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The Bethlehem Steel plant in the United States went bankrupt in 2001, and has since been converted into the Sands Casino.

The countries in green are considered to be the current industrializing nations (see: Newly industrializing countries). China and India (in dark green) are special cases.

Deindustrialization (also spelled deindustrialisation) is a process of social and economic change caused by the removal or reduction of industrial capacity or activity in a country or region, especially heavy industry or manufacturing industry. It is an opposite of industrialization.

Multiple interpretations[link]

There are multiple interpretations of what this process is. Cairncross (1982) and Lever (1991) offer four possible definitions of deindustrialization:

1. A straightforward decline in the output of manufactured goods or in employment in the manufacturing sector. This, however, can be misleading because short-run or cyclical downturns may be misinterpreted as long-run deindustrialization
2. A shift from manufacturing to the service sectors, so that manufacturing has a lower share of total output or employment. This may also be misleading, however, as such a shift may occur even if manufacturing is growing in absolute terms
3. That manufactured goods comprise a declining share of external trade, so that there is a progressive failure to achieve a sufficient surplus of exports over imports to maintain an economy in external balance
4. A continuing state of balance of trade deficit (as described in the third definition above) that accumulates to the extent that a country or region is unable to pay for necessary imports to sustain further production of goods, thus initiating a further downward spiral of economic decline

Explanations[link]

Theories that predict or explain deindustrialization have a long intellectual lineage. Rowthorn (1992) argues that Marx's theory of declining (industrial) profit may be regarded as one of the earliest. This theory argues that technological innovation enables more efficient means of production, resulting in increased physical productivity, i.e., a greater output of use value per unit of capital invested. In parallel, however, technological innovations replace people with machinery, and the organic composition of capital increases. Assuming only labor can produce new additional value, this greater physical output embodies a smaller value and surplus value. The average rate of industrial profit therefore declines in the longer term.

Rowthorn and Wells (1987) distinguish between deindustrialization explanations that see it as a positive process of, for example, maturity of the economy, and those that associate deindustrialization with negative factors like bad economic performance. They suggest deindustrialization may be both an effect and a cause of poor economic performance.

Pitelis and Antonakis (2003) suggest that, to the extent that manufacturing is characterized by higher productivity, this leads, all other things being equal, to a reduction in relative cost of manufacturing products, thus a reduction in the relative share of manufacturing (provided manufacturing and services are characterized by relatively inelastic demand). Moreover, to the extent that manufacturing firms downsize through, e.g., outsourcing, contracting out, etc., this reduces manufacturing share without negatively influencing the economy. Indeed, it potentially has positive effects, provided such actions increase firm productivity and performance.

George Reisman (2002) identified inflation as a contributor to deindustrialization. In his analysis, the process of fiat money inflation distorts the economic calculations necessary to operate capital-intensive manufacturing enterprises, and makes the investments necessary for sustaining the operations of such enterprises unprofitable.

Institutional arrangements have also contributed to deindustrialization such as economic restructuring. With breakthroughs in transportation, communication and information technology, a globalized economy that encouraged foreign direct investment, capital mobility and labor migration, and new economic theory's emphasis on specialized factor endowments, manufacturing moved to lower-cost sites and in its place service sector and financial agglomerations concentrated in urban areas (Bluestone & Harrison 1982, Logan & Swanstrom 1990).

The term de-industrialization crisis has been used to describe the decline of manufacturing in a number of countries and the flight of jobs away from cities. One example is Detroit. After free-trade agreements were instituted with less developed nations in the 1980s and 1990s, Detroit-based manufacturers relocated their production facilities to other areas where wages and standards were lower. In addition, technological inventions that required less manual labor eliminated many manufacturing jobs.

By country[link]

Australia[link]

Although literature (Brady et al. 2007, Feinstein 1999, and Lee 2005) indicates the occurrence of deindustrialization in Australia, industrial employment and output in the country have been steady. Industrial output has been stable since 1975, according to OECD (2008) data, and has been increasing gradually since 2001. Industrial employment has also been stable since 1964, actually increasing since 2001. It is notable that employment in the service sector has been increasing substantially since 1964, with the most dramatic rises occurring from 1995 onward. At the same time, employment in agriculture was steady from 1964 until 2000 when it began to decrease. These contradictions imply that Australia is not deindustrializing. The country has shifted to service oriented production however, with 70% of the GDP resulting from the service sector and only 26% from the industrial sector.

Austria[link]

Austria has many indicators that justifies labeling them as a deindustrializing country. Data collected from the OECD for Austria has shown that since 1956 total employment did grow until 1994 and since then has remained relatively steady. Employment in industry and construction, however, has declined steadily as service sector employment has steadily increased. Data also shows that even as employment in industry and construction has decreased, industry productivity has continued to grow. Austrian unemployment has steadily increased since 1983 due to deindustrialization. Austria was one of countries in a study that showed that increasing overall unemployment was significantly related to manufacturing unemployment. Austria's foreign and domestic policy has made deindustrialization possible. High labor taxes and high withholding taxes repel low skill immigration as low capital taxes enables domestic capital investment. Stern banking secrecy policies, no withholding taxes for non-residents, joining the European Union, and adopting the Euro enabled substantial growth in Austria's services sector.

Belgium[link]

Data taken from the OECD website shows that industrial employment in Belgium rose between 1999 and 2000 and then declined until 2003, rising again until 2006. The overall trend in industrial employment in Belgium, however, is still a decline. OECD data also shows that production and sales of total industry in Belgium has been on the rise since 1955 with the exception of small declines during a few years. Despite this trend, deindustrialization is occurring at fairly rapid rates in Belgium. Variables such as large population increases and regional discrepancies account for these misleading statistics. Deindustrialization is hitting the region of Wallonia much harder than the region of Flanders. Wallonia remains much more impoverished and has an unemployment rate of about 17% (twice that of the unemployment rate in Flanders). Other Statistics displaying the effects of deiundustrialization in Belgium is the rise in employment in the service sector from 1999 until 2006. Today, industry is much less significant in Belgium than it has been in previous years.

Canada[link]

Much of the academic literature pertaining to Canada hints at deindustrialization as a problem. However over the past fifty years, according to 2008 OECD data, industrial production and employment have been steadily increasing. Industrial production leveled off a bit between 2004–2007, but its production levels are the highest that they've ever been. The perception of deindustrialization that the literature refers to deals with the fact that although employment and economic production have risen, the economy has shifted drastically from manufacturing jobs to service sector jobs. Only 13% of the current Canadian population has a job in the industrial sector. Technological advancements in industry over the past fifty years have allowed for industrial production to keep rising during the Canadian economic shift to the service sector. 69% of the GDP of Canada comes from the service sector. (CIA World Factbook 2008)

Denmark[link]

Regarding Denmark’s industry, the country does not appear to be deindustrialising as a whole. Literature (Goldsmith and Larsen 2004) has stated that perhaps Denmark’s size and “Nordic style” of governing has allowed it to hide from the detrimental effects of globalization. Both men’s and women’s labor statistics (OECD data 2008) show a steady increase over the past decade. Despite a slight dip from 2001 to 2003, overall employment in Denmark has been at a steady increase since 1995. Denmark’s total industry output has also been on the rise since the 1974, despite an economic recession from 1987 to 1993. The country’s high employment and low unemployment rates have improved the production industry and the high tax rates have strengthened the economy.^{[citation needed]}

Finland[link]

Based on the data from the OECD website, Finland has been industrialising according to industrial employment and industrial production statistics. Finland has been considered very resilient based on its remarkable economic comeback after their recession in 1990 due to the fall of the Soviet Union. During this time production of total industry and civilian employment in industry declined rapidly. Finland has been ranked number one three times in the World Economic Forum competitiveness studies as one of the most developed IT economies since 2000. Since the 1990 recession, which was one of the largest in European history, Finland has managed to soar back to the top of the economic ladder. Finland has done so by focusing strongly on education. After their recession, Finland invested its money on boosting R&D, education, and retraining workers that had lost their job due to the recession. With its investment in education, Finland has succeeded in increasing some of its industries. For example, the forest industry now specializes in high-quality papers. As a result of investment in education and technology, Finland is now one of the world’s largest producers of paper-making machinery. According to the statistics on the OECD website, Finland is not deindustrialising.

France[link]

Data for France indicates that while employment in industry relative to the total French economy has decreased, there is a lack of sound evidence pointing to an overall trend of deindustrialization. Research (Lee 2005, Feinstein 1999) shows that at the same time relative employment in industry is decreasing, total production in industry has almost quadrupled since the mid 20th century, leveling off only since about the year 2000 (OECD 2008). Lee shows that between 1962 and 1995, employment in industry in France fell 13.1% (2005:table 1). Advances in technology that allow for higher output by fewer employees, coupled with a change in the type of products manufactured domestically, such as the high-tech electronics now manufactured in France, explain negative relationship of employment and output in French industry. Thus, it may feel like deindustrialization is occurring because of the relative decrease of employment or highly publicised cases of outsourcing, yet the data suggest industry production in France is not suffering.^{[original research?]}

Germany[link]

Historic[link]

In occupied Germany after World War II the Morgenthau Plan was implemented,^[1] although not in its most extreme version.^[1] The plan was present in the U.S. occupation directive JCS 1067^[2][3] and in the Allied "industrial disarmament" plans.^[3] On February 2, 1946, a dispatch from Berlin reported:

Some progress has been made in converting Germany to an agricultural and light industry economy, said Brigadier General William H. Draper, Jr., chief of the American Economics Division, who emphasised that there was general agreement on that plan. He explained that Germany’s future industrial and economic pattern was being drawn for a population of 66,500,000. On that basis, he said, the nation will need large imports of food and raw materials to maintain a minimum standard of living. General agreement, he continued, had been reached on the types of German exports — coal, coke, electrical equipment, leather goods, beer, wines, spirits, toys, musical instruments, textiles and apparel — to take the place of the heavy industrial products that formed most of Germany's pre-war exports.^[4]

According to some historians the U.S. government abandoned the Morgenthau plan as policy in September 1946 with Secretary of State James F. Byrnes' speech Restatement of Policy on Germany.^[5]

Others have argued that credit should be given to former U.S.President Herbert Hoover who in one of his reports from Germany, dated March 18, 1947, argued for a change in occupation policy, amongst other things stating:

"There is the illusion that the New Germany left after the annexations can be reduced to a 'pastoral state'. It cannot be done unless we exterminate or move 25,000,000 people out of it."^[6]

Worries about the sluggish recovery of the European economy, which before the war had depended on the German industrial base, and growing Soviet influence amongst a German population subject to food shortages and economic misery, caused the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Generals Clay and Marshall to start lobbying the Truman administration for a change of policy.^[7]

In July 1947, President Harry S. Truman rescinded on "national security grounds"^[8] the punitive occupation directive JCS 1067, which had directed the U.S. forces of occupation in Germany to "take no steps looking toward the economic rehabilitation of Germany [or] designed to maintain or strengthen the German economy", it was replaced by JCS 1779, which instead noted that "[a]n orderly, prosperous Europe requires the economic contributions of a stable and productive Germany."^[9]

It had taken over two months for General Clay to overcome continued resistance to the new directive JCS 1779, but on July 10, 1947, it was finally approved at a meeting of the SWNCC. The final version of the document "was purged of the most important elements of the Morgenthau plan."^[10]

Dismantling of (West) German industry ended in 1951, but "industrial disarmament" lingered in restrictions on actual German Steel production, and production capacity, as well as on restriction on key industries. All remaining restrictions were finally rescinded on May 5, 1955. "The last act of the Morgenthau drama occurred on that date or when the Saar was returned to Germany."^[3]

Vladimir Petrov concluded: "The victorious Allies … delayed by several years the economic reconstruction of the war torn continent, a reconstruction which subsequently cost the US billions of dollars."^[11]

Currently[link]

While unemployment in Germany is very high, industrial output is steadily increasing. Germany's startling unemployment rate of roughly seven percent (OECD, 2008) is by and large due to the continuing struggles with the reunification process between East and West Germany that began in 1990. However, the unemployment rate has been declining since 2005, when it reached its peak of over ten percent. Despite this high rate of unemployment, Germany's economy was ranked third largest in the world (measured by GDP, Wikipedia, 2008), and exports over a trillion dollars worth of goods every year. This notion of deindustrialization may be an inaccurate label for what is really happening in Germany. Germany is producing more with less labor; a product of improving efficiency. Another factor that is camouflaged by deindustrialization is that the labour market has shifted from industry to service. On the surface, it appears that deindustrialisation is occurring in Germany (and all over the world), but it may be just a shift in interests that are generating these statistics. 33.4% of Germany's workforce is in the industrial sector, whereas 63.8% work in the service sector (and the remainder work in agriculture). Germany's recent history has made quite a difference in its economic standing; it has been through a lot of peaks and valleys over the past few decades.

Ireland[link]

Ireland has yet to de-industrialise. Industrial employment and production and sales in industry have increased since 1990 according to OECD data. The increase in industry coincided with the introduction of Intel to the Irish economy in late 1989. Though one may not think of Intel as industry in the same sense as steel production, it is considered to be industry. Intel is now the largest company by turnover in Ireland. This was the beginning of what was called the “Celtic Tiger” economy. Dell and Microsoft also followed Intel to Ireland, creating a large software industry. As is evidenced by these 3 companies, a majority of the industries that exist in Ireland are a result of foreign direct investment. The top 3 FDIs are the U.S., the U.K., and Germany.

Italy[link]

Overall, Italy does not seem to be deindustrialising. According to OECD (2008) Archived 18 March 2008 at the Wayback Machine data, the rate of industrial employment is at an all-time high, although, in general, it has stayed relatively consistent since 1956. The rate of industrial production is also on the rise after a small dip in recent years; even though production rates are still at almost 2 percent less than they were in 2000, the 2005 rate is eighty percent more than what it was in 1955. These figures, however, do not make the distinction between different regions of the country: according to Rowthorn and Ramaswamy (1999), most manufacturing plants are located in cities such as Genoa and Milan in Northern Italy, and the unemployment rate in the south is significantly higher than in the north. Prior to World War II, Italy's economy was mainly agricultural, but it has since shifted to become one of the largest industrial economies in the world. In general, Italy is continuing to experience a period of industrialisation that has been taking place since the shift.

Japan[link]

Historic[link]

To further remove Japan as a potential future military threat after World War II, the Far Eastern Commission decided that Japan must partly de-industrialized. Dismantling of Japanese industry was foreseen to have been achieved when Japanese standards of living were reduced to those between 1930 and 1934.^[12][13] (see Great Depression) In the end the adopted program of de-industrialisation in Japan was implemented to a lesser degree than the similar U.S. "industrial disarmament" program in Germany.^[12]

Current[link]

A notable event began in the 1990s as the economy of Japan suddenly stagnated after three decades of tremendous economic growth. This could be construed as directly linked to deindustrialization, as this phenomenon began to be recognized in developed countries of the world around this same time. However, Japan had larger economic problems, the effects of which can still be seen in the country's low economic growth today. According to data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (2008), deindustrialization is occurring in Japan. However, although industrial employment as a percentage of total employment has dropped over the last couple of decades in Japan, total employment has not.^{[citation needed]} Unemployment was fairly low at 3.5% in 2007 (CIA World Factbook 2008) and the economy is relatively stable. Literature (Matsumoto 1996) has stated that the service sector has been expanding and providing jobs for those that have been displaced from industry. Strong union membership has also played a role in keeping employment rates stable. Although outsourcing and industrial decline may contribute to job loss in industry, the shift in modern economies from industry to service may help reduce negative effects.

Netherlands[link]

Much like many other OECD countries, the Netherlands is not experiencing deindustrialisation in the usual way one might think of it. While the OECD’s Annual Labor Force Statistics Survey may show that industrial employment opportunities in the Netherlands have significantly decreased in the past 50 years, the OECD’s Production and Sales MEI for Industry and Service Statistics shows that the overall production in the industrial sector has actually improved. Meaning, the Netherlands, like many other countries, has advanced to produce more with less.

Also, perhaps in response to the decline in industrial sector employment, the service industry of the Netherlands has grown and expanded its employment opportunities. The timely response of alternatives for employment may have had something to do with the progressive policies the Netherlands has in place to complement the changes in industry. An example might include tax breaks for families where the father works full time and the mother works part time, also referred to as the “one-and-a-half breadwinner” policy.

New Zealand[link]

New Zealand, along with other affluent global economies, is in a phase of deindustrialisation, starting in the late 1990s. The evidence for this phenomenon is apparent in the decrease of economic output, a shift from employment in the manufacturing sector to the service sector (which may be due to an increase in tourism), the dissipation of unions caused by immigration and individual work contracts, along with the influence on culture by highbrow mass media (like the internet) and technology. It is possible to interpret these trends in a different way due to the complex nature of the data and the difficulty in quantifying and calculating reliable results. These trends are important to study, because they might occur in waves that could help predict economic and cultural outcomes in the future.

Poland[link]

In Poland, as in many other former communist countries, deindustrialisation occurred rapidly in the years after the fall of communism in 1989, with many unprofitable industries going bankrupt with the switch to the market economy.

Soviet Union[link]

Prior to its dissolution in 1991, the USSR had the second largest economy in the world after the United States.^[14] The economy of the Soviet Union was the modern world's first centrally planned economy. It was based on a system of state ownership and managed through Gosplan (the State Planning Commission), Gosbank (the State Bank) and the Gossnab (State Commission for Materials and Equipment Supply). Economic planning was through a series of Five-Year Plans. The emphasis was put on a very fast development of heavy industry and the nation became one of the world's top manufacturers of a large number of basic and heavy industrial products, but it lagged behind in the output of light industrial production and consumer durables.

As the Soviet economy grew more complex, it required more and more complex disaggregation of control figures (plan targets) and factory inputs. As it required more communication between the enterprises and the planning ministries, and as the number of enterprises, trusts, and ministries multiplied, the Soviet economy started stagnating. The Soviet economy was increasingly sluggish when it came to responding to change, adapting cost−saving technologies, and providing incentives at all levels to improve growth, productivity and efficiency.

Most information in the Soviet economy flowed from the top down and economic planning was often done based on faulty or outdated information, particularly in sectors with large numbers of consumers. As a result, some goods tended to be underproduced, leading to shortages, while other goods were overproduced and accumulated in storage. Some factories developed a system of barter and either exchanged or shared raw materials and parts, while consumers developed a black market for goods that were particularly sought after but constantly underproduced.

Conceding the weaknesses of their past approaches in solving new problems, the leaders of the late 1980s, headed by Mikhail Gorbachev, were seeking to mold a program of economic reform to galvanize the economy. However, by 1990 the Soviet government had lost control over economic conditions. Government spending increased sharply as an increasing number of unprofitable enterprises required state support and consumer price subsidies to continue.

The industrial production system in the Soviet Union suffered a political and economic collapse in 1991, after which a transition from centrally planned to market-driven economies occurred. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the economic integration of the Soviet republics was dissolved, and overall industrial activity declined substantially.^[15] A lasting legacy remains in the physical infrastructure created during decades of combined industrial production practices.

Sweden[link]

Sweden’s industrial sector presents diverging information in production output and industrial employment levels. Using OECD (2008) data, specific statements can be made about these elements. With this data, it can be seen that production output within the industrial sector has been constantly rising. Contrastingly, employment within industry has been steadily declining since the 1970s, as service sector employment rates increase. Though the decline in industrial employment points to a deindustrialising economy, the increasing levels of production output state otherwise.

Sweden’s industrial sector remains intact as it relies on its resource base of timber, hydropower, and iron ore as a large economic contributor (CIA World Factbook 2008). Because of its increased production rates in industry, it can be ascertained that deindustrialisation has not occurred in Sweden. The decrease in industrial employment has been countered by an increase in efficiency and automation, increasing output levels in the industrial sector.

Switzerland[link]

Deindustrialisation is a phenomenon that has been occurring in Switzerland since the mid 1970s. Civilian employment in industry has been in decline since 1975 according to OECD (2008) data due to a major recession in the market. Literature (Afonso 2005) has stated that this is due to large numbers of migrant workers being forced to leave the country thanks to nonrenewable working permits, the industry, heavily based in foreign labour suffered greatly and those losses are still observed in the present. Globalisation has also had a negative effect in the employment market. Production of total industry has been increasing consistently at a slow rate since a slight decline in 1974.

United Kingdom[link]

The United Kingdom has experienced many possible signs of deindustrialisation such a shift in employment from the manufacturing sector to the service sector. However, United Kingdom manufacturing output has not declined. According to the OECD, the workforce in industry has declined substantially since 1967. Although the employment in industry has declined, the OECD shows the total sales and production in the United Kingdom has increased over the past fifty years. The correlation between the decrease in industrial employment and the increase in national production and sales implies an increase in productivity.

United States[link]

This former industrial site in Connecticut was used for office space after the manufacturer ceased operations in 1994.^[16]

Sectors of US Economy as Percent of GDP 1947-2009.^[17]

According to OECD (2008) data, real industrial production rose in the United States in every year from 1983 to 2007, with the exceptions of 1991, 2001 and 2002. Manufacturing output has followed a similar pattern. Total industrial employment has been roughly constant at around 30 million people since the late 1970s (though there has been a steady decline since the all-time peak of 31.5 million in 2000).

The widespread perception of deindustrialization in the United States is due to shifting patterns in the geography and political geography of production (from the heavily unionized Northeast and Midwest towards the right-to-work states of the Southeast and the high supply of workers (largely immigrant, first-generation, and second-generation) willing to accept low wages in the Southwest), along with increasing labor productivity, which has led to higher levels of output without increases in the total number of workers. In addition, though total industrial employment has been relatively stable over the past forty years, the overall US labor force has increased dramatically, resulting in a massive reduction in the percent of the labor force engaged in industry (from over 35% in the late 1960s to under 20% today). Industry (and specifically manufacturing) is thus less prominent in American life and the American economy now than in over a hundred years.

Changes in industrial production have varied greatly between a number of sectors in recent years; since 2000, for instance, while overall output has remained roughly flat, the production of electronic equipment has risen by over 50%, while that of clothing has fallen by over 60%. Following a moderate downturn, industrial production grew slowly but steadily between 2003 and 2007. The sector, however, averaged less than 1% growth annually from 2000 to 2007; from early 2008, moreover, industrial production again declined, and by June 2009, had fallen by over 15% (the sharpest decline since the great depression). Output thereafter began to recover.^[18]

The population of the United States has nearly doubled since the 1950s, adding approximately 150 million people. Yet, during this period (1950–2007), the population of the great manufacturing cities of the northeast has declined significantly. During the 1950s, the nation's twenty largest cities held nearly a fifth of the US population. In 2006, this proportion has dropped to about one tenth of the population.^[19]

Many small and mid-sized manufacturing cities in the Manufacturing Belt experience similar fates. For instance the city of Cumberland, Maryland declined from a population of 39,483 in the 1940s to a population of 20,915 in 2005.

As Americans migrated away from the manufacturing centers, they formed sprawling suburbs, and many former small cities have grown tremendously in the last 50 years. In 2005 alone, Phoenix has grown by 43,000 people, an increase in population greater than any other city in the United States. Contrast that with the fact that in 1950, Phoenix was only the 99th largest city in the nation with a population of 107,000. In 2005, the population has grown to 1.5 million, ranking as the fifth largest city proper in the US.^[19]

See also[link]

• Economic restructuring
• Jobless recovery
• Reindustrialization
• Post-industrial society
• Urban decay
• Industrialisation
• Industrial revolution
• The End of Work
• Rust Belt

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Afonso, A (2005) 'When the Export of Social Problems is no Longer Possible: Immigration Policies and Unemployment in Switzerland' Social Policy and Administration, Vol. 39, No. 6, Pp. 653–668
• Baumol, W J (1967) ‘Macroeconomics of Unbalanced Growth: The Anatomy of Urban Crisis’ The American Economic Review, Vol. 57, No. 3
• Boulhol, H (2004) ‘What is the impact of international trade on deindustrialisation in OECD countries?’ Flash No.2004-206 Paris, CDC IXIS Capital Markets http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Deindustrialization&action=edit&section=21
• Brady, David, Jason Beckfield, and Wei Zhao. 2007. “The Consequences of Economic Globalization for Affluent Democracies.” Annual Review of Sociology 33: 313-34.
• Bluestone, B. and Harrison, B. The Deindustrialization of America: Plant Closings, Community Abandonment and the Dismantling of Basic Industry. New York: Basic Books, 1982.
• Cairncross, A (1982) 'What is deindustrialisation?' Pp. 5–17 in: Blackaby, F (Ed.) Deindustrialisation, London: Pergamon
• Cowie, J.,Heathcott, J. and Bluestone, B. "Beyond the Ruins: The Meanings of Deindustrialization." Cornell University Press, 2003.
• Central Intelligence Agency. 2008. “Japan.” Washington, D.C.: Central Intelligence Agency. Retrieved January 22, 2008 (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ja.html).
• CIA World Factbook (2008) 'Sweden'
• The CIA World Factbook (2008) 'Canada'
• Feinstein, Charles. 1999. “Structural Change in the Developed Countries During the Twentieth Century.” Oxford Review of Economic Policy 15: 35-55.
• Fuchs, V R (1968) The Service Economy New York, National Bureau of Economic Research
• Lever, W F (1991) ‘Deindustrialisation and the Reality of the Post-industrial City’ Urban Studies, Vol. 28, No. 6, Pp. 983-999^{[dead link]}
• Goldsmith, M and Larsen, H (2004) "Local Political Leadership: Nordic Style." International Journal of Urban and Regional Research Vol. 28.1, Pp. 121–133.
• Krugman, Paul. "Domestic Distortions and the Deindustrialization Hypothesis." NBER Working Paper 5473, NBER & Stanford University, March 1996.
• Kucera, D. and Milberg, W (2003) "Deindustrialization and Changes in Manufacturing Trade: Factor Content Calculations for 1978-1995." Review of World Economics 2003, Vol.139(4).
• Lee, Cheol-Sung. 2005. “International Migration, Deindustrialization and Union Decline in 16 Affluent OECD Countries, 1962-1997.” Social Forces 84: 71-88.
• Logan, John R. and Swanstrom, Todd, Beyond City Limits: Urban Policy and Economic Restructuring in Comparative Perspective, Temple University Press, 1990.
• Matsumoto, Gentaro. 1996. “Deindustrialization in the UK: A Comparative Analysis with Japan.” International Review of Applied Economics 10:273-87.
• Matthews, R C O, Feinstein, C H and Odling-Smee, J C (1982) British Economic Growth,, Oxford: Oxford University Press
• OECD Stat Extracts (2008)
• Pitelis, C and Antonakis, N (2003) ‘Manufacturing and competitiveness: the case of Greece’ Journal of Economic Studies, Vol. 30, No. 5, Pp. 535–547
• Reisman, G (2002) Profit Inflation by the US Government
• Rowthorn, R (1992) ‘Productivity and American Leadership – A Review…’ Review of Income and Wealth Vol. 38, No. 4
• Rowthorn, R E and Wells, J R (1987) De-industrialisation and Foreign Trade, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
• Rowthorn, R E and Ramaswamy, R (1997) Deindustrialization–Its Causes and Implications, IMF Working Paper WP/97/42.
• Rowthorn, Robert and Ramana Ramaswamy (1999) 'Growth, Trade, and Deindustrialization' IMF Staff Papers, 46:18-41.
• Sachs, J D and Shatz, H J (1995) ‘Trade and Jobs in US Manufacturing’ Brookings Papers on Economic Activity No. 1
• Vicino, Thomas, J. Transforming Race and Class in Suburbia: Decline in Metropolitan Baltimore. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.
• Rodger Doyle, Deindustrialization: Why manufacturing continues to decline, Scientific American magazine - May, 2002

External links[link]

• "The Qualitative Shift in European Integration: Towards Permanent Wage Pressures and a ‘Latin-Americanization’ of Europe?", Erik S. Reinert
• De-industrialisation in Sub-Saharan Africa: Myth or Crisis?

Tarpley attending the 2005 Axis for Peace conference

Webster Griffin Tarpley (born 1946) is an American historian, author, journalist, lecturer, and critic of US foreign and domestic policy. Tarpley maintains that the September 11 attacks were engineered by a rogue network of the military-industrial complex and intelligence agencies as a false flag operation.^[1] His writings and speeches describe a model of terror operations by a rogue network in the military/intelligence sector working with moles in the private sector and in corporate media, and locates such contemporary false flag operations in a historical context stretching back in the English speaking world to at least the Gunpowder Plot in England in 1605.

Education[link]

The "rogue network" which Tarpley suspects of the September 11 attacks

Tarpley was born in Pittsfield, Massachusetts in 1946. He received a BA degree summa cum laude in English and Italian from Princeton University in 1966. While a student at Princeton he became a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and was a Fulbright Scholar at University of Turin in Italy.^[2] Tarpley also obtained a MA degree in humanities from Skidmore College. As well as a Ph.D. from The Catholic University of America in History.

Career[link]

In 1971, Tarpley was on the editorial board of The Campaigner, a National Caucus of Labor Committees' journal, according to its masthead.^[3]

As a European based journalist in the 1980s, Tarpley wrote a study on the assassination of Prime Minister Aldo Moro. The study claimed that the murder was a false flag operation orchestrated by the Propaganda Due, a Masonic Lodge, with the cooperation of senior members of Italian government secret services but blamed on the Red Brigades.^[4]

Tarpley was president of the Schiller Institute of the United States in the 1980s^{[5][clarification needed]} and in 1993.^[6] In 1986 Tarpley attempted to run on Lyndon LaRouche's U.S. Labor Party platform in the New York State Democratic Party primary for the U.S. Senate, but was ruled off the ballot because of a defect in his nominating petitions.^[7] He was a frequent host of "The LaRouche Connection" which its producer LaRouche's Executive Intelligence Review News Service^[8] describes as "a news and information cable television program."^[9]

Tarpley first gained attention for co-authoring, with Anton Chaitkin, ("history editor of Executive Intelligence Review") a 1992 book on George H. W. Bush, George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography, which was published by Executive Intelligence Review, run by Lyndon LaRouche.^[10] He has expounded the "Versailles Thesis" laying the blame for the great wars of the 20th century on intrigues by Britain to retain her dominance.^[11] He gained experience as a political operative during his years with the LaRouche movement but broke away sometime after 1995.

In 2005, Tarpley published 9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA. He speaks at length about the themes in the book during an interview in the film Oil, Smoke, Mirrors.

Since March, 2006, Tarpley has had a weekly online talk radio show called World Crisis Radio,^[12] currently hosted on GCNLive.com. Tarpley is a member of the "world anti-imperialist conference" Axis for Peace, of Scholars for 9/11 Truth and of a research Netzwerk of German 9/11 authors founded in September 2006. He is featured in the film, Zero: an investigation into 9/11 (2007–2008).^[13]

Tarpley is a critic of the Dalai Lama; in 2010 he told Russia Today that "pre-1959 Tibet ... was probably the closest thing to hell on earth that you had ... social reform was impossible." In the interview he criticizes US funding of pro-Dalai Lama organizations, which he says amounts to US$2 million per year, saying "this is a bad deal for the American taxpayers."^[14]

He also maintains that "The notion of anthropogenic global warming is a fraud."^[15]

Bibliography[link]

• Chi ha ucciso Aldo Moro? (Who Killed Aldo Moro?), a study commissioned by a member of the Italian government and published in Rome in 1978 The Larouchian, Partito Operaio Europeo http://www.movisol.org/moro.htm, which broke open the affiliation of the Red Brigades with the neofascist lodge P2.
• George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography (1992) (co-authored with Anton Chaitkin, son of the lawyer who indicted Prescott Bush under the Trading with the Enemy Act for collaboration with Nazi Germany.) Reprinted 2004, ISBN 0-930852-92-3.
• Against Oligarchy (1996)
• Surviving the Cataclysm: Your Guide through the Worst Financial Crisis in Human History (1999); updated edition, 2009.
• 9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA - Myth of the 21st Century (2005), Foreword by Thierry Meyssan, ISBN 0-930852-31-1, Fourth edition ISBN 0-930852-37-0 (April 2007).
  • Version française: La Terreur Fabriquée, Made in USA : 11 Septembre, le mythe du XXIe siècle (Sept. 2006). ISBN 2-9525571-4-4
  • In Italiano: La Fabbrica del Terrore (Sept. 2007). ISBN 978-88-87307-36-6
  • En Español: 11-S, El Falso Terrorismo Jan. 2008 ISBN 0-930852-98-2.
• Obama - The Postmodern Coup: Making of a Manchurian Candidate (Apr. 2008) ISBN 0-930852-88-5.
  • Deutsche Fassung: Barack Obama: Wie ein US-Präsident gemacht wird (Aug. 2008) ISBN 978-3-938516-74-4.
  • Japanese Edition: Obama: Dangerous Geometry (Nov. 2008) ISBN 4-88086-239-8
  • Barack H. Obama: The Unauthorized Biography (Aug. 2008) ISBN 0-930852-81-8; Japanese edition, March 2009.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Tarpley's Website
• Tarpley's Show on the Genesis Network
• Ground Zero Grassy Knoll - Feature article in New York Magazine (March 20, 2006)
• Publisher's web site
• Amazon.com's Webster Griffin Tarpley page

Audio and Video Links:

• Webster Tarpley lecture and interview videos

v t e LaRouche movement History Lyndon LaRouche Views of Lyndon LaRouche LaRouche criminal trials Lyndon LaRouche U.S. Presidential campaigns Organizations Bürgerrechtsbewegung Solidarität Citizens Electoral Council European Workers Party Executive Intelligence Review LaRouche movement National Caucus of Labor Committees Schiller Institute Worldwide LaRouche Youth Movement Defunct California Proposition 64 (1986) Fusion Energy Foundation North American Labour Party Party for the Commonwealth of Canada U.S. Labor Party Members Robert Beltran James Bevel Michael Billington Amelia Boynton Robinson Norbert Brainin Anton Chaitkin Jacques Cheminade Billy Davis Sergey Glazyev Janice Hart Hulan Jack Kenneth Kronberg Stanislav Menshikov Theo Mitchell Robert James Moon Kesha Rogers Nataliya Vitrenko William Warfield Frederick Wills Helga Zepp-LaRouche Critics Chip Berlet Daniel Patrick Moynihan John Rees Mike Royko People separated from the movement Nicholas F. Benton Robert Dreyfuss F. William Engdahl Laurent Murawiec Webster Tarpley Related persons Jeremiah Duggan J. Gordon Edwards (entomologist and mountaineer) Daniel Estulin Erik R. Fleming Roy Frankhouser Victor Gunnarsson Zbigniew Jaworowski Gordon M. Johnson Karen Kwiatkowski Eric Lerner Friedwardt Winterberg Book:LaRouche movement Politics portal Wiktionary Wikibooks Wikiquote Wikisource Wikimedia Commons Wikinews Wikiversity

Takis Fotopoulos

Born	(1940-10-14) October 14, 1940 (age 71) Chios, Greece
Era	20th / 21st-century philosophy
Region	Political Philosophy
School	Founder of the Inclusive Democracy project.
Main interests	Political philosophy, Political Economy, Philosophy of Social Science, International Political Economy, International Relations, Social Movements
Notable ideas	Inclusive Democracy, the present multi-dimensional crisis, the transnational elite and its wars on terrorism, critique of left-wing politics
Influenced by Aristotle, Karl Marx, Mikhail Bakunin, Peter Kropotkin, Rosa Luxemburg, Cornelius Castoriadis, Murray Bookchin

Takis Fotopoulos (Τάκης Φωτόπουλος) (born October 14, 1940) is a political philosopher and economist who founded the inclusive democracy movement. He is noted for his synthesis of classical democracy with libertarian socialism^[1] and the radical currents in the new social movements. He was an academic, and has written many books and over 900 articles, several of which have been translated into various languages. He is the editor of The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy (which succeeded Democracy & Nature) and author of Towards An Inclusive Democracy in which the foundations of the inclusive democracy project were set.^[2] Fotopoulos is Greek and lives in London.^[3]

Early life[link]

Fotopoulos was born in the Greek island of Chios and his family moved to Athens soon afterwards. After earning degrees in Economics and Political Science and in Law from the University of Athens, he moved to London in 1966 for postgraduate study at the London School of Economics on a Varvaressos scholarship from Athens University. He was a student syndicalist and activist in Athens^[4] and then a political activist in London, taking an active part in the 1968 student movement in London, as well as in organisations of the revolutionary Greek Left during the struggle against the military junta in Greece (1967–74). During this period, he was a member of the Revolutionary Socialist Groups in London, which published the newspaper Μαμή ("Midwife", from the Marxian dictum, "violence is the midwife of revolution"), for which he wrote several articles.^[5]

Academia and afterwards[link]

He was Senior Lecturer in Economics at the Polytechnic of North London from 1969 to 1989, until he started editing the journal Society & Nature, later Democracy & Nature and subsequently the online International Journal of Inclusive Democracy.^[2][3] He is also a columnist of Eleftherotypia,^[6] one of the most widely-circulated newspapers in Greece which has filed for bankruptcy.^[7]

Inclusive Democracy[link]

Takis Fotopoulos developed the political project of Inclusive Democracy in 1997 (an exposition can be found in Towards An Inclusive Democracy). The first issue of Society & Nature declared that:

"our ambition is to initiate an urgently needed dialogue on the crucial question of developing a new liberatory social project, at a moment in History when the Left has abandoned this traditional role."^[8]

and specified that the new project should be seen as the outcome of a synthesis of the democratic, libertarian socialist and radical Green traditions.^[9] Since then, a dialogue has followed in the pages of the journal, in which libertarian socialists like Cornelius Castoriadis, Social ecologists like Murray Bookchin, and Green activists and academics like Steven Best have taken part.

The starting point for Fotopoulos's work is that the world faces a multi-dimensional crisis (economic, ecological, social, cultural and political) which is caused by the concentration of power in elites, as a result of the market economy, representative democracy and related forms of hierarchical structure. An inclusive democracy, which involves the equal distribution of power at all levels, is seen not as a utopia (in the negative sense of the word) or a "vision" but as perhaps the only way out of the present crisis, with trends towards its creation manifesting themselves today in many parts of the world. Fotopoulos is in favor of market abolitionism, although he would not identify himself as a market abolitionist as such because he considers market abolition as one aspect of an Inclusive Democracy which refers only to the Economic Democracy component of it. He proposes a model of economic democracy for a stateless, marketless and moneyless economy but he considers that the economic democracy component is equally significant to the other components of ID, i.e. Political or direct democracy, Economic democracy, Ecological Democracy and Democracy in the Social Realm. Fotopoulos' work has been critically assessed by important activists, theorists and scholars.^{[10][11][12][13][14][15]}

Works[link]

Major works[link]

• (English) Towards An Inclusive Democracy. The Crisis of the Growth Economy and the Need for a New Liberatory Project (London/New York: Cassell Continuum, 1997), 401 pp. ISBN 0-304-33627-0 and 0-304-33628-9.
• (Greek) Περιεκτική Δημοκρατία (Athens: Kastaniotis, 1999), 656 pp. ISBN 960-03-2416-6
• (Italian) Per Una Democrazia Globale (Milano: Eleuthera, 1999), 254 pp. ISBN 88-85060-37-4
• (Spanish) Hacia Una Democracia Inclusiva, Un nuevo proyecto liberador (Montevideo: Nordam, 2002), 325 pp. ISBN 9974-42-098-9
• (French) Vers Une Démocratie Générale (Paris: Seuil, 2002), 250 pp. ISBN 2-02-052846-0
• (German) Umfassende Demokratie, Die Antwort auf die Krise der Wachstums-und Marktwirtschaft (Grafenau: Trotzdem Verlag, 2003), 445 pp. ISBN 3-931786-23-4
• (English) The Multidimensional Crisis and Inclusive Democracy (Entire English E-book publication [2005] of the book with the same title published in Athens, 2005 by Gordios, 334 pp. ISBN 960-7083-69-5. Published in Chinese, 2008. ISBN 978-7-5607-3533-7)
• (Greek) Περιεκτική Δημοκρατία: 10 Χρόνια Μετά (Athens: Eleftheros Typos, 2008), 591 pp.
• (English) The pink revolution in Iran and the “Left” A Special E-Book Issue of the International Journal of Inclusive Democracy (Vol. 5, No. 3, Summer 2009), PDF Version

Books published in Greece[link]

• Dependent Development: The Case of Greece (Athens: Exantas, 1985 & 1987).
• The Gulf War: The First Battle in the North-South Conflict (Athens: Exantas, 1991).
• The Neo-Liberal Consensus (Athens: Gordios, 1993).
• The New World Order and Greece (Athens: Kastaniotis, 1997).
• Inclusive Democracy (Athens: Kastaniotis, 1999).
• Drugs: Beyond the Demonology of Penalisation and the 'Progressive' Mythology of Liberalisation (Athens: Eleftheros Typos, 1999).
• The New Order in the Balkans and the First War of the Internationalised Market Economy (Athens: Staxy, 1999).
• Religion, Autonomy and Democracy (Athens: Eleftheros Typos, 2000).
• Globalisation, the Left and Inclusive Democracy (Athens: Ellinika Grammata, 2002).
• From the Athenian Democracy to Inclusive Democracy (Athens: Eleftheros Typos, 2002).
• The War against 'Terrorism': the Elites Generalised Attack (Athens: Gordios, 2003).
• Chomsky's capitalism, Albert's post-capitalism and Inclusive Democracy (Athens: Gordios, 2004).
• The Multidimensional Crisis and Inclusive Democracy (Athens: Gordios, 2005).
• Inclusive Democracy - 10 Years Afterwards (Athens: Eleftheros Typos, 2008).
• Global Crisis, Greece, and the anti-systemic movement (Athens: Koukida, 2009), 318 pages, ISBN 978-960-94100-0-7
• Greece as a protectorate of the transnational elite (Athens: Gordios, November 2010), 412 pages, ISBN 978-960-6826-18-4

Contributions to other books[link]

• (Greek) Studies on the contemporary Greek Economy, ed. by S.Papaspiliopoulos (Papazisis, 1978). (Takis Fotopoulos' contribution: "Dependent development and industrialisation").
• Education, Culture and Modernization, ed. by Peter Alheit et al. (Roskide University, 1995). (Takis Fotopoulos contribution: "The crisis of the growth economy, the withering away of the nation-state and the community-based society").
• (Italian) Complessità sistemica e svillupo eco-sostenibile, ed. by I.Spano & D.Padovan (Sapere 2001). (Takis Fotopoulos contribution: "La crisi dell 'economia di crescita. Societa ecologica e democrazia").
• Defending Public Schools, ed. by David A. Gabbard & E. Wayne Ross (Praeger, 2004). (Takis Fotopoulos contribution: "The State, the Market and (Mis-)education").
• (Greek) Globalisation, Technology and Paideia in the New Cosmopolis (Atrapos, 2004). (Takis Fotopoulos' contribution: "Contrasting views on globalisation and the myth about the end of globalisation").
• Critical Perspectives on Globalisation, ed. by Robert Hunter Wade, Marina Della Giusta and Uma Kambhampati (Chelthenham, UK & Northhampton, MA US: Edward Elgar publishing, 2006). (Takis Fotopoulos contribution: "The global 'war' of the transnational elite").
• Globalised Capitalism, The Eclipse of the Left and Inclusive Democracy, ed. by Steven Best (Athens: Koukkida, 2008). And as Special Issue of "The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy", Winter 2009, in English: Online/PDF (with two contributions by Takis Fotopoulos, "Recent Theoretical Developments on the Inclusive Democracy Project" & "Is Inclusive Democracy Feasible and Desirable?").
• Eco-socialism as Politics: Rebuilding the Basis of Our Modern Civilisation ed. by Qingzhi Huan (Springer, 1st Edition, 2010, XI), 224 p., Hardcover, ISBN 978-90-481-3744-2 (Takis Fotopoulos contribution: "The De-growth Utopia: The Incompatibility of De-growth within an Internationalised Market Economy").
• Academic Repression: Reflections from the Academic Industrial Complex ed. by A.J.Nocella, Steven Best, Peter McLaren (AK Press, Oakland, CA & Edinburgh, 2010), 590 p, paperback, ISBN 978-1-904859-98-7 (Takis Fotopoulos contribution: "Systemic Aspects of Academic Repression in the New World Order". A full version of this essay is published in The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy, Vol. 4, No. 4 (October 2008).
• (Greek) Critical Pedagogy in the New Middle Age, ed. by Maria Nikolakaki, (Sideris, October 2011). (Takis Fotopoulos' Contribution: "From Education to Paedeia" ISBN 978-960-08-0581-9).

Videos[link]

• Takis Fotopoulos talk on the Multidimensional Crisis and Inclusive Democracy, Oxford University, November 2008. Google-video in 3 parts. Part 1 (talk), part 2 (talk/discussion), part 3 (discussion).
• Takis Fotopoulos' Interview to Oliver Ressler about Inclusive Democracy. This is an interview with Takis Fotopoulos taken by Oliver Ressler for his video series "Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies" on July 19, 2003, about the Inclusive Democracy project. English and Greek subtitles are available. In this video, Fotopoulos discusses the constituents of Inclusive Democracy: Political, Economic, democracy at the Social level and Ecological democracy. He is also offering a thorough analysis of the ID' s proposed economic model for a market-less and money-less economy. Finally, he refers to the transitional strategy for the transformation to an autonomous society, for an Inclusive Democracy.
• A talk given by Takis Fotopoulos at the University of Vermont (US) in 1996, followed by a discussion in which Murray Bookchin, Dan Chodorkoff and others take part. Google Video in 3 parts Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

See also[link]

• Democracy & Nature Journal
• Inclusive Democracy project
• Anarchist economics
• Cornelius Castoriadis
• Economic Democracy
• Libertarian Socialism
• Murray Bookchin

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• See also the "Inclusive Democracy" entry in the Routledge Encyclopedia of International Political Economy, (ed. by Barry Jones), Vol. 2 (2001), pp. 732–740.
• “The Inclusive Democracy project – six years on“, (essays on the ID project by Michael Levin, Arran Gare, David Freeman, Serge Latouche, Jean-Claude Richard, Takis Nikolopoulos, Rafael Spósito, Guido Galafassi, Takis Fotopoulos and others), Democracy & Nature, Vol. 9, No. 3 (November 2003).
• “Debate on the Inclusive Democracy project (Parts I & II)“, The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy, Vol. 1, No. 2 (January 2005) and Vol. 1, No. 3 (May 2005).
• Takis Fotopoulos, "Inclusive Democracy" in Alternative Economies, Alternative Societies ed. by Oliver Ressler & Aneta Szylak, 240 pages (20 pages in color), languages: English and Polish, ISBN 978-83-924665-0-5 (Gdansk: Wyspa Institute of Art, Poland, 2007). [Published in German/Hungarian by Promedia Verlag, Vienna 2008. ISBN 978-3-85371-291-7].

External links[link]

• Takis Fotopoulos' Archive
• Democracy & Nature
• The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy - ISSN 1753-240X.
• Inclusive Democracy - A transcript of a video interview given by Takis Fotopoulos to Oliver Ressler for the project Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies.
• An Interview with T.Fotopoulos by Indymedia Hungary, April 2005
• Interview for Equal Time for Freethought radio show - [show 247: Takis Fotopoulos, Dec 30th 2007] - WBAI 99.5 FM New York City, 1] read the transcript, 2] listen to the audio mp3—72 Mb

Harold Meyerson (born 1950) is an American journalist and opinion columnist. In 2009 The Atlantic Monthly named him one of "the most influential commentators in the nation" as part of their list "The Atlantic 50."^[1][2]

Born in Los Angeles, Meyerson was educated in the Los Angeles public schools and at Columbia University. The son of long time leaders in California of the Socialist Party of America, he was active in the 1970s in the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee.

Meyerson is editor-at-large of The American Prospect and has been a weekly columnist for the Washington Post since 2003.^[2][3] He served as executive editor of the L.A. Weekly from 1989 through 2001, and continues to write about California politics in the Los Angeles Times.^[2] His articles on politics, labor, the economy, foreign policy, and American culture have also appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New Republic, The Nation, and New Statesman.

He is the author of Who Put The Rainbow in The Wizard of Oz?, a biography of Broadway lyricist Yip Harburg, and his articles have been republished in several books, most notably the Brookings Institution's volume on Bush v. Gore. From 1991 through 1995, Meyerson hosted the weekly show "Real Politics" on the NPR station KCRW in Los Angeles. He has been a frequent guest on television and radio talk shows, including "The Four O'Clock Report" with Jon Wiener on KPFK in Los Angeles.^[3]

An avowed democratic socialist—according to Meyerson one of only "two" that he encounters during "daily rounds through the nation's capital," the other being Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont^[4]—he is a vice-chair of the National Political Committee of the Democratic Socialists of America.^[5]

He currently shares his time between Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles.[1]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website

This article about an American journalist born in the 1950s is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Glenn Beck
Beck speaking at the Values Voter Summit in 2011
Born	Glenn Edward Lee Beck[1] (1964-02-10) February 10, 1964 (age 48) Everett, Washington, U.S.
Residence	Fort Worth, Texas[2]
Nationality	American
Education	Sehome High School
Occupation	Radio host, vlogger, author, entrepreneur, political commentator and former television host
Home town	Mount Vernon, Washington, U.S.
Salary	US$32 million (2009–10)[3][4]
Net worth	US$65 million (2011)
Religion	The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon)[5][6][7][8]
Spouse	Claire (1983–1994) Tania (m. 1999); 4 children total
Awards	Defender of Israel Award, Zionist Organization of America 2011[9]
Website
Glenn Beck's Official Website

Glenn Edward Lee Beck (born February 10, 1964) is an American conservative radio host, vlogger, author, entrepreneur, political commentator and former television host. He hosts the Glenn Beck Program, a nationally syndicated talk-radio show that airs throughout the United States on Premiere Radio Networks. He formerly hosted the Glenn Beck television program, which ran from January 2006 to October 2008 on HLN and from January 2009 to June 2011 on the Fox News Channel. Beck has authored six New York Times–bestselling books.^[3] Beck is the founder and CEO of Mercury Radio Arts, a multimedia production company through which he produces content for radio, television, publishing, the stage, and the Internet. It was announced on April 6, 2011, that Beck would "transition off of his daily program" on Fox News later in the year but would team with Fox to "produce a slate of projects for FOX News Channel and FOX News' digital properties".^[10] Beck's last daily show on the network was June 30, 2011.^[11] In 2012, The Hollywood Reporter named Beck on its Digital Power Fifty list.^[12]

Beck's supporters praise him as a constitutional stalwart defending traditional American values,^[13] while his critics contend he promotes conspiracy theories and employs incendiary rhetoric for ratings.^[14]

Personal life[link]

Early years[link]

Glenn Edward Lee Beck was born in Everett, Washington, to William and Mary Beck, who lived in Mountlake Terrace, Washington at the time of their son's birth.^[15] The family later moved to Mount Vernon, Washington,^[16] where they owned and operated City Bakery in the downtown area.^[17] He is descended from German immigrants who came to the United States in the 19th century.^[18] Beck was raised as a Roman Catholic and attended Immaculate Conception Catholic School in Mount Vernon.

Glenn and his older sister moved with their mother to Sumner, Washington, attending a Jesuit school^[19] in Puyallup. On May 15, 1979, while out on a small boat with a male companion, Beck's mother drowned just west of Tacoma, Washington, in the Puget Sound. The man who had taken her out in the boat also drowned. A Tacoma police report stated that Mary Beck "appeared to be a classic drowning victim", but a Coast Guard investigator speculated that she could have intentionally jumped overboard.^[19] Beck has described his mother's death as a suicide in interviews during television and radio broadcasts.^[19][20]

After their mother's death, Beck and his older sister moved to their father's home in Bellingham, Washington,^[21] where Beck graduated from Sehome High School in June 1982.^[22] Beck also regularly vacationed with his maternal grandparents, Ed and Clara Janssen, in Iowa.^[23] In the aftermath of his mother's death and subsequent suicide of his stepbrother, Beck has said he used "Dr. Jack Daniel's" to cope. At 18, following his high school graduation, Beck relocated to Provo, Utah, and worked at radio station KAYK. Feeling he "didn't fit in", Beck left Utah after six months,^[24] taking a job at Washington D.C.'s WPGC in February 1983.^[21]

Adulthood[link]

While working at WPGC, Beck met his first wife, Claire.^[26] In 1983, the couple married and had two daughters, Mary and Hannah. Mary developed cerebral palsy as a result of a series of strokes at birth in 1988.^[26] The couple divorced in 1994 amid Beck's struggles with substance abuse. A recovering alcoholic and drug addict,^[27] Beck has been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.^[28][29]

By 1994, Beck was suicidal, and imagined shooting himself to the music of Kurt Cobain.^[28] He credits Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) with helping him achieve sobriety. He said he stopped drinking alcohol and smoking cannabis in November 1994, the same month he attended his first AA meeting.^[28] Beck later said that he had gotten high every day for the previous 15 years, since the age of 16.^[21]

In 1996, while working for a New Haven area radio station, Beck took a theology class at Yale University, with a written recommendation from Senator Joe Lieberman, a Yale alumnus who was a fan of Beck's show at the time.^[30] Beck enrolled in an "Early Christology" course, but soon withdrew, marking the extent of his post-secondary education.^[28][31]

Beck then began a "spiritual quest" in which he "sought out answers in churches and bookstores".^[28] As he later recounted in his books and stage performances, Beck's first attempt at self-education involved six wide-ranging authors, comprising what Beck jokingly calls "the library of a serial killer": Alan Dershowitz, Pope John Paul II, Adolf Hitler, Billy Graham, Carl Sagan, and Friedrich Nietzsche.^[28][30] During this time, Beck's Mormon friend and former radio partner Pat Gray argued in favor of the "comprehensive worldview" offered by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, an offer that Beck rejected until a few years later.^[28]

In 1999, Beck married his second wife, Tania.^[28] After they went looking for a faith on a church tour together, they^[28] joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in October 1999, partly at the urging of his daughter Mary.^[32][33] Beck was baptized by his old friend, and current-day co-worker Pat Gray.^[28] Beck and his current wife have had two children together, Raphe (who is adopted) and Cheyenne. Until April 2011, the couple live in New Canaan, Connecticut, with the four children.^[34][35]

Beck announced in July 2010 that he had been diagnosed with macular dystrophy, saying "A couple of weeks ago I went to the doctor because of my eyes, I can't focus my eyes. He did all kinds of tests and he said, 'you have macular dystrophy ... you could go blind in the next year. Or, you might not.'" The disorder can make it difficult to read, drive or recognize faces.^[36]

In July 2011, Beck leased a house in the Fort Worth suburb of Westlake, Texas.^[2]

Career[link]

In 2002 Beck created the media platform Mercury Radio Arts^[30][37] as the umbrella over various broadcast, publishing, Internet, and live show entities.

Radio[link]

In 1983 he moved to Corpus Christi, Texas, to work at radio station KZFM.^[26] In mid-1985, Beck was hired away from KZFM to be the lead DJ for the morning-drive radio broadcast by WRKA in Louisville, Kentucky.^[26] His four-hour weekday show was called Captain Beck and the A-Team.^[38] Beck had a reputation as a "young up-and-comer". The show was not political and included the usual off-color antics of the genre: juvenile jokes, pranks, and impersonations.^[30] The show slipped to third in the market and Beck left abruptly in 1987 amid a dispute with WRKA management.^{[citation needed]}

Months later, Beck was hired by Phoenix Top-40 station KOY-FM, then known as Y-95. Beck was partnered with Arizona native Tim Hattrick to co-host a local "morning zoo" program.^[28] During his time at Y-95, Beck cultivated a rivalry with local pop radio station KZZP and that station's morning host Bruce Kelly. Through practical jokes and publicity stunts, Beck drew criticism from the staff at Y-95 when the rivalry culminated in Beck telephoning Kelly's wife on-the-air, mocking her recent miscarriage.^[26] In 1989, Beck resigned from Y-95 to accept a job in Houston at KRBE, known as Power 104. Beck was subsequently fired in 1990 due to poor ratings.^[26]

Beck then moved on to Baltimore, Maryland and the city's leading Top-40 station, WBSB, known as B104. There, he partnered with Pat Gray, a morning DJ. During his tenure at B104, Beck was arrested and jailed for speeding in his DeLorean.^[28] According to a former associate, Beck was "completely out of it" when a station manager went to bail him out.^[28] When Gray, then Beck were fired, the two men spent six months in Baltimore, planning their next move. In early 1992, Beck and Gray both moved to WKCI-FM (KC101), a Top-40 radio station in Hamden, Connecticut.^[28] In 1995, WKCI apologized after Beck and Gray mocked a Chinese-American caller on air who felt offended by a comedy segment by playing a gong sound effect and having executive producer Alf Gagineau mock a Chinese accent. That incident led to protests by activist groups.^[39] When Gray left the show to move to Salt Lake City, Beck continued with co-host Vinnie Penn. At the end of 1998, Beck was informed that his contract would not be renewed at the end of 1999.^[28]

The Glenn Beck Program first aired in 2000 on WFLA (AM) in Tampa, Florida, and took their afternoon time slot from eighteenth to first place within a year.^[40][41] In January 2002, Premiere Radio Networks launched the show nationwide on 47 stations. The show then moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, broadcasting from new flagship station WPHT. On November 5, 2007, The New York Times reported that Premiere Radio Networks was extending Beck's contract. By May 2008, it had reached over 280 terrestrial stations as well as XM Satellite. It was ranked 4th in the nation with over six and a half million listeners.^[42] Glenn Beck is number three in the ratings behind Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.^[43]

Television[link]

In January 2006, CNN's Headline News announced that Beck would host a nightly news-commentary show in their new prime-time block Headline Prime. The show, simply called Glenn Beck, aired weeknights. CNN Headline News described the show as "an unconventional look at the news of the day featuring his often amusing perspective".^[44] At the end of his tenure at CNN-HLN, Beck had the second largest audience behind Nancy Grace.^[45] In 2008, Beck won the Marconi Radio Award for Network Syndicated Personality of the Year.^[46]

In October 2008, it was announced that Beck would join the Fox News Channel, leaving CNN Headline News.^[47] After moving to the Fox News Channel, Beck hosted Glenn Beck, beginning in January 2009, as well as a weekend version.^[48] One of his first guests was Alaska Governor Sarah Palin^[49] He also has a regular segment every Friday on the Fox News Channel program The O'Reilly Factor titled "At Your Beck and Call".^[50] As of September 2009^[update] Beck's program drew more viewers than all three of the competing time-slot shows combined on CNN, MSNBC and HLN.^[51][52]

His show's high ratings have not come without controversy.^[47] The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz reported that Beck's use of "distorted or inflammatory rhetoric" has complicated the channel's and their journalist's efforts to neutralize White House criticism that Fox is not really a news organization.^[47] Television analyst Andrew Tyndall echoed these sentiments, saying that Beck's incendiary style had created "a real crossroads for Fox News", stating "they're right on the cusp of losing their image as a news organization."^[47]

In April 2011, Fox News and Mercury Radio Arts, Beck's production company, announced that Beck would "transition off of his daily program" on Fox News in 2011.^[53] His last day at Fox was later announced as June 30.^[54][55] FNC and Beck announced that he would be teaming with Fox to produce a slate of projects for Fox News and its digital properties.^[10] Fox News head Roger Ailes later referenced Beck's entrepreneurialism and political movement activism, saying, "His [Beck's] goals were different from our goals ... I need people focused on a daily television show."^[56] Beck hosted his last daily show on Fox on June 30, 2011, where he recounted the accomplishments of the show and said, "This show has become a movement. It's not a TV show, and that's why it doesn’t belong on television anymore. It belongs in your homes. It belongs in your neighborhoods."^[11] In response to critics who said he was fired, Beck pointed out that his final show was airing live.^[11] Immediately after the show he did an interview on his new GBTV internet channel.^[11]

GBTV[link]

Glenn Beck's Fox News one-hour show ended June 30, 2011,^[57] and a new two-hour show began streaming his subscription-based internet TV network, GBTV, on September 12, 2011.^[58][59] Using a subscription model, it was estimated Beck is on track to generate $27 million in his first year of operation.^[60] This was later upgraded to $40 million by the Wall Street Journal when subscriptions topped 300,000. ^[61]

Books[link]

Beck has reached #1 on the New York Times Bestseller List in four separate categories as of 2010^[update]: Hardcover Non-Fiction,^[63][64] Paperback Non-Fiction,^[63] Hardcover Fiction,^[65] and Children's Picture Books.^[66]

Non-fiction

• The Real America: Messages from the Heart and Heartland. Simon and Schuster. 2003. ISBN 978-0-7434-9696-4. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0743496965. ^[67]
• An Inconvenient Book: Real Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems. Simon and Schuster. 2007. ISBN 978-1-4391-6857-8. 
• America's March to Socialism: Why We're One Step Closer to Giant Missile Parades. 2008. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0743598547.  (Audiobook)
• An Unlikely Mormon: The Conversion Story of Glenn Beck, Deseret Book 2008 (Audiobook). ISBN 978-1-59038-944-7^[68]
• America's March to Socialism: Why We're One Step Closer to Giant Missile Parades, Simon & Schuster Audio 2009 (Audio CD). ISBN 978-0-7435-9854-5
• Glenn Beck's Common Sense: The Case Against an Out-of-Control Government, Simon & Schuster 2009. ISBN 978-1-4391-6857-8^[69][70][71]
• Arguing with Idiots: How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government, Simon & Schuster 2009. ISBN 978-1-4165-9501-4
• Idiots Unplugged, Simon & Schuster 2010 (Audio CD). ISBN 1-4423-3396-0
• Idiots Unplugged, 2010 (Audiobook)^[72]
• Broke: The Plan to Restore Our Trust, Truth, and Treasure, Simon & Schuster 2010. ISBN 1-4423-3457-6.^[73]
• The 7: Seven Wonders That Will Change Your Life, Keith Ablow, co-author; Threshold Editions, 2011; ISBN 978-1-4516-2551-6.
• The Original Argument: The Federalists' Case for the Constitution, Adapted for the 21st Century, with Joshua Charles; Threshold Editions, 2011; ISBN 978-1-4516-5061-7.
• Being George Washington: The Indispensable Man, As You've Never Seen Him. Simon and Schuster. 2011. ISBN 978-1-4516-5931-3. http://books.google.com/books?id=WCHGmGTdnk8C&dq. 
• Cowards: What Politicians, Radicals, and the Media Refuse to Say. Simon and Schuster. 2012. ISBN 978-1-4516-9347-8. http://books.simonandschuster.com/Coward/Glenn-Beck/9781451693478. 

Fiction

• The Christmas Sweater, Simon & Schuster 2008. ISBN 978-1-4165-9485-7
• The Overton Window. Threshold Editions. June 2010. ISBN 978-1-4391-8430-1. http://www.amazon.com/dp/1439184305. ^[74][75]
• Beck, Glenn; Baart, Nicole (2011). The Snow Angel. Threshold Editions. ISBN 978-1-4391-8720-3. 

Children's

• The Christmas Sweater: A Picture Book, Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing 2009. ISBN 978-1-4169-9543-2
• Beck, Glenn; Schoebinger, Chris; Dorman, Brandon (illustrator) (2011). The Snow Angel. Aladdin Books. ISBN 978-1-4424-4448-5. 

Beck also authorized a comic book:

• Political Power: Glenn Beck, by Jerome Maida, Mark Sparacio (illus.); Bluewater Productions, 2011; ISN B004VGB4FO^[76]

Stage shows and speeches[link]

Since 2005, Beck has toured American cities twice a year, presenting a one-man stage show. His stage productions are a mix of stand-up comedy and inspirational speaking. In a critique of his live act, Salon Magazine's Steve Almond describes Beck as a "wildly imaginative performer, a man who weds the operatic impulses of the demagogue to the grim mutterings of the conspiracy theorist".^[77] A show from the Beck `08 Unelectable Tour was shown in around 350 movie theaters around the country.^[78]

In Beck's hometown of Mt. Vernon, Washington, supporters and detractors hold handmade signs on the day Beck was honored by the mayor.

The finale of 2009's Common Sense Comedy Tour was simulcast in over 440 theaters.^[79] The events have drawn 200,000 fans in recent years.^[80]

In March 2003, Beck ran a series of rallies, which he called Glenn Beck's Rally for America, in support of troops deployed for the upcoming Iraq War. On July 4, 2007, Beck served as host of the 2007 Toyota Tundra "Stadium of Fire" in Provo, Utah. The annual event at LaVell Edwards Stadium on the Brigham Young University campus is presented by America's Freedom Foundation.^[81] In May 2008, Beck gave the keynote speech at the NRA convention in Louisville, Kentucky.^[82]

In late August 2009, the mayor of Beck's hometown, Mount Vernon, Washington, announced that he would award Beck the Key to the City, designating September 26, 2009, as "Glenn Beck Day". Due to local opposition, the city council voted unanimously to disassociate itself from the award.^[83] The key presentation ceremony sold-out the 850 seat McIntyre Hall and an estimated 800 detractors and supporters demonstrated outside the building. Earlier that day, approximately 7,000 people attended the Evergreen Freedom Foundation's "Take the Field with Glenn Beck" at Seattle's Safeco Field.^[84]

In December 2009, Beck produced a one-night special film titled "The Christmas Sweater: A Return to Redemption".^[85] In January and February 2010, Beck teamed with fellow Fox News host Bill O'Reilly to tour several cities in a live stage show called "The Bold and Fresh Tour 2010". The January 29 show was recorded and broadcast to movie theaters throughout the country.^[86]

Philanthropy[link]

In 2011, Beck founded the non-profit organization Mercury One, designed to sustain itself through its entreneurship and without grants or donations.^[87] In early 2011, Beck began work toward developing a clothing line to be sold to benefit the charity and October 2011, Mercury One began selling the minuscule, upscale clothing line labeled 1791 exclusively at its website 1791.com. The line's maiden offering was manufactured by American Mojo of Lowell, Massachusetts.^[88]

Projects and rallies[link]

9-12 Project and Tea Party protests[link]

In March 2009 Beck put together a campaign, the 9-12 Project, that is named for nine principles and twelve values that he says embody the spirit of the American people on the day after the September 11 attacks.^[89] The Colorado 9-12 Project hosted a "Patriot Camp" for kids in grades 1–5, featuring programs on "our Constitution, the Founding Fathers, and the values and principles that are the cornerstones of our nation".

Restoring Honor rally[link]

The Restoring Honor rally was promoted by Beck and held at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. on August 28, 2010. The rally — which purported to embrace religious faith and patriotism — was co-sponsored by the Special Operations Warrior Foundation, promoted by FreedomWorks, and supported by the Tea Party movement.^[90]

[edit] America's First Christmas

In December 2010, Beck went to Wilmington, Ohio, a town devastated by the late-2000s recession, to host live events to encourage his fans to go to the town to boost the local economy in a project called "America's First Christmas".^[91] He hosted an event and his radio and television shows from the local theater.^[92]

2011 international tour[link]

Beck headlined his "Restoring Courage" events in Jerusalem, Israel, in August 2011 in a campaign Beck said was designed to encourage people worldwide "to stand with the Jewish people".^[93][94] After Jerusalem, Beck visited Cape Town, South Africa, and was scheduled to visit Venezuela.^[95]

Political views[link]

Beck has described himself as a conservative with libertarian leanings.^[96] Among his core values Beck lists personal responsibility, private charity, the right to life, freedom of religion, limited government, and family as the cornerstone of society.^[97] Beck believes in low national debt, and has said "A conservative believes that debt creates unhealthy relationships. Everyone, from the government on down, should live within their means and strive for financial independence."^[98] He supports individual gun ownership rights and is against gun control legislation.^[99]

In an O'Reilly Factor interview in August 2010, when Beck was asked if he "believe(s) that gay marriage is a threat to [this] country in any way", he stated, "No I don't…I believe that Thomas Jefferson said: 'If it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket what difference is it to me?'"^[100]

Beck believes that there is a lack of evidence that human activity is the main cause of global warming.^[101] He holds that there is a legitimate case that global warming has, at least in part, been caused by mankind, and has tried to do his part by buying a home with a "green" design.^[102] He also views the American Clean Energy and Security Act as a form of wealth redistribution, and has promoted a petition rejecting the Kyoto Protocol.^[103]

Opposition to progressivism[link]

During his 2010 keynote speech to Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Beck wrote the word "progressivism" on a chalkboard and declared, "This is the disease. This is the disease in America", adding "progressivism is the cancer in America and it is eating our Constitution!"^[104][105] According to Beck, the progressive ideas of men such as John Dewey, Herbert Croly, and Walter Lippmann, influenced the Presidencies of Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson; eventually becoming the foundation for President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal.^[104] Beck has said that such progressivism infects both main political parties and threatens to "destroy America as it was originally conceived".^[104] In Beck’s book Common Sense, he argues that "progressivism has less to do with the parties and more to do with individuals who seek to redefine, reshape, and rebuild America into a country where individual liberties and personal property mean nothing if they conflict with the plans and goals of the State."^[104]

A collection of progressives, whom Beck has referred to as "Crime Inc.", comprise what Beck contends is a clandestine conspiracy to take over and transform America.^{[107][108][109]} Some of these individuals include Cass Sunstein, Van Jones, Andy Stern, John Podesta, Wade Rathke, Joel Rogers and Francis Fox Piven.^[107][110] Other figures tied to Beck's "Crime Inc." accusation include Al Gore, Franklin Raines,^[111] Maurice Strong, George Soros,^[112] John Holdren and President Barack Obama.^[108] According to Beck, these individuals already have or are surreptitiously working in unison with an array of organizations and corporations such as Goldman Sachs, Fannie Mae, ACORN, Apollo Alliance, Tides Center, Chicago Climate Exchange, Generation Investment Management, Enterprise Community Partners, Petrobras, Center for American Progress, and the SEIU; to fulfill their progressive agenda.^[108][112] In his quest to root out these "progressives", Beck has compared himself to Israeli Nazi hunters, vowing on his radio show that "to the day I die I am going to be a progressive-hunter. I’m going to find these people that have done this to our country and expose them. I don’t care if they’re in nursing homes."^[30]