HUMOUR:

MOTIVATION ?:

POLITICS/HUMOUR:

WHERE THE BALLOT "COUNTS"

HUMOUR:

TRICKLE DOWN ECONOMICS

INTERNATIONAL POLITICS; THE ARAB REVOLUTIONS:

THE POSSIBILITIES AND LIMITATIONS OF REVOLUTION:


I guess that one might consider me fortunate to have lived through three different eras of international revolutionary ferment. The first was the late 60s, early 70s. The next was the late 80s, early 90s with the fall of the Soviet bloc. Now there is the revolutionary wave sweeping the Arab world. In the first I was a full fledged participant. In the second I did my little bit of solidarity work. This time around, aside from signing petitions and going to the occasional demonstration I am very much only a spectator and commentator.


To be honest the first period left me with something of a sour taste in my mouth, but I responded quite differently than the majority of the so-called "new left" did. Behind all the bombastic rhetoric and grandiose fantasies there was far less of the reality of a revolution than the participants imagined. In the country where I live, Canada, most of the "flaming revolutionaries" became simple bureaucrats via either the NDP or even the Liberals. Others took a brief detour through the mindless maze of trying to recreate Leninist fantasy parties. Which, I suppose, just goes to show that they were not too bright in the first place. Myself I became an anarchist.


My own anarchism, however, became increasingly heterodox as I became familiar with not only the anarchist critique of class societies, both western and 'Marxist' but also with a wide range of other "left wing alternatives" and other economic literature that was basically unknown to the simplistic Marxists of that era. From Bernstein and Berle and Means to Max Nomad to Jan Machaijski , to Berle and Means to the transitional ideas of Burnham as he went from Trotskyism to conservatism, I read them all. As the "new left" circled the drain into the cesspool of Maoism and terrorism I became increasingly convinced that "revolution" was impossible in an advanced industrial society while also simultaneously believing that only in such a society could the sort of libertarian socialism I now favoured be built.



As to the "impossibility" of revolution in advanced countries I was wrong, and I guess I should have noticed this much earlier than I did. It's an old truism that, "if something can't go on forever it won't". This applies to countries and economic systems as well as to most other things. It took the revolutions against Communism to make me doubt my earlier doctrine about the "impossibility" of revolution. Especially as at least one of these revolutions occurred in a nuclear armed country with one of the largest if not most effective armies on Earth. No doubt revolution was "impossible" in the Soviet Union from a purely military perspective. Any revolt could very easily be crushed as previous attempts in eastern Europe had amply demonstrated. But what I ignored in my thoughts were some very important things about actual revolutions rather than the cartoonish Marxist ideas I was familiar with. My thinking changed. I also grew to understand that the earlier period of "revolution" ie the 60s/70s that I dismissed as simply grandstanding and third world nationalism was actually a real revolution, ie the completion of the "managerial revolution". Nothing to do with achieving a classless society of course, but definitely a re-division of the spoils amongst different segments of the ruling class.


As I came to understand that the "revolution of our times" was not a libertarian or even a socialist one I came to understand it as an expansion of the power of the managerial class into hitherto "unknown frontiers" of exercising power and "incidentally" making money. Yes, I am of a generation that understands and remembers how sick and how weird such things as the "grief industry" are ! The Third World revolutions of the late 60s/early 70s reproduced the usual Stalinoid bureaucracies, and when the Soviet bloc collapsed their "proletarian heroes" engaged in the same sort of looting that established a new class order in the ex-communist countries. This was one of the things that "sharpened" my own ideas about "revolution". Even in Poland where a large sector of the working class was attached, at least slightly, to the idea of "self-management" the resulting economic order contained no trace of such ideals. What went wrong ?


When all the dust had settled down I came to understand that it was not only that pretty well all modern revolutions served the interests of a managerial class. It was also that NO class system could exist in its pure form. Soviet society depended on the underground economy (capitalist ? but at least "free market") to continue its existence. The great mass of the economy of the modern world is similarly "mixed" having characteristics of both managerial/government control and a free market that is allowed to exist because of necessity. Is such a thing stable ? Personally I don't know having abandoned the religious precepts of Marxist dialectics many decades ago. There is no foreordained march of history, only possibilities and probabilities.


All that being said how do I view the 'Arab Revolutions' ? Unlike some I don't expect any great "libertarian upsurge" from them though I am sure that anarchist groups will be formed in the countries where the revolution has been "successful". The independent actions of the working class will be suppressed as they are today in Egypt.


The Arab revolutions have, however, shaken the forces of international imperialism. As such I personally support them even if I am sure that the resulting polity will be not even close to what I might want. THAT is the message that I would like to leave with people. Support what you can, but don't expect miracles. Revolutions are only possible in the modern world when certain conditions are met. These conditions simultaneously both make the revolution possible and also limit the amount of change that one can expect from such events. In the end I am just as firmly convinced that a libertarian society can only come about gradually, but I also feel that anarchists/libertarian socialists cannot divorce themselves from revolutionary events if they occur as some outcomes are infinitely better than others for a "slow march" to a free society to take place.



In previous posts on this blog I have mentioned how revolutions, being as they are essentially unpredictable movements of large segments of the population, cannot be "planned" or called into being by "revolutionary conspiracy". The efforts of Leninist groupuscles or so-called "insurrectionists" are nothing but magical thinking. The forces behind revolutionary moments are as far outside of the farcical plotting of such groups as is the movement of the planets. Even the "Model-T of Revolutions", the Russian Revolution was not produced by the Bolsheviks. What that party actually did was take advantage of a revolution already in process to achieve a coup-d'etat, and later they created their own managerial rule as the original revolution was defeated.


While revolutions cannot be conjured out of the ground there are, however, certain conditions that are necessary before any such event can occur. First of all there has to be mass disbelief in a given sociopolitical economic system. This doesn't necessarily mean that the majority of people suddenly join the revolutionaries, merely that the majority are more than content to at least "stand aside" in the conflict between the old order and the revolution, having no overwhelming loyalty to the regime. As a matter of fact it is quite rare (though not non-existent) that an actual majority join the revolution from day 1, except perhaps in restricted locales. The fact that revolutions rarely have the participation of a majority, only their passive acquiescence, is already a "snake in Eden" for the Revolution as the active minority must of necessity act boldly in order to avoid defeat, and they thereby act in a relationship of power vis-a-vis the inactive majority. Great dictatorships from many such little acts grow.


As unfavourable as such necessities may be for actually resulting in a truly more equal and free society the problem is not insurmountable. What is insurmountable is the fact that revolutions are inevitably pluralistic. All sorts of people come to oppose the dying regime because of all sorts of different reasons. This has sometimes included those such as Leninist groupuscles or Islamist ideologues in the Arab world who think this pluralism is a Very Bad Thing. Those to whom the whole idea of pluralism is anathema. Whether these people will be "compromisers" as the Egyptian Islamists appear to be or those who hope to advance their own cause by pushing the revolution as far ahead of the majority as possible depends upon circumstance. A lot depends upon the exact level of another condition for revolution...the ruling class must be divided. At least a large segment of this class must be willing to see the old order crumble and either stand passively by or actively help to tear it down. Lacking this the inevitable military realities that led me to first discount the possibility of revolution still hold true.


Revolutions are carried out, at least initially, by minorities. Military necessity requires this minority to carry out actions without any sanction from the majority. Revolutions are inevitably pluralistic and inevitably are open to the influence both of parts of the old ruling class and to would be ruling classes whose rule is often far worse than the old order. Where does this leave those who style themselves anarchists or libertarian socialists ? Many (almost all ?) of those who want to retain what I call the "romance of revolution" respond by imagining a non-pluralistic revolution, one more purely "anarchist". This is maintained by having, against all historical evidence, what may be unbounded faith in the "libertarian instincts of the masses". No doubt revolutions, by their very nature, develop instances of self-management. This is necessary if the revolution is to survive and grow. Or at least if the population is to fed. Yet even in the most fertile historical ground, Spain of the 1930s, the anarchists attracted the participation or approval of only 1/3rd of the population. The Spanish Revolution was inevitably pluralistic, and all appeals to greater militancy simply ignore this inevitable fact of both then and even more now.


This almost inevitable fact of pluralism sets natural limits as to what can be accomplished by a revolution. What this means in actuality is being demonstrated these days in both Tunisia and Egypt. Also in both cases what is usually a military necessity of a successful revolution ie the desertion of at least sizable chunks of the military and police hamstrings that revolution in terms of how far it can go. In other words all these factors together could be summed up as, "the conditions necessary for a revolution to succeed inevitably lead to restricting what it can achieve". Thermidor is the Siamese twin of revolutions, sharing the same vital organs.


How does all this affect what I think now ? I no longer think revolution in an advanced society is impossible, but I am even more convinced that it can never lead to any great gains that last. Such gains can only come about in a slow, patient and "non-heated" atmosphere where social experiments can be tried out for their viability without any "war necessity" looming over them. This doesn't mean that revolutions are a matter of indifference. Such events can hopefully be influenced to result in situations where such experimentation is more possible and easier. Doing this, however, requires a much "finer touch" than the usual libertarian response of "always push harder and harder". In some cases this might be just what is needed. In other cases, such as choosing the wrong allies and dealing with those that we have made, it can be disastrous.

CANADIAN LABOUR:

AVERAGE CEO MAKES 155 TIMES MORE THAN AVERAGE CANADIAN WORKER:

It now the evening of Monday, January 3, and the average Canadian annual wage has already fallen well below that of an average of the 100 top CEOs in this country. In actual fact this happened at 2:30 pm earlier today. As the following press release from the Canadian Centre For Policy Alternatives points out the average top CEO makes 155 more money than the average Canadian.

Does this means, as the myth often says, that they "work harder" than the average Canadian ? For this to be true there would have to be 760 hours in each day, and the CEOs would have to work every second of them. Do they magically "create value" by their cunning business decisions ? If that was true then their remuneration should drop when the company they are in charge of drops in value or income, a thing that rarely happens. As the title of the following makes plain CEO pay is "recession proof". Bonuses come whether the company does well or poorly.

Leaving aside the question of the recent massive bailouts of business by government and the mostly invisible day to day subsidies provided by government I would challenge anyone to prove that any CEO has made a cunning non-obvious decision in any company that increased its value to anywhere near the amount these people are paid. In actual fact most companies "run themselves" despite management decisions. Management, of which CEOs are the "big fish" are better pictured as some sort of tube worm existing parasitically on the body of the company fish. They are hardly ever "propellers" that drive the firm forward.

Is this sort of inequality justified in any society ? What are its costs, and I don't mean merely monetary ones ? Things to ponder. Here's the press release. You can read the full17 page report at the Policy Alternatives website.

CEOCEOCEOCEO

Canada’s best-paid CEOs ‘recession-proof’: study
January 3, 2011
TORONTO – Canada’s best-paid 100 CEOs breezed through the worst of the recession with earnings 155 times higher than the average Canadian income earner, says a new study by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).
The study, Recession-Proof, looks at 2009 compensation levels for Canada’s best paid 100 CEOs and finds they pocketed an average of $6.6 million during the darkest period of the recession – a stark contrast from the total average Canadian income of $42,988.

“At this rate of reward, this handful of elite CEOs pocket the equivalent of the average Canadian wage by 2:30 pm on January 3 – the first working day of the year,” says the study’s author and CCPA Research Associate Hugh Mackenzie.

The study shows executive compensation in Canada wasn’t always this rich. In 1998, the best paid 100 CEOs pocketed an average of 104 times more than the average Canadian wage earner, compared to 155 times more in 2009.

“Even that extraordinary number understates the real story,” says Mackenzie. “Thanks to a change in corporate reporting introduced in 2008, we only have a conservative statistical estimate of the stock options that make up about one third of CEOs’ 2009 pay. The public will never know how much most of these CEOs actually got paid in 2009.

“And that’s only half the story. These CEOs are sitting on $1.3 billion of stock options they haven’t yet cashed in. That’s about $2 in future income for every $1 they declared in 2009.”

When the CEOs decide to exercise those stock options, the study reveals Canadians will subsidize that bonus with an estimated average of $360 million in foregone taxes, since stock options are taxed at a lower rate, as if they are capital gains. Among Mackenzie’s recommendations: getting rid of that expensive and unfair loophole.

The study highlights the role that soaring executive compensation plays in the dramatic growth in income inequality in Canada identified in a recent CCPA study by Senior Economist Armine Yalnizyan. Yalnizyan found that fully one third of all income growth in Canada in the past 20 years went to the richest 1% of Canadians.

–30–

For more information please contact: Trish Hennessy at (416) 551-2059 or Kerri-Anne Finn at (613) 563-1341 x306.

HUMOUR:

ECONOMIC CRISIS AS VIEWED FROM THE BAR:

Yet another great one from Kirktoons (I wonder whatever happened to him?).

HUMOUR:

WHAT'S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE ?:

CANADIAN LABOUR:

CANADIANS WANT PENSIONS INCREASED:

We live in interesting times. Corporations and the governments that represent them across the "developed world" are frantically trying to pare back the gains that working people have made over many decades. Some of this is an attempt to reduce labour costs to maintain competitiveness in the face of rising industrial producers such as India, China and Brazil. It is also partly an attempt to redistribute the social surplus that flows through government from ordinary people to those corporations that might be said to be "national" (though governments are generally pretty poor judges of such things) once more because of foreign competition. It is also, however, a genuine fiscal crisis of the state that has been building for a long time and has been exasperated by the recent stimulus spending that many governments have engaged in.

Many things, excluding corporate giveaways of course, are being cut back, but pensions have proven to be a particularly sore point as recent events in Greece, Spain and especially France have shown. It seems that the population of many countries have been willing to (sullenly) accept such things as long term stagnant wages and the virtual end of good chances for the social mobility of their children. As I said, sullenly, as resentment over such loses for ordinary people has led to a revival of class based politics in many places, despite its premature obituary pronounced by many pundits left and right.

The attack on pensions across the world seems to be the straw that broke the camel's back. To date the gradually growing realization that things aren't going to get any better has been tempered with an assurance that they wouldn't get significantly worse. If, however, the 'promise" of at least some comfort on retirement is withdrawn it is little wonder that open rebellion has broken out in many countries. Here in Canada where everybody except right wing "think"(sic) tanks agrees that the federal pension system is financially sound the mood of the general population is actually that pension benefits should be increased not reduced. Such a mood will provide a great barrier to the federal government following the European model of cutbacks no matter how much the neocons now in power there would dearly love to do so.

Here's an article from the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) about a recent survey of what Canadians think should be done about our pension system.

CPPCPPCPPCPP

Western Canadians support increase in Canada Pension Plan benefits
Nov 4, 2010 09:02 AM


More than three quarters of western Canadians support increasing Canada Pension Plan benefits, according to a new national survey. Eighty percent also support increasing federal payments to senior citizens and four in ten believe the government is moving too slowly in reforming Canada’s pension system.

The Future of Pensions poll was completed by Environics Research Group in late August for the Canadian Union of Public Employees and the Public Service Alliance of Canada. The national poll surveyed 2,020 Canadians and has a margin of error of +/-2.2 per cent 19 times out of 20. Responses from British Columbia have a margin of error of +/-6.2 per cent 19 times out of 20, and responses from the Prairies have a margin of error of +/-4.4 per cent 19 times out of 20.

“From coast to coast, Canadians support higher CPP benefits," said CUPE National president Paul Moist. “Western Canadians are sending a clear message to federal and provincial politicians who are currently studying ways to improve the CPP."

The survey asked western Canadians their views on saving and their expectations for retirement. While many have set up a Retirement Savings Plan or a Tax-Free Savings Account, 35 per cent in British Columbia and 30 per cent on the Prairies acknowledge that they are not saving for retirement—mostly because they cannot afford to.

Only one in four western Canadians is fully confident that they will be able to save enough to live comfortably in retirement, and three in 10 believe they won’t have enough to live comfortably, with lower income being the most pessimistic.

“Western Canadians are concerned with their capacity to retire in comfort,” said John Gordon, National President of PSAC. “If action is not taken now, poverty will become a dire reality for more and more elderly Canadians.”

Poll respondents also overwhelmingly support increasing Old Age Security and Guaranteed Income Supplements for those living below the poverty line. OAS and GIS payments amount to only $11,000 per year.

The survey also asked respondents for their preference on different types of pension plans. Despite the economic downturn, those currently part of workplace pension plans believe their pension benefits are safe. But more than 70 per cent prefer a defined benefit plan, which guarantees a fixed amount of benefit when you retire, to a defined contribution plan, where the benefits paid out depend on the performance of the investments in the fund.

Together, CUPE and PSAC represent more than 800,000 public sector workers across Canada. Both organizations have been advocating for retirement security for all Canadians.


Read The Future of Pensions Poll


For more information, please contact:

British Columbia
Barry O’Neill, president, CUPE BC 604-340-6768 (cell)
Patrick Bragg, PSAC Communications, 778-889-3486
Clay Suddaby, CUPE Communications 604-313-1138 (mobile)

Alberta
Jeffrey Vallis, PSAC Communications, 204-391-3067
Lou Arab, CUPE Communications, 780-271-2722

Saskatchewan
Jeffrey Vallis, PSAC Communications, 204-391-3067
Tom Graham, president CUPE Saskatchewan, 306-229-8171

Manitoba
Jeffrey Vallis, PSAC Communications, 204-391-3067
Mike Skaftfeld, president CUPE Manitoba, 204-470-1313

LOCAL EVENTS WINNIPEG:

SLO PITCH SOCIAL:

I have to admit that the last item on this blog made me feel sort of "creepy". Perhaps it is merely my personal distance from the true believers in veganism. Thus I feel the need to clear the air and my own gut pains via another announcement from here in Winnipeg about a social for the North West Slo Pitch League that Molly has recently received. Now Molly has little interest in baseball. I consider it a great contender for the title of 'Most Boring Game On Earth', (football yeah !) but I have to say that I have infinitely more interest in it than I do in the "ethical purity" of vegans. At least these people hold a social that I might consider attending.

I probably shouldn't make a great political argument out of this, but it dredges up memories of one statement that I read here on the internet "complaining" that there is no more "working class culture". Of course there is, but it is very much defined by things that the average leftist has been trained to hate by their academic conditioning which says that only the exotic has any value. Such things as baseball leagues are one such example of what leftists are trained to hate. There are undoubtedly hundreds more.

Anyways here is the announcement, and Molly hopes to receive many more.

SPLSPLSPLSPL
NWSPL social Sat Nov 6th at Glenwood cc

8pm-1am
Time Saturday, November 6 at 8:00pm - November 7 at 1:00am

-------------------

Location Glenwood cc
27 Overton st
Winnipeg, MB

------------------
More Info

Hey there NWSPL nation ! The ball season isnt over just yet! We are having our windup social & awards night on Sat Nov 6th at Glenwood cc 27 Overton street from 8pm-1am.Tickets are only $10.00 so come out& enjoy a great night of fun , friends, great silent auction prizes,awards,food & drinks along with a few games & surprises! Come cheer on the winning teams & mvps as they receive all their hardware. All team captain have tickets but if you or someone you know need more then let me know asap! We also have a donation letter on the league website if you are able to help out with some silent auction prizes. Hope to see everyone out for a crazy party to wind down the 2010 season! Lets all have a blast & blow the roof off the club!

Thanks Jamie 223 9118 jwbates@shaw.ca

HUMOUR:

RECESSION OPINIONS:

ECONOMY:

YOU GO DOWN THEY GO UP:

Here's an interesting item from the American Institute for Policy Studies. It seems that the recession is hitting some (workers) much harder than it is hitting others (corporate management). Here's the story. You can access the full report at the IPS website. Please note that the IPS names names and salaries and that they also want this news spread as far as possible.>>>

CPCPCPCPCP
Executive Excess 2010: CEO Pay and the Great Recession
By Sarah Anderson, Chuck Collins, Sam Pizzigati, Kevin Shih

The 17th annual executive compensation survey looks at how CEOs laid off thousands while raking in millions.
America’s CEOs had a terribly rough 2009. Or so the national and regional executive pay surveys released so far this year would suggest. “CEOs See Pay Fall Again,” blared one headline early this past spring. “CEO pay rankings dominated by large salary cuts,” read another in June. “Silicon Valley bosses,” summed up still another, “get pay cut.” Month after month, the headlines have pounded home a remarkably consistent message: Corporate executives, here in the Great Recession, are suffering, too.

Corporate executives, in reality, are not suffering at all. Their pay, to be sure, dipped on average in 2009 from 2008 levels, just as their pay in 2008, the first Great Recession year, dipped somewhat from 2007. But executive pay overall remains far above inflation adjusted levels of years past. In fact, after adjusting for inflation, CEO pay in 2009 more than doubled the CEO pay average for the decade of the 1990s, more than quadrupled the CEO pay average for the 1980s, and ran approximately eight times the CEO average for all the decades of the mid-20th century.

American workers, by contrast, are taking home less in real weekly wages than they took home in the 1970s. Back in those years, precious few top executives made over 30 times what their workers made. In 2009, we calculate in the 17th annual Executive Excess, CEOs of major U.S. corporations averaged 263 times the average compensation of American workers. CEOs are clearly not hurting.

But they are, as we detail in these pages, causing others to needlessly hurt — by cutting jobs to feather their own already comfortable executive nests. In 2009, the CEOs who slashed their payrolls the deepest took home 42 percent more compensation than the year’s chief executive pay average for S&P 500 companies. Most careful analysts of the high-finance meltdown that ushered in the Great Recession have concluded that excessive executive compensation played a prime causal role. Outrageously high rewards gave executives an incentive to behave outrageously, to take the sorts of reckless risks that would eventually endanger our entire economy. Our nation’s leading political players have sought, sometimes with grand fanfare, to confront this reality. Leading politicos have been railing against excessive executive bonuses and inappropriately high incentives ever since the economy nosedived. Various executive pay reforms and regulations have even found their way into the statute book. The financial industry reform package enacted this July, for instance, codifies into law several long-term goals of the executive pay reform community, most notably a “say on pay” provision that hands shareholders

the right to take nonbinding advisory votes on executive compensation. Will measures like these rein in excessive executive rewards? Will they begin to significantly narrow the corporate pay gap? That appears doubtful. The UK, for instance, has had a “say on pay” provision on the books since 2002, and that provision has not prevented a continuing executive pay spiral. Despite the recession, UK executive compensation sits substantially above pre-“say on pay” levels. To bring executive pay back down to mid-20th century levels, we need reforms that cut to the quick, that recognize the dangers banks and major corporations create when they dangle oversized rewards for executive “performance.” Some reforms that would move us in that direction are now pending in Congress. Others have yet to make their way onto the congressional docket.

We offer, in this Executive Excess edition, our first comprehensive analysis of all these reform proposals, those already passed, those still pending, and those promising initiatives not yet on our U.S. political radar screen. Our goal: to rate the reform steps already taken and highlight the steps we still need to take. Thorough executive pay reform, we remain convinced, holds an important key to our healthy economic future.

ANARCHIST THEORY:

STATE AND CLASS:

I originally saw the following item on the Miami Autonomy and Solidarity site. The original source is an exciting new website Havana Times written from a progressive viewpoint but with none of the displaced mindless patriotism so typical of western leftists who worship foreign dictatorships.

I would certainly not characterize Havana Times as anarchist, but many of the items there are things that few anarchists could disagree with. I found the following interesting despite having my own disagreements with some of the author's opinions. Like many, perhaps most, anarchists the author characterizes state socialist regimes as being essentially "state capitalist". I disagree, and I think "managerial" is a better word just as it is for the societies in which most of us live ie so-called "capitalist" regimes. My reason is the overwhelming way in which prices are set and resources allocated in such regimes, a manner remote from the idealized "capitalism" of a century ago (though "capitalism" was always a mixed economy in any case) where they were supposed to be set by market competition. In the case of Marxist dictatorships the word is even less apt because the supposed labour market consisting of those free to sell their labour to the highest bidder is a total fantasy. The labour "market" under Marxism is closer to that of theocratic slave states or serfdom than it is to "capitalism".

I also disagree that a system of de jure government ownership and de facto self management would be anything resembling a stable arrangement. I admit its theoretical possibility and actual probability over a long term transition to real self management. With the proviso, of course, that the controllers of the state would continually try to expand their power at the expense of actual self managed socialism.

All that being said the following is a perceptive look at the difference between legal fictions of ownership and the actual realities of social power. Well worth reading.

SCSCSCSCSC
State Owned Doesn’t Mean Socialist
HAVANA TIMES, April 27 — Recently in Granma, the newspaper of the Communist Party of Cuba, an article appeared about the economic efficiency of “socialist government enterprises” in the armed forces (4/16/10).

In the spirit of helping to clarify certain concepts, I have attempted to provide a few, more precise, details here.

Apparently the comrades who wrote about the Military Agricultural Union “socialist government enterprise,” based themselves on the identification of state and socialist property by virtue of the fact that this property belongs to the Cuban state; they assume that all state property is, de jure, socialist. However, what gives a property its social character —be it socialist or capitalist— is the form of its operation and the appropriation of its output, not its legal form.
This confusion was introduced in socialist theory by those who mistook estatización (state ownership) for socialization. They thought that for property to be socialized, it was sufficient to place it under state ownership and then hold the state sacred above the rest of society.

The social character of a company is one thing and the legal structure of its ownership is something else. The social character of property is determined by the form in which it is put to use, by the way in which work is organized, the mode of production (based on slave, serf, wage or freely associated labor) and the way in which the surplus obtained is distributed. This is independent of the property’s legal structure, which can be state-owned, collective or privately owned. This said, the natural tendency is for the content (the social character) of property to determine its legal form (structure), not the other way around.

Certainly, a government enterprise that exploits wage labor can be efficient. There are many examples of this throughout the entire capitalist world , even in the USA, England and Japan.

However, though the legal form of such property is state-owned, those companies are not socialist. They are capitalist because they respond to the capitalist logic of obtaining profits through wage labor, which in this case is appropriated by the state. As a corollary, when that state seeks the “well being” of the workers, with fairer distribution, this is what characterizes social democracy.

So what if the state is in the hands of the workers?” the statists might ask.

The same thing would happen as what has occurred in every “worker’s state”: the workers would continue being paid a wage (which would not be determined by the level of production), they would have no ownership or usufruct relationship with the means of production, and they would not participate in the distribution of profits.


On behalf of socialism, all those tasks would be overseen by a bureaucratic stratum, which in the long run —as has always occurred— winds up as the bureau-bourgeoisie (“the accidental class,” as described by Russian academics) who appropriate the means of production and the surpluses, and plunge the working class into deeper misery.

That “working class,” harnessed to their new capitalists (the bureaucrats), would not bring new production relations with them, since these laborers still would not have understood their need to liquidate themselves as a working class and become a new class of freely associated workers…of cultured cooperativists, the new class that bears the new production relations.

The government enterprise that exploits wage labor, seeks profits and concentrates the surplus in a few hands is in fact a state capitalist company given its content…given its social character.

Its juridical state form doesn’t matter. This was what all the confusion was around concerning “state socialism,” which never transcended the limits of state monopoly capitalism. This clearly occurred in Russia but also in Cuba.

Wage labor is what characterizes the form of capitalist exploitation, while freely-associated, cooperative or autogestionario (self-managed) work is the generic form of organizing socialist labor.

For the social character of a company to be described as socialist (it doesn’t matter if the property legally belongs to the state or the collective of workers) it must be managed through socialist methods – not capitalists ones; this is to say, with cooperative and self-managerial forms of work and management by freely associated workers who are directed and managed in a collective and democratic way by the workers themselves.

This would even include the election of management, which should be revolving, and the equal distribution of part of the profits (after paying taxes and other expenses due to the state and leaving another part for the extended reproduction of the company, emergency funds and other reserves).

Even under capitalism there are properties that are legally collective, but that in and of itself doesn’t make them socialist. This is the case of the corporation, which legally belongs to its community of shareholders, a few or many of whom might work for that same company. However by organizing itself into a capitalist form of operation —that’s to say with wage labor, with hierarchical forms of management and control of the surplus by a group of owners who control most of the shares— it continues essentially as a capitalist company given its social character, even when it constitutes the first form of the decomposition of capital.

This is what they deceivingly refer to as “popular capitalism,” which capitalists sought to present as an alternative to cooperativist socialism.

Likewise, there exists property that is private by its legal form and socialist by its self-managerial social form of operation. This is the case of many small family-owned businesses, which manage the company democratically, distribute the profits equally and do not exploit wage labor.

Socialist government enterprises would be those where the state maintains the ownership of the means of production in a legal form, but where the social form of its operation is carried out in a socialist, self-managerial and cooperative manner. This would be the case of a type of company that is co-managed between the state and the workers.

By the same token, just as cooperatives are socialist firms in capitalist countries, it’s possible for there to exit in socialist countries reminiscences of capitalist companies (not in name, but because some day cooperative and self-management types of freely associated production relations will prevail), be they state, private or mixed ownership.

The interesting experience of Perfeccionamiento Empresarial (Managerial Improvement), originally conceived and applied in the Cuban armed forces (MINFAR), was a step forward in connection with the traditional statist wage-labor scheme, though still without breaking from it.

INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY:

THE BANDS ARE BANNED:

Sometimes there are items of stupidity over and above the call of foolishness that leave me gaping with wide eyed wonder. Now appreciate that I am an anarchist and as such am privy to the occasional screed from those who want to "abolish civilization" (a mercifully small part of modern anarchism) and who also- beggar the imagination- delude themselves into thinking they have a way to accomplish this goal. You'd think I'd be enured to craziness. No such thing. The so-called "mainstream society" contunues to produce examples of insanity that equal or surpass the idea of "abolishing civilization", and it does it on a routine basis. What follows is one such example.

SBSBSBSBSBSBSB
Apparently there is a new 'tweenie' fad called 'Silly Bandz'. I guess that I may have seen them on the arms of young kids in the homes that I visit but I never paid any attention whatsoever- which is perhaps exactly the level of attention they deserve. I'd be hard put to think of anything that deserves less attention. Basically they are cheap rubber bands in the shape of various things-animals, mythical figures, princess icons,etc. that kids strap across their wrists. There's a website for them, and a Wikipedia note on them as well.

Considering the low cost of this item (which is, of course at least about 50 times the cost of production) I'm considering ordering a bunch to amuse the yard apes and keep them off my back when I visit homes. OK. If you can think of anything more harmless (but I'm sure you can think of things more silly) I challenge you to present it. Maybe nose picking in private? This, however, is not the opinion of various schools who have "banned the silly bands". I became aware of this while reading this week's Time Magazine. They have a more extensive article online. What on God's Green earth could be the problem here ? The teachers and the principals who put their insanity into policy claim that it is "distracting".

Pupils may "play with their bands" rather than sitting with bated breath until the next utterance from the god at the front of the room. I suggest they strip the little buggers naked so they will have nothing to "play with" while they imbibe the great wisdom from the front of the room. But maybe then they would still have "something to play with". Ooops !

The teachers have also claimed that the kids engage in 'trades' of the bands and that sometimes the partners in these trades "regret" the deals that they have made. This leads to "hard feelings", and, of course, the abolition of any feeling beyond loyalty to an ideology is a primary goal of modern education.

Teachers today are, for instance, under the illusion that they can "abolish bullying" by ramping up the control of the students by institutional bullying to such a degree that the students will not engage in "bullying" - other than of course informing the great bully (the teachers and the school administration) of violations of the code ie informing just like any good member of the Hitler Youth would have done.

The inculcation of ideology, however, while a primary goal of our education system is not the primary goal. That goal is pretty simple...to keep the little bastards babysat so that both their parents can engage in the wage labour necessary to raise a family today. In the last few decades the ideas of "progressive eduction" have been gradually corrupted such that today the idea that there are objective standards of knowledge would be considered evidence that you were a right wing fanatic. At the same time the school system, while it has gradually abandoned the real function of teaching ie the passing on of knowledge (the conservatives are right here) has taken up a Hitler/Stalin pact whereby, as long as you have the little lizards trapped in kid jail for a few hours a day you might as well "teach them to behave properly". In this desire to exercise control leftists and right wingers are equally enthusiastic.

The desire to "ban the bands" has to be seen in this context. Of course it is silly and absurd, but it means a lot to that portion of the working class whose product is social control. It comes close to being their reason for being. It is also taken up with enthusiasm by their bosses who are part of the ruling class and are very much in agreement with the idea that children should be controlled whether the control is rational or not. After all control is the major reason for the institutions that they govern. The irrationality is not so irrational once you understand that, aside from warehousing kids, one of the major functions of the schools are to discipline kids to "fit in" to institutions where the word of the boss and his point of view is divine.

That's how I personally see this incredible attempt to impose bureaucratic will on young children. I don't know how long a period of "physical reality" without the ability to control others would be necessary to reform people who want to increase their power by such evil acts. Canada has a huge area on Ellsmere Island for their colonies where they would have no opportunity to direct the behavior of anyone else. A compassionate society would, of course, provide the necessary food and shelter for the bare physical comforts necessary to philosophical contemplation on the nature of good and evil. No "political commissars" would be provided. Figure it out yourselves guys, and maybe some day you could rejoin civilized society.

INTERNATIONAL LABOUR- FRANCE:

FRENCH WORKERS AGAINST PENSION THEFT:

Last Thursday, May 27, tens of thousands of workers struck and took to the street in response to a call from the major labour unions to oppose the proposed pension "reforms" that would raise the retirement age in France from 60 to 62 years. While large the demonstrations and the response of workers to the strike call was decidedly smaller than expected by the unions and perhaps suggests disillusionment with the endless rounds of "half-strikes" and street marches that the major unions have relied on in their continued disputes with the conservative Sarkozy government.

It might also suggest that efforts to convince the population of the "necessity" of reduction in government benefits are bearing fruit in the atmosphere of the fiscal crisis of much of southern Europe. The drive to reduce pension benefits, however, predates the present crisis and is an ongoing campaign by governments across the world to roll back pension benefits while maintaining or increasing give-aways to corporate business. With the demise of the pseudo-alternative of the state-communist countries the ruling managerial class has long seen its way open to "rationalize" the system of social support in various ways, and one of these is the reduction of pension benefits, especially by raising the age of retirement. they are aided in this by the fact that most social democratic parties worldwide have abandoned all but the slightest pretence to a "class perspective" in their policies. Either trendy leftism such as "greenishness" or self-promotion as "better managers" has become their raison d'etre. The present fiscal crisis is merely an opportunity for long term plans to be accelerated, not some unique crisis.

It should also be noted that the raising of the age of eligible retirement is a worldwide phenomenon that happens whether a state is in a deficit position or not. In Europe Germany will bring in a retirement age of 67 next year. The trend to raising the age of retirement extends across Europe and way beyond. Retirement ages are increasing outside of Europe in places such as Australia, India, Singapore and South Korea amongst many others. It should also be noted that while a retirement age of 60 (in France) may seem generous by North American standards that there are countries such as China where the age is 60 for males and 55 for females. Appeals to "competitiveness" hardly hold water when you look at the numbers in an international context.

The attack on pension benefits in France has to be seen in the context of the worldwide tendency of government managers to shift income from the working and other lower classes to the ruling classes. They do this in the context of assurance that they have no serious consequences to face beyond possible disorder ie there is presently no widely accepted "alternative" to their rule outside of South America and its neo-caudillos. The so-called fiscal "crisis" that much of Europe faces today is, from the point of view of its managers more an "opportunity" than a crisis. Watch carefully. If France's retirement age goes from 60 to 62 it will become 65 a few years after.

Meanwhile Canada's age will creep up from 65 to 67 to 69 and finally to 70. If you are so unlucky as to have health problems come upon you before then, well tough shit. The hope of government managers is that you die before you can collect a penny.

It will be a long hard slog before a popular alternative to such policies will be built, but doubtless the anarchist movement - in more realistic aspects - will be a major force in the formulation of such a thing. Until then defensive struggles to fight back against the plans of the managers have their place, but perhaps the French are right in their lack of faith in the traditional ways of doing this.

Here's an item from the Globe and Mail about the recent "semi-strike" in France.

ILILILILILILILIL
French workers hit the streets
Paris — Reuters
Published on Thursday, May. 27, 2010 9:56AM EDT

Last updated on Thursday, May. 27, 2010 6:34PM EDT


Tens of thousands of workers took to the streets in cities across France on Thursday to protest against government plans to raise the minimum retirement age of 60 as part of a reform of the costly pension system.

Trade union leaders said the marches were the first step in a long struggle to defend the retirement age, a trademark reform of the late Socialist President Francois Mitterrand, against the current government which says it has no alternative.

Transport was working almost normally and between 10 and 20 per cent of public service workers went on strike in schools, the post office and France Telecom. A poll for the Le Parisien daily said 62 per cent of those responding were ready to demonstrate.

One of the earliest marches, in Marseille, drew a larger turnout than a previous protest day in March. Unions estimated the crowd at 80,000 while police gave a figure of 12,000.

Estimates for the Paris march were due later on Thursday.

“Only a show of force on the streets can defend the 60-year retirement age and the social achievements that [President] Nicolas Sarkozy is methodically attacking,” Bernard Thibault, secretary general of the powerful CGT union, said.

Labour Minister Eric Woerth said on Wednesday that the current retirement age was “not dogma” and Budget Minister Francois Baroin said on Thursday a pension reform bill would be debated in parliament after the summer break.

“There are basically no other measures on the table that are convincing,” Mr. Woerth told reporters.

Mr. Sarkozy added a partisan sting to the debate on Wednesday by saying, to loud protests from the opposition Socialists, that France would have “much fewer problems” if Mr. Mitterrand had not lowered the retirement age in 1983.

According to a report last month by the government-appointed Pensions Advisory Council, France’s pension system faces a funding gap of around €70-billion ($86-billion U.S.) in 2030 and that could balloon to more than €100-billion by 2050.

Like other countries in the euro zone, France is struggling to bring its swollen public deficit under control. It has announced a freeze on central government spending over the next three years but has ruled out tax increases.

According to French media reports, the government is considering increasing the retirement age to 62 or 63 years and extending the period during which contributions have to be paid to 42 years from the current level of 40.5 years by 2030.

However, President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office said that no decisions had been taken as yet.

Mr. Sarkozy has singled out an overhaul of the pension system as his government’s key reform project this year but his plans already have aroused strong opposition from unions.

The CGT’s Thibault said further protests could come before the summer break. CFDT union leader Francois Chereque said: “Things will happen over time. One protest will not suffice.”

There have been expectations for several months that a rise in the retirement age would be part of the planned reform but French media have focused closely on the issue in recent days.

The transport chaos that often accompanies strikes in France was mostly absent on Thursday, partly because the reform plan would not touch costly special pension schemes for transport workers, a powerful sector that brought an earlier conservative government to its knees in 1995 when it tried to reform them.

“The government’s plan is not the toughest that could be, despite what the banners will say,” the business daily Les Echos wrote in an editorial.

HUMOUR:

THE NIGHT SHIFT:

INTERNATIONAL ANARCHIST MOVEMENT- GREECE:
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH:

The events in Greece continue along with the anarchist response there, a response that I have often characterized on this blog as "inadequate". Perhaps "immature" would be a better word. Despite the great rebelliousness of the Greek population the anarchists there generally have little to offer beyond...more rebellion. this is immensely sad. Looking across the world Greece may be the second country after Spain where anarchism is most popular on a per capita basis. Travelling through downtown Athens you might even get the illusion that anarchism was more popular than in places such as Barcelona. I've been in both. The difference, and it is a great and profound difference, an essential difference, is that in Spain the majoritarian anarchist tradition is anarcho-syndicalist. This means that anarchism has sunk deep roots amongst ordinary people, and that anarchism speaks to their concerns and not to people whose primary identification is with a subculture. This means that anarchism in Spain is inherently less "flashy" but much more profound and practical for its lack of visible "difference".

Not that I don't admire the Greeks. When visiting that country I was privileged to meet with anarchosyndicalists and members of the 'Anti-Authoritarian Movement'. The former, however, are small and marginal amongst Greek anarchists. Hopefully it will not always be so. The latter are gradually struggling towards a class based politics and a program that is detailed enough to appeal beyond a subculture of rebellion. This subculture is, it must be admitted, a considerable cut above that that is so common in the 'anglosphere', especially the USA. There is none of the usual nonsense about how to dress, what to eat, what music to listen to (more or less) nor how to talk (politically correct speech). Still, while it may be admirable in comparison it is still...an incestuous subculture. Many Greek anarchists recognize this, and they also know that what has been offered so far is simply not enough to draw the ordinary person to their side.

The problem in Greece is that this evolution towards a "popular anarchism" is inhibited by a form of anarchism, "autonomism" which actually derives from Maoist roots and is under the great illusion that one can precipitate some sort of libertarian revolution without either organization nor program by simple violent actions. Autonomism is a particularly European example of the decay of Maoism 9and the idea of "peoples' war" applied to urban settings) that has very little echoes today outside of Greece, Italy and Germany. It is in Greece that it is most prominent.

This "deviation" (to use an old commie term) has always inhibited the Greek movement insofar as its addiction to mindless violence has both disgraced anarchism in the view of the average person and also diverted the majority of the movement into something resembling a "competition of militancy" whereby they hope to compete with the firebombers.

Firebombers !!! Arson in an urban setting is pretty well always a very stupid idea. Here in North America the stupidity is compounded by the fact such arsons are pretty well inevitably connected to nothing more than the desire of the perpetrators to prove how committed and "enlightened" they are. Even when there is a "real" issue that doesn't involve arrogance bordering on psychopathology such as "hating porn stores" (Canada) or the people who drive SUVs (USA) arson very rarely (never ???) accomplishes anything. Even if you are making a "class point" against the ruling class - such as firebombing banks- it accomplishes nothing.

It is also very bad propaganda. What it says very plainly is that you don't give a shit about what has euphemistically called "collateral damage" which is always a possibility when fires are started in urban areas. Don't depend on the fire departments to be omnipotent. In Greece this possibility has become a reality as three bank workers were killed by a fire started by protesters in recent demonstrations. There have been all sorts of "excuses" for this. Some "anarchists" have echoed the commies and the vague leftists of the Coalition of the Radical Left by trying to blame the incident on agents provocateurs. This is nonsense. Others have tried to shift the blame to the management of the bank who (literally) locked the workers in. This, at least, has some truth to it, but it avoids the ultimate question. EVERY TIME when you start a fire in an urban area (and often in a rural area) there is the possibility of the death of innocent people. Greece has certainly seen enough of this sort of arson (with deaths) in recent years carried out by people who intend to redevelop land. It's a sad commentary on the "anarchism" of some people that they should imitate the actions of the lowest and most criminal of the business class.

No doubt there are some who are hardened ideologues, once more particularly in the USA, who call themselves "insurrectionist anarchists" who do their damnest to excuse such actions-or at least to argue against how atrocious they are. In Greece this "struggle for the soul of anarchism" has been going on for many years. Those who think that terrorist options are the best way to proceed have not been sparing in also physically attacking attacking other anarchists who disagree with them, and once more arson has been one of their methods.

What should be made plain here and now is that the semi-religious devotion to "a diversity of tactics" here in North America can result in obvious disaster. The demand that there be no criticism of any action no matter how foolish is preliminary to physical attacks on those who dissent. Such attacks have already happened in Canada and the USA.

Quite frankly it hardly matters in the cosmic scheme of things if totalitarians disguised as anarchists want to attack those who disagree with theatrical "mini-riots" involving a few dozen people. Nor if they physically assault somebody who has dissented from the "vegan cult". The world moves on. It does, however, matter when important issues such as those in Greece are in play.

The great point that I want to make here is not to those who are ideologically convinced that one riot after another will lead to a libertarian society (or at least convinced for 5 1/2 years until they either mature or find a way to make money out of the nonsense). I speak here to those who have been convinced by the rhetoric of "diversity of tactics". Such suspension of disbelief may be all well and good when an action will have no visible consequences ie all "anti" protests so favoured by the "travelling anarchist rent-a-riot". It is a totally different matter when the destiny of a nation is being determined. People in Greece are desperately attempting to make anarchism relevant for ordinary people. You have two choices for your "solidarity". You can be in solidarity with the Greek anarchists who want to make anarchism a living and practical reality or you can be in "solidarity" with those who have both frustrated their project in the past and also physically attacked them. The choice is clear.

The following , from the Anarkismo website, is one out of many self criticisms from within the Greek anarchist movement about the events that led to the deaths of the three workers. What is significant here is that the criticism comes from within, and it proposes the question of "who" you are in solidarity with. It's obvious what side I have chosen. To echo Martin Luther..."here I stand, I can do no other".
@@@@@@@@@@
An anarchist comrade from Athens:
Enough is enough

Let us shout it out loud and if they do not hear it let us show it with our actions: Enough is enough.



On the 5th of May, we lived the chronicle of three pre-destined deaths. Unfortunately, the belief that we had for the longest time that it is only a matter of time before we mourn the first victims of indiscriminate violence, came true. Unfortunately, lives had to be lost in order to hear or read from some of the collectives of the movement, albeit timidly, albeit vaguely, the first allusions of criticism for the nihilistic culture of violence. Unfortunately, some still continue to hide behind their finger, focusing on those that bear the moral instead of the actual responsibility, on the results of the murderous act and not the reasons behind it.

Let's show the courage and the sincerity that (must) characterize a revolutionary/liberating movement and let's talk about the gist of the matter. If the death of the three people was proven to be the result of a targeted action by the far right, would they focus on the - anyway criminal and inhuman - stance of the management of the bank? But even if this was the case, the below are fully in effect.

The tolerance that has been shown for the longest time by a part of the anarchist movement to the proponents of indiscriminate violence is the beginning of any (self-) criticism. All those that, for many years, acted virtually undisturbed, in the same monotonous, dangerous, destructive and provocative ways, next and inside our blocks, should have been isolated, instead of being described on hindsight, generally and vaguely as "agents provocateur" or "gang-members", without any analysis whatsoever on how we ended up in this situation accompanying those characterizations. This can still take place though and work as a kind of catharsis. All these years when anyone tried to distance themselves from phenomena of indiscriminate violence, or from mass - armed or not - violence, was thought as setting themselves apart, was jeered or attacked. So is it not positive that even now, even vaguely, voices against the practice of violence for the sake of violence are being heard? Maybe it is and maybe it isnʼt. Only time will tell.

The more our critique of the phenomenon remains hazy and without supporting evidence, the less persuasive it becomes. The effortless characterization of "agents provocateur" is insufficient mainly because it is too general. With this general condemnation you do not expose the crux of the matter. You only avoid to answer questions such as those that follow, ones that we need to answer with clarity and also look into the results of a sterile "insurrectional" oratory and the even more sterile and dangerous practices that originate from this oratory. As agents provocateur can act not only a sad gang of ego-centric malcontents, but a state-sponsored gang on designated duty as well, if we judge the acts only in relation to their results. But is such a judgment suitable for us to adopt? No, because the revolutionary expression is rational, clear, acute and examines the causes of each phenomena. No, because at this point we need to be direct and act accordingly. No, because such a critique characterizes Authority and the crutches that prop it up. They are the ones who are used to give a fuzzy explanation and leave it at that. But if you are indeed seeking to prick the boil of violence, your discourse against blind violence needs to be concise and consistent at all times. Your actions, even more so. Otherwise, any abstract verbal distance one may try to keep from those gangs and their actions will not be believable. And moreover, they do not help in the spreading of the anti-authoritarian word. Even if one is not diachronically consistent, the change of attitude and course - if it is sincere - has to be followed with arguments and self-criticism, to avoid becoming opportunism. The questions we talked about earlier are many. If they were a state-sponsored gang, why did we not break them up during the rally? Were we caught with our pants around our ankles? Obviously not, since they act the same way for years on end. But then the question becomes why we have not done so all those years. Our reflexes against state gangs and secret policemen have not been blunted that much, so our inactivity is not justified. Perhaps the reflexes of some of us have been blunted towards gangs that hijack anarchist and anti-authoritarian ideology to play their little games to our detriment.

Let's dispense with the jokes, the convenient excuses and reasoning. We watch the same play for years on end. A part of the movement was accepting for many years the brainless partisans of violence for violence's sake, the proponents of window-smashing, providing them with an ideological basis for their actions. The rest either reacted spasmodically, or put up with them, or awaited a fateful event in order to react. Let it be understood that their murderous stupidity has cost human lives. We are not talking anymore about immaturity and ideological fixations; we are talking about a crime. They are the perpetrators. The anarchist and the social movement in general has paid dearly the fad and the autism of a few cowards and those that supported their actions with their so-called 'insurrectionist' oratory, believing that the social struggle against the State and Power is undertaken by a few insurrectionary types in society's absence and is limited to broken glass or whatever mobilizes the police for a stone-throwing war. With them and their practices, anarchy has nothing in common. Enough discredit, enough backward steps. The conflict will be multi-level and massed. Targeted and conscious.

The very moment that an entire square demanded furiously "Burn this brothel, the parliament", the very moment that hundreds of thousands were on the streets to clash with totalitarianism, the very moment that life is taken away from us, this moment the anti-violence to the violence of Power must at all costs shed this weight. This though, from now on, even belatedly we need to prove that it is a fact. For starters, we can do what people are talking among themselves: organize immediately a rally and protest march against indiscriminate violence. This will act as a rallying beacon for the movement, will make known our position towards society and maybe become the starting point of setting the score straight with the aforementioned autism.

Let us shout it out loud and if they do not hear it let us show it with our actions: Enough is enough.

CANADIAN POLITICS-VANCOUVER:

GRANDVIEW PARK; REDEVELOP OR LEAVE ALONE:

Here's an interesting quandary, or at least it is for libertarian socialists as opposed to vague leftists. Out in Vancouver there is a park called 'Grandview Park' in the East End. There's a conflict in the neighbourhood about the park's future. On the one side are the authors of the following item, Defend Grandview. On the other side are the 'Friends of Grandview Park', allied with the local business improvement association.

What do I find problematic about this--besides the fact that it is doubtful in the extreme whether any infrastructure projects in the park will do anything whatsoever to address the concerns of the 'Friends' ? Such a hope seems rather fanciful to me and one wonders about other motives. Or perhaps the rather disingenuous claim by the Defend Grandview groups that "hard drugs" are "consciously excluded" from the park ? By whom ? How ? Isn't this park located in (ahem) Vancouver ? Seems like a hard claim to swallow.

What I find questionable in all this is the way it is couched in rather simplistic "class warfare" terms. I have no immediate knowledge of the area in question. It's been many years since I was visiting Vancouver, and at the time there were indeed "islands of yuppification" in the area around Commercial Drive. Situated in an ocean of ordinary working class neighbourhoods. I also have no doubt that the process of gentrification has proceeded apace. I do however have very profound doubts about the implied idea that "only the yuppies" are concerned with certain activities that go on in the park. I actually have no doubt that the 'Friends' have broad support amongst the working class population resident in the area.

That's the crux of the matter. I may be wrong about the character of the area, and I stand ready to be corrected. I do not, however, automatically jump to support each and every 'anti-development' initiative are some are prone to do. Neither do I automatically leap in on the side of what was once known as the "lumpenproletariat" when their interests conflict with those of ordinary working class people. I am well aware that for some people such side taking is a reflex action, untroubled by any thought process.

All across the world the process whereby ordinary people try to get more control over their neighbourhoods and hence their lives is marked by campaigns to "clean up" the area in which they live. It may be (probably is) that the residents near the park have legitimate safety concerns. If I am personally inclined to take sides at all I would tend to favour the interests of say working class residents over those of say drug dealers or other criminals who actually have victims.

OK, so I'm uncertain about this one. Here's one side of the story. I'm afraid that I cannot find a website for the 'Friends' to give theirs.

GPGPGPGPGPGPGP
ON THE REDEVELOPMENT OF GRANDVIEW PARK

A group that calls themselves the “Friends of Grandview Park” has called for the park’s redevelopment. They made a presentation to the Vancouver Parks Board under the title “Reclaim, Renovate, and Reinvent.” The proposed renovations are to take place in spring/summer 2010. Without a deeper look, the changes seem like an uncontroversial proposal. The “Friends” want a “new functionality” and to “create a space worthy of acclaim and notoriety.” But a closer inspection of the group’s complaints, goals and supporters reveals their actual vision – not just the gentrification of the park, but ultimately the creation of a neighbourhood only for those who can afford it.

Who are the “Friends of Grandview Park”
and who supports them?

The “Friends” of Grandview Park are a group of homeowners who live around or by Grandview Park, and who originally formed in order to stop the serving of free food to homeless people on Tuesday nights (the Chili Wagon).
The “Friends” of Grandview Park are supported by the Business Improvement Association (BIA), which stated “The BIA supports the renovation to Grandview Park and believes it will contribute to the business development, as well as security and safety in the area.” You might better know the BIA as the organization that pays for the Fusion security guards who patrol Commercial Drive in packs of two or four, harassing buskers, panhandlers and people selling their wares in the park.

The Friends of Grandview Park’s
official complaints:

In the section below we have listed the complaints laid out by the “Friends” of Grandview Park in their presentation to the Parks Board. Following each point is a counter-point or explanation of the implications of their statements, and what we think they really mean.

The Friends of Grandview Park say…

the park is…

1. “Chronically overrun by illegal inhabitants.”

To the “Friends” of Grandview Park there are too many homeless people in the park. This statement calls out for the criminalization of poverty, or at the very least pushing the homeless out of the park. The use of the term “illegal inhabitants” to describe the homeless is doubly absurd due to the fact that Grandview Park is native land; if anyone should technically be named “illegal inhabitants” it should be the city of Vancouver.

2. Used for “drug dealing and hard drugs.”

The “Friends” of Grandview Park assume the mantle of morality police over the park, above anyone who has used the park to purchase, sell or consume any type of drug. In reality, hard drugs are consciously excluded from Grandview, and members of the community – including parents of children who use the park – use the area to sell or purchase soft drugs. Maybe you have a friend who has bought, sold or smoked pot in the park?

3. “The chosen location of illegal protesters.”

In reality, protests in the park are rare. However, what better way for people to use a park than to come together to confront common concerns?

and, that …

4. “The design of the playground encourages loitering of non-families.”

This statement is ridiculous. Parks are for loitering. What are “non-families” and why are they not allowed to use the park?

5. “The unsanctioned use of tennis courts by the bi¬cycle polo club” means that the “… tennis courts (are) no longer available for parents to teach their kids how to ride bikes.”

This – and other parts of their presentation that call for “order” in the park – illustrate the “Friends’” broader goal of assuming total control. Teaching kids how to ride bikes us also an unsanctioned use of the tennis courts. The “Friends” would like to see the park used as they see fit, rather than how others already use it – even when its current use is positive and social.

6. The park has “poor drainage”

It is true that the park has poor drainage, but it is also interesting to point out that the drainage of Victoria Park was targeted in recent renovations with little to no improvement.

Stopping The Redevelopment

The “Friends” want “to bring order, safety and new functionality to the park.” Order in the sense of control over what happens in the park. The illusion of safety through removing homeless people and eliminating petty victimless crime. New functionality through the explicitly stated goal of turning the park into a “destination for shoppers and tourists.”

We want East Vancouver to be a community where you don’t have to be rich to exist, and where we don’t criminalize our neighbours. Because the redevelopment of Grandview Park is a step towards the further elimination of the poorer people from our neighbourhood, we say

NO REDEVELOPMENT
OF GRANDVIEW
PARK!