Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Justin, Ransom, Roger L. and Richard Sutch. 1977. One Kind of Freedom: The Economic Consequences of Emancipation (Cambridge University Press). show that leisure increased immediately after the Civil War, however, that phenomenon was short lived after the Southern planters regrouped. [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I think I can report that Jim is flat wrong to say that the ex-slaves gained in "leisure time" or indeed in much else, except formal freedom, and by that I mean just that they were not technically chattel property. Otherwise they had no freedom. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Does this mean that peasant societies were inefficient or that a large portion of the output was siphoned all by landlords and userers? Dennis R Redmond wrote: But didn't this have to do with limited food sources and chronic disease and malnutrition? Peasant societies couldn't sustain year-round work efforts simply because most folks were hungry most of the time (no refrigeration, few reserves, salt was a luxury, etc.), right? -- Dennis -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: RE: American looneyism EVERYWHERE
Michael Hoover [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/12/00 05:48PM btw: Michael Parenti has noted that policy of containing spread of slavery was promptly reversed following death of President Zachary Taylor (southern slaveowner opposed to extension of slavery and secession) death. Parenti's article "The Strange Death of President Zachary Taylor" (*New Political Science*, Vol. 20, #2: June 1998) raises questions about official cause of death (severe indigestion from eating too many iced cherries with milk after sitting too long in sun, or something like that), looks askance at mainstream historians' parroting of official line despite insufficient evidence, and critiques conclusion drawn from 1991 exhumation that Taylor was not poisoned. __ CB: Soon someone will denigrate Parenti as a conspiracy theorist. Coup d'etats may be more common in U.S. history than legends of American democracy have it. CB
Fwd: petition against repression in Iran (fwd)
-- Forwarded message -- Date: Sat, 13 May 2000 10:33:24 +0200 (MEST) From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Fwd: petition against repression in Iran Dear Friends, If you would like to add your name to this petition, please send to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] in solidarity, Victor Wallis * As concerned scholars and human rights advocates, we feel compelled to express our concern about the recent crackdown on the pro-democracy and reform movement in Iran. We appeal to the world community and call on all international human rights organizations, non-governmental as well as governmental bodies, including the United Nations, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, as well as individuals who are supportive of democracy, human rights, and civil society to protest the most recent repression of reform and reformers in Iran. An overwhelming majority of the Iranian people has demonstrated their support for democracy and reform through three national elections in Iran: the presidential election in May 1997, the municipal elections in February 1999, and the parliamentary elections in February 2000. The ruling minority, however, has been resisting the will of the majority by violent and repressive means and by finally resorting to a coup-like plot through various overt and covert actions including the following: * The partial annulment of the results of the people's parliamentary elections; * The closing of 16 pro-reform daily or weekly publications since April 23rd. * The arrest of several pro-reform journalists, including Mr. Akbar Ganji, Mr. Latif Safari, and Mr. Mashallah Shamsolvaezin, and two prominent advocates of human/women rights, Ms. Shahla Lahiji, director of a publishing house, and Ms. Mehrangiz Kar, lawyer and writer, and Ali Afshari, a leader of a major student organization; * Public threats of death and violent repression against the pro-democracy activists issued by some of the commanders of the Revolutionary Guards; * Public calls for the murder of reformers by clerics like Abolqasem Khazali; * The secret trial of 13 Iranian Jews on charges of espionage; Meanwhile vigilantes and security forces have held hundreds of pro-democracy activists and students in prisons since the July 1999 violent invasion of universities. The case of serial killers, a great threat to the intellectual community as well as to civility and individual liberties for all Iranians, remains unresolved. Prisoners of conscience like Mr. Abbas Amir-Entezam, former Deputy Prime-Minster, who enters his 20th year of imprisonment, and reform-minded clerics like Abdollah Nuri and Mohsen Kadivar have not been released. We urge the authorities in Iran to respect the wishes of the majority, the rule of law and human and basic civil rights, release journalists, writers, and all other prisoners of conscience. 1. Gelareh Abedi (University of Califronia, Los Angeles, USA) 2. Nuraddin Abdulmannan (Sudan Human Rights Organization, Washington, DC,USA) 3. Ervand Abrahamian (City University of New York, New York, USA) 4. Janet Afary (Purdue University, Indiana, USA) 5. Mahnaz Afkhami (Womens Learning Partnership for Rights, Bethesda, MD, USA) 6. Olufemi A. Akinola (Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA) 7. Pooya Alaedini (Rutgers University, New Jersey, USA). 8. Kazem Alamdari (California State University, Los Angeles, USA) 9. Ozgur Basak Alkan (MIT, Massachusetts, MA, USA) 10. Abbas Alnasrawi (University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont, USA) 11. Magda M. Al-Nowaihi (Columbia University, New York, NY, USA) 12. Edward Alpers (University of California, Los Angeles, USA) 13. Elaheh Amani (California State University, Fullerton, USA) 14. Mehdi P. Amineh (University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands) 15. Alireza Azizi (Amnesty International, Los Angeles Chapter, USA) 16. Shannon Badiee (Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, USA) 17. Roksana Bahramitash (Mc Gill University, Montreal, Canada) 18. Ali Banuazizi(Boston College, Boston, MA, USA) 19. S. Scott Bartchy (University of California, Los Angeles, USA) 20. Giulia Barrera (North Western University, Evanston, IL, USA) 21. Sanjay Basu (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA) 22. Jane Bayes (California State University, Northridge, USA) 23. Sohrab Behdad (Denison University, Granville, Ohio, USA) 24. Maziar Behrooz (California State University, San Francisco, USA) 25. Joel Beinin (Stanford University, Stanford, USA) 26. Houri Berberian (California State University, Long Beach, CA, USA) 27. Elizabeth Berry (California State University, Northridge, CA, USA) 28. Cyrus Bina, (California State University, Fullerton, USA) 29. Leonard Binder (University of Califronia, Los Angeles) 30. Paul W. Blank (Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA, USA) 31. Mehrzad Boroujerdi
Re: Baseball, Reductionism, and Engenderization(fwd)
But, Mine! Isn't football (the real one - ie. the one they play with their feet) the sport most played by the world's girls and women? And you'd be living in a strange place indeed if an awful lot of the women weren't just a tad interested in the men's game, too, I reckon. Women can be as tribal and as nationalistic as any man. And, anyway, 'soccer' does happen to be the most beautiful thing men do. Even if advertisers seem to think they look best cuddling babies all of a sudden - not a bad look, mind, but hardly George Best arrogantly floating down the line, cruelly turning a sweating right-half inside-out, and effortlessly delivering an inch-perfect cross for a Bobby Charlton scissors-volley, drawing a cacophonous roar of ecstacy from the assembled worshippers on those close, clammy Stretford End terraces ... er, have to go now ...
RE: RE: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
[mbs] The threat to move a manufacturing plant is central to the ability of Capital to suppress wage demands. That's hardly zilch. When this threat entails moving plants to other countries, it exposes business firms to a combined nationalist/laborist attack. In effect, Capital runs afoul of notions of patriotism it had previously used to uphold its rule. Anyone who fails to take advantage of this, for the sake of the working class, is being foolish. Clearly now the trade deficit does not mean an absolute shortage of jobs, but a change in their composition. The impact of this change on living standards has been well documented, and it is not zilch either. === 1)That is different from my point that the system of national accounting we currently use misrepresents the flows of capital. It's the who and how that now matters, not where. Consumers owe the money to Sony, BMW, Volvo[Ford]; not Japan, Germany, Sweden. It's firms that make the investments that catalyzes states into the destructive bidding down of wages via labor policies to attract investment. The focus should then be placed on "outing and shaming" the firms that leverage their market power to put states' labor policies into competitive play against one another; a process that ineluctably favors the continued evolution of authoritarian/oligarchic governance structures and governments. 2)Capital is now more than happy to use cosmopolitanism in place of partiotism as a rhetorical complement to it's fictions of comparative advantage. Labor should expose the ersatz cosmopolitanism of Capital and put forward a viable alternative that plays on respect for workers dignity and respect for ecosystem integrity as two necessary conditions for any definition of cosmopolitanism worthy of the name. Isn't the whole point of free trade to deconstruct political boundaries vis a vis the boundaries of firms/commodity chains [assuming tariffs are taxes]? [mbs] No, the whole point is to screw workers by securing absolute rights for Capital. Mere rhetorical difference... And wouldn't that whole accounting convention be rendered meaningless if and when free trade becomes triumphant? ]mbs] Yes if we lose, then we would have lost. It seems the question for the left is no longer [if it ever was] where, but rather our far more important and older question of HOW is it made; property/firm structure and ecological conditions of production take precedence over Westphalian geographies. Ian [mbs] It will always be where, as long as people have some identification with nations. They always will because nations serve irreplaceable functions, both good and bad. You're skipping ahead to the fourth millennium. mbs == Which is where young people in a hurry want to be; they see Capital as ditching liberalism/nationalism and they/we-me want to do it too and beat Capital at its own game. Nationalism is no more immortal than feudalismWhat could be more cosmopolitan than "Workers of the World Unite!" Duck Dodgers in the 24th and a 1/2 century
Re: RE: Re: RE: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
Max says: Capital will go wherever the State permits it to go. Hence the laws of and among States are the logical target. Trade agreements the workings of the WTO are part and parcel of these laws. Somehow that is translated into a politics that says we need to focus on the actions of the Chinese state or China and not the actions of the U.S. state. The problems facing US workers from highly mobile capital go beyond China, but focusing on China and the actions of the Chinese state narrow the politics in a way that is self-defeating if our aim is to illuminate what is happening and build a radical movement for change. Max adds: Rather than labor's present campaign, MHL proposes that we "focus our attention on US capital and the logic of international capitalism." But that's not politics; it's a seminar. Or a book. Getting up in front of a crowd and saying, "I denounce capitalism" is not politics. It's a potential component of politics, but one that lacks any referents in current events or practice. I guess we have a difference of opinion on what politics is about. The issue is not short-run "victories" which are really non-victories. Keeping China out of the WTO will only ensure the status quo. At issue is first determining what kind of political understanding we want to promote and then figuring out how to effectively promote it. I think that in this period ideological struggle is very important. Real politics is finding a way to help people understand the nature of the system that they live in and move as quickly as possible to embrace actions to transform that system in appropriate ways. If the problem is capitalism and the role of the US state and US MNCs, then we need to think creatively about how to promote that understanding. Saying that the issue is china and its lack of human rights for workers is not some how any more or less a lecture than saying that the issue is capitalism and the actions of US MNCs. The difference is that the first is just a bad lecture, from which confused politics is bound to come. And the second well you can guess. Marty
Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
This seems correct -- but it also seems to indicate the irrelevance or even obscurantist nature of long arguments about whether some other people are/were happier in Situation A rather than Situation B. Carrol You don't seem to get it. This is not about a "Golden Age". It is whether radicals should defend the right of peasants to live in conditions that people like Walt Rostow or others view as "primitive". Marxism has tended to err on the side of Rostow. If you look at "Marxism and Social Democracy: The Revisionist Debate 1896-1898", edited and translated by H. and J.M. Tudor, you will discover that Edward Bernstein cited the Communist Manifesto in support of colonialism in Morocco. Between the rude "tribalism" of the Moroccans and the "civilizing" role of the Europeans, Bernstein aligned himself with the latter. Citing slavery and pasha despotism, he claimed that "modern democratic institutions" were necessary. You got the same kind of arguments from the now-defunct LM magazine in Great Britain which viewed resistance to the Narmada dam in India or efforts to defend the Yanomami in the Amazon as reactionary. It is what Williams characterized in the following terms: "They were also, and more critically, the brisk metropolitan progressives, many of them supposedly internationalists and socialists, whose contempt for rural societies was matched only by their confidence in an urban industrial future which they were about in one way or anothermodernisation, the white heat of technology, revolutionto convert into socialism." This is not Marxism, it is Walt Rostow/Menshevism. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
Re: Work on the land will have to become more . . . important
The question should not be, would you rather be a poor peasant or a well-to-do urban inhabitant. It would be just a silly to ask whether he would rather be a wealthy aristocrat in the countryside or homeless person in the big city. I try to play with the idea of rural life in my book, Transcending the Economy. Here is the relevant section: Farm Work vs. Gardening In order to understand the potential for transforming the economy, let me use a simple example that does not require much of a stretch of the imagination. Just think of the enormous contrast between farm work for wages and gardening as a hobby. Farm work is considered to be so abhorrent in the United States that we regularly hear that only foreign-born workers are willing to perform it. Supposedly, citizens of the United States would never be willing to subject themselves to the life of a farm worker. While farm labor may be among the hardest, most dangerous work in our society, many people regard gardening as a pleasant diversion. While the United Farm Workers Union represents mostly downtrodden workers, a good number of wealthy people are proud affiliates of their blue-blood garden clubs. Over and above the time that they spend in their gardens, many gardeners enthusiastically devote considerable leisure time to conversing or reading in order to become better gardeners. In addition, many gardeners also willingly spend substantial sums for equipment and supplies to use in their gardens. What, then, is the underlying difference between farm work and gardening? Farm work typically entails hard physical labor, but many gardeners also exert themselves in their gardens. The difference lies in the context of gardening. Gardeners, unlike farm workers, freely choose to be gardeners. During their free time when they work in their gardens, they want to be gardening. Nobody tells them what to do. Of course, gardeners are not entirely free to follow their whims. The rhythms of the seasons and the sudden shifts in the weather dictate some of what the gardeners do, but gardeners generally accept these demands beforehand. As the psychologist, John Neulinger says: "Everyone knows the difference between doing something because one has to and doing something because one wants to" (Neulinger 1981, p. 15). We should also keep in mind that society respects gardeners. Our newspapers regularly print features of interest to gardeners. Some even have special sections to appeal to their affluent gardening readers. All the while, the lives of farm workers generally pass virtually unnoticed. After all, in our society, farm work is not "respectable" work in the sense that well-to-do families would not approve of their children becoming farmworkers. If we paid farm workers as well as those who labor on Wall Street and accorded farm workers the sort of dignity that college professors enjoy, parents might still try to steer their children away from farm work because of the frequent exposure to potentially lethal toxins. But then, if society esteemed farm workers, farmer owners would not and could not spray them with impunity. Gardeners engage in a modest sort of passionate labor. They tend to take pride in their gardens. They work with care and joy. They can take pleasures in their surroundings and feel a part of nature. Farm workers take orders or, if they work by the piece, they must concentrate all their energies on picking an enormous quantity of fruits and vegetables, just to make ends meet. Recall how the short-handled hoe was designed to put a quick stop to any possible reveries about the farm workers' surroundings. Our goal in making society work for the betterment of all people would be to convert our economy from something that resembles a nation of a few farmers working a multitude of farm workers into a new kind of economy that resembled a community of gardeners, in which workers would have good reason to attack their jobs with a sense of care, pride, joy and even exhilaration. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
Re: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
On Fri, 12 May 2000, Lisa Ian Murray wrote: Lets see, US firms make the stuff in China then send it back duty free to sell to US consumers [or anywhere else]; just what does trade deficit mean in this circumstance? My guess is zilch. Well, it does mean something in the comparative sense that Japan and the EU run big trade surpluses in their good sectors vis-a-vis the US, and they're just as globalized as we are. This suggests, in turn, that the mighty US economy is far less mighty than Wall Street would like us to believe, that deep structural problems are being papered over by a financial bubble. Usually, peripheries run huge deficits with metropoles, not the other way around. -- Dennis
Sowing Dragons (fwd)
But didn't this have to do with limited food sources and chronic disease and malnutrition? Peasant societies couldn't sustain year-round work efforts simply because most folks were hungry most of the time (no refrigeration, few reserves, salt was a luxury, etc.), right? -- Dennis Not really. In precapitalist societies, farmers were "sell-husbanding". They generally produced food for themselves and made their own clothing and other necessities. Tribute was paid to the feudal lord in exchange for protection. The amount of tribute was a function of the class struggle. In the early days of the transition to capitalism, it became both necessary to free up land for cattle and sheep raising and to create a source of wage labor. This led to bitter and protracted struggles which Marx discussed in Capital. It is also the subject of Michael Perelman's wonderful, soon to be published "The Invention of Capitalism: Classical Political Economy and the Secret History of Primitive Accumulation", that I read in manuscript. From the angle of cultural studies, it is also the subject of Raymond Williams' indispensable "The Country and the City", which considers English poetry's reaction to the industrial revolution: From "The Deserted Village" by Oliver Goldsmith (1730?-1774) Even now the devastation is begun, And half the business of destruction done; Even now, methinks, as pondering here I stand, I see the rural virtues leave the land. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
Re: Re: Re: genderization (fwd)
And up is down and left is right and black is white and out is in and no is yes and big is little and... [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: NO. You are creating false dichotomies. Vulgar biological "determinism" is a already product of vulgar "idealist" mentality, which essentializes, reifies and idealizes biology.. Mine I understand your point about vulgar biological determinism, but to deny the influence of hormones, etc. is a vulgar idealism. Rod [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: One can not "identify" masculine behavior by looking at the presence or absence of reproductive organs.. I think the research is biased for the reasons I mentioned below. It does not consider the social factors other than the "family"! Mine It does saying "acting like" anything. It says "identifying as" Rod -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada
Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
How much of the legislation relates to tariffs? Brad De Long wrote: And this is supposed to be an argument that U.S. restrictions on imports of African textiles are for Africans' own good? -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
technology and legal systems
This article appeared on the ZDnet tech news. It brings up some interesting questions about the relationship between technology and legal systems. And, I think reaffirms the marxist position that technology is the dominant moment in that particular dialectical relation. Rod Thursday May 11 09:30 PM EDT All hail Napster! By Matthew Rothenberg, ZDNet News Whatever you make of Metallica's beef with Napster Inc., swapping MP3s doesn't signal a new Red Menace. "socialism n. 1 any of various theories or systems of the ownership and operation of the means of production and distribution by society or the community rather than by private individuals, with all members of society or the community sharing in the work and the products." -- Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fourth Edition A staple of what a friend calls the "eatin' peanuts" diet of second-hand paperbacks I consume during my daily commute is spy thrillers written before the end of the Cold War. The Red Menace was alive and well, and the tension between the familiar marketplace of western capitalism and the spooky encroachment of international communism made for sure-fire literary thrills that are hard to find anywhere today. Anywhere, that is, outside the commentary section of ZDNet News, where TalkBack posters and some full-time columnists alike are quick to categorize recent events in the high-tech market as signs of a socialist resurgence. In fact, some contributors have been slapping that hot button with enough fervor to send banana pellets skittering all over their keyboards. First, myriad TalkBack posters lined up behind the notion that the Department of Justice's predations against Microsoft signal a Marxist desire to punish this fabulously successful company. Nonsense. Whether the DOJ's move reflects a sensible desire to break an unfair hold on the market by one private company, allowing other private companies a chance to compete, or it signals a nasty plot hatched by jealous plutocrats to get a piece of Microsoft's well-deserved action, the arena and its players are fundamentally capitalistic. Is there any move within the federal government to eliminate private control of the tech sector? Not on your life. Splitting Microsoft in half may prove to be a bad move, but it ain't socialism. Rockers of the world, unite Now, Inter@ctive Week columnist Matt Carolan has played the "socialism" card in relationship to another hot topic: the recent legal actions by recording artists Metallica and Dr. Dre against the MP3 swappers on Napster.com. According to Carolan, Napster users' callousness toward the bands reflects a disregard for capitalism fueled by "a society where people think they have a right to fuel, apartments or prescription drugs at prices that they or the government get to set. ... We are a society educated to believe we have a right to other people's stuff." From where I stand, however, the Napster revolution has nothing to do with socialism. The current state of flux in music distribution may bear a superficial resemblance to anarchism -- a terrifying prospect to the entrenched industry, to be sure -- but the upshot is still a robust, capitalist marketplace. If this is socialism, why is Napster Inc. making so much money? And considering this week's admission by music-industry bigwigs of CD price fixing, are these the players we want the U.S. legal system to shield? Historical materialism Happily, some TalkBack readers agree with me that the "socialism" tag is a poor fit in the Napster case. " Nothing about the capitalist system entitles the RIAA to their business model, either," wrote Cambridge, Mass., network administrator Scott O'Neil. "Yet that's what they're protecting through the courts. No one's forcing them to sell CDs. If they want to protect their copyrights, then don't release the stuff to the public. Sound absurd? It's the 'public-feels-entitled' argument in reverse. "The RIAA's failure to adjust to technological advance has cost them nothing -- so far. But it will cost them everything if they don't wake up soon." I'll close out with these great comments from Barry Scott Will, a Richmond, Va., systems administrator and Web developer: "This is not socialism. The Napster/Gnutella flap is a major indication that capitalism is alive and well in the Internet age; content creators simply have not yet come to grips with this new market. "Simply put, the supply of content has increased so the price of content has come down. The Internet, especially because of the easy access to digital media, is causing intellectual property to be worth less than it was in the past. "Over the next generation (or two), creative people (and the companies that manage their works) will have to adjust to two changing factors: the way in which they earn money from their intellectual property and the amount of money they earn for their intellectual property. The market has effectively said, 'We
RE: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
"Max B. Sawicky" [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/12/00 08:51PM . . . Lets see, US firms make the stuff in China then send it back duty free to sell to US consumers [or anywhere else]; just what does trade deficit mean in this circumstance? My guess is zilch. [mbs] The threat to move a manufacturing plant is central to the ability of Capital to suppress wage demands. That's hardly zilch. When this threat entails moving plants to other countries, it exposes business firms to a combined nationalist/laborist attack. In effect, Capital runs afoul of notions of patriotism it had previously used to uphold its rule. Anyone who fails to take advantage of this, for the sake of the working class, is being foolish. CB: You all are getting to some nitty gritty. This might sound typically Marxist, but don't we have to think a little deeper to see how this can really be taken of advantage of by or for the working class ? Doesn't a real solution have to involve some kind of new level of solidarity between the U.S. working class and those in other countries ? Won't the nationalist aspect of the above undermine that ? __ Clearly now the trade deficit does not mean an absolute shortage of jobs, but a change in their composition. The impact of this change on living standards has been well documented, and it is not zilch either. CB: This is no doubt true. But are trade barriers a long term solution for the U.S. working class ? Doesn't it have to be something more like direct legal curbs and controls on the perogatives of the corporations to move plants whenever and whereever they want ? Isn't the whole point of free trade to deconstruct political boundaries vis a vis the boundaries of firms/commodity chains [assuming tariffs are taxes]? [mbs] No, the whole point is to screw workers by securing absolute rights for Capital. And wouldn't that whole accounting convention be rendered meaningless if and when free trade becomes triumphant? ]mbs] Yes if we lose, then we would have lost. It seems the question for the left is no longer [if it ever was] where, but rather our far more important and older question of HOW is it made; property/firm structure and ecological conditions of production take precedence over Westphailian geographies. Ian [mbs] It will always be where, as long as people have some identification with nations. They always will because nations serve irreplaceable functions, both good and bad. You're skipping ahead to the fourth millenium. __ CB: If the corporations are transcending the nation in this millenium, isn't it plausible that the working class can do it a little sooner than a thousand years from now ?
Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
On Fri, 12 May 2000, Louis Proyect wrote: very often of a seasonal nature. If you read Juliette Schor's "The Overworked American", you will discover that the average peasant worked half as many hours as the average proletarian during the rise of the industrial revolution. That is the reason resistance to the Enclosure Acts and bans on hunting was so fierce. But didn't this have to do with limited food sources and chronic disease and malnutrition? Peasant societies couldn't sustain year-round work efforts simply because most folks were hungry most of the time (no refrigeration, few reserves, salt was a luxury, etc.), right? -- Dennis
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
My understand of the shift from hunting and gathering to agriculture is that nutritional standards did decline, but so did the risk of starvation. Agricultural output was less uncertain. Rod Jim Devine wrote: At 02:33 AM 05/13/2000 -0700, you wrote: On Fri, 12 May 2000, Louis Proyect wrote: very often of a seasonal nature. If you read Juliette Schor's "The Overworked American", you will discover that the average peasant worked half as many hours as the average proletarian during the rise of the industrial revolution. That is the reason resistance to the Enclosure Acts and bans on hunting was so fierce. But didn't this have to do with limited food sources and chronic disease and malnutrition? Peasant societies couldn't sustain year-round work efforts simply because most folks were hungry most of the time (no refrigeration, few reserves, salt was a luxury, etc.), right? it has a lot to do with the fact that agricultural is by its very nature seasonal. Schor specifically refers to the change from the peasant agriculture of the European Middle Ages to capitalism. During the Middle Ages, many of the Catholic Church's saints days were actually celebrated -- except during planting and harvest time -- so that work hours per year rose with the transition to capitalism. (I think it's a good idea to avoid the myth of unilineal and no-downside progress. There is also a lot of evidence that living standards fell with the transition from hunting and gathering to farming. But of course, it's mixed.) Most pre-capitalist societies had high death rates rather than lots of chronic diseases, as I understand it. Those who survived the infant phase are tough critters, who lived about "3 score and 10" if they survived waves of plagues. Also, there are a lot of ways to keep reserves besides using salt, such as smoking meat. As others have noted, the standard of living of peasants also depends on the rate of exploitation by the lords, the state, the Church, etc. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada
Re: Creeping state fascism in Russia
I traced the reference on the Guardian archive for yesterday. Extracts Squads of machine gun-wielding police commandos in balaclavas seized the main offices of Russia's biggest independent media mogul and critic of President Vladimir Putin yesterday, as leaked internal Kremlin documents were published urging Mr Putin to establish full control over the country's political life and the media, and use dirty tricks to silence the opposition. About 40 armed police and officials, said to be tax inspectors, raided the Moscow offices of the Media-Most holding company, headquarters of the powerful magnate Vladimir Gusinsky. His NTV television channel, Russia's biggest private channel, has been critical of the war in Chechnya and sceptical about the democratic credentials of Mr Putin. Mr Gusinsky's main newspaper, the daily Segodnya, is also anti-Kremlin and focuses on revealing corruption in high places. A discussion document has not been denied by the Kremlin. It calls on Mr Putin to establish a new "presidential political directorate" as the key Kremlin body seeking to dominate the parliament, government, elections, media and Russia's 89 regions. Smear campaigns, blackmail and other dirty tricks should be deployed to secure the entire political establishment's fealty to the Kremlin. "It's a strategic necessity to include the FSB and other special services in the directorate's activities," the document says. "The intellectual, staff and professional potential of the FSB should be used by the directorate to obtain quick and productive results." The directorate's operations are split into "open and covert" activities. The covert activities included "gathering and using special information on political activities, leadership staffs, funding sources, official and unofficial contacts, supporters, and compromising information" of political parties and movements, national and regional leaders, legislative bodies at all levels. The information should be used to "aid or block" candidates and parties "depending on their loyalty to the president". The document proposes setting up two computer systems geared to the most comprehensive information-gathering system ever seen in Russia. All political opposition would be targeted by "counter-propaganda". "In its work and in its statements the directorate has to be sharper than the opposition, use more crushing facts. There can be no weakness nor liberalism, there's no time for that." The Kremlin, the blueprint continues, "should take various mass media under control and make use of the collected information including the compromising material". "Opposition media should be driven to financial crisis, their licences and certificates withdrawn and conditions created where the work of every single opposition medium is either controllable or impossible," it says. I recommend the full article. http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4017211,00.html Chris Burford London
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons
Michael Hoover wrote: [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Certainly, Cuba would have done quite well in the absence of both Soviet subsidies and intervention from the United States. The second is a very big if. Clearly the U.S. will try to destroy any regime that resists the global hierarchy. While the USSR existed, it offered a counterweight. Now that it's gone, what can a small, poor country do? Doug Read Zizek... Excellent suggestion. Why didn't I think of that? Doug
RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Martin Hart-Landsberg Max says: Capital will go wherever the State permits it to go. Hence the laws of and among States are the logical target. Trade agreements the workings of the WTO are part and parcel of these laws. Somehow that is translated into a politics that says we need to focus on the actions of the Chinese state or China and not the actions of the U.S. state. The problems facing US workers from highly mobile capital go beyond China, but focusing on China and the actions of the Chinese state narrow the politics in a way that is self-defeating if our aim is to illuminate what is happening and build a radical movement for change. And your statement would make sense if unions did not spend most of their lobbying time fighting against bad budget policies and fighting for pro-worker legislation. The China deal is getting prominent play because it is actually coming to a vote, unlike pro-labor or anti-capitalist legislation which never comes to a vote. Because of the debacle of the 1995 government shutdown, the GOP Congress has been relatively reluctant to bring up large-scale antilabor legislation, preferring a series of small bills and riders on other legislation. So while labor spends a lot of time fighting those individual bills, there is rarely a single up-down vote with the consequences of the China trade deal. Back in 1993 and 1994, the unions put a similiar scale of effort (especially relative to the anemic energy of the Kirkland regime) into passing striker replacement legislation that fits MHL's definition of "actions of the US state", but such legislation does not even get to the floor for a vote now. So given that the China deal is coming to a vote, does MHL say that in protest of the fact that the GOP Congress won't let pro-labor legislation come to a vote, US labor should abstain from lobbying on the China deal in order to maintain a balanced ideological profile? If the China deal should not be a top priority of labor, what legislation THAT ACTUALLY CAME TO A VOTE would MHL suggest should have taken its place over the last year? -- Nathan Newman
Re: Re: genderization (fwd)
I think you should read the report of the study again. It says that boys surgically transformed to resemble girls still identify as boys and act as boys (this may be mimicing, etc.) But they were raised as girls. And identified to everyone as girls. I understand your point about vulgar biological determinism, but to deny the influence of hormones, etc. is a vulgar idealism. Rod [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: One can not "identify" masculine behavior by looking at the presence or absence of reproductive organs.. I think the research is biased for the reasons I mentioned below. It does not consider the social factors other than the "family"! Mine It does saying "acting like" anything. It says "identifying as" Rod -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada
Re: genderization (fwd)
In a message dated 00-05-13 17:00:18 EDT, you write: Many women are grown up with social values that contradict the conventional female wisdom. Some parents, but still few, choose not to give their daughters dolls or son gun toys, or even not vice versa Yeah, this is a lot easier said than done. We won't let guns (toy or real) in the house, but my son has always played with anything that looks gunlike (sticks), and his fantasy life is mosty childish dreams of slaughter. He also dances ballet, out of choice, but he is a very boyische boy. I should add that we have no TV. My daughter never showed interest in toy tools, and has always played with dolls. She went throw a stage from 3 to 6 or so when she would wear nothing but dresses, the frillier the better. I am not saying that this shows anything about an affinity between boy genes and guns or girl genes and dolls, but anyone who thinks that it is a simple matter to go against the stereotypes has no children. --jks
Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
I wrote: [*] Has anyone ever noticed the similarity between the development of the USSR and that of the Ford Motor Company (or similar "entrepreneurial" corporations)? It starts with the radical idiosyncrasies of the Great Leader (Stalin, Henry Ford, Sr.), who is then replaced by nameless bureaucratic suits who normalize the regime. Michael P. wrote: Schumpeter? I was thinking maybe John Kenneth Galbraith. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine
Sowing Dragons (fwd)
In a message dated 00-05-13 23:18:59 EDT, you write: The ex-slaves weren't really "proletarianized" until the early 20th century, because immediately after the Civil War most of them became debt peons (though they did gain a lot in terms of leisure time and the like). It's only when they were no longer needed in cotton that they moved North (or to New South places like Atlanta) and became proletarianized. Having just finished Leon Litwack's Trouble in Mind, a terrifying, beatifullly written, though not terribly analytical account of bacl life under Jim Crow from the end of Reconstruction through the 20s-, I think I can report that Jim is flat wrong to say that the ex-slaves gained in "leisure time" or indeed in much else, except formal freedom, and by that I mean just that they were not technically chattel property. Otherwise they had no freedom. These were people who so so poor that it took them working can't see to can't see to subsist. I thought I knew a fair amount about black life in that era, but Litwack's book, despite its lack of materialist analysis, is brilliant phenomenology, and it really highlights the almost unimaginable extent to which blacks were sabagely oppressed and degraded under Jim Crow. It was worse than you can imagine. I remarked to a friend that it makes you wonder why they didn't just kill all the whites in their sleep. L does not discuss any deep economic explanation of the Northern migration, and it would be useful to know if the demand for agricultural labor in the South really fell in the 20s and 40s or what. Just now, however, I am worthing through Litwack's earlier book, Been In The Storm So Long, about the period from 1980 through the start of Reconstriction. --jks
(no subject)
Apologies for cross posting. Fu'ad, this article provides a partial response to your question about the social status of Arab women and the recent economic restructuring in the Middle East.. Mine Al-Ahram Weekly 11 - 17 May 2000 Issue No. 481 http://www.allnewspapers.com/middeast/ Women's work By Fatemah Farag It is 7.00am in front of a ready-made garments factory in Shubra Al-Kheima. Droves of young women, clutching little money purses tightly in their hands are making their way through the factory gates to begin a long day's work. "We must be at our machines at 7:30am and work goes on to seven or eight at night. Each one of us is responsible for a specific section in the garment, such as a hem or a button, and I usually process 700 to 800 pieces per day and make between one to two piastres a piece," explained 23-year-old Fatheya. Fatheya is part of a new generation of women workers who have found job opportunities in the new private sector textile factories. "It is good to have the opportunity to make some money, but I hope that once I am married my husband will make enough money to keep me at home. My back hurts all the time from bending over the machine for such long hours," she said. According to the most recent Human Development Report issued by the UN, in 1998/1999, women constituted 15 per cent of the labour force. This indicates a decline from figures published by the Central Authority for Mobilisation and Statistics (CAPMAS) in 1996, which show that, between 1984 and 1994, women represented 22 per cent of the labour force. Further, according to the 1996 Labour Sample Survey, issued by CAPMAS, the highest unemployment rates are among women. The survey documented that between 1988 and 1995, for every five unemployed men, there were 20 unemployed women. "The highest unemployment rates are among women despite the government's policy to encourage women's work. The general environment is against her working and reflects a very different attitude from that of the sixties, when women were very much encouraged to become prominent players in development," said Aisha Abdel-Hadi, member of the executive council of the General Federation of Trade Unions (GFTU) for women's affairs. The context of this change in attitude is provided by Fardos El-Bahnasi, social researcher and director of the Women's Development and Empowerment Association in the working class district of Manshiet Nasser. "When women were encouraged to work in the sixties, social services to help her out in her role within the family were not provided. The result was that women took on a double burden. This has not been a positive experience and young girls who have seen their mothers carry this burden will feel that the better option is to choose only one of these roles," explained El-Bahnasi. Add this to working conditions such as those described by Fatheya and the attitude cannot be expected to be very positive. But, of course, what drives people into the job market is not so much prevalent attitudes as material need. According to official statistics, the largest percentage of women's work is in the informal agricultural sector, while 32 per cent is in the government, with the private sector accounting for only 16 per cent. "Much of women's work is unpaid, such as when she works in agricultural fields for the family. It is also difficult to determine the exact number of women actually working outside the home," explained Samia Assal of the Union for Agricultural Workers. El-Bahnasi adds that even in the formal sectors, since employers do not always register the total number of workers to evade social security payments, the figures available are bound to be inconclusive. "Still, we can see that there are factories, such as those for ready-made garments, which employ women almost exclusively. These are the women who are driven onto the job market as a result of extreme poverty," said El-Bahnasi. Abdel-Hadi completes the description of the vicious circle faced by female labourers, "With high unemployment in women's ranks and because of their need, there is bound to be violation of the law which stipulates equal wages, social and health insurance for both genders." The women interviewed by Al-Ahram Weekly on their way to work in Shubra Al-Kheima had not heard of legal protection, or even the GFTU, for that matter. "In the security room, there is a framed copy of the Ministerial Regulation for Women's Work. It has nothing to do with our lives," one said. El-Bahnasi points out that women are treated as inferior on the job because they are, for the most part, unskilled labour and also because their work is considered only a supplement to family income. "This last point is of particular importance since official statistics show that one
Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Schumpeter? Jim Devine wrote: [*] Has anyone ever noticed the similarity between the development of the USSR and that of the Ford Motor Company (or similar "entrepreneurial" corporations)? It starts with the radical idiosyncrasies of the Great Leader (Stalin, Henry Ford, Sr.), who is then replaced by nameless bureaucratic suits who normalize the regime. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Re: RE: Re: RE: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in C
I've seen a couple of longer things Marty has done that spell out the argument. One is a superb new book on Japan/East Asia with Paul Burkett (St Martin's Press), whose last chapter blew me away, as it really tackles the problematic of progressive social/labour-movement organising against neoliberalism... when Kism has to be more firmly in our sights. Another is a forthcoming MR article which contrasts China-bashing with a more durable, anti-capitalist strategy: to shorten the working day. It's a shame email is not a particularly good medium for getting deep into these debates and interrogating a complex line of argument. Maybe Marty wouldn't mind, anyhow, sending whatever relevants bits of these pieces he can. They really convinced me... Date: Sat, 13 May 2000 17:23:58 -0700 (PDT) From: Martin Hart-Landsberg [EMAIL PROTECTED] To:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:18903] Re: RE: Re: RE: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China Reply-to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Max says: Capital will go wherever the State permits it to go. Hence the laws of and among States are the logical target. Trade agreements the workings of the WTO are part and parcel of these laws. Somehow that is translated into a politics that says we need to focus on the actions of the Chinese state or China and not the actions of the U.S. state. The problems facing US workers from highly mobile capital go beyond China, but focusing on China and the actions of the Chinese state narrow the politics in a way that is self-defeating if our aim is to illuminate what is happening and build a radical movement for change. Max adds: Rather than labor's present campaign, MHL proposes that we "focus our attention on US capital and the logic of international capitalism." But that's not politics; it's a seminar. Or a book. Getting up in front of a crowd and saying, "I denounce capitalism" is not politics. It's a potential component of politics, but one that lacks any referents in current events or practice. I guess we have a difference of opinion on what politics is about. The issue is not short-run "victories" which are really non-victories. Keeping China out of the WTO will only ensure the status quo. At issue is first determining what kind of political understanding we want to promote and then figuring out how to effectively promote it. I think that in this period ideological struggle is very important. Real politics is finding a way to help people understand the nature of the system that they live in and move as quickly as possible to embrace actions to transform that system in appropriate ways. If the problem is capitalism and the role of the US state and US MNCs, then we need to think creatively about how to promote that understanding. Saying that the issue is china and its lack of human rights for workers is not some how any more or less a lecture than saying that the issue is capitalism and the actions of US MNCs. The difference is that the first is just a bad lecture, from which confused politics is bound to come. And the second well you can guess. Marty
the Mother of All Bears
Here's a story on what I call "Momma Bear" in the so-called Goldilocks economy, fromthe L.A. TIMES, May 13, 2000: Household Debt Grows Precarious as Rates Increase Spending: Total liabilities have passed after-tax incomes for the first time, especially among lower-earning families. Interest hikes weigh heaviest on those maxed out on cards. By LESLIE EARNEST, Times Staff Writer The upward creep of interest rates has become a growing burden to American families, as more are straining under record debt loads amassed in a spending binge powered by the booming economy. Families are overextending themselves as never before, as indicated recently when total household debts--including mortage loans--surpassed total after-tax incomes for the first time in history. And debt burdens continue to rise, notably for lower-income families. Credit card debt particularly has grown sharply in recent years, and banks are now hiking rates on those cards, leaving some consumers hurting. "It really does indicate that there's a soft underbelly in the economy," said Mark Zandi, an economist at RFA Dismal Sciences, referring especially to lower-income households. "And that soft underbelly will be exposed the higher interest rates go." Household debt service--or interest and principal payments as a share of take-home pay--rose to 13.5% in the fourth quarter of 1999. While considered high, that percentage is still lower than the peak of 14.2% in late 1986. But the figure masks the hardships faced by lower-income households, which have been the most aggressive borrowers recently, as lenders have been liberally extending credit. And signs of trouble are emerging. Last year, FHA home loans that were delinquent by more than 30 days rose to a high of 8.6%. And delinquencies are also rising on the so-called sub-prime loans, made largely to poor-credit households, as well as other higher-risk equity loans. And interest rates will probably move even higher after the Federal Reserve Board likely raises the key short-term interest rate Tuesday, probably by a sizable half-point, to 6.5%. The Fed is trying to slow the giddy spending by consumers, which has fueled the nation's sizzling economic growth but is now kindling inflation. "The Fed has every intention of trying to squeeze, especially consumers who are overburdened with debt," said Peter Kretzmer, a senior economist at Bank of America. "The idea here is to slow down consumers enough so that larger interest rate increases aren't necessary later on, the kind that could cause defaults to rise and the economy to go into recession. In short, a little pain now saves greater pain later on." for the rest, see http://www.latimes.com/news/front/2513/t45192.html Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine "From the east side of Chicago/ to the down side of L.A. There's no place that he gods/ We don't bow down to him and pray. Yeah we follow him to the slaughter / We go through the fire and ash. Cause he's the doll inside our dollars / Our Lord and Savior Jesus Cash (chorus): Ah we blow him up -- inflated / and we let him down -- depressed We play with him forever -- he's our doll / and we love him best." -- Terry Allen.
Re: Re:Work on the land will have to become more . . . important
Michael Perelman wrote: The question should not be, would you rather be a poor peasant or a well-to-do urban inhabitant. It would be just a silly to ask whether he would rather be a wealthy aristocrat in the countryside or homeless person in the big city. I try to play with the idea of rural life in my book, Transcending the Economy. Here is the relevant section: Farm Work vs. Gardening In order to understand the potential for transforming the economy, let me use a simple example that does not require much of a stretch of the imagination. Just think of the enormous contrast between farm work for wages and gardening as a hobby. [snip] Our goal in making society work for the betterment of all people would be to convert our economy from something that resembles a nation of a few farmers working a multitude of farm workers into a new kind of economy that resembled a community of gardeners, in which workers would have good reason to attack their jobs with a sense of care, pride, joy and even exhilaration. This is an acceptable argument -- with one qualification. I do not see how the argument would change if for farmwork you substituted factory work or retail clerking work or cranking out compute code to fill in someone else's algorithm. It is fundamental to any vision of socialism that the division of mental and manual labor must be (slowly or quickly is debatable) smashed. Of all the kinds of labor which, under changed social conditions would become pleasurable rather than onerous, why should gardening occupy a special place? Do you expect us all to become gardeners under socialism? This would remind me of the old joke. "Come the revolution we will all have strawberries and cream." "But I don't like strawberries and cream." "Come the revolution, eveyrone will like strawberries and cream." I am no doubt personally biased -- I did enough farm work 55 years or so ago that my dislike of it carries over to any kind of play or labor vaguely similar. But as long as the world's population is 6 billion and counting, some sort of farmwork a bit more strenuous and mechanized than gardening-for-pleasure is going to be necessary. Humans will need to work out ways to make all labor (and not just some kinds) more pleasant. Since at least for some gardening (as you present it) is or can be a positive pleasure, you need to pick a harder example of work under socialism. Try warehousing, managing data bases, or steel smelting. And if peaches are going to be a part of the future diet of humanity, some way of separating them from their fuzz will continue to be necessary -- and it boggles the imagination how *that* activity could ever be other than a form of cruel and unusual punishment. I would suppose *all* work will have to become more . . .important. Why privilege work on the land for this proposition? That labor is useless, for example, without the labor of packaging and preserving. (I would assume, for example, that considerable progress in architecture was a precondition for the late neolithic revolution. What is the use of raising grain if you can't store it?) Carrol
Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Brad DeLong writes: Either that or people actually *liked* having their teeth fall out... Louis Proyect writes: I don't think the discussion is about dental hygeine. It is about the right of a Vietnamese in the 60s or a Colombian peasant today to not have napalm dropped on them because they believe that the development theories of Walt Rostow are inappropriate to their society. Actually, isn't there a Greek myth about sowing dragon teeth, so that Brad is getting us back to the subject line? Joking aside, the issue is closer to what Louis says. We don't have to go all the way with to napalm (and we should remember that by today's Newtish Clintonite standards, Walt Rostow was a New Deal liberal). The fact is that these days, as part of the world-wide neoliberal ascendancy, the US, IMF, World Bank, and transnational corporations are using military, economic, and financial power to destroy all sorts of "traditional" agriculture in a way that's quite similar to the process that Marx described in his chapters on "Primitive Accumulation." This means that people aren't simply moving to the city to get away from bad dental hygiene and to get to the bright lights on Broadway (or their equivalent in Mexico City or Manila or ...) They're being shoved aside by the spread of agribusiness, which in conjunction with its allies in the state is grabbing all of the best land and destroying the environment with massive doses of pesticides, herbicides, and chemical fertilizers. In the city, the expelled people find conditions that may be even less conducive to good dental hygiene or the good nutrition that helps people keep their teeth (which is what Brad is referring to, I believe -- he hardly ever elaborates his thoughts to clarify them). Without having their own gardens (which are destroyed by the capitalist process of urbanization), they become dependent on the good will of the capitalists for their sustenance and can starve not only due to bad weather or famine but due to the overproduction crises that come with the rise of capitalism, which lead to mass joblessness. And the powers don't be don't care about that starvation until the workers organize and make a lot of noise (or if diseases threaten to spread to La Zona Rosa or its equivalent rich district in other poor-country cities). Actually, the good news about the move to the city is _not_ any kind of automatic increase in the standard of living (since the powers that be, including not only the US, the IMF, and the World Bank but also the local bourgeoisie will struggle mightily to prevent that kind of increase) but rather the fact that the concentration of workers into cities and factories helps creates conditions that allow workers to unite and actually win some of their demands. (Being scattered across the countryside in distinct communities with small holdings of property makes it hard to organize collectively. I think that atomization is what Marx was talking about when he referred to the "idiocy of rural life.") The big fear of the US elites is that the workers and peasants will try moving trying a path to good dental hygiene and other worldly goods that deviates from the neoliberal Party Line. This fear remains even though the official Truth is that "There Is No Alternative," that only (neoliberal) capitalism can exist. So the efforts to suppress alternatives continues apace. Besides, imposing neoliberalism is profitable business, as when the Harvard Harpies dug their talons into Russia's carcass. What's good for capitalism as a whole and what's good for individual capitalists as individuals mesh together well, reinforcing the trend -- until the "race to the bottom" causes an underconsumption crisis and/or an environmental melt-down that swamps even the US. One problem is that the revolutions in the poor countries often are pretty incomplete themselves. Social-democratic parties have found themselves swept into the neoliberal whirlpool as their roots in the working class withered. On the other hand, the "actually existing socialisms" were usually pretty good at developing welfare states (in response to the popular revolts which put the leadership in power) which helped dental hygiene and provided a large amount of security (once the revolution got beyond the bloody stage, e.g., high Stalinism).[*] But in the long run, even the best revolutionary governments became detached from their social bases, becoming increasingly top-down toward, and fearful of, the workers and peasants. (In Eastern Europe, with the notable exception of Tito's Yugoslavia, the situation _started_ that way, since the revolution was imposed from the outside, by the USSR.) More concretely, we see people like the leftist rebels in Colombia being willing to compromise with the drug traders and the like. Note that I'm not blaming them, since the objective conditions they face make any other choice close to impossible. But
RE: Re: RE: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
MHL:
And what political implications should we draw from the fact that US
capital is highly mobile, using China, among other places, as either off
shore production locations or as a threat. Max notes that this mobility
or threat of mobility has real consequences. I agree. So, should our
movement attack China and mobilize to keep it out of the WTO or focus our
attention on US capital and the logic of international capitalism. I
think that the choice leads to very different kinds of campaigns and
educational work.Marty Hart-Landsberg
Capital will go wherever the State permits it to go.
Hence the laws of and among States are the logical
target. Trade agreements the workings of the WTO
are part and parcel of these laws.
THERE IS NO "ATTACK ON CHINA." Rather, there is an
attack on labor standards and suppression of human
rights in China, and on China's posture regarding
international labor standards, and therefore on
China's entry into WTO and on PNTR. I'm not going
to rehash the difference between labor/human rights
in China and the U.S., which some, present company
excepted, seem to fail to appreciate.
Rather than labor's present campaign, MHL proposes
that we "focus our attention on US capital and the
logic of international capitalism." But that's not
politics; it's a seminar. Or a book. Getting up
in front of a crowd and saying, "I denounce
capitalism" is not politics. It's a potential
component of politics, but one that lacks any
referents in current events or practice.
---
Ian:
1)That is different from my point that the system of national accounting we
currently use misrepresents the flows of capital. It's the who and how that
now matters, not where. Consumers owe the money to Sony, BMW, Volvo[Ford];
not Japan, Germany, Sweden. It's firms that make the investments that
catalyzes states into the destructive bidding down of wages via labor
policies to attract investment. The focus should then be placed on "outing
and shaming" the firms that leverage their market power to put states' labor
policies into competitive play against one another; a process that
ineluctably favors the continued evolution of authoritarian/oligarchic
governance structures and governments.
[mbs] If you spend money it's the company that you deal
with, but if you WORK, where the job is and where you is
matter a great deal.
The bit about 'shaming' firms is pretty funny. ("Go
you Gates, and sin no more!") But actually the point is
ingrained in the views of others as well. If you mean
anything, you mean that targeting a firm is prelude to
some legislative action that means some new sort of
regulation of said firm, and others like it. So
what is this regulation to be? I raised this before.
Do we exalt a law against a firm leaving Michigan as
somehow a different thing than a law against a firm
relocating to some other country? What is the practical
difference from the standpoint of, say, Chinese workers?
Presumably an anti-relocation law bothers people because
it sounds anti-foreign and chauvinistic.
In actuality labor must be a bit more discriminating.
We can't denounce a firm for shifting jobs from UAW-USA
to UAW/Canada. So the anti-relocation focus is on
nations with lousy labor standards etc.
2)Capital is now more than happy to use cosmopolitanism in place of
partiotism as a rhetorical complement to it's fictions of comparative
advantage. Labor should expose the ersatz cosmopolitanism of Capital and
put forward a viable alternative that plays on respect for workers dignity
and respect for ecosystem integrity as two necessary conditions for any
definition of cosmopolitanism worthy of the name.
[mbs] What is the content of this non-ersatz cosmopolitanism?
What is the concrete form of "respect for workers dignity"?
If it isn't labor standards embodied in international law,
including trade agreements, what in the devil is it?
. . .
Which is where young people in a hurry want to be; they see Capital as
ditching liberalism/nationalism and they/we-me want to do it too and beat
Capital at its own game. Nationalism is no more immortal than
feudalismWhat could be more cosmopolitan than "Workers of the World
Unite!"
Duck Dodgers in the 24th and a 1/2 century
Really? "Young people" have all become international
socialists? Do tell.
To the contrary, all those young people, not to mention
we over-the-hill types, mean zilch without the potential
mobilization of the working class. That mobilization is
necessarily conditioned by the practical importance of
nation-states and their laws as defenders of living
standards against amoral markets.
Cheers,
mbs
Re: Work on the land will have to become more . . . important
I did not mean that everyone should be a farm worker, except to the extent that more and more people have the opportunity -- not the obligation -- to grow food or flowers under pleasant circumstances. One of the first things that I did when I arrived in Chico a worse to organize a collective food buying co-op, which led to a series of community gardens. I think everybody had fun working there growing food, which anyone was free to pick. Carrol Cox wrote: This is an acceptable argument -- with one qualification. I do not see how the argument would change if for farmwork you substituted factory work or retail clerking work or cranking out compute code to fill in someone else's algorithm. It is fundamental to any vision of socialism that the division of mental and manual labor must be (slowly or quickly is debatable) smashed. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Justin writes: Having just finished Leon Litwack's Trouble in Mind, a
terrifying, beatifullly written, though not terribly analytical account of
bacl life under Jim Crow from the end of Reconstruction through the 20s-,
I think I can report that Jim is flat wrong to say that the ex-slaves
gained in "leisure time" or indeed in much else, except formal freedom,
and by that I mean just that they were not technically chattel property.
I was referring to the period _before_ the rise of Jim Crow, immediately
after the Civil War. The fact that the "freedmen" had more time where they
weren't forced to work is documented by Ransom Sutch, among others.
However, with the rise of Jim Crow, with a major turning-point in 1876
("the Compromise," which pulled the Northern troops out of the South), the
ex-slaves sank toward debt peonage (reinforced by the links between
landlords, money-lenders, and politicians, reinforced by this incestuous
trio's support from the "poor whites").
... L does not discuss any deep economic explanation of the Northern
migration, and it would be useful to know if the demand for agricultural
labor in the South really fell in the 20s and 40s or what. Just now,
however, I am worthing through Litwack's earlier book, Been In The Storm
So Long, about the period from 1980 through the start of Reconstriction.
the mechanization of cotton production helped reduce the demand for Black
labor in the South, as did the slow decline of the demand for US cotton.
During the 1930s, there was some movement back to the South by Blacks (just
as many other urbanites of recent rural extraction moved back to the
countryside during that period). The 1940s were the decisive point for the
Black migration to the North, accelerated by tight labor markets due to WW
2. I don't have time to fill in the gaps in that explanation.
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine
Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
similar example to the point raised by Louis. Adam Smith's defense
of the "landed gentry" and country values can be seen as a reaction to
commercialization of the Scottish agriculture, a point made by David
McNally in _Political Economy and the Rise of Capitalism: A
Reinterpreation_. this is interesting though because McNally
does not read Smith as a theorist of urban/merchant capitalism, but rather
as an intellectual product of "agrarian capitalism". McNally challenges
the "liberal view of the origins of the capitalist society ("manufacturers
in pursuit of rational economic self-interest" rhetoric), and instead
traces the origins of capitalism to agricultural transformation "in the
social relationships of the landed society". The book raises the question
of agriculture as it is reflected in the writings of 1) english
mercantalists (Sir Thomas Smith) 2)British classical political economists
(William Petty) 3) french mercantalists (Colbert) 4) french physiocrasts
(Quesnay) 4) British anti-mercantalists (Locke, Smith, Hume, and
Scientific Whiggism)
Mine Doyran
Phd student
Political Science
SUNY/albany
Louis Proyect wrote:
From
the angle of cultural studies, it is also the subject of Raymond
Williams'
indispensable "The Country and the City", which considers English
poetry's
reaction to the industrial revolution:
From "The Deserted Village" by Oliver Goldsmith (1730?-1774)
Even now the devastation is begun,
And half the business of destruction done;
Even now, methinks, as pondering here I stand,
I see the rural virtues leave the land.
Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Either that or people actually *liked* having their teeth fall out... Brad DeLong I don't think the discussion is about dental hygeine. It is about the right of a Vietnamese in the 60s or a Colombian peasant today to not have napalm dropped on them because they believe that the development theories of Walt Rostow are inappropriate to their society. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
Re: Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
On Fri, 12 May 2000, Louis Proyect wrote: very often of a seasonal nature. If you read Juliette Schor's "The Overworked American", you will discover that the average peasant worked half as many hours as the average proletarian during the rise of the industrial revolution. That is the reason resistance to the Enclosure Acts and bans on hunting was so fierce. But didn't this have to do with limited food sources and chronic disease and malnutrition? Peasant societies couldn't sustain year-round work efforts simply because most folks were hungry most of the time (no refrigeration, few reserves, salt was a luxury, etc.), right? -- Dennis Either that or people actually *liked* having their teeth fall out... Brad DeLong
Work on the land will have to become more . . . important
No doubt this is part of a chapter in which Williams traces lost Golden Age tropes back to the 13th century - the good times were always a bit in the past, and the present a time of decay and debasement. From the conclusion to Raymond Williams' "City and the Country": But at one time, while writing Border Country, I felt a sudden sadness, apparently separate from my theme. I felt, because I think I had been told, that the rural experience, the working country, had gone; that in Britain it was only a marginal thing, and that as time went by this would be so everywhere. I accepted this, at one level, for much longer than now seems possible. It was one of the impulses, I can see now, that kept sending me back to old rural literature and history. And. I cannot clearly remember when I suddenly realised that it was not really true at all. Even while I was showing in the novels a different and persistent experience, this idea had stuck. When at last I saw that it was false I knew I had to look for its sources. These were not only, as might be supposed, the sentimental ruralists, though just because of my experience I had to face them. They were also, and more critically, the brisk metropolitan progressives, many of them supposedly internationalists and socialists, whose contempt for rural societies was matched only by their confidence in an urban industrial future which they were about in one way or anothermodernisation, the white heat of technology, revolutionto convert into socialism. There are so many writers and thinkers, still, of each of these kinds, that it takes a long time, a long effort, to look round and say that their common idea of a lost rural economy is false. Is it then not false? Is it not obvious that in Britain a working agriculture is marginal? That was the first mode of error I learned to perceive: an unnoticed persistence, in the old imperialist countries, of a kind of abstract chauvinism: that what happened to them was what was happening or would happen to everyone. Still most countries in the world were predominantly rural, but within the imperialist division of the world they did not really count, were not in important ways there. Even those who saw that they were exploited, within the imperialist division of the world, did not necessarily go on to see that in and through this condition and its struggles a working agriculture, a rural economy in any of its possible forms, simply had to persist: in the exploited countries themselves and, if some elements of the exploitation were to be diminished, in what had been abstractly thought of as the developed metropolitan countries. Perhaps more of us now know this. The facts of the food and population crisis have been widely and properly publicised. If we are to survive at all, we shall have to develop and extend our working agricultures. The common idea of a lost rural world is then not only an abstraction of this or that stage in a continuing history (and many of the stages we can be glad have gone or are going). It is in direct contradiction to any effective shape of our future, in which work on the land will have to become more rather than less important and central. It is one of the most striking deformations of industrial capitalism that one of our most central and urgent and necessary activities should have been so displaced, in space or in time or in both, that it can be plausibly associated only with the past or with distant lands. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
genderization (fwd)
Rod posted: Saturday May 13 1:02 AM ET Study Questions 'Sex Reassignment' By SETH HETTENA, Associated Press Writer BALTIMORE (AP) - The practice of surgically ``reassigning'' boys born without penises is being called into question by a new study that suggests gender identity is determined in the womb. Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Hospital on Friday said the study found that such boys, raised as girls, had masculine behavior and most declared themselves to be boys. actually, this is falsified by other studies. Many studies prove that there is no necessary relationship between your biological identity and gender identity. If you are born with a penis, you may develop a different identity through time, so you don't need to be born without a penis to see how you develop a masculine identity. In so far as the above study is concerned,I would still look at the social environment of male participants. boys may be raised as girls, but do the researchers look at the non-familial enviromental factors such as schooling, friends, media,etc.? The boys may have learnt masculine behaviour from other external sources, which could have become dominant through time, as to contradict family socialization. this has nothing to do with their hormones, but something to do with the contradictions between two forms of socialization (family versus outside family)..we should not underestimate the external factors. Many children, grown with, let's say, egalitarian values at home and see parents sharing household responsibilities equally, may become patriarchal later due to their socialization into external forms of masculinist social practices.. It is also true the reverse case. Many women are grown up with social values that contradict the conventional female wisdom. Some parents, but still few, choose not to give their daughters dolls or son gun toys, or even not vice versa (which . Another big example is mothering. Vulgar biological determinists relate mothering to women's biological and emotional predisposition. It has been found out that men can mother as adequately as women since mothering is a social function, not a biological one. There are many men around who raise children. There are also many women around who don't prefer mothering... Acting "like a man or a woman" is a socially learnt behavior designed to fit the ideological constructions of gender. Mine
Re: Baseball, Reductionism, and Engenderization (fwd)
But, Mine! Isn't football (the real one - ie. the one they play with their feet) the sport most played by the world's girls and women? And you'd be living in a strange place indeed if an awful lot of the women weren't just a tad interested in the men's game, too, I reckon. Women can be as tribal and as nationalistic as any man. I don't deny this. However, I am talking about "dominant" masculine cultural practices. football is one of those generally associated with manly charecteristics (socially defined of course).Emprically speaking, it is men who in the majority of cases play football . don't you follow the world cubs? there are some women football teams, but very few, to my knowledge. Even if women play it, they should fit in the masculine definition of football player. i don't the know case in football,in the case of olympic games, women are subject to genetic testing. if you are "ambigiously female", you are considered to be a freak... once there was a similar streotype used to describe "leftist women" in turkish political discourses: less feminine, freak, manly, agressive, etc. thanks to "some" feminists that they have effectively perpetuated this streotyping to criticize socialism instead of fighting against the dominant culture (this is another story though) Since I am a socialist egalitarian feminist in the final analysis, I am not opting for the elimination of any kind of sport because it is a male sport. We need a society where such activities should be radically engendered in favor of "substantive" equality between sexes, and where men and women are allowed to attain the full develioment of their potentials equally. we are very far way from this society in so far as society dictates us what you can or can not do as a woman or a man. so we need to eliminate the gender division of labor itself.. Mine
Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Louis Proyect wrote: Either that or people actually *liked* having their teeth fall out... Brad DeLong I don't think the discussion is about dental hygeine. It is about the right of a Vietnamese in the 60s or a Colombian peasant today to not have napalm dropped on them because they believe that the development theories of Walt Rostow are inappropriate to their society. And this is supposed to be an argument that U.S. restrictions on imports of African textiles are for Africans' own good? This makes even less sense than usual...
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
In a message dated 00-05-13 17:05:51 EDT, you write: Either that or people actually *liked* having their teeth fall out... Brad DeLong Hey, Brad, revealed preferences, right? --jks
Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Thank's for the plug Louis. The book, as well as Transcending the Economy, is not published. Louis Proyect wrote: This led to bitter and protracted struggles which Marx discussed in Capital. It is also the subject of Michael Perelman's wonderful, soon to be published "The Invention of Capitalism: Classical Political Economy and the Secret History of Primitive Accumulation", that I read in manuscript. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
Excellent! By the way, is the China vote a straight up and down vote or are other things attached as in the WTO and NAFTA votes? Martin Hart-Landsberg wrote: And what political implications should we draw from the fact that US capital is highly mobile, using China, among other places, as either off shore production locations or as a threat. Max notes that this mobility or threat of mobility has real consequences. I agree. So, should our movement attack China and mobilize to keep it out of the WTO or focus our attention on US capital and the logic of international capitalism. I think that the choice leads to very different kinds of campaigns and educational work. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: RE: RE: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
And what political implications should we draw from the fact that US capital is highly mobile, using China, among other places, as either off shore production locations or as a threat. Max notes that this mobility or threat of mobility has real consequences. I agree. So, should our movement attack China and mobilize to keep it out of the WTO or focus our attention on US capital and the logic of international capitalism. I think that the choice leads to very different kinds of campaigns and educational work. Marty Hart-Landsberg On Fri, 12 May 2000, Max B. Sawicky wrote: . . . Lets see, US firms make the stuff in China then send it back duty free to sell to US consumers [or anywhere else]; just what does trade deficit mean in this circumstance? My guess is zilch. [mbs] The threat to move a manufacturing plant is central to the ability of Capital to suppress wage demands. That's hardly zilch. When this threat entails moving plants to other countries, it exposes business firms to a combined nationalist/laborist attack. In effect, Capital runs afoul of notions of patriotism it had previously used to uphold its rule. Anyone who fails to take advantage of this, for the sake of the working class, is being foolish. Clearly now the trade deficit does not mean an absolute shortage of jobs, but a change in their composition. The impact of this change on living standards has been well documented, and it is not zilch either. Isn't the whole point of free trade to deconstruct political boundaries vis a vis the boundaries of firms/commodity chains [assuming tariffs are taxes]? [mbs] No, the whole point is to screw workers by securing absolute rights for Capital. And wouldn't that whole accounting convention be rendered meaningless if and when free trade becomes triumphant? ]mbs] Yes if we lose, then we would have lost. It seems the question for the left is no longer [if it ever was] where, but rather our far more important and older question of HOW is it made; property/firm structure and ecological conditions of production take precedence over Westphailian geographies. Ian [mbs] It will always be where, as long as people have some identification with nations. They always will because nations serve irreplaceable functions, both good and bad. You're skipping ahead to the fourth millenium. mbs
Re: Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
At 02:33 AM 05/13/2000 -0700, you wrote: On Fri, 12 May 2000, Louis Proyect wrote: very often of a seasonal nature. If you read Juliette Schor's "The Overworked American", you will discover that the average peasant worked half as many hours as the average proletarian during the rise of the industrial revolution. That is the reason resistance to the Enclosure Acts and bans on hunting was so fierce. But didn't this have to do with limited food sources and chronic disease and malnutrition? Peasant societies couldn't sustain year-round work efforts simply because most folks were hungry most of the time (no refrigeration, few reserves, salt was a luxury, etc.), right? it has a lot to do with the fact that agricultural is by its very nature seasonal. Schor specifically refers to the change from the peasant agriculture of the European Middle Ages to capitalism. During the Middle Ages, many of the Catholic Church's saints days were actually celebrated -- except during planting and harvest time -- so that work hours per year rose with the transition to capitalism. (I think it's a good idea to avoid the myth of unilineal and no-downside progress. There is also a lot of evidence that living standards fell with the transition from hunting and gathering to farming. But of course, it's mixed.) Most pre-capitalist societies had high death rates rather than lots of chronic diseases, as I understand it. Those who survived the infant phase are tough critters, who lived about "3 score and 10" if they survived waves of plagues. Also, there are a lot of ways to keep reserves besides using salt, such as smoking meat. As others have noted, the standard of living of peasants also depends on the rate of exploitation by the lords, the state, the Church, etc. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine
Re: genderization
Rod Hay wrote: Saturday May 13 1:02 AM ET Study Questions 'Sex Reassignment' By SETH HETTENA, Associated Press Writer BALTIMORE (AP) - The practice of surgically ``reassigning'' boys born without penises is being called into question by a new study that suggests gender identity is determined in the womb. The debate that has developed over this is probably askew. From many years of eagerly reading every report on research on mental illness that comes my way in the popular press I have learned that the early reports on some particular piece of research are almost *always* (not just usually, but always) contradicted by other reports within six months to a year. Science writers just can't get it straight. And when they do get the bare details more or less accurate, they tend both to make wild extrapolations from the research and to leave out the kind of warnings that serious scientists always make concerning the finality and/or implications of their research. So on the basis of an AP report we can assume nothing whatever about this research, its validity, or its implications. This does not mean that the conclusions asserted may not turn out to be accurate, but it does mean that we don't really *know*, now, any more than we know before the article was published. So, really, debates over its implications ought to be postponed for a year or so. One caution: I doubt very strongly that careful researchers would have been so confident as the report seems to indicate as to what constitutes "boyish" behavior. That too is contested ground. Carrol P.S. Just one example. *Science News* is remarkably accurate in its reports on research. And it is fairly careful to indicate whenever research is not fully confirmed. Yet if one were to read through it for the last 10 years (and I've been subscribing for nearly 15 years), one would discover that bipolar affective disorder was genetic, that it was not genetic, that new research established quite decisively that it was genetic, that further new research suggested strongly that genetic factors only indicated a tendency, that might or might not be realized, to develop bipolar disorder, that psychotherapy was more or less useless, that medication without psychotherapy had and so forth.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
At 01:35 PM 05/13/2000 -0400, you wrote: My understand of the shift from hunting and gathering to agriculture is that nutritional standards did decline, but so did the risk of starvation. Agricultural output was less uncertain. Maybe, but it's not unmixed progress. It's more a matter of a trade-off (which was my point). Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine
Re: genderization (fwd)
It does saying "acting like" anything. It says "identifying as" Rod [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Rod posted: Saturday May 13 1:02 AM ET Study Questions 'Sex Reassignment' By SETH HETTENA, Associated Press Writer BALTIMORE (AP) - The practice of surgically ``reassigning'' boys born without penises is being called into question by a new study that suggests gender identity is determined in the womb. Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Hospital on Friday said the study found that such boys, raised as girls, had masculine behavior and most declared themselves to be boys. actually, this is falsified by other studies. Many studies prove that there is no necessary relationship between your biological identity and gender identity. If you are born with a penis, you may develop a different identity through time, so you don't need to be born without a penis to see how you develop a masculine identity. In so far as the above study is concerned,I would still look at the social environment of male participants. boys may be raised as girls, but do the researchers look at the non-familial enviromental factors such as schooling, friends, media,etc.? The boys may have learnt masculine behaviour from other external sources, which could have become dominant through time, as to contradict family socialization. this has nothing to do with their hormones, but something to do with the contradictions between two forms of socialization (family versus outside family)..we should not underestimate the external factors. Many children, grown with, let's say, egalitarian values at home and see parents sharing household responsibilities equally, may become patriarchal later due to their socialization into external forms of masculinist social practices.. It is also true the reverse case. Many women are grown up with social values that contradict the conventional female wisdom. Some parents, but still few, choose not to give their daughters dolls or son gun toys, or even not vice versa (which . Another big example is mothering. Vulgar biological determinists relate mothering to women's biological and emotional predisposition. It has been found out that men can mother as adequately as women since mothering is a social function, not a biological one. There are many men around who raise children. There are also many women around who don't prefer mothering... Acting "like a man or a woman" is a socially learnt behavior designed to fit the ideological constructions of gender. Mine -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada
Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
On Fri, 12 May 2000 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: moreover, how would US develop its own capitalism without slave labor ( especially agricultural production in the South)? Ah, but Marx would insist on the relative antagonisms between rival modes of production: it's not that capitalism is identical to slavery, rather you had a slave mode of production coexisting side-by-side with textile capitalism (i.e. unequal exchange between manufactured goods and agrarian goods). US capitalism didn't really challenge Britain's hegemony until after the Civil War, when huge masses of ex-slaves were proletarianized and vast new sources of cheap raw materials were made available via railroads and the monstrous slaughter of indigenous Americans. Thus the contradiction of Lincoln and the Republicans -- scions of Northern finance capital -- underwriting the defeat of slavery (the 20th century equivalent would be, US monopoly capital gearing up to fight against German and Japanese fascism). wither away. So are you telling me that Vietnam is still patriarchal because it is not capitalist enough? Nope, just that "capitalism" and "patriarchy" are not unhistorical signifiers which mean the same thing to every era. There's local capitalism, regional, urban, national, international, multinational, financial, industrial, etc. and these modes of production are themselves saturated by the relics and survivals of previous modes of production (feudal, clan, familial etc.). By all accounts, Vietnam is in the throes of agarian/simple manufacturing accumulation, i.e. clan capitalisms are facing off against a limited nomenklatura socialism. What that means is that the women workers in the export processing zones are on the front lines of the class struggle. The struggle against patriarchal modes of domination over women's bodies merges, at its outer limit, with the struggle against capital's dominion over laboring bodies. -- Dennis
Baseball, Reductionism, and Engenderization (fwd)
true, indeed! nobody has paid attention to the gender dimension of baseball so far. may be, it is much better to offer a middle ground solution since capitalism is a "gendered" social system by definition. so we can still "engender" baseball according to class. what class of men has a tendecy to watch or play baseball? middle class? working class? urban rich? urban poor? what about women? I don't know baseball.I know football (european type).it is a hyper masculanized sport, but it seems a very "popular" one as well. almost all men from social classes like it in my country..even the ones that reject it in theory to look somewhat cool, still secretly watch it...it is part of the definition of what it means to be a man. baseball must have the same sexist connotations too.. Mine I shall not go on about the social processes around baseball but it is, today, likely as much a engenderization process (teaching boys "how to be men" - and occasional girls too) as much as anything else. Eric
Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
[Sorry -- I clicked the send instead of the quote button on the preceding empty post.] Louis Proyect wrote: Either that or people actually *liked* having their teeth fall out... Brad DeLong I don't think the discussion is about dental hygeine. It is about the right of a Vietnamese in the 60s or a Colombian peasant today to not have napalm dropped on them because they believe that the development theories of Walt Rostow are inappropriate to their society. This seems correct -- but it also seems to indicate the irrelevance or even obscurantist nature of long arguments about whether some other people are/were happier in Situation A rather than Situation B. The latter kind of argument seems always to tend either toward some mechanical assertion of Progress with an uppercase P or towards some sort of nostalgia for the simple life. We need to understand prior states of society as deeply and in as much detail as possible -- but really important political arguments should never be made to hang on a particular description of some such prior state. Empirical knowledge of the past is always subject to constant change, partly in response to new or newly emphasized information or in response to shifted perspectives on available information. Carrol
Re: Re: RE: American looneyism EVERYWHERE
Michael Hoover [EMAIL PROTECTED] 05/12/00 05:48PM btw: Michael Parenti has noted that policy of containing spread of slavery was promptly reversed following death of President Zachary Taylor (southern slaveowner opposed to extension of slavery and secession) death. Parenti's article "The Strange Death of President Zachary Taylor" (*New Political Science*, Vol. 20, #2: June 1998) raises questions about official cause of death (severe indigestion from eating too many iced cherries with milk after sitting too long in sun, or something like that), looks askance at mainstream historians' parroting of official line despite insufficient evidence, and critiques conclusion drawn from 1991 exhumation that Taylor was not poisoned. __ CB: Soon someone will denigrate Parenti as a conspiracy theorist. Coup d'etats may be more common in U.S. history than legends of American democracy have it. CB I'll denigrate Parenti for being unwilling to look at evidence--they did dig the guy up, after all, out of historical curiosity... Brad DeLong
genderization
Saturday May 13 1:02 AM ET Study Questions 'Sex Reassignment' By SETH HETTENA, Associated Press Writer BALTIMORE (AP) - The practice of surgically ``reassigning'' boys born without penises is being called into question by a new study that suggests gender identity is determined in the womb. Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Hospital on Friday said the study found that such boys, raised as girls, had masculine behavior and most declared themselves to be boys. In what is believed to be the first study of its kind, researchers tracked the development of 27 children born without a penis, a rare defect known as a cloacal exstrophy. The infants were otherwise male with normal testicles, male genes and hormones. Twenty-five of the children were sex reassigned, meaning doctors castrated them at birth and their parents raised them as girls. But over the years, all of the children, currently aged 5-16, exhibited the rough-and-tumble play of boys. Fourteen declared themselves to be boys, in one case as early as age 5, said Dr. William G. Reiner, a child and adolescent psychiatrist and urologist at the Hopkins Children's Center. ``These studies indicate that with time and age, children may well know what their gender is, regardless of any and all information and child-rearing to the contrary,'' he said. ``They seem to be quite capable of telling us who they are.'' The two children who were not reassigned and were raised as boys fit in well with their normal male peers and were better adjusted psychologically than the reassigned children, Reiner said. He called for a thorough review of the practice of sex reassignment of children. The study was presented Friday at the Lawson Wilkins Pediatric Endocrine Society Meeting in Boston. The results contradicted a Canadian study published in the journal Pediatrics in 1998 that suggested gender identity develops after birth. In that study, researchers found that a boy who was raised as a girl after his penis was mutilated during circumcision continued to live as a woman. ``This has very profound implications for the development of gender identity,'' said Michael Bailey, an associate professor of psychology at Northwestern University who studies gender identity and sexual orientation. ``This suggests that hormones' effect on the brain has a major impact on gender identity.'' Dr. Marianne J. Legato, a Columbia University professor of clinical medicine who studies the differences between men and women, said sexual differentiation occurs in the first trimester of pregnancy. ``When the brain has been masculinized by exposure to testosterone, it is kind of useless to say to this individual, 'You're a girl,''' she said. ``It is this impact of testosterone that gives males the feelings that they are men.' -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada
Re: Re: Sowing Dragons (fwd)
Dennis, I exactly argued the same. We are talking past to each other! See my previous post where I used the words "local" and "global" capitalism.. Mine There's local capitalism, regional, urban, national, international, multinational, financial, industrial, etc. and these modes of production are themselves saturated by the relics and survivals of previous modes of production (feudal, clan, familial etc.). again this proves my point that capitalim "remodifies" patriachy, but DOES NOT GET AWAY WITH IT.. -- Dennis
Re: Re: genderization (fwd)
NO. You are creating false dichotomies. Vulgar biological "determinism" is a already product of vulgar "idealist" mentality, which essentializes, reifies and idealizes biology.. Mine I understand your point about vulgar biological determinism, but to deny the influence of hormones, etc. is a vulgar idealism. Rod [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: One can not "identify" masculine behavior by looking at the presence or absence of reproductive organs.. I think the research is biased for the reasons I mentioned below. It does not consider the social factors other than the "family"! Mine It does saying "acting like" anything. It says "identifying as" Rod -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada
Re: Re: EPI Paper on U.S. FDI in China
I think that what Martin argues below is similar to the arguments that Bill Tabb made a few months ago in MR, right on the money. Steve Martin Hart-Landsberg wrote: And what political implications should we draw from the fact that US capital is highly mobile, using China, among other places, as either off shore production locations or as a threat. Max notes that this mobility or threat of mobility has real consequences. I agree. So, should our movement attack China and mobilize to keep it out of the WTO or focus our attention on US capital and the logic of international capitalism. I think that the choice leads to very different kinds of campaigns and educational work. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
What Rosa Luxemburg was reading in 1917
Rosa Luxemburg in a letter to a friend on May 2, 1917: What am I reading? For the most part, natural science: geography of plants and animals. Only yesterday I read why the warblers are disappearing from Germany. Increasingly systematic forestry, gardening and agriculture are, step by step destroying all natural nesting and breeding places: hollow trees, fallow land, thickets of shrubs, withered leaves on the garden grounds. It pained me so when I read that. Not because of the song they sing for people, but rather it was the picture of the silent, irresistible extinction of these defenseless little creatures which hurt me to the point that I had to cry. It reminded me of a Russian book which I read while still in Zurich, a book by Professor Sieber about the ravage of the redskins in North America. In exactly the same way, step by step, they have been pushed from their land by civilized men and abandoned to perish silently and cruelly. The Letters of Rosa Luxemburg, Stephen Bonner ed. (Atlantic Highlands New Jersey: Humanities Press, 1993) pp. 202-03. Louis Proyect Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org/
