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Talk:Autarky: Difference between revisions

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Autarky vs. Autarchy

I think this is wrong:

The term comes from Greek language, where it properly means "self-government", and effectively it is typically connected with political evaluations or determinations.

I think the -arky bit comes from Greek Arkein, to suffice, so I changed the article accordingly. Enchanter, Friday, July 12, 2002

Correct. Self-government is autarchy, which is pronounced the same in English but not in Greek. -phma 18:09, 12 July 2002 (UTC)[reply]

autarchy redirects to this article. should it point to self-government --Rj 17:39, Nov 13, 2004 (UTC)

I'm afraid there is a language problem here, in British English Autarchy means the same as Autarky in American English, for example this link names what the American equivalent calls Autarky as Autarchy, I will therefore make a distinction between the too. --JDnCoke 17:51, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The definition is the same in American English. Editing that nonsense out. JFHJr (㊟) 18:13, 19 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

North Korea receives food aid from Japan, among others. It's not trade but diplomacy, but it would imply a lack of self-sufficiency incompatible with autarchy. --62.58.152.52 (talk) 12:43, 9 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

North Korea trades with China, doesn't it? —Ashley Y 04:31, Dec 2, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, it does, off and on. I think that Cuba has been, at times, an autarky as well. Rhymeless 07:59, 30 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]

I doubt it. Cuba traded with Comecon a lot. After the fall of the Soviets, it has had to import oil and export its sugar. There have been efforts to reduce imports and increase exports but I wouldn't call that autarky. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 80.58.3.239 (talk • contribs) 08:10, 14 September 2004 (UTC).[reply]

The Soviet-Type-Economies in Central & Eastern Europe in the twentieth century also aimed for a limited form of autarky. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.15.13.4 (talk • contribs) 20:01, 1 May 2006 (UTC).[reply]

Not exactly what you'd call 'autarky' in the Eastern and Soviet bloc, it was more mercantilism. Khrushchev called it the 'specialization of the socialist bloc' I believe, it meant that each country would produce goods they excelled at doing, it was actually quite capitalist and based on comparative advantage, it was adopted after Stalin's death when the USSR was promoting that all countries should become an autarky by themselves.

Funnily enough, it was Khrushchev's demand that Albania become the 'bread basket' of the bloc that led Albania into autarky and away from the Soviet bloc, eventually leaving Comecon and the Warsaw Pact. Enver Hoxha believed that the Soviet plan was capitalist, and was the same as what the Western countries did to the Third World in exploiting it.

This is also very relevant, considering that the concept of autarky goes with the 'international division of labor', which autarkies tried to free their countries from. The basic idea is, you have the rich urban advanced countries with the big industry and processing, and you have the backward rural poor countries, which pull out the raw materials and make the wheat for the rich countries. I suppose you could call it neo-imperialism. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.223.175.93 (talk) 12:24, 21 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Was Nazi Germany an autarky for at least part of its existence prior to World War II? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.15.127.254 (talk) 04:05, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That was mentioned in the article before, but a user removed it, stating "autarky was not a goal and embargoes were ineffective". I don't know what the veracity of that is. Korny O'Near 04:59, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Speaking of Soviet-style economies, didn't Albania try to be an autarky under Enver Hoxha? I thought I read once that their constitution once forbade foreign trade and they had to pass a special act of parliament each time they had to trade anything, but I can't verify this. They had certain strategic minerals such as chrome and oil and I think they were self-sufficient for food production, so, despite being a small country they could have survived in a limited way without trade. Zagubov 17:10, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think you're on to something here. I did a quick web search - this article says Hoxha instituted something like full autarky (or "self-reliance", as they called it) in 1976. And this one says it was relaxed a little after his death in 1985, but didn't really end until 1991. Korny O'Near 18:24, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I seem to remember the other Eastern Bloc countries did trade with each other via Comecon and Yugoslavia traded with just about everybody. but that Albania was pretty unique in their commitment to self-sufficiency and it tied in with their limited diplomatic links and a command economy set at a low consumption rate. I heard their isolation was so extreme they only opened their (single) airport for a few days each week.

I don't have enough references to add this to the main article, but it looks like a good example of a modern(ish) autarky. I also remember that Rhodesia under UDI was banned from trade and had an extensive import substitution programme making it a closed kind of market economy. I'm not sure if that counts as an autarky as it was an externally imposed blockade.Zagubov 10:04, 26 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What would be necessary for a state to be a sustainable autarky? Is not the world as a whole an economic autarky? Is that sustainable? 168.7.251.84 20:21, 24 January 2007 (UTC)David[reply]

A state would be a sustainable autarky if it produced exactly the products it needed in exactly the amounts it needed them. It's certainly doable, but it's not efficient. Each state has things it's got a competitive advantage in - things it can produce more cheaply than other states (oil in Saudi Arabia, timber in Canada, etc.) The Saudis *could* just drill the oil they need for their own consumption, and try to produce all the goods they need, but this would be inefficient. Instead of spending a lot of money to try to grow lettuce in the desert, they're better off trading oil for lettuce with the United States - and the US is better off too. This is the basic economic argument that trade is good because specialization increases efficiency. So one of the reasons North Korea is so much poorer than South Korea is its unwillingess to trade and therefore the inefficiency of some of its domestic industries. There are lots of other reasons, but that's a big one.

The world is certainly an autarky because we don't trade with anyone off the planet. It is definitely sustainable (leaving aside arguments about resource extraction, pollution, and the like) - any autarky can be sustainable, it's just that autarky is not efficient if there are potential trading partners who have different economic specializations than you do and if transportation costs etc. are not too high. In the case of Earth, obviously there are no possible trading partners so the planet is by default an autarky. Fasrad 19:59, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• In my A-level history classes (in the UK) - Nazi Germany was given as an example of a wannabe autarchy - hence invading the Ukraine for its fertile land and coal.Malick78 14:25, 21 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Unless anyone has any objections I'll go ahead and remove the below passage. Socialism in one country did not require a specific programme of autarky (even if the Soviets did generally keep a distance from the West) in either theory or practice. While not an integral part of the global economic system, during the 1930s the USSR was definitely involved in world trade and had absolutely no qualms about importing the required technical expertise/equipment. I can provide figures from RW Davies if required. I'm not even sure what relevance Lysenko has to Soviet foreign trade

"The Soviet Union during Stalin's reign was proposing a doctrine labeled Socialism in One Country. Although it was not necessarily an absolute form of autarky it contained elements supporting an isolationist policy, such as claims of Russian pre-eminence in various scientific fields, attempts of dissociating the scientific grounds from the Western synchronic theories (the Lysenko affair) and others.[citation needed]"

GreatGodOm (talk) 19:18, 6 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]