[WSF-Discuss] Fwd: Follow Brazil's Example

Wed Mar 25 12:43:31 UCT 2009

I agree. We have to be careful with this polarization, as it is
weakening our capacity to develop pragmatic and effective strategies
for change. It is also exposing a lot of people who do not agree with
the mainstream to a lot of confusion, as the "New Right" is being more
flexible and is using some of our causes to frame their ideas in a way
that is more "politically correct" and appealing to those who are
searching for alternatives.

Warm regards,

Ana Margarida Esteves

2009/3/25 Giuseppe Caruso <giu.caruso at gmail.com>:
> Dear Jai,
>
> thank you for this. A quick line of comment on this: As many in the
> WSF believe/practice, NEVER is either one or the other. Such obtusely
> radical dualism (any dialectics comrade wallerstein?) polarises, does
> not explain and does not develop any robust theory/practice of change.
> but of course i guess that's just a snippet of W's article which i
> read and found mostly interesting if a little "predictable"
>
> Best
> g
>
> 2009/3/25 Jai Sen <jai.sen at cacim.net>:
>> Wednesday, March 25, 2009
>>
>> Here’s an article that I think all on this list would want to read – since
>> the author, Immanuel Wallerstein, looking at the world situation today in
>> the short, medium, and long term, says :
>>
>> What can we do? First of all, we must be clear what the battle is about. It
>> is the battle between the spirit of Davos (for a new system that is not
>> capitalism but is nonetheless hierarchical, exploitative and polarizing) and
>> the spirit of Porto Alegre (a new system that is relatively democratic and
>> relatively egalitarian). No lesser evil here. It's one or the other.
>>
>>             Any comments ?
>>
>>             JS
>>
>>
>> Begin forwarded message:
>>
>> From: CyberBrook <Brook at CALIFORNIA.COM>
>> Date:  March 24 2009 6:37:44 PM GMT+05:30
>> To: SOCIAL-MOVEMENTS at LISTSERV.HEANET.IE
>> Subject: Follow Brazil's Example
>> Reply-To: International forum for discussion and information on social
>> movements <SOCIAL-MOVEMENTS at LISTSERV.HEANET.IE>
>> Here's a short article by Immanuel Wallerstein from a special section of The
>> Nation on "reimagining socialism". There are other worthy contributions to
>> this topic there as well.
>> http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090323/wallerstein
>> Any comments or suggestions?---Dan
>>
>> Eco-Eating: Eating as if the Earth Matters
>> www.brook.com/veg
>>
>>
>>
>> Follow Brazil's Example
>>
>> Immanuel Wallerstein
>>
>> On : Reimagining Socialism: A Nation Forum
>>
>> http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090323/wallerstein
>> This article appeared in the March 23, 2009 edition of The Nation.
>>
>>
>> March 4, 2009
>>
>> There seem to me to be two occasions, which require two plans for the world
>> left, and in particular for the US left. The first occasion is in the short
>> run. The world is in a deep depression, which will only get worse for at
>> least the next one or two years. The immediate short run is what concerns
>> most people who are facing joblessness, seriously lowered income and in many
>> cases homelessness. If left movements have no plan for this short run, they
>> cannot connect in any meaningful way with most people.
>>
>> The second occasion is the structural crisis of capitalism as a world
>> system, which is facing, in my opinion, its certain demise in the next
>> twenty to forty years. This is the middle run. And if the left has no plan
>> for this middle run, what replaces capitalism as a world system will be
>> something worse, probably far worse, than the terrible system in which we
>> have been living for the past five centuries.
>>
>> The two occasions require different, but combined, tactics. What is our
>> short-run situation? The United States has elected a centrist president,
>> whose inclinations are somewhat left of center. The left, or most of it,
>> voted for him for two reasons. The alternative was worse, indeed far worse.
>> So we voted for the lesser evil. The second reason is that we thought
>> Obama's election would open up space for left social movements.
>>
>> The problem the left faces is nothing new. Such situations are standard
>> fare. Roosevelt in 1933, Attlee in 1945, Mitterrand in 1981, Mandela in
>> 1994, Lula in 2002 were all the Obamas of their place and time. And the list
>> could be infinitely expanded. What does the left do when these figures
>> "disappoint", as they all must do, since they are all centrists, even if
>> left of center?
>>
>> In my view, the only sensible attitude is that taken by the large, powerful
>> and militant Landless Workers' Movement (MST) in Brazil. The MST supported
>> Lula in 2002, and despite all he failed to do that he had promised, they
>> supported his re-election in 2006. They did it in full cognizance of the
>> limitations of his government, because the alternative was clearly worse.
>> What they also did, however, was to maintain constant pressure on the
>> government--meeting with it, denouncing it publicly when it deserved it and
>> organizing on the ground against its failures.
>>
>> The MST would be a good model for the US left, if we had anything comparable
>> in terms of a strong social movement. We don't, but that shouldn't stop us
>> from trying to patch one together as best we can and do as the MST
>> does--press Obama openly, publicly and hard--all the time, and of course
>> cheering him on when he does the right thing. What we want from Obama is not
>> social transformation. He neither wishes to, nor is able to, offer us that.
>> We want from him measures that will minimize the pain and suffering of most
>> people right now. That he can do, and that is where pressure on him may make
>> a difference.
>>
>> The middle run is quite different. And here Obama is irrelevant, as are all
>> the other left-of-center governments. What is going on is the disintegration
>> of capitalism as a world system, not because it can't guarantee welfare for
>> the vast majority (it never could do that) but because it can no longer
>> ensure that capitalists will have the endless accumulation of capital that
>> is their raison d'être. We have arrived at a moment in which neither
>> farsighted capitalists nor their opponents (us) are trying to preserve the
>> system. We are both trying to establish a new system, but of course we have
>> very different, indeed radically opposed, ideas about the nature of such a
>> system.
>>
>> Because the system has moved very far from equilibrium, it has become
>> chaotic. We are seeing wild fluctuations in all the usual economic
>> indicators--the prices of commodities, the relative value of currencies, the
>> real levels of taxation, the quantity of items produced and traded. Since no
>> one really knows, practically from day to day, where these indicators will
>> shift, no one can sensibly plan anything.
>>
>> In such a situation, no one is sure what measures will be best, whatever
>> their politics. This practical intellectual confusion lends itself to
>> frantic demagoguery of all kinds. The system is bifurcating, which means
>> that in twenty to forty years there will be some new system, which will
>> create order out of chaos. But we don't know what that system will be.
>>
>> What can we do? First of all, we must be clear what the battle is about. It
>> is the battle between the spirit of Davos (for a new system that is not
>> capitalism but is nonetheless hierarchical, exploitative and polarizing) and
>> the spirit of Porto Alegre (a new system that is relatively democratic and
>> relatively egalitarian). No lesser evil here. It's one or the other.
>>
>> What must the left do? Promote intellectual clarity about the fundamental
>> choice. Then organize at a thousand levels and in a thousand ways to push
>> things in the right direction. The primary thing to do is to encourage the
>> decommodification of as much as we can decommodify. The second is to
>> experiment with all kinds of new structures that make better sense in terms
>> of global justice and ecological sanity. And the third thing we must do is
>> to encourage sober optimism. Victory is far from certain. But it is
>> possible.
>>
>> So, to resume: work in the short run to minimize pain, and in the middle run
>> to ensure that the new system that will emerge will be a better one and not
>> a worse one. But do the latter without triumphalism, and knowing that the
>> struggle will be tremendously difficult.
>>
>>
>> ______________________________
>>
>> Jai Sen
>> jai.sen at cacim.net
>> CACIM, A-3 Defence Colony, New Delhi 110 024, India
>> www.cacim.net
>> Ph : +91-11-4155 1521, +91-98189 11325 - PLEASE NOTE NEW SECOND NUMBER !
>>
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