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Category Archives: Marxian Theory (Marxism)

Jacobin | The Revolutionary Humanism of Frantz Fanon

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Posted by ztnh in Africa, Anti-Capitalism, Anti-Fascism, Anti-Imperialism, Anti-Racism, Civic Engagement (Activism), Marxian Theory (Marxism), Memoirs, Political Science, Pyschology & Psychiatry, Racism (phenotype)

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Dr. Peter Hudis, Frantz Fanon (1925-1961), lumpenproletariat, Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968), peasantry

LUMPENPROLETARIAT—A friend of mine at a Mediterranean café in Berkeley many years ago commented to a mutual friend about me, as I gorged on shawarma: You know what he needs to read? He needs to read Frantz Fanon. Indeed. I was only familiar with the “Cliff’s” notes version of The Wretched of the Earth. Honestly, I think I was afraid to read Fanon, even as an adult in my 20s, American fascism being what it is and all. People of color are often discouraged from reading, or being associated with, so-called radical or revolutionary thinkers, theorists, and authors. The French government, for example, censored Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth.

Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) 

Even studying the fate of Martin and Malcolm leads you down some pretty scary investigative journalism leads. You get called names, if you’re not careful. And, yet, the forbidden writings and ideas of Frantz Fanon might have never been more relevant than today, with the Black Lives Matter movement reaching a critical mass in 2020, perhaps the biggest protest movement in U.S. history.

Even now, something about our society makes it seem like a radical act to even discuss Fanon. Thankfully, we have Dr. Peter Hudis, a welcome scholar and discussant in the body of work established by Frantz Fanon, the French West Indian psychiatrist and political philosopher.

The philosopher, psychiatrist, and revolutionary militant Frantz Fanon was a key figure in the struggle against European colonialism. Fanon’s innovative thinking on racism and its relationship to class oppression still speaks vividly to the present.

Fanon argued that the peasantry and the lumpenproletariat would serve as the principal force of the revolution, not Africa’s nascent working class.

Peter Hudis, “The Revolutionary Humanism of Frantz Fanon”

Messina

***

JACOBIN—[26 DEC 2020] The renewed protests against racism and police brutality over the last year have supplied a fresh impetus for thinking about the nature of capitalism, its relationship to racism, and the construction of alternatives to both. Few thinkers speak more directly to such issues than Frantz Fanon, the Martinican philosopher, psychiatrist, and revolutionary who is widely considered one of the twentieth century’s foremost thinkers on race and racism.

— snip —

These considerations were central to Fanon’s last and most famous book, The Wretched of the Earth. He began writing the book after learning that he had incurable leukemia and died shortly after it appeared in 1961. Scholars often overlook the fact that The Wretched of the Earth does not completely turn its back on Europe. Instead, Fanon set out to critically rethink dimensions of European thought, including Marxism.

Fanon insisted that a Marxist analysis “should always be slightly stretched when it comes to addressing the colonial issue.” In Marx’s analysis of capitalist accumulation in Europe, the development of capitalism had torn peasants from the “natural workshop” of the land and transformed them into urban proletarians, who in turn would become a massive, compact, and revolutionary force through the concentration and centralization of capital. Fanon saw that this process was not being repeated in Africa.

The destruction of the continent’s traditional communal property forms did not lead to the formation of a massive, radicalized proletariat, since the colonialists did not industrialize Africa but rather underdeveloped it through the brutal extraction of labor power and natural resources. The peasantry remained the greater part of the population, while the working class in towns and cities was relatively small and weak. Because of this, Fanon argued that the peasantry and the lumpenproletariat would serve as the principal force of the revolution, not Africa’s nascent working class.

— snip —

Learn more at JACOBIN MAGAZINE.

***

[31 DEC 2020]

[Last modified on 1 JAN 2020 at 06:02 PST]

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Economist Dr. Richard Wolff On Basic Economic Theory from a Comparative Perspective, as a Corrective for the Intellectual Dishonesty Built Into Most American Economics Curricula

24 Fri Feb 2017

Posted by ztnh in Anti-Capitalism, Critical Pedagogy, Critical Pedagogy, Critical Theory, Dr. Karl Marx (1818-1883), Education, Global Labour Movement, History of Economic Theory, Marxian Theory (Marxism), Philosophy of Education, Political Economy, Worker Self-Directed Enterprises

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Dr. Richard David Wolff (b. 1942), Economic Update, heterodox economics, Keynesian economics, KPFA, laissez faire, Lord John Maynard Keynes 1st Baron Keynes CB FBA (1883–1946), Lord Robert Skidelsky (b. 1939), Marxian economics, MMT, neoclassical economics, Pacifica Radio Network, Post-Keynesian economics, Robert Jacob Alexander Baron Skidelsky FBA (b. 1939), transcript, UMKC heterodox economics

usdayofrageLUMPENPROLETARIAT—On free speech radio’s Economic Update, host and heterodox economist, Dr. Richard D. Wolff discussed various economics topics, as he does every week.  And, this week, Dr. Wolff devoted the second half hour of the broadcast to breaking us out of the dominant ruling class/Wall Street paradigm of economics, which we are all force-fed in most economics textbooks in most American schools, colleges, and universities, and which permeates our newspapers, our radio, TV, and internet news reports.  Thankfully, there is more than one way to approach the economy and questions of economics.

The dominant version of economic theory (dominant, in terms of geographic footprint, not intellectual superiority), which saturates, at least, the English-speaking (and Western) world is known as neoclassical economics, which is merely one theoretical approach to economics.  By contrast, heterodox economics considers alternative approaches to economic theory and practice from a comparative perspective.  The New School (where Dr. Richard Wolff currently teaches) and the UMKC Department of Economics at the University of Missouri-Kansas City (where your author studied) are two examples of the few heterodox economics departments in the USA, which offer a comparative approach to economics.  Most economics departments around the nation are modeled after the conservative/neoclassical Chicago school of economics.  Indeed, the Chicago school has essentially colonised most economics departments around the nation and stifled alternative perspectives, such as Marxian economics (which has been suppressed and even criminalised), Keynesian economics (which has been co-opted by neoclassical economics), Post-Keynesian economics (which has sought to remain true to the original spirit of Keynes‘ work), and institutional economics (which has sought alternative ways of viewing the economy, from broader perspectives beyond simply money, business, finance, and trade).

As a result of the stifling hegemony of neoclassical economics, the field of economics has been rendered deliberately abstruse, opaque, dull and uninteresting, and completely removed from all human/social context by an overly mathematised and rigid adherence to neoclassical assumptions.  The interesting professors of economics employ a comparative approach and make real-world connections, such as Dr. John Henry, who taught us at UMKC, among other things, about the History of Economic Theory (or, somewhat derogatorily, the History of Economic Thought) as well as microeconomic analysis.  Another interesting, indeed awesome, UMKC professor of economics was Dr. Fred Lee, who was respected for his level of knowledge and vast reading.  Dr. Fred Lee was always one of my favorite participants at UMKC economics presentations because he didn’t mince words and he always called it like he saw it.  He was very outspoken and very passionate about heterodox economics and socioeconomic justice.  Indeed, if memory serves me, Dr. Lee coined the name heterodox economics.  For economics professors, who are not confined within neoclassical dogma, economic theory must always be first and foremost descriptive before prescriptive.  Notably, Dr. Henry also taught Post-Keynesian economist Dr. Stephanie Kelton, who continues to teach the world, as do other MMT advocates, how our money system works and why the government can afford to spend for public purpose, such as effectively ending involuntary unemployment through an MMT-based job guarantee programme.

It’s a shame that the American people are not taught to understand their own economy and economic system, or how the two-party system of Democrats and Republicans locks in place a capitalist system, which is misunderstood and confounded by myths, perpetuated by bad, or narrow and dogmatic, economics curricula.  But our U.S. Constitution encourages us to speak freely and for each one to teach one, and to help our neighbors survive and prosper.  That’s where the politics of education come in, which might involve base human drives, such as ego and greed, but also altruism and a deeper underlying philosophy of education.  Even Pope Francis uttered a few years ago, “Injustice is not invincible.”  To help us better understand our world, Dr. Richard Wolff disabuses us of many harmful myths regarding our economy, economics and economic theory, and how those economic myths harm our working class lives. [1]  Listen (and/or download) here. [2]

Messina

***

[Working draft transcript of actual radio broadcast by Messina for Lumpenproletariat and Economic Update.]

Economic UpdateECONOMIC UPDATE—[24 FEB 2017]

[A critique of the working conditions and pay scales of so-called ‘adjunct’ professors at post-secondary educational institutions.]

[KPFA paid-staff member Mitch Jeserich appeals for KPFA listener-sponsorship, membership, and support in the context of KPFA’s Winter Fund Drive (February 2017).]

[A brief comparative analysis of wealth inequality around the world.]

[KPFA paid-staff member Mitch Jeserich appeals for KPFA listener-sponsorship, membership, and support in the context of KPFA’s Winter Fund Drive (February 2017).]  (c. 31:51)

On basic economic theory, from a comparative perspective.

DR. RICHARD WOLFF:  “Okay.  Much of the time, that remains for me today, is going to be used to talk about economic theory.  Don’t worry.  This is not gonna be an abstruse lesson of the sort you might get in a bad class in a bad school.  I’m gonna try to make it clear.  And I’m gonna try to make it interesting.  But we have to deal with this.  (c. 31:58)

“Economics is not like fixing a car.  If you wanna fix a car, you go to a place where they teach you:

This is the carburetor. This is the engine. This is how it works. This is how it breaks down. And this is how you fix it, when it breaks down, so that it works again.

“Things are kind of understood.  They’re fairly universal, car engines being what they are.  And, so, you can become a mechanic and a skilled worker by learning how the engine is put together, what goes wrong, and how to fix it.  Economics is not like that.  (c. 32:56)

“What do I mean?  The economy is part of the mystery of how human beings interact with one another.  You know other parts of that mystery because we all confront those mysteries.

Why do I find that person attractive, rather than the other one?

Why did I marry him, or her, rather than that other one?

Why am I friends with this person, but not with the other one?

“These are mysteries of relationships.  And we spend much of our time trying to figure them out.  And we make progress.  We learn how or why, at least part of how or why we [for example] marry the way we do, and we have friendships the way we do, and this job works for us, and that one doesn’t, and this neighborhood is attractive, and that one isn’t, etcetera.  (c. 33:47)

“Well, the economy is like that.  We don’t experience the economy in the same way.  If you are the head of a big corporation, you do not experience the economy in the same way, that a person does, who drives a truck.  If you’re a farmer, you do not experience the economy the way you do, if you’re an office worker.  You don’t.  And that’s not a fault or a failure.  That’s the way the world is.

“But it’s even more complicated.  If you were educated in certain ways, you were taught to think about the economy in certain ways.  And if someone else taught you with a very different approach, then you learned that approach.  It turns out that economic systems are understood, and experienced, differently by different people.  And it has always been that way, just like human beings understand love, sex, friendship, and all the other relationships in life in very different ways.  And, indeed, one of the fascinating and interesting things about life is to encounter, to discover other ways of looking at the world.  It will change us.

“If I look at it one way, and I encounter a person, who looks at it in a different [way], my perspective will be changed.  I will now be more sensitive.  I will understand, even if I don’t agree with other ways of thinking about the world.  It’s a little bit like discovering that there are other kinds of food preparation, than the one you grew up with.  You don’t have to like them as well; but they’re interesting; they’re tasty.  From time to time, you would like to taste it again.  So, here in New York, one restaurant offers sushi and one restaurant Tex-Mex and another restaurant Chinese food and so on.  And people in New York love that about this city, that you can literally go to a different corner of the world whenever you want to taste how differently human beings have understood the relationship between us and the food we eat.  (c. 36:08)

“So, let’s do the economics.  How do we get into it?  Well, I give that a lot of thought because, when I teach economics, I teach it in what we call a comparative perspective.  I don’t teach economics as if it were carburetor or car engine studies.  The economy isn’t a thing, that it works in this and this way, that we can learn and figure out how to fix.  That makes economics boring, mechanical, and technical, when what is exciting about it is precisely how differently [for example] people eat.  Imagine, if I gave you a course about food, and all I talked about was how you cook the hamburger, here’s how you cook the french fries, and, therefore, here’s how you make food.  Eventually, you’d figure out that that isn’t about food.  That’s about one kind of food.  And you don’t want to be limited to just that kind.  You want to, at least, know what the other ones are. (c. 37:19)

“It would be as if I taught you a course on religion, but the only religion I told you about was, let’s say, uh, Unitarian Universalist religion.  After a while, you’d say to me:  Look, I’m perfectly happy learning about Unitarians and Universalists. But aren’t there other religions, too? Like Roman Catholicism or Muslim religion or Jewish religion? Or and-so-on-and-so-on?  You want to understand that people engage with divinity, God, the spiritual, if you like, in different ways, just like they engage with food in different ways.  Well, friends, your education is narrow, stunted, and inadequate, if you think economics is one way to go.  (c. 38:10)

“Now, why do I stress that?  Because that’s how it’s taught in the United States.  And that’s how it’s been taught for most of the last 50 years.  We do not admit to most of our students in most of our colleges and universities that there are alternative ways of understanding what an economy is, how it works, what’s wrong with it, and how to fix it.  There are multiple ways of doing that, just like there are multiple ways of dancing or singing or eating or dressing or praying or anything else, particularly anything else that really matters in life.  And our economy matters, just like our eating matters and our religions matter and so on.  (c. 38:57)

“So, I am now, in the time that I have, going to try to address the different ways you can understand the economy.  One last reason, before I do it, why: because economics has been so narrowly taught in the United States, because only one way of thinking about it dominates almost to the exclusion—not quite, but almost to the exclusion—of other ways.  Our economic leadership in companies, in the government, has been poor.

“We have had, for example, [an economic] crash in 1929, a terrible [economic] crash, that gave us [an economic] depression—that’s what it’s called—that lasted eleven years, roughly, from ’29 to ’41.  One of the reasons we had that terrible crash is we didn’t have the insight, the understanding, to see it coming.  We didn’t understand, once it came, why it was there.  And we didn’t understand real well what to do about it, which is why it lasted eleven horrible years.

“And did we, at least, learn after that?  Not really very well. [3]  The narrowness of our economics prevented us from asking, and answering, crucial questions.  And that’s part of the reason why, in 2008, capitalism in the United States and beyond crashed again.  And, once again, the profession didn’t see it coming. [4]  And, once again, when it hit, they didn’t understand why.  And, once again, they couldn’t fix it, which is why here we are, eight years, nine years later, in 2017, a crash that happened in 2008, and we’re still, most of us, living with the consequences, the terribly damaging consequences.  That should have been more than enough evidence to suggest that the way we were teaching, studying, learning, and using economics was inadequate, was too narrow, missed too much.  But it didn’t.

“It didn’t.  And that’s because there are reasons why we teach what we teach, even though it doesn’t work very well.  A dangerous way to run your society.  But it’s the one, that has dominated in our society.”  (c. 41:38)

[KPFA paid-staff member Mitch Jeserich appeals for KPFA listener-sponsorship, membership, and support in the context of KPFA’s Winter Fund Drive (February 2017).] (c. 43:18)

DR. RICHARD WOLFF:  “So, what is that way?  [What is that single, narrow, way in which economics is taught at most schools, colleges, and universities in the United States?]  It’s called neoclassical economics.  We don’t have enough time to go into why it has this funny name.  But it does.  That’s a matter of the history of how it arose.  And, in this view, capitalism is a magnificent economic system.  Neoclassical economics is not neutral about capitalism.  It loves capitalism.  It doesn’t just love capitalism.  But it loves a particular kind of capitalism; it’s the kind with very little government intervention in the economy. [5]  Indeed, from a neoclassical perspective:

All we want from the government is to make sure that nobody interferes with this beautiful system called capitalism, a system, which is perfect, which rewards everybody in proportion to what they contribute.  If you’re rich it’s ‘cos you contributed a lot.  If you’re poor, it’s because you haven’t.

“It’s very morally loaded this way.

It’s a system, in which what gets produced is what everybody wants.  So, it’s kind of fair.  It’s kind of responsive.  It’s consumer-oriented, if you like that language.  It’s a system, that’s self-healing.  If anything goes wrong, it fixes itself.  You don’t need the government to come in.  You just let it be. [6]  Let the private individual buy and sell—buy the goods and services, that he or she wants—sell whatever they have to contribute to production, their labour (if that’s all they have) or some capital (if they have some wealth) or their land (if they own some).  You contribute what you wish and have.  And you get in proportion to what you contribute.  Fairsies, you might call it.  A wonderful system, that is the best way to organise an economy, that the world has ever achieved.  And, therefore, it should be celebrated, which is what neoclassical economics does.  And it should not be interfered with, which is the message, that neoclassical economics gives to the journalists, who write about the economy, to the politicians, that run the government, and to the leaders, who own and operate the enterprise.  (c. 45:50)

Neoclassical teaches: The private economy is what should dominate, is the best thing, that could happen, should be left alone, and works perfectly.  Nobody has anything to complain about.  Your income is your reward for what you contribute.  Don’t complain.  If you want more, contribute more.  And, if you don’t have more to contribute—you don’t have more labour you could do; if you don’t have more capital, you could offer; if you don’t have more land, you could make available—then, it’s your fault.  And you have to live with whatever rewards you get for what contribution you make.  (c. 46:26)

“This [i.e., neoclassical economics, or pro-capitalist dogma] is a celebratory system.  This is what is taught in American colleges and universities 95% of the time.  5%, not quite.  I’m gonna get to that in a minute.  But this is what is taught.  Therefore, you shouldn’t be surprised that journalists, when they write about economics, write as if we live in this wonderful system, that works really beautifully; and that the government should keep its hands off; and nobody should break the rules; and, if there’s a problem, the market, the system will solve it itself.

“And you shouldn’t be surprised if corporate leaders love this because it says they’re in charge of an enterprise, which can do everything it wants.  The government is not gonna interfere because that would only make things bad.  This is what the people, who run the society, want.  Politicians are told to think like this.  That’s why you can hear politicians so often saying these weird things, like:

Let the market decide.

Let the private enterprise system work its way out.

“These [neoclassicals or capitalists] are people, who believe this [economic mythology].  And, after all, they were taught it over and over again.  They got it from their newspapers and TV.  They get it from their political leaders.  Of course, they believe it.  (c. 47:47)

“But is this the only way to look at the economy?  And the answer is an absolute, unqualified, no, no, no.

“To imagine that this is the only way to understand an economy is the same thing as imagining that the only way to have a meal is to eat hamburgers and french fries, or the only way to pray is in the manner of the Unitarians and Universalists.  It is to misunderstand a part of the story for the whole story.  And that does you no service and is no complement to your smarts.  (c. 48:26)

GrantKeynes“So, here we go.  Here’s the first alternative [to neoclassical economic theory or capitalist ideology].  The first alternative is called Keynesian economics [7], named after John Maynard Keynes, a British economics professor at Cambridge University, who in the depths of the Great Depression of the 1930s looked around him and said:

I see a quarter of the people unemployed.  I see poverty and misery all around me.  Don’t tell me capitalism is a wonderful system, that works beautifully, that produces wealth, prosperity, economic growth, that gives everybody what they deserve.  Stop it!  You’re describing an economy, that may be a utopian dream you may have.  But it does not describe and, therefore, it is not gonna help us fix an economy, that is clearly not working well.

“This was a bombshell for many.  This was a man, John Maynard Keynes, who had been an accomplished practitioner of neoclassical economics, but who was realistic about what he saw in the Britain of his time, which was as devastated by the Great Depression as the United States was.  And he said:

Capitalism, private enterprise, markets, left to themselves can and, here, clearly have produced social and economic disasters, crashes, poverty, unemployment, misery, inequality, economic instability.

“Should I go on?  And Mr. Keynes didn’t waste a minute.  He developed an explanation for how private enterprise capitalism can produce these disasters and what should be done about it.  And, to make a long story short, he said there were mechanisms, normal and natural to capitalism, that could and regularly would produce economic horror stories, disasters, failures, miseries, inefficiencies, depressions.  And the solution, he said, was for the government to step in.  Systematically, the government should pump money into the economy when it turned down to build it up again, that the government should, when the private sector wasn’t spending enough money to keep people in their jobs working and producing, well, then, the government should step in.  It didn’t even matter to Keynes.  (c. 51:15)

Buy anything you want.  Take in each other’s laundry.  Build national parks.  Do whatever it is, that has to be done.  Keep people working by having the government buy whatever it thinks might be useful to build.  But the government has to come in, otherwise capitalism self-destructs.

“This is a very different economic theory.  Most schools in the United States don’t teach it.  And, if they do teach it, they have one or two faculty doing that, everybody else is parroting the old neoclassical song and dance.  But is Keynesian the only alternative?  Not at all.  (c. 51:58)

marx_and_engels“The third big one: Marxian economics.  And here’s the big difference about it.  Neoclassical economics celebrates private capitalism.  Keynesian economics says private capitalism is good, but only if it’s controlled, regulated, supplemented by government intervention.  Otherwise, the bad parts of it drown out the good parts of it.  But Keynesian economics likes capitalism.  It just likes it with a heavy dose of government involvement, which freaks out the neoclassicals, who don’t want any government.  And, so, that’s been the debate between them—more or less government, more or less government intervention.  (c. 52:35)

“Marxian economics: completely different.  For Marxian economics, the problem isn’t more or less government.  The problem is capitalism, itself.  This system of organising production, so that a tiny group of people at the top, the board of directors, make all the decisions; and the mass of employees do what their told.  That, for Marxists, is the problem.  You have an undemocratic economic system.  And it undermines democracy everywhere else.  You have a system, that gives a small number of people the dominant say.  They’ll make the system work for them and not for everybody else.  And that’s why you get the inequality, that we talked about in the first half of today’s programme. (c. 53:24)

“No, no, no.  The Marxian argument is:

You have to change the economic system at the foundation. You have to, finally, bring democracy to the workplace.  All the workers together, collectively and democratically, decide what happens in the enterprise, not a handful of shareholders, not a handful of board of directors elected by the shareholders.  No, no, no.

The autocracy, the non-representative nature of the leadership of enterprises, that’s the core problem.  And that has to be fixed.  Otherwise, you will have recessions and depressions and crashes.  The government coming in, as Mr. Keynes proposed, wasn’t enough to stop us from having another crash in 2008, not having learned what the Marxists want us to see, which is the Crash of the 1930s was also a problem of the underlying system.

“Why would a country like ours be this way?  Why would we continue to teach one way of thinking, when it hasn’t worked real well and the alternatives are obvious?  And the answer is: fear.

“For 50 years, the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union made Americans fearful about the Soviet Union.  It talked about Marxism.  So, they [i.e., the Americans] didn’t want to talk about that at all.  If you talked about it, you lost your career; you lost your job; you were in trouble.  A little bit like James Joyce trying to write his novel.  He was censored.  You were pushed away.  It’s a tragedy.  It’s intellectually dishonest.  It’s a tragedy for our country.  We need all the insights and all the theoretical avenues available to our people to solve our problems.  Shutting us out of two of the three major theories in the world today is self-destructive.  It’s only done to fearfully support the status quo, what the corporations now like.

They are not the problem.  It’s the government intervention.  It’s this.  It’s something else.  It’s immigrants.  But it’s not the system, itself.

“Thank you for your attention.  Thank you for your partnership.  I look forward to speaking with you again next week.”  (c. 55:53)

[Economic Update theme music comes in momentarily]

[KPFA paid-staff member Mitch Jeserich, then, closed out the broadcast with appeals for KPFA listener-sponsorship, membership, and support in the context of KPFA’s Winter Fund Drive (February 2017).]

[snip] (c. 59:59)

Learn more at ECONOMIC UPDATE.

***

[1]  Unfortunately, Dr. Richard Wolff seems to perpetuate at least one myth, the myth that federal taxes pay for federal government spending.  Dr. Wolff seems to deliberately avoid informing the public about MMT.

[2]  Terrestrial radio transmission, 94.1 FM (KPFA, Berkeley, CA) with online simulcast and digital archiving:  Economic Update, this one-hour broadcast hosted by Dr. Richard Wolff, Friday, 24 FEB 2017, 10:00 PST.

[3]  After the Great Depression of the 1930s, which was triggered by the economic crash of 1929, Keynesian policies prevailed, which involved increased government interventions to attempt to stabilise the economy.  These economic reforms, however, meant reductions in the extreme wealth accumulation of the ruling classes.  In other words economic reforms, in the context of economic collapse, invariably mean restraints on unbridled financial, business, and labour relations; and such restraints are restraints on capitalism, which are restraints on profit motive.  The ruling classes prefer inequality because obscene wealth depends on obscene poverty.  As the celebrated abolitionist (and former slave) Frederick Douglass presciently articulated:

Power concedes nothing without a demand.  It never did and it never will.  Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both.

During the mid-20th century, ruling class elites, with their well-funded think tanks and connections, eventually managed to undermine Keynesian reforms and usher in a conservative backlash to progressive politics.  By the late 1970s, neoclassical economics struck back in the forms of right-wing elections of President Ronald Reagan (in the USA) and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (in the UK).  Then, we saw the rise of Wall Street, reflected in Oliver Stone’s 1987 blockbuster movie.  At the same time as neoclassical economics was restoring and galvanising its stifling hegemony over the discipline of economics, the ostensibly liberal, or progressive, Democratic Party (USA) was effectively co-opting labour unions and turning them into ‘Gomperist’ business unions.  Such unions today, which are most unions, narrowly focus on individual work site issues, shirk their working class solidarity, and ignore broader societal and political issues, whilst remaining predominantly loyal to the Democratic Party, despite the Democratic Party’s unresponsiveness to working class issues.  Indeed, unions have even lost their legal right to engage in wildcat strikes or general strikes, especially since the passage of the anti-labour Taft-Hartley Act, which labour leaders called the “slave labour bill“.  Even President Truman had to admit that the anti-labour Taft-Hartley Act was a “dangerous intrusion on free speech”, which would “conflict with important principles of our democratic society.”

Today, the fire of organised labour is almost entirely extinguished in the USA; and it poses no political resistance to the anti-working class abuses of capitalism.  And heterodox economics has lost almost all influence in American government and institutions.  Dr. Stephanie Kelton (former chair of the Economics Department at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, or UMKC, and one of your author’s former economics professors) is an exception, as she was hired by Senator Bernie Sanders to work as chief economist, first, in the Senate Minority Budget Committee, then, on his campaign trail.  Unfortunately, Bernie Sanders wasn’t as courageous as FDR was in backing economic reforms to remedy the economic hazards of capitalism.  If Bernie Sanders had been courageous, he would have allowed Dr. Stephanie Kelton to lend her expertise on the campaign trail to explain to the American people, for example, how an MMT-based job guarantee programme could provide real jobs to a faltering economy, stimulate a depressed economy, and even end involuntary unemployment as we know it.  The ideas are out there, only they are being suppressed, not only by the corporate media, but even, apparently, by the cowardice of our ostensible political heroes.  (Even Dr. Richard Wolff seems to refuse to speak honestly about MMT, or even mention it.  He continues, for example, to perpetuate the economic myth that taxes pay for federal government spending, as if the USA’s monetary system (or money system) were still on the gold standard.  It’s impossible to imagine that Dr. Wolff isn’t informed about MMT, as he is personal friends with faculty members at UMKC.  But, then, who knows?  We’ll have to reach out to him and ask.)

As far as economists not having had the foresight to see the Global Financial Crisis of 2007/2008 coming down the pike, as Dr. Richard Wolff points out, we observe that heterodox economists, such as Dr. Hyman Minsky, did provide very cogent analyses and clear warnings of the cyclical economic disasters, which are produced by capitalist modes of production.  For example, see Dr. Minsky’s financial instability hypothesis, in which Minsky argued that a key mechanism, which pushes an economy towards crisis is the accumulation of debt by the non-government sector.  Minsky identified three types of borrowers, which contribute to the accumulation of insolvent debt: hedge borrowers, speculative borrowers, and Ponzi borrowers.  As one of my UMKC economics professors, Dr. L. Randall Wray (himself, a graduate student of Dr. Hyman Minsky) taught us, the only thing, which prevented Dr. Minsky from a more accurate prediction of the Global Financial Crisis, was that nobody counted on such a high degree of creativity, which the financial sector would engage in to extend the Ponzi phase of the so-called business cycle.

We can also look back to the work of heterodox economist Dr. Abba Lerner and his theory of functional finance, which is based on effective demand principles and chartalism.  It states that government should finance itself to meet explicit goals, such as taming the so-called business cycle, achieving full employment, ensuring economic growth, and low inflation.

Lerner’s ideas were most heavily in use during the Post-World War II economic expansion, when they became the basis for most textbook presentations of Keynesian economics and the basis for policy.  Thus, when Keynesian policy came under fire in the late ’60s and early ’70s, it was Lerner’s idea of functional finance, which most people were attacking.  During the post-war period, U.S. unemployment reached a low of 2.9% in 1953 when the inflation rate averaged at 1.1%.

Other economists, such as Dr. L. Randall Wray (UMKC), Dr. Michael Hudson (UMKC), and others have also written critically about the inevitable economic boom-and-crash cycles, which result in widening inequality and worsened economic instability.  What all economists, left of center, agree on is the fact that capitalism demands, at the very least, strong government interventions to prevent mass unemployment and economic misery.  That is the opposite of the laissez faire, or let it be, approach of neoclassical, or free market fundamentalist, economics.  The more radical economists admit, as Dr. Michael Hudson often does, that all economies are planned.  That means that capitalist economic crises are expected and allowed to happen, such as the USA’s subprime mortgage crisis, which caused millions of people to lose their homes, their jobs, and their life savings, but which allowed bankers and profiteers to capture a greater share of wealth.  It’s true, all economies are planned, as Dr. Hudson reminds us, the only questions are:  Will the economy be planned by private for-profit banks and Wall Street for ruling class interests?  Or will the economy be planned by Main Street for working class interests?

[4]  Again, we recall exceptions to the general rule that economists didn’t see the Global Financial Crisis coming, such as Dr. Hyman Minsky and the relevance of his work around financial theory.  In the wake of the subprime mortgage crisis of the late 2000s, The New Yorker labelled the subprime mortgage crisis “the Minsky Moment“.

[5]  Again, here we come to the neoclassical economic principle of laissez-faire economics, which ostensibly argues for very little government intervention in the economy.  Of course, this is only a symbolic principle on the part of neoclassical economists.  They don’t really mean laissez-faire.

To wave the banner of laissez-faire economics, or free market economics, is to make it easier for neoclassical economics to saturate the minds of the public and popular notions about economics.  The unassuming non-economist will readily associate popular buzz words, such as free market and the invisible hand and laissez faire capitalism, with notions of liberty and freedom, if only freedom to choose what one can afford.  But, in actuality, this politically conservative economic principle of laissez-faire economics, where the government is supposed to stay out of the economy, really, is only meant to apply to government interventions, which may help or improve working class interests.  As we saw with the huge government bail-outs of Wall Street interests in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis, making insolvent institutions whole again, resuscitating them to life as zombie banks.  So, what is actually meant by laissez-faire economics is: no government interventions on behalf of the working classes, only for the capitalist asset-owning classes.

It’s important to keep in mind that, when we hear pro-capitalist arguments about keeping the government out of the economy, we cannot overlook the many ways in which government intervenes to safeguard the interests of the ruling capitalist classes.

[6]  Dr. Richard Wolff uses the words, let it be, which is a common American translation of laissez-faire, as in laissez-faire economics, or neoclassical economics.  Laissez-faire is an alternative spelling of the French, laissez faire, which means let it be or leave it be, or which literally translates to let do.

[7]  Students of economics will find, today, that Keynesian economics has been largely supplanted by Post-Keynesian economics, at least at the leading edge of heterodox economics.  As economic historian Lord Robert Skidelsky (whom your author has met occasionally around the UMKC campus as well as attended his presentations) argues, the post-Keynesian school has remained closest to the spirit of Keynes’ original work.  Lord Skidelsky, a British economic historian of Russian origin, is the author of a major, award-winning, three-volume biography of British economist John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946).  Lord Skidelsky is, perhaps, the most authoritative biographer of Keynes.

***

[1 MAR 2017]

[Last modified at 07:41 PST on 8 MAR 2017]

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The Making of a Transnational Capitalist Class: Corporate Power in the 21st Century (2010) by Dr. William K. Carroll

06 Fri Jan 2017

Posted by ztnh in Anti-Capitalism, Anti-Imperialism, Critical Theory, Globalisation, Marxian Theory (Marxism), Neoliberalism, Political Economy, Political Science, Sociology

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Dr. Peter Phillips, Dr. William K. Carroll (b. 1952), interlocking directorates, KPFA, Meindert Fennema (b. Leeuwarden 1946), Mickey Huff M.A., neoliberalism, Pacifica Radio Network, Project Censored, Smedley Darlington Butler (1881–1940), social justice studies, transcript, transnational capitalist class, University of Victoria

transnationalcapitalistclasswilliamkcarrollamazonLUMPENPROLETARIAT—On this week’s edition of free speech radio’s Project Censored, Dr. William K. Carroll discussed his classic and influential book, The Making of a Transnational Capitalist Class: Corporate Power in the 21st Century, on the capitalist imperialism of Euro-North American hegemony, represented by interlocking directorates, corporate power, and resisted by various social movements. [1]

Leslie Sklair (London School of Economics), author of The Transnational Capitalist Class (2001), called Professor Carroll‘s The Making of a Transnational Capitalist Class, “the most significant recent contribution on the transnational capitalist class.”  Listen (and/or download) here. [2]

Messina

***

[Working draft transcript of actual radio broadcast by Messina for Lumpenproletariat and Project Censored.]

ProjectCensoredPROJECT CENSORED—[6 JAN 2017]  [KPFA station ID by Erica Bridgeman(sp?)]

[Project Censored theme music:  “We Want” by Junkyard Empire]

“Welcome to the Project Censored show on Pacifica Radio.  I’m Mickey Huff with Peter Phillips.

“On today’s programme, we discuss The Making of a Transnational Capitalist Class: Corporate Power in the 21st Century.  We’ll be joined for the first segment by Professor William Carroll to speak about his book on the topic of the transnational capitalist class.  Later in the programme, we’re joined by journalist Sunsara Taylor and activist Rafael Kadaris, of RefuseFascism.org, to talk about the growing resistance against the incoming Trump administration. [3]  Please stay with us. (c. 1:25)

[brief musical interlude]

“Welcome to the Project Censored show.  I’m Mickey Huff, with Peter Phillips.  On today’s programme, for the first segment, we’ll be talking about an ongoing theme we’ve dealt with on the programme, and certainly a theme, that has been researched and we’ve published about [in the annual Project Censored book].  Peter Phillips has written about the transnational capitalist class in the last several of the Project Censored books in varying degrees.

“And, today, we are going to be in conversation with William Carroll, who is an expert on the matter.  And here is Peter to properly introduce our guest to you.  Peter?” (c. 2:04)

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “Bill Carroll is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Victoria, where he directs the Social Justice Studies programme.  His research interests are political economy and corporate capitalism, various social justice movements, associated with social justice and critical social theory.

“His most recent book is The Making of the Transnational Capitalist Class.  And a recent article he wrote was ‘Neoliberalism and the Transnational Capitalist Class‘.

“So, Bill, welcome.”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Thanks very much.  Thanks for having me.”

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “What is your definition of, or overall understanding of, the transnational capitalist class?” (c. 2:38)

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “There’s a lot of discussion of that—you know?—exactly how to bound the transnational capitalist class.  Who is in it?  And who isn’t in it?  For example, Donald Trump.  The man’s a transnational capitalist.  In some respects, he certainly is, in terms of the reach of his investments; although, they expand beyond it.  And that’s often the case these days.  And, so, it does depend on how you bound it.  (c. 3:00)

“My own research has really looked at, sort of, what I call the leading edge of the transnational capitalist class.  And those are the people, who are really engaged in pretty high level global corporate elite relations and practices.  They might be involved in transnational policy groups, you know, like the World Economic Forum or the Trilateral Commission.  But they sit on corporate boards.  I guess, in terms—you might—it’s just a basic sort of nuts and bolts criterion for it.

“They will be sitting on multiple corporate boards, that span across national borders.  So, they’re involved in, really, transnational corporate business in a networked way.  At the top of the power structure, as directors and executives of the largest corporations.”

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “And these policy groups, that these folks are involved in, like the International Chamber of Commerce, the Bilderberger, the Trilateral Commission—” (c. 3:53)

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “M-hm.”

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “—the World Economic Forum?  Are you saying, then, that those are setting global policies, in terms of monetary policy or other agendas for various nation states?” (c. 4:05)

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “They’re definitely part of the policy planning process.  There’s no question that they have influence.  It’s not as if they dictate policy.  But they have influence; and, of course, the influence is more than just the kind of policy positions, that they’re taking and communicating to state officials and the lobbying processes and that kind of thing.” (c. 4:24)

“But it’s structurally underpinned by the power of the corporations themselves and the structural power of transnational capital, which is a power to invest or divest, to move one’s capital somewhere else, especially, in an era of financialisation, you know, where a lot of capital exists in financial forms.  So, it’s very easy to move it around and to desert, let’s say, a currency, if a particular government moves too far from the neoliberal framework, that’s hegemonic globally these days—although, somewhat tattered; I would say.  In some ways, discredited by the [Global Financial] Crisis of, uh, 2008-2009 [sic]. (c. 5:01)

“And, yet, enjoying a kind of second life, you know, in a weird way through the various austerity programmes, that came in after all the bank bailouts and everything to sort of pay for those bank bailouts.

“So, it’s a bit of a long-winded answer.  But I think the policy groups definitely have influence.  And, you know, if you look at some of these groups, they’re quite strategic.  For example, the transatlantic business dialogue, which has a board comprised of, you know, the major transatlantic capitalists.  They, basically, they shadow the international meetings of state leaders and so forth in the mid-Atlantic region.  And they prepare briefings papers, that they submit before each summit and so on and so forth.

“So, they’re, sort of, in a sense, in the background of the whole policy formation process.”  (c. 5:44)

MICKEY HUFF:  “Bill Carroll, Mickey Huff, here.  This is Project Censored show, Pacifica Radio.  I have two questions.

“One of them just came up because you mentioned the north atlantic.  And I couldn’t help but think of NATO.  And Peter Phillips has certainly written about the transnational capitalist class, in terms of its connections to military companies and contractors and these types of things.

“But how do you see any kind of relationship between this groups of individuals and some of the powers of NATO and how that might help direct policy?”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Definitely.  There are points of contact, informally at least.  This isn’t something I’ve really researched.  But, for example, the Bilderberg conferences generally involve transnational capitalists as well as various state officials.  And the Bilderberg group line has generally been pro-NATO, you know, from its conception in the early ’50s.  So, it’s, sort of, unscripted and undocumented elite discussion, that takes place annually.  And I’m sure that, in those discussions, if, you know, if we were flies on the wall or something, we’d probably hear people talking about specific issues, including NATO.

“NATO’s interesting, again, in terms of thinking about Trump and Trumpism, whatever that might turn out to be.  It’s a bit hard to say at this point.  But, you know, he certainly created a certain panic among European elites, in terms of some of his statements and cosying up to Russia.

“So, you know, the kind of status quo geopolitical power arrangements are, I would say, distinct from the transnational capitalist class has influence in, uh, in geopolitics and, generally, has an interest in open borders and open investment, political stability, which often means the use of force against local left movements and dissident groups and so on and so forth to try to really secure stable conditions for capital accumulation in various countries throughout the world.” (c. 7:34)

MICKEY HUFF:  “And that, surely, goes back to at least Smedley Butler, uh, going way back over, uh, up to a hundred years, even, and certainly in the first two decades of the 20th Century.

“That leads to the second part of what I wanted to ask you about.  But I wanted to know if you could somehow, maybe, encapsulate or give listeners kind of a brief history of the rise of what you are calling the transnational capitalist class.”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “My research is, really, sort of looking at the leading edge, or the top tier, of the transnational capitalist class.  I mean capitalism has been sort of transnational and kind of a globalising force for, you know, five centuries.

“But you begin to trace these power structures coming into being and being consolidated in the 20th Century, and progressively more so in the Post-WWII era, where you really have a new American leadership, or hegemony, a global economy opening up under the U.S. Open Door policy.

“And, so, the former structure, if you like, of imperialism, which involved competing states and states trying to secure spheres of influence through colonisation processes, or things resembling that, that begins to break down.  And, instead, you get development over a long period of time, from the ’40s into the ’70s and ’80s, of this less and less enclosed world, in a sense, of political borders to capital mobility. (c. 8:53)

“And, with that, you have transnational corporations, of course, developing an increasingly internationalised financial system.  And, at the top of that power structure, you have the executives and directors of those largest corporations of those financial institutions.  And, as they’re investing more and more globally, they begin to cohere into a transnational corporate elite.  My colleague Meindert Fennema, really, did the path-breaking work on this sociologically, in terms of networks of the transnational capitalist class in the early 1970s.  He was able to trace it, at that point.

“But, basically, the structure has been very, very much Euro-North American, in terms of the major participants and the way the network of elite relations, these [inaudible] who are sort of sitting on each other’s boards. that that is really a structure, that is very strongly developed in Europe and North America.  And the whole EU integration process has actually deepened that process in Europe.  But the rest of the world is rather peripheral to the network. (c. 9:53)

“So, Japan has some connections into the transnational corporate elite network, but not that many.  And the global south is, larglely, out of the picture.  But, in the past 20 years, there has been some increase in that, you know, with the development of the so-called BRICS and so on.  The high rates of capital accumulation in very large corporations developing in countries, like Brazil; obviously, China; India—that these corporate directors and executives of the really large corporations in the global south are beginning to hook into the transnational corporate elite.  But they still occupy quite a marginal position compared to the European and North American capitalists.” (c. 10:31)

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “Bill Carroll, you have done research showing the interlocks of major corporations, particularly in Canada, but also around the world.  And one of the things, since the [Global] Financial Crisis of 2007-08, you say there has been a thinning, so to speak, of interlocks between major corporations worldwide.  Does that play into the further establishment of these policy groups, the Trilateral Commission and others, that kind of cement opportunities for corporations and CEOs to talk to each other?” (c. 11:05)

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Yeah.  I do think so.  I think the policy groups have been proliferating.  And that corporate policy elite network is a very important apparatus, if you like—again, informal.  It’s not as if there’s someone formally directing all of this.  It’s, really, a matter of, sort of, powerful people being recruited to the boards of these policy groups because they are powerful people, and they have connections and insights about how the world works and so on and so forth.  What we end up with is a pretty dense network of corporate executives and directors, who are connected through their participation in the transnational policy groups.

“And, then, at the same time, there has been a thinning of the interlocks among corporations themselves.  This is an uneven process.  But, in some countries, these corporate elite networks have been quite dramatically.  Japan would be an example of that.  And it has to do with a number of factors.  And one of the main ones is corporate governance reforms coming out of various financial scandals in the 1980s and in the 1990s, so that by the mid-1990s the OECD, for example, had adopted best practice guidelines for how corporate boards should be structured and tried to, basically, reign in the tendency toward a kind of very hierarchical, closed kind of old boys club, and tried to make boards more efficient, so that they could be better generators of corporate profit by making the boards smaller and limiting the involvements of corporate directors on other boards.

“So, there’s still plenty of interlocking happening.  But it’s at a lower rate than it used to be before some of these governance reforms came in.” (c. 12:45)

MICKEY HUFF:  “This is the Project Censored show on Pacifica Radio.  I’m Mickey Huff, with Peter Phillips.  We’re in conversation with Professor Bill Carroll.  The topic is the transnational capitalist class.”

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “Bill, I would like you to talk about neoliberalism and how that seems to be a continually core philosophy for the transnational capitalist class.”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Neoliberalism really has a long history, a deeper history than we often think.  We often identify it with Margaret Thatcher, which is fair enough, in terms of the political mobilisation of neoliberalism in the 1970s in the global north.  But we can take it back to Augusto Pinochet and the coup in Chile in 1973 because, really, Pinochet implemented the first neoliberal project.

“And, before that, there was the development of neoliberal thinking and policy frameworks within the Mont Pelerin Society, beginning in the 1940s, led by the famous economist-philosopher Hayak.  And, really, from Hayak’s writings forward, neoliberalism through Milton Friedman and so on and so forth involves a kind of policy framework, if you like, that recognises capital as the source of wealth and growth and prosperity.  And states are burdens on capital.

“Basically, the philosophy is one of trying to free investment to, basically, seek the highest profits in unregulated markets, trying to privatise public assets because public assets are, again, a drain on wealth creation.  And, so, it’s a philosophy, that really centers the world around the market.  But, of course, in our era, which is an era of very large corporations, not free competition, when you do that, what you’re actually doing is accentuating corporate power.  So, the more capital is deregulated, the more public assets are privatised, and so on and so forth, which are basic to neoliberalism as a framework, the greater the power of capitalists and, especially, the capitalist, that control the very major corporations and financial institutions, the more power they have to move things around, to make the decisions, that they think will maximise their profits.  (c. 15:00)

“And, I guess, in my view, the problem with neoliberalism is that it doesn’t recognise the way capital is actually a parasitic phenomenon, in the sense that it really is generated out of people’s work.  And, so, the labour, that people are doing in factories or in the service sector, whatever, gets turned into capital and turned into profit, some of which goes back to workers as wages.  But the basic system is one of accumulating private wealth in the hands of a very small class of people.

“And neoliberalism is, really, in that sense, I would agree with David Harvey, it’s very much a part of class warfare.  It’s a kind of reassertion of the power of capital in every day life, in the public sphere, in the private sphere, and certainly vis-à-vis the state.”  (c. 15:50)

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “Certainly, Bill, you’ve written about the Atlas Economic Research Foundation, which supports, and is closely involved with, over 400 think tanks worldwide, that support neoliberal policies.  That’s a massive network.  And huge amounts of money go into that.  They, of course, influence the media and push that agenda.

“Do you see Donald Trump, with his sort of neoliberal privatisation policies supporting this globally?  Or is going to be more in isolating the United States economically?”  (c. 16:28)

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Yeah.  I think Trump is a very interesting phenomenon.  I mean, when Thatcher came to power in the, uh, ’70s, and through the ’80s when she was in power and, really, effecting the transformations, that became neoliberalism and were generalised beyond Britain, of course.  You know?  And Reagan was doing the same thing at the same time.

“When all of that happened, a term that came into parlance, at least among academics, is authoritarian populism.  And, you know, I think Thatcher, certainly, was an authoritarian populist.  But, in a sense, Donald Trump takes that to a new level, in terms of the combination of, kind of, white nationalism, that is in some ways in tension with neoliberalism—at least, they say, Hillary Clinton-style neoliberalism.

“And, on the other hand, he is, himself, a well-placed billionaire capitalist with all sorts of investments and so on and so forth—and, certainly, is a neoliberal in a very basic sense that he believes in the logic of capital.  So, for example, his public works programme is going to be a kind of programme, that privileges corporations and to some extent may be a kind of crony capitalist operation.  It’s hard to say at this point.  We don’t know.  He’s not yet president.  (c. 17:39)

“But, in any case, he is in some ways, I think, a neoliberal.  And, in some ways, his nationalism runs against the grain of neoliberalism, which is why right now there’s so much questioning and tension, I think around the phenomenon and what it might mean for what has been a fairly settled neoliberal hegemony in the world, despite the 2008 [Global] Financial Crisis, that I mentioned earlier.”  (c. 18:02)

MICKEY HUFF:  “Bill Carroll, taking a look at some of the characters, that have begun populating the incoming Trump administration, these are pretty establishment characters, however.  I mean, certainly, we could riff on the authoritarian populism.  That was certainly a component to the campaigning and the rhetoric, that we saw here in the U.S.

“But what about the actual people, that are being put in cabinet positions?  I mean these are Wall Street insiders.  You’ve mentioned crony capitalism.  In many ways, is this not business as usual?”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “I agree.  I think it’s hard to read at this point, I would say.  Like, his cabinet—his cabinet is looks to me like a combination of corporate boardroom and a military junta.  But—”

MICKEY HUFF:  “Sounds like fascism.”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “But I think the people in the cabinet, a lot of them, are pretty mainstream people.  Who knows if Hillary Clinton, uh—she, actually, did win the election.  But she, you know—if she were the president-elect assembling a cabinet, she might have chosen some of the same people—” [Mickey Huff overlapping]

MICKEY HUFF:  “Well, that’s the issue.  Right?”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Yeah—”

MICKEY HUFF:  “Which is back to business as usual.”  (c. 19:06)

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Yeah—”

MICKEY HUFF:  “For neoliberalism, at any rate.

“What do you see in the strain here, maybe, that is a shot across the bow of neoliberalism, outside of ire and angst in the electorate?  You know.  We don’t have time to bring Brexit in it, and all these other things into the discussion, perhaps.

“But I mean what are some signals you see here in, uh, perhaps, that—what might be different in Trump?”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Well, I think the signals so far have been sort of Tweets and—”

MICKEY HUFF:  “[laughs]  Yeah.  Okay.  Yeah.”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “—and right through his term in office.  But—”

MICKEY HUFF:  ” [laughs] “

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “You know.  Things, you know—how much of this was prearranged or exactly how it took place, we don’t really know.

“But, for example, the pressure put on Ford to invest in the United States and to, in fact, divest or not do a project in Mexico, that it was planning to do.  It’s, um, I think maybe the idea of scrapping NAFTA—I mean I don’t think NAFTA will be scrapped—but the renegotiation, which could happen, um, that I think it certainly has people, neoliberals, concerned because NAFTA is sort of the, you know, it’s the template for so much of what has happened, in terms of these investor rights agreements.

“But I agree with you.  I don’t think we’re looking at a massive shift with Trump, except that he does have this authoritarian populist or semi-fascist—however we wanna describe it—aspect to his thinking and to his politick.  And we just have to wait and see how that plays out, I guess.

“But some of his cabinet appointments and some of his advisors, like his chief advisor are, really, far-right activists.  And that’s a bit different.”  (c. 20:52)

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “Certainly, the idea of the final conclusion of the New Deal seems to be part of this administration’s focus, and whether or not they can take Social Security and privatise it, and the safety net programmes, essentially, eliminate or weed down to very, very low levels.

“That authoritarian populism combined with the negations of ethnic groups—”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “M-hm.”

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “—Muslims and immigrants, really does speak to a strong fascism agenda, that—I mean when we go to the actual definition of fascism.  Would you—”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Yeah.”

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “—agree with that?”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Yeah.  I think it’s always tricky, you know, that F-word.  You know.  What is fascism?  Uh, what—”

MICKEY HUFF:  “Well, in a—

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “—”

MICKEY HUFF:  “In terms of political science, not in terms of Nazism and so forth.”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “The aspect of it, that I see, is particularly fascist is the tendency, I think, in Trump from the beginning of his campaigning to really not be interested in open political discussion, debate of issues.  I think his approach is that of kind of very powerful corporate executive.  And I think that’s how he will run the state, to the extent that the president runs the state, which is, you know, definitely has considerable power.  And I think there is a kind of fascism in that, you know, a kind of commitment to the regnant goals of capital and of business.  I’m not sure what he’s gonna end up, in terms of the labour front.  He’s got a Labor Secretary, who is basically opposed to minimum wages. [laughs] You know?

“I mean this is—I think part of fascism is a kind of attack on labour, typically, and on democratic rights, on minority groups, as you mentioned.  And, so, we can see that in Trump.  And I guess we’ll just have to wait and see and figure out how to resist the actual policies, that might come forward under that flag.”  (c. 22:54)

DR. PETER PHILLIPS:  “Bill Carroll, we’re gonna wrap up here pretty quick.  And I just really want you to talk about the transnational capitalist class and its agenda for the world, the privatisation, and the free flow of capital anywhere in the world.  And I really have to think of the American military empire and NATO as in support of that agenda.  So, capital seeks its own places for return.  And that is an ongoing agreement.  Could you comment a little bit on that?”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Well, yeah.  I think ever since, um, you know, again, the original neoliberal project of Thatcherism, neoliberalism has always relied on a strong state to secure them the conditions for the so-called free market, for capital investor rights and mobility and so on and so forth.

“So, I think that translates also, at the international level, to the need for strong militaristic and state back-up to the power of corporations, themselves.  And I don’t see that changing, certainly, I think that is the trajectory of the transnational capitalist class.

“If it’s going to change, it will be pressure from below through democratic movements, that seek alternatives to corporate power, globally and locally.

“But I think neoliberalism, as I’ve mentioned, is in some ways rather discredited.  And, yet, there isn’t any strong alternative, that’s been presented successfully.  Although, I think, Bernie Sanders, you know, with his kind of social-democratic vision was very important and very instructive to see how much traction that got among the American public.

“And, similirly, in Britain with Jeremy Corbyn.  So, you know, we can sort of see.  We can see opposition to neoliberalism, the Pink Tide in Latin America and so on and so forth; developments in South Africa.  But I think we’ve got a real uphill struggle, in the sense of how entrenched, uh, that, both, power of capital and the power of the state and, as you say, the US military, but also the broader kind of global governance framework, that’s come in as part of neoliberalism.”  (c. 25:05)

MICKEY HUFF:  “We’ve been talking today about the transnational capitalist class.  We’ve been joined by Professor of Sociology at the University of Victoria, Bill Carroll.  The book we’ve been discussing is called The Making of a Transnational Capitalist Class: Corporate Power in the 21st Century.

“Bill Carroll, thanks so much for taking time out to join the Project Censored show today.”

DR. WILLIAM K. CARROLL:  “Oh, you’re most welcome.”  (c. 25:28)

[End of interview with Dr. William K. Carroll.] 

MICKEY HUFF:  “After this musical break, we’ll be back to talk about the incoming Trump administration and resistance growing towards it.  Please stay with us.”

[brief music break]  (c. 26:00)

[Begin interview with activist Rafael Kadaris (of RefuseFascism) and journalist Sunsara Taylor on Refuse Fascism actions against Trump taking the White House.]

[snip] (c. 59:59)

Learn more at PROJECT CENSORED.

***

[1]  About the author:

Dr. William K. Carroll, a.k.a. Bill Carroll, is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.  He is known for his work on interlocking directorates, corporate power, and social movements.  His published works include

Expose, Oppose, Propose: Alternative Policy Groups and the Struggle for Global Justice (2016); The Making of a Transnational Capitalist Class (2010)

Remaking Media: The Struggle to Democratize Public Communication (with Robert Hackett, 2006)

Challenges and Perils: Social Democracy in Neoliberal Times (with R.S. Ratner, 2005)

Corporate Power in a Globalizing World (2004, recipient of the 2005 John Porter Tradition of Excellence Book Award of the Canadian Sociological Association)

Critical Strategies for Social Research (2004)

Organizing Dissent: Contemporary Social Movements (1997)

Corporate Power and Canadian Capitalism (1986, recipient of the 1988 John Porter Award).

BRIEF BIOGRAPHY

William K. Carroll was born in 1952 close to Washington, DC.  He immigrated to Canada with his family in 1968, where he attended Brock University in Niagara Falls, and then York University in Toronto.  He obtained his Ph.D. in Sociology in 1981, and the same year accepted a position at the University of Victoria, where he still teaches.

RESEARCH

Bill Carroll is considered a leading Canadian critical sociologist.[i]  His research on the political economy of corporate capitalism, social movements, social change, and critical social theory and method is informed by Marxist and post-Marxist theory, and especially the writings of Antonio Gramsci.  Dr. Carroll produced major empirical work investigating the power and social organisation of capitalist classes in Canada and transnationally.  In parallel, he wrote extensively on Canadian and transnational social movements, with a focus on key institutions of knowledge production, such as the media and alternative policy-planning groups.  Over the years, his research has increasingly integrated environmental concerns, and his most recent project maps out the political power of the carbon extractive industry in Western Canada.[ii]

[2]  Terrestrial radio transmission, 94.1 FM (KPFA, Berkeley, CA) with online simulcast and digital archiving:  Project Censored, this one-hour broadcast co–hosted by host Dr. Peter Phillips and Mickey Huff, M.A., Friday, 6 JAN 2017, 12:00 PST.

[3]  Rafael Kadaris is a longtime SF Bay Area activist, based in Berkeley’s Revolution Books.  He is an activist organiser with Revolution Club and RCP (i.e, the Revolutionary Communist Party).

I first met Rafael back in 2007, when I attended, and participated in, anti-war direct actions at Dianne Feinstein’s San Francisco offices.  That action was organised by various groups, including World Can’t Wait.  I was there with fellow KPFA board candidate Dr. Sureya Sayadi, a Kurdish-American physician and social justice activist.  (We also marched down the road to join in another demonstration in solidarity with the Jena Six.)  I stayed in touch with Rafael, and others from RCP, for some years in the late-2000s.  Rafael was always a very sincere social justice activist and a kind and compassionate human being.  Although, we haven’t always agreed on everything, politically-speaking—me, being a so-called ‘third–party‘ advocate, and him, having long-rejected electoral politics—I have always appreciated his, and the RCP’s, far-left political stance.  We need our comrades on the far left of the political spectrum to counterbalance the deluge of far right political messaging, which saturates corporate media across the country, and which—without a far-left counterbalance—perpetually shifts the political center rightward.  Activists, such as Rafael, remind us, that we must always demand the impossible and refuse fascism.

One thing is for sure, Rafael proved to prophetic back in 2007 when he argued, as liberals and progressives salivated at the prospect of an Obama Presidency, Rafael sighed, the Democrats and Republicans fool the people every time.  Yes, but we haven’t had an active socialist or communist party in the United States since the so-called Red Scare.  Since then, we haven’t had any semblance of political diversity in the USA.  But that discussion continues.

***

[Image by source, used via fair use.]

[8 JAN 2017]

[Last modified at 16:32 PST on 10 JAN 2017]

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