——

''"'I'lupmi

20 NEW YORK POST, SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1964 MAGAZINE PAGE TWO

was chosen to head the project because Sweden had

GUNNAR MYRDAL no history of color discrimination.
Myrdal's conclusion, 20 years ago, was that the
Ideal would eventually prevail, through government
intervention, through a rise of national productivity
and through the exertions of the Negro people them-
selves. For rejecting a vague concept of self-propelled

Reflector "gradualism," Myrdal was assailed by the conserva-

tives. ("Every time they burned a copy of my book
in the South, I got a dollar royalty," Myrdal recalls.)
And for rejecting the Marxist contention of the
'30s that the Negroes could achieve liberation only
through revolutionary overthrow of existing economic
institutions, Myrdal was assailed equally by the Com-

Of America's Image
munists. ("So when people call me names nowadays,
I wish they would know what they are talking about.")
The criticism is small stuff compared to Myrdal's
contribution to the flow of American progress. "An
I!
American Dilemma" brought to fore a number of
young Negro social scientists who collaborated with

I By JOSEPH WERSHBA
UNNAR MYRDAL is a Swedish economist who
is too small. And that's a danger to you and to the
rest of the world.
him— including Ralph Bunche. And when the Supreme
Court,handed down its historic 1954 decision outlaw-
ing Segregation in the schools, the Court cited Mydral's
G made an international reputation by his work in
America. That was almost 20 years ago when he pro-
"A strong America is a wise America," Myrdal
says. "You are not very good losers. Every time
findings.
Myrdal has no difficulty at all identifying with
you are losing, an element of insanity enters your Americans. "Your President Johnson—-he's Just like
duced "An American Dilemma"—the most extensive thinking that is very dangerous. If you are"' not me, a peasant boy from the country who made good.
. tudy ever made of the plight of the Negro people strong, you are not going to be the leader of the Mr. Johnson has seen starvation. He knows he has
here* And ever since, the name Gunnar Myrdal has Western world." to win over the liberals and the big city vote. And
been something of a legend—with a touch of the myth. he has to combine this with his poqr boy background.
But the man is all flesh and blood, very much alive. • My own feeling," says Myrdal, "is that your Mr.
He is 65, with hardly any gray in his heavy blond MYRDAL'S SOLUTION IS HKAVY GOVERNMENT Johnson comes out as much as President Kennedy to
hair. He is a bouncing, voluble, controversial man investment and long-term planning. "You have eradicate poverty from the 'affluent' society."
with clear blue eyes to match his ruddy complexion. hospitals, schools and roads to build. You have cities But as much as he identifies with America, Gunnar
He heads Stockholm's Institute for International Eco- full of slums. You have people thrown out of jobs Myrdal remains a Swede "a squarehead," he says
nomic Studies and is prolific as ever. "An American by automation who have to be retrained. You have with proud defiance.
Dilemma" was recently reissued by Harper in a 26th to give business a tax cut to get them moving. His ancestors came over from Finland and settled
edition; Pantheon has just published his analysis of in a valley' near swampland. "That's what 'Myrdal'
what's wrong with America today under the title of 'You keep talking about a balanced budget when
you should' be talking about a balanced economy. means Mir is swamp and Dal is valley," he explains.
"Challenge to Affluence." A Senate committee asked
him for his views last month; and when he came Private business can't—or doesn't-plan and invest
for the whole economv. The government can- and > * * *
through New York the ether day for a seminar at the KARL <&JNNAR MYRDAL WAS BORN DEC. 0, 180M
American Jewish Committee, Gunnar Myrdal lived should.
And I can't understand why you Americans get in the small village of Dclacarlia. Ills father was a
up to form as a man with strong opinion.
so shy when it comes to talking about long-term trends railroad construction man. "I spent half my early
"I permit myself free opinions in America this of your economy. Is it because, to the .ignorant and years on a farm, the other half in the city." Myrdal
is my second home," he'says, "I'm a Swede who feels prejudiced, it has a Russian and Communist smell? was 21 by the time ho reached the University of Stock-
as much allegiance to America as Americans. What's But it's rapidly becoming a regular part o(\govern- holm- He studied law, was graduated in 1923 and
this business in the Daily News calling me a U. S.- ment and business planning in all West European entered private practice-—a rather unusual beginning
hater? I've been around this country a long time and countries," says Myrdal. for the man who was to become Sweden's ranking
when things go wrong, I get sad. And when things Conservatives call him a Marxist, and Myrdal'dis- social scientist.
go right, they make me happy. misses the charge as preposterous. "I'mf just ah old- By 1027, he had made the big change. He got a
"Of course I have strong opinions. I don't want fashioned Victorian economist," he says, not com- doctorate in economics, published a book on the theory
people making a monument out of me. That's not my pletely able to conceal the sly grin. "Of course I'm a Of prices and was appointed docent-instructor in
type. I'm a scholar, not a monument. I don't want Social Democrat—an independent one. Too many political economy at the University of Stockholm. From
everyone agreeing with me either. That's not my style. Americans live in the past—too many of them, are on then on, his rise to prominence was r a p i d - h e trav-
The thing about America Is that you can do so a flight from reality. eled, wrote, debated, taught and had a profound influ-
many things that arc cruel and so many things that "Let me tell you about this nonsense of labels. ence on both the academic and political communities
are fine You're a strong country; you've always There's a joke tha' describes politics in England. of Sweden. His reputation spread abroad.
shoutec' your imperfections from the rooftops. I don't There are three panies— the Labor Labor Party, the He came to America on a Rockefeller Fellowship
think you have to worry about bad publicity. Liberal Labor Party and the Conservative Labor in 1920 - " t h e day before the market crashed." With
v "The best picture is the true picture. And the true Party.' The point is, Europe has made great strides— him was his wife, Alva Reimer, a psychologist whom
picture is that you're a great country with many and America is in danger of slipping back. And that's he had ma Fried In 1924.

I serious problems, with tremendous discussion going

on ail the time, and with people who are willing to put
their shoulders to the wheel and solve them.
the last thing. I want to see."
• '
"Before I came to America, I considered myself
* •
primarily as a technician,", he says. "Hut traveling
through your country in '29 and '30 at the beginning
ON THK BASIS OF "AN AMERICAN DILEMMA," of the Depression—I really became Interested in
"I sc»: nothing wrong owith the image of America
that you're rich and can solve—or buy—everything. Gunnar Myrdal remains a propet with honor in his politics. Those were years of crisis, for you and for
"Th.e trouble is: you're not doing It. "second country." us. My wife and I lived through it too. And that's
"The affluent society in America, is largely a The book -a classic in its field-described the why I always feel at home in America. We shared."
myth except for a privileged upper stratum. You dilemma of a country which talked about freedom and Back in Sweden, Myrdal was appointed to a lead-
have great areas of poverty and 'unemployment,' es- equality as its ideal, but at the same time practiced ing professorial post at Stockholm University and
pecially among Negroes, minorities, old folks, young the worst form ,of soul-destroying discrimination turned his attention to the problems of poverty and
people coming into the labor market—and longtime against a tenth of its population. The book was com- social welfare. He and his wife were also influential
workers displaced by automation. Your.rate"oi growth missioned by the Carnegie Corporation and Myrdal in re-orienting Scandinavian views on the? region's
declining birth rate.
• •

"Our idea was 'radical'," he says. "We frit thai

people should have as many children as they wanted
but that they should want them. Naturally, this
Involved sex education for parents and sex education
for high school students and naturally, there wa c
always some uproar. Sweden is a puritanical country
- like yours."
His name often became a verb "To Myrdal" was
a description of couples living together without mar-
rying. "Ah," he says "Everything I touch—they
call Myrdal."

WfflM
• • • '
IN THK POST-WAR YEARS, MYRDAL WAS A
storm center as a Social-Democratic member of
Sweden's Parliament and Minister of Commerce. His
policies for economic reform came under constant
attack by the opposition as "socialistic." He was, as
always, his own man, and quite frequently out of step
with his own party. He was an early advocate of nor-
mal trade relations with eastern European countries.
He resigned in 1947, was appointed Secretary Gen-
eral of the Economic Council of Europe, and spent the
next 10 years in economic research in Geneva. Cur-
rently, he and his wife live in Stockholm. Mrs\ Mydral,
who was Sweden's first woman ambassador In 1955
(to India), is now a disarmament expert for her
government, with an ambassador-at-large title.
The Myrdals have three married children and six
grandchildren. His daughter Sisscla is married to an
American and lives in Princeton. "That's my latest
instalment to improve the American race," he says.
"You know," he adds reflectively—"if my father
had migrated here with the other Swedes, I might
Pwf Photo by JacobeilM have been a Republican Senator from Minnesota. No.
•!'i ''i ' *• : M f-:"-M : "I don't think you have to worry abo< ! !...-.I ....M;, l!-/." I would have preferred to be a liberal Democrat."

Untitled Document

Thomas M. Tryniski
309 South 4th Street
Fulton New York
13069

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