Building the post-capitalist economy

Post-capitalist economy? - that old chestnut, a socialist arguing for the end of capitalism? But in recent times capitalism has shown that it is perfectly capable of bringing about its own demise. This isn't just about the collapse of banks, the current 'debt crisis' obscures and compounds the real problem which is the collapse of ecosystems on which we depend for our survival. Capitalism is not just the driver of climate change, but also of massive environmental degradation, and loss in biodiversity - see this recent example. It is capital accumulation that is devouring our planet and you cannot use the same mechanisms which are destroying the Earth to save it. What we need to do is bring about economic change before the consequences of climate change become unimaginably destructive to our global society. A post-capitalist economy is inevitable, but we can do it the hard way or the better way, and what we need to do is think about how that economy ought to work.

This is a slight detour, but I wonder how many people know that Karl Marx, was an admirer of capitalism, in the sense that he admired the huge productive capacity of capitalism, which far exceeded any previous economic system. Marx recognised that if the productive capacity of capitalism was harnessed for the good of society, it could provide people with a much better material standard of living than they had ever had before. But he also recognised that, through the mechanism of surplus value, capitalists were able to deprive workers of the wealth that they created, and that there would always be a conflict between capitalists and workers, between the productive forces - workers - and the non-productive forces - capitalists. Marx was the first political economist to understand the massive forces that capitalism could unleash, and Marx and Engels were also much more aware of environmental degradation than they have been given credit for. Engels said:    

Let us not, however, flatter ourselves overmuch on account of our human victories over nature. For each such victory nature takes its revenge on us. Each victory, it is true, in the first place brings about the results we expected, but in the second and third places it has quite different, unforeseen effects which only too often cancel out the first.

As far as climate catastrophe is concerned, the left may have led the way in our understanding of the unfolding crisis but the 'free' market right have since caught up, and are now pouring their millions into persuading people that climate change is not an issue, through climate change denial, because they are concerned about their profits and the end of domination of democracies by the market. As I have pointed out before, in this post, the 'free' market fundamentalists are fighting to deny climate change precisely because they recognise that a genuine and meaningful response the climate change will mean the end of capitalism as we know it. This state of affairs was beautifully summed up in an article by Naomi Klein called 'Capitalism vs the Climate'.

So what would a post-capitalist economy look like? It would not mean the end of the private sector, because, as I've argued before, the private sector is not the same thing as capitalism, but initially it would inevitably mean a much bigger role for the state because a collapsing capitalist economy would have to be replaced by extensive nationalisation of banks, transport and utilities to save them from going under. Energy and food production would have to be regulated as would imports and exports. We would need planning in a democratically controlled economy.This would not simply be an ideological choice but a necessary response to crisis. We would have to grow as much as our own food as possible and economies would become much more localised. It would be an economy much more like the one that we had in the UK during the Second World War.

Caroline Lucas in her report 'New Home Front' has gathered together ideas on what we can do in response to climate change

We are already beginning to experience problems with climate change in terms of freak weather events, and disruption to agriculture, and we will inevitably soon experience difficulties with energy supply. We have a choice, we can begin to adjust our economy now, to deal with these problems, or we can carry on with 'business as usual' and inevitably face much worse conditions later. What we need to do is forget about the 'free' market neoliberal nonsense about competing with China, and work together to create a new kind of economy to deal with possibly the greatest challenge that human beings have ever faced.

The dregs of democracy

Its conference season. Its also election time in the USA. Last Wednesday there was a Presidential debate between Mitt Romney and Barack Obama, and earlier in the week Ed Milliband's conference speech.  What did we learn from these two events? The main outcome for me was that we learned how impoverished our democracy is in the west, how hollowed out it has become. We used to have a choice. In the UK it was a clear-cut choice between Labour and Conservative. Not any more. Politics has become homogenous. The very people who claim that they want us to have more choice, by which they really mean more privatisation, want us to have less and less choice when it comes to politics, and who we can vote for.

What was scary about to Obama-Romney debate wasn't the fact that , by all accounts, Romney won. It was the lack if difference between the two candidates. So dominant has the neoliberal consensus become amongst the political class that the debate is nuanced between minor differences in policy, whether to cut taxes a bit more or a bit less, whether to have a bit more private sector. Politics is now about personality. Is Ed a strong leader? Is he a geek? Who do you prefer Cameron or Milliband, Romney or Obama? Politicians have to market themselves to the electorate as Ed Milliband did on Tuesday. This is pure and utter bullshit, and a complete distraction from the things that matter - like policies for instance. But its a distraction which suits the neoliberal right. Let people argue about whether Cameron is better than Milliband, while we get on with asset stripping the NHS and the Public sector. Glenn Greenwald, writing in the Guardian, hit the nail on the head:

"Wednesday night's debate between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney underscored a core truth about America's presidential election season: the vast majority of the most consequential policy questions are completely excluded from the process. This fact is squarely at odds with a primary claim made about the two parties – that they represent radically different political philosophies – and illustrates how narrow the range of acceptable mainstream political debate is in the country."

The first Kennedy and Nixon debate in 1960

Out in the real world however, as we have seen all over the world, in Mexico, Spain, and the USA, millions of people want real choice and real change. Here in the UK our politicians have the democratic system with a Parliament and first-past-the-post voting system that is more fitted to the 17th century than the 21st century. That is why people are increasingly disillusioned with the democratic process. But that, in itself, suits politicians. However few people vote, they still get to be in power. What we have now, is a sham democracy instead of a proper democracy.  This is a sort of corporate-neoliberal totalitarianism maintained and stitched-up between corporations, politicians and the media, and before things can be changed for the better they look set to get much worse.

Apparently 'economics' means screwing the workers

Last week we heard that Vince Cable had decided to kowtow to his Tory masters and introduce a range of 'reforms' which are intended to make it easier to sack workers and 'create more jobs'. This is an ideological class-war driven attack on workers rights which follows hot on the heels of the recent lengthening of the period of no fault dismissal for workers from one year to two years, and apparently implements some parts of the discredited Beecroft Report, described as 'crap' by Coalition government insiders. It's important to point out that there is no evidence that these measures will create any more jobs - just evidence that the 1% are using the economic crisis that they caused as an opportunity to bash the workers. This is part and parcel of the well known 'Shock Doctrine' described by Naomi Klein, you create a crisis, then use it as cover to attack the living standards of the 99%.

Cable - screwing the workers

Now, these attacks are being followed by renewed calls for an end to national pay bargaining in the public sector. According to the Guardian '25 senior academic' economists have called for individually negotiated public sector contracts.  This is a blatant attack not only on employee rights but the trade union movement itself, and has been a Tory dream for decades. All the usual bogus arguments about 'labour market flexibility' and 'job creation' are predictably trotted out. What's crucial here is to understand that this is really 'free' market fundamentalist ideology dressed up as 'economics'. This is not about the economy it's about politics. The so-called economists who have dreamt up this stuff are capitalist economists  - the same blinkered individuals who promoted the ideas that caused the economic crisis in the first place and who see the solutions as more of the same or 'business as usual'. This is about screwing workers -  allegedly to make markets work better. It is not a science or an academic discipline but a belief system, and these economists are the high priests of the system, worshipping at the altar of the market.

These are the very same neoliberal 'free' market fanatics who believe in 'externalities' which is capitalist economic speak for explaining away the right of corporations to dump their costs free of charge onto communities and the environment, in the form of pollution and unemployment, causing health problems, hardship for millions, and massive environmental destruction. These are the same sort of people who believe that basics such as food can be traded as commodities - in short they are people without human values who should not be taken seriously and represent a danger to the well-being of millions. Their type of economic 'solutions' are responsible for death and destruction on a global scale, and, of course, they won't be the ones to suffer pays cuts and unemployment as a result of these proposals. They will remain safe in their cosy academic bubble while the rest of us get our standard of living cut still further.  

Of course economics doesn't have to be like this. There are economists who recognise that economics has a social dimension, and at its heart should be the well-being of people and communities, not abstract notions about money which favour corporations and the rich. For an excellent analysis of the ongoing destruction of the social contract in Europe by neoliberal economists, and its consequences, read this excellent article by the economist Ha-Joon Chang. At its root this debate is not about economics at all - it is really about values. The values of humanity, decency and pay equality for hardworking people doing the same job versus the anti-human, 'abstract', and immoral values of the 'free' market, and screwing the workers.

Cameron's Paralympic hypocrisy covers a vicious Coalition attack on the disabled

Have you been watching the Paralympics? If so you will have been impressed by the endeavour of the Paralympians in striving for medal success. But what will happen to Paralympians after the games are over? How many will be adversely affected by the government's attempts to remove Disability Living Allowance (DLA) from 500,000 disabled people in the UK? Predictably, Prime Minister David Cameron plumbed new depths of hypocrisy recently when he spoke about the Paralympics. According to the BBC :

Prime Minister David Cameron has said that he believes Paralympics will "inspire a lot of people and change people's views on disability".

But Cameron has done more than any other Prime Minister change people's views on disability, causing harm to disabled people in the UK in the process. The Coalition's attempts to deny benefits to disabled people through removal of the DLA and Employment Support Allowance (ESA) have lead to great hardship for many people who relied on the allowances to lead a decent life. And their attack on the disabled has lead some people to believe that they are "benefit scroungers". Disabled people have been subject to abuse and physical attacks as a direct result of  the government's policy. Its important to point out that these benefits for disabled people are there to help them live independent lives, and in many cases enable them to go out to work.

The government have paid 'healthcare' firm Atos £400 million to carry out 'disability assessments' designed to get disabled and chronically sick people off benefits. In a cruelly ironic twist it turns out that Atos is a sponsor of the Paralympic Games! Now Disabled People Against the Cuts (DPAC) are fighting back and recently staged a protest at Atos's offices in London. DPAC have also collected stories about the hardship caused to sick and disabled people by the Coalition. DPAC's Linda Burnip, quoted in the Independent, said:

"The stories are disgusting, really harrowing, they are people who are really, really seriously ill who couldn't possibly be expected to work – and yet they're being found capable. Disabled people are being driven to suicide and death"

Cameron has filled his role as Tory Party frontman really well. Despite the Tories still being the nasty party, and despite the vicious class-war attacks on the poorest and most vulnerable in our society, Cameron somehow remains popular, almost as if the worst excesses of an extremist Coalition government had nothing to do with him. This latest outburst of shameless hypocrisy is typical of Cameron, but how long can this continue before people see him for what he really is, a class-war reactionary politician protecting the interests of corporations and the rich at the expense of the rest of us? Lest hope this Paralympic hypocrisy will soon backfire and help to hasten the end of this rotten government.

Bringing back Laws shows the desperation of a failing Coalition

Austerity isn't working. George Osborne's economic policy is in ruins, and he is now a lame-duck Chancellor. Last month the government had to borrow £600 million more, so much for debt reduction. Panic is beginning to grip a failing and fractured government. So it has now been signalled, that David Cameron will re-arrange the deckchairs on the titanic - better known as a cabinet re-shuffle. One of the highlights, we are told, is the expected return to government of the darling of the neoliberal right, David Laws. Laws, who is a millionaire, managed only 17 days in the original Coalition cabinet before having to resign due to a dodgy expenses claim of £40,000, more than many people earn in a two year period.

David Laws

As you might expect, the 'free' market fundamentalists in the Coalition will be delighted by the return of Laws who is a fervent tax-cutter and privatiser. Laws recently called for deeper tax cuts, and the shrinking of the state, in a continuation of the failed neoliberal market 'economic' policies which caused the so-called deficit crisis (the deficit is not really a crisis and is being used as an excuse to destroy welfare) in the first place. All this shows the desperation of a Coalition government which has nowhere to go, the moral bankruptcy of allowing Laws to return, and the growing realisation for Cameron that he will be a one term premier unless he can salvage his sinking ship.

The problem for the market fundamentalists dominating the Coalition is that because they don't believe the state should plan or intervene, by creating jobs for example, they have no levers to pull to revive the economy. Interest rates cannot be reduced, quantitative easing has failed, there is no room for tax cuts, and the economy is still, at best, stagnating. That is why we have suddenly begun to hear calls for big infrastructure projects such as a third runway at Heathrow and a projected £30 billion Severn barrage. Predictably, these are the wrong projects, and even if adopted now, they will come too late to have any effect before the next election. It would have been better for Cameron and Osborne  to begin those projects soon after the 2010 election.

Of course, there are some very real options to get people working and rebuild our economy and you can find them in the Green Party manifesto. But those green solutions are beyond the blinkered ideology of the government. One of the government's key priorities ought to be the building of hundreds of thousands of social homes to boost the economy, create thousands of jobs, and help alleviate our appalling housing crisis, the origins of which lie in the Thatcher government's infamous 'right to buy' policy of 1979. But there is no chance of the government adopting such a common-sense solution. Trapped by their own fundamentalist belief system, government ministers are like the lunatics doomed to repeat the same failed policies over and over again, and each time expecting a different result.

Free market myths no. 4: capitalism is dynamic and innovative

I was talking to a friend the other day who was telling me about someone in his family who is a businessman. "What is his business" I said, "property" came the reply. This exchange set me thinking about how capitalism works. For sure, it wouldn't work without 'property', because the concept of private ownership of property is crucial, and without it capitalism couldn't function. When the Soviet Union collapsed and the 'free' market vultures moved in to feast on the corpse, one of their first priorities was to introduce new laws enshrining property rights so that the 'oligarchs' could get their hands on the loot - otherwise known as the common property and resources of the people of the Soviet Union.

So property is a crucial part of capitalism because from property comes rents and the commodification of land, which leads to capitalists cashing in on the exploitation of natural resources such as oil, which ought to be held in common. All these activities which rely on the holding of property can be used to generate great profits but none of them are in any way dynamic or innovative. Much of capitalism is about getting an easy ride like rent-seeking, asset stripping, corporate welfarism and cannibalising the public sector. Far from being innovative capitalists will seek to squeeze every drop of profit from existing commodities and plant and machinery before they bother to think of trying to do something new or different. There are countless examples of this, one recent example being the iPad 3 which differed from its predecessor largely only in having a higher definition screen. And, you can easily see how conservative capitalism is if you go to your local supermarket where you will see the same old detergents wrapped up in packets labelled "new" and "improved" .

Its much easier to make money from what you know. If you have a good product you flog it to death before thinking about a new one. This makes corporations resist change and become conservative rather than innovative, and that, as I've pointed out before on the blog is the reason why capitalists aren't using new, resource efficient methods which would make them more competitive and be much better for the environment - see here. What capitalism tends to be good at is adaptation to changing circumstances and finding a way around the crises it creates. But its the public sector which often leads the way in innovation. Many of the greatest breakthroughs we have seen in medicine, engineering and computing, like the mouse you are using with your PC, come from publicly funded activities. However, for the 'free' market fundamentalists its essential to maintain the myth that the public sector is slow and bureaucratic, whilst the private sector is dynamic and innovative. The problem is this just isn't true.

The Left must create an alternative political narrative

It's never easy to admit that you've been outsmarted, but that is what has happened to the left in the last 30 years or so. We can always find good excuses because our political enemies on the right have more money and therefore much greater resources than we do, and they do own the media, and so have a collection of very powerful propaganda tools at their disposal, which they use to great effect.

But the right hasn't won political arguments in Western democracies just because they have more resources, they've done it by being clever and exploiting a series of simple straightforward 'policy positions' which appear to be credible and are persuasive to voters - they have succeeded in large part by building a convincing narrative. The right may be wrong but alas they're not (all) stupid. They know that they need a 'straightforward' story to sell to voters and that is something they have done very successfully. Contrast that with the left's love of complexity and focus on policies.

We all know what that narrative is because we hear it every day. It goes something like this: 

"Capitalism is the only way to build a prosperous society. It is dynamic and much more efficient than any alternatives. It thrives through the mechanism of competition. But we have economic problems because wealth creation is being held back by stifling bureaucracy and red tape. To solve our economic problems we need to free-up entrepreneurs by slashing red tape, increasing incentives by reducing the tax burden, having a smaller state and privatising public services. If we do that we'll all be better off. Some may gain more, but hey it's worth it because we'll all benefit." 

Note that I have underlined the keywords or frames in this narrative.

Now I know, and you know, that this recipe doesn't work, the global crisis shows that, and I could demonstrate it by dissecting any one of those key words. In fact I have done that in many posts on this blog, but that is not the point of this post. The point is that the right has a narrative that works, and that is what the left is lacking. Its high time the left created an alternative coherent narrative to challenge the neoliberal paradigm. We not only have to create that narrative but we have to tell it over and over and over again just as the right have done. I can't emphasise this enough. Tell, tell, and tell again. We have a great opportunity to do this at a time that people are disillusioned by the failures of neoliberalism and the economic crash.

So what would that narrative be? Well, we can get some of it simply providing the opposites to the right's 'keywords'. For example, take 'competition' which has long been a totem of the right. The left believes in 'cooperation' and it's hardly difficult to demonstrate that 'cooperation' is far more necessary and productive in our society than 'competition' - the benefits of which are, in reality, marginal anyway. Without cooperation, our society couldn't function. Instead of 'tax burden' we should perhaps be talking about 'tax investment' and 'tax insurance'. Its essential for us to use our own keywords and frames frequently and in opposition to the keywords of the right. The narrative is about establishing our values in opposition to the inferior values of the political right.

Its not for me to decide what the left's narrative should be but it might go something like this: "Capitalism is failing us economically, environmentally and socially. We can make Britain a more prosperous and equal society through co-operation and economic democracy. We need to build a green steady-state economy to create worthwhile jobs and deal with damaging climate change, with a vibrant wealth-creating public sector built on the values of public service, not private profit, and an enabling state with tax insurance for social security." 

Just like our political opponents we need to put across our narrative at every opportunity, whilst exposing the hollowness of neoliberal ideas. This narrative has to have a broad appeal without compromising our core principles. If we aren't able to do this we are never going to take the majority of people with us.

What is the Green Party leader for?

What is the Green Party Leader for? That might seem like an odd question to ask at a time when the Party is just about to elect a new leader, but it has never been clear what the role of the leader of the Green Party of England and Wales (GPEW) really is, and the leadership election has raised issues about the role and position of leader. In fact the Party has only had a leader for four years. Before that, the closest thing to a leader the Party had was the post of Principal Speaker, and there were two of those, one male, one female. We need to ask the question and find the answer for the new leader.

In 2007 the Party members voted for a leader and deputy leader to replace the old system of Principal Speakers. In the end, after fierce debate, the vote to change to leadership secured 73% in favour. Those who supported the change included Caroline Lucas who said:

"This is a fantastic day for the Green party and will help ensure we have a party that is understandable, recognisable and effective" 

At the time, I was against the change, and I still am. But we have to work with what we've got and make the best of it. The problem is that the party isn't sure what it has got and what the role of the leader should be.

What we haven't got is what the other 'grey' neoliberal parties have; a leader who is essentially an elected dictator, someone who lays down policies and has a veto on anything the party wants to do. The Tory party has never pretended to be democratic, always electing its leader from a ruling class cabal until the 1960s. Not that electing a leader has made much difference to the way it works. In Labour, Tony Blair managed to destroy the last vestiges of democracy in the party in the 1990s turning conferences into stage managed media events. I have no doubt that these are not the leadership models that most GPEW members want the party to follow.

So what does that leave us with? What should our leader be doing? Well, there is no doubt that the leader must be a strong advocate for the Party and seek to promote its policies as widely as possible. I believe the leader should be a campaigning leader, and one who holds a dialogue with other groups, such as the trade unions, on behalf of the party. Whoever wins will have to contend with the media spotlight and all the brings with it, including hacks rummaging through your dustbins.

One of the key issues that has arisen during the campaign is the question of whether the leader should be paid. This was not an issue while Caroline was leader, but now it is. It would have been good if the Party had made this decision at the conference in Liverpool, before the election started, but this will now be decided at the conference in September, after the leader is elected. Is the role a full-time job? And what would we expect a Green Party leader to earn - the median wage? My view is that it probably shouldn't be full-time but that might prevent good candidates from standing in future elections. For a small party with very little money, it is difficult to justify spending on full-time posts.

Those who argued for a leader said that the public, the electorate, and the media wouldn't understand a party that had no leader. But there are obvious dangers to having a leader for a radical party. They - the media and ruling class - want us to have a leader. A leader can be co-opted, they can be 'persuaded', they can be vilified, caricatured, but ultimately - they can be made to conform - and ditch policies voted for by their members. The beauty of the old GPEW system was precisely the fact that the media didn't understand it. Just like with Occupy, the powers that be were frustrated that there wasn't an individual they could single out and blame, or coerce, or prosecute and imprison. That gave the movement strength, and it sent out an important signal, that it is possible to organise without a leader.  We are here to bring about change, not just simply play by their rules, and I hope that whoever is elected will show the same determination that Caroline showed, to set the agenda, and not have the agenda set by our political enemies.

Why I will be voting for Romayne and Will

Very soon Green Party members will be receiving ballot papers for the election for Leader, Deputy Leader and GPEx posts. Understandably, most attention will be focused on the election for Party Leader. The leadership election was precipitated by the decision of our MP Caroline Lucas not to stand again after completing a two year term. As I said in a previous post on this issue:

"..party leader Caroline played a blinder as an advocate for the Party's policies of social justice, economic regeneration, fighting climate change, and support for the public sector. As leader, she is going to be sorely missed, and hard to replace..."

I don't want to get bogged down in the leadership election rules but the rules state that for the leader and the deputy, each post must be filled by a person of the opposite gender. So if a male wins the leadership, the deputy must be female and vice versa. Voting is by STV so that does make it possible to support one candidate of either gender for either position. In this post I want to focus on the leadership election.

There are four candidates; Peter Cranie, Natalie Bennett, Pippa Bartolotti and Romayne Phoenix. All of the candidates have put their case, both on their own websites, Facebook, and through party hustings. As far as the latter is concerned, arrangements for hustings were haphazard to say the least, and little account was made by the organisers of the fact that some of the candidates might not be able to attend. In fact, not all the candidates could attend all of the hustings. Next time we need to do much better in ensuring we have a coordinated and organised programme of hustings, including online hustings.

I have made no bones in this blog about the fact that I am an ecosocialist and that I believe that the Green Party must be a radical party or otherwise it has very little useful purpose. We are not here to tinker with the current system. We are fighting against economic and an ecological crises, both of which are linked, and an increasing democratic deficit. 'Business as usual' is no longer an option and the Party needs to be able to get its radical message for change across in an effective way. This is not the time to simply pick a leader who we think will appeal to disaffected Liberal Democrats as some in the Party have suggested. We need to make an electoral breakthrough to bring about change, and we can only do that by having a leader who, like Caroline, can argue our radical case and make their voice heard.

So it will come as no surprise that I believe that Romayne is best placed to do this. Romayne fits the bill very well as an experienced and active, campaigning Party member, who has been an elected councillor, GPEx member, and a very effective platform speaker through her role as chair of the Coalition of Resistance. Like Caroline, she is also well aware of the kind of message we need to get across to a disillusioned electorate, and has clearly put herself at the front of the fight against austerity nationally, in a way that none of the other candidates has been able to do.

Having said that, I have taken time to study the statements and views of the other candidates, and there can be no doubt that they are making all the right noises in terms of growing the membership, improving party organisation and getting more Greens elected. Nothing wrong with that, all good stuff. Peter Cranie has a very good, relaxed, media presence which will be popular amongst many Party members, and is probably seen as a safe pair of hands, and the favourite to win. My problem is that I'm not hearing enough from any of them about that radical edge that I have been talking about, how to promote the real alternative that the Green Party has to offer, and crucially, the kind of policies that support that alternative.

I also like that fact that Romayne and Will are standing as a team on the same platform, and I believe that if they are both elected that will greatly strengthen the Party. I have met Will and I was very impressed both by his down-to-earth approach and the key role he has played in the electoral success the Party has had in the West Midlands. I'd urge you to vote for both of them and as you can see from the video they have made they are perfectly capable of speaking for themselves. If you want to know more about their views visit their website here.

The 'free' market Taliban pose a very real threat to our society

There can hardly be a person in the UK who has not heard of the 'terrorist threat' or the 'war on terror'. We have become used to living with heightened security. If you travel by train as I do you will have heard automated Orwellian announcements which refer to "unattended luggage being removed and destroyed by the security services" - whoever they are supposed to be. Some people have argued that all this security has gone way over the top and that the 'terrorist threat' has been deliberately exaggerated by politicians to suit their own purposes. Adam Curtis, in his excellent documentary, The Power of Nightmares, argued that politicians play on our fears and use the terrorist threat to get us to vote for them, and ultimately, to control us. I am sympathetic to this view, but that is not what this post is about. It is about a very real threat which is causing enormous economic damage, human misery and death in the West on a scale that terrorist groups like Al Qaeda could never hope to emulate.

Ayn Rand - prophet of the 'free' market right

But the real threat doesn't come from outside, from some foreign power or terrorist group it comes from within. Those who a perpetrating very real damage to our society are not terrorists or even idealists -  they, like the Taliban, are fundamentalists. These people are neoliberal 'free' market fundamentalists whose views are not economic, nor even really ideological, they are more a belief system. If you wanted to compare these 'free' market fundamentalists with other groups you would find they had more in common with extremist religiously inspired groups like the extreme evangelicals in the USA or the Taliban in Afghanistan.

The holy tenets of this 'free' market religion are not to be found in one holy book, though if they had a bible it would probably have to be Atlas Shrugged, and their prophet would be its author, Ayn Rand. The 'free' market fundamentalists claim to be the descendants of Adam (Smith) though their views are a distorted and selective extract from his writings. They believe in deregulation, privatisation, in outsourcing, downsizing, austerity and small government. They believe that there are magic beings called entrepreneurs who we all depend upon for wealth and  prosperity. And make no mistakes these are beliefs, which when examined closely, turn out to have about as much validity as the beliefs of the Creationists and other flat-earthers. Do they care about that? Not at all! -  because they have faith.

The 'free' market fundamentalists are the very people who brought you the greatest economic crisis in capitalism, a near collapse of the world economic system, featuring the credit crunch, the sovereign debt crisis, and the Eurozone crisis. These are the people who have deepened and made worse those same crises by their belief in austerity, and, as things continue to get worse, as economies crumble, mass unemployment grows and people's living standards are destroyed, what is their answer? Why - of course - more of the same! They are like the mad medieval doctors who while bleeding the patient to death - call for yet more blood to be spilt. Believe me, these people are a far greater threat to the planet, your family and your community than the Taliban or Al Qaeda ever could be. They need to be stopped, for all our sakes, before they bring the whole world down in ruin.

It's not just the banks that need a change of culture

Speaking about the banks last week , Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England, said that what was needed was a "change of culture". Some people might think that was an understatement given the emerging scale of wrongdoing at Barclays, and other major banks. Vince Cable, Secretary of State for Business, described the City as a "cess pit".  Strong stuff then? But criticism is about as strong as it gets these days from our feeble politicians. In relation to the banks there can be no doubt where real power lies, and it's not in our democratically elected parliament.

But King was right, we do need a change of culture, but not just in the City of London, we need it throughout business and throughout our whole society. When I grew up in Britain in the 60s and 70 s there was a much greater culture of mutual support and solidarity than there is now. This stemmed, in large measure, from a sense of solidarity in adversity that developed during WWII, and a large factory-based working class that had jobs and pride in their work.


The aim of Thatcherism was to destroy that social solidarity and create a culture of selfishness and individual gain. In the 1980s it became smart to get rich quick and jump on what then seemed like a capitalist bandwagon that promised endless growth. Measures such as the sale of council housing, at knock down prices, contributed to the fact that many working class people thought they had "arrived" and that they were better off if not actually better than their forbears. We have had 30 years of relentless plugging of this Thatcherite culture by politicians and the capitalist media, and it has had a corrosive effect on our society at all levels, in politics, business and in our democracy. More than ever, in recent history, we have seen the revolving door in Westminster where politicians and senior civil servants have colluded in the privatisation of public assets, to be rewarded afterwards by lucrative jobs in the private sector.

Margaret Thatcher: "There is no such thing as society"

In the noughties we had a relentless attack from New Labour on the public sector and the values of public service. Public sector workers were lambasted and pilloried  as petty bureaucrats, jobsworths and inefficient skivers on bloated pensions. Public bad, private good was the message. Why bother with serving the public when you could be making a profit out of their illnesses and public service needs?


Its not just a change of culture in the banks that we need, its a wholesale change of culture across British society. We need to re-establish the values of social justice, solidarity and equality, which made our society a much better place to live in the decades after WWII. We need to kick out commercialism from the public sector, re-establish the commons, and create a lasting systemic change. I think that millions of  people want this kind of change. Many were never part of the Thatcherite revolution anyway. That change can only happen if people get involved in our democratic process and vote for parties and politicians who can deliver that change, and if they show social solidarity in their personal lives.  And, believe me, its essential that we succeed in doing this because the crisis of capitalism isn't going away anytime soon, and, as we have seen with the flooding recently, we will have to come together to mitigate the worst effects of climate change.

Talking about a revolution!

Did you know there was a revolution going on? If you had been watching and reading the corporate media you might have got some inkling but hardly the full picture. But lets look at some of the examples; the Arab Spring; Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, Syria, Bahrain, and even Saudi Arabia; Occupy in the USA; Protests in Russia; in Greece with SYRIZA; and in Spain, Italy, Ireland and the UK; Massive student protests in Chile and Canada. Many of these protests have been ignored by the media but this is a real revolution, and it is happening before our eyes if we care to look for it.

There is a revolution going on!

Why is this happening? - it is because the mass of ordinary people globally are sick and tired of  poverty, unemployment, and the cosy neoliberal stitch-up between commercial interests and tame 'free' market fundamentalist politicians and economists, which is destroying our economies and the planet. In our own small way, as individuals, we are all part of this revolution, but we need to come together as part of a wider international movement which can throw-off the sham democracies we live in, and bring about real and lasting change.That change must include democratic control of our economies and decent housing, healthcare, jobs and education for all.

In the UK, we have the "let them eat cake" politics of David Cameron, his banker friends, and his rotten, discredited Coalition government. In the USA, we have a battle between Obama and Romney, the former is marginally less bad than the latter but both are corporate creatures, dependent on big money to get elected. In Europe, we have Merkel and the sterile dead end of austerity, designed to protect the banks at the expense of the European taxpayers. People have had enough!

It is time for radical democratic change,  and the only way that change can happen is for people to channel their anger and throw off their apathy with the 'system', take to the streets, protest, and vote for parties that can bring about that change. The people of Egypt have shown us the way. In the UK, the Green Party is the only mainstream party which opposes the neoliberal paradigm and has the policies to make the breakthrough that people want. But the Party can only do that if it maintains its radical edge, engages with and works with the wider movement, and campaigns hard for change. Simply seeking electoral success is not enough. To make that breakthrough, we need to demonstrate that we are serious about the changes people want, and we must be able to take them with us. In Romayne Phoenix and Will Duckworth I think we have two leadership candidates for the Green Party who can accomplish that task.


Footnote: I will give my detailed views about the Green Party leadership contest in a later post.

Now the banks must be brought under democratic control

Its not that long ago that UK taxpayers bailed-out UK banks to the tune of £1.2 trillion. This, in the UK alone, is a sum which dwarfs the amounts being spent on the bailouts of five Eurozone countries - Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and now Cyprus. It was a scandal that this happened and banks such as Northern Rock, RBS and HBOS (which was merged with Lloyds TSB) were allowed to remain under private management and the senior managers continued to award themselves, and traders, vast bonuses. Nobody was really held to account. Nobody went to gaol, despite the damage done to the UK economy, which has lead to savage cuts in jobs and benefits, affecting the very taxpayers who funded the bailout - though Tory chancellor George Osborne couldn't find £81 billion to help them. As I have said before, this is pretty much the biggest heist in history.

But now we find out that Barclays Bank has been fined £290 million by the FSA for fiddling the LIBOR interbank lending rate. Not just Barclays though, apparently they were in cahoots with other banks. This kind of stuff, coming on top of the bailout, beggars belief. Barclays boss Bob Diamond earned £20.9 million in 2011 as chief executive. Did he know what was going on? One thing we have learned from the News International scandal is that top people just can't remember whether they knew anything or not, so perhaps Bob won't.

Bob Diamond: earned £20.9 million in 2011

This is an unfolding scandal so we don't know what the outcome will be but it seems incredible that nobody will face criminal charges. It has to be some sort of fraudulent activity surely? Those affected, and there are bound to be many companies and individuals who lost money, will be asking these questions and expecting compensation. And all this comes on top of the recent RBS IT debacle.

For me, the case for breaking up and nationalising the banks has become unanswerable. There will never be a better opportunity because most of them are bust anyway. For a start, RBS and Lloyds must be brought under national democratic control. They should be broken up. We need smaller, regionally-based banks which can help to grow jobs by investing in local communities, and we need mutuals and credit unions to support and democratise finance in our economy. Finally, can anyone really understand that a UK government can give such support to the banks but can't find £69 million to bailout a hospital trust?

We must Occupy the economy

The roller coaster ride of the world economic crisis continues. Elections in Greece and France have shifted the political ground slightly to the left, with a Socialist majority in France, and the spectacular result obtained by SYRIZA in coming second in Greece with about 27% of the vote. But the Eurozone crisis stumbles on and the 'free' market fundamentalists, the architects of the broken economic system, are still in the driving seat. Banks are bust and, under the current system, there is nothing to look forward to apart from years of economic stagnation at best. Meanwhile in the UK, millions are being pushed below the breadline by the governments cuts in benefits, tax credits, and increases in rents.

In 1966, the Marxist economist Paul Sweezy wrote a book, with Paul Baran, called Monopoly Capital, in which he said that the natural tendency of monopoly capitalism was economic stagnation, as capitalists struggled to use the surpluses of capital accumulation, and that they could only achieve this by increases in spend on marketing and defence spending, and increasing debt. Was Sweezy right? Its certainly true that US defence spending in WWII ended the Great Depression, and that a mountain of debt has been used to keep capitalism going in the past 30 years or so.

So what do we do? The market fundamentalists have no answer. They are like the mad person who repeats the same actions over again in Einsteins famous quote:

"Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results"

Einstein: described the madness of market fundamentalists

 
So we need an economic alternative. But what is that alternative? Neoliberalism, over the past 30 years has put commercial interests above democratic sovereignty. This has happened globally through organisations like the WTO and the European Union. We need to reverse this process and re-assert democratic control of our economy. This economic change must put governments in charge, actively planning and managing economic development, allow local decision making and create a mixed economy based on  genuine sustainable development to deal with ecological crises and halt endless growth. In the longer term the only answer to the domination of private commercial interests is to put the economy in the hands of the 99%. How can we do all that?

Firstly, we need to nationalise the bust banks that are hoovering up resources which need to be spent on creating jobs. Its a scandal that the UK's bust banks have been bailed out but are still in private hands. This must end, some banks must fold, and we need banks to be broken up to provide finance to small businesses, and local and regional banks which can focus on reviving local economies;

Secondly, we need to take the creation of credit out of private hands and put it under democratic control. Debt creation is too great a power to be left in the hands of private enterprise - this is what caused the current crash;

Thirdly, we need to take control of the big utilities such the energy and water companies, and sectors which rely on massive public subsidy to continue such as the railways;

Fourth, we must institute a programme of investment in our economy to create jobs through green quantitative easing and a Green New Deal;

Finally, and most importantly, we must break the power of the corporations by mutualising the economy, providing the finance to set up co-operatives and giving employees the power to buy-out the companies they work for and control them. This latter measure is crucial in putting economic power into the hands of ordinary people. We need to create a new culture of doing business in which people work together to create successful mutuals which are focused on local communities. Co-operatives have a better success rate than companies and they don't outsource downsize, or export jobs overseas.

Its a little known fact but there was an expansion of mutuals in the USA during the last Great Depression and there are many successful co-operatives both in the USA and here. It is a sector that is already growing. 130 million (yes that is million) people in the USA are now involved in mutuals and if you want to find out more detail read this previous post. You should also take a look at Gar Alperovitz's excellent book 'America beyond Capitalism' which gives practical examples of how the 99% in America are taking control of their economy from the bottom up by creating co-operatives. This is economic democracy in action and something we should celebrate.

Think it can't happen? Well, we have to make it happen. Its likely that the failure of the global banking system is going to mean that states are going to have to take a much bigger role in managing the economy now that the failures of the market have been exposed, and that people are going to be much more willing to trust democratic control and planning after they have experienced the privations of neoliberal austerity. If we want to really cure the malaise of neoliberalism and avoid the stagnation of monopoly capitalism we need to participate in the most important occupation of all, we need to Occupy the economy.

While Cameron schmoozes Murdoch, Greeks and Spaniards are fighting austerity

There are thousands of Spanish and Greek workers fighting to defend their jobs against the dead hand of austerity which is threatening to wreck Europe's economies. You would hardly know about this if you followed the mainstream media, which is instead fascinated by David Cameron's schmoozing of the Murdoch empire, and Simon Cowell's string of girlfriends.

Meanwhile, in Spain thousands of miners have been on strike since the end of May, defending their jobs and communities. In time-honoured fashion the Spanish government have unleashed the police who have been given a free hand to break up the strikes and protests leading to violent clashes. In Greece, striking steelworkers have stopped work for 228 days in their fight to protect their jobs.

So why doesn't this make the headlines? Because it doesn't fit with the media agenda which is the modern equivalent of bread and circuses, designed to distract and manipulate us, whilst pandering to the 'free' market neoliberalism of the corporations and their tame politicians. Its OK to report such clashes in the middle east, in places like Egypt,  because that is considered safe, but in Europe such events are not considered to be "newsworthy".

The big event this weekend is the Greek election and its looking like the Eurocrats have managed to turn the screws enough on the electorate to ensure a government which will support the 'memorandum' which is killing the Greek economy, and causing great pain to the Greek people. If New Democracy and its pro-bailout allies can form a government the Greeks will be ground down even further to protect the banks and the Euro vanity project. We can only hope that SYRIZA and its allies can gain enough votes to prevent this from happening. Since the bailout cannot work, a victory for the pro-bailout parties would be based on fear and ultimately fruitless. Either the terms of the bailout must be renegotiated and the debts written off or Greece will have to default anyway. Whatever happens the European Union has been badly damaged by this attempt to make its people pay for the blunders of the ruling 'free' market elite, who are wholly responsible for the current crisis.