Saturday, December 30, 2006 The death of liberalism
posted by lenin [from Lenin's Tomb] -clip- The advanced capitalist world is in serious trouble, and the resort to increasingly austere measures will themselves produce social problems that it will be the burden of repressive institutions to deal with. If you want to understand why Blair and Bush are rolling back even basic liberal commitments such as habeus corpus, it is because they and the state personnel that they direct, understand the likely impact of the economic programmes they are committed to, and they are equipping the state with the means to deal with it. Social attitudes are less likely to be liberal, and popular political action less likely to take place through traditional venues. Growing numbers of disposable workers creates a popular basis for tumult, not consensus. How about when the global recessionary pressures move in sufficient concert to bring about a worldwide depression? How about when the oil becomes more and more difficult to find, the prices go sky high and people can't afford to take their cars to work? ^^^^^ CB: But bite your tongue and don't use the F-word prematurely ^^^^^^ -clp- The bulk of new work in the world will be informal. That's a process taking place everywhere from Brazil to India to China to the Gulf States, and it isn't exactly a solid basis for liberalism. As more and more people flee to the relatively wealthy metropole, the reaction will be tighter and tighter controls, more 'detention centres' and more intense resistance - the fires and riots at these prison camps in recent years will pale by comparison.
