Native American land rights
Native American land rights Ronald Reagan passed legislation guaranteeing the land rights of Native Americans that allowed the two surviving Pequod to claim territories in New England. The Pequod lands are now home to gambling under a legal loophole - one of the easiest ways for Native Americans to cash in on their claims. Currently in the courts the claim of that unfortunate Native American people who intermarried with African slaves in Brooklyn. Their right to set up casinos in New York is unlikely to be upheld by the courts. The willingness of the courts to recognise claims on the basis of ancient treaties raises the question: what is the basis of the land rights of Native Americans. For many years that question has been ignored as a troublesome irritation. More recently there has been a sense of outrage at the theft of indian lands. The historical record shows, however, that Native American land rights are far from straight- forward, and arise more out of the triangular relationship between the colonial powers (France and Britain), the colonialists (the Americans) and the indigenous people (the Sioux, Pawnee, Iroquois, Pequod, Mohicans etc). Native Americans had no concept of ownership of land, which was alien to their culture. Any land rights recognised in treaties between the colonial powers and the Native Americans were rights granted by the European powers. In fact the French courts and the English Parliament ennobled Native American leaders as Chieftans or Chiefs of their tribes or clans on the model of the fictitious recognition of the land rights of the Scottish lairds. Like that artificial nobility, the Native American chiefs were received in the Court of the Sun King Louis IV, and throughout European high society. The purpose of these first treaties was not to assist the Native Americans, but to frustrate the growing ambitions of the Colonists. As long as the Colonists were landless labourers they were subordinate to the Colonial powers. The Englishman William Penn founded Pennsylvania on vast estates claimed as his Manor. The early Colonists lived in peculiar subservience, often as indentured servants to their English masters. The monopoly over the land held by a handful of English lords guaranteed their servitude and their masters power. A common strategy to escape servitude was to Go West, claiming new lands for themselves by extending the frontier, and therefore escape the domination of the English. The counter strategy of the Colonial Powers was to grant rights to Native Americans. These land rights were an attempt by the Colonial Powers to hem the colonists in behind a savage wilderness. Nor did the European powers balk at arming the Native Americans to hunt down their runaway servants. Frances policy of trading guns with the Iroquois provided a powerful disincentive to aspiring frontiersmen - it also led to a spectacular disruption of the balance of power between the Native American Nations, as the Iroquois deployed their new found fire power to wipe out their competitors. Clearly the Native Americans - considered as a cultural group - had an interest in supporting whichever power promised less change in the region. They were no match for the yankee ingenuity that was growing on their hinterlands, and could not compete with the new technologies that were being applied to farming and industry. Their whole way of life was threatened. Tragically, though, those interests meant that they would always be on the losing side, backing the most reactionary forces at work in the new continent. Time and time again Native Americans supported, and had their claims supported by whichever power was most hostile to change in the region. First the French attempted to restrict the relation to the new colony to one of trading only. In the French and Indian Wars absolutist France enjoined Native Americans to fight alongside them against the English and the Colonists. The French lost the war, but the Native Americans lost a great deal more. Later the British Crown tried to rein in the Colonists, provoking the War of Independence. Rightly sensing that a victory for the Colonists would mean further expansion East, Native Americans sided overwhelmingly with England - and again paid a terrible price. Unerringly the Native Americans gravitated towards the most conservative side of every conflict. In 1812, when Britain opened hostilities with the Americans once again, Native Americans rallied Quixotically to the cause of George IV. Furthermore, conservatives in America who wished to see an end to frontier populism gravitated towards the rights of the native Americans. When the growing class of East Coast patricians grew restless at the Eastward expansion of Georgia onto Cherokee lands, pamphlets romanticised the Noble Savages in familiar terms. On the opposite end of the equation, the Colonists had only one outlet for their aspiration to be free from European domination - to press the frontier
Re: Native American land rights
James Heartfield: >Clearly the Native Americans - considered as a cultural group - had an >interest in supporting whichever power promised less change in the >region. They were no match for the yankee ingenuity that was growing on >their hinterlands, and could not compete with the new technologies that >were being applied to farming and industry. Their whole way of life was >threatened. Tragically, though, those interests meant that they would >always be on the losing side, backing the most reactionary forces at >work in the new continent. > I'm glad that James Heartfield has joined PEN-L so that this august body can get a feel for the sort of mindset that has created a speakers bureau for the Cato and Hudson Institutes in the name of Marxism. I suspect that James has simply crossposted an old LM article, but that is just as well. The sentence "tragically, though, those interests meant that they would always be on the losing side, backing the most reactionary forces at work in the new continent" speaks volumes about their methdology. The Indians become cats-paws of reactionary forces rather than societies fighting for their own just demands. James has a similar analysis of the "Odonis" in Nigeria, who were upsetting Shell Oil's efforts to revolutionize the means of production and consummate the bourgeois revolution. I had to explain to him that there are no "Odonis" in Nigeria, just "Ogonis". But why quibble. Odonis--Ogonis. We certainly know *who* he was condemning. It was the fishermen and farmers led by Ken Saro-Wira. They were cats-paws of imperialism, who were dividing Nigeria. And who were the imperialist agencies manipulating Nigerian politics? The CIA? No, it was the Body Shop, the greenish bath-soap and body-oil company, whose CEO campaigned for the release of Ken Saro-Wira. Body Shop as imperialist goliath trampling on Shell Oil? Sound nutty? Well, of course it's nutty. Welcome to Furedi-land. It is most telling that James Heartfield's little essay contains not a single word of outrage about what has happened to American Indians. It is a coldblooded attempt to rationalize their extermination. The Indians supported the reactionaries, so they got what they deserved. Absolutely loathsome stuff and antithetical to Marxism as I will prove. Louis Proyect
Re: Native American land rights
Thanks Louis for briging up the subject. I agree with Jim Devine that we should discuss it without any sect bashing. I will ignore my own advice and raise an issue about the Cato Institute. For those outside of the U.S. it is a fightful libertarian "think tank/ideological factory". I did not mind at all when the Greens made common cause with Cato to fight government subsidies for big business. Nor did I mind that the Global Warming activists joined with the insurance lobby. I do not think that the program, as it was described served any good purpose, but if it did, working to expose contradictions within capitalism seems worthwhile. Now to a few unrelated questions: 1. Can we speak of native americans or indigenous people as a whole? 2. Capitalist culture is very seductive. Almost every incident of contact subtly lures people to give up their ways. The only exception I know occured when some islanders gave Captain Cook back his metal axes because they did not know how to make the tools themselves. What fraction of Native Americans are willing to reject the casinos? Maybe we have already destroyed so many indigeneous cultures that they have already incorated the worst of what the West has to offer. Wasn't Russell Means running for the libertarian presidential nomination? 3. Rights are difficult to define. "We" usually can find a leader who is willing to collaborate. How do we define rights? Whose rights. Wasn't the Native American Movement rife with factions? I think that I recall that one split involved Ward Churchill. 4. Indigeneous people often have wonderful technology, superior to our own in terms of the biological potential of their land. 5. Despoiling people of their livelihood, as with the oil drilling in Ecuador or Nigeria is despicable. What are/should we be doing to punish the culprits. 6. We are fouling our own nest to the point that we are threatening to exterminate ourselves. How can we prattle about our superior technology? Or do we believe that nuclear power will solve all of our ills? Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
test -- do not read
-- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: The Same Old Song II
When more than an hour passed in sepulchral silence, without any post to the list on _any_ subject, I got paranoid and logged off for some time. "What have I done?!" Coming back, it's a relief to see this from Louis. [...] > These are big questions really. Rush Limbaugh has a field day with liberals > who defend Indian rights. "Do you want to give the country back to the > Indians?" And so what do Marxists say? Frankly, I don't think it would be a > bad idea in some ways. This was anticipated in the early Sixties, when estranged bourgeois kids were living stoned in teepees. Of course there were no palpable politics to make out of that, so the story went on to Chicago and the Pentagon, but the pot was necessary to get the mind and senses in synch with the living earth, and no one who did that number can possibly forget the sensations and meanings it brought. This is the brief golden age that tantalizes much of the American left in its little mouseholes of memory, making the practical tasks seem absurdly beside the point. The so-called Drug War and the Palmer Raids of the early '20s are truly ideological brother-maggots under the skin! [..] > One of the areas I want to examine is Engels' attitude toward the Iroquois. > I was at the Barnes and Noble in the neighborhood a little while ago > looking through the Native American shelf. Jerry Mander's book > "Disappearance of the Sacred" was there and I browsed through it. He, along > with Vandana Shiva, are prominently identified with indigenous rights. (I know that title differently, but maybe there's a new edition.) Mander, who runs what's probably the only _pro bono_ advertising agency in the world, is just totally out of sight. I've been recommending that book for about 3 years and have yet to find another human who's read it, even online. > [Mander] makes an interesting point. He says that Engels greatly admired the > Iroquois political decision-making machinery and said that socialists could > learn more from them than anybody else in the world. No mystery there: it's the land-use and property issues, which would stymie everyone else from the first moment of being raised. > Also, Marx's ethnological notebooks, which are supposed to be published > this year along with extensive commentary, apparently call for PRESERVATION > of tribal societies against bourgeois encroachment. I would like to get an > advance copy of this to review. The problem posed by Means is not insurmountable. Marx the analyst should be separated from Marx the strategist. Marx more or less subverted himself in asserting that a stage of production/distribution would persist (along with its associated superstructure) until all of its intrinsic possibilities are played out. Where does that leave us but waiting for the entire world to become a network of Mexico Cities surrounded by automated cropland, and then waiting for the moon and Mars to be fully worm-eaten by mining operations supporting domed conurbations, etc? As long as an apple remains, capitalism will be there to bite into it, and doctrinaire Marxists will be there as patient _de facto_ accomplices: no wonder we invariably end up talking to ourselves and sometimes not even that! To the world's disinherited indigenes this doctrinal path makes us quite irrelevant at best; at worst we can't be distinguished from fascists. Ah, but whenever I bring up these contradictions I feel like the chorus in a Greek tragedy. I hope we can have some honest talk about all this; talk that any proletarian fly on the wall can follow. Time for change! valis
Marxism and Native Americans
a good topic, better than cult-bashing any day. I can't claim to be able to digest all of the posts that came across the pen-l wires on this subject within the last few hours, but here are some modest and preliminary thoughts of my own: I guess it could be argued that the victory of capitalism over the American Indian communities is inevitable; it sure looks inevitable, after the fact. (It always does, as Isaac Deutscher remarks.) We have to remember that the bison-hunting prosperity of the Northern Plains Indians was largely the result of the introduction of the horse to the "New" World -- by Europeans (in the merchant capital phase of their (our) expansion). They were already being incorporated into the capitalist system. But what are the _terms_ of the conquest? Some tribes ended up being totally destroyed -- either physically or culturally. Others had a big impact on the invading Europeans, as in Mexico, where much of the culture in indigenous rather than iberian. Some tribes -- like the Navahos -- have done pretty well (considering). I wouldn't say that life on the Navaho "Res" is to be admired, but it's better than on most reservations (at least according to what I've read). The terms of the European/capitalist conquest are not predetermined, just as those of the globalizers' conquest of national-based capitalism are not predetermined. I think that the Indians get much better terms, get incorporated into capitalism's maw with more of their culture intact and with a larger impact on the conquerors, to the extent that they fight back as a group and are supported in a nonpaternalistic way by outsiders. So: we must defend them. There's no going back, but at least people can live better and with more self-respect than if they abjectly surrender. Self-respect is important; without it people end up wallowing in alcoholism, drug addiction, or worse. I'm using the term "American Indian" here because my impression is that most "Native Americans" use that term, seeing "NA" as a purely academic term. any comments? (Jim Craven, are you there?) in pen-l solidarity, Jim Devine
Re: The Same Old Song
Valis: >When our indefatigable Louis today began a project called "Marxism and >Native Americans" I was reminded that some years ago I happened upon >a book by that very title at the library, a 1983 collection edited >by the ever-angry American Indian academic Ward Churchill. Yes, that was the first book I took out of the Columbia Library when I decided to embark on this project. It is times like this when I am reminded why I don't go back to work on Wall Street for $600 per day making year 2000 fixes to mainframe software. These are big questions really. Rush Limbaugh has a field day with liberals who defend Indian rights. "Do you want to give the country back to the Indians?" And so what do Marxists say? Frankly, I don't think it would be a bad idea in some ways. Granted nobody really considers LM Marxist any longer, especially the cult leader who has mutated, like Jeff Goldblum in "The Fly", into his complete opposite. But they have really embraced the full deadly logic of this position and go out of their way to attack human rights groups everywhere that stand up for indigenous rights. Sectarian outfits like the Spartacist League would also tend to belittle such struggles, although this is more of a suspicion than anything else. I should check this out. One of the areas I want to examine is Engels' attitude toward the Iriquois. I was at the Barnes and Nobel in the neighborhood a little while ago looking through the Native American shelf. Jerry Mander's book "Disappearance of the Sacred" was there and I browsed through it. He, along with Vandana Shiva, are prominently identified with indigenous rights. He makes an interesting point. He says that Engels greatly admired the Iriquois political decision-making machinery and said that socialists could learn more from them than anybody else in the world. Also, Marx's ethnological notebooks, which are supposed to be published this year along with extensive commentary, apparently call for PRESERVATION of tribal societies against bourgeois encroachment. I would like to get an advance copy of this to review. Also, I plan to research what Debs movement and Daniel DeLeon said about the Indians. It would be interesting to see what the socialist movement thought about these issues when it was much closer in time to the historical moment in which the Indian nations were being destroyed. Lots of interesting things to think about. Louis Proyect
Christmas greetings from the capitalist class
Here is your bonus!! Click on the rectangle. Dave application/ms-tnef
The Same Old Song
When our indefatigable Louis today began a project called "Marxism and Native Americans" I was reminded that some years ago I happened upon a book by that very title at the library, a 1983 collection edited by the ever-angry American Indian academic Ward Churchill. (No point using the term "Native American," since anyone born here is that.) In this book I found a speech by Russell Means that has remained something much more than just a cult favorite since it was delivered: it is sometimes called "The Same Old Song," but otherwise in this file. It managed to crystallize all the doubts of logic and philosophy that had vaguely nagged at me since I drew my first Marxist breath more than 30 years ago, doubts that have kept me a misperceived pariah on the sidelines more often than not. Means delivered this speech in July of 1980, at a convocation of several thousand called the Black Hills International Survival Gathering, in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Not everything in it will speak to modern Americans, whether Marxist or otherwise, but, paraphrasing Niels Bohr on quantum theory, I feel no hesitation in saying that anyone who is not shocked by it has not understood it! valis _ FOR AMERICANS TO LIVE, EUROPE MUST DIE! _ The only possible opening for a statement of this kind is that I detest writing. The process itself epitomizes the European concept of "legitimate" thinking; what is written has an importance that is denied the spoken. My culture, the Lakota culture, has an oral tradition, so I ordinarily reject writing. It is one of the white world's ways of destroying the cultures of non-European peoples, the imposing of an abstraction over the spoken relationship of a people. So what you read here is not what I've written. It's what I've said and someone else has written down. I will allow this because it seems that the only way to communicate with the white world is through the dead, dry leaves of a book. I don't really care whether my words reach whites or not. They have already demonstrated through their history that they cannot hear, cannot see; they can only read (of course, there are exceptions, but the exceptions only prove the rule). I'm more concerned with American Indian people, students and others, who have begun to be absorbed into the white world through universities and other institutions. But even then it's a marginal sort of concern. It's very possible to grow into a red face with a white mind; and if that's a person's individual choice, so be it, but I have no use for them. This is part of the process of cultural genocide being waged by Europeans against American Indian peoples today. My concern is with those American Indians who choose to resist this genocide, but who may be confused as to how to proceed. (You notice I use the term American Indian rather than Native American or Native indigenous people or Amerindian when referring to my people. There has been some controversy about such terms, and frankly, at this point, I find it absurd. Primarily it seems that American Indian is being rejected as European in origin - which is true. But all the above terms are European in origin; the only non-European way is to speak of Lakota - or, more precisely, of Oglala, Brule, etc.- and of the Dineh, the Miccousukee, and all the rest of the several hundred correct tribal names.) (There is also some confusion about the word Indian, a mistaken belief that it refers somehow to the country, India. When Columbus washed up on the beach in the Caribbean, he was not looking for a country called India. Europeans were calling that country Hindustan in 1492. Look it up on the old maps. Columbus called the tribal people he met "Indio," from the Italian "in dio," meaning "in God.") It takes a strong effort on the part of each American Indian not to become Europeanized. The strength for this effort can only come from the traditional ways, the traditional values that our elders retain. It must come from the hoop, the four directions, the relations: it cannot come from the pages of a book or a thousand books. No European can ever teach a Lakota to be Lakota, a Hopi to be Hopi. A master's degree in "Indian Studies" or in "education" or in anything else cannot make a person into a human being or provide knowledge into traditional ways. It can only make you into a mental European, an outsider. I should be clear about something here, because there seems to be some confusion about it. When I speak of Europeans or mental Europeans, I'm not allowing for false distinctions. I'm not saying that on the one hand there are the by-products
Re: Marxism and Native Americans
Friends, I want to applaud Louis's inquiries into the struggles of indigenous peoples. I wonder what sort of radical it is who does not stand up forthrightly for the rights of indigenous peoples just to exist as independent cultures. And it is not as if we do not have much to learn (about egalitarian distribution, efficient use of the land and resources, about medicines, etc.) from the few indigneous peoples left on earth. And what exactly do indigenous peoples have to gain from an integration into the modern world? If they do choose to integrate, then should we not make sure that we are fighting to make it a world worth integrating into? michael yates
Marxism and Native Americans
LM magazine says, "The hard truth is that, whether we value them or not, you can't preserve cultures in the way that you can preserve jam. The Yanomami, even if they wish to, cannot remain isolated from the world system. Even if they have no interest in going into the developed world, the developed world will come to them." Should Marxists stand apart from struggles to defend tribal peoples from cultural and social extinction? Is it best for such peoples to become integrated into capitalist society as rapidly as possible, like getting a baby to stop breast-feeding? And when a "higher" form of society--in Marxist terms--assaults a "lower" one, shouldn't we cheer for the higher one? Those of us who are trained as Marxists think that the wars of Oliver Cromwell against the British feudal class were progressive, as were those of the sans-culottes against the decadent French aristocracy. We also understand why Marx supported the north against the south in the American civil war. The victory of the north would bury the unproductive chattel slavery system in the south and create free labor. But if Marx supported the north against the south, wouldn't he also support the wars against the Indians? What could be more backward than tribal ownership of the Great Plains? Indians depended on buffalo-hunting, but this would seem to clash with the need to cultivate the land for food production for urban populations in the east. So why not cheer the cavalry's campaigns against the Sioux and Apache if it hastened the development of an urban proletariat and modern industry? In the early 1970s the radical movement organized support for the American Indian Movement's occupation of the Wounded Knee reservation. Was this wrong? AIM and similar groups were fighting the encroachment of outside commercial interests on Indian land, just like the Yanomamis are doing today. Was the radical movement misguided and deserving of the kind of tongue-lashing that LM gave Survival International, a group that fights for Yanomami cultural and social survival? These questions also lead in to a discussion of Marxist morality. Do we philosophically accept the genocide of peoples like the Arawak who greeted Columbus, because they stood in the way of progress? These people, according to Bartolome de las Casas, had no weapons, nor any concept of such things. They cut themselves accidentally on the swords of Columbus's men because they could not even recognize the danger of sharpened steel. These questions get to the bottom of some of Marxism's most common presuppositions which are worth subjecting to a critique. I plan to have a look at them in the coming weeks. In my next post I will review the recent history of Native American struggles in the United States based on my own memory and information available in Howard Zinn's excellent and authoritative "People's History of the United States." Louis Proyect
Violence against women
Below is is a tentative piece of mine on male violence against women that has partly grown out of discussion on the Marxism list on the question of male violence against women. Violence of male individuals against female individuals. Again this form of violence has its source in the nature of capitalist society. It can never be eliminated without eliminating capitalism. Capitalism and this form of violence necessarily go together. Capitalist oppression is mediated or expresses itself through the violent oppression of individual women by individual men. The inverse relation, although it exists, is only marginal against the extent to which it exists in former relation. Does this mean that gender oppression exists in which the male gender is violent towards the female gender? No! Because some men are violent against women it does not logically follow that men are necessarily violent against women. In short, then, male violence against women is not a gendered based violence. The violence of men against women is a specific form assumed by capitalism's violent character. The violence of working class men against working class women is one of the forms by which class violence against the working class is maintained by capitalism. Working class men who inflict violence on working class women are promoting the perpetuation of class violence against the working class as a whole and working class women specifically. Through this form of violence they are promoting a sexist division within the working class. This being so the violence of working class men against working class women is a specific class form by which the capitalist class maintains a violent and oppressive relation to the working class. Violence by working class men against working class women is a class issue. The struggle against violence by working class men to working class women forms an indispensable part of the class struggle against the capitalist class. In short the struggle against violence by men against women forms part of the struggle against the bourgeoisie. This specific struggle forms a part of the struggle for socialism. To attempt to conduct the struggle against male violence on a narrow gender basis is to displace the struggle and thereby defend capitalism. To attempt to reduce violence by men against women to the context of gender is to suggest that the violence has its source in gender; in a specific gender: the male gender. If male violence is gender violence then that means that it is male gender constituted violence. This means the male gender organises and structures its violence against women. This makes men as a whole and not capitalism responsible for male violence. The source of male violence against woman begins and ends with men as a whole. Accordingly male violence transcends class relations and even history itself. This conveniently removes the real source of the violence, capitalism, form view. In this way feminism serves a useful (capitalist blind) bourgeois ideological and political function. To promote the form of the struggle along gender lines is to promote capitalism and thereby undermine the interests of working class women. The struggle against male violence against women must be conducted on a revolutionary basis if it is to be a real struggle against male violence. There is only one real way of conducting the struggle against male violence directed at women --the revolutionary way. To confine the struggle against male violence within gender constraints is not to conduct the struggle at all. By confining it to a gendered context is to confine the struggle to an abstract level that transcends history. It is to turn the struggle from a concrete class question to an abstract naturalist struggle. It is to emancipate the struggle from politics thereby suggesting that class relations play no significant part in the struggle. By focusing on gender difference as a difference that is common to all historical periods feminism is focusing on what is common to all periods instead of the relevant specificity under capitalism. Attention must be focused on the specific form oppression acquires under a specific society --capitalism. To concentrate on what is common to all societies is to concentrate on what is in effect natural and above history. This is to then suggest that historical movement cannot eliminate these characteristics. This means that they cannot be eliminated. If this is the case then one must just accept them living as best one can. Consequently it is a futile exercise to consider these issues. They are differences that are beyond politics. Consequently there obtains an irresolvable contradiction in a feminism that locates the source of the oppressive relations between men and women in gender. But the point is that they are wrong. Oppressive relations between men and women are not located in gender but in historical conditions. The point is that the capitalism, by its very nature, give out largesse even if
UnDemocracy threat to Canada? (fwd)
> December 19, 1997 The Toronto Star by Richard Gwyn > >IMF now de facto government for millions > >FOR ALMOST ALL practical purposes, the >Washington-based International Monetary >Fund (IMF) is now the government for the >350 million people living in South Korea, >Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand. > >It's the IMF rather than the elected >governments of these countries (no matter >that in some instances the word >``elected'' can only be used in its >broadest sense) that is now determining >all the matters that really affect the >lives of people there - the level of >unemployment, the level of interest rates, >the value of the currency, the rules about >banking and investment. > >The IMF's writ is far wider than this. In >another 71 countries, from Albania to >Zimbabwe, with a combined population of >over one billion or about one-fifth of all >the people in the world, where the IMF is >operating what it calls ``programs,'' this >international institution has similarly >largely displaced and replaced the >authority of the nation-state governments. > >Never in history has an international >agency exercised such authority. > >It's time long over-due for a hard look at >this nascent global government. > > The rest of the article can be found at: > > http://www.thestar.com/thestar/editorial/opinion/971219NEW02c_OP-GWYN19.html >
Cross Border Trade Unionism (fwd)
>The New York Times >December 20, 1997, Saturday, Late Edition - Final > > SECTION: Section A; Page 1; Column 4; Foreign Desk > > HEADLINE: After 4 Years of Nafta, Labor Is Forging Cross-Border Ties > > BYLINE: By SAM DILLON > > DATELINE: MEXICO CITY, Dec. 19 > >Benedicto Martinez Orozco, a veteran labor organizer, rushed to Tijuana > this week to celebrate a landmark victory: the replacement of a > Government-backed union by the first independent local in any of Mexico's > thousands of border assembly plants. > >But Mr. Martinez arrived late for the celebration. On Tuesday, the day > the new Tijuana local won recognition with the help of trade unionists in > the United States who persuaded President Clinton to raise the issue with > President Ernesto Zedillo, he was in Connecticut on another cooperative > project. > > He and his labor colleagues north of the border protested at a > stockholders meeting of an auto parts company embroiled in a Mexican labor > dispute. > >Mr. Martinez's whirlwind week as a transcontinental labor activist > underlined the new cooperation emerging among unions from Mexico, the > United States and Canada. > >The effort is beginning to give Mexican workers important new leverage > in a world of globalized production. > >Four years after the North American Free Trade Agreement opened borders > for freer movement of capital, reshaping the continent's industrial > landscape, labor is belatedly forging its own cross-border alliances. And > the new ties are changing the way unions on both sides of the border > defend their interests. > >Union leaders in the United States have been passionate opponents of > Nafta and have watched with alarm as businesses moved factories south. But > now many have decided to join forces with their Mexican counterparts to > strengthen independent unions in Mexico. > >The move is part of a broader shift in American labor tactics, which > have recently brought new victories in strikes and organizing drives at > home. "We're finding that there's a new vision among trade unionists in > the United States," said Mr. Martinez, who has been organizing Mexican > workers for nearly four decades. "They're showing more interest in > understanding what we're up against in Mexico: the control, the > manipulation, the gangster tactics. And we're learning about the problems > they face, the firings, the factory shutdowns." > >Peter H. Smith, a Latin American studies professor in San Diego, said > the trade agreement had made clear not only to labor bureaucrats but to > grass-roots unionists all across the continent how working together to > improve wages and conditions in Mexico also would benefit workers north of > the border by reducing the incentive for corporations to move factories > south. > >"United States labor has a stake in helping Mexican unions because it > leads to protection of their own self-interest," Mr. Smith said. "So now > real workers and real union members are beginning to demonstrate and take > sides on issues affecting Mexican workers within Mexico. And that is very > new." > >For decades, Mexico has had an authoritarian labor system in which most > unionized workplaces have been controlled by a handful of labor > federations tied to the governing Institutional Revolutionary Party, or > PRI. Labor experts say the system has served mainly to turn out votes for > the PRI on election day and to keep labor cheap. > >One common practice has been for employers to sign collective > bargaining agreements known as "protection contracts" with PRI-backed > union leaders, bypassing entirely the rank and file, who in many cases are > not even allowed to see the contract. > >The labor boss who controlled the system for five decades, Fidel > Velazquez, died in June at age 97. When faced with overtures for > cooperation during his long rule, Mr. Velazquez, a nationalist, preferred > to keep United States labor at arm's length. > >Leonardo Rodriguez Alcaine, Mr. Velazquez's successor as secretary > general of the Confederation of Mexican Workers, shares his predecessor's > views. He was asked his opinion of the support given by United States > unionists to the Tijuana organizing drive, whose target was Han Young, a > Korean-owned company that supplies chassis for Hyundai trucks. > >"With all due respect, I think that my U.S. labor comrades are mistaken > in involving themselves in an affair that doesn't involve their homes, > their jobs or their factory," Mr. Rodriguez said. > >But the virtual monopoly exerted over Mexican labor by his > confederation is eroding, along with the power of the PRI itself. Last > month, several major Mexican unions joined forces in a new central labor > group that is already a powerful political rival to the confederation, and > the new group has encouraged cross-border labor cooperation. > >
Re: Violence against women
On Sat, December 20, 1997 at 11:59:28 (-) Rebecca Peoples writes: >... >Violence of male individuals against female individuals. Again this >form of violence has its source in the nature of capitalist >society. It can never be eliminated without eliminating >capitalism. Capitalism and this form of violence necessarily go >together. You make three slightly several different claims here, none of which is persuasive. If sexist violence perpetrated by males against females "has its source in the nature of capitalist society", we should not expect to see it prior to the advent of capitalist relations. This, plainly not the case, leaves this assertion empty. It also is logically flawed---there is no logical connection between capitalist relations and sexist relations, other than they are both unjustified relations of unequal power, hence both intolerable. The two can survive independently quite well, though at any particular time the two can be found together in cozy company, feeding off one another. In order for capitalism to survive, it requires only, by definition, that capitalist relations survive. >Capitalist oppression is mediated or expresses itself through the >violent oppression of individual women by individual men. This assertion also falls apart: this is hardly more than vague handwaving which could be used as a boilerplate for a whole range of similar assertions. Capitalist relations do quite well bulldozing people without the aid of sexism, and in fact utilize anti-sexism to quite good advantage. One could just as easily say: Capitalist oppression is mediated through the energy devoted to undermining and eliminating sexist relations. I'm sorry to say that the rest of the piece wanders on chasing its tail in a similar way. Bill
