AUSTERITY: IT’S ANOTHER WORD FOR WAR.

Posted on January 10, 2013 by stutteringsteps

1) The attack is already under way.

Globally, the troops have been prepared, the weapons sharpened, the strategic headquarters of capitalism have been readied, the national command centres have been briefed and the local field marshals are on the alert. In 2013 the previous heavy skirmishes conducted by the financial, economic and political agents of capital, will be intensified into a veritable war against the working classes and the poor.

As usual it’s the bondholders and banksters among the 1% plus who will order an increase in the intensity of the war against the rest of society. Their colleagues in the strategic, decentralised headquarters of IMF, World Bank, Central and national banks, along with their paid mercenaries in national governments and states are planning the tactics and strategy. Their field agents in local governments and law courts are on stand-by – ready to wield the life-threatening armaments – and do their bidding.

The missiles this elite group of exploiters and spoilers of the planet, will deploy have already been successfully trialled in the past few years. They are bankruptcies, redundancies, price rises, tax increases, house repossessions, wage and salary reductions, monetary devaluation, welfare reductions, resource contractions and loss of civil liberties. Each weapon has been carefully fashioned and designed to take out a specific section of society. In addition to these hard physical weapons of civilian destruction, soft weapons of media propaganda will also be utilised.

The hard weapons, already loaded and awaiting to be fired in sustained volleys, will indeed destroy countless families and individual lives, throughout Europe, the UK and North America in 2013. They will do so by delivering poverty, ill health, homelessness, cold, malnutrition, crime, drug addiction and even suicide. For this reason the propaganda weapons will play an important role in the austerity war. As in all wars media propaganda will be deployed to make all the death and destruction seem regrettable, but inevitable and unavoidable.

The current economic and financial crisis has ramped up the economic and social war between capital and labour by a considerable degree. In 2013 it will be further intensified against the working classes and the poor in most countries. The casualties are now found not only among the long-term unemployed, a group which has been increasing everywhere since the 1970’s, but also among those who once felt safe. Even small and medium capitalist concerns will be sacrificed to the needs of the system and its bankers and bondholders.

It is a war in which the enemy is not only outside the territorial limits of each country, but also within it. The capitalists and their pro-capitalist supporters are ensconced in positions of political, economic and financial power in each country, from the Middle East, through Europe and on to North and South America. The local agents of this austerity assault on communities will offer the classic Nuremburg defence; ’We are only following orders’. They will display all the hallmarks of bureaucratic banality which clings onto ‘position ‘and attaches its own self-interest to that of maintaining the ’system’. The capitalist induced austerity war is therefore a global war in which the battle fields will be fought out primarily, but not exclusively, within nation states.

2) A first line of defence?

In times of all out war – in which innocent civilians will be randomly attacked – it is sensible for societies to prepare lines of civil defence. Unfortunately, very few people have recognised that this really is an all-out war and so defensive preparations are not very well advanced. Many people simply think that a rogue battalion of mixed conservative and liberal troops with too much authoritarian testosterone have conquered political power here and there. Consequently they just need to be told to stop what they are doing by sufficiently large demonstrations, petitions and frequent one-day strikes. The ultimately penalty envisaged being to send these ‘rogues’ back to their barracks by voting them out of office. If only it were so simple.

Yet this perspective and these very tactics have already been tried and found wanting in the Middle East, Greece and Spain. Undoubtedly, more of these tactics (and similar) will be, and should be, tried as the crisis continues to unfold. However, it is becoming obvious that no amount of verbal abuse, eloquent persuasion or mass demonstrations is going to shift these representatives of a global system of exploitation, from the hostilities they are bent upon. So where does that leave us? If, for example, there were political parties in each country with sufficient strength and determination to champion the policies such as the following;

a) refuse to pay the sovereign debts; b) refuse to bail out the banksters; c) turnover the zombie firms to their workers; d) fully nationalise the high street banks; e) close down all the futures and speculation avenues; f) institute a low maximum salary and a high minimum wage; g) introduce a maximum amount of currency which could be taken out of the country; h) confiscate the property of those who leave; i) end foreign interventions by our troops; j) abandon nuclear deterrent; k) limit the amount of land an individual could own and control; l) turn over all unused local resources to local citizens community groups.

Then an initial complimentary part of our civil defence would be support for such a party. However, with the exception of Syriza in Greece, no such parties exist and even Syriza does not – as yet – have a fully radical programme, which would do more than stabilise capitalism in the short-term and reintroduce it with all the same problems in the longer. Elsewhere the moderate left is not even substantially collaborating to maximise the effects of demonstrations, meetings and potential strike actions. The anti-capitalist left, despite a general recognition that austerity is an intensification of class war, has not shrugged off its sectarian competitive divisions based upon the desire to be the exclusive ‘leaders’ of any present and future significant events.

The obscene extent of the global inequalities, the international spread of injustices, the planetary scope of ecological destruction, caused by the capitalist mode of production, requires a general emancipation of humanity from this system. But such emancipation can only come from a section of society which is large enough, dynamic enough and generous enough to be prepared to champion, not just its own needs, but those of humanity in general. In the 20th and 21st centuries, no class has as yet arrived at that position and hardly any sub-group of the classes, including sections of the working classes, has articulated the need to become such representatives. Each class and each political tendency within each class are as yet primarily concerned with their own class and narrow political interests. And these are far from sufficient to found society anew.

3) A second line of defence.

In the absence of such an organisational development, and not being paralysed whilst awaiting its possible (and contradictory) creation, then working people and the oppressed should fall back on their own resources. Indeed, as the ordinary people of Greece and Spain (and elsewhere) have already demonstrated, these are many and varied and some are well established. Pressing need has re-instated the humanitarian deed. Defence against the intensification of the austerity war as it effects the working and non-working classes and poor in all countries subject to austerity war citizen bombardment, will need to include the following:

a) Local community defence groups to prevent damage and looting in disturbances.

b) Community action to prevent house evictions.

c) Community action to re-connect essential services cut off for none payment.

d) Community resource sharing (transport, tools, food, communications etc.)

e) Community trading. (L.E.T.S schemes, Credit Unions.)

f) Keeping open essential services. (education, health, fire, libraries.)

Such levels of local self-activity by working people will put communities on a defensive war footing as the government attacks increase in number and intensity. It is out of such activities that the presently missing – consistent – human solidarity can be created and the ’muck of ages’ be washed away. It is out of such activities, that the basis of a new form of citizen self-activity and reliance can develop. It is out of such activity that other sections of society can be drawn in and recognise – in practice – that another world is possible. It is out of such experiences that a deeper recognition of politics as being the problem and all forms of politics is merely a perpetuation of elite exploitation. It is out of such inclusive activities and the defence of non-profit-making forms of social production which will really point the way beyond capital. [see Defending Public Services’.]

Roy Ratcliffe (January 2013.)

[For an example of how subsidies are given to businesses whilst cutting back on welfare see http://blacktrianglecampaign.org/2013/05/15/the-hidden-welfare-state-that-the-u-k-government-dares-not-speak-of/. For more more on how the economic and political elite organise at a global level see  http://www.aworldtowin.net/blog/davos-elites-warn-of-perfect-global.html   [For more on the propaganda war against the victims of the capitalist mode of production see: http://stevedrant.wordpress.com/%5D

Posted in Economics, Finance, Politics | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

DEFENDING PUBLIC SERVICES.

Posted on December 28, 2012 by stutteringsteps

It is true that many of the public services in Europe, America, the UK and elsewhere are badly managed, some are corrupt, and others divisive. It is also true they were set up by bourgeois governments committed to the capitalist mode of production. In addition, many have been neglected in some places to the point of dysfunction and disintegration by a political class, that has seen only its own wealth creation and military status as the essential prerequisites of 21st century modernity.

It is also easy for those workers employed in the ruthless private sector to begrudge the often better working conditions and pay applicable in many public services. In addition, the once dreamed of inclusive ambition to level all workers up to the highest conditions, has been replaced by the neo-liberal nightmare of levelling these down to the lowest. So why should trade unionists and non-trade unionists not employed in them continue to defend public services if the recent track record is so dismal?

a) The historic function of non-profit-making organisations.

The ‘New Deal, ‘Fair Labor Standards Act’ in the US, the Beveridge ’Social Insurance and Allied Services developments in the UK, were part of a raft of alternative methods of economic and social organisation introduced in the west, before and after the Second World War. These initiatives were set up by the bourgeois elite for two main reasons. One was to grant reforms to working conditions which would distract workers away from militant action and thoughts of revolution. Another was that the massive loss of infrastructure and fixed assets, caused by the two world wars, was too great and insufficiently profitable to be replaced quickly by normal capitalist forms of investment.

From different causes, these two motivations are once again exercising the minds of the political, financial and economic elites. The state bailouts of banks and other capitalist concerns, such as General Motors in the US, and other state sponsored and funded re-structuring, indicate that from the right-wing perspective, the state is once again being used to stabilise the private enterprise system now it has started to implode. In this crisis context, nationalisations and public sector service development could also be again used by the left reformist (‘bourgeois socialist’) wing of capital to unwittingly save capitalism.

At the same time there are also those among the conservative bourgeoisie and petty-bourgeois who like the state to ameliorate the conditions of workers, without changing the system. In times of crisis both these constituents are able to share a common goal – the stabilisation and resuscitation of the system – from different motives. The program of Syriza in Greece, needs to be considered with this distinct possibility in mind. Nevertheless, this possibility does not mean these calls should be automatically opposed. For it is important to recognise that this massive and necessary development of the public sector in Europe and elsewhere, after the war, represented a considerably modified economic form to that of 19th century capitalism.

b) Distinguishing the ‘essence’ from the ‘form‘.

Despite their introduction by the pro-capitalist elite, these mid-20th century developments represented a distinct, series of non-profit making forms of organising social production. In this case, as in many others, we need to carefully distinguish between the ‘essence’ of something and the particular form it takes. All of these projects successfully operated without a profit motive being the functioning incentive. They were socio-economic models of production and distribution based upon perceived (sometimes misperceived) social need as distinct from models based upon greed for surplus-value and private wealth accumulation. They had their (often severe) problems, particularly their hierarchical structures and their subservience to the bourgeois economic and political system

For some people among the working class and enlightened middle-class of the time, these forms, particularly ‘nationalisation’ were in fact viewed as completely alternative forms to capital, within and outside the capitalist system. Yet viewed more soberly, they were clearly not alternatives – as they then existed – and in the political and economic context of the time could never have been. The most large-scale examples of this mistaken concept and practice, that a potentially transitional form is actually an alternative form, was in regard to Russia and China. In such cases, whole-scale nationalisation of the ‘means of production’ placed the production of use-values in the hands of a political party oligarchy, who continued to appropriate the surplus-value, for their own use and purposes.

The ‘mode’ of production, under Bolshevik and other vanguardist forms of ‘leadership’ was one in which workers became wage and salary-working employees of the state instead of employees of large capitalists. The extraction and appropriation of workers’ surplus-value by an elite section of society continued. The elite exploiters had merely changed their social identity (their personifications of capital) from members of an economic class to those of a political class. Some of these nationalised and public service forms of organisation and production could have attained more for workers if they had been viewed as transitional vehicles in a movement that was intent upon fully abolishing all forms of wage-labour and capital – including state-capitalist forms. But they were not.

Yet if a post-capitalist mode of production based upon production for social need, rather than private greed, is a necessary development for future societies, then the ‘essence’ of these large-scale public service industries has in many ways represented something valuable. Indeed, some are well worthy of preserving whatever the mode of production – free (at the point of use) non-profit based education, (lower and higher), along with health provision – for instance. All of which are now under attack.

c) Production for need versus production for greed.

As noted, the form imposed upon these non-profit-making organisations was a top-down, bourgeois model of management and control. As such these services were always severely compromised and deformed by this structure. Nevertheless, for a time they demonstrated two important results. First, decent products, efficient services, improved wages and salaries as well as sick leave, pension and other enhanced in-service working rights. Second, a practical sustained example, that large-scale organisations can function and develop without the need for a profit motive.

So I suggest that in the 20th century, three broad non-profit based economic structures had been successfully tried – co-operative societies developed from the 19th century and nationalised industries and public service agencies from the 20th. A fourth has been developed further than these 3 in the Parecon movement. All these models have proved their initial and mid-term viability despite some being shackled by management who became progressively elitist, self-interested, parasitic and ideologically opposed to this particular form.

However, it should be obvious that any form capable of being transitional, by definition, is capable of being transitioned in more than one direction. In the absence of revolutionary changes in economic and political power and lacking democratic workers and citizen control, that direction (in the ‘communist’ East as well as the capitalist West) was not forward – but backward into degeneration  – and now privatisation!

The pro-capitalist government agents of the Labour Party, Conservative Party, Democrats and Republicans, (and their equivalents elsewhere) with an ideological fixation on profitability, saw the public sector as inefficient, and costly. In other words nationalisations and public services, were increasingly seen as ‘alien’ economic forms to profit-maximising, surplus-value extracting, capitalism. And of course production costs (and therefore prices) in a method of production which provides good wages, conditions and welfare under the domination of, and competition from, the capitalist mode could not be kept as low as the private sector. However, this does not mean they were not cost effective or innovative.

So I suggest when public sector workers and others are defending the welfare state, education and local government provisions, they are not only defending their own jobs and the services upon which other people rely, they are wittingly or unwittingly defending a potentially valid transitional method of producing goods and services, and should be supported. In this sense, a future post-capitalist mode of production has already been partly revealed or revealed in embryo; by the unintended actions of pro-capitalist governments during the period of late 20th century capitalist post-war reconstruction.

d) Can capitalism really give birth to its opposite?

To those who dualistically condemn everything that is produced or developed, under the capitalist mode of production and created during its existence, I would therefore suggest caution and recommend a dialectical approach to consider. The following 19th century observation by Karl Marx on the capitalist mode of production indicates one such approach:

“At a certain stage of development it brings forth the material agencies for its own dissolution. From that moment new forces and new passions spring up in the bosom of society…. ..capitalist production begets, with the inexorability of a law of nature, its own negation.” (Marx Capital Volume 1. Chapter 32.)

The new forces, emerging out of the old, are the ‘means of production’ (machinery, raw materials, labour and the organisational methods of production) these ‘forces’ (including the waged and salaried workers) are the off-spring of, and reaction against, the domination of profit-seeking production, from within that mode. In normal times, we workers are alienated from our own production and in the regular crises of capital (financial and economic) we are further alienated from being allowed to earn and learn freely. To the capitalist and pro-capitalist elite, workers and their campaigns to protect and advance their living standards and the conditions they produce in, are viewed as an alien force resisting their pursuit of austerity for us and bank bailouts and profits for them.

Under the capitalist mode of production the processes and methods of production have been developed (over-developed in the 20th and 21st centuries), beyond the individual and narrow, localised dependency on skills and raw materials during feudal times. However, it has at the same time created a two-fold nature to the production process – one positive and one negative. The capitalist mode has developed the technical and social production process for producing use-values as a large-scale collective activity, but at the same time has created a despotic form of this process which is primarily concerned with surplus-value extraction.

So the effective socialised production of use-values is the other side of the coin – so to speak – to socialised production for the purpose of creating profits. Whilst anti-capitalists would want to end production for profit, for the few, I doubt whether most of us would think it desirable or even possible to end the socialised production of use-values. Our social reliance upon each other, (now globally) for our necessities and leisure is nonetheless a fundamental essence which will undoubtedly be carried forward beyond the present domination of capital. Marx recognised the further development of this socialised ‘essence’ and its continuous development with regard to joint-stock companies and to 19th century co-operation. He noted for example:

“The value of these great social experiments cannot be over-rated. By deed, instead of argument, they have shown that production on a large-scale, and in accord with the behests of modern science, may be carried on without the existence of a class of masters employing a class of hands…the means of labour need not be monopolised as a means of domination over and extortion against, ..the labouring man.” (Marx. Address to the Working Man’s International.)

Correct the gender specific term and replace it with ‘population’ and this undoubtedly still stands with regard to co-operative methods of production and importantly, as noted, this model has been further developed by the Parecon movement. But the above assessment applies also to other previously noted non-profit-making forms of social organisation in the production of use-values. The nationalised industries, the health services, education institutions etc., even in their deformed and distorted manifestations, have demonstrated in practice – not in theoretical propositions or fantastic left utopian imaginings – that high quality goods and services are possible without the organisational motivation being the acquisition of personal or collective profit.

e) For the defence and democratisation of public services.

If in discussions with workers and others, now and in the future, what other models than these are we going to suggest point the way to a future post-capitalist society? Are we to point to; the ’Soviet Union’; China; Yugoslavia; North Korea; Cuba? Do we really want to influence workers into preferring to resurrect capitalist domination rather than such forms of oligarchic domination, which went (and are still going) nowhere positive?

We need to not only defend these current forms, because in the current crisis, they are the source of jobs and pensions of up to 60% of current workers, and the services other citizens presently rely upon and need – that is indeed important. But we should also be arguing for much more as we raise the issue of the need for abolishing production for profit which self-destructively accumulates in the hands of a privileged class. True such nascent forms need to be democratised, extended across all service and productive industries and placed under the direct democratic control of workers and citizen committees for their potential to become a transitional basis toward a post-capitalist form of society.

Alongside petty-bourgeois socialist demands for further nationalisations to stabilise capital, we should be placing revolutionary, transitional demands such as placing these potential transitional forms under the direct control of workers and citizens democratic committees. According to this view a post-capitalist form of society does not have to look like the Soviet Union or China, under the iron fist of political oligarchies etc. It could look more like the best parts of the twentieth-century Europe, North and South America and elsewhere, without the pollution, without the poverty, without corrupt politics, without the obscene levels of ostentatious wealth, without hierarchical domination and without wars to forcibly extract raw materials and provide markets for capitalist profit making.

Roy Ratcliffe (December 2012.)

Posted in Economics, Marx, Politics | Tagged , , , , | 10 Comments

UPRISINGS AND REVOLUTIONS (Introduction).

Posted on December 13, 2012 by stutteringsteps

In a previous article [Crisis! So what else can we do?‘] I argued that among the anti-capitalist left there was much discussion of ’revolution’ and what initiatives given the developing crisis, might galvanise the masses into struggle. I asserted the following;

“However, some of these initiatives stem from a mistaken view, that small groups, with the correct orientation and ideas can stimulate  significant and sustained actions, involving large numbers of people – before the vast majority of the population are ready to do so. In this case, such attempts are bound to fail….. A parallel problem is that promoters of these initiatives generally appear to have insufficient understand of the dynamics and evolution of protest, uprisings and revolutions.”

This article itself gave rise to some criticism and discussion, particularly after its further posting on the Commune blog. Because that particular article was suggesting what could be done, much of the reasoning behind the last sentence of the above extract was not included. However, there is now a further article posted in above pages, entitled ‘Uprisings and Revolutions’ which attempts to make good that deficiency and make clear my own reasoning behind the original assertion.

The article outlines three economic and social circumstances which form the historical context for uprisings, civil wars and revolutions along with the general sequence of stages which serve to distinguish between the unfolding of these various social upheavals. It suggests that while such processes are complex, fluid, contradictory, and interconnected, recognising the outlined general stages and phases can be useful in helping to understand what is and what is not happening in the various struggles around the world. Popular uprisings are the collective – NO! Popular revolutions are the collective – YES! For those interested the full article can be read by clicking on the following; ‘Uprisings and Revolutions’.

Roy Ratcliffe (December 2012.)

Posted in Critique, Politics | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

THE SHOOTING OF MALALA YOUSAFZAI

Posted on November 30, 2012 by stutteringsteps

1. Yet another recent victim of religious ideology.

Malala Yousafzai is a fourteen year old Pakistani girl from the township of Swat in Islamabad. At the time of her interview on Aljazeera during the summer of 2012, she was a bright, intelligent, gentle girl who loved going to school and learning. She was very mature for her age and knew her own mind. During the interview, she gently disagreed with her father’s opinion on some issues, but showed her respect and love for him. She was clearly a young woman who sought information, weighed up situations for herself and then without rancour, arrived at her own opinions. On October 9th 2012 she was shot in a deliberate attempted execution and she barely survived the two bullets aimed at her. Yet in the case of Malala Yousafzai, and others, we need to look beyond the immediate horror and outrage and look at what motivated it and what reasons were used by the perpetrators to justify it.

The attempted execution was carried out by adult members of a fundamentalist religious group (the Taliban) on October 9th 2012. Armed with at least one gun they intercepted the vehicle in which the defenceless fourteen year old was travelling. Then these religiously motivated cowards attempted to end her life by directing two bullets at short range into the young girls head. She survived the brutal ordeal and was rushed to hospital and later flown to the UK for further surgical work to save her life. At the time of writing she is recovering. This cold and calculated execution effort failed as the bullet travelled along the left side of her jaw, narrowly missing her brain and thus failed to kill her. But what was her terrible transgression to deserve such a savage attempt on her young life?

The crime she had been found guilty of, asserted by her Taliban judges, was introducing western values into her community. The charge was not in anyway substantiated and perhaps for very good reasons. During the TV interview all she was insisting upon for herself and advocating for other females was the right for women to be educated. But that was apparently enough. Or was it? Was that really the full extent of her crime? In fact I suggest her transgression – in the eyes of her religious judges and those tasked with her execution – went far deeper than simply desiring to learn to read and write. Her full crime was to openly advocate “peace, education, freedom of thought and freedom of expression“. The latter two elements are the ones which religious authority of all denominations try to resist and the fundamentalists among them – most fiercely.

I suggest there were two further problems the patriarchal fundamentalists who planned her demise had identified. First of all she was a girl on the way to being a woman who could reason for herself and could not be cowed by words of a man – not even her father. Second; she was a living example to other young Muslim women that women are capable of being independently minded and could assert their rights against any religious assertions to the contrary. This from the standpoint of a patriarchal religion – that proposes a male supernatural being and advocates male domination in all affairs – is an anathema. And it is the resurrection and conservation of patriarchy which all the modern militant members of the three Abrahamic religions are intent upon achieving.

Given that the Taliban admitted its members carried out the judgement, authorised the execution and carried out the attempt, it is not difficult to work out that this was a religiously inspired attempted murder. It cannot be dismissed as a ubiquitous terrorist attack by anti-imperialists. It was not aimed at North American or European Imperialists and ex-Colonialists – it was aimed at one of their own. For this reason, there must have been a religious-backed discussion between members of the Taliban. No doubt after consulting with their religious elders, a decision was sooner or later made to punish the 14 year old girl for not adhering to the religious norms which the Taliban religious mentality think appropriate and insist upon. But just what are these norms, and where are they derived from?

The Taliban represents a certain segment of the religion of Islam. However, it is important to recognise that Islam is itself a branch of the above mentioned Abrahamic family of religions. All three Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam are patriarchal institutions based upon imagined and sanctified patriarchal ideologies. In theory and practice all three religions consistently and persistently elevate men’s authority above women and religious authority above all members of the religion. In particular, the ‘holy’ scriptures of all three religions repeatedly and stridently advocate and emphasise, the subordination of women to men. Below are some examples.

2. Religious justifications for the subjection of women.

Lest people try to use this article as a pretext for singling out Islam, let us begin with the Judaic Torah or Old Testament, before going forward to the New Testament and concluding with the Qur‘an;

“And the Lord God said;…in labour you shall bear children. You shall be eager for your husband and he shall be your master.” (Genesis 3 v 16.)

“Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection….For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and she transgressed the law.” (1 Timothy 2 v 11, 13 and 14.)

“Men have authority over women because Allah has made the one superior to the others,….Good women are obedient….As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them.” (‘Women’ Surah 4: 34.)

So here is a scriptural basis (one of many) of the denial of women’s full and equal rights in all three of the Abrahamic religions and this includes young women like Malala. These examples, along with many others, in their scriptures, make clear the patriarchal foundations of these ancient religions in the world of male hierarchical and authoritarian societies. For thousands of years the hierarchy of all three Abrahamic religions persecuted women and heretics in various ways. It is only in the last few hundred years that those living in European Christian and Judaic communities have been free of such barbaric tortures, burning at the stake, and summary executions for disobeying the religious elite and their supporters. Yet even in the 21st century, women, world-wide, are still not treated as equal to men. And Malala along with young women like her, born into Muslim communities, are increasingly not accepting ‘mastery’ from a husband, nor are they learning in ‘silence and subjection’, or happy to be ‘beaten’ and sent to bed.

Before a degree of European and Western arrogance steps in, we should recognise that in most western societies made up of Judaic and Christian religious communities, women are also not treated equally to men, despite generations of campaigning for equal rights. Societies in which one or other of the Abrahamic religions plays an important part are still male dominated and women continue to be treated as second class citizens. And in many cases women in Judaic and Christian societies are still expected to be subjected to men. Even in Western societies with secularised and equalised legal systems, rape and sexual harassment of women within and outside of marriage, are still common. These are the unsavoury cultural vestiges of that Abrahamic patriarchal domination tradition. So it is not all ancient history and enlightenment over here. As recently as November 2012 the English Church denied the right of women to serve as Bishops. The Abrahamic ideology clearly still maintains a stranglehold on the intellect and humanity of its adherents.

For this reason alone (and there are others) revolutionary-humanists are opposed to all religious power and control over people. And that opposition includes not excusing, glossing over or defending the ideologies associated with them. Whilst the defence of religious members from racist or sectarian assault and discrimination is something we should actively promote and engage in, this does not extend to supporting the ideologies which assist in their continued subjection. Let us be clear on this. It means not furthering the practical subjection of these individuals to religious authority by remaining selectively uncritical of that ideology and its implications. Silence and complicity on this issue and justifying this position in the name of accepting cultural diversity is a reactionary position. We can see what so-called enlightened religious thinking can accept as God-given with respect to women‘s employment rights, so how bad can it get when this patriarchal mentality really aggressively asserts itself? We have a glimpse with the shooting of Malala and its justification comes from the same source.

3. Religious justifications for killing in the name of God.

“Now go and smite the Amalekites, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both men and women, young people and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and asses.” (1 Sam. 15 v 3)

That is an extract from the Jewish Bible which Christians refer to as the ‘Old Testament’. Think about last months ‘fire and brimstone’ rained down on Gaza! And is not slaying men, women and children, exactly what the Zionists in Israel did to the inhabitants of Gaza and did in 2009? Will the Israeli Army Rabbi’s or others have not read this or any of the other such extracts before the Israeli Offence Force went into battle against the Palestinians? From the Christian New Testament we read;

“And out of his mouth came a two-edged sword, that with it he should smite the nations; and he will rule them with a rod of iron;” (Revelation 19 v 15.)

Although Christian economic and political rulers, such as IMF chiefs, Bankers, Obama, Cameron etc., now control nations mainly through economic and financial means, they nevertheless still wield the sword and rods of iron (now laser guided) in Iraq, Afghanistan and they did so in Libya. And of course the last thousand year history of Christianity is littered with corpses killed and tortured in the name of Jesus. So what about the Qur’an?

“He whom Allah has led astray cannot be guided. They would have you disbelieve as they themselves have done, so you may all be alike. Do not befriend them until they have fled their homes for the cause of Allah. If they desert you, seize them and put them to death wherever you find them. (Qur’an Surah 4. 88/89. Women.)

Sincere belief in this portion of Islamic ideology, as devout Taliban members will undoubtedly have, would suggest that the all-powerful Allah has led young Malala Yousafzai astray and she is no longer guided. The sentence following this proposition suggests that such followers can ‘seize and put to death’ any such deserter. And isn’t that exactly what was attempted on Malala in October 2012? Whilst not all members of these three religions would choose to follow such barbaric suggestions, (there are many more in these three religious documents) the fact is they remain as solid, accepted – even revered – parts of this ideology and so can be used by those who choose to do so. This possibility – motivated and justified directly by religious ideology – means there is a clear difference between support for a human beings rights and support for an ideology and practice which denies those rights in numerous other ways. The deliberate conflation of religion, culture and identity by those supportive of or immersed in religion, raises an important issue for solidarity among the oppressed.

4. Solidarity with the oppressed.

So solidarity yes! But as human-beings and workers not as Muslims, Jews or Christians. From the perspective I suggest we adopt, we should not fail to distinguish between a) ideologies which enslave the intellect and practices of the oppressed and b) the rights of human-beings not to be the target of racist intolerance. This is particularly important where this racism is thinly disguised as intolerance against a religion. In any case, racists and neo-fascists are not against religion, many are religious themselves. We should expose this subterfuge, refuse to accept it’s validity and thus ourselves distinguish between religion and the person. To my mind, simply or crudely to defend people as Muslims, Christians or Jews, against racist attacks is to defacto support their ideological subservience to Judaism, Christianity, Islam and their potential or actual subordination to the Rabbis, Priests and Imams. We should defend them as human beings. Yet this failure to distinguish between the person and the ideas they have been subjected to since childhood has been repeatedly manifest among the left, including those who class themselves as revolutionary left – particularly with regard to Islam.

To my way of thinking, this uncritical position also fails to recognise the existing tensions within Islam and those between secular tendencies against religious governance – particularly from women and youth. It is the latter two categories who bear most of the weight of this oppressive form of hierarchical governance. This false dualism may also omit to recognise that not all those oppressed workers and students in the middle-east and elsewhere, are Muslims. Some identify with Christianity or Judaism, and many are secularists. For the most part in the many anti-west riots and disturbances there is a tenuous and fragile alliance between political Islam tendencies and others, which – as in Egypt is already breaking down. We should not be party to effectively allying with only the political Islamists by blanketing them all together and defending them on the basis of their religious ideology. For it is an ideology which intends to reintroduce patriarchal, anti-female, anti-gay norms alongside modern forms of capitalist exploitation. Religion is part of the problem for humanity, not part of the solution. [See also ‘Religion versus Women’s Rights’]

Roy Ratcliffe. (November 2012.)

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GAZA-WAR CEASE FIRE: SO WHO WON?

Posted on November 24, 2012 by stutteringsteps

a) Who won?

At a superficial level it may seem as if the Zionist-based colonialist entity called Israel won the just over a week-long war. After all with their superior weaponry and expertise funded and informed by North American and European military sources, they had incessantly pulverised Gaza from the air, from land and from sea – all in order to subdue them. The Nazis tried to do the same to London during the Second World War and also failed. It is a historical fact that you cannot easily subdue a people and their culture by aggressive and belligerent military destruction. In contrast to this latest incessant Israeli barrage only a very few of the Palestinian resistance forces rockets were able to avoid interception and do damage. For this reason, the military mentality of the Zionists and those who identify with them imagine they have won. But struggles are not always or entirely won by military means. There are other factors at work in the modern world.

One is the fact that the Palestinian David in Gaza, despite this month’s battle with the Goliath of Israel, continues to exist. For sixty years the Palestinians have resisted being entirely cleared off their land even though the Zionists have re-drawn their maps to remove the name ‘Palestine’ from the colonised territory. Through armed struggle and two Intifada’s, Palestinians have continually struggled to assert the moral and legal rights to exist and to their land. They have not been beaten into submission. Indeed, they continue to fight back in the only way they can with the only weapons they have – civil disobedience, peaceful demonstration and now rockets and guns. Of course, just to exist is to resist; but to resist with whatever weapons are available is to resist positively. In this sense the Palestinians have continued to win against the Zionist struggle to obliterate them – and this time in Gaza they have won that battle again.

But in an even greater sense the Zionist have lost! In fact they have been loosing the moral, intellectual and legal ground ever since the world awoke to what was really going on in former Palestine. When the Nakba became internationally recognised as the Zionist putsch instigating the colonialist land grab in 1948, the ‘facts on the ground‘ were matched by the ‘facts in peoples heads’ and printed in the historical records. The last two bombardments of Gaza, operation ‘Cast Lead’ in 2009 and operation ‘Pillar of Cloud’ in 2012 have demonstrated to the world the complete and utter inhumanity of the ideology of Zionism and the inhumanity of those Jewish nationalists who have failed to break decisively and completely with all it stands for. Israel is increasingly seen as a rogue nation and the majority of its people an anathema to all who do not directly benefit from its existence. As with all such elitist ideologies, humanity has nothing positive at all to learn from the example of Israel and the ideology of Zionism.

b) Who else won?

It was claimed by many commentators that Mohammed Morsi role as intermediary won him a spectacular level of respect from the world’s leaders. He was feted by Obama and his political coterie. But did he and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood really win much by this action? The best the newly elected Brotherhood leadership in Egypt could do to openly and practically support the people of Gaza, was to broker a cease fire. No other form of publicly declared practical help appeared to be given to those suffering the bombardment in Gaza. Were the borders opened to allow support to go in and non-combattants to escape destruction? And are eulogies from Obama, Clinton and any of the other European and North American political pirates of capital any form of useful endorsement for Morsi? I think not. Quite the opposite! And of course the resistance of Gaza was not only the work of Hamas, who played a considerable role, but of all non-betraying Palestinians, Christian, secular and Muslim.

If a gang of thugs were holding you down, squeezing your throat and punching you in the face you may well be glad when they stop hitting you in the face. You would nonetheless still want the thugs to stop strangling you. And you would hope that any sufficiently strong bystanders or so-called friends, would not only help you but would intervene and insist the thugs did exactly that. You would certainly not expect bystanders to urge you to stop struggling or to stand idly by and watch as did the western international community of Senior Politicians. Yet this may be exactly how many Palestinians in Gaza feel now the week-long bombardment from high-tech weaponry directed from land, air and sea by the armed Zionist state has ended. Punching Gaza in the face may have stopped for the moment, but the economic stranglehold on the lives of the people of Gaza remains as the despicable blockade initiated by Israel continues. So there still remains much to be done.

c) So who are the other losers?

It is obvious that the very many dead Palestinians in Gaza, the injured and the survivors who have lost their families and their homes are the losers in this tragic and brutal demonstration of Zionist inhumanity. In a direct physical sense this – and those blinded by Zionist loyalty and killed or injured in the struggle against the occupation of Palestinian land – is the greatest loss. Buildings can be replaced, at least if and when the Zionists allow building materials and machinery to be imported to Gaza. Human beings can not be replaced as easily. But of course deaths and missing limbs, are not the only losses in this latest battle. Further related non-physical losses have been demonstrated over this latest period of Zionist blitzkrieg. They are different from the loss of life, and have been losses we need not mourn. There has been a visible loss of respect, trust and integrity in the international political classes – of all political and religious denominations.

Apart from occasional hot-air rhetoric, and the odd visit, what have the Arab and Muslim leaders throughout the world done in a practical way to aid their co-religious counter-parts in Gaza or the West Bank? They have definitively not grabbed the chance to publicly do more during the bombing and shelling. And the recent self-elevation of Morsi to status of effective dictator in Egypt demonstrates that the ideology of Islam as with Judaism and Christianity is an ideology suitable and necessary to the respective governing classes. It is not enough for them to allow people to choose to be self-governed by the ‘book’, whether this is the Old Testament, the New Testament or the Qur’an. The people must be ruled by them and they mean to enforce their interpretation of social conformity through the coercion of the state. All the US  war-mongering presidents have been devout Christians and the vast majority of European political leaders are similarly ‘guided’ including the war criminal Tony Blair.

The best the so-called liberal-democratic elite political bystanders such as those in America, Europe and Britain, could do during the time powerful Israel was raining high explosive blows on defenceless Gaza, was to urge them (as Obama did) not to retaliate in any way. The same people who have supplied military equipment, intelligence and personnel to Israel – knowing it will be used against Palestinians – unsurprisingly stood on the sidelines and did little or nothing positive. They are definitely the losers – even if they don‘t know it yet. The same politicians are being further exposed as such as they implement austerity measures to ensure that ordinary people in Europe and North America pay for the financial crisis created by their counter-parts in the public and shadow banking sector.

Finally, in the absence of direct support and through its continued collusion with the Zionist entity, the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, following the ’Palestine Papers’ revelations, are also poised to be the losers. One can hardly see how they come out of recent events with anything other than serious loss of standing in the eyes of Palestinians. So for anyone freed from one-sided partisan blindness, or sectarian prejudice – with the exception of those solidarity groups and individuals who spoke out and demonstrated, – there have been no other winners except the Palestinian people themselves. Their complete victory is not as yet assured but the justice of their cause certainly is. And if we succeed in creating a truly positive humanity out of the coming turmoil’s, their homeland will eventually be re-instated.

Roy Ratcliffe. (November 2012.)

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GAZA: THE LITMUS TEST – AGAIN!

Posted on November 16, 2012 by stutteringsteps

Once again the brutal onslaught of the hi-tech Goliath against the Palestinian David in Gaza demonstrates the studied inhumanity of the Zionist colonial entity of Israel. As in the case of ‘Operation Cast Lead’ in 2008/9, the most advanced weapons of destruction are being poured down mercilessly on innocent citizens in Gaza by the Zionist states armed bodies of men and women. The complete inequality of the two sides in this colonialist enterprise; one side an impoverished, oppressed, colonised people and the other side one of the most militarily well equipped and wealthy nation states in the world, once again is ignored by all international capitalist elites, most of the people of Israel and the international media. This new bombardment follows quickly after further colonial expansion in the west bank settlement building and the decade long calculated starvation of Gaza.

Once again the capitalist and pro-capitalist elites in powerful positions around the world not only stay largely indifferent to the sixty plus years of human suffering in Palestine since the Nakba, but also fail to condemn the recurring blitzkrieg mentality of the Israeli Zionists. The silence of the international ‘elite’ and their lack of action against the ongoing genocide and land-grabbing perpetrated against the Palestinians can only be understood from the perspective of this elites self-interests. The primary purpose of their capitalist system is the reproduction of capital on a global scale. This reproduction relies upon a reliable global system of raw material supplies and markets, which in turn relies upon a reliable governing elite in each nation state. All else, including any concerns for the poor, the exploited and the oppressed, are secondary or even further down the priority list.

Their silence and complicity with Zionism is not a mystery of intellectual confusion. It is simply not in the political and economic interests of global elites to condemn or take economic action against Israel. Their electoral support or economic activity would suffer from such critical positioning. Similarly it is not in the interests of the global elites to bankrupt the bond-holders and banksters in the present crisis, for this would impede their economic, social and political position or advancement. However, it is in their interests to continue to sell Israel weapons with which to destroy Palestinian homes. It is also in their present and future interests to bankrupt the lives of their own citizens, through austerity. For this reason, the global elites indifference to the plight of those in Gaza, is matched by the indifference of the same global elites to the increasingly impoverished plight of their own citizens in the current crisis.

The system’s structural economic crisis is being managed by this same global economic and political elite by measures which protect the future of capital and the lives of rich and impoverish the mass of ordinary citizens. The humanity of all economic and political elites, whether Christian, Judaic, Islamic, Hindu or Buddhist, is compromised by their connection to and complicity in the global economic system of capitalism. Hence their silence and inaction or at best mealy-mouthed statements of support and occasional rhetorical posturing for Palestine and their continued implementation of policies suggested and directed by the dominant institutions of global capital.

However, so enormous and so barbaric is the current and past treatment of those Palestinians trapped in Gaza, that it does represent a litmus test for the moral health of all people. Nothing any of the people in Gaza could possibly do would justify such treatment.  Their situation is the modern equivalent of the treatment meted out to the Native American Indians by the American colonists; the treatment meted out to the African native populations by all European colonists; and the Australian and Hobart native peoples by the British colonist elite. This was a treatment which was part of the global development of the capitalist mode of production in its scramble for raw material resources and market outlets for its production.

We can only read about those human tragedies of the past and retrospectively denounce them, but Palestine is different. It is a contemporary high-point manifestation of the brutality of the capitalist and colonialist oppression and expansion. In a world that has adopted a universal approach to human rights, Palestine reveals that for the global elite this adoption is no more than rhetoric. It demonstrates, along with the rest of the world’s problems, that the global capitalist elite and their system have no place in the future development of an egalitarian humanity. They and their system are ‘the’ barrier to be overcome. It also demonstrates the way that the domination of specific religious and cultural identities, can blind ordinary working class human beings to the plight and suffering of other human beings who do not belong to that specific cultural or religious ideology and identity.

Although the leadership of the Palestinian people only wish to establish a political state based upon the capitalist mode of production, this does not remove the necessity for anti-capitalists to support the struggle of the working and oppressed classes in Palestine. Nor does it remove our need to support the campaign for them to be freed of the Zionist onslaught against their very existence as human beings. The boycott and divestment campaign, as it was in the case of South Africa many years ago, is an important device for engaging people in this support along with other forms of solidarity activity such as the International Solidarity Movement and Palestine solidarity groups. Step up the campaign, speak out and act now when and where this is possible.

Roy Ratcliffe (November 2012.)

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THE SUBTLE CHARACTERISTICS OF SECTARIANISM.

Posted on November 9, 2012 by stutteringsteps

In a previous article (‘Sectarianism and the question of a general strike) I identified ten characteristics of sectarianism obtained from the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky. Despite my severe reservations concerning the Leninist and Trotskyist positions and traditions, on the question of sectarianism, they made important observations. However, my own experience during the past 50 years of anti-capitalist involvement, revealed two additional ones.  The first was the absolute denial by sectarians of being sectarian, whist not even being aware of, or considering, the full range of the characteristics of sectarianism. The second was the characteristic of being dishonest with each other and with the working class.

These are two characteristics shared by all political groupings who are in competition with each other for leadership of populations including those seeking to lead the working and oppressed.  This is because elite forms of leadership require influence over those who can be influenced and manoeuvres against any rival leadership bids. Within the anti-capitalist struggle this sectarian characteristic of dishonesty takes the following forms. Sectarians;

1. Often exaggerate or inflate the numbers (or active members) they have in their group. (In order to appear stronger and more influential than they actually are.)

2. Often exaggerate or embellish their actual influence among their chosen target audiences. (Usually for the same reasons as point one.)

3. Often claim that decisions made essentially by individuals represent the decisions of the group. (As point one, but also to give the appearance of genuine, active, democratic practices.)

4. Often hide their true intentions to other participants while offering a substitute intention and working toward their witheld intention and in the process undermine unity. (Because the true intentions may be rejected by potential participants.)

5. Often hide or deny problematic situations or dubious practices within their own ranks. (Since potential recruits would be more likely to refrain from joining or associating with them.)

6. Often violently attack those who expose, sectarianism, hypocrisy or deviousness in their group whether this exposure comes from within or without. This often takes the form of a clandestine character assasination of individual or group critics. (In order to defend their self-promoted, superior image.)

7. Often vigorously defend their own allies, irrespective of any transgressions they may have carried out. (Because they are more committed to group results than principles.)

All the above practices are  the stuff of politics in general and is the stuff of sectarian traditions within the anti-capitalist struggle. It would be difficult if not impossible to find a group on the left that hasn’t practiced one or more of the above and many of the additional characteristics in the previously noted article. However, it is obvious, that when such thinly disguised characteristics and practices come to light – as eventually they must – it causes disgust and repulsion among those who are genuinely committed to unity and trust.

Such revelations often result in a loss of individuals to the anti-capitalist struggle. For so many left groups are sectarian that many view these characteristics as fundamental to anti-capitalism in general, instead of the sectarian mentality in particular. This loss to the anti-capitalist struggle represents not just the numbers involved but the talents, skills and energy these individuals take with them.

This drain on the anti-capitalist movement has taken place over several decades and it cannot be surprising.  Solidarity and trust are essential features to develop the anti-capitalist struggle. If they are lacking, then all positive development is lost, and only suspicion and a fractured, splintered disunity remains. Which is fundamentally what I hope we – and others – are trying to overcome.

If we are to genuinely succeed in creating a different tradition within the anti-capitalist left, than that of past generations, then certain things follow. I suggest adherence to at least the following six principles would begin to create a different non-sectarian culture among anti-capitalists which could only have positive results.

1. Opposition to Capitalism in all its economic, social and economic forms.

2. Opposition to dogmatism and sectarianism.

3. Opposition to polemical distortion in disagreements.

4. Opposition to disrespect, sarcasm, and intimidation.

5. A commitment to sharing information and understanding.

6. A refusal to allow theoretical differences to impede or prevent joint action.

For the 10 characterisitics of sectarianism see Sectarianism and the question of a General Strike.

Roy Ratcliffe (November 2012)

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CRISIS! SO WHAT ELSE CAN WE DO?

Posted on October 29, 2012 by stutteringsteps

Among the anti-capitalist left there has been much debate of what is an appropriate course of action in the present circumstances of developing capitalist crisis. A great deal of conflict exists together with considerable impatience. Discussions and debates among the ‘left’ are tending to orientate around assisting and initiating class or population wide actions, and this via competing forms of organisation. Such attempts are largely by either invigorating existing ones, such as trade-unions and political parties, (eg the Labour-Party in the UK) or initiating new ones such as Occupy and Syriza in Greece.

However, some of these initiatives stem from a mistaken view, that small groups, with the correct orientation and ideas can stimulate  significant and sustained actions, involving large numbers of people – before the vast majority of the population are ready to do so. In this case, such attempts are bound to fail. And of course, simply turning out in large numbers to demonstrate (as the cases of Greece and Spain indicate) or vote will be insufficient to solve this present structural crisis. A parallel problem is that promoters of these initiatives generally appear to have insufficient understand of the dynamics and evolution of protest, uprisings and revolutions.

In particular, a number of ‘left’ initiatives also suffer from an overly subjective and bourgeois view of history. They tend to exaggerate the importance of leadership and talented individuals as key motive forces of changes in economic, social and political affairs. Bourgeois historical methodology predominantly focuses upon the great figures in history – kings, statesmen, military leaders – and imagines it is these characters that galvanise, stimulate or create the development of important events and historic transformations. From this elevated individualist viewpoint, the ordinary people, the microscopic incremental social changes, the day to day processes of production, the moods of the population are inevitably held in the background whilst these figure-heads, reflecting hero worship (or aspirations in that direction) are posted in sharp focus and placed upon various historic pedestals.

This same phenomena is manifest within some sections of the anti-capitalist movement as former ’leaders’ (such as Lenin and Trotsky) are treated to the same bourgeois form of elevation to hero or guru status, while the real dramatis personnel – the workers and oppressed others – are absent or appear only in blurred grey streaks across the historical record. One of the rare personalities in the anti-capitalist movement, who did not follow (or aspire) to this tradition was Karl Marx. He rarely credited any individual – including himself – with any such pivotal position of importance. Although occasionally recognising some outstanding contributions by individuals, in all his researches, he concentrated upon classes, economic categories and historical processes, as being the real motors and engines of economic, social and political developments.

Accordingly, when informed of the contents of a planned workers congress in Zurich he responded critically in a letter. He considered its organisers had their ‘heads in the clouds‘, and were contemplating ‘phantom problems’ when he wrote the following;

“What should be done at any definite moment in the future, and done immediately, depends of course entirely on the given historical conditions in which one has to act…….The doctrinaire and inevitably fantastic anticipation of the programme of action for a revolution of the future only diverts one from the struggle of the present.” (Marx to Nieuwenhuis. February 1881.)

This letter contained useful advice which still has contemporary relevance. The letter clearly warns against adopting doctrinaire positions and ‘fantastic’ anticipations of programmes of action and revolution. It also suggests formulating proposals after giving serious thought to the given historical conditions. For revolutionary anti-capitalists, those conditions involved a realistic appraisal of the economic, social and political elements of contemporary life at the time, not one or other variety of wishful thinking or anticipation of an impending revolution. [see for example ‘Uprisings and Revolutions’] If we consider these historic conditions today we cannot avoid including the following.

A) A fundamental, structural and episodic, economic and financial crisis.

B) The complete abandonment of any serious anti-capitalist positions among all the major political parties in Europe and North America along with the modern trade union movements.

C) The spectre of Stalinist sectarianism and its post-capitalist form in the Soviet Union, China and elsewhere which continues to damage and inhibit the post-capitalist project.

D) A divisive and debilitating residue of Leninist and Trotskyist sectarianism and vanguard elitism within the revolutionary anti-capitalist tradition, which further distorts the anti-capitalist and post-capitalist viewpoint.

E) The almost virtual absence of any serious anti-capitalist economic theory among the vast majority of the population, including that proportion organised within the trade union movement.

For those anti-capitalists who accept that the above five aspects of the current historical conditions are of key importance, certain things should follow. If we also accept that the capitalist mode of production is one which is destructive of the welfare of large numbers of humanity and the planet’s ecological balance, then certain responsibilities also attend that understanding. The first task, I suggest, is that of widening the understanding of the fundamental nature of the current crisis. Without this understanding only varieties of Keynesian and neo-liberal policies are likely to be proposed and pursued. I suggest that this economic understanding is best guided by the forensic economic analysis of Karl Marx, in Das Capital and other of his associated documents.

A study of the history of the anti-capitalist movement suggests that Das Capital was not well understood even by various 19th and 20th century intellectuals within the anti-capitalist movement, let alone those workers who at the time could barely read or write. Given the neglect of Marx after the sectarian distortion of anti-capitalist theory and practice, an economic vacuum of radical criticism exists. It is not surprising therefore, that Keynesian and other bourgeois doctrines persist among the organised and unorganised working class for many workers today do not understand the real and fundamental nature of the capitalist system and its current crisis. All mainstream economic, financial and political observations and suggestions are therefore dealing primarily with the symptoms rather than causes and workers are left considering and pursuing solutions to the ‘appearances‘ presented to them by those among the elite, who oppose to their interests.

This in turn is leading to workers, workers organisations and suffering interest groups only making defensive proposals to deal with one or other symptoms of the crisis, rather than the cause. A degree of that misunderstanding is inevitable, but it is logical that that degree should be reduced where possible. Only a revolutionary anti-capitalist perspective can begin to counter this form of ideological confusion and to counter it – it needs to exist in larger numbers than at present.

Although a minutely detailed economic understanding of capital is not necessary for all those involved in anti-capitalist activity, the basic principles do require a wide level of understanding among all anti-capitalists. Dissemination of such a critical understanding of economic production under the capitalist mode, is being hampered by the fact of sectarian divisions among the left. It is further hampered by the impatience of those on the left who wish to leap over this step and prioritise the immediate building of defensive organisations. It need not be a case of either/or; but both.

For the history of revolutions demonstrates that masses do not move into large-scale protest movements until their situation becomes extremely desperate. Even then the general perspective of the masses for a definite period of time is one of challenging the existing economic and political system to change its direction, modify its programme and ameliorate their worsening situations. Whilst this period exists, revolutionary transformations do not automatically occur under the impetuous of even large-scale demonstrations, general strikes or even mass uprisings.

The latter, where they occur, are merely akin to the seismic trembling of the earths crust – which may or may not result in a large-scale volcanic eruption or serious tectonic plate shift. This noted initial trend of workers and others making demands upon the existing system has been repeated in the 21st century by the examples of Tunisia, Egypt, Lybia and Syria in the middle east and North Africa, along with Greece, Spain, Italy, France, Portugal in Europe and to a lesser extent in the UK. Nowhere has this tendency been exhausted. The mis-labelling of middle-eastern uprisings and demands upon the existing system, as ‘revolutions’ indicates this confusion exist among the bourgeois as well as many left commentators.

The fact that the majority of the citizens are as yet only stirring into sectional activity and subject to at least some democratic illusions concerning the economic and political system they live under, makes it a mistake to focus predominantly or only upon agitation to organise large-scale sectional actions. When workers and others are ready, they will stir themselves and begin to act on mass. When they do so they will be better equipped for the struggle if they (or at least many among them) have absorbed an understanding of the economic essence of the capitalist mode of production and the need to champion and defend all oppressed sectors of society – not just their own!

To my mind the task of revolutionary anti-capitalists is to work alongside such workers and convince them by discussion and by the results of their defensive and reformist struggles that the capitalist system holds no future well-being for themselves, their neighbours, their offspring or the planet. That task of convincing others cannot be done unless those anti-capitalists are capable of understanding the system itself and of being able to work positively (in a non-sectarian fashion) alongside workers and non-workers.

Of course, part of that society-wide learning will be by their own direct experience, but another part should be played by being informed of the history of class struggle against capital along with the lessons learned. The responsibility for the dissemination of that history and the lessons learned during it lies at the moment with those anti-capitalists who are part of a non-sectarian, non-elitist milieu. It would be of considerable assistance to workers if a milieu developed who see their task, not as authoritarian leaders with the solutions already in their pockets, but as egalitarian facilitators of the self-activity of working people and the oppressed. In addition to the above need to understand and disseminate more fully the economic contradictions of the capitalist system, the further tasks of such individuals and groups I suggest should be;

2. To fully understand, explain and overcome in practice, the sectarian heritage of the anti-capitalist tradition.

3. To help facilitate, extend and develop an international, non-sectarian network of anti-capitalists and workers.

4. Where possible, to assist and support anti-capitalist, anti-globalisation and anti-ecological-destruction issues and campaigns.

5. To share with all those in anti-capitalist, anti-austerity,  anti-cuts, and other defensive struggles those above-noted understandings and critical re-appraisals to begin to positively reassert the humanist possibilities of a post-capitalist form of economic society which produces for need rather than greed.

That task has begun in a number of places around the world, but as yet it is sporadic and few in numbers. It would be useful over the coming months if a network of internet sites and contacts, could be created among those who share this or a similar perspective. In this way the pooling of knowledge and sharing good practice could be developed. If one already exists – all the better – please let me know! It is to be hoped that others will soon join in and assist in creating a critical-mass which will in various ways be able to make an effective contribution to clarifying the struggle against the champions of capital and resurrect the struggle for a post-capitalist society. One which fully understands how to avoid replicating the disasters of previous attempts.

Roy Ratcliffe (October 2012)

Additional points to those above are made in ‘The Revolutionary Party; Help or Hindrance‘; ‘Marxists against Marx’; and ‘The Five-fold Crisis of Capitalism‘.

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SNAKE-OIL REMEDIES FOR CAPITALISM.

Posted on October 18, 2012 by stutteringsteps

Quack doctors selling snake-oil and other supposedly effective remedies were popularised in US Cowboy adventures on the silver screen when I was a youngster. They rolled into town and offered bottles of the stuff to naïve citizens claiming it had qualities which would cure any ill that the human condition might suffer. Now we have a similar situation with regard to so-called contemporary ‘experts’ in curing the economic woes of capitalism. Each expert has his or her own brand of economic snake-oil and show up on our TV screens offering remedies that they insist are sure to be part of the cure for the sick system of capitalism. Some of these prescriptions have been covered in previous articles, particularly ‘Q3: Bailouts and Banks; and ‘Bonds and Bubbles’. This article will outline some more of them touted in the media as means of solving the ‘five-fold crisis. It will hopefully become clear from analysing them that the system cannot be saved by reforming various aspects of it.

1. Saving Capitalism by boosting spending.

As a way of trying to create economic growth, there have been a few suggestions recently by so-called economic experts that the government should not just print more money and give it to the banks, but give every adult a few hundred pounds to spend. The suggestion includes conditions which should be placed upon it; to be spent on sensible commodity items and within a set period of time – for example one or two months. The idea is that people will spend the money, shops will take on more staff, sell their stocks and re-order from manufacturers who will take on more staff and increase production. Whilst it ‘appears’ on the surface to make sense and have its attractions, economically it is a nonsense proposal for the following reasons.

Let us assume, for example, that the UK government gives out £200 to 40 million adults (a total handout of £8 billion) with the above conditions stipulated. In the first months shops are busy, take on temporary staff, have a bonanza and order more goods. The manufacturers, increase production, through overtime and/or temporary staff. Are new factories going to be built? No! Are high levels of permanent jobs going to appear? No! After the months are over, trade drops back at least to previous levels, shops order less, manufacturers cut-back production again. Temporary staff are laid off and the situation is back to its previous condition.

Or is it? Of course not – for at least 3 reasons! 1. Forty million people do not have to buy the things they have just purchased. 2. Retails capitalists have gained a share of the £8 billion. 3.Manufacturing capitalists have got a share. 4. The government is now £8 billion (minus the VAT they get back) further in debt. And so in the months after, the economic level may go further down than before and the government must raise taxes or cut expenditure. And all the above is assuming the very best scenario, for it is by no means certain that all the retail shops will increase the orders from UK based manufacturers. It is more likely the case that they will find ways to purchase cheaper supplies from the global market.

It only sounds a good idea if you don’t stop to think about it, but now more than ever we need to stop to think about things the elite are suggesting. This is not to suggest that giving people some of the money back which the capitalists and government have previously extracted from their labour, is not a good thing in itself, but it is not a cure (or even a partial cure) for the massive contradictions within the capitalist mode of production. And of course as a policy objective it would act as a distraction. A similar process would occur with any country which adopted such a suggestion and that is exactly why it is unlikely to be adopted anywhere.

Another allied scheme for saving the system by boosting spending, is the idea of payment of a ‘living-wage’. The idea that a certain level of wage is necessary to live and that the government-set minimum-wage is insufficient, pre-supposes wage-slavery and the continuation of capitalism. Of course a higher-wage, whilst the system persists is something to campaign for, but the idea of certain local authorities and private companies paying a ‘living-wage’, on a voluntary basis, leaves out of consideration those who are not so employed and those who are unemployed. Since under austerity, the former are getting less numerous and the latter more so, this will do nothing to seriously stimulate the economic activities of a country or region. Nor will it solve the problem of a satisfactory existence for the bulk of society – those who will not get a ‘living-wage‘.

For the sake of brevity, this is an extract from a longer analysis of six ‘remedies’ suggested by various schools of political and economic thought. The other snake-oil remedies are as follows.

2. Saving Capitalism by increased taxation.

3. Saving Capitalism by more/better regulation.

4. Saving Capitalism by increasing competitiveness.

5. Saving Capitalism by economic growth.

6. Saving Capitalism by further privatisations.

The full article discussing the five above suggestions appears with the title ‘Snake-oil for Capitalism’ in the black strip below the picture banner at the head of this page, or by clicking on the following link.

https://criticalmassdotnet.wordpress.com/snake-oil-remedies-for-capitalism

Roy Ratcliffe (October 2012.0

 

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BONDS AND BUBBLES.

Posted on October 5, 2012 by stutteringsteps

Bonds.

Bonds are pieces of paper which are offered to the financial sector for investment purposes by two types of institution. First is the private company who, if they cannot or do not want to raise money in any other way, offer a paper promise (the bond). The promise is to return a certain amount (the bond value) at a future date in return for some cash. In order for bonds to be bought, there must be large quantities of liquidity within the overall financial sector otherwise there would be no point in offering one to the bond-market. This cash the bond issuers can use in two ways. They can use it (as with any spare internal revenue they have on their books), to develop production or they can use it to speculate. In the case of government bonds (sovereign bonds) it is generally used for revenue.

One element of the existing crisis arose because bonds were issued by firms in the past and the funds used to speculate. Many, if not most of those speculations, went sour during different phases of the crash. In other words many of those companies and financial institutions now still have high levels of debt. As argued in a previous post (Bailouts and Banks) those companies are hardly likely in the present circumstances to issue more bonds for either purpose. On the other hand most of those companies which did not speculate and are still financially sound, are also unlikely to issue bonds for the reasons mentioned above. They are hanging on to their large positive balance sheet entries. A lack of present demand, and given a promised future of austerity, a probable lack of future demand, is highly unlikely to tempt these and other firms to increase production. But these are not the only source of bonds.

A second source of bonds are those issued by governments. These have been much in the media’s attention of late. The tax income of 20th and 21st century governments, from all sources, is insufficient to sustain their expenditures. The debt of governments has increased to such a level, that there is now a genuine possibility of a future series of sovereign debt defaults (ie a governmental failures to pay). For this reason, those who purchase them are insisting on the interest they effectively receive on these bonds, from governments deemed most likely to default, is high. In this way those governments most in debt, are getting even more in debt. Some governments are having to issue bonds just to pay the interest on previous and current bonds. Even the so-called strong Governments such as the USA, the UK and Germany, are heavily reliant on bond income for their survival.

An interesting fact about bonds is that those who purchase them in effect are giving very little money away. This is because in exchange for their money-capital, they are given a certificate (the bond) which can be – and is – traded and exchanged like any other asset or money. So in normal times buying a government bond for a capitalist or capitalist consortium is almost like doubling the quantity of money invested. It’s ’substance’ enables the bond to be sold and a second investment to be made with a asset value not much less than the first. All this without risking any further money. In this way at least two investment vehicles can be operating with the one advancement of finance-capital. Also because the government bonds are issued by the state and the ultimate payees of the bond are all the tax-payers, then every tax-payer, who cannot ‘dodge’ their tax is in debt to the bond-holders without ever having entered into that debt themselves. This is the bond-holders trump card, with pro-capitalist politicians in charge, sovereign bonds are financial instruments of mass destruction for communities.

This new twist has been designated as ‘collateral transformation’. One of the definitions of ‘transformation’ is ‘alter out of recognition’ which is apt in this case for this is exactly what is intended. Note here that this ‘transformation’ just continues previous business as usual and as before merely hides the flimsy nature of the paper-backed assets along with the considerable risk of default. At the same time it should be noted that these so-called ‘high-grade’ collateral assets which are to be ‘rented out’ in this way are nothing more than government bonds. Bonds, which we have seen are nothing more than paper promises to pay – issued by governments who have no possible way to repay them! How sensible is that? Guess who are already gearing up for this new ‘transformative’ trading? JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Barclays, Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank! Does this list ring any bells? Clearly nothing has been learned from the previous crash and the feeble efforts to hinder this practice have already been crudely subverted.

So much for the USA. Meanwhile across the pond! In Europe a so-called solution has been contrived by the political and economic elite, whereby the European central bank (ECB) will buy up the bonds, or guarantee them, providing the sign up to certain conditions (conditionality). It is hoped by this measure that the bond-market will continue to lend to government at more reasonable interest rates. ECB conditionality effectively dictates central-bank policies to governments. It is an attempt to overthrow European democracy by financial dictatorship. The conditions which will be demanded of course will comprise of cut-backs in government expenditure and the selling off of state (peoples collective) assets. These cut-backs, as those elsewhere, will of course not solve the underlying problem. They will as they are implemented, cause the destruction of working peoples standards of living and in some cases their lives, and of course, fight-backs. But austerity programmes also have further economic effects.

Cut-backs in government spending will also take further demand out of the market and so undermine any government activity trying to stimulate growth. But also note here the overall surreal nature of this crazy circuit. The central government prints money, via its central bank (ECB in Europe) and gives it to the banks. The banks lend it to financial investors and institutions, who give it back to governments in exchange for government bonds. The governments then spend it on their salaries and favoured war projects etc., but of course they are supposed to pay the value of the bonds to the investors. Just in case they cannot, the central banks guarantee to buy the bonds back if the individual governments can’t honour them. Think about it! Central Banks representing governments are printing money, practically giving it away in order to get it back again via the financial sector and paying interest for the privilege. In the process making the bond-holders, their ilk and their brokers even richer.

If it weren’t for keeping their buddies among the financial elite happy, it would make more capitalist sense to just print money and give it directly to the investors and cut out the middle-men? The full stupidity of this solution to the sovereign debt crisis is revealed by the fact that at no stage does this any phase of this money-printing circuit involve stimulating fundamental economic activity. But of course printing shed-loads of money tokens and handing them out to the rich individuals and institutions will enable some things and stimulate others. It will enable members of the political class to get jobs in the City of London and Wall Street (the revolving door between governments posts and jobs in the finance sector.) and importantly the extra financial assets will stimulate more bubbles.

Bubbles.

The publicity around the toxic mortgage crisis of 2007 also revealed the tip of an iceberg of what are generally called ‘financial bubbles’. These bubbles are more frequent than is often assumed and they occur when large amounts of finance capital chase what is seen as sure thing, ’value-enhancing’ investments. In such cases, there is an expectation that the investment opportunity targeted will continue to rise in value and so more and more money chases assets tied to the target. This initially has all the symptoms of a self-fulfilling prophesy, for the sequence of purchases boost the price of the asset and therefore it seems indeed to be increasing in value by the ‘obvious’ fact of its increasing price.

However, price and value are not always the same thing. Indeed, they rarely are. Prices always fluctuate, for a variety of reasons, above or below the value of anything. In the case of bubbles the price is pushed up by chasing demand and is based upon hopes far more than reality. It continues until a point is reached when some investors, start to sell because they recognise this and fear a downward trend. This too becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. As more people sell, the price continues to drop and eventually a virtual downward stampede occurs and the price drops catastrophically. As it did in the dot-com bubble of the 1990’s and again in the more recent housing bubble. When bubbles burst, as they always do, some of the rich investors lose all or substantial amounts of their investments.

So if the previously noted further printing of money will not stimulate economic growth in general, it will almost certainly stimulate further bubbles. How can it not do otherwise? With huge dollops of money available at low interest are the speculators, now accustomed to big returns and the brokers used to huge fees, simply going to stop at home and watch TV? No! Sooner or later, they are going to search frantically for something or somewhere to ‘put’ their money for safety or enrichment. Just watch Bloomberg TV for an afternoon, to see the amount of effort being put into the search. But even looking for safety is a form of competition which has the potential to produce its own bubbles as it has partially done in the case of gold and other metals.

According to some economic statisticians, the dollar value of Gold has increased by 460% from $250 per ounce in 2000, to almost £2,000 dollars per oz, in 2012. Over the same 12 year period, silver has increased by 650%, Copper by 450%, Iron by 760%, zinc by 169%, nickel by 170% and Uranium by 370%. These calculated percentage rises, accurate or not, are not all to do with the costs of production increases, for in some cases costs have come down or stayed the same. One part of this rise is due to the depreciation of money as a measure of value, but another is due to this abundant money supply as finance-capital chasing the relative safe harbours of essential raw materials. These increases are not all certain bubbles, but they are the thick froth of speculation fermented by the invasive spores of finance-capital greed.

As noted, when the bubbles pop, the bubble chasers lose, but these are not the only casualties, because those at the bottom of the capitalist pyramid, are dependent, – whilst it exists – upon the capitalist mode of production. The bubble losses, cause further contractions and dislocations in the value and surplus-value creating circuit of capitalist production, which only employs labour for the purpose of creating surplus-value and thus profits. If credit shrinks, debt increases and profits fall drastically, as they do in a financial crisis, then practically everyone is effected. If this triggers a general crisis, then production is also additionally curtailed, with further knock-on losses of jobs and income. But not everyone suffers. Even in a downturn or crisis, some of the super-rich can and will get richer.

With the callous commitment to austerity throughout Europe and North America, the last remnants of shame and conscience among the rich and their colleagues in politics has finally disappeared. The imposition of measures to reduce welfare expenditure for the average citizen comes at the very moment when the rich are at their richest for generations and who have made a profession of avoiding their tax obligations. Having previously tightened their belts through the gradual austerity period leading up to the capitalist crisis, the workers existence is now being further depleted by a general collapse across most segments of economic activity. Crucially, the indebtedness and contraction of capitalist private industry is in now in sync with governmental indebtedness. The two interrelated debt inspired contractions are already making the crisis a general one and it will continue to deepen.

All the policies so far suggested or recommended are aimed at dealing with symptoms, for that reason they will be to no avail. The underlying cause of the symptoms lies in the fundamental circuit of the production and augmentation of industrial capital and the accumulation and capitalisation of surplus-value. Poor tax collection, a popular symptom targeted by some, is only a part of the problem. It merely exacerbates the fundamental problem caused by the nature of large-scale surplus-value extraction and its augmentation into industrial capital. Taxation is a deduction from the surplus value created annually by the efforts of workers as they engage with the means of production. All the policies promoted and activated by all the pro-capitalist political parties, whether Conservative, Republican, Liberal, Democratic, or bourgeois pretend-socialist are dealing with symptoms. With these policies, there is no escape from the eventuality of a general and long-lasting crisis as occurred between the 1840-50’s, the 1920-30’s and 2008-14?

Sooner or later the mass of the people will have to engage with transforming the capitalist system or the capitalist system will continue to engage in transforming their standards of living. It will do so to a level much below the ones obtained during the 1960’s to 1980’s and even the depressed ones currently in existence. Sooner or later people will have to engage with the ideas and practices of anti-capitalism with a human face or they will be presented with the inhuman face of capitalist promoted nationalism, racism and neo-fascism. To paraphrase Marx; ’It is not enough that theory seeks people, people need to seek theory‘. It is not enough for educated people to use that education to intelligently moan or intellectually criticise the struggle of others. If they do not become part of the solution, they may become part of the problem. Or alternatively find themselves on the sidelines whilst the economic crisis is transformed into a political and social one. And it will be a crisis capable of ripping what is left of the heart out of even more defenceless communities

Roy Ratcliffe (October 2012.)

 

 

 

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