HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 7
- Original Message - From: Sebastian Budgen [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, July 23, 2001 1:22 AM Subject: News from HM and call for papers - please circulate Dear Friends, We are pleased to tell you that the new issue 7 of HISTORICAL MATERIALISM is just out see details below. Issue 8, focusing on East Asia will be out in early September. We also take this opportunity to inform you that, from Autumn 2001, HM will be published by the Dutch publishers E.J. Brill in Leiden. From 2002, HM will come out in a quarterly format. Finally, we would like to remind you that we are open to any proposals from you for articles, reviews, interventions or symposia. If you would like to make us a proposal, please send an abstract and some details of your research interests and publications (if any) to [EMAIL PROTECTED] HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 7 Tony Burns on Materialism in Ancient Greek Philosophy and in the Writings of the Young Marx o Chik Collins on Vygotsky on Language and Social Consciousness: Underpinning the Use of Voloshinov in the Study of Popular Protest o Paul Wetherly on Marxism, OManufactured Uncertainty¹ and Progressivism: A Response to Giddens o Patrick Murray on Marx¹s OTruly Social¹ Labour Theory of Value: Part II, How Is Labour that Is Under the Sway of Capital Actually Abstract? o Geert Reuten on The Interconnection of Systematic Dialectics and Historical Materialism o John Kelly vs. Gregor Gall on class mobilisation o An interview with Slavoj Zizek o Reviews by Noel Castree on Manuel Castells o Paul Blackledge on Perry Anderson and the end of history o Paul Jaskot on art history o John Roberts on Adorniana o Andrew Hemingway Paul Jaskot on T.J. Clark O.K. Werckmeister o Larry Wilde on Sean Sayers HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 8 (due out September 2001) Focus on East Asia: Paul Burkett Martin Hart-Landsberg on East Asia Since the Financial Crisis o Giles Ungpakorn on Thailand o Vedi Hadiz on Indonesia o Gareth Api Richards on Malaysia o Dae-oup Chang on South Korea o Raymond Lau on China o Patrick Bond Jim Kincaid on Marxist Explanations of the Crisis o plus Enzo Traverso on Marx and Bohemia o Paul Zarembka Sean Sayers debate Marx and Romanticism o Ted Benton Paul Burkett debate Marx and Ecology o Reviews: Walden Bello on Naomi Klein o Warren Montag on Toni Negri o Alex Callinicos on Slavoj Zizek o Paul Burkett on Jonathan Hughes o Brett Clark on Paul Burkett o John Bellamy Foster on Capital Class PREVIOUS ISSUES HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 1 Ellen Meiksins Wood on the non-history of capitalism o Colin Barker on Ellen Wood o Esther Leslie on Benjamin's Arcades Project o John Weeks on underdevelopment o Tony Smith on theories of technology o Michael Lebowitz on the silences of Capital o John Holloway on alienation o Peter Burnham on globalisation and the state o Fred Moseley on the US rate of profit o reviews by Matthew Beaumont on Bloch o Benno Teschke on Guy Bois o Peter Linebaugh on Robin Blackburn HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 2 China Miéville on architecture o Gregory Elliott on Perry Anderson o Andrew Chitty on recognition o Michael Neary Graham Taylor on alchemy o Paul Burkett on neo-Malthusian Marxism o Slavoj Zizek on risk society o reviews by Geoff Kay on Freeman Carchedi o Ben Watson on Adorno and music o Mike Haynes on the Russian Revolution o Elmar Altvater on David Harvey o Martin Jenkins on Althusser and psychoanalysis o Esther Leslie on Benjamin HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 3 Symposium on Leninism and political organisation: Simon Clarke o Howard Chodos Colin Hay o John Molyneux o Alan Shandro o Jonathan Joseph o Peter Hudis o John Ehrenberg o Plus Paul Burkett on Ted Benton o Werner Bonefeld on novelty o reviews by Michael Lebowitz on Felton Shortall o Gareth Dale on East Germany o Adrian Budd on Kim Moody o Giles Peaker on John Roberts o Chris Bertram on analytical Marxism o Ken Hammond on Vietnam HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 4 Symposium on Brenner and the world crisis, Part 1: Alex Callinicos o Guglielmo Carchedi o Simon Clarke o Gerard Dumenil Dominique Levy o Chris Harman o David Laibman o Michael Lebowitz o Fred Moseley o Murray Smith o Ellen Meiksins Wood o Plus Hal Draper on Lenin o Tony Smith on John Rosenthal o reviews by Rick Kuhn on Australian trade unionism o Charles Post on Terence Byres o Edwin Roberts on pragmatism and American Marxism o Alan Wald on Michael Löwy o Matt Worley on British Communism HISTORICAL MATERIALISM 5 Symposium on Brenner and the world crisis, Part 2: Werner Bonefeld o Alan Freeman o Michel Husson o Anwar Shaikh o Tony Smith o Richard Walker o John Weeks o Plus Geoff Kay on abstract labour and capital o Craig Brandist on ethics, politics and dialogism' o reviews by John Gubbay on Erik Olin Wright o Alan Johnson on the Third Camp o Sean Sayers on Marx on Russia o Adrian Haddock on Andrew Collier o Gregor Gall on
Marshall Aid plan for Africa, plus more?
Thoroughly indignant at the Genoa summit being disrupted by the unelected, Tony Blair yesterday claimed that it had made major progress on the world financial system. But although he went on record to claim that the plan for Africa was a kind of Marshall Plan (which would be highly progressive in present world conditions), I cannot trace any statement on a wider consensus about managing the whole global economy in a new way. Bush is quoted as reiterating that the dollar's value is a matter for markets: The dollar needs to float in the marketplace. If the market is allowed to function, the dollar will be at an appropriate level. But perhaps as with Kyoto, Bush is in a minority, and there is a wider consensus emerging among other states, that the world cannot put all its faith in the greenback as being satisfactory world money. Blair will play down any split with Bush. Does anyone know what an alternative plan for the world financial system might be? Chris Burford London
Re: Re: Kliman vs URPE/RRPE
Although this dispute is no doubt very painful for the protagonists, and they have my sympathy, there is an instructive issue here about how much important disputes can or cannot be resolved outside the bourgeois law. There are two different meanings of the concept of civil society in the marxist tradtion: 1) as an arena in which bourgeois right only, prevails, and different rights of atomised individuals contest it out in law, and are ultimately enforced by state power. 2) the more benign post Gramcian concept of civil society (which the Germans have translated back with a different word), in which everyone is sensitive to overall opinion and culture. In a painful dispute like this one, hopefully people will find some compromise, but it is normal at times that there will be miscommunication, mistrust, suspicion, rumour, and gossip. Although much of this should be kept off an e-mail list like this one, there will be other channels for informal exchanges, and the status and trust placed in any individual will rise and fall, not always fairly. One of the rules for handling painful disputes in a not for profit organisation, is to reduce the risk of counterattack for improperly pursuing your grievance, by having consideration to how others might read it. This makes for great caution in how complaints are expressed. The danger is that the contradictions are then not addressed. But that is where the attention should be directed. Some people need to be able to identify both aspects of the contradiction in this and other cases. Chris Burford At 21/07/01 09:52 -0700, you wrote: Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: I know absolutely NOTHING about the content of this case. I know and like Kliman, while I've been on the ed. board of the RRPE and admire their magazine. In this kind of situation, all else constant, my basic, gut-level, instinct is to assume that whoever brings lawyers into the picture is wrong. Lawyers are needed in many situations, I guess, but not in relationships between friends or folks who are supposed to be fighting for similar goals. I still don't get why the RRPE issued a ban on Kliman. They seem to be admitting that it was based on a misunderstanding. But if one issues a ban without making sure there is no misunderstanding in the first place, then of course the censored one is going to interpret this as malicious. It would seem to me that since the RRPE admitted that its ban was based on a misunderstanding, it is going to be in a lot of legal trouble. It would seem to me that Freeman is right that friends of the RRPE should be encouraging its editors to settle this case now before the journal is put under. Rakesh
having and using words
Do some fucking research and try to stay on point. Then maybe it would be worth arguing with you. I see at the weekend that fuck has reached the pages of the Church TImes (UK) (joke: Loutish adolescent shouted fucking nun to a woman on a bicycle. Either one thing of the other came the spirited and spiritual reply) I have not quite gathered the sequence of exchanges that led to the quote above, which I got off the web, rather than the e-mail version of PEN-L, but it looks outside Michael's guidelines. Could it be translated as no investigation, no right to speak? I am not suggesting then that there should be frequent challenges of people's right to speak, but people ought to realise (and I have not as a I say got the sequence of this thread and am not necessarily making a comment) that if their words over a period of time appear to be empty, other readers will pass over them rapidly. The other thing is that people ought to be aware that extensive use of the internet is associated with stress, low mood and irritability. People will also judge each other on the ability to keep cool under stress. Another reason why it is prudent to limit the number of posts a day, voluntarily. Hope that is not pious, but I suggest that this particular contradiction is better handled without Michael having to resort to suspensions. Chris Burford
BLS Daily Report
BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS, DAILY REPORT, FRIDAY, JULY 20, 2001: RELEASED TODAY: Regional and state unemployment rates were generally stable in June. All four regions recorded little or no change from May, and 45 states reported shifts of 0.3 percentage point or less, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. The national jobless rate was little changed at 4.5 percent in June. Nonfarm employment increased in 27 states and the District of Columbia in June. The inflation-adjusted weekly median earnings of full-time U.S. workers increased 1.7 percent in the second quarter compared with a year ago, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. It was the largest real gain over a 12 month period since the third quarter of last year (Daily Labor Report, page D-11). Food, housing and health care costs rose last month but lower energy prices held to moderate inflation, the Labor Department said. The consumer price index increased 0.2 percent in June, or 3.8 percent for the year. The core rate of inflation, which excludes volatile energy and food prices, rose 0.3 percent in June, compared with just 0.1 percent in May (The Washington Post, page E2 The index of leading economic indicators rose 0.3 percent in June, marking the third consecutive monthly advance, according to figures released by the Conference board, a New York based business research organization. Although analysts are encouraged by the steady gains in the leading index, they point out that the improvement has been in a few sectors rather than being indicative of a broad based upturn. The June increase followed a revised 0.4 percent gain in May, which was initially estimated as a 0.5 percent rise. The leading index stood at 109.6 in June, up by a modest 0.8 percent from 108.7 (Daily Labor Report, page D-1). The index of leading economic indicators rose for a third month in June, a private research firm said today, suggesting growth may accelerate by the end of the year. A gain in consumer confidence last month helped push the Conference Board's gauge up 0.3 percent after a 0.4 percent increase in May (The New York Times, page C4). Hopes that an economic turnaround is imminant were buoyed when a key gauge of future activity inched higher for the third straight month in June, and the U.S. trade deficit shrank in May to its lowest level in more than a year. The New York based Conference Board said its index of leading economic indicators rose a higher-than-expected 0.3 percent, to 109.6 last month, after risking 0.5 percent in May. Meanwhile, the Commerce Department said the US trade deficit shrank 11.4 percent in May, as Americans scaled back on purchases of foreign-made goods and exports increased (Tribune News Service, Chicago Tribune). New York State's economy, which had been bucking the national economic slump, has slammed into a brick wall, losing jobs in the private sector in both May and June, the first such back-to-back job declines since 1998. Employment also fell in New York City, which has been the powerhouse of the state economy in the last couple of years, according to new data from the New York State Department of Labor and the City Comptroller's office. An accompanying chart shows the change from the previous month of total jobs in the private sector in New York, seasonally adjusted. Source of the data is given as the Bureau of Labor Statistics, New York State Department of Labor, and the City Comptroller's Office (The New York Times, page A1). . New claims filed with state agencies for unemployment insurance benefits dropped by 35,000 to 414,000 during the week ended July 14, according to the Employment and Training Administration. The more closely watched 4-week moving average increased by 2,500 to 414,000. Economists view this figure as a more accurate measure of claims because it smoothes out the volatile weekly data. ETA attributed some of the drop in initial claims to workers at automobile plants returning to their jobs following annual plant shutdowns for model changeovers (Daily Labor Report, page D-9). The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services narrowed in May by $3.7 billion to $28.3 billion, marking its lowest level since January 2000, the Commerce Department says (Daily Labor Report, page D-2; The Wall Street Journal, page A2). application/ms-tnef
RE: the significance of global riots
If 'everybody' is rioting, there is an obvious political burden on the authorities (distinct from the security burden) because there is a failure of policy. It becomes clear that something is wrong. If a few isolated goofballs are rioting, that has the opposite effect, or no effect. Days of Rage in Chicago is a good example. It could be argued that anarchists are seen as part of the spectrum of protest, and therefore elevate the profile of the entire affair when they break things. But it's possible to overdo it and make the rioting the center of the story, instead of the teaser. Gang assaults on police in broad daylight, with media coverage, are more interesting than oh, 100,000 people marching peacefully. mbs The protestors are of course much more than a travelling circus of anarchists, but they may not have a fully rational strategy for dealing with state power internationally. The movement can still go on even if no one has. The problems will be resolved in the course of practice. But these violent disturbances inevitably fill a social and political role, even if you do not entirely agree with them. Like the riot in Brixton, south London, last night by 40-100 protestors after a protest against the police shooting a black man a few days ago who had an imitation gun on him as a cigarette lighter. Windows were smashed. The jacquerie at the time of the French revolution, going back to the peasant uprisings in mediaeval France. The Gordon riots in 18th century London. VViolent crowd behaviour may be stereotyped as mindless but it plays a social role. It challenges the existing state structures and forces those who support some sort of state structure to argue which reforms are necessary to reestablish some sort of social order. If militant anti-capitalist protestors make it virtually impossible for the capitalist leaders of the rich world to meet for their conferences in publically accessible places, then these leaders radically lack global legitimacy however many votes they have won in bourgeois democratic elections in their own countries (dominated by the capitalist media). The state is a compromise between bodies of armed men to uphold it, and a measure of ideology and ideological state structures to smooth over the class and other contradictions. These battles therefore are about what compromises must be made to establish some form of accepted world government. Chris Burford
Re: Marshall Aid plan for Africa, plus more?
G'day Chris and Ellen, Bush is quoted as reiterating that the dollar's value is a matter for markets: The dollar needs to float in the marketplace. If the market is allowed to function, the dollar will be at an appropriate level. What the market decides is appropriate, so it's appropriate if the market decides it. And the definition of 'appropriate' is similarly defined. It'd be interesting to hear if Ellen thinks Ohmae's thesis of departing Yen (for domestic 'restructuring') has any potential to take the shine off the greenback (in its role as bullion to the world). But perhaps as with Kyoto, Bush is in a minority, and there is a wider consensus emerging among other states, that the world cannot put all its faith in the greenback as being satisfactory world money. Then they'd have to come up with something - right now the Euro's up against a lot of friction. Britain won't be in it until after the next election (giving rise to the possibility it won't happen); convergence criteria are still a worry (again, Britain is close to not qualifying, according to some readings of expenditure projections and the anti-privatisation campaign - and Greece is simply disqualified for the moment); and the majority of Germans, Brits, Spaniards and Italians are against the idea even now (look for that to get a bit more militant). And doubtless there is something to what they say. There are a lot of political risks involved in a policy that sells itself on diminishing business risk, and a projected 0.4%-of-GDP saving on transaction costs ain't the sort of number to set the everyday punter's mind reeling. And business is quite loudly and honestly saying they look forward to having policy made beyond the range of localised (ie. national) political slings and arrows (especially safely away from those troublemakers in the Latin climes). I mean, if the Euro 'works', what exactly will that mean? Stock markets more solid than Wall St (which is on the nose again today, btw)? A greenback-dissolving international currency? A rival economic/strategic bloc (in the Orwell/Lenin mode)? One-stop shopping for US foreign Affairs diplomats/stategists? I certainly haven't a clue ... Cheers, Rob.
Re: RE: the significance of global riots
At 11:11 AM 7/23/01 -0400, you wrote: It could be argued that anarchists are seen as part of the spectrum of protest, and therefore elevate the profile of the entire affair when they break things. But it's possible to overdo it and make the rioting the center of the story, instead of the teaser. Gang assaults on police in broad daylight, with media coverage, are more interesting than oh, 100,000 people marching peacefully. I don't know enough about the riots in Genoa, but I wonder how much of the black block anarchist behavior reflects the macho belief that being tough and/or violent somehow solves things or makes a political statement? I also wonder about the role of agents provocateurs? what is the black block program? how do they see their tactics as fitting in a strategy for attaining their goals? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: the significance of global riots
Also note the way the bloody violent assault on the Genoa Social Forum gets mushed into the story. Without the countervailing pictures of the protester assaulting the cop, the pictures of the attack and blood at the non-violent Social Forum would incite far more massive condemnation of the Italian authorities. But in combination, it creates a sense of the authorities reacting to violence and thereby justified in finding weapons that might be used against the cops. The acts of the most violent protesters are thereby foreseeably attributed to the nonviolent protesters and actually lead to a greater hand for repression against non-violent protest. This may be unfair and illegal, but we aren't living in a fair and legal world on those terms, so the nonviolent wing of the protest movement will have to, out of self-defense, isolate the non-violent wing. To do otherwise will be for the movement to commit political suicide, since the repression we saw at Genoa is just the beginning. The above does NOT mean a lessening of militancy, but the militancy has to be justified defiance of police repression -- not offensive violence that will accomplish nothing in terms of the exercise of power. Nathan Newman [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.nathannewman.org - Original Message - From: Max Sawicky [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, July 23, 2001 11:11 AM Subject: [PEN-L:15459] RE: the significance of global riots If 'everybody' is rioting, there is an obvious political burden on the authorities (distinct from the security burden) because there is a failure of policy. It becomes clear that something is wrong. If a few isolated goofballs are rioting, that has the opposite effect, or no effect. Days of Rage in Chicago is a good example. It could be argued that anarchists are seen as part of the spectrum of protest, and therefore elevate the profile of the entire affair when they break things. But it's possible to overdo it and make the rioting the center of the story, instead of the teaser. Gang assaults on police in broad daylight, with media coverage, are more interesting than oh, 100,000 people marching peacefully. mbs The protestors are of course much more than a travelling circus of anarchists, but they may not have a fully rational strategy for dealing with state power internationally. The movement can still go on even if no one has. The problems will be resolved in the course of practice. But these violent disturbances inevitably fill a social and political role, even if you do not entirely agree with them. Like the riot in Brixton, south London, last night by 40-100 protestors after a protest against the police shooting a black man a few days ago who had an imitation gun on him as a cigarette lighter. Windows were smashed. The jacquerie at the time of the French revolution, going back to the peasant uprisings in mediaeval France. The Gordon riots in 18th century London. VViolent crowd behaviour may be stereotyped as mindless but it plays a social role. It challenges the existing state structures and forces those who support some sort of state structure to argue which reforms are necessary to reestablish some sort of social order. If militant anti-capitalist protestors make it virtually impossible for the capitalist leaders of the rich world to meet for their conferences in publically accessible places, then these leaders radically lack global legitimacy however many votes they have won in bourgeois democratic elections in their own countries (dominated by the capitalist media). The state is a compromise between bodies of armed men to uphold it, and a measure of ideology and ideological state structures to smooth over the class and other contradictions. These battles therefore are about what compromises must be made to establish some form of accepted world government. Chris Burford
Re: Re: the significance of global riots
At 11:42 AM 7/23/01 -0400, you wrote: the nonviolent wing of the protest movement will have to, out of self-defense, isolate the non-violent wing. I know that the above is a typo, but it's true that the left has been very good at isolating itself. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: the significance of global riots
Nathan writes: Also note the way the bloody violent assault on the Genoa Social Forum gets mushed into the story. Without the countervailing pictures of the protester assaulting the cop, the pictures of the attack and blood at the non-violent Social Forum would incite far more massive condemnation of the Italian authorities. But in combination, it creates a sense of the authorities reacting to violence and thereby justified in finding weapons that might be used against the cops. The acts of the most violent protesters are thereby foreseeably attributed to the nonviolent protesters and actually lead to a greater hand for repression against non-violent protest. This may be unfair and illegal, but we aren't living in a fair and legal world on those terms, so the nonviolent wing of the protest movement will have to, out of self-defense, isolate the non-violent wing. How do you plan on doing the isolating? Yoshie
free-market silliness
[was: Re: [PEN-L:15460] Re: Marshall Aid plan for Africa, plus more?] Bush is quoted as reiterating that the dollar's value is a matter for markets: The dollar needs to float in the marketplace. If the market is allowed to function, the dollar will be at an appropriate level. What the market decides is appropriate, so it's appropriate if the market decides it. And the definition of 'appropriate' is similarly defined. when in doubt, invoke the free market: recently, the Cheney/Rove administration said that it was against subsidies for clean energy sources (and the end of subsidies for petrol) because it wanted a free-market solution. July 14, 2001, Saturday U.S. Set to Oppose International Plan For Cleaner Energy By JOSEPH KAHN Source: The New York Times The Bush administration plans to oppose an international drive to phase out fossil fuel subsidies and increase financing for nonpolluting energy sources worldwide, administration officials said today. ... Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
RE: Re: The US Dollar (spend it fast as you can)
. . . As we have had most graphically demonstrated over the past two decades, economic growth is not a means to enable the nations to afford better housing, social programs and a more equitable distribution of income. Economic growth is an ideological program offered as a substitute for democracy, equality and social justice. FUCK GROWTH. Tom Walker Truly digmatic poetic. It's going on my wall, next to my Allan Ginsburg postcard. mbs
Re: the significance of global riots
- Original Message - From: Yoshie Furuhashi [EMAIL PROTECTED] This may be unfair and illegal, but we aren't living in a fair and legal world on those terms, so the nonviolent wing of the protest movement will have to, out of self-defense, isolate the non-violent wing. -How do you plan on doing the isolating? That depends on the collective decision of a movement organizing a protest. Simply separating away from the most violent protesters denies them protection in the mass of non-violent protesters. They can then try to take on the cops by themselves, but without the ability to then melt back into the non-violent group, they won't last long and most will not then do the acts endangering the non-violent protesters. There is the more active alternative of shutting them down physically, since the non-violent protesters outnumber them. This blocking need not be violent, since unlike assaults on cops, if they then assault the non-violent protesters blocking them, they won't have the moral sanction even of most of their compatriots. Most will not do it, especially if confronted with sufficient numbers. Shutting down the violent protesters is relatively simple technically. The question is the political will to do it, given the individualistic rhetoric of those saying they have the right to do whatever they want, no matter what the collective will of the rest of the protesters. All this posturing of the right to commit violent acts despite the wishes of the vast bulk of democratic organizations protesting is all just bourgois individualist hedonism masking itself as revolutionary rhetoric. Nathan Newman
Godley/Izurieta in the ECONOMIST
July 14, 2001 FINANCE ECONOMICS In the balance MANY economists believe that America's economy has escaped recession and may rebound in the second half of this year. But a new paper* by Wynne Godley and Alex Izurieta at the Jerome Levy Economics Institute argues to the contrary that large, unsustainable imbalances may make a recession inevitable. Mr Godley was among the first to argue that America's boom of the late 1990s was unsustainable, for two reasons. First, private-sector spending was growing faster than income, causing a huge increase in corporate and household debt. Second, America's current-account deficit had widened to a record 4.3% of GDP. The current-account deficit has been much discussed by other economists, but few Americans pay any attention to the private-sector financial deficit. The chart (see article) shows the financial balances of the three sectors of the economy over the past 40 years: the external current-account balance, the government's budget balance, and the private sector's financial balance. This last (calculated as the disposable income of firms and households, minus their spending) is also known as private-sector net saving, since it is equivalent to saving less investment. By accounting definition, private net saving and the budget balance combined must be equal to the current-account balance. The government's shift from budget deficit to surplus has been much trumpeted. But far more dramatic has been the private sector's swing from a surplus of 5.4% of GDP in 1992 to a deficit of almost 7% late last year. Between 1960 and 1997, the private sector was always in surplus. The unprecedented switch during the 1990s reflects the behaviour of households more than of firms. As a result of it, household debt climbed from 95% of disposable income in the early 1990s to 124% in the fourth quarter of last year. Mr Godley argues that private-sector net saving will eventually rise sharply, as households repair their balance sheets, so driving the economy into recession. Plenty of economists disagree. A flurry of recent papers has concluded that the household saving rate, properly measured, is a lot higher than official figures suggest. If so, fears of a rebound in saving may be overdone (see article). But the problem is that these studies look at gross saving rather than net saving (ie, minus investment). Consider some of the supposed reasons why household saving is higher than it seems. First, the saving rate as officially measured includes employers' contributions to pension schemes, but pensioners' benefits from those schemes are not counted in income. In recent years, large capital gains have allowed many firms to take a holiday, paying out pensions without making contributions. That means that household saving has been understated. Yet if the figure was increased to allow for this, it would also change firms' financial balance in the opposite direction (as the increased pension benefits of households show up as an increased cost for firms). Total private net saving would thus be unchanged. Second, some have argued that household spending on cars and other consumer durables should be treated as investment, not consumption, which would lift gross household saving. Yet since this would boost both saving and investment, private net saving would again be unaffected. Third, it is argued that capital gains should be counted as saving. These do indeed boost wealth, but can be drawn on only if households either sell assets or borrow against those assets-and there are limits to both. Debts have to be serviced out of income; if everybody tried to realise their capital gains by selling shares, prices would crash. The private-sector financial deficit is therefore a better measure of sustainability than gross saving. Indeed, this measure is favoured by the International Monetary Fund and the Bank for International Settlements. In its latest annual report the BIS points out that, in the past, when a country's private-sector net saving has fallen sharply below its long-run average, this has always been followed eventually by a sharp economic slowdown, as the private sector swung back into surplus and spending slumped. Examples are Britain and Sweden in the late 1980s, and Japan after 1990. In the first quarter of 2001, America's private-sector financial deficit shrank for the first time. Could this be the turning point? What goes up... The authors consider the likely future path of America's financial imbalances. Using the latest projections by the Congressional Budget Office for the budget balance and GDP growth implies that the private-sector deficit would rise to 8% of GDP by 2006, with debt continuing to explode. That is clearly unsustainable. Yet, at the other extreme, a turnaround of the financial deficit is unlikely to be as severe as it was in Britain after 1989, because high inflation then reduced Britain's scope
Re: Re: the significance of global riots
what about also politically isolating the violent ones, by criticizing their tactics, strategies, and goals in a principled way? At 12:24 PM 7/23/01 -0400, you wrote: -How do you plan on doing the isolating? Nathan writes: That depends on the collective decision of a movement organizing a protest. Simply separating away from the most violent protesters denies them protection in the mass of non-violent protesters. They can then try to take on the cops by themselves, but without the ability to then melt back into the non-violent group, they won't last long and most will not then do the acts endangering the non-violent protesters. There is the more active alternative of shutting them down physically, since the non-violent protesters outnumber them. This blocking need not be violent, since unlike assaults on cops, if they then assault the non-violent protesters blocking them, they won't have the moral sanction even of most of their compatriots. Most will not do it, especially if confronted with sufficient numbers. Shutting down the violent protesters is relatively simple technically. The question is the political will to do it, given the individualistic rhetoric of those saying they have the right to do whatever they want, no matter what the collective will of the rest of the protesters. All this posturing of the right to commit violent acts despite the wishes of the vast bulk of democratic organizations protesting is all just bourgois individualist hedonism masking itself as revolutionary rhetoric. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: Re: Re: the significance of global riots
- Original Message - From: Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] what about also politically isolating the violent ones, by criticizing their tactics, strategies, and goals in a principled way? That would have to precede any physical isolation- the responsibility on the broader movement is to articulate exactly what tactics are and are not acceptable. I'm criticizing the violent protesters but I'm actually criticizing the broader non-violent movement more for its failure to clearly mark out a line of unacceptable behavior, since fuzzy lines encourage people to test them- with tragic consequences in Genoa. Nathan Newman [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.nathannewman.org
Re: the significance of global riots
-How do you plan on doing the isolating? That depends on the collective decision of a movement organizing a protest. Simply separating away from the most violent protesters denies them protection in the mass of non-violent protesters. They can then try to take on the cops by themselves, but without the ability to then melt back into the non-violent group, they won't last long and most will not then do the acts endangering the non-violent protesters. There is the more active alternative of shutting them down physically, since the non-violent protesters outnumber them. This blocking need not be violent, since unlike assaults on cops, if they then assault the non-violent protesters blocking them, they won't have the moral sanction even of most of their compatriots. Most will not do it, especially if confronted with sufficient numbers. Shutting down the violent protesters is relatively simple technically. The question is the political will to do it, given the individualistic rhetoric of those saying they have the right to do whatever they want, no matter what the collective will of the rest of the protesters. All this posturing of the right to commit violent acts despite the wishes of the vast bulk of democratic organizations protesting is all just bourgois individualist hedonism masking itself as revolutionary rhetoric. Nathan Newman Is there any practical mechanism to reach a collective decision generate a political will to stop sabotage pitched street battles with the police when the entire movement is just a large collection of extremely disparate groups individuals who don't have much in common with one another politically, except the desire to protest against supranational institutions? The Genoa Social Forum, I hear, set up its own 'security service' to try to isolate and thwart the Black Bloc, who work in small groups (_Independent on Sunday_ [London] 22 July 2001). The GSF apparently was not successful at doing so. At 9:59 AM -0700 7/23/01, Jim Devine wrote: what about also politically isolating the violent ones, by criticizing their tactics, strategies, and goals in a principled way? We can certainly criticize them, though there isn't much to say except that their goals strategies are unclear. It's not very likely that they'll look into PEN-l either. Yoshie
Cut off from access.
The Chico State system seems to be having problems and the server that handles pen-l is down. I have only looked at a few messages in the archive since I don't think many messages have gone through. I thought that the discussion regarding the paper by Alex and Wynne was excellent. I am saddened to see Rakesh personalizing his disagreements with Max. I have to be back on line soon. Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929
Re: Re: the significance of global riots
At 01:43 PM 7/23/01 -0400, you wrote: At 9:59 AM -0700 7/23/01, Jim Devine wrote: what about also politically isolating the violent ones, by criticizing their tactics, strategies, and goals in a principled way? Yoshie writes: We can certainly criticize them, though there isn't much to say except that their goals strategies are unclear. It's not very likely that they'll look into PEN-l either. but preliminary critiques on pen-l can develop into more complete versions on other venues (helped by constructive criticism, I hope). Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: RE: Re: The US Dollar (spend it fast as you can)
Truly digmatic poetic. It's going on my wall, next to my Allan Ginsburg postcard. mbs ...eyes sexy in their dark skin passing out incom- prehensible leaflets, who burned cigarette holes in their arms protesting the narcotic tobacco haze of Capitalism, who distributed Supercommunist pamphlets in Union Square weeping and undressing while the sirens of Los Alamos wailed them down, and wailed down Wall, and the Staten Island ferry also wailed, who broke down crying in white gymnasiums naked and trembling before the machinery of other skeletons, who bit detectives in the neck and shrieked with delight in policecars for committing no crime but their own wild cooking pederasty and intoxication, who howled on their knees in the subway and were dragged off the roof waving genitals and manu- scripts, who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy... America I feel sentimental about the Wobblies. America I used to be a communist when I was a kid I'm not sorry. I smoke marijuana every chance I get. I sit in my house for days on end and stare at the roses in the closet. When I go to Chinatown I get drunk and never get laid. My mind is made up there's going to be trouble. You should have seen me reading Marx. My psychoanalyst thinks I'm perfectly right. I won't say the Lord's Prayer. I have mystical visions and cosmic vibrations. America I still haven't told you what you did to Uncle Max after he came over from Russia. I'm addressing you. Are you going to let your emotional life be run by Time Magazine? I'm obsessed by Time Magazine. I read it every week. Its cover stares at me every time I slink past the corner candystore. I read it in the basement of the Berkeley Public Library. It's always telling me about responsibility. Business- men are serious. Movie producers are serious. Everybody's serious but me. It occurs to me that I am America. I am talking to myself again. Asia is rising against me. I haven't got a chinaman's chance. I'd better consider my national resources. My national resources consist of two joints of marijuana millions of genitals an unpublishable private literature that goes 1400 miles an hour and twenty-five-thousand mental institutions. I say nothing about my prisons nor the millions of underprivileged who live in my flowerpots under the light of five hundred suns. I have abolished the whorehouses of France, Tangiers is the next to go. My ambition is to be President despite the fact that I'm a Catholic. America how can I write a holy litany in your silly mood? I will continue like Henry Ford my strophes are as individual as his automobiles more so they're all different sexes. America I will sell you strophes $2500 apiece $500 down on your old strophe America free Tom Mooney America save the Spanish Loyalists America Sacco Vanzetti must not die America I am the Scottsboro boys. America when I was seven momma took me to Com- munist Cell meetings they sold us garbanzos a handful per ticket a ticket costs a nickel and the speeches were free everybody was angelic and sentimental about the workers it was all so sin- cere you have no idea what a good thing the party was in 1835 Scott Nearing was a grand old man a real mensch Mother Bloor made me cry I once saw Israel Amter plain. Everybody must have been a spy. America
Query- GDP by states
I see occasional references to GDP of the State of California. I. e. California by itself is the XX largest economy in the world. How is the GDP for a state defined? For computer chips, for example: Intel is headquarted in California but produces chips in New Mexico, Ireland -- and elsewhere. H-P the same. How are state GDP numbers put together? One reason for asking is a number that is now used here -- the energy use (in BTUs, say) per dollar of state GDP. Gene Coyle
RE: Query- GDP by states
Gross State Product, produced by Regional Economic Info Service of BEA, Dept of Commerce. GSP is state counterpart of GDP. Since profits (and a few other things) are not reported by state, BEA takes profits for an industry and allocates it by state according to earnings for that industry. Same goes for capital consumption. The upshot is that 'Net State Product' is more real than GSP since it has fewer imputations. GSP = earnings (incl fringes), payroll taxes paid by employer, profits (imputed), depreciation (imputed), rent (don't recall how they do this piece), business transfers (tiny), and interest paid. Basically it's in terms of income produced. First thing I did out of grad school was papers on state fiscal capacity, in which GSP figured prominently. mbs I see occasional references to GDP of the State of California. I. e. California by itself is the XX largest economy in the world. How is the GDP for a state defined? For computer chips, for example: Intel is headquarted in California but produces chips in New Mexico, Ireland -- and elsewhere. H-P the same. How are state GDP numbers put together? One reason for asking is a number that is now used here -- the energy use (in BTUs, say) per dollar of state GDP. Gene Coyle
No Subject
I am still cut off from my normal access to e-mail. I was thinking this morning about what would happen in the power of the US relative to the IMF and World Bank were reduced by 99%. What would a structural adjustment plan for the US look like? Also, I thought that one good thing about the US abrogating treaties was that it would make retreat from WTO, NAFTA, etc. easier. Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929
Two world progressive successes
Two major pieces in one day; news that is progressive economically and politically and has world significance. 1. The Bonn Global Warming Treaty, enormously valuable for the size of the agreement. But also for the fact that Europe stepped forward to give a world lead, separate from the US, who will now be more isolated. This marks a very clear recognition that the material interests of Europe may differ from those of the USA, and it is prepared to make compromises and negotiate with other countries in the world to offer a different strategy to that of the USA. The Guardian (UK): The accord effectively politically isolates the world's biggest emitter of carbon pollution, the US. Paula Dobrianksy, head of the US delegation, told the final plenary session today that, although the US did not intend to ratify the protocol, we have not sought to stop others from moving ahead, so long as legitimate US interests are protected. However, she was booed in the final moments of her speech when she said the Bush administration takes the issue of climate change very seriously. The prime minister, Tony Blair, who had put pressure on the US president, George Bush, to reverse his desertion of Kyoto, hailed the deal as the most significant step on the issue since the 1997 protocol. Mr Blair said: It shows that the international community can face up to the challenges of the modern world and globalisation when they sit down together. This is perhaps the closest Blair would ever get to confronting the USA, but it is an important decision point in the way Britain is leaning, and for the emergence of a multi-polar world. 2. Although Wahid did some progressive things to recognise the reactionary nature of the slaughter of Indonesian Communists in 1966 (when it was the largest Communist Party outside a socialist state), the advent to power by Megawati Sukarnoputri, marks the triumph of a national democratic perspective after the years of Indonesia being a reactionary and fascist force in world politics. There are still dangers of populist fascism but the risk at the time of Wahid's accession to power of a national fascist regime, appears to have receded in favour of an alliance between the armed forces and the progressive forces around Sukarnoputri. The memories for the daughter of Sukarno of how Indonesia was a great progressive anti-imperialist force in the world suggest further openings in this direction. The change did not come easily, without a lot of tactics and compromise. The risks of fascism, racism and commonalism are not gone. But dare to imagine again a world in which one of the most populous countries on earth is on the side of progress! [Some from an ultra-leftist point of view believe that in celebrating any success as progressive, I wish to turn people into passive followers of bourgeois reformists. My motivation however, is that only with some confidence in the possibility of victory can people have the courage to plot out a longer term strategy which would overthrow the domination of finance capital throughout the world.] As the old song goes, Our demands most moderate are... Chris Burford
Horatio Greenspan
[courtesy of Financial Markets Center] In case you missed it, Alan Greenspan provided the following information in his semi-annual monetary policy report to the House Financial Services Committee on July 18: Ms. Jones: Do you support a living wage? Greenspan: I don't know what that means. I support the highest wages that people can get in the marketplace. I started off making $35 a week when I was a kid. I mean, that was barely a living wage, and I worked my way up.
Re: RE: Query- GDP by states
Max, You need to make it simpler for me. If Intel were, in 1980, producing all its chips in California, would its product be considered 100% California GSP, though its sales were world-wide? If that were the case, then its California consumption of electricity, in kWh/GSP would be XX. Then, by the year 2,000, production is mostly out of California -- e. g. New Mexico, Ireland, Asia, sales still world-wide. Now it would not be manufacturing much in California, so its electricity consumption would be down but $$ of GSP would be up. It would look, in that case, as if California had become much more energy efficient. So, help me get my head around that. I keep reading that Califonia is much better than other states in terms of electricity/GSP. I'm trying to understand what that is based on. Gene. Max Sawicky wrote: Gross State Product, produced by Regional Economic Info Service of BEA, Dept of Commerce. GSP is state counterpart of GDP. Since profits (and a few other things) are not reported by state, BEA takes profits for an industry and allocates it by state according to earnings for that industry. Same goes for capital consumption. The upshot is that 'Net State Product' is more real than GSP since it has fewer imputations. GSP = earnings (incl fringes), payroll taxes paid by employer, profits (imputed), depreciation (imputed), rent (don't recall how they do this piece), business transfers (tiny), and interest paid. Basically it's in terms of income produced. First thing I did out of grad school was papers on state fiscal capacity, in which GSP figured prominently. mbs I see occasional references to GDP of the State of California. I. e. California by itself is the XX largest economy in the world. How is the GDP for a state defined? For computer chips, for example: Intel is headquarted in California but produces chips in New Mexico, Ireland -- and elsewhere. H-P the same. How are state GDP numbers put together? One reason for asking is a number that is now used here -- the energy use (in BTUs, say) per dollar of state GDP. Gene Coyle
Re: SS Privatization = DEFAULT (sounds bad, no?)
2016 and All That By PAUL KRUGMAN (NY TIMES, July 22, 2001) I knew that the commission on Social Security reform appointed by George W. Bush would produce a slanted report, one designed to bully Congress into privatizing the system. But the draft report released last week is sheer, mean-spirited nonsense. The commission, in an attempt to sow panic, claims that Social Security is in imminent peril that the system will be in crisis as soon as 2016. That's wildly at odds with the standard projection, which says that Social Security reserves will last until 2038. And even that projection is based on quite pessimistic assumptions about future economic growth and hence future payroll tax receipts. If you use more optimistic assumptions say, the assumptions in the budget forecasts that were used to justify Mr. Bush's tax cut the system will still be financially sound in 2075. So how did the commission reach its pessimistic conclusion? Through a truly Orwellian exercise in doublethink the art of believing two mutually contradictory things at the same time. It's true that in 2016, according to (pessimistic) projections, benefit payments will start to exceed payroll tax receipts. By then, however, the Social Security system will have accumulated a multitrillion-dollar trust fund. Just as a private pension fund uses earnings on its assets to pay benefits, the Social Security system can use earnings from this trust fund to pay benefits. And that trust fund will extend the life of the system for decades, perhaps indefinitely. But the commission declares that these accumulated assets aren't real, and don't count as resources available to pay future benefits. Why? Because they are invested in government bonds perfectly good assets when they are accumulated by private pension funds but worthless, says the commission, when accumulated by a government agency. Does this make any sense? There is a school of thought that says that Social Security shouldn't have a separate budget, that Social Security receipts should be regarded simply as part of general revenue, and outlays as part of general expenditure. But in that case it's hard to see why we should get worked up about 2016: who cares if the payroll tax, which is only one of many taxes, collects less money than the government spends on retirement benefits, which are only one of many government expenses? Social Security benefits can be paid out of the general budget a transfer of revenue that is clearly justified if payroll tax receipts have meanwhile been used to pay off the national debt, releasing large sums that would otherwise have been consumed by interest payments. Alternatively, you could say that for political reasons it's important that Social Security have its own separate account. But in that case, we should count government bonds in the trust fund as real assets, just as we would if Social Security were a private pension fund. (Here's a proposal: let's launder the trust fund by putting it in private banks, which then buy government bonds. Will that make the assets real?) So the commission is trying to have it both ways. When Social Security runs surpluses, it doesn't get any credit because it's just part of the government. But when it runs deficits, Social Security is on its own. This twisted logic in effect expropriates all of the extra money workers have paid into the system since 1983, when Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, among others, pushed through an increase in payroll taxes an increase whose purpose was to build up the trust fund that the commission, co-chaired by Mr. Moynihan, now says isn't real. And how big will the Social Security deficit be once the trust fund has been expropriated? The commission says 37 percent of payroll tax receipts, which sounds immense; but that's only about 2 percent of G.D.P. That's an interesting number: it's about what the federal government now pays in interest on its debt the debt that Social Security surpluses are being used to pay off. Oh, and there's another budget item that's about the same size as the putative Social Security shortfall: the Bush tax cut, which will eventually reduce revenue by about 1.7 percent of G.D.P. There is a case for reforming Social Security; there is even a case for privatization. But we can't have a meaningful debate about reform unless the parties to the debate are willing to discuss the issues honestly. And the members of the commission, including Mr. Moynihan, have just disqualified themselves. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Bell Curve
Subject: Report: President Bush Has Lowest IQ of all From the Pennsylvania Court Observer 7-10-01 12:32 PM CST University Notes Contributors: Cristina L. Borenstein, Lana Taamar In a report published Monday, the Lovenstein Institute of Scranton, Pennsylvania detailed its findings of a four month study of the intelligence quotient of President George W. Bush. Since 1973, the Lovenstein Institute has published its research to the education community on each new president, which includes the famous IQ report among others. According to statements in the report, there have been twelve presidents over the past 50 years, from F. D. Roosevelt to G. W. Bush who were all rated based on scholarly achievements, writings that they alone produced without aid of staff, their ability to speak with clarity, and several other psychological factors which were then scored in the Swanson/Crain system of intelligence ranking. The study determined the following IQs of each president as accurate to within five percentage points: 147 Franklin D. Roosevelt (D) 132 Harry Truman (D) 122 Dwight D. Eisenhower (R) 174 John F. Kennedy (D) 126 Lyndon B. Johnson (D) 155 Richard M. Nixon (R) 121 Gerald Ford (R) 175 James E. Carter (D) 105 Ronald Reagan (R) 098 George HW Bush (R) 182 William J. Clinton (D) 091 George W. Bush (R) The six Republican presidents of the past 50 years had an average IQ of 115.5, with President Nixon having the highest IQ, at 155. President G. W. Bush was rated the lowest of all the Republicans with an IQ of 91. The six Democrat presidents had IQs with an average of 156, with President Clinton having the highest IQ, at 182. President Lyndon B. Johnson was rated the lowest of all the Democrats with an IQ of 126. No president other than Carter (D) has released his actual IQ, 176. Among comments made concerning the specific testing of President GW Bush, his low ratings were due to his apparent difficulty to command the English language in public statements, his limited use of vocabulary (6,500 words for Bush versus an average of 11,000 words for other presidents), his lack of scholarly achievements other than a basic MBA, and an absence of any body of work which could be studied on an intellectual basis. The complete report documents the methods and procedures used to arrive at these ratings, including depth of sentence structure and voice stress confidence analysis. All the Presidents prior to George W. Bush had a least one book under their belt, and most had written several white papers during their education or early careers. Not so with President Bush, Dr. Lovenstein said. He has no published works or writings, so in many ways that made it more difficult to arrive at an assessment. We had to rely more heavily on transcripts of his unscripted public speaking. The Lovenstein Institute of Scranton Pennsylvania think tank includes high caliber historians, psychiatrists, sociologists, scientists in human behavior, and psychologists. Among their ranks are Dr. Werner R. Lovenstein, world-renowned sociologist, and Professor Patricia F. Dilliams, a world-respected psychiatrist. This study was commissioned on February 13, 2001 and released on July 9, 2001 to subscribing member universities and organizations within the education community.
RE: Re: RE: Query- GDP by states
Max, You need to make it simpler for me. If Intel were, in 1980, producing all its chips in California, would its product be considered 100% California GSP, though its sales were world-wide? If that were the case, mbs: Firm-level data is not involved. If U.S. IT profits were $100 billion, and earnings of IT workers (under SIC codes) in California were 10% of national IT earnings, then California GSP would be credited with $10 billion (10%) in IT profits. I don't know if there is data on electricity consumption by SIC category by state. If not, then you would be reduced (or, more precisely, aggregated) to an average consumption per dollar of GSP for all industries in the state. then its California consumption of electricity, in kWh/GSP would be XX. Then, by the year 2,000, production is mostly out of California -- e. g. New Mexico, Ireland, Asia, sales still world-wide. Now it would not be manufacturing much in California, so its electricity consumption would be down but $$ of GSP would be up. mbs: if there are no IT workers in CA, then there are no IT profits to allocate, under BEA methodology (assuming it hasn't changed in the past ten years). It would look, in that case, as if California had become much more energy efficient. mbs: with out-sourcing, consumption/GDP would increase, but if new GSP (and jobs) replace old, then out-sourcing makes no difference to energy 'efficiency.' If composition changes from production to services, and if services use less/more electricity, then for a given GSP level you would register an increase/decrease in 'efficiency.' So, help me get my head around that. I keep reading that Califonia is much better than other states in terms of electricity/GSP. I'm trying to understand what that is based on. Gene.
BLS Daily Report
BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS, DAILY REPORT, MONDAY, JULY 23, 2001: The economic slowdown felt in virtually all regions has boosted unemployment rates to 5 percent or higher in eight states and the District of Columbia, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But 32 states still had jobless rates below the national average of 4.5 percent in June. The Pacific region remained the area with the highest rate, at 5.2 percent in June. The latest regional and state data also confirmed that the slump remains concentrated in manufacturing, where job losses continue to add to state jobless rolls. Service industries are continuing to add jobs, although the pace of expansion is more moderate than earlier this year (Daily Labor Report, page D-1). Immigrants -- legal and illegal -- now make up 13 percent of the nation's workers, the highest percentage since the 1930s. They dominate job categories at both ends of the economic spectrum. Immigrants hold 35 percent of the unskilled jobs, according to the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank in Washington, D.C. They also command a significant share of highly skilled technology jobs. At the height of the dot-com boom, as many as a third of the techies working in California's Silicon Valley were from Asia. But most of the nation's 17.7 million immigrants toil, like those who preceded them, in jobs that native-born Americans refuse to do. They work as meatpackers, hotel maids, hamburger flippers, waiters, gardeners, seamstresses, fruit and vegetable pickers, and construction hands. Despite the current round of layoffs by U.S. businesses, government officials project a continuous need for immigrant labor. The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that the country will have 5 million more jobs than it has workers before the end of the decade. The current wave of immigration brings about 700,000 legal immigrants into the United States every year. That pace, which Congress sets through an elaborate system of quotas, is expected to continue. An additional 300,000 immigrants arrive illegally or overstay their visas every year. In total, there are an estimated 30 million immigrants in the country, of which about 8.5 million are here illegally (USA Today, page 1A). The Wall Street Journal's feature Tracking the Economy (page C21) shows the Employment Cost Index for the second quarter, which is scheduled to be released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics Thursday, as up 1.0 percent according to the Thomson Global Forecast. The actual increase in the first quarter was 1.1 percent. Initial Jobless Claims for the week to July 21, also due out (from the Employment and Training Administration in the Department of Labor) Thursday, as 405,000, compared to the actual figure of 414,000 the previous week. application/ms-tnef
Economic Reporting Review, Dean Baker, July 23, 2001
Economic Reporting Review, July 23, 2001 By Dean Baker You can sign up to receive ERR every week by sending a subscribe ERR email request to [EMAIL PROTECTED] You can find the latest ERR at http://www.tompaine.com/news/2000/10/02/index.html . All ERR prior to August, 2000 are archived at http://www.fair.org/err/. All ERR after August, 2000 are archived at www.tompaine.com OUTSTANDING STORIES OF THE WEEK U.S. Opposes Plan for Financing of Clean Energy over Fossil Fuel, by Joseph Kahn in the New York Times, July 14, 2001, page A1. This article reports on the Bush administration's efforts to obstruct proposals by the G-8 to support the development of clean energy, and to phase out subsidies for fossil fuels. Hispanic Workers Die at Higher Rate, by Steven Greenhouse in the New York Times, July 16, 2001, page A11. This reports on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which shows that Hispanic workers are far more likely to die on the job than other workers. It includes assessments from a number of experts on workplace safety who offered possible explanations for this discrepancy. Drug Ads Hyping Anxiety Make Some Uneasy, by Shankar Vedantam in the Washington Post, July 16, 2001, page A1. This article reports on the efforts of GlaxoSmithKline, one of the world's largest pharmaceutical manufacturers, to convince the public that millions of people suffered from a particular mental disorder. The company undertook a major advertising campaign to convince people that they or their children suffered from this new psychological disorder. This is exactly the sort of abuse that economists predict would result from monopoly profits generated through drug patents. An Executive's Missing Years: Papering over the Past, by Floyd Norris in the New York Times, July 16, 2001, page A1. This article reports on the past history of Arthur J. Dunlap, the former chief executive officer at Sunbeam. Mr. Dunlap, who had the nickname chainsaw because of his willingness to lay off workers, was fired from Sunbeam in 1998 over accounting irregularities. According to the article, Mr. Dunlap had engaged in similar behavior two decades earlier at another company, but had apparently managed to keep his past secret as he became a top executive in several major corporations. Belt Tightening Is Called Threat to the Economy, by David Leonhardt in the New York Times, July 15, 2001, Section 1, page 1. This article examines the potential impact of consumers' decision to cut back on consumption, as a result of a weakening job market and flat stock market. It notes that consumption growth has been the only factor keeping the economy out of a recession in the last nine months. GLOBALIZATION Bush Urges Shift to Direct Grants for Poor Nations, by David E. Sanger in the New York Times, July 18, 2001, page A1. Protestors at Bay, Rich Nations' Chiefs to Meet in Genoa, by Alessandra Stanley and Warren Hoge in the New York Times, July 18, 2001, page A10. Fortress Genoa Awaits G-8 Leaders and Foes, by Alessandra Stanley in the New York Times, July 19, 2001, page A12. Bush Scolds Protesters at Genoa Talks, no byline, New York Times, July 19, 2001, page A12. The Times article by Sanger discusses a speech in which President Bush advocated that the World Bank convert many of its loans to grants. The other Times articles report on preparations for the G-8 summit in Genoa, Italy. All of these articles include criticisms directed against those who have protested the recent course of globalization, including comments from President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair. For example, the Stanley and Hoge article quotes Blair saying, If the public knew [the protesters'] views, they'd disagree with them, but neither this article nor any of the others cited above present the protesters' views. The theme repeated by the protesters' critics is that developing nations must export to the industrialized nations in order to escape poverty. It is worth noting that a large share of export earnings, especially for the poorest nations, are used to service past debt. If this debt were cancelled, poor nations would have to divert far fewer resources to producing goods for export and would be better able to develop their domestic economies. The TRIPS agreement, which extends U.S.-type patent and copyright protection to developing nations, will increase the flow of royalty payments and licensing fees from developing nations, further increasing the need for developing nations to export. In short, the industrialized nations are seeking to impose a situation in which developing nations must increase their exports. This need is not a natural development, as implied by the protesters' critics. The article by Sanger notes that the World Bank's programs often go awry, but attributes this fact to local corruption or the conflict between the bank's plans and those of local and national leaders. It is also possible that the World Bank's programs go awry because
Hutton on global financial meltdown
In his article in the Observer of the previous Sunday, 15th, Will Hutton predicted world financial meltdown. The trouble is that for 30 years the US has worked tirelessly to create a world system that suits its interests but without simultaneously creating robust international institutions for its management. The US economy is no longer big enough to justify our acceptance of American rule on US terms. ... But Europe is not united and Bush has no intention or interest in engaging with the issue. But the European lead on the Treaty on Global Warming, rather changes this assumption, plus the insistence of the demonstrators at Genoa. Europe now has a moral issue against the USA bigger than state executions of murderers. The full article (below) as always, presents Hutton's predictions very clearly: Chris Burford We're hurtling into recession While delegates and protesters face up to each other at the G8 summit in Genoa, the world stands on the brink of economic meltdown Special report: Global recession Will Hutton Sunday July 15, 2001 The Observer The world economy is on a knife-edge. The anti-capitalist protesters gathering to protest at the world economic summit in Genoa are both right and wrong. Right in their anger but wrong in what they are protesting against. For while capitalism during a boom certainly has its faults, a full-blown world recession would mean that most of the protesters would not be able to afford the fares to the summit. So as world leaders will tell us that all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds and the anti-capitalists will protest at unaccountable private corporate power, an avalanche is gathering pace that threatens to make both arguments redundant. We have had a lucky 10 years, but our luck is running out. The mid Seventies, early Eighties and early Nineties were disfigured by nasty recessions. At various times in between, since we began the era of floating exchange rates and exponential growth of capital flows, there have been terrifying moments when it seemed that the world economic system was built on sand. But it has proved much more resilient than we had any reason to expect. There was a regional recession in Latin America for most of the 1980s and Asia did not look too bright after the financial crisis in 1997, but despite some bank collapses the industrialised West has carried on regardless. There may be interruptions but the basic movement is always upwards. Except this time. Events that, until now, have occurred in a manageable sequence are happening simultaneously, when world institutions are at their feeblest and American economic leadership at its most empty-headed and self-seeking. Latin America and Asia, which have had their financial crises and economic slumps separately, are now having them together, just as Japan stagnates and the US has hit the buffers. Throw in an oil shock (the price of oil has trebled over the last two years) and the global telecoms disaster and the picture is complete. The next 12 months will provide the greatest test the world economy has had since the 1974 oil crisis, as both the Bank of England and IMF have warned as seriously as they can, given the opaque economic jargon in which both feel compelled to speak. The trouble is that for 30 years the US has worked tirelessly to create a world system that suits its interests but without simultaneously creating robust international institutions for its management. That would have demanded a surrender of sovereignty that the US simply could not and would not contemplate. The Clinton administration had the wit not just to carry on opening up the globe to US financial capital and corporate interests but to organise massive bail-outs when an individual country's difficulties menaced the functioning of the system. Mexico in 1994, Asia in 1997, Russia and Brazil in 1998 and, latterly, Argentina and Turkey have all been the recipients of large IMF and US Treasury support measures, with the IMF working to US instructions. In essence, stricken governments have had to accept the necessary dollars to stave off speculative pressure, but at the price of massive austerity and promising to keep their economic and financial systems open to US multinationals and investment banks. In 1972, Richard Nixon signalled American intent when he declared that the US needed 80 per cent of the industrialised West's trade surplus as a matter of right in order to finance its military ambitions and a trade deficit it was unwilling or unable to correct. The object of US financial diplomacy, he openly acknowledged, was to ensure that the dollar remained the overwhelmingly important unit of account for international business, even though the US only comprised one-fifth of world GDP. Hence a system of floating exchange rates based on the dollar. Thus the US could pay for its massive network of overseas base complexes and its
Re: Kliman vs URPE/RRPE
I agree that the legal system (U.S.) is inappropriate for disputes such as these. I think we've all been in a few verbal tussles and flame wars with friendlies. It's not fun, but it probably shouldn't draw a lawsuit. Allow me to suggest a radical solution. I'm not sure that this could work, but I think it's worth suggesting. Take a number of the radical intelligentsia, each from a different and distinct wing (at least one anarchist, at least one ...), each of the highest personal integrity, ethics, and recognition, and appoint them as judges on a new left-wing supreme court. There would be no compensation and no courthouse. It could be international. A few simple by-laws would be drafted. If, in the future, another Andrew Kliman had a dispute with the editorial board of the RRPE, or some other institution or person, he or she could file a charge with the left-wing supreme court. There would be a hearing of the evidence, in person or over e-mail, with the proceedings made publicly available. At the end of the case, the judges would decide if a sanction was called for. The sanction would be only a statement that one of the parties was in the wrong. No money would exchange hands. The left-wing community would hear about the sanction, however. Reputations could be enhanced or harmed. The whole point would be to create a process where conflict is resolved. It wouldn't be perfect. But it might help us resolve our differences. Well, again, I don't know if this is a good idea or not. Andrew Hagen [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Mon, 23 Jul 2001 08:20:29 +0100, Chris Burford wrote: Although this dispute is no doubt very painful for the protagonists, and they have my sympathy, there is an instructive issue here about how much important disputes can or cannot be resolved outside the bourgeois law. There are two different meanings of the concept of civil society in the marxist tradtion: 1) as an arena in which bourgeois right only, prevails, and different rights of atomised individuals contest it out in law, and are ultimately enforced by state power. 2) the more benign post Gramcian concept of civil society (which the Germans have translated back with a different word), in which everyone is sensitive to overall opinion and culture. In a painful dispute like this one, hopefully people will find some compromise, but it is normal at times that there will be miscommunication, mistrust, suspicion, rumour, and gossip. Although much of this should be kept off an e-mail list like this one, there will be other channels for informal exchanges, and the status and trust placed in any individual will rise and fall, not always fairly. One of the rules for handling painful disputes in a not for profit organisation, is to reduce the risk of counterattack for improperly pursuing your grievance, by having consideration to how others might read it. This makes for great caution in how complaints are expressed. The danger is that the contradictions are then not addressed. But that is where the attention should be directed. Some people need to be able to identify both aspects of the contradiction in this and other cases. Chris Burford At 21/07/01 09:52 -0700, you wrote: Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] said: I know absolutely NOTHING about the content of this case. I know and like Kliman, while I've been on the ed. board of the RRPE and admire their magazine. In this kind of situation, all else constant, my basic, gut-level, instinct is to assume that whoever brings lawyers into the picture is wrong. Lawyers are needed in many situations, I guess, but not in relationships between friends or folks who are supposed to be fighting for similar goals. I still don't get why the RRPE issued a ban on Kliman. They seem to be admitting that it was based on a misunderstanding. But if one issues a ban without making sure there is no misunderstanding in the first place, then of course the censored one is going to interpret this as malicious. It would seem to me that since the RRPE admitted that its ban was based on a misunderstanding, it is going to be in a lot of legal trouble. It would seem to me that Freeman is right that friends of the RRPE should be encouraging its editors to settle this case now before the journal is put under. Rakesh
WTO/FSC
Monday July 23 5:57 PM ET WTO Panel Rules Against U.S. Tax Break Plan By Adrian Croft BRUSSELS (Reuters) - World Trade Organization experts ruled on Monday that a U.S. business tax break program was actually an illegal export subsidy, bringing the European Union and the United States closer to a potentially explosive trade conflict, a source familiar with the case said. The WTO dispute panel's confidential final report, sent to Brussels and Washington, confirmed an interim report released last month that said the U.S. tax law broke international agreements on subsidies and agriculture, the source said. Without commenting on details of the panel report, U.S. trade officials acknowledged the EU victory. ``This is obviously a sensitive issue,'' U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick said through a spokesman. ''Therefore, we are reviewing our options with affected U.S. interests and the Congress.'' The EU has threatened to impose up to $4 billion of sanctions on U.S. goods if it ultimately won the WTO case -- a step Zoellick has previously likened to using a ``nuclear weapon'' on the trade system. The WTO ruling comes at a time when EU-U.S. relations have been strained by President Bush's withdrawal from the Kyoto global warming treaty and the EU's blocking this month of General Electric Co.'s proposed $43 billion acquisition of another U.S. firm, Honeywell International Inc. The 15-nation EU has taken aim at a U.S. law that it contends grants billions of dollars a year in tax breaks to major U.S. exporters such as plane-maker Boeing Co. and software leader Microsoft Corp. The panel's 66-page report concluded the U.S. law was inconsistent with an international agreement on subsidies ``as it involves subsidies contingent ... upon export performance,'' the source said. A key lawmaker in the U.S. House of Representatives said the WTO ruling showed the U.S. tax system needed ``fundamental reform.'' ``We should accept the message of the WTO ruling, roll up our sleeves and get down to work immediately to design a tax system that will make Americans competitive both at home and as they trade abroad,'' House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas said in a statement from Washington. NEED FOR TRADE TALKS Zoellick warned in May the United States could hit back over the case by taking aim at European tax systems. Following the WTO panel's preliminary report last month, however, Zoellick said the U.S. loss would heighten the need for both sides of the Atlantic to work harder on launching a new round of global trade talks. The dispute panel's report will be made public on August 13 and the United States will have until at least September to decide whether to file an appeal. ``In seeking a resolution, we are focusing on how to promote America's economic interests while meeting our WTO obligations,'' Zoellick said on Monday. If the final ruling favored the EU, WTO arbitrators would decide what level of sanctions the EU could impose. It would be early next year before the EU could impose sanctions. The EU won a WTO case against an earlier U.S. tax break program for exporters, known as the Foreign Sales Corporation program, in 1999, when a panel found it constituted an illegal export subsidy. The United States, then under the Clinton administration, had changes approved in Congress, but Brussels came back to the WTO last year, arguing the changes actually boosted the subsidies. EU officials are aware the case must be handled with care. The EU needs U.S. support to succeed in its drive to get a new round of global trade liberalization talks off the ground at a WTO conference in Qatar in November. An EU diplomat, speaking shortly before release of the WTO report's contents on Monday, suggested sanctions could be avoided if the United States made a commitment to seek changes in the tax break law to bring it in line with the WTO ruling. ``As a basic start, we'd want them (the United States) to signal they were willing to try to make legislative changes,'' the diplomat said. If the United States refused point-blank to do so, ``we'd have no choice politically but to go down the sanctions route,'' he said. Since Bush took office in January, the EU and the United States have resolved festering trade disputes over banana trade and wheat gluten. But they remain at odds over an EU ban on hormone-treated beef and new rows have broken out over steel.
Back on line
I am back online, albeit with a Telnet connection only. About four or five days worth of mail evaporated without reaching me. I could've lost out on the opportunity to earn millions of dollars in the latest Nigerian scheme. The loss was more extreme because I thought that the discussion regarding Alex's and Godley's paper was first rate. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Raising the temperature
Raising the Temperature George Monbiot Tuesday July 24, 2001 The Guardian Asking the G8 leaders to decide what to do about the developing world's debt is like asking the inmates of Wormwood Scrubs to decide what to do about crime. Debt is the direct result of the banking structure which has enriched the G8 nations. Our leaders are the last people on earth who should be charged with tackling it. The same goes for poverty in Africa. For 150 years, a few rich nations have decided how Africa should be helped. The G8's new Marshall plan for the continent is no more enlightened than the schemes some of its members were devising in 1860. The problem is not the decisions the G8 makes. The problem is that it's the G8 making the decisions. I had imagined that this was so obvious it scarcely needed stating, but some of the big development charities criticising the G8's new plans are now arguing not that these constitute a new form of colonialism, but that this colonialism is insufficiently funded. Reading the responses of some of the organisations I have long admired, I can't help wondering whose side they are on. My bewilderment has been compounded by a recognition, painful and reluctant as it is, that the G8 leaders, the press and the millions of people for whom these issues were meaningless just a year or two ago, are now discussing them only because of the fighting in the streets. Having campaigned against violence towards people for years, I find this perception terrifying. It is simply not true to say that Carlo Giuliani died in vain. By contrast to the hundreds of thousands of people who, like me, spent their working lives making polite representations, he was acknowledged by the eight men closeted in the ducal palace. They were forced, as never before, to defend themselves against the charge of illegitimacy. This discovery is hardly new. I have simply stumbled once more upon the fundamental political reality which all those of us who lead moderately comfortable lives tend occasionally to forget: that confrontation is an essential prerequisite for change. The problem with the fighting at Genoa is not only that the confrontation was of the kind which hurts people, but also that it was not always clear what they were being hurt for. The great Islamic activist Hamza Yusuf Hanson distinguishes between two forms of political action. He defines the Arabic word hamas as enthusiastic, but intelligent, anger. Hamoq means uncontrolled, stupid anger. The Malays could not pronounce the Arabic H, and the British acquired the second word from them. On Friday and Saturday, while the white overalls movement practised hamas, seeking to rip down the fences around Genoa's red zone but refusing to return the blows of the police, the black block ran amok. The important thing about hamas is that, whether or not it is popular, it is comprehensible. People can see immediately what you are doing and why you are doing it. Hamoq, by contrast, leaves its spectators dumbfounded. Hamas may have demolished the McDonald's in Whitehall on May Day 2000, but it would have left the Portuguese restaurant and the souvenir shop beside it intact. Hamas explains itself. It is a demonstration in both senses of the word: a protest and an exposition of the reasons for that protest. Hamoq, by contrast, seeks no public dialogue. Hamas is radical. Hamoq is reactionary. If, like some of the black block warriors I have spoken to, you cannot accept this distinction, then look at how the police responded to these two very different species of anger. On Friday, though they were armed to the teeth and greatly outnumbered the looters, the police stood by and watched as the black block rampaged around Brignole station, smashing every shopfront and overturning the residents' cars. Then on Saturday night, on the pretext of looking for the people who had caused the violence, the police raided the schools in which members of the non-violent Genoa Social Forum were sleeping, and started beating them to a pulp before they could get out of their sleeping bags. The police, like almost everyone else in Genoa, knew perfectly well that the black block were, at the time, camped in a car park miles away. It is not hard to see which faction Italy's borderline-fascist state feels threatened by, and which faction it can accept and even encourage. If Carlo Giuliani did not die in vain, it was because the Genoa Social Forum had so clearly articulated the case he may have been seeking to make. His hamoq forced a response because other people were practising hamas. Hamas instructs us to choose our enemies carefully. And if there is one thing upon which all the diverse factions whose members gathered at Genoa can agree, it is the identity of some of our enemies. There are some corporations, for example, which activists and non-activists everywhere regard as a menace to society. Almost everyone agrees that the world would be a better place without the
Re: Re: Kliman vs URPE/RRPE
It's called "arbitration," and people do it all the time, mainly to avoid the expense and delay of regular judicial proceedings. There's no reason lefties couldn't set up arbitration panels. Ypu don't entirely escape the toils of the courts. The arbitrator's awards have to be consistent with the law, and the arbitration is enforceable in a regular court. --jks From: "Andrew Hagen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [PEN-L:15488] Re: Kliman vs URPE/RRPE Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2001 19:58:42 -0500 I agree that the legal system (U.S.) is inappropriate for disputes such as these. I think we've all been in a few verbal tussles and flame wars with friendlies. It's not fun, but it probably shouldn't draw a lawsuit. Allow me to suggest a radical solution. I'm not sure that this could work, but I think it's worth suggesting. Take a number of the "radical intelligentsia," each from a different and distinct wing (at least one anarchist, at least one ...), each of the highest personal integrity, ethics, and recognition, and appoint them as judges on a new "left-wing supreme court." There would be no compensation and no courthouse. It could be international. A few simple by-laws would be drafted. If, in the future, another Andrew Kliman had a dispute with the editorial board of the RRPE, or some other institution or person, he or she could file a charge with the left-wing supreme court. There would be a hearing of the evidence, in person or over e-mail, with the proceedings made publicly available. At the end of the case, the judges would decide if a sanction was called for. The sanction would be only a statement that one of the parties was in the wrong. No money would exchange hands. The left-wing community would hear about the sanction, however. Reputations could be enhanced or harmed. The whole point would be to create a process where conflict is resolved. It wouldn't be perfect. But it might help us resolve our differences. Well, again, I don't know if this is a good idea or not. Andrew Hagen [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Mon, 23 Jul 2001 08:20:29 +0100, Chris Burford wrote: Although this dispute is no doubt very painful for the protagonists, and they have my sympathy, there is an instructive issue here about how much important disputes can or cannot be resolved outside the bourgeois law. There are two different meanings of the concept of civil society in the marxist tradtion: 1) as an arena in which bourgeois right only, prevails, and different rights of atomised individuals contest it out in law, and are ultimately enforced by state power. 2) the more benign post Gramcian concept of civil society (which the Germans have translated back with a different word), in which everyone is sensitive to overall opinion and culture. In a painful dispute like this one, hopefully people will find some compromise, but it is normal at times that there will be miscommunication, mistrust, suspicion, rumour, and gossip. Although much of this should be kept off an e-mail list like this one, there will be other channels for informal exchanges, and the status and trust placed in any individual will rise and fall, not always fairly. One of the rules for handling painful disputes in a not for profit organisation, is to reduce the risk of counterattack for improperly pursuing your grievance, by having consideration to how others might read it. This makes for great caution in how complaints are expressed. The danger is that the contradictions are then not addressed. But that is where the attention should be directed. Some people need to be able to identify both aspects of the contradiction in this and other cases. Chris Burford At 21/07/01 09:52 -0700, you wrote: Jim Devine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>said: I know absolutely NOTHING about the content of this case. I know and like Kliman, while I've been on the ed. board of the RRPE and admire their magazine. In this kind of situation, all else constant, my basic, gut-level, instinct is to assume that whoever brings lawyers into the picture is wrong. Lawyers are needed in many situations, I guess, but not in relationships between friends or folks who are supposed to be fighting for similar goals. I still don't get why the RRPE issued a ban on Kliman. They seem to be admitting that it was based on a misunderstanding. But if one issues a ban without making sure there is no misunderstanding in the first place, then of course the censored one is going to interpret this as malicious. It would seem to me that since the RRPE admitted that its ban was based on a misunderstanding, it is going to be in a lot of legal trouble. It would seem to me that Freeman is right that friends of the RRPE should be encouraging its editors to settle this case now before the journal is put under.
Re: Re: Kliman vs URPE/RRPE
I agree the case could be looked at by a small number of people who would be trusted by both sides, but to be valuable the proceedings would have to be different from those of a parallel, left wing, court. It should not be looking at a concept of whose bourgeois right was wronged, and the *exact* redress or punishment. Such a panel should not have as its main output to say who was in the wrong. It should not expect to announce a victor. It should identify why there was a difference in aims of the journal and the researcher, why presumably they came to the question of professional and ethical integrity from different positions in this concrete case. What remains common in their value systems - there must be common things since the researcher was seeking to publish and is hurt by the (unfair) refusal. The problem is best identified as a problem sitting out there *between* the two parties. Initially it could be called a communication problem . A wooly but useful term. What is the nature of the miscommunication? Also what has led to a breakdown of trust, which all systems have to rely on to some extent? The logic should not be the precise logic of bourgeois law, protected by the criteria of beyond all reasonable doubt. It should be a fuzzier logic. Rather than identify wrong it should clarify good standards for publishers and writers, and, may, more gently, make comments to each side, about how unfortunately probably both sides fell short of these, in unintended ways. The aim of good standards is to avoid accidents or near misses. They involve opportunity costs and the panel's report should not be unrealistic: eg that all members of an editorial board and all writers should undergo independently verified lie detector tests! A left wing panel as an alternative to bourgeois courts of law, should have people skilled in conflict management. It should take time getting agreement about what the problem is, and not just accept the definition of one side or the other. It could start by asking each side to state the nature of the complaint and the redress they wish from the other side. While I agree with Andrew Hagen that a panel could lead to reputations being enhanced or harmed, and while it will only work if participants have some awareness of this, I would suggest the panel should not set out with an intention to enhance or harm reputations of the guilty party. Rather it should try to identify what the dispute was actually about in terms of a dispute about value system, and why certain objects or actions assumed a powerful symbolic significance. Sorry if that is not very clear. Partly that is because such procedures would need to be fostered and developed. Partly it is because the logic to be useful must be fuzzy logic, and not the spurious black/white logic of bourgeois right. I should add that I am not in a position to offer any help myself on this dispute and do not know who could, but I have appreciated Andrew Kliman's contributions in the past and I think it is important that radical political economists find a way to go forward taking disputes in their stride. Retired or semi-retired older figures might volunteer to do this, and could be useful having lived through many disputes (so long as they have got started to dement! or become eccentric). There could be one nominee from each side and one agreed hopefully impartial chairperson. They could aim to give their findings in the form of a confidential report separately to each side, with a public statement a number of weeks later, after comments had been received back. The public statement could be valuable for other progressive publications provided it was cautiously worded. At 23/07/01 19:58 -0500, you wrote: I agree that the legal system (U.S.) is inappropriate for disputes such as these. I think we've all been in a few verbal tussles and flame wars with friendlies. It's not fun, but it probably shouldn't draw a lawsuit. Allow me to suggest a radical solution. I'm not sure that this could work, but I think it's worth suggesting. Take a number of the radical intelligentsia, each from a different and distinct wing (at least one anarchist, at least one ...), each of the highest personal integrity, ethics, and recognition, and appoint them as judges on a new left-wing supreme court. There would be no compensation and no courthouse. It could be international. A few simple by-laws would be drafted. If, in the future, another Andrew Kliman had a dispute with the editorial board of the RRPE, or some other institution or person, he or she could file a charge with the left-wing supreme court. There would be a hearing of the evidence, in person or over e-mail, with the proceedings made publicly available. At the end of the case, the judges would decide if a sanction was called for. The sanction would be only a statement that one of the parties was in the wrong. No money would exchange hands. The left-wing
Re: Godley/Izurieta in the ECONOMIST
It is difficult to do justice to this article by way of comment, because much of it is about pushing the technical limits of information about private credit/debt. All human beings and all societies live with an element of risk, and try to take precautions against it. We have to accept that for some strange reasons the US population is more complacent than expected, that warm days will never end. It may be that the change will come about not through any economic factor, but through a political development. The management of credit is socially approved. Should some political developments draw to the attention of the citizens of the USA that other countries are less content to let it engineer the global financial system, they might lose some of their complacency. But the USA is so large, it is the new middle kingdom. Its inhabitants can feel they need give little attention to external news. The international rebuffs to Bush would have to be more dramatic to get through to them. Just at the moment the dollar has gone *up* after the Genoa conference. (I should say I am quite influenced by the Hutton article I posted, but not everyone perhaps would agree with it.) Chris Burford London
