[Marxism] Chossudovsky on privatisation and militarisation

["Jurriaan Bendien" <andromeda246@xxxxxxxxx>]

Chossudovsky writes:

"On the economic front, we can expect militarisation to accelerate the gamut
of neoliberal economic reforms both nationally and internationally (In the
later case, they would be implemented under the auspices of the IMF, World
Bank and World Trade Organisation). Militarisation will be accompanied by a
new deadly wave of privatization of public services, urban infrastructure
would be transferred to private companies, local economies including small
scale enterprises and agriculture would be further destabilized and
deregulated, etc, leading to increased levels of unemployment and the
impoverishment of millions of people. Militarisation is an integral part of
the neoliberal agenda."

Some comments about this -

(1) Privatisation of public services and enterprises is also a response to
the decline of average rates of return, and sluggish demand growth among the
majority of ordinary consumers, i.e. privatisation provides new investment
opportunities through "out-sourcing" public sector tasks, or selling off
public assets, under conditions where the real economy isn't growing
significantly.
(2) Privatisation is a response to the fiscal crisis and indebtedness of the
state: it is a way to balance the books, offloading debts and budget
expenditures at the same time. Ultimately it is not possible to finance the
operations of such a large military machine as the USA has, from taxation
alone.
(2) If  neo-liberal policies eradicates non-profit institutions and
organisations which help integrate people socially, then social control must
necessarily take the form of more direct forms of coercion: police and
military surveillance.
(4) If neoliberal marketisation entails that the future depends on how much
money you have (or can make), yet enormously increases the rich-poor gap,
then this necessarily implies an increase in forms of racism: in the
competition of the "survival of the fittest", some people are just
"culturally and biologically better than others" (sic.).
(5) The military-industrial complex is one of the few areas where the USA
still has global superiority, hence, in a competitive world market, it is
one of the few large industries that has real growth prospects.
(6) What is ahead of the USA has already been experienced since the 1980s by
many other countries in Latin America, Africa, Asia and Australasia; in
terms of political consciousness, the USA lags behind - what has sustained
liberal ideology hitherto is the sheer wealth of the USA.
(7) If historical experience is anything to go by, a militarisation solution
can only succeed for at most three decades or so.

It's in this context worth having a look at Ernest Mandel's essay "World
crisis and the monetarist answer", in Karel Jansen (ed), Monetarism,
economic crisis and the Third World (London: Frank Cass, 1983). In
retrospect, Mandel's prognosis is rather prophetic; he comments among other
things on how, from the late 20th century onwards, ideological conceptions
have increasingly reverted back to the 19th century.

I vividly recall how, in 1979, sociologists confidently denied the existence
of social classes. Who could say that now ?

Jurriaan


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