Colonial regimes are good employers if you are from the colonizing side. They pay well and offer exciting travel to exotic locations. They support your family with benefits and subsidies. And they convince you (because you want to be convinced) that you are benefiting the many whilst, as Rudyard Kipling insisted, carrying their burden. Rather than being an enabler of greed and pillaging, you are really bringing forth civilization, such as with education or healthcare – sacrificing yourself for the greater good. A humanitarian, even if at the beck and call of rich and powerful people.
International Public Health and Decolonization
The World Health Organization (WHO) arose in the aftermath of World War Two, as much of the world was throwing off the yoke of colonial masters. Colonialist approaches varied, from those who built infrastructure and were seen to provide something for those they ruled, to those whose only interest seems to have been loot. Some had conquered well-functioning States, others replaced regimes as brutal as themselves. However, like slavery, colonialism, or imposing one’s will on others for one’s own benefit, is always wrong. Both probably go back as long as humankind, have been ubiquitous across most of history, and remain prevalent today. We have learned to veil them.
The 1950s to 1970s saw half the world move from serving other nations to become more-or-less politically self-governing. It was far from smooth, with European powers ‘freeing’ their colonies based on arbitrary colonial borders and so leaving behind intrinsically unstable States (the Balkans tell us this is not just an Asian or African problem). Another legacy is the ownership of companies that extract resources, with former masters and their allies sometimes going to considerable lengths to maintain this. They ensured that their colonies remained, economically at least, colonies. Companies exist to extract and accumulate wealth, and the rich world wanted their companies to continue gaining higher returns from lower costs after their colonies were lost. Poorer countries tend to have lower costs and less oversight, and with a sufficiently amoral approach, they can be kept that way. Wealth can still flow upwards to the former colonial power, even when the colony is officially free.
The author has problems with the changing nature of the WHO from post-colonialist back to a colonialist model of wealth extraction from the colonized countries. The big problem is, now, all countries are being colonized by fascistic organizations the PPP (Public-Private Partnership) arrangements that happen to make a lot of money for the Private part of the arrangement. The focus of the health prevention and which diseases to prioritize is being decided by such glorious organizations as GAVI. He is making a warning that perhaps we should rethink the colonial approach and do it the way WHO started doing it.