On 5/12/07, Michael Hoover <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
On 5/11/07, Yoshie Furuhashi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> the FT is basically saying that
> state oil companies tend to limit access and give less than maximally
> favorable terms to oil multinationals based in the West.
> Yoshie
<<<<<>>>>>
to what meaningful extent is state property (whether in politically
left or politically right countries) 'public' or 'social'... michael
That a company is nominally a state enterprise doesn't mean that the
people benefit much from it, let alone have control over its
activities. A great struggle over PDVSA, which was already a state
enterprise before the Chavez administration, is an example of that
fact.
But any power elite and ruling class, even of the most right-wing, who
run a functioning state of an independent nation have to provide for
the public at least enough to fend off any backlashes against them
monopolizing profits. That is why the Gulf states are such great
assets for the empire, for they are not nations, a majority of their
labor forces being migrants, for whose social reproduction (from
education to retirement) the Gulf ruing classes do not have to pay, so
their profits get handily recycled back into the financial centers at
the core of the empire.
--
Yoshie
