Freewheeling Tiger in a Faraway Land
Stephen J. Dubner of New York Times points to an article dubbed Muslim Land Joins Ranks of Tigers in The Wall Street Journal, and finds it fascinating in his short post You Don’t Have to Be Freewheeling to Love Free Markets. Since the Journal article required a paid subscription, I was short of finding it fascinating, but the first three free paragraphs gave me a good idea:
When an Islamist-leaning political party took charge of Turkey six years ago, this vibrant Mediterranean resort town [Antalya] feared a bumpy ride for a local economy driven in part by booze and bikinis.
Today, says Ahmet Barut, a hotel magnate here, the only real question is whether the town can sustain an unprecedented economic boom. He’s not keen on the teetotaling habits of the governing party’s leaders, nor the headscarves worn by their wives, but he applauds a key part of their record: “They are good at economics.”
From tourism and tomato growing to car making, Turkey has prospered far more under an Islam-tinged government than it did under some previous, ardently secular administrations more in tune with the often decidedly un-Islamic ways of many Turkish businesspeople.
OK, I admit. After reading the articles, I thought a lot. They were selling something, but what? Could it be the superiority of free market economies over socialist or state controlled ones? No, as they could have used a title like “Free market shines even in the hands of …” or something similar. Apparently it was not it.
Maybe, I thought, they were trying to prove Turkish economy was going strong (go tiger), but this time the subject sampled did not seem right. You would not pick a hotel magnate - whatever that means - from Antalya, in the peak season, surrounded by warm Mediterranean waters and ancient sites and relics that half of the world awe in wonder, and ask his opinion about the economy, would you? Selecting a subject from another industry and town would have made the opinion less biased, right?
How about businessmen know best? After all, everybody knows that they are far-sighted, nature loving, environment caring people that hold interests of the society over their self-interests, no? Unlikely.
Alright, perhaps they were trying to say if economy is good, everything’s good. Nothing else matters. Well, I can count a handful of countries where economy is really good but would you live there?
So, I’m still thinking. What were they trying to sell?
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