At 10:56 13/09/99 -0400, you wrote: >I can assure you that any proposal for the IMF to become more independent of member governments will be DOA in Washington. That's a personal guarantee. I doubt that IMF officials would dare to embrace such a proposal, but I would be delighted if they did so: we'll squash them. > >-bob > > >------------------------------- >Robert Naiman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Preamble Center >1737 21st NW >Washington, DC 20009 The attack will have to be more subtle. And it will be. Meanwhile the missing billions of the Russian loan are embarrassing. Gordon Brown would not have been made chair of this "interim" committee of the IMF if he was seen by the US as a threat, but he still has the potentiality to scramble the frames of reference and pose the questions in different ways. Brown will be very diplomatic but there is no reason why he should not subtly exploit the embarrassment to have an opportunity to make his own mark on history. Charles Brown commented >But doesn't the central committee of the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie sit above both the IMF and its member governments, really , anyway ? >"Who" is the IMF ? You mean the executive committee? and you are referring to the US government? Interesting point but when we come to look at these things close up they are not homogeneous entities. They have their own divisions within them. Also I would suggest that capitalism has developed to a size where some of its interests are not mainly located in a particular state but are located in the globe. Rod Hay wrote > >The issue of world government is much more complicated than Chris indicates. I am sure that is right. I wanted to risk the subject and get some debate going by writing up the news reports about this Geneva report on the IMF. >I don't see how the IMF could be made independent of the USA. The technical >constitution may be rewritten, but the practical matter is that the USA >would not agree unless it a strong say in who these technical experts were. >Without approval no appointment. Sure. It cannot be made totally independent. The Geneva Report seems to suggest some technical devices to make them *less* immediately dependent - longer term offices and a code of practice etc. >A world government is more likely to come about in the same way that >national governments did by the force of arms. That is the way it happened >in Britain, France, the USA, etc. That is the way it will happen in the >world. It will not happen by way of a committee report in Geneva. It will come about pragmatically. I agree it is like the nation states being formed at the end of the middle ages by all sorts of semi-random iniatives, and coalescences. Part of that will be about who manages international armed forces. The US did not get it all their own way. The British general defied the US general at Pristina airport and failed to put tanks on the runway to block the Russians landing. He got away with it, and the British defence minister got made head of NATO. Whether Europe is dependent on US arms to sort out a conflict in Moldova in 2005 will matter. But I would have thought the big decisions will be about the economic trading blocs. >Globalisation is a fact that lefties have to deal with. It is futile to >oppose it. Good >Chris is pointing in the right direction but he is point at the >wrong path. Capitalism may have some room for progressive action. There are >still feudal institutional remnants around the world. But it is not the >place of leftist to cheer the progress of capitalism. Or to worry about the >institutional arrangements of international financial regulators. It is the >place of leftist to champion the rights of workers. To insist that workers >have their rights inforced, that everyone has enough to eat, that health >care be available to those who need it, that good free education be >available, etc., etc., etc. Important, but to limit the struggle to this is economist. Even more important than trying to get more buns for the workers is to take over the bakery. >It is this opposition that will build socialism >not an uncritical promotion of elite institutional reform. World government >is of interest only because it helps break down national barriers to the >self-organisation of the working classes of the world. No no. As with the individual state, so the argument also applies to the world: "the first step in the revolution of the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class, to win the battle of democracy." "Centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly." Unless we watch the skirmishing about the IMF we will not be able to formulate demands that will initially weaken the hold of the capitalists over the IMF and then take it from them, perhaps after restructuring into a more appropriate institution. But there should be no compromise on the ultimate objective: the system of world credit must be brought under democratic control. Chris Burford London
