Globalisation & Neoliberalism

[pandarilla]

Firstly,  this is one of the most interesting and illuminating threads on here in recent times. On the whole , some very incisive and intelligent comment......Apart fromAd lib, unfortunately who is determined to drag this thread through the gutter. His contempt for the electorate is breath taking and the very reason people are voting for the Trumps of this world.

Secondly, Let's quickly analyse he achievements of the ruling neo liberal elite over the past 100 years......WW1, The Great Depression, WW2, The Iron Curtain  ,Apartheid,  The Cold War, Wars in Suez, Cyprus , Korea, Vietnam, The Balkans, Iraq, Afghanistan  etc , African genocide , Banking crises, Financial crises in the Eurozone, Austerity, National debt of trillions, Mass deforestation,  Global warming ,  mass immigration/refugees from regional conflicts.........and more besides.

If Globalised Neoliberalsm was a shop there wouldnae be anything there I'd want to buy.

 

 

This is a bit like that Billy Joel song, 'we didn't start the fire'.

A new version of that is long overdue.

[McSpreader]

Just now, dorlomin said:

I think you have them confused with the Elders of the Protocols of Zion. Neoliberals are only responsible for everything evil since 1979.

I really like the Iron Curtain though. That Stalin, what a card he was hiding his love of Hayek under his Marxist-Leninist rougish exterior. 

Yes I know but It's still those that hold the reins of power in whatever form or whatever the agenda. The ones who lose are the same every time. That's sort of what I was getting at I guess.

[Alan Stubbs]

For people working as self-employed delivery drivers or putting on a paper hat every day to intern at Morrisons, I guarantee that resentment towards anyone for swapping a paddyfield for an iPhone is not high on the agenda. Whilst I'd agree that phenomenons such as globalisation and now the sharing economy are fundamentally positive, there are quite clearly people who's working lives are now less dignified and secure than it might have been for previous generations.

As far as I can tell the left and centre are in a real bind here for two main reasons. Firstly the question of making the huge economic and technological shifts of the last and next few decades work for everyone, are genuinely really difficult. As just one example, the tide seems to have turned against the progress in tackling labour exploitation - how do we successfully regulate against that when business and capital are more transient than ever?

Secondly and sorry to sound like AdLib but the people on the sharp end of these problems are some of the least capable of or willing to engage in these questions. The answers offered up by Farage, Trump and co. are complete bollocks but folk are willing to buy into them. The left have had absolutely nothing to say regarding the issues their traditional voter base faces and the vacuum has been filled by stop the world I want to get off, bogeyman politics; communicated through soundbites and memes. Thanks to the left's complacency and lack of foresight, they now not only have to find new solutions to difficult challenges but they have to get that message to fit on a hat.  

 

[invergowrie arab]

5 minutes ago, Alan Stubbs said:

For people working as self-employed delivery drivers or putting on a paper hat every day to intern at Morrisons, I guarantee that resentment towards anyone for swapping a paddyfield for an iPhone is not high on the agenda. Whilst I'd agree that phenomenons such as globalisation and now the sharing economy are fundamentally positive, there are quite clearly people who's working lives are now less dignified and secure than it might have been for previous generations.

As far as I can tell the left and centre are in a real bind here for two main reasons. Firstly the question of making the huge economic and technological shifts of the last and next few decades work for everyone, are genuinely really difficult. As just one example, the tide seems to have turned against the progress in tackling labour exploitation - how do we successfully regulate against that when business and capital are more transient than ever?

Secondly and sorry to sound like AdLib but the people on the sharp end of these problems are some of the least capable of or willing to engage in these questions. The answers offered up by Farage, Trump and co. are complete bollocks but folk are willing to buy into them. The left have had absolutely nothing to say regarding the issues their traditional voter base faces and the vacuum has been filled by stop the world I want to get off, bogeyman politics; communicated through soundbites and memes. Thanks to the left's complacency and lack of foresight, they now not only have to find new solutions to difficult challenges but they have to get that message to fit on a hat.  

 

Eat the Rich

[Ad Lib]

2 hours ago, pandarilla said:

 

I pretty much agree with this post. Especially in groups, humans can be unbelievably fucking thick.

But you seem to equate attacking neoliberalism from the right with attacking it from the left. They are entirely different angles of perception.

Capitalism has to be controlled. It's all about the degree of that control - and societies through governments have to get a lot of that control back.
 

 

But they yield the same result.

Almost no one doesn't believe capitalism has to be controlled. Where neoliberals disagree with the left is whether and how it can be controlled without massive, dreadful, politically perverse consequences.

Major change is functionally impossible. The best that is physically achievable is incremental change. And the very act of arguing for something more radical makes racists more likely to win and undo the delicate managing of the least shit.

[Ad Lib]

3 hours ago, pandarilla said:

Neoliberal models want the public to invest heavily in research only for a corporation to then hijack that research for massive profit - without returning anything to the public!

It's theft. Public money being filtered (legally I hasten to add) into a few private pockets.

These people only exist on Twitter.

Almost no one wants public money to be spent just so corporations can profit from it. Like, not even most Republicans or Tories believe that, let alone progressives.

You are attacking a man of straw.

[jmothecat]

I knew it was JMO's fault, even when they said it was the bears i knew it was JMO

I'll add 'destroyed neoliberalism' to my CV. I'll just not mention it was inadvertent.

[Ad Lib]

2 hours ago, invergowrie arab said:

It's not even about people being thick they are just uneducated.

The problem is where you would draw the line. I would say I know enough to make an informed decision but so would everyone.

I think a basic civics or legal courses in schools should be mandatory. As someone who did Advanced Higher Modern Studies you can pass that with not the first clue about how the country operates. It's far too focussed on party politics.

I basically think that about 85% of the electorate is not qualified to make decisions about public policy, and about 40% of politicians are in that 85%.

Restricting the vote to those with qualifications in higher or some forms of further education might begin to come close to it, but unfortunately it would lead to riots.

[Ad Lib]

2 hours ago, WaffenThinMint said:

"We believe that sovereignty rests with the people and that authority in a democracy derives from the people."

(Taken from the Liberal Democrats own constitution, for the benefit of anyone other than Graeme Cowie that might care)

I don't think the authority in a democracy comes from Rangers Fans. Maybe I should quit the Lib Dems then.

[invergowrie arab]

10 minutes ago, Ad Lib said:

I basically think that about 85% of the electorate is not qualified to make decisions about public policy, and about 40% of politicians are in that 85%.

Restricting the vote to those with qualifications in higher or some forms of further education might begin to come close to it, but unfortunately it would lead to riots.

Bring back the university seats!!

I was always keen on exploring weighted voting. 10 multiple choice questions and the number correct is what your vote is worth.

[jmothecat]

Maybe 5 votes per higher, 10 votes per advanced higher, 50 per degree and a bonus 500 votes if you have a politics degree.

[invergowrie arab]

I was "engaging" with some first year politics students about Brexit only last week.

A more clueless bunch of thickos you couldn't wish to meet.

No, I think it's best if the law graduates get the bonus 500. 250 for a science/medicine/engineering, 100 for humanities and 10 for arts.

[Ad Lib]

2 minutes ago, invergowrie arab said:

I was "engaging" with some first year politics students about Brexit only last week.

A more clueless bunch of thickos you couldn't wish to meet.

No, I think it's best if the law graduates get the bonus 500. 250 for a science/medicine/engineering, 100 for humanities and 10 for arts.

Students ain't graduates.

[invergowrie arab]

3 minutes ago, Ad Lib said:

Students ain't graduates.

I'm not sure I have said otherwise.

[welshbairn]

You couldn't have it for General Elections obviously, but a 3 question quiz for referenda might be an idea. Say for Brexit:

1. Name a European Country.

2. If we leave the EU will it stop all the Pakistanis coming in?

3. What do we spend more on, the NHS or Europe?

[ayrmad]

5 hours ago, Ad Lib said:

You say that like it's sarcastic, but that's literally correct.

The vast majority of human beings are fucking morons. Democracy is like asking a six-year-old illiterate to design and build you a functioning jumbo jet.

Your tears are salty.

[jmothecat]

I was "engaging" with some first year politics students about Brexit only last week.

A more clueless bunch of thickos you couldn't wish to meet.

No, I think it's best if the law graduates get the bonus 500. 250 for a science/medicine/engineering, 100 for humanities and 10 for arts.

First year students of almost any subject tend to be a bit clueless and loudmouth. Often siding instantly with the controversial view on something or regurgitating the first lecture they attended. Good Will Hunting style.

[invergowrie arab]

2 minutes ago, jmothecat said:

 

First year students of almost any subject tend to be a bit clueless and loudmouth. Often siding instantly with the controversial view on something or regurgitating the first lecture they attended. Good Will Hunting style.

 

That's right, do you know them?

[ayrmad]

2 hours ago, pandarilla said:

 

You need to keep up chief.

Do you think ad lib doesn't know this? He's been clear that parties have to say that to get elected but actually the system is pretty shit.
 

 

Perhaps he shouldn't have been hypocritical enough to stand for election to a system he quite obviously has no faith or interest in, he'll be using Haye's sore toe defence next.

[jmothecat]

That's right, do you know them?

No, but I do remember speaking to a first year politics student in the QMU a few years ago. She told me that fascism was the only legitimate form of government and that her plan was to move to Barbados and live on shellfish after she graduated until the world saw sense.