[PEN-L:1975] Re: Something completely different

[bill mitchell <ECWFM@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Doug says:

>This is getting very depressing. First we're told that the French strikers
>are a bunch of racist, nuclear-armed greedheads; now we're told that
>they're corrupt and "over-reaching." That's not the way I read it at all. I
>see unions making very broad political demands - against austerity, against
>what Daniel Singer calls "the American nightmare" being proposed for the
>EU. Since I'm usually the pessimist on most issues, it feels odd to be
>taking this position, but the French strikes are good news. Maybe not
>perfect, but Jesus, gang, it's been a pretty awful decade, hasn't it?
>

i normally am in agreement with you doug. but if you are referring to my
serious contributions to the debate here then why not characterise them in more
accurate ways - i did not call them nuclear armed greedheads, in fact i don't
even know what that means. i said that huge issues like the french bombs (which
curiously people in the US, for example, seem to not care much about - even the
left) are ignored in general by the european unions. i did say that the unions
pushing the strikes have not been particularly sympathetic to the plight of the
migrant workers in france.

i sort of think about all the anti-bill posts on this topic in the context of
"what price salvation?" (george bernard shaw). the union movements around the
world are not in my view serving as a vehicle for dialectical change (this is
now commenting a bit on louis's post of yesterday too).

yes they are groups of workers asking for economic protection. not for all
workers, but for themselves. so what? have we got such a narrow perception of
class struggle that we will be context with what ever the workers say.

i think that marxism in the 1990s is a much more sophisticated ideology (with
the attendent need for a much more sophisticated praxis) than it was in teh
1960s - go get em era.

we have to be mindful that the revolution cannot be merely economic. that does
nothing much for women, minorities, unskilled, and fails to address the
environmental issues entirely. i think the early marxist activist model which
concentrated class struggle entirely on the economic mode is not appropriate
now.

unions have failed badly (in general) to embrace the changing needs of the
struggle. they have failed to attract women, the youth, and ignore major
environmental implications of their stances.

so i worry as to whether we harness the wagon to this horse with all its myopia
and unattractiveness (recognising that some of the union focus is still very
important - *please read that last phrase and remember i said it*), or do we
strive for more broad based and inclusive vehicles to push the struggle along.

i must admit i am favouring the latter. i feel more comfortable with
organisations that include women, for example, as partners in the struggle. i
certainly prefer organisations that see the protection of the environment (and
the need to construct social organisation so that it can be protected) as a
paramount thing.

the french tests for example in mururoa were horrific acts of violence against
the people and nature. the reductions in pensions for train drivers, is in
relative terms, minor, in my view. that is why we are disagreeing doug here. my
"function" weights things like that.

i suspect that the french unions have no broader agenda. the union movement has
to have or become redundant. then the cappos have won and the scale of attack
on workers and the natural world will be like nothing else. i just want the
left to be discussing this.

it is nothing to do with greedheads, whatever that means.

kind regards
bill

p.s. Louis seems to have a set against academics in tenured jobs. let me tell
you that academics in OZ no longer have tenure. the start of us losing it was
intiated by the pathetic academic union we have who traded award conditions
relating to tenure for a measly 2 per cent pay rise.
--
         ####    ##        William F. Mitchell
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