Category Archives: Crisis of Capitalism

Sorry America, It is not YOU, it is US (*) …

05 Saturday Nov 2016

Posted by in China's Rise, Crisis of Capitalism, One World, Uncategorized

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Lessons from the USA election campaign

The coming elections in the US supplied an extraordinary drama, watched with both trump-vs-clintonenthusiasm and disdain almost all over the world. If this is the most important democratic election for the most influential leadership position in the world, the scarcity of the debate about the real issues at stake must make people ask substantial questions about democracy. The identity and performance of the candidates, especially Republican Donald Trump, and the fact that an enormous establishment, with millions of people and billions of dollars, couldn’t produce a more respectable candidate, must raise even more substantial soul searching questions about the human nature.

The Big Picture

Lenin once said that, while the yellow press floods us with lies about everything, the good serious capitalist press feeds us with plenty of facts and information in order to hide the big picture. In the rest of this post I will try to relate to some of the big issues that all this election campaign and all the serious fact-finding and analysis around it are either ignoring or trying to hide…

Trump promises to “make America great again”. Clinton is trying to out-perform Trump’s patriotism by claiming that mighty America is as great as ever and couldn’t be diminished. But the whole election campaign is only a small animated illustration to the fact that the USA is not what it used to be.

The people of the US are famous for their ignorance of the world outside their borders. But for the last hundred years the fate and meaning of the USA, call it “greatness” or “the big Satan” or “imperialism” or “leader of the free world”, was not about what happens inside these borders but developed around its role as the strongest and finally the only world superpower.

This time is over. And it is not over because America became any smaller. It is over because we, the rest of the world, succeeded somehow to grow.

China’s rise, USA’s decline

In 2012, in one of the first posts in this blog, I presented an optimistic view on China’s rise. Let me try to sketch here in raw lines an optimistic view about America’s decline, or rather the decline of the North American imperialism.

First ask yourself what is “America”? Talking about the United States as “America” already ignores and marginalizes most of the people living in the American continents from Canada in the north to Chile and Argentine in the south. The population of the US is hardly a third of the almost billion people that live in the Americas. This naming that ignores your neighbors is only a symbol of the disregard toward and tramping over the people of the rest of the world…

Second, how do you define greatness? No doubt, at least when we speak about the most capitalist nation, that the economy is playing a central role in it. What most readers of the mainstream media might have easily missed is the “small” fact that the US is no more the biggest economy in the world. According to “The World Factbook”, a site maintained by the CIA, in 2015 China’s GDP (measured by purchasing power parity) was 19.7 trillion dollar, almost 10% more than the US’s 18 trillion. In fact China has already become the biggest economy in the world in 2014.world-factbook-gdp-ppp

But this raw measure is far from revealing the whole picture. China’s economy is in a positive momentum, while the US (and the rest of the imperialist powers in Western Europe and Japan) failed to get their economies back on their feet after the 2008 world financial crisis. To hide this we can read every day articles about the “slowdown” in the Chinese economy, which means that it is developing steadily at 6-7% yearly. In China’s planned economy they build modern cities (no shanty towns there) for 300 million people that will move from their villages to the cities over the next 15 years – that alone is like building a brand new USA or Western Europe.

The difference between a rising productive power and a declining parasitic empire is illustrated as we look at the relations of the two economies with the outside world. According to the same source, China’s exports at 2.1 trillion are 40% higher than the US’s 1.5, while its imports at 1.6 are only 70% of the US’s 2.3.

The good jobs that went to China, manufacturing everything from steel to trains to computers and smartphones, are not such good jobs any more. They don’t pay western salaries. It is just that people around the world can now buy all of these things much cheaper. This is another reason why we don’t cry with our USA brothers.

China is a different kind of world power. Its 1.3 billion people made all the way from being one of the poorest people on earth, just fifty years ago, to the top of the world economy by hard work and (relatively) good management. They are the first great world power that didn’t gain its place through occupation and exploitation of other nations. This in itself is a basic fact to think about and a major reason for optimism.

Imperialism is not working any more

The hegemony of the Western powers, and over the second half of the 20th century the hegemony of the USA, enabled them to dictate the world division of labor and the terms of trade to the benefit of the big multinational capitalist companies. This was the source of the “good jobs” that the US and European citizens are now longing for. 80% of humanity was forced to sell its resources for cheap and work for pennies in marginalized agriculture or industry and serve as an open market for the Western developed economies.

After direct colonialism and military occupations were not sustainable any more, neocolonialism and neoliberalism served the same hegemony very well. In the second half of the 20th century, almost any local leader in the 3rd world that tried to do something to develop his country was either deposed or assassinated by agents of the USA. Look for the fate of Patrice Lumumba in Congo, Mohammad Mossadegh of Iran, Sukarno from Indonesia, Salvador Allende of Chile and Omar Torrijos of Panama, to name just a few.patrice-lumumba

Bloody dictatorships, regional wars, civil wars, ethnic cleansing, bombing and occupation – no cruelty was too much to force the subjugation of the third world – the vast majority of humanity – to imperialist rule. In the nineties, after the fall of the Soviet Union, there seemed to be no challenge left to the imperialist rule. By that time most 3rd world countries were under some form of sanctions by the “international community” for this reason or that. Real commodities prices, representing the terms of trade of the 3rd world, reached unprecedented historic lows (see graph taken from a study by David Jacks in NBER). The global gap between the starving majority and the prosperous imperialist center seemed widening forever.real-commodity-prices-historic-low-in-the-nineties

But every party has its hangover. There came the surge of noisy protests at trade conferences and summits of the world imperialist leaders. There were the world social forums, looking for alternatives. When neoliberalism drove Argentine into an economic wall, mass mobilization casted away one government after another and brought to power (in 2003) the leftist Peronists, which refused to pay Argentine’s international debt. When, out of the blue, crazy Arab militants kidnapped airplanes and flew them into the WTC in New York, some people in the USA started to ask “why do they hate us?”

The empire tried to strike back to re-establish its authority, but somehow the world was not responding as expected. In 2002 the army in Venezuela tried to repeat the CIA coup scenario that worked so well in Latin America before, but the masses took to the streets and reinstated Hugo Chavez. When the US army occupied Iraq in 2003, it found that defeating the Iraqi army was the easiest part of it. Popular resistance made the occupation unsustainable and the ensuing US-imposed government in Iraq ended up doing business with China and closer politically to Iran, which is supposed to be the strategic rival of the US in the region. The US ended up burning about one trillion dollar in Iraq for no obvious benefit, (killing hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and destroying the lives of millions is nothing to count in world politics). It was about the same one trillion that were missing in its coffers when it financial system collapsed in 2008.

From Argentine to Iran, from Cuba to Sudan and Zimbabwe, when the Western powers were trying to force economic blockade of undisciplined third world nations, we’ve seen the new China factor. There is almost nothing you can’t buy in China these days. Over the last fifteen years the gap between the imperialist centers and the 3rd world started to contract. For the first time talking about “developing countries” doesn’t sound so hollow.

Dangerous curves ahead

Being optimist doesn’t mean that you should ignore the dangers ahead. One fact that makes the next period combustive is that while the USA is a declining economic power it still holds the strongest military by far. An irresponsible US president may try to use this power to try to “make America great again”. I do not think that there is a real danger that the USA can make itself the top world power again, but in the process of trying it can easily destroy humanity.the-end-of-the-world

We have seen president Obama declaring his pivot to East Asia, trying to build all kind of military alliances in the region to contain China. We have read the capitalist media writing endlessly with running tears about the danger to World Peace from China building some artificial islands, while they see no danger in the easily preventable death of thousands of refugees in the Mediterranean and have little problem with the continuing killing of hundreds of thousands of Arabs in civil wars in Syria and Yemen.

Some good friends that are fed up by US interventions in our (and other) region(s) are hoping for a Trump victory. They believe it will be such a disgrace that it will accelerate the process of diminishing US influence worldwide. It could happen. You can forgive them if they are ready to sacrifice the US itself for another period of internal racist tension and upheavals. But as I see that the decline of US power is irreversible, and the main danger today is from a desperate attempt to reverse it, I wouldn’t recommend taking the pill that may kill you.

It is us, the people

I would like to finish with one more optimistic note about democracy in the USA and in general. When we speak about democracy we should look for the substance, not any symbolic representation. How much power people really have to control their future?

First start with what comes up in mind in this election, the qualities of the candidates… It is my humble opinion that the candidates in this election are not basically morally different from most candidates over the last decades. I think the main difference is that now we know much more about everything, including about the candidates past, their connections and obligations to the capitalist class, etc. The other factor that comes up in this election is that most people are angrier and less tolerant to the behavior of the candidates – only that they differ about their priority target for anger. So, even as there is no positive alternative in sight, we see that the basic balance of power between the establishment and the people is changing as a result of technological progress, education and the crisis of the system.

Second the content of democracy is not the “consumerist” free choice between Coca Cola and Pepsi, as many US elections used to be. Till now voters in Iran had more diverse options (consider Ahmadinejad vs. Khatami) and more influence about the general direction of the regime than US voters used to have. In this election for the first time a more profound option, the vaguely socialist Bernie Sanders, came anywhere close to be counted.

The US is not ripe for true change, but in this election it already raised the glass ceiling that prevented women from contesting the presidency, and it may have its first Ms President. Not a small change if you remember that women are allowed to vote there only since 1920.

The greatness of US imperialism left its people weak and helpless. It deprived them of free education and health care that are taken for granted in many much poorer countries. It made them work longer hours and be thrown to the dogs if they are not useful to the machine. If they are Native Americans, Black, Muslims or Hispanic they may be terrorized or humiliated. The only statistic in which the US leadership is unchallenged worldwide is the rate of incarceration.

While the US multinationals had the power to rule and rob the world, ordinary people could only run endlessly along the predesigned competition for career and consumerism, with minimal control over their own lives and no say about the future of their country.

Now, as the system is disintegrating, it is the time that the people will take control of their lives. The American people (from Canada to Argentine, NY & Texas included), like all the people of the world, will be the winners from the demise of US imperialism.

(*) Comment about the title

I don’t know whether you share my associations – so I may explain.it-is-not-you

It is a common saying in “relations”, when a guy leaves a girl (or vice versa), that he tries to be nice and says: “It is not you, it is me”. Meaning, don’t blame yourself. I’m “not built for a lengthy connection”. It is intended to be polite, but as it became an easy pattern it is thought to be nasty.

I wanted to start with “Dear America” to emphasis the romantic cord – but many of my readers are too angry at “America” and may have no patience with my literature niceties…

But my American readers are really dear to me, and I hope they will find this piece somewhat consoling in these hard days.

 

Bomb 4 Peace & Work 2 Live

24 Wednesday Dec 2014

Posted by in Crisis of Capitalism, Socialism

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Colour PrintThis post was initially published in the new Bomb4Peace blog…

Welcome Nur to the blogosphere…

You called your blog “bombing4peace”, so I may assume that you intend to expose some of the annoying and dangerous contradictions in our world order. I know you experienced and suffered a lot from the contradictions of our distorted society. I really hope you will have the time and passion to bring more of your experience and reflections into writing.

To be more specific, I wanted to celebrate your new-born blog by relating to your first post.

You named it “I don’t want to ‘work to live’ or ‘live to work’”… At first glance it may look like an expression of “laziness” of a spoiled youth that don’t want to be enlisted to the mass slave-labor (or wage-labor) market. In the post you go much beyond your personal choices and propose a new world economic order, based on universal division of the really necessary work (maybe 4 hours’ work, 4 days a week) in order that everybody in the world will be able to live in dignity and still have a lot of free time and control of their life choices.

* * *

The belief and knowledge that “Another World is Possible” is an important part of our self-defense mechanism against our enslavement to the system.

Fighting for a better world is not only a matter of choice, but it is a necessity. You pose the question “how much work is really necessary?” In our age things are changing fast, and the answer to this question is also changing…

On my first year working in the factory (as a computer programmer), more than 30 years ago, our work week was shortened by a quarter of an hour, at the initiative of the management (We were never allowed to organize!). I thought this was the most natural thing, and that with the progress of technology we will have to work less and less. But it never happened again.

The Capitalist system failed to translate better technology and higher productivity to lesser work burden. This is in part because the system itself is causing high friction, inflicting immense extra expenses on everybody through wars, arms-race, the legal system, mass imprisonment, advertising, pollution, bureaucracy, the financial system, rampant consumerism and much more.

But unnecessary work is not the only damage caused by the Capitalist system. While the original meaning of work, as you suggest in your post, is to produce the necessities for human living, Capitalism converted work, or waged-labor, into a commodity that is traded in the market…

Our work is not ours any more. We are not making the things that we need, but we sell our working power in order to get the money to buy our needs. Our magnificent ability to change the world, our creativity, doesn’t belong to us but we are obliged to sell it in order to live… This way our work is converted from the essence of our Human lives to an activity that is forced upon us, mostly in frustrating and humiliating circumstances, many times in direct service to our most despised enemies.

This system of alienated over-work may not be sustainable much longer, even as we put all our effort unwillingly at its service.

* * *

In a special report about the world economy, dated October 4, 2014, The Economist investigates the future of work under the third industrial revolution – the consequences of the information and communication technology. It provides a wide perspective of the change that is just taking place… It estimates that about 47% of current jobs in the US may be replaced by computers or automation over the next decade. It describes how the percentage of the population employed in manufacturing has already peaked in many 3rd world countries before industrialization had the chance to pull them out of poverty.

In spite of all the amazing technological development over the last decade, productivity growth and economic development are slowing. The report goes on to describe the shrinking part that workers are getting from the hardly-expanding cake, while the rich elite are accumulating unprecedented wealth. Within the working population itself, the proportion of income of the top small minority is increasing while the fate of most workers is not improving or even getting worse. The types of available jobs is also changing, as middle-skill jobs with decent wages are most prone to be replaced by technology, and therefore, most workers are pressed to the lower skill low-paid jobs.

The prospect that the report is predicting for the majority of Humanity who live from their work is dire: “a generation of workers, the world over, is facing unemployment and stagnant pay”… By treating work as a commodity that workers must sell for their living, they conclude that there will not be work enough for everybody and the price of Human working-power (like any commodity whenever its supply exceeds demand) will continue tumbling.

* * *

We learn in High Tech that every problem is an opportunity.

Capitalism is a system that designates most of humanity to poverty, just because work (defined as the caring for peoples’ needs) can be done ever more efficiently. This system IS lunatic while yours proposals are pure logic.

Actually, what we are missing is political power to the people. As the Capitalists are controlling the state and the international system, they utilize them to their self interest – to make more money at the expense of the vast majority. More and more people today understand that only through political power this process may be stopped or even reversed. You can see it in the mass movement to raise the minimum wage.

If putting your effort in order to create better conditions for Human livelihood is the original meaning of work, than working for political change, working for a just social order, for Socialism, is the most necessary and productive work in our times.

You might even discover that writing your blog is also work… I hope it will not dissuade you from going on with this blessed effort.

* * *

To finish with some real-world hard facts about work and working times, I wanted to mention also a recent BBC inquiry into working conditions in the supply-chain used to produce Apple’s iPhones.

They report appalling condition in a Pegatron factory near Shanghai, with workers working up to 16 hours a day. They also report the exploitation of children in dangerous conditions in mines in Indonesia.

As all big companies expertise today in “Social Responsibility,” Apple was quick to reply that is making a lot of progress to assure decent working conditions along all its supply chain… They claimed to have reached 93% compliance with their generous goal of no more than 60 working-hours a week!!!

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Ilan Pappe in Haifa: The Arab Spring Puts Israel Against the Historical Trend

28 Monday Jan 2013

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Ilan Pappe in Haifa: The Arab Spring Puts Israel Against the Historical Trend

Historian Ilan Pappe is in Palestine, in homeland visit. On Thursday, 3.1.2013, he was a guest of “Herak Haifa” (حراك حيفا – Haifa Action) for a lecture on “The Arab Spring storm – how does it affect the opportunities for solving the Palestinian problem?”

“Haifa AlGhad” Club in Wadi Nisnas was crowded with activists who came to hear the lecture. Ilan Pappe sat on the couch in an environment where he is not “controversial historian” but a wanted partner. You might say he was “playing on home ground”. Everyone wanted to hear his insights as historian about the exciting events storming our region.

Pappe explained that in historical perspective the last two years are just a moment in time. Historians “guess what happened in the past” and certainly have no tools to predict the future. So what we can do is look at processes that have already begun and try to understand the nature of the new era we are entering.

He stressed that the Arab Spring is not a series of separate events in each country, but a comprehensive process of change that only started and can lead to profound changes in other countries in the region. Beyond that, the Arab Spring is part of a process of change in the global political map, as the “Western” hegemony of Europe and the United States is in crisis. This crisis includes an internal crisis that began with the financial crisis in 2008, during which it became clear to everybody that the heads of the capitalist system were cheating the public, causing deep damage to the economy and society as a whole, and no one is held accountable. Internationally China, India and other countries emerge as a central economic force, which can also affect the geopolitical balance of power. In this situation appears the Arab Spring, based on the direct action of the masses, with “Tahrir Square” a live symbol, as an example that a wide public would like to follow in Europe and all over the world.

Most of the lecture handled the consequences of the Arab Spring on the international scene and the position of Israel. It was evident that Ilan Pappe lives between different worlds, familiar with the ruling elites in Europe as well as left-wing circles. He talks intimately about the emotional aspects that accompany the Crisis of Zionism in the Jewish community and brings new winds from Egypt, where he recently attended a conference to discuss the Arab Spring with old friends from the left and new friends from the Islamic movements. Hovering between these worlds he outlines to the audience the contemporary political scene, seen from above but never remotely, with “Close-Up” on details from every arena and arena.

Changes in the world order

Pappe has characterized the Western hegemony as a world order “in which 10% use 40% of the world’s resources”. Today it is increasingly difficult to maintain this order. There is a danger of excessive use of force in an attempt to stop the erosion of the hegemony of the West, as was the case, for example, in the war in Iraq.

However, the main currently visible trend is the deep internal political crisis in Europe and the United States which accompanies the economic crisis and the erosion of global hegemony. Lack of confidence in the existing political system leads to the formation of a new kind of popular movements. There is a general desire for democratization, to protect the rights of those who were trampled all the time by the system. This is the “Zeitgeist” and it affects every arena and arena.

The new democratic spirit is also affected by technological changes and new tools that enable a wide public to take an active role in the dissemination of information and discussion about it. Today no regime can effectively block discussion. Young people take an important active role in these changes. The younger generation in China is not much different culturally from their brothers in the West. The democratic trends are not restricted only the West, but they can be seen everywhere, including Burma and North Korea.

The Arab Spring, as a democratization movement led by young people and mobilizing the power of a broad popular movement, constitutes an advanced part of this “Zeitgeist” of democratization and a role model for others.

Israel stands out in the world as a negative example of a state and a society which develop in a clear anti-democratic direction.

Undermining Israel’s status

For a long time Israel succeeded to maneuver itself to hold a major role in the global and regional agenda. After the Second World War the West wanted to restore West Germany to “the family of nations” as a cornerstone to its geopolitical alignment. Ben Gurion knew how to make the most financially and maximize Israel’s influence by providing forgiveness to “The Other Germany” in the name of the ultimate victims.

Later Israel was incorporated as a Western fortified outpost in the Cold War. At the end of the Cold War and the declaration of the “end of history”, Israel marketed itself as a modern open society which developed from a third world country to be part of the first. When the Western agenda abandoned “the end of history” and moved to “the war on terror” and the fight against Islam, it enabled Israel’s standing to reach its peak when it presented itself to the West as the most experienced expert on these subjects.

Now the Arab Spring presents a new model of democracy in the Middle East and Israel is exposed more and more as undemocratic. For the first time we see that Israel doesn’t know what to say and can’t adapt to the new era. Israel even fails to play the role of “experts of Arab affairs” for the West – a role based on the Orientalist approach – at this time. New realities in the Arab countries are imposing themselves on the political arena and Western elites get accustomed to working with the new authorities in Arab countries where Israel has no role.

Israel is trying to promote its own picture of the world. They claim that “the Arab spring turned to Islamic winter”. But even according to Israel’s favored scenario, if the West will accept their perspective, adopt a hostile approach toward the new Arab authorities and oppose democratic change in the region – Israel may find itself as a burden on the West and not as an asset that strengthens its control. In Egypt, for example, there is a deep disagreement between the Muslim Brotherhood and the secular opposition, but opposition to Israel and support of the Palestinians are a unifying cause.

Clearly, in a Middle East moving toward democracy, as part of a world where many are fighting for more democracy, when the Palestinian flag is used by everybody as a symbol of the struggle for freedom, Israel finds itself against the stream of history.

These changes will not translate immediately into an end to support for Israel. In the Military sphere and the sphere of interests Israel still has a lot of support – here values​don’t play any role. There are also the Jewish lobby and buying the support of local politicians with money – for example by donations to parties. However, power and corruption alone can’t maintain a political project over time. Support for Israel in the past was based on moral arguments and values, on supportive public opinion – for us it may all seem faked but it was a strong factor. Today all that is changing.

In the past, young Zionist Jews could be leading progressive students’ movements around the world. In today’s campuses they are busy defending Israel as an apartheid regime. For them it is a frustrating and grinding role.

In Israel today there is a majority which openly says “We want a racist Jewish state.” For those who want to continue to live by their lies and claim to be liberal and to protect Israel from a position of justice – the lie is getting harder and ever more tiring.

No wonder Israel today defines its “de legitimization” as a strategic threat. Previously it treated the issue through “Hasbara” (propaganda), diplomacy and foreign relations. Today it is handled also by its security apparatus.

The emerging powers, such as India and China, even if basically their policies will not be more moral, are not committed to Israel as much as the West. They don’t feel guilt for the Holocaust and Christian messianism is not a political factor there. Even in this respect Israel is losing the central standing it enjoyed so far.

The undermining of Israel’s geopolitical position makes the coming years very dangerous – there is a real danger that the government will take aggressive measures in a desperate attempt to stop the deterioration of power to which they are used. A possible attack on Iran is only one scenario that illustrates this danger. We might also witness an intensification of internal repression – the anti-democratic laws that were adopted by the Knesset illustrate this trend.

On the other hand, the deepening crisis can convert positions that were regarded marginal to feasible solutions people are ready to hear. To realize this potential, the people that carry these positions should undergo mental change, after they got used for a long time to be a radical minority whose voice is silenced. We should find the proper means to bring those solutions to the general public as a real alternative.

The solution of the one democratic state in Palestine becomes a hot topic for discussion in academic circles and in the media around the world. Pappe described how he, as one of the best known presenters of this alternative, can’t find time any more for all the requested lectures. But what should supporters of this solution do in order to present it as a real alternative to the public? Overcoming the difficulties of cooperation and building a shared vision between the Arab – Palestinian and Jewish components of this movement are an important part of the answer…

The Arab Spring

The lecture focused, as mentioned, on the analysis of the effects of the Arab Spring on the crisis of Zionism. Not much was said about the “gorilla in the middle of the room” – the Arab Spring itself. However, the general approach presented by Pappe regarding the essence of the Arab Spring was clear. This is a democratic process, in which many and diverse political actors take part, and at its center there is a mass movement which generates the change.

He spoke of the need and possibility for cooperation between the secular left – to which he, and most of the audience who came to hear him, belong – and the Islamic movements which are working for democracy. He mentioned as an example the fruitful cooperation that exists in England between the left, which is very secular and liberal regarding social issues, and the Islamic movements.

Answers to questions

In response to questions from the audience, Pappe clarified a number of additional issues:

  • No. Palestinians could not prevent what was done to them by Zionism. The problem for Zionism was the very existence of the Palestinian Arab inhabitants in the country in which it decided to establish its state, not any specific political position of these residents.
  • Concerning the integration of the Arab Palestinians who are citizens of Israel in the state – over time this integration becomes less possible due to Israel’s racism and therefore attempts to integrate become less attractive. Pappe asked why Arab parties still participate in the Knesset elections despite the lack of any real ability to influence through the Knesset and despite the benefits that Israel derives from this participation.
  • Many different political actors take part in the Arab Spring and there is no realistic possibility of one party taking control. Specifically, there is no danger of Islamic extremists taking control of Syria as its government tries to claim in order to gain legitimacy for it continuing control.
  • In the past the main slogan of the left was “secular democratic state”. Today the main slogan is “one democratic state”. Yes, this is a concession of the secular left. This concession reflects the need, in the conditions of the Arab Spring, to cooperate with Islamic movements in the struggle for democracy. The left should examine critically its own history and the history of the region, remember what was done in the name of the left and on behalf of secularism, and understand the need for flexibility and the central role of democracy in the region’s political agenda in this period.

You may read this report also in Arabic and Hebrew.

Posted by | Filed under Arab Revolution, Boycott the Knesset, China's Rise, Crisis of Capitalism, Jews in Palestine, ODS, Palestine, Zionism

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Assisi 2012– Greece & Italy

29 Wednesday Aug 2012

Posted by in Anti Imperialist, Crisis of Capitalism, Socialism

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From the time of the Black Panthers I remember the following small story. Long after Black Power won and established its rule in the States, two black businessmen in posh suits were entering a pub in Manhattan when they saw a group of poor white youth sitting with some guitars on the edge of the pavement and singing. One of the black businessmen tells his friend: “See what beat those white folk have in their blood”.

For long time revolutionaries from the 3rd world used to look from above on their comrades from the imperialist centers. It is true that they enjoyed better living standards and more freedom, but all the real action was in other places. The imperialist countries gained so much from robbing the poor people all over the world that they could buy the consent of their own working class with social benefits and democratic freedoms, corrupt the elite and local leaderships and give a civilized look to their class rule.

This is not true anymore. With China surpassing the US as the major economic power and after the political and economic failure of its military adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, the imperialist countries’ ability to bully and rob the rest of the world is not what it used to be.

This led to the global financial crisis that started back in 2007. This time it is not a cyclic crisis, correcting over investment and over capacity, but a structural crisis that already lasts 5 years and is not going away anytime soon. The Assisi 2012 Anti Imperialist camp was a great opportunity for us, coming from the Arab World in the idle of its revolution, to learn how the people in Europe are coping with this crisis.

Greece

On Friday morning, August 24, we met to hear about the situation in Greece, where the crisis is most severe. The comrades from Greece told the story of collapsing health services and education, idling fields and factories, rocketing unemployment and a population that is not sure whether it will have enough to eat. They described the rage of the people at the feeling that they are forced to pay the price for the corruption of the elite. They spoke of the despair as all the sacrifices of the poor people are tunneled to repay the banks and not to rebuild the economy that they destroyed.

But however clear it is what the international and local financial oligarchy is doing and causing, the alternative is far from clear.

Petros Al Achmar, from the Communist Organization of Greece (KOE) and the newly formed left coalition Syriza, presented the new hope of the left. Building a coalition of many political forces of the left since 2001, Syriza succeeded to raise it share of the vote from 5% to 27% during a short period in 2012, as the economic and political crisis reached new heights and people looked for an alternative that is different from the current corrupt system. Petros stressed that the key to the rapid development of Syriza is not only the collection of existing forces but also the openness to the new activists of the mass movement. It required the readiness of the leadership to hear and learn from the new activists and not to force on them its own ready solutions.

As Syriza prepared itself to form an alternative government after the June 17, 2012, elections, and as it rides the mass protest movement more than it leads it, its positions are duly reflecting the mood of the masses. It means that it is clear who is to blame for the crisis, but not too clear how to get out of it. Basically the question of exit from the Euro zone was not yet decided. To say the truth, I don’t know what the right path is, and whether Syriza could lead it, but I enjoyed hearing representatives of the sincere left in Europe trying to cope (even if only mentally, till now) with the task of leading their country.

Yiannis Rachiotis from “Antarsya” and Mikhalis Tiktopoulos spoke for the other part of the Greek left, which is not part of Syriza. They clearly proposed exit from the Euro zone but were more pessimistic about the potential of the mass movement for real influence on the state’s crisis. To some degree they were closer to the Anarchists position (that was not represented), which concentrates on fighting the system in the streets more than on posing a practical alternative. (Though comrade Yiannis made a nice try at posing concrete steps which a future left Greek government may take, including, for example, issuing internal bonds. As before, I enjoyed this one too.)

Italy

The last session of the Camp, on August 26, was dedicated to the crisis in Italy. The economic crisis in Italy is far from the Greek climax, but the crisis of the political system is even more profound. I will not handle it in much detail, but I wanted to mention Italy in connection with the Greek discussion because of the appearance of new type of social movements.

In Sicily a strong protest movement led by farmers and lorry drivers challenges the austerity and neo-liberal policy of the government. It was formed outside the established parties, blaming the whole elite, established political parties and the media for corruption and responsibility to the economic crisis.

From Sardinia we heard Felice Flori, leader of the Sard shepherds. He spoke of a unique local experience, with a broad coalition of popular organizations forming an “assembly” to challenge the established power. He showed a high level of consciousness when he spoke of the deliberations how to build popular power independent of the establishment, while trying to influence the established system through participation in elections.

This new type of popular power, building from the local level by uniting organizations of popular struggle, may be the way to solve the puzzle posed by the Greek comrades. If you start with taking the government from above, let’s say through elections, you may find that with the tools of a capitalist government you can’t really implement a very different policy. If you just fight it in the streets you leave it to the representatives of the system to lead and to give solutions. Maybe they are simply unable to do it. The ordinary people that suffer from the crisis must have some intermediary steps to develop their role from protest to leading a new type of society.

Independence vs. European Unity

Both in Greece and in Italy, one main scheme was the need for national independence or sovereignty. The most convincing argument in this direction is that the rules of the European Union are a dictate of Capitalist Neo-Liberal policies that the local government has no way to challenge. Regaining local independence in decision making is a pre-condition for trying to do something else.

This is in contrast with the natural tendency to think that a greater union is progress. It makes sense at a time of crisis to take a step backward in order to gain self control in a smaller framework. But the left should also regain the initiative and pose its own vision for European unity.