[PEN-L:1855] Soros Questions Tobin Tax
NDP MP Lorne Nystrom has introduced a motion in Parliament, M-239, that urges the Government of Canada to implement a Tobin Tax. That motion will be voted on in February, 1999 George Soros indicates below that a Tobin Tax may not be effective. == Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1998 19:05:31 -0500 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: paul rodgers [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Tobin Tax Canada Feb 1999 (fwd) Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1998 09:00:44 -0500 (EST) From: Neva Goodwin [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Tobin Tax Canada Feb 1999 (fwd) To: Michael Gurstein [EMAIL PROTECTED] UN Reform [EMAIL PROTECTED], futurework [EMAIL PROTECTED] A comment on the Tobin tax, which I have always thought was a great idea, and I hope it still is -- but I was recently at a talk by George Soros in which someone asked him about this. He replied that he had intended to push it in his new book, but that, after looking into it, he concluded that it was no longer workable, because there are many novel forms of currency trading and international transactions -- through new instruments that have just been invented in the last few years -- and many of these cannot be monitored or controlled by governments. A Tobin tax, he said, would just create a perverse tax-avoidence incentive for people to do their transacting through these instruments. I don't know enough about financial markets to be able to assess this conclusion (I don't even know the names of many of these new instruments!) -- I'd be interested in reactions from those who are more up on this. I fear that Soros opinion is one that has to be taken pretty seriously; he's had more experience in these areas than almost anyone, and, though he certainly has mixed motives (the desire for profits continues to burn strong in him), I believe that his wish to contribute to a world of sanity and freedom is also strong. Neva Goodwin, Co-director Global Development And Enviroment Institute [EMAIL PROTECTED] web address: http://www.tufts.edu/gdae street address: G-DAE, Cabot Center Tufts University Medford, MA 02155 . Bob Olsen, Toronto[EMAIL PROTECTED] .
[PEN-L:1851] Yugoslav inequality
I feel a need to express some further observations on this topic that came up in conjunction with the social democracy thread. Why did regional inequalities get so bad in Yugoslavia? One aspect of this that is especially puzzling is that there was quite a bit of regional redistribution under the old regime. Indeed this was one of the grievances of the secessionists in both Slovenia and Croatia, the desire to stop sending funds to the poorer southern republics and autonomous republics. Which raises the question as to why did the sent funds fail to help? Conservatives might argue that this is what one should expect, that people do not do well who are being given handouts. Another argument has to do with corruption and mafias. After all, nearby Italy has also had a major divergence between north and south in per capita income since WW II with many blaming the mafia for the Mezzogiorno problem. It is curious that more market capitalist economies have had more regional convergence, e.g. the catching up by the South in the US, as have the more command socialist type economies such as the USSR or China under Mao. Of course in China under Mao the development of the interior was partly driven by defense motives. The local self-sufficiency laid the foundation for growth later with the TVEs. In the old USSR there was a successful effort to develop hinterlands, including the far north, the far east, and Central Asia. The "conservatism" of the Central Asian nations, maintaining much of the previous system and resisting Islamic fundamentalism must be at least partly attributed to this successful development, although some of it was ecologically disastrous as in the Aral Sea region, and there is much local despotism by leaders, many simply left over from the ancien regime. But in Russia the hinterland is now suffering and badly. Anyway, I don't have any answers as to why the regional inequality problem was so bad in Yugoslavia, but I am skeptical that one can attribute Slovenia's success to an alleged exploitation of the poorer regions of the former nation state. Barkley Rosser -- Rosser Jr, John Barkley [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:1850] Albert Camus
(excerpted from a review article by John Hess in the latest Monthly Review) The New York Times Book Review summarized Todd's Albert Camus: A Life as a "biography of the near-proletarian from Algeria who reached the top of the literary pole in Paris, then fell silent when he could not defend the fashionable Stalinism of the 1950s." To which a knowledgeable French reader might reply, quelle neo-connerie! To begin with, Camus never fell silent, expect that he refused to speak out against the French terror in Algeria--a refusal that drew reproaches not only from the left but also from the Christian Democrat Francois Mauriac, the Gaullist Andre Malraux, the conservative Raymond Aron, and Camus's allies in the CIA-financed Congress for Cultural Freedom, Arthur Koestler, Ignazio Silone, and Stephen Spender. And it was obtuse for the Times reviewer, Richard Bernstein, to imply that Camus's famous break with his benefactor Jean-Paul Sartre was over Stalinism. Sartre was never a Communist, as Camus had been before the war. Indeed Todd relies on that experience to defend Camus from the charge of prejudice. He relates that the party assigned Camus to agitate for a bill to grant suffrage to a select few Algerian Arabs, but dropped the effort in 1937 in deference to Popular Front unity Camus, Todd says, broke with the party rather than go along. Against that brief outreach to the Other, however, must be weighed the rest of Camus's life and works. For Americans in the 1950s, Camus came on as a dashing figure, a literary genius, an existentialist icon, a champion of our side in the Cold War and a Resistance hero. He rather resembled Humphrey Bogart, and indeed flirted with a movie career; his glamour was magnified by a Nobel Prize and sanctified by his death like James Dean in an automobile crash in 1960. (Of his celebrity tour here, Todd records chiefly that he added an American to his harem.) The two novels he wrote during the Occupation became must reading, as they remain. I recall, however, feeling that I was missing something. Having been to Oran during the war, I wondered as I read Camus, where are the Arabs? They appear to have escaped The Plague entirely; only two figure, barely, in The Stranger--a prostitute who is beaten by the narrator's thuggish pal Raymond, and an Arab youth, perhaps a kin of hers, whom the narrator, Meursault-Camus, seeks out and senselessly murders. I confess I was less struck then by the low status Camus accorded women--the other Other. Meursault treats with callous indifference the woman who loves him, and rebuts a suggestion by the court that his crime might have been impelled by grief and rage over his mother's death. On the contrary, he embraces an imminent release from "this whole absurd life," and the novel ends, "I had only to wish that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they greet me with cries of hate." It is no wonder that the Nazi cultural gauleiter in Paris liked the manuscript and volunteered to help find "all the paper needed" to publish it. A hero's contempt for life and decency and the Other-- what could have been more timely, in occupied Europe, in 1942? Or, alas, today? Camus's contempt for life did not, though, extend to his own, not literally. In The Fall (1956), an autobiographical monologue of self-pity, self-glorification, and disdain for mankind and especially womankind, he said he had refused to join the Resistance because he had a horror of being beaten to death in a cell. "Underground action suited neither my temperament nor my preference for exposed heights," he wrote. Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:1849] Re: Fwd: Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdum
At 02:58 PM 12/22/98 EST, you wrote: No, unlike Bill's, my apology is sincere and as for close to Bill's, well you know the rest..."close but no cigar". But you know, reductio ad absurdum/nauseum as a instrument of rhetoric and reasoning does not so much suggest analogy as to expore the inner and perhaps hidden nature and consequences of a thing by extrapolating the inexorable or likely consequences if given "principles", "axioms" and "concepts" are consistently and universally applied. That is the spirit in which it is used rather than to suggest that the nazis were holding seminars and praticums on Walras, Pareto or even Hayek to construct marginalist calculations and general "equilibria" schemes and orders. slippery-slope stories only go so far. But I really did like Wotjek's comments and about the illusions of "choice". I too thought that his historical analysis was useful. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:1848] Re: Re: Re: Re: Social Democracy and Utopia
In a message dated 12/18/1998 9:26:27 AM Eastern Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On the plus side we have a somewhat smaller set of countries spending a generation or two under the rule of Communist regimes of varying quality--from Pol Pot or Mao or Kim Il Sung at the bottom end to Castro at the top end. Whether U.S. post-WWII foreign policy was--broadly speaking--a good (or at least a not-so-bad) idea depends on whether the plus side outweighs the minus side. And so you cannot say that the quality of life in South Korea relative to North Korea is an "entirely separate issue." It just isn't. I am a democratic socialist and have a pretty strong moral and theorectical proclivity towards opposing what I consider apologies for authoritarian regimes of the right or left, so I won't (unless giving ample prodding) jump to the conclusion that Brad's position is "crude anti-communism." Personally, the effects of Communisn, I would contend, are deucedly hard to sort out, even if I have little preference for it as an ideology or a system of government. In part, this is because development whether under capitalist or communist auspices has been an ugly, brutal process. Did Communism make the process worse by speeding it up and erecting hulking state apparati in the process? Maybe, probably. Did those same regimes, bring a degree of material enrichment and cultural progress, that were, especially early in the process, an attractive alternative to what the world market offered them. Sometimes, probably yes. Did Marxist revolutionary ideology make those regimes more oppressive than they had to be by foisting on ruling elites an unrealistic sense of what could be accomplished along with a near messianic belief in the legitimacy of their own authority? I suspect that is true as well. But frankly, I don't consider myself, or for that matter, anyone so wise as to have known how it all could have been much different. What we often forget to realize is that the ideology didn't make the history, but the other way around (at least most of the time). That said, I am amazed at the answer above. Surely Brad is correct, as much as there is a correct position, in deciding not to separate the issues of nuclear war and post-colonial development. You can sum up the pluses and minuses as you like. The whole point, if perhaps put a little too ironically in my last post, is that the consequences of the nuclear issue (i.e., survival of human civlization, at a minimum) far outweigh even the most dire reading of the effects of communism in world history. You can calculate the weight of Chevy's and feathers all you want, it is just hard to come up with a convenient unit of measurement for them both. Truman and the architects of the Cold War could only have been justified in putting all of humanity at risk if they expected that the Soviets were about to over- run the entire world. (And even then, better red than dead, I say.) It is not clear that even they believed that, and if they did, they were scandalously wrong.
[PEN-L:1847] Fwd: Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdumboundary=part0_914356735_boundary
This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --part0_914356735_boundary No, unlike Bill's, my apology is sincere and as for close to Bill's, well you know the rest..."close but no cigar". But you know, reductio ad absurdum/nauseum as a instrument of rhetoric and reasoning does not so much suggest analogy as to expore the inner and perhaps hidden nature and consequences of a thing by extrapolating the inexorable or likely consequences if given "principles", "axioms" and "concepts" are consistently and universally applied. That is the spirit in which it is used rather than to suggest that the nazis were holding seminars and praticums on Walras, Pareto or even Hayek to construct marginalist calculations and general "equilibria" schemes and orders. But I really did like Wotjek's comments and about the illusions of "choice". As the new inmates came to Auschwitz they were greeted with the monstrous grand illusion "Arbeit Macht Frei" implying the "choice" to either directly die or survive through work. Of course the work itself was designed not only to produce but to degrade and kill through other means. A lot of capitalism is like that. Enough of my analogies already--for now. Jim Craven --part0_914356735_boundary Return-Path: [EMAIL PROTECTED] by rly-ya05.mx.aol.com (8.8.8/8.8.5/AOL-4.0.0) Tue, 22 Dec 1998 14:38:33 -0500 (EST) be forged)) Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1998 11:35:12 -0800 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [PEN-L:1844] Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdum In-Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa for any overreach on mym part or for not making the extent of any analogy clear. you don't need to apologize as much as this! (Watch out: you'll start sounding like Bill Clinton.) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html --part0_914356735_boundary--
[PEN-L:1846] Re: imf report
Patrick Bond queries: Anyone have anything quirky and insightful to say on the IMF report on world economic prospects? I have to go on South African tv tomorrow morning at 5:30 GMT to chat about it with a bourgeois economist. Any hints? Why not just challenge the clown to take a personal financial gamble on the outcome of a particular IMF project? I can't think of anything that concentrates the bowels more powerfully. valis
[PEN-L:1845] Re: neo-classical muzak
At 10:58 AM 12/22/98 -0800, Tom Walker wrote: What you get then is not some inexorable totalitarian argument leading from the market to the gas chamber, but a soppy mush of sycophantic string music that acts as recorded background for the arbitrary and seemingly uncontestable exercise of power. No, I am not suggesting that there is a road leading from the market to the gas chamber. After all, paraphrasing one Maggie Thatcher, there is no such a thing like markets, only moneygrubbers and their sycophantic apologists. Market is an abstraction, a shadow on the Platonic cave wall if you will, whereas gas chambers were quite real, I've seen them (whereas I cannot say the same about the markets), so claiming that the former leads to the latter would be an inexcusably idealistic argument -- unaccaptable to any self-respecting Marxist. Instead, I view all this market-schmarket schmoozing as a cultural text, a myth devised to legitimate the unequal power relations and US imperialist domination by wrapping them in the shroud of "voluntarism" and "free choice" - and then, following the logic of hedonistic-utilitarian ethics: if people freely choose something it is good form them. People can choose things in the markets, ergo, markets are good. Moreover, United States is also good, because it is market society (I have not seen any markets here, excpet a few fleamarkets in the Baltimore area, but that is another story). I used the Auschwitz exampe as a "reduction ad absurdum" technique - to demonstrate the absurdity of the "free choice voluntarism" claim by showing that such a claim can be made in virtuallly any circumstances, even Auschwitz. It was not my intention to cheapen the gravity of Nazi crimes, as you and Jim Devine seem to suggest. That, of course, does not mean that no analogy between the modus operandi of the nazi regime and that of the market cannot be made. Best regards, and again, I'm signinig off for a few days. Have a nice winter solstice and the new year, everyone. Wojtek
[PEN-L:1844] Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdumboundary=part0_914354916_boundary
This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --part0_914354916_boundary To Jim Devine's reposne I have to agree. There is a real danger in trivializing the most horrible with analogy overreach or fallcy of "proof" by analogy. On the other hand, Auschwitz was an inexorable result--not a beginning--of a system of twisted logic, imperatives, interests and power structures that progressively unfolded from post WWI--and even before--on. The captured SS document does indeed embody the cold and sterile and inhuman kinds of "calculus of rationality, optimality, efficiency, general equilibrium--order"-- and hypothetico deductivism quite common in marginalism and neoclassical tracts. Further the trite disctinction between "normative" and "positive" as well as the sterile models was also being alluded to. But the point is very well taken; false analogies or overreach can indeed trivialize the most montrous and put them on the plane of the comonplace. But then let's take the principle one more step: not to see clear parallels or analogies--e.g. the one and only one true Holocaust or the one and one only true victims concept--also trivializes the commonly known/referred to Holocaust along with the commonly known/referred to victims and not commonly known/not commonly referred to victims. On one more note, the foundations--legal, social, moral, economic, political, cultural--of fascism in Germany as well as every other known past and present case of fascism are progressively laid well before the full asumption of State power by fascists. Typically those laying the foundations do so under banners of "conservativism", let markets do what markets do (at the level of rhetoric only) and the core principles of the Bruning, Von Pappen and Von Schleicher regimes that were instrumental in laying the foundations of fascism in Germany presented the rhetoric of capitalist-driven efficiency with which most neoclassicals would have had no problem rationalizing at the theoretical level. But the comment and exception of Jim Devine remains important and very necessary. Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa for any overreach on mym part or for not making the extent of any analogy clear. Jim Craven --part0_914354916_boundary Return-Path: [EMAIL PROTECTED] by rly-zd03.mx.aol.com (8.8.8/8.8.5/AOL-4.0.0) Tue, 22 Dec 1998 13:42:21 -0500 (EST) Tue, 22 Dec 1998 10:43:57 -0800 (PST) be forged)) Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1998 09:25:22 -0800 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:1839] Re: Fwd: Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdum In-Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Jim Craven writes: The reason I see Auschwitz as an inexorable metaphor/expression of libertarianism is on the plane of the sterile, cold, calculating, selfish calculus of maximization, "optimality", "efficiency" dog-eat-dog and rat-race individualism embodied in the libertarian perspective coupled with the de jure illusions of market-driving "choice" hiding the tyrrany and brutality of market-based de facto realities and consequences on the many in service of the profits/power of the few. I for one am really tired of Nazi analogies, like one that showed up awhile back on pen-l comparing (now exiting) California Governor Pete Wilson to the Nazis. Sure he's a horrible person and probably deserves to be forced to live in Pelican Bay (one of the prisons he built) for a month or more to see what he hath wrought. But he's no Nazi. (I bring up that analogy in hopes that I don't have to repeat my arguments from a previous thread.) The problem with the overused Nazi analogy is not only the fallacy of argument by analogy (i.e., that saying that Wilson is like the Nazis ignores the way in which Wilson is _not_ like the Nazis). It's also that the excessive use of the Nazi analogy slowly but surely undermines the horror of the Nazis and their rule. I can imagine someone thinking: oh, the Nazis must not have been so bad, if they're only as bad as Pete Wilson. (Similarly, when a young man "cops a feel" of his date's breast, calling it "date rape" threatens to undermine the meaning of rape.) We should try to avoid excess rhetoric. Getting back to the issue of false analogies as applied to the comparison between markets and Auschwitz, there's a clear difference between the two, summarized by Marx's phrase "commodity fetishism." An explicit despotism like Auschwitz lacks it. The market -- commodity production -- hides the class despotism (the monopolization of the means of production and subsistence by a small minority of the population, so that the majority has little choice but to work for the minority, producing surplus value). People living in a "market system" usually see it as a "natural" process and suffer from what Marx termed "the illusions created by competition" (which is basically the same as com. fet.), concluding that rent is produced by land or the scarcity of a resource,
[PEN-L:1843] imf report
Comrades, Anyone have anything quirky and insightful to say on the IMF report on world economic prospects? I have to go on South African tv tomorrow morning at 5:30 GMT to chat about it with a bourgeois economist. Any hints? P. *** Patrick Bond 51 Somerset Road, Kensington 2094 Johannesburg, South Africa phone: (2711) 614-8088 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] office: University of the Witwatersrand Graduate School of Public and Development Management PO Box 601, Wits 2050 phone (o): (2711)488-5917; fax: (2711) 484-2729 email (o): [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[PEN-L:1842] neo-classical muzak
I'd like to point out a few weaknesses in the Auschwitz example:
1. 'the nazis' are definitively others -- "they're not like us" -- which
gives the student an escape hatch.
2. the nazis were presumably 'undone' both by the barbaric irrationality of
their ideology and by the forces of good ('us'). There is a smug hint of
inevitability to this story of defeat.
3. the example is a variation on the theme of "graduating", as in graduating
from smoking marijuana to mainlining heroin. Maximizing utility doesn't
inevitably lead to genocide. Nor does neo-classical economics inevitably
lead to a apology for genocide.
This is not to dispute that there is a totalitarian logic to neo-classical
economics, only to point out that Auschwitz example probably gives more
grounds (subjectively) for dismissing the danger of that totalitarianism
than for attending to it.
I'd propose muzak as a better metaphor than Auschwitz for *most*
neo-classical analysis. Most articles published in academic journals has
been produced primarily for the purpose of career advancement, not the
advancement of knowledge. The selection of this material by "peer review" is
largely dictated by conformism, not by any genuinely rigourous intellectual
criteria -- although typically that conformism is communicated as
"scholarly" ("I am a scholar, therefore if I don't like the argument it is
'unscholarly'").
What you get then is not some inexorable totalitarian argument leading from
the market to the gas chamber, but a soppy mush of sycophantic string music
that acts as recorded background for the arbitrary and seemingly
uncontestable exercise of power.
Tom Walker
http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/
[PEN-L:1841] Russian Stalinists Commemorate Dictator's Birthday
Stalinists Commemorate Dictator's Birthday MOSCOW, Dec. 22, 1998 -- (Reuters) Several hundred Russian Communists marched to Red Square on Monday to lay carnations at the Kremlin wall tomb of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin on the 119th anniversary of his birth. The solemn scene, amid a light drizzle, underscored the extent to which the question of Stalin's legacy still divides Russians seven years after the fall of the Soviet Union. Most Russians have come to regard Stalin as he is regarded in the West -- a capricious tyrant who murdered millions during nearly three decades of repressive rule. Some years after his death in 1953, the Soviet Communist party took down nearly all of Stalin's statues and moved his embalmed body from the ostentatious mausoleum in the center of Red Square -- where it lay next to that of Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin -- to a more prosaic grave nearby. But many, especially some elderly people, still recall with fondness the days when Russia was a superpower, and credit Stalin for leading the country to victory in World War II. Although open signs of reverence toward Stalin remain rare, even among the Communists who make up the largest party in parliament, a few Stalinists gather at the anniversaries of his birth and death each year. Despite an exhortation from the man next to her not to "give an interview to the Zionists," Tatyana Kryzhanovskya told reporters that she remembered her childhood under Stalin with pride. Clutching a portrait of the dictator, she described the celebrations his birthday once drew. "In 1940, we gathered with our teachers in Moscow. They put red Young Pioneer ribbons around our necks with metal clasps. And now, our teachers walk by and do not say that this is our beloved father," she said. "During the war I lost my mother and father. We worked alongside the adults and defended our motherland, believing in our own Stalin." Mikhail Ivanov, who said he was a child during the 900-day siege of Leningrad, said: "Under Stalin, Russia became a great power that helped other countries fight for their freedom." Russia's NTV television over the weekend reported another sign of how Stalin's image continues to haunt Russians. A bust of the dictator was unveiled in a provincial Ural Mountains Russian school on Saturday, to applause from local Communists and protests from some teachers. NTV said it was the first time a memorial to Stalin had been restored in Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union. "It was because of his command that the Soviet Union achieved victory in World War II," one schoolgirl told NTV. But liberals held a demonstration outside the school. "Those who are for Stalin today are simply trying to blame the present government for all their troubles," one man said. Liberal politicians have warned in recent months that the economic crisis which has engulfed the country since August is fuelling political extremism. They point to a recent spate of anti-Jewish statements by Communist party leaders. During Stalin's reign, Jews were widely persecuted by Soviet officials. -- Gregory Schwartz Department of Political Science York University 4700 Keele St. Toronto, Ontario M3J 1P3 Canada tel: (416) 736-5265 fax: (416) 736-5686
[PEN-L:1839] Re: Fwd: Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdum
Jim Craven writes: The reason I see Auschwitz as an inexorable
metaphor/expression of
libertarianism is on the plane of the sterile, cold, calculating, selfish
calculus of maximization, "optimality", "efficiency" dog-eat-dog and rat-race
individualism embodied in the libertarian perspective coupled with the de
jure
illusions of market-driving "choice" hiding the tyrrany and brutality of
market-based de facto realities and consequences on the many in service of
the
profits/power of the few.
I for one am really tired of Nazi analogies, like one that showed up awhile
back on pen-l comparing (now exiting) California Governor Pete Wilson to
the Nazis. Sure he's a horrible person and probably deserves to be forced
to live in Pelican Bay (one of the prisons he built) for a month or more to
see what he hath wrought. But he's no Nazi. (I bring up that analogy in
hopes that I don't have to repeat my arguments from a previous thread.)
The problem with the overused Nazi analogy is not only the fallacy of
argument by analogy (i.e., that saying that Wilson is like the Nazis
ignores the way in which Wilson is _not_ like the Nazis). It's also that
the excessive use of the Nazi analogy slowly but surely undermines the
horror of the Nazis and their rule. I can imagine someone thinking: oh, the
Nazis must not have been so bad, if they're only as bad as Pete Wilson.
(Similarly, when a young man "cops a feel" of his date's breast, calling it
"date rape" threatens to undermine the meaning of rape.) We should try to
avoid excess rhetoric.
Getting back to the issue of false analogies as applied to the comparison
between markets and Auschwitz, there's a clear difference between the two,
summarized by Marx's phrase "commodity fetishism." An explicit despotism
like Auschwitz lacks it. The market -- commodity production -- hides the
class despotism (the monopolization of the means of production and
subsistence by a small minority of the population, so that the majority has
little choice but to work for the minority, producing surplus value).
People living in a "market system" usually see it as a "natural" process
and suffer from what Marx termed "the illusions created by competition"
(which is basically the same as com. fet.), concluding that rent is
produced by land or the scarcity of a resource, interest is a reward for
the deferment of enjoyment ("waiting" or time preference), and profits is
the reward for risk-taking and entrepreneurship. They don't see these
incomes as being parts of surplus value and as resulting from class
despotism. The market usually hides the human responsibility for what's
going on and for the creation of class inequality, blaming inhuman forces
such as technology.
On the other hand, the death camp's social relations are very transparent
to the participants.
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://clawww.lmu.edu/Faculty/JDevine/jdevine.html
[PEN-L:1835] Fwd: Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdumboundary=part0_914344462_boundary
This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --part0_914344462_boundary IMHO this is wonderfully argued and quite historically accurate--and an excellent and concentrated metaphor. The libertarian "voluntarism" is the a priori, hypothetico-deductivist or de jure coupled with no notion or concern--summarily assuming away--for the de facto effects and realities. Some small "concessions" to "asymmetric" information or "asymmetric" factor mobility with "given" initial resource endowments and "given" institutions, and no concession or even mention of class, race, gender, history, power, we get the grand tautology "everything tends to the best in the best of all worlds." Deviations or failures are simply ascribed to the anthropomorphized market not being market-like; in order words, the answer to any "failures" of market-based processes and illusory choices is simply more and "more free" markets and illusory choices. The reason I see Auschwitz as an inexorable metaphor/expression of libertarianism is on the plane of the sterile, cold, calculating, selfish calculus of maximization, "optimality", "efficiency" dog-eat-dog and rat-race individualism embodied in the libertarian perspective coupled with the de jure illusions of market-driving "choice" hiding the tyrrany and brutality of market-based de facto realities and consequences on the many in service of the profits/power of the few. Jim Craven In a message dated 12/22/98 7:25:24 AM Pacific Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: he absurdity of the voluntarism requirement becomes evident that the case for "voluntary" participation can be made in virtually _any_ situation, even Auschwitz. The fact of the matter is that people (Jews others) often _volunteered_ for the camps, duped by the Nazi deceptive advertising them as "resettlement." The victims were led to believe that they would be resettled to Eastern Europe and given a chance to work. To be certain, the Nazis fulfilled that part of their promises - they merely added an unadvertised special, the gas chamber. Moreover, Judenrat - the Nazi administration of Jewish affairs staffed by Jews - often participated in spreading that deception. They believed that if they cooperate with the nazis they will demonstrate the usefulness of at least some part of the Jewish population for the Nazi war machine and thus save them form the extermination. --part0_914344462_boundary Return-Path: [EMAIL PROTECTED] by rly-zb04.mx.aol.com (8.8.8/8.8.5/AOL-4.0.0) Tue, 22 Dec 1998 10:25:19 -0500 (EST) Tue, 22 Dec 1998 07:25:01 -0800 (PST) From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1998 10:23:25 -0500 Subject: [PEN-L:1830] Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdum In-reply-to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] v04003a01b2a44c1f5fdc@[136.152.90.200] Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] At 04:36 PM 12/21/98 -0800, Ken Hanly wrote: This is quite a different situation than people voluntarily trading to an equilibrium in a market. No libertarian would approve of Auschwitz. It is a clear violation of rights. Jews didn't voluntarily work in the labor camps or go to the gashouses as a result of some trade. The issue of voluntarism is a smokescreen to coverup the totalitarian nature of the market institution. It is totalitarian because, as you correctly point out in the remainder of your post, it makes decisions based on value, that is, accumulated wealth - hence the haves will always prevail. Voluntarism, on th eother hand stpulates the excuse "people apparently accept that state of affairs" - hence th emarket seems to be a morally good institution. The absurdity of the voluntarism requirement becomes evident that the case for "voluntary" participation can be made in virtually _any_ situation, even Auschwitz. The fact of the matter is that people (Jews others) often _volunteered_ for the camps, duped by the Nazi deceptive advertising them as "resettlement." The victims were led to believe that they would be resettled to Eastern Europe and given a chance to work. To be certain, the Nazis fulfilled that part of their promises - they merely added an unadvertised special, the gas chamber. Moreover, Judenrat - the Nazi administration of Jewish affairs staffed by Jews - often participated in spreading that deception. They believed that if they cooperate with the nazis they will demonstrate the usefulness of at least some part of the Jewish population for the Nazi war machine and thus save them form the extermination. So the case can be made that the camps were to some degree voluntary - if only resulting from constraining of other alternatives and deceptive advertising. But that is standard business practice under capitalism, no? Heil Market! Wojtek --part0_914344462_boundary--
[PEN-L:1833] Fw: [IAC] FROM Baghdad -- news release
-- From: Rania Masri [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [IAC] FROM Baghdad -- news release Date: Monday, December 21, 1998 9:33 AM =Iraq Action Coalition http://leb.net/IAC/ === To subscribe, send an e-mail to "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" with 'subscribe iac-list' in the body of the message == From: Kathy Kelly [EMAIL PROTECTED] PRESS STATEMENT 20 DECEMBER Voices in the Wilderness A Campaign to End the UN/US Sanctions Against Iraq For Immediate Release December 20, 1998 Contact Kathy Kelly Baghdad - Al Fanar Hotel: 001-964-1-7188007 Members of the 19th Voices in the Wilderness delegation, who arrived in Baghdad on December 19, welcome the news that President Clinton has ceased the bombing of Iraq. Yet we know that the silent warfare will continue through economic sanctions, and that the destruction caused by this most recent bombardment will result in ongoing suffering and death. Our itinerary will be as follows: December 22: Ministry of Trade building. We will hold a press conference at the Ministry of Trade to announce that we continue to publicly defy U.S. laws regarding the embargo. In 18 previous delegations, we have broken the embargo by traveling to Iraq and bringing medicines to children and families. On December 3, Voices in the Wilderness received a letter from the U.S. Treasury Department proposing a $163,000 fine for delivering "medicines and toys" to children in Iraq. We will show samples of medicines and toys which we will be bringing to the children we plan to visit in Iraqi hospitals this week. We will explain our refusal to pay any penalties, as all donations to our campaign are intended for the purchase of medicines and to assist with efforts to end the embargo against Iraq. We will invite members of the U.S. Government and other governments to join us in our effort to alleviate the suffering by ending the embargo. The U.S. and UK governments unilaterally chose to bomb Iraq. They acted without the support of the UN. The time has come for people throughout the world and governments of the world to act in spite of the U.S. veto in the UN Security Council, and to begin free trade and travel with Iraq. The time has come for the world to resume buying Iraq's oil so that Iraqi families can feed themselves and care for their urgent physical and medical needs. We will symbolically declare an end to the embargo by purchasing a small amount of Iraqi oil, which will be used to light a small lamp. This act will demonstrate our determination to "shed light" on the suffering caused by the embargo, and our continued commitment to work with others worldwide to avoid further destruction and to reinstate free trade and travel with Iraq. 23 December Voices in the Wilderness members will visit students at a primary and secondary school in Baghdad. We will display a large banner bearing our logo of a woman crouching over her child to protect the infant from a weapon labeled "sanctions." Students will be asked what this image means to them. We will ask the students to help us understand what they have experienced this past week. 24 December Christmas Eve Vigil. At 12 noon, we will hold a press conference in the maternity ward of a hospital damaged by the recent bombing. In the U.S., people will be preparing to celebrate the birth of Jesus, an infant born into wretched poverty and revered as the Prince of Peace. We will erect a nativity scene by setting up a tent and a Star of Bethlehem at the site where children were born into the world under bombardment. Doctors will be invited to speak as the "wise men" or magi, and new mothers, expectant mothers and children will be invited to join us. Various representatives of NGOs working in Baghdad, along with religious leaders, will also be welcome. 19th Delegation Members: Kathy Kelly, Chicago IL. Anne Montgomery, NYC, NY. Alan Pogue, Austin TX. Brad Simpson, Chicago IL. Voices in the Wilderness A Campaign to End the US/UN Economic Sanctions Against the People of Iraq 1460 West Carmen Ave. Chicago, IL 60640 ph:773-784-8065; fax: 773-784-8837 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] website: http://www.nonviolence.org/vitw
[PEN-L:1831] Re: Re: Environmental Quality in Developing Countries
Brad De Long wrote: I'm not going to defend Lant Pritchett's inept and overwritten memo, or Lawrence Summers' signing it (although I would note that Summers-as-academic is known for giving credit to RAs and elevating them to co-author and lead-author status much more than most of his ilk). But there is a serious issue here. In Ghana--where 60% of the urban population has no access to the sewer system, where 70% of energy still comes from burning wood and charcoal (and where rain acidity as a result at times reaches Black Forest levels), where 40% of people drink contaminated water, and where 15% of people suffer from waterborne diseases--should taxicabs have to have catalytic converters installed? Is that what Summers/Pritchett meant by "I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that"? It was about catalytic converters? There is also a fourth argument: What business is it of anyone in the first world telling people in developing countries that they can or cannot pollute? Which people in "developing" countries? The capitalists and politicians, or the folks who'll have to live next to the impeccably pedigreed load of toxic waste? But these are hard and serious issues where I don't think I have many (if any) of the answers. I certainly don't have "the" answers, but one point seems pretty unassailable - in countries that are lightly industrialized, should they just imitate the heavily industrialized countries, embracing (or having thrust upon them) the filthier industries? Or should they try to do it right from scratch? Doug
[PEN-L:1830] Re: Re: Redutio ad Absurdum
At 04:36 PM 12/21/98 -0800, Ken Hanly wrote: This is quite a different situation than people voluntarily trading to an equilibrium in a market. No libertarian would approve of Auschwitz. It is a clear violation of rights. Jews didn't voluntarily work in the labor camps or go to the gashouses as a result of some trade. The issue of voluntarism is a smokescreen to coverup the totalitarian nature of the market institution. It is totalitarian because, as you correctly point out in the remainder of your post, it makes decisions based on value, that is, accumulated wealth - hence the haves will always prevail. Voluntarism, on th eother hand stpulates the excuse "people apparently accept that state of affairs" - hence th emarket seems to be a morally good institution. The absurdity of the voluntarism requirement becomes evident that the case for "voluntary" participation can be made in virtually _any_ situation, even Auschwitz. The fact of the matter is that people (Jews others) often _volunteered_ for the camps, duped by the Nazi deceptive advertising them as "resettlement." The victims were led to believe that they would be resettled to Eastern Europe and given a chance to work. To be certain, the Nazis fulfilled that part of their promises - they merely added an unadvertised special, the gas chamber. Moreover, Judenrat - the Nazi administration of Jewish affairs staffed by Jews - often participated in spreading that deception. They believed that if they cooperate with the nazis they will demonstrate the usefulness of at least some part of the Jewish population for the Nazi war machine and thus save them form the extermination. So the case can be made that the camps were to some degree voluntary - if only resulting from constraining of other alternatives and deceptive advertising. But that is standard business practice under capitalism, no? Heil Market! Wojtek
[PEN-L:1829] Greenfield on WTO
The WTO, the World Food System, and the Politics of Harmonised Destruction Gerard Greenfield Education Programme Organiser (Indonesia) IUF-A/P IUF-A/P Globalisation Seminar II: Globalisation and the Future of Agri-Food Workers November 16-18, 1998, Ahmedabad, India __ 1. Introduction Only three years after its creation, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) has had a dramatic and far-reaching impact on our lives. Rising unemployment and declining living standards brought about by the rush towards `zero' tariffs and subsidies, destructive competition inflicted by Transnational Corporations (TNCs) under `free market access', the reversal or revision of domestic laws and regulations to bring them into line with new international standards, and the undemocratic rulings on trade disputes involving everything from bananas to telephone directories, is proof enough that the WTO is capable of turning all our fears of GATT into a reality. This paper will focus on four aspects of the WTO's impact on the world food system and the role of agri-food Transnational Corporations (TNCs): (I) The reality of the WTO's agenda for `free trade', `free competition' and a `level playing-field' in agriculture is based on greater inequality, the monopolisation and centralisation of control of the agri-food industry by TNCs, and massive dumping of agri-food exports by the major industrialised countries. (ii) The harmonisation of national and sub-national laws and regulations to conform with the new global standards devised by private industry and imposed by the WTO. The result is the systematic destruction of efforts to protect the collective rights, health, and livelihood of working people and our capacity to exercise democratic controls over capital. (iii) Like the proposed Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) in the OECD, the plan to include a Multilateral Investment Agreement (MIA) in the WTO will create a global charter for the rights of TNCs and further consolidate their power. (iv) Rather than signaling a decline in the power of the state, the WTO agenda requires a more powerful state to act against attempts by mass movements and organised labour to impose democratic controls on capital. Ultimately the aim of the neoliberal globalisation project is to lock the state into the networks of power of TNCs. - The complete article is at: http://www.labournet.org/discuss/global/wto.html Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)
[PEN-L:1828] Re: Craven vs. Clark II
Queried Jeff "Deep Mole" Fellows of CDC: Valis, did you even read the article? "Even"? I guess I should cop to your expectation that I read it with a divided attention or not at all. What did I miss or misinterpret? valis
[PEN-L:1827] RE: Jim Craven vs. Clark College
Valis, did you even read the article? -- From: valis -- Vancouver (Washington State) Columbian, Sunday Dec. 20, 1998 Clark College restricts professor's computer use E-mail feud with Canadian student triggers hints of defamation lawsuit against college By Richard S. Clayton, Columbia staff writer Yup, it can only be another day or two before the networks are obliged to pick this one up. Poor Clark! It'll be toasted worse than Clinton. valis
[PEN-L:1825] Re: Environmental Quality in Developing Countriesboundary=part0_914306050_boundary
This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --part0_914306050_boundary On the comments blow, my own comments are: a) I can think of a long list of "non-democratic"/anti-democratic regimes set up and social systems engineered as non-democratic/anti-democratic regimes in the service of US and other imperial interests; in fact those imperial interests are secured and expanded through these alliances/regimes. And as for the so-called "democratic" regimes, well there we get into de jure versus de facto and what do thse labels really mean. b) How about a variation on the celebrated marginal productivity theory where instead of each "factor" being "rewarded" according to its marginal revenue product or marginal contribution to the value of total output, perhaps each "nation" is responsible to absorb/dispose of/recycle--on its own soil--a portion of global pullutants proportionate to its "marginal contribution" to global pollution? Something like "no marginal benefits" without proportionate "marginal costs"? c) Unfortunately, global jetstreams. ocean currents, atomspheric patterns, topsoil erosion flows, rivers, migrating populations, epidemiological patterns etc are poor at recognizing nations and national boundaries. In economics and politics and other spheres, where do the limits of a given economy or society really begin and end? d) The isolated car in a rural setting without anti-pollution equipment very rapidly becomes the clone of many in cogested and polluted urban settings under the dynamics of capitalism and capitalist-driven globalization. As for choices about optimal allocations of scarce resources consistent with "social" needs and imperatives, well that calculation rarrely if ever occurs or is intended in market-based calculations--except when system-threatening crises emerge. e) The rich who run the so-called "developed countries" are in some ways like the affluent running to the surburbs to build insulated "communities", higfher and more electrified fences, hiring private security and screening the hired help with hidden videos while keeping them poorly paid and at arms length. Eventually oppression, misery, disease, poverty bring resistance and mobility. Then no walls can be built ilt high enough, no electrical field will be strong enough, no security guards tough or trustworthy enough, no national borders secure enough and no imperial forces enough in numbers and force to hold off the "hoards" coming on many fronts. It is a question of imperatives and necessity eventually exposing and checking hubris and power. That's why I like the Titanic metaphor/allegory so much. Yes more rich got out and had a greater chance of survival than second-class and steerage, but they went down also--playing cards and listening to music certain the ship would never sink while it sank all around them. e) Out of 73 targerted EPA toxic waste sites, 72 were on Indian Reservations. There is also the matter of International Law, Common Law of Nations, the Vienna convention and other standards (UN Convention on Genocide) and even bourgoeis rights held sacred that can be used and will be used to limit major pollutors contributing more hubris than their proportionate contributions to global pollution and far ess clean-up responsibilities/costs than their marginal contributions to global pollution that are at each others throats as well as alienating and marginalizing large segments of the global community; their own sacreds call into question the very properties and behaviors they purport to protect; Just some thoughts. Jim Craven --part0_914306050_boundary Return-Path: [EMAIL PROTECTED] by relay20.mx.aol.com (8.8.8/8.8.5/AOL-4.0.0) Tue, 22 Dec 1998 00:00:43 -0500 (EST) Mon, 21 Dec 1998 21:01:16 -0800 (PST) In-Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1998 20:58:03 -0800 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Brad De Long [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:1821] Re: Environmental Quality in Developing Countries Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] I'm not going to defend Lant Pritchett's inept and overwritten memo, or Lawrence Summers' signing it (although I would note that Summers-as-academic is known for giving credit to RAs and elevating them to co-author and lead-author status much more than most of his ilk). But there is a serious issue here. In Ghana--where 60% of the urban population has no access to the sewer system, where 70% of energy still comes from burning wood and charcoal (and where rain acidity as a result at times reaches Black Forest levels), where 40% of people drink contaminated water, and where 15% of people suffer from waterborne diseases--should taxicabs have to have catalytic converters installed? The "no" argument is that it adds $700 or so to the cost of the automobile. That $700 could--if it were used wisely--be devoted to upgrading the sewer system, or building a water purification plant, or expanding the electrical grid so that smoke
[PEN-L:1799] A harmonised australia
G'day all, A lovely follow-up to the MUA story (remember the Ozzie wharfies' strike?) ... The government, interest groups and Patrick Stevedores may yet be laid low! But not by the union. Nope. The spectre that haunts them is that of the scabs! These blokes are suing for millions in compensation for being cast asunder as soon as the dirty work was done. And whatever evidence for the conspiracy the MUA had so long hinted at (but either didn't use or didn't have) would logically be in the possession of this lot, no? They reckon they have it, anyway - all the way back to the quasi-military training in Dubai. And they look like they're prepared to pull the trigger, too. 'Course, the election has been and gone (the Tories won), but one suspects there is a bit of good in this. At the very least upwards of 350 people might just have endured a salutory lesson in class consciousness, eh? At the very best, some hitherto smug brows might now be furrowing a bit (quickly, I hope - a goods and services tax and the repeal of some unfair dismissal regulations are on the immediate agenda here) and a lot of other people might get a clearer idea of where the ultimate battle lines are ... Cheers, Rob.
[PEN-L:1796] Re: Redutio ad Absurdum
G'day Brad, Thanks for this: I think famines work better--they make the point that if your labor-time endowment has no value, then your utility has no weight in the social welfare function that the market maximizes, and so you starve to death: the market's equilibrium weighs each person's preferences roughly by the market value of his/her endowment. I think famines work better because starvation is not a willed and desired objective of anyone in the market--while mass death certainly was a willed and desired objective of those who ran the show during the "final solution." "Final solution" examples leave people thinking, "yes, this market-as-a-social-allocation-mechanism does indeed efficiently produce the goals that society has chosen." Famine examples--I think, at least--probe a little bit deeper because the market also plays a powerful role in "choosing" "society's" "goals." A terrific supplement, I reckon (although I don't doubt a few famines might have been deliberately orchestrated) - to complete the mutual constitution stressed in the slowly reawakening term 'political economy' (notice how it's back on the covers of so many text-books? Gotta be good, I reckon). Very slightly tangentially, I am reminded of a cute Joan Robinson line: "utility is the quality in commodities that makes individuals want to buy them, and the fact that individuals want to buy commodities shows that they have utility." And then I think of ol' man Galbraith (I find free associations like this come easily to me when I'm dog-tired - but mebbe you gotta be dog-tired to follow 'em ... ), who adds another dimension - as demand is consciously and necessarily 'managed' by corporations, even the apparently mindless market's role in 'choosing' 'society's' 'goals' has a degree of conscious authorship about it. With apologies to Woody Allen, economics is only confusing if it's done right, eh? Time to greet the new day as if it's not the old one ... Cheers, Rob.
[PEN-L:1780] Re: Fwd: Re: Re: ReductioAd/Absurdum/Nauseum/Inhumanum
G'day Jim, You'd written: "I do a little number in my Micro classes called "Pareto Optimality at Auschwitz" ... " Way back, I changed degrees half a semester into an education/economics degree. Those who purported to teach how to teach couldn't teach, and those who purported to explain human behaviour weren't talking about anybody I knew - well, not then, anyway. Maybe I wasn't as lucky with my teachers as your students so obviously are. Maybe too many of us weren't. All the best, Rob.
