging a picture, putting up a shelf, replacing a nut, securing a cord or repairing something else around the house is to discover that you didn't get the appropriate fasteners and you can't finish the job unless you go back to the hardware store. This 15-drawer steel cabinet (15 centimeters deep, 20 centimeters high and 25 centimeters wide) is the answer to that. The cabinet includes some 1,500 fasteners in a variety of sizes-from push pins to upholstery tacks to screw anchors to wood machine and sheet metal screws. Its clear plastic drawers are spill-proof with adjustable dividers and labels. And, of course, as with any bulk orders, the kit is a great bargain: The fasteners cost much less than they would if they were bought in small amounts only as and when yOLLneededthem.

Most toothaches seem to occur in the evening-maybe because as the day's activities wind down dental pain gradually moves to the front of consciousness. In any event, this means that when the pain begins to irk you, you can't even call the dentist until the next morning.

This dental emergency kit. designed by dentists, gives temporary relief in such cases. It includes materials for making temporary fillings, toothache drops and a medicated cream, tools including a dental mirror, and a 56-page illustrated manual that gives clear directions about what treatments to apply in what circumstances. The kit can be used to relieve toothaches, to replace lost fillings, to recement loose caps or bridges, to treat gum irritations, canker sores or denture sores, and to protect chipped or broken teeth. There are even instructions for reimplanting a tooth that has been knocked out entirely, since the first hour is the crucial period if reimplantation is to work.

ONBEING

The important qualities of a household fan are safety, quietness, portability and force enough to get the air circulating. This little powerhouse of a fan meets all these criteria. The fan blade is made of pliable plastic.

If you stick your finger in, the blade simply stops turning.

The possibility of injury, even for small children, is virtually nil. The fan has two speeds, and although it is small (only about 20 centimeters high), it moves a surprising volume of air. The operation is ultraquiet, so the soothing breeze comes with no distractable mechanical rattles.

A MIGHTY SMALL VISE

Made of plastic and standing only 7.5 centimeters high, this ingeniously designed vise is as powerful-if not more powerful than-a 10kilpgram, ¡temperedcsteel .

bench vise. Its suction base fixes the vise firmly to any nonporous surface (metal, glass, Formica, finished wood) so firmly that you can't break the suction without using the release lever. Eminently portable and solidly fixed in place during use, the mini-vise holds small objects securely but gently. It is perfect for precise glueing jobs, for crafts, for small assembly work, for taking apart a fishing reel or putting together a clock, and for those household taskssharpening s~issors, for instance-that always seem to require three'hands.

'WE CAN D LONGER In his first major address to a joint session of the u.s. Congress, PresidentReagan outlined acomprehensive new program aimedat revitalizing the American economy.Excerpts from his speech are reprinted below.

Only a month ago, I pledged to you my cooperation in doing what is right for

thisnation we all love so much.

I am here tonight to reaffirm 'that pledge and to ask that we share in restoring thepromise that is offered to every citizen by this,the last, best hope of man on earth.

All of us are aware of the punishing inflationwhich has, for the first time in some 60 years, held to double digit figuresfor two years in a row. Interest rateshave reached absurd levels of more than20 percent and over 15 percent for thosewho would borrow to buy a ..home.

Almost eight million Americans are outof wqrk. These are people who want tobeproductive. But as the months go by, despairdominates their lives. The threats of layoff and unemployment hang over other millions, and all who work are frustrated by their inability to keep up withinflation.

We can no longer procrastinate and hopethings will get better. They will not. .If we do not act forcefully, and now, the economy will get worse.

Can we who man the ship of state deny it is out of control? Our national debt is approaching $1,000,000 million. A few I

I

weeks ago I called such a figure-a trillion dollars-incomprehensible.

I've been trying to think of a way to illustrate how big it reaI1y is. The best I could come up with is to say that a stack of 1,000dollar bills in your hand only 10 centimeters high would make you a millionaire.

A trillion dollars would be a stack of I,OOO-dollarbills 108 kilometers high.

The interest on the public debt this year will be over $90,000 million. Unless we change the proposed spending for the fiscal year beginning October I, we'll add another almost $80,000 million to the debt.

Adding to our troubles is a mass of regulations imposed on the shopkeeper, the farmer, the craftsman, professionals and major industry that is estimated to add $100,000 million to the price of things

we buy and reduce our ability to produce.

The rate of increase in American productivity, once one of the highest in the world, is among the lowest of all major industrial nations. Indeed, it has actually declined in the last three years.

I have painted a grim picture, but I believe I have painted it accurately. It is within our power to change this picture, and we can act in hope. There is nothing wrong with our internal strengths. There has been no breakdown in the human, technological, and natural resources upon which the American economy is built.

Based on this confidence in a system which has never failed us-but which we have failed through a lack of confidence, and sometimes through a belief that we could fine tune the economy and get a

tune more to our liking-I am proposing a comprehensive four-part program.

This plan is aimed at reducing the growth in government spending and taxing, reforming and eliminating regulations which are unnecessary and counterproductive, and encouraging a consistent monetary policy aimed at maintaining the value of the currency.

If enacted in full, our program can help America create 13 million new jobs, nearly 3 million more than we would without these measures. It will also help us gain control of inflation.

It is important to note that we are only reducing the rate of increase in taxing and spending. We are not attempting to cut either spending or taxing to a level below that which we presently have.

This plan will get our economy moving again, increase productivity growth, and thus create the jobs our people must have.

I am asking that youjoin me in reducing direct Federal spending by $41,400 million in fiscal year 1982, along with $7,700 million in user fees and off-budget savings for a total savings of $49,000 million.

This will still allow an increase of $40,800 million over 1981 spending.

I know that.exaggerated and inaccurate stories about these cuts have disturbed many people, particularly those dependent on grant and benefit programs for their basic needs. I regret the fear these unfounded stories have caused and welcome this opportunity to set things straight.

We will continue to fulfill the obligations that spring from our national conscience. Those who through no fault' of their own must depend on the rest of us, the poverty-stricken, the disabled, the elderly, all those with true need, can rest assured that the social safety net of programs they depend on are exempt from any cuts.

The full retirement benefits of the more ,than 31 million social security recipients will be continued, along with an annual cost of living increase. Medicare will not be cut, nor will supplemental income for the blind, aged and disabled. Funding will continue for veterans' pensions.

School breakfasts and lunches for the children of low-income families will continue, as will nutrition and other special services for the aging. There will be no cut in Project Head Start or summer youth jobs.

All in all, nearly $216,000 million providing help for tens of millions of Americans will be fully funded. But

government will not continue to subsidize individuals or particular business interests where real need cannot be demonstrated.

And while we will reduce some subsidies to regional and local governments, we will at the same time convert a number of categorical grant programs into block grants to reduce wasteful administrative overhead and to give local government entities and states more flexibility and control. We call for an end to duplication in Federal programs and reform of those which are not cost-effective.

Already, some ha ve protested there must be no reduction of aid to schools. Let me point out that Federal aid to education amounts to only 8 percent of total educational funding. For this, the Federal Government has insisted on a tremendously disproportionate share of control over our schools. Whatever reductions we've proposed in that 8 percent will amount to very little of the total cost of education.

It will, however, restore more authority to states and local school districts.

"Inftation and a growing tax burden will put an end to everything we believe in and to our dreams for the future. \Ve do not have an option of living with inflation and its attendant tragedy, of millions of productive people willing to work but unable to find buyers in the job market."

Historically the American people have supported by voluntary contributions more artistic and cultural activities than all the other countries in the world put together. I wholeheartedly support this approach and believe Americans will continue their generosity. Therefore, I am proposing a savings of $85 million in the Federal subsidies now going to the arts and humanities.

There are a number of subsidies to business and industry I believe are unnecessary. One such subsidy is the U.S. Department of Energy's synthetic fuels program. We will continue support of research leading to development of new technologies and more independence from foreign oil, but we can save at least $3,200 million by leaving to private industry the building of plants to make liquid or gas fuels from coal.

We are asking that another major business subsidy, the Export-Import Bank loan authority, be reduced by one-third in 1982. We are doing this because the primary beneficiaries of taxpayer funds in this case are the exporting companies themselves-most of them profitable corporations.

And this brings me to a number of other 'lending programs in which government makes low interest loans, some of them for an interest rate as low as 2 percent. What has not been very well understood is that the U.S. Treasury Department has no money of its own.

It has to go into the private capital market and borrow the money to provide those loans. In this time of excessive interest rates the government finds itself paying interest several times as high as it receives from the borrowing agency. The taxpayers, of course, are paying that high interest rate, and it just makes all other interest rates higher.

By terminating the Economic Development Administration (EDA), We can save hundreds of millions of dollars in 1982 and biiIions more over the next few years. There is a lack of consistent and convincing evidence that EDA and its regional commissions have been effective in creating new jobs. They have been effective in creating an array of planners, grantsmen and professional middlemen.

We believe we can do better just by the expansion of the economy and the job creation which will come from our economic program.

The food stamp program will be restored to its original purpose, to assist those without resources to purchase sufficient nutritional food. We will, however, save $1,800 million in fiscal year 1982 by removing from eligibility those who are not in real need or who are abusing the program. Despite this reduction, the program will be budgeted for more than $ 10,000million.

We will tighten welfare and give more attention to outside sources of income when determining the amount of welfare an individual is allowed. This plus strong and effective work requirements will save $520 million next year.

I stated a moment ago our intention to keep the school breakfast and lunch programs for those in true need. But by cutting back in meals for children of families that can afford to pay, the savings will be $1,600 million in fiscal year 1982.

Let me just touch on a few other areas which are typical of the kind of reductions

we have included in this economic pack- at present are not cost-effective. An age. The' trade adjustment assistance example is Medicaid. Right now Washingprogram provides benefits for workers ton provides the states with unlimited who become unemployed when foreign matching payments for their expenditures. imports reduce the market for- various At the same time we here in Washington American products; causing the shutdown pretty much dictate how the states will of plants and the layoff ill workers. The manage the program. We want to put a cap purpose is to help these workers find on how much the Federal Government jobs in growing sectors of our economy. . will contribute, but at the same time allow And yet, because these benefits are paid the states much more flexibility in managout on top of normal unemployment ing and structuring their programs. I benefits, we wind up paying greater bene- know from our experience in California fits to those who lose their jobs because that such flexibility could have led to far of foreign competition than we do to their more cost-effeCtive reforms. This will friends and neighbors who are laid off due bring a savings of$l ,000 million next year.

The space program has been and is to domestic competition. Anyone must agree that this is unfair. Putting these two important to America and we plan to programs on the same footing will save continue it. We believe, however, that a reordering of priorities to focus on the $1,150 million in just one year: most important and cost-effective NASA Earlier I made mention of changing categorical grants to states and local (National Aeronautics and Space Adminigovernments into block grants. We know straticn) programs can result in a savings of $250 million. of course that categorical grant programs Coming down from space to the mailburden local and state governments with box-the postal service has been cona mass of Federal regulations and Federal sistently unable to live within its operating paperwork. budget. It is still dependent on large, Ineffective targeting, wasteful adminiFederal subsidies. We propose reducing strative overhead-all can be eliminated by shifting the resources and decision- those subsidies by $632 million in 1982 making authority to local and state to press the postal service into becoming more effective., In subsequent years, the government. This will also consolidate savings will continue to add up. programs which are scattered throughout the Federal bureaucracy. It will bring The Economic Regulatory Adminisgovernment closer to the people and will tration in the Department of Energy save $23,900 million over the next five has programs to force companies to convert to speCificfuels. It has the authoryears.

Our program for economic renewal ity to' administer a gas rationing plan, deals with a number of programs which and prior to decontrol it ran the oil price

control program. With these and other regulations gone we can 'save several hundreds of millions of dollars over the next few years.

Now I'm sure there is one department you've been waiting for me to mention.

That is the I)epartment of Defense. It is the only department in- our entire program that will actually be increased over the present budgeted figure. But even here there was no exemption. The Department of Defense came up with a number of cuts which reduced the budget increase needed to restore our military balance, These measures will save $2,900 million in 1982 outlays and by 1986 a total of $28,200 million will have betm saved.

The aim will be to provide the most effective defense for the lowest possible cost.

I believe my duty as president requires that I recommend increase in defense spending over the coming years. Since 1970 the Soviet Union has invested $300,000 million more in its military forces than we have. As a result of its massive military buildup, the Soviets now have a significant numerical advantage in strategic nuclear delivery systems, tactical aircraft, submarines, artillery and antiaircraft defense. To allow this imbalance to continue is a threat to our national security.

We remain committed to the goal of arms limitation through negotiation and hope we can persuade our adversaries to come to realistic balanced and verifiable agreements. But, as we negotiate, our security must be fully protected by a balanced and realistic defense program.

Let me say a word here about the general problem of waste and fraud in the Federal Government. One government estimate indicated that fraud alone may account for anywhere from 1 to 10 percent-as much as $25,000 million-of Federal expenditures for social programs. If the tax dollars that are wasted or mismanaged are added to this fraud total, the staggering dimensions of this problem begin to emerge.

The Office of Management and Budget is now putting together an interagency task force to attack waste and fraud.

No administration can promise to immediately stop a trend that has grown in recent years as quickly as have government expenditures themselves. But let me say this: waste and fraud in the Federal budget is exactly what I have called it before-an unrelenting national scandala scandal we are bound and determined to

do something about.

Marching in lockstep with the whole program of reductions in spending is the equally important program of reduced tax rates. They are essential if we are to have economic recovery. It is time to crea te new jobs, build and rebuild industry, and give the American people room to do what they do best. And that can only be done with a tax program which provides. incentive to increase productivity for both workers and industry.

Our proposal is for a 1O-percent acrossthe-board cut every year for three years in the tax rates for all individual income taxpayers, making a total tax cut of 30 percent. This three-year reduction will also apply to the tax on unearned income, leading toward an eventual elimination of the present differential between the tax on earned and unearned income.

Again, let me remind you this 30 percent reduction in marginal rates, while it will leave the taxpayers with $500,000 million in their pockets over the next five years, is actually only a reduction in the tax increase already built into the system.

Unlike some past tax "reforms," this is not merely a shift of wealth between different sets of taxpayers. This proposal for an equal reduction in everyone's' tax rates will expand our national prosperity, enlarge national incomes, and increase opportunities for all Americans.

Some will argue, I know, that reducing tax rates now will be inflationary. A solid body of economic experts does not agree. And certainly tax cuts adopted over the past three-fourths of a century indicate these economic experts are right. The advice I have had is that by 1985 our real production of goods and services will grow by 20 percent, and will be $300,000 million higher than it is today. The average worker's wage will rise (in real purchasing/ power) by 8 percent-and those are after-tax dollars.

The other part of the tax package is aimed directly at provi4ing business and industry with the capital needed to modernize and engage in more resea~ch and development. This will involve an increase in depreciation- allowances.

The p'resent depreciation system is obsolete, needlessly complex, and economically counterproductive: Very simply, it bases the depreciation of plant, machinery, vehicles. and tools on their original cost with no recognition of how inflation has increased their replacement cost. We are proposing a much shorter write-off time than is presently allowed. We propose

a five-year write-off for machinery; three years for vehicles and trucks; and tenyear write-off for plants.

In fiscal year 1982 under this plan business would acquire nearly $10,000 million for investment, and by 1985 the figure would be nearly $45,000 million.

These changes are essential to provide the new investment which is needed to create millions of new jobs between now and 1986 and to make America competitive once again in world Jl1arkets.

American society experienced a virtual explosion in government regulation during the past decades. Between 1970 and 1979, expenditures for the major regulatory agencies quadrupled, the number of pages published annually in the Federal register nearly tripled, and the number of pages in the code of Federal regulations increased by nearly two-thirds.

The result has been higher prices, higher unemployment, and lower productivity growth. Overregulation causes small and independent businessmen and women, as well as large businesses, to defer or ter-

"The people are watelling and waiting. They don't demand miracles, but they do expect us to act. Let us act together."

minate plans for expansion, and, since they are responsible for most of our new jobs, those new jobs aren't created.

We have no intention of dismantling the regulatory agencies-especially those qecessary to protect the environment and to assure the public health and safety.

However, we must come to grips with inefficient and burdensome regulationseliminate those we can and reform those we must keep.

The final aspect of our plan requires a national monetary policy which does not allow growth to increase consistently faster than the growth of goods and' services. In order to curb inflation, we need to slow the growth in our money supply.

A successful program to achieve stable and moderate growth patterns in the money supply will keep both inflation and interest rates down and restore vigor to our financial institutions and markets.

This, then, is our proposal. "America's New Beginning: A Program for Economic Recovery. " I

Can we do the job? The answer is yes.

But we must begin now. Our social, political and cultural, as well as our economic institutions, can no longer absorb the repeated shocks that have been dealt with over the past decades.

The substance and prosperity of our nation is built by wages brought home from the factories and the mills, the farms and the ships. They are the services provided in 10,000 corners of America; the interest on the thrift of our people and the return from their risk-taking. The production of America is the possession of those who build, serve, create and produce.

For too long now, we've removed from our people the decisions on how to dispose of what they created. We have strayed from first principles. We must alter our course.

The taxing power of government must be used to provide revenues for legitimate government purposes. It must not be used to regulate the economy or bring about social change. We've tried that and surely must be able to see it doesn't work.

Spending by government must be limited to those functions which are the proper province of government, We can no longer afford things simply because we think of them.

Next year we can reduce the budget ~by $41,400 million, without harm to government's legitimate purposes and to our responsibility to all who heed our benevolence. This, plus the reduction in tax rates, will help bring an end to inflation.

In the health and social services area alone the plan we are proposing will substantially reduce the need for 465 pages of law, 1,400 pages of regulations and 5,000 Federal employees who presently administer 7,600 separate grants at about 25,000 lo~ations. Over seven million man and woman hours of work by state and local officials are required to fill our Federal' forms.

If we don't do this, inflation and a'growing tax burden willput an end to everything we believe in and to our dreams for the future. We do not have an option of living with inflation and its attendant tragedy, of millions of productive people willing and able to work but unable to find buyers in the job market.

True, it will take time for the favorable effects of our proposal to be felt. So we must begin now.

The people are watching and waiting.

They don't demand miracles, but they expect us to act. Let us act together.

0

do

DANCER LAURA DEAN

An economy run by robots is no longer a futuristic dream, says thefounder of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's artificial intelligence lab. With these remote-control "hands," what he calls telepresences, it will be possible to "work" in another room, in another city, in another country, or on another planet.

In a lively give-and-take

debate, two experts-one Indian and one American-discuss a wide range of questions relating to U.S.foreign policy on South Asia.

Saving the Siberian Crane The Siberian crane's seasonal passage between Siberia and India is a biannual ritual older tharz civilized man. Today, it is an endangered species. Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary counted only 33 Siberian cranes last winter.

Of late, oral history has become a popular technique for recording information, especially of local historical interest, in informal interviews. Here, two Americans from Vermont and an Indian librarian of Jaipur's City Palace Museum make history come alive.

SUBSCRIBE TO

SPAN

SPAN is a\(ailable at leading newsstands at Rs. 2.75 per copy.

An annual subscription at Rs. 21 for 12 issues saves you one-third and conveniently brings SPAN to your home or office.

TO NEW SUBSCRIBERS Fill out coupon on reverse side and mail to: SPAN Magazine Subscription Service, Post Box 213, New Delhi 110001.

CHANGE OF ADDRESS

FORM

When notifying SPAN about a change in your address. please i'ttach the address label from a recent SPAN envelope in addition to filling out the form below. Since four to six weeks are needed to process a change of address. please let us know about any change promptly NEW ADDRESS

(USE BLOCK LETTERS)

Pin Code -------MAIL TO: Circulation Manager. SPAN Magazine 24 Kasturba Gandhi Marg. New Delhi 110001

TO: SPAN Magazine Subscription Service Post Box 213 New Delhi 110001

SPAN Name (Mr./Mrs./Miss)----------------Address ----------------------

---------------

o o

Pin Code ------

I enclose payment of Rs 21 in favor of SPAN Magazine by "A/C Payee" Bank Draft 0 Postal Order 0 Money Order (receipt enclosed) Cheque (Add Rs 3 on outstation cheque. please)

PROGRAM SCHEDULE SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY

Short Wave: . 139.

169.

197.198.252.255.42.2.

194. 19.5.

197.198.307.309.311.

421.422.49.1 Medium Wave: 190.

Short Wave:

ShortWave:

197.

254.

139.

314.

168.

41.8.

13.9. 140.

19.8. 25.4.

Short Wave:

168.169.

Short Wave: 19.7.

314.

254.

41.8.

Short Wave: 197.309.

Short Wave:

139.

169.

13.9. 16.8.

254. 310 13.9. 16.8.

0700-0730

Short Wave:

2130-2230

Short Wave: 168. 198.

25.1 Medium Wave: 190