General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums“There Is No Alternative!” Sound familiar? and The “iron lady”
This is perhaps a more ephemeral, and consequently a less familiar, example, unless you are of a certain age. In the British newspaper the Daily Telegraph on 22 May 1980, Mrs Thatcher wrote:
Theres no easy popularity in what we are proposing, but it is fundamentally sound. Yet I believe people accept there is no real alternative.
She was using it to describe the policies that she and her government would follow, and she made use of the slogan many times afterwards. The initial letters of four of the five last words went on to form an acronym TINA which became yet another of Thatchers nicknames, later extended to any doctrinaire approach, particularly those which were somewhat unpopular.
http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2013/04/margaretthatcher/
Neoliberal Globalization: Is There an Alternative to Plundering the Earth?
The following is a preview of a chapter by Claudia von Werlhof in The Global Economic Crisis: The Great Depression of the XXI Century. (2009)
Is there an alternative to plundering the earth?
Is there an alternative to making war?
Is there an alternative to destroying the planet?
No one asks these questions because they seem absurd. Yet, no one can escape them either. Until the onslaught of the global economic crisis, the motto of so-called neoliberalism was TINA: There Is No Alternative!
No alternative to neoliberal globalization?
No alternative to the unfettered free market economy?
What Is Neoliberal Globalization?
Let us first clarify what globalization and neoliberalism are, where they come from, who they are directed by, what they claim, what they do, why their effects are so fatal, why they will fail and why people nonetheless cling to them. Then, let us look at the responses of those who are not or will not be able to live with the consequences they cause.
This is where the difficulties begin. For a good twenty years now we have been told that there is no alternative to neoliberal globalization, and that, in fact, no such alternative is needed either. Over and over again, we have been confronted with the TINA-concept: There Is No Alternative! The iron lady, Margaret Thatcher, was one of those who reiterated this belief without end.
The TINA-concept prohibits all thought. It follows the rationale that there is no point in analyzing and discussing neoliberalism and so-called globalization because they are inevitable. Whether we condone what is happening or not does not matter, it is happening anyway. There is no point in trying to understand. Hence: Go with it! Kill or be killed!
Some go as far as suggesting that globalization meaning, an economic system which developed under specific social and historical conditions is nothing less but a law of nature. In turn, human nature is supposedly reflected by the character of the systems economic subjects: egotistical, ruthless, greedy and cold. This, we are told, works towards everyones benefit.
The question remains: why has Adam Smiths invisible hand become a visible fist? While a tiny minority reaps enormous benefits from todays neoliberalism (none of which will remain, of course), the vast majority of the earths population suffers hardship to the extent that their very survival is at stake. The damage done seems irreversible.
All over the world media outlets especially television stations avoid addressing the problem. A common excuse is that it cannot be explained.[1] The true reason is, of course, the medias corporate control.
What Is Neoliberalism?
Neoliberalism as an economic policy agenda which began in Chile in 1973. Its inauguration consisted of a U.S.-organized coup against a democratically elected socialist president and the installment of a bloody military dictatorship notorious for systematic torture. This was the only way to turn the neoliberal model of the so-called Chicago Boys under the leadership of Milton Friedman a student of Friedrich von Hayek into reality.
The predecessor of the neoliberal model is the economic liberalism of the 18th and 19th centuries and its notion of free trade. Goethes assessment at the time was: Free trade, piracy, war an inseparable three![2]
At the center of both old and new economic liberalism lies:
Self-interest and individualism; segregation of ethical principles and economic affairs, in other words: a process of de-bedding economy from society; economic rationality as a mere cost-benefit calculation and profit maximization; competition as the essential driving force for growth and progress; specialization and the replacement of a subsistence economy with profit-oriented foreign trade (comparative cost advantage); and the proscription of public (state) interference with market forces.[3]
Where the new economic liberalism outdoes the old is in its global claim. Todays economic liberalism functions as a model for each and everyone: all parts of the economy, all sectors of society, of life/nature itself. As a consequence, the once de-bedded economy now claims to im-bed everything, including political power. Furthermore, a new twisted economic ethics (and with it a certain idea of human nature) emerges that mocks everything from so-called do-gooders to altruism to selfless help to care for others to a notion of responsibility.[4]
This goes as far as claiming that the common good depends entirely on the uncontrolled egoism of the individual and, especially, on the prosperity of transnational corporations. The allegedly necessary freedom of the economy which, paradoxically, only means the freedom of corporations hence consists of a freedom from responsibility and commitment to society.
The maximization of profit itself must occur within the shortest possible time; this means, preferably, through speculation and shareholder value. It must meet as few obstacles as possible. Today, global economic interests outweigh not only extra-economic concerns but also national economic considerations since corporations today see themselves beyond both community and nation.[5] A level playing field is created that offers the global players the best possible conditions. This playing field knows of no legal, social, ecological, cultural or national barriers.[6] As a result, economic competition plays out on a market that is free of all non-market, extra-economic or protectionist influences unless they serve the interests of the big players (the corporations), of course. The corporations interests their maximal growth and progress take on complete priority. This is rationalized by alleging that their well-being means the well-being of small enterprises and workshops as well.
The difference between the new and the old economic liberalism can first be articulated in quantitative terms: after capitalism went through a series of ruptures and challenges caused by the competing economic system, the crisis of capitalism, post-war Keynesianism with its social and welfare state tendencies, internal mass consumer demand (so-called Fordism), and the objective of full employment in the North. The liberal economic goals of the past are now not only euphorically resurrected but they are also globalized. The main reason is indeed that the competition between alternative economic systems is gone. However, to conclude that this confirms the victory of capitalism and the golden West over dark socialism is only one possible interpretation. Another opposing interpretation is to see the modern world system (which contains both capitalism and socialism) as having hit a general crisis which causes total and merciless competition over global resources while leveling the way for investment opportunities, i.e. the valorization of capital.[7]
The ongoing globalization of neoliberalism demonstrates which interpretation is right. Not least, because the differences between the old and the new economic liberalism can not only be articulated in quantitative terms but in qualitative ones too. What we are witnessing are completely new phenomena: instead of a democratic complete competition between many small enterprises enjoying the freedom of the market, only the big corporations win. In turn, they create new market oligopolies and monopolies of previously unknown dimensions. The market hence only remains free for them, while it is rendered unfree for all others who are condemned to an existence of dependency (as enforced producers, workers and consumers) or excluded from the market altogether (if they have neither anything to sell or buy). About fifty percent of the worlds population fall into this group today, and the percentage is rising.[8]
Anti-trust laws have lost all power since the transnational corporations set the norms. It is the corporations not the market as an anonymous mechanism or invisible hand that determine todays rules of trade, for example prices and legal regulations. This happens outside any political control. Speculation with an average twenty percent profit margin edges out honest producers who become unprofitable.[9] Money becomes too precious for comparatively non-profitable, long-term projects,
or projects that only how audacious! serve a good life. Money instead travels upwards and disappears. Financial capital determines more and more what the markets are and do.[10] By delinking the dollar from the price of gold, money creation no longer bears a direct relationship to production.[11] Moreover, these days most of us are exactly like all governments in debt. It is financial capital that has all the money we have none.[12]
Small, medium, even some bigger enterprises are pushed out of the market, forced to fold or swallowed by transnational corporations because their performances are below average in comparison to speculation rather: spookulation wins. The public sector, which has historically been defined as a sector of not-for-profit economy and administration, is slimmed and its profitable parts (gems) handed to corporations (privatized). As a consequence, social services that are necessary for our existence disappear. Small and medium private businesses which, until recently, employed eighty percent of the workforce and provided normal working conditions are affected by these developments as well. The alleged correlation between economic growth and secure employment is false. When economic growth is accompanied by the mergers of businesses, jobs are lost.[13]
If there are any new jobs, most are precarious, meaning that they are only available temporarily and badly paid. One job is usually not enough to make a living.[14] This means that the working conditions in the North become akin to those in the South, and the working conditions of men akin to those of women a trend diametrically opposed to what we have always been told. Corporations now leave for the South (or East) to use cheap and particularly female labor without union affiliation. This has already been happening since the 1970s in the Export Processing Zones (EPZs, world market factories or maquiladoras), where most of the worlds computer chips, sneakers, clothes and electronic goods are produced.[15] The EPZs lie in areas where century-old colonial-capitalist and authoritarian-patriarchal conditions guarantee the availability of cheap labor.[16] The recent shift of business opportunities from consumer goods to armaments is a particularly troubling development.[17]
It is not only commodity production that is outsourced and located in the EPZs, but service industries as well. This is a result of the so-called Third Industrial Revolution, meaning the development of new information and communication technologies. Many jobs have disappeared entirely due to computerization, also in administrative fields.[18] The combination of the principles of high tech and low wage/no wage (always denied by progress enthusiasts) guarantees a comparative cost advantage in foreign trade. This will eventually lead to Chinese wages in the West. A potential loss of Western consumers is not seen as a threat. A corporate economy does not care whether consumers are European, Chinese or Indian.
The means of production become concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, especially since finance capital rendered precarious itself controls asset values ever more aggressively. New forms of private property are created, not least through the clearance of public property and the transformation of formerly public and small-scale private services and industries to a corporate business sector. This concerns primarily fields that have long been (at least partly) excluded from the logic of profit e.g. education, health, energy or water supply/disposal. New forms of so-called enclosures emerge from todays total commercialization of formerly small-scale private or public industries and services, of the commons, and of natural resources like oceans, rain forests, regions of genetic diversity or geopolitical interest (e.g. potential pipeline routes), etc.[19] As far as the new virtual spaces and communication networks go, we are witnessing frantic efforts to bring these under private control as well.[20]
All these new forms of private property are essentially created by (more or less) predatory forms of appropriation. In this sense, they are a continuation of the history of so-called original accumulation which has expanded globally, in accordance with to the motto: Growth through expropriation![21]
Most people have less and less access to the means of production, and so the dependence on scarce and underpaid work increases. The destruction of the welfare state also destroys the notion that individuals can rely on the community to provide for them in times of need. Our existence relies exclusively on private, i.e. expensive, services that are often of much worse quality and much less reliable than public services. (It is a myth that the private always outdoes the public.) What we are experiencing is undersupply formerly only known by the colonial South. The old claim that the South will eventually develop into the North is proven wrong. It is the North that increasingly develops into the South. We are witnessing the latest form of development, namely, a world system of underdevelopment.[22] Development and underdevelopment go hand in hand.[23] This might even dawn on development aid workers soon.
It is usually women who are called upon to counterbalance underdevelopment through increased work (service provisions) in the household. As a result, the workload and underpay of women takes on horrendous dimensions: they do unpaid work inside their homes and poorly paid housewifized work outside.[24] Yet, commercialization does not stop in front of the homes doors either. Even housework becomes commercially co-opted (new maid question), with hardly any financial benefits for the women who do the work.[25]
Not least because of this, women are increasingly coerced into prostitution, one of todays biggest global industries.[26] This illustrates two things: a) how little the emancipation of women actually leads to equal terms with men; and b) that capitalist development does not imply increased freedom in wage labor relations, as the Left has claimed for a long time.[27] If the latter were the case, then neoliberalism would mean the voluntary end of capitalism once it reaches its furthest extension. This, however, does not appear likely.
Today, hundreds of millions of quasi-slaves, more than ever before, exist in the world system.[28] The authoritarian model of the Export Processing Zones is conquering the East and threatening the North. The redistribution of wealth runs ever more and with ever accelerated speed from the bottom to the top. The gap between the rich and the poor has never been wider. The middle classes disappear. This is the situation we are facing.
It becomes obvious that neoliberalism marks not the end of colonialism but, to the contrary, the colonization of the North. This new colonization of the world[29] points back to the beginnings of the modern world system in the long 16th century, when the conquering of the Americas, their exploitation and colonial transformation allowed for the rise and development of Europe.[30] The so-called childrens diseases of modernity keep on haunting it, even in old age. They are, in fact, the main feature of modernitys latest stage. They are expanding instead of disappearing.
Where there is no South, there is no North; where there is no periphery, there is no center; where there is no colony, there is no in any case no Western civilization.[31]
Today, everything on earth is turned into commodities, i.e. everything becomes an object of trade and commercialization (which truly means liquidation, the transformation of all into liquid money). In its neoliberal stage it is not enough for capitalism to globally pursue less cost-intensive and preferably wageless commodity production. The objective is to transform everyone and everything into commodities, including life itself.[35] We are racing blindly towards the violent and absolute conclusion of this mode of production, namely total capitalization/liquidation by monetarization.[36]
We are not only witnessing perpetual praise of the market we are witnessing what can be described as market fundamentalism. People believe in the market as if it was a god. There seems to be a sense that nothing could ever happen without it. Total global maximized accumulation of money/capital as abstract wealth becomes the sole purpose of economic activity. A free world market for everything has to be established a world market that functions according to the interests of the corporations and capitalist money. The installment of such a market proceeds with dazzling speed. It creates new profit possibilities where they have not existed before, e.g. in Iraq, Eastern Europe or China.
One thing remains generally overlooked: the abstract wealth created for accumulation implies the destruction of nature as concrete wealth. The result is a hole in the ground and next to it a garbage dump with used commodities, outdated machinery and money without value.[37] However, once all concrete wealth (which today consists mainly of the last natural resources) will be gone, abstract wealth will disappear as well. It will, in Marxs words, evaporate. The fact that abstract wealth is not real wealth will become obvious, and so will the answer to the question of which wealth modern economic activity has really created. In the end it is nothing but monetary wealth (and even this mainly exists virtually or on accounts) that constitutes a monoculture controlled by a tiny minority. Diversity is suffocated and millions of people are left wondering how to survive. And really: how do you survive with neither resources nor means of production nor money?
The nihilism of our economic system is evident. The whole world will be transformed into money and then it will disappear. After all, money cannot be eaten. What no one seems to consider is the fact that it is impossible to re-transform commodities, money, capital and machinery into nature or concrete wealth. It seems that underlying all economic development is the assumption that resources, the sources of wealth,[38] are renewable and everlasting just like the growth they create.[39]
The notion that capitalism and democracy are one is proven a myth by neoliberalism and its monetary totalitarianism.[40]
http://www.globalresearch.ca/neoliberal-globalization-is-there-an-alternative-to-plundering-the-earth/24403
https://store.globalresearch.ca/store/the-global-economic-crisis/
LWolf
(46,179 posts)one of the alternatives is to make sure that we don't elect another neo-liberal "iron lady" here in the U.S..
Ichingcarpenter
(36,988 posts)'we came , we saw and killed the mufa fucker.
LWolf
(46,179 posts)Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)99Forever
(14,524 posts)The last thing this nation needs is our own grossly arrogant and entitled "iron lady" anywhere near the reins of power.
Ichingcarpenter
(36,988 posts)I think the article and book is ahead of the curve
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)But it's ok because it's been proven that we don't live in a democracy anywayz, so the laugh is on you (the article not you personally).
swilton
(5,069 posts)Margaret Thatcher of the US - need I say more?
cantbeserious
(13,039 posts)eom
cheapdate
(3,811 posts)Today in Europe there are growing questions over the desirability of ceding local economic control and autonomy to remote governing bodies. Some South American nations have taken strong stands for local control of wealth and resources. But the pull of globalization is strong and even leftist governments are not immune to the call.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)hfojvt
(37,573 posts)I may get around to reading it. Need to take a research break though.
Other than TINA though often we are presented with a straw choice said to be worse than the one we are objecting to. It is either invade Iraq or "do nothing". It is either nominate Hillary or "lose the election". Compete globally or "lose our standard of living".