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Here is a new start in my attempts to communicate with you what I consider the main oversights of the socialist movement today. Many people are concerned about environmental degradation, almost every week there is new alarming news, from record low maximum arctic sea ice to the ominous "cold blob" in the North Atlantic to the melting of Antarctica to a super El Nino. People look around to see who can give them leadership. They are overwhelmed because many changes are necessary for the social order, which has been optimized over the last two centuries to promote capitalist profits, to switch over to today's urgent task of building a sustainable economy. If the socialist opposition wants to become this leader, they must change along with pretty much everything else in society. Socialism must become eco-socialism. Traditionally, socialists are trying to heal the class-based rifts in society. This is not identical to, although it is highly related with, what is on the agenda today, namely, healing the rift between humans and the rest of nature. The biggest shift which socialists have to make, in my view, is to explain to the masses in the rich countries that they must learn to live well with less, and that it is possible to meet all their needs with much less stuff. The second biggest shift is that even the most revolutionary socialists must embrace reforms. We in the US, Europe, Canada, Australia do not have the power to overturn the capitalist regime quickly enough to implement the necessary changes in time. We must try to build the necessary structures within capitalism. On Feb 17, Raghu said on Pen-l that, since nationalization of the polluting energy sector is not achievable, we have to aim for the second best, namely, their regulation. This should not be dismissed but discussed seriously among socialists. Another big shift is the following: from many decades of losing battles, we socialists have come to expect that capitalism is incredibly resilient and popular. This is no longer the case. The ecological catastrophe is a huge blow to capitalism. The entire system is becoming more and more like a paper tiger, people are clamoring for alternatives. This is why capitalists are so afraid of reforms and regulation: they know this is the beginning of their end. Many socialists do not recognize that capitalism right now is deeply on the defensive, because the blow which put them on the defensive did not come from the working class. The falling rate of profits is the textbook example of an inner contradiction. Marx was of the view that capitalism would be able to overcome and integrate every exterior obstacle, the only thing which will topple it is its inner contradictions. We know now that Marx was wrong: environmental catastrophe cannot be overcome by capitalism, and it is not a reliable source for profits because the pie is shrinking. If Michael Roberts defends the falling rate of profits today, i.e., if he concentrates on the inner contradictions of capitalism instead of investigating the exterior crash between capitalist growth and the limitations of our planet, he is faithful to Marx but he is conducting yesterday's battles. His time series are nice for understanding the past, but they are irrelevant for the future because the future will be different from the past. Insurance companies know this, socialists should know this too. Hans G Ehrbar _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
