Leftwing politics - Anti-Globalism

[pieter]

Europe faces multiple challenges, dangers, threats and thus political developments. Thank god like in the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South-Korea, Singapore, the Western Cape in South Africa, Brazil and India moderate centrist democratic forces are more dominant still than the extremist forces of the left, right, theologic fundamentalist side or military dictatorial direction.



With the growth of the popular right, the renaissance of the alt right (romantic, reactionary, utopic and messianic and darwinist) European nationalism, Neo-liberalist Capitalism and certain theocratic or National conservative national religious tendencies (Catholic Poland, Orthodox Russia, Orthodox Macedonia, Serbia, Greece and Cyprus, and the Islamism of certain Muslim migrant groups) the counter movement of anti-fascism re-emerged on the stage. The anti-fascist movement has roots in the European ultra-left (also called Radical left), left and center left, since you have Social-Democratic anti-fascists (old Dutch, Polish, Danish, French, Czech, German and Austrian Social Democratic resistance fighters and circles), communist anti-fascists (the Old German KPD anti-fascists, the Polish and Dutch communist resistance during the Second World War) and the anarchist anti-fascists of the Spanish civil war and cold War Franco Spain.



During the nineties anti-fascism got new international vibes, strength and dynamism due to the anti-globalization movement, or counter-globalisation movement. That movement has it's roots in the late eighties during the Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, that took place in West Berlin in 1988 and a counter summit against G7 which was organized in Paris in July 1989. The strong protests that took place in both West-European capitals at the end of the Cold War era can be categorized as a precursor of the anti-globalization movement.

After that the anti-globalization movement grew in strength and organisation during the nineties in Madrid during the 50th anniversary of the IMF and the World Bank, which was celebrated in Madrid in October 1994. Madrid94 was the scene of a protest by an ad-hoc coalition of what would later be called anti-globalization movements. Starting from the mid-1990s, Annual Meetings of the IMF and the World Bank Group have become center points for anti-globalization movement protests. They tried to drown the bankers' parties in noise from outside and held other public forms of protest under the motto "50 Years is Enough".



One of the first international anti-globalization protests was organized in dozens of cities around the world on June 18, 1999, with those in London and Eugene, Oregon most often noted. The drive was called the Carnival Against Capital, or J18 for short. The day coincided with the 25th G8 Summit in Cologne, Germany. The protest in Eugene turned into a riot where local anarchists drove police out of a small park. One anarchist, Robert Thaxton, was arrested and convicted of throwing a rock at a police officer.

The second major mobilization of the movement, known as N30, occurred on November 30, 1999, when protesters blocked delegates' entrance to WTO meetings in Seattle, Washington, USA. The protests forced the cancellation of the opening ceremonies and lasted the length of the meeting until December 3. There was a large, permitted march by members of the AFL-CIO, and other unauthorized marches by assorted affinity groups who converged around the Convention Center. The protesters and Seattle riot police clashed in the streets after police fired tear gas at demonstrators who blocked the streets and refused to disperse. Over 600 protesters were arrested and thousands were injured. Three policemen were injured by friendly fire, and one by a thrown rock. Some protesters destroyed the windows of storefronts of businesses owned or franchised by targeted corporations such as a large Nike shop and many Starbucks windows. The mayor put the city under the municipal equivalent of martial law and declared a curfew.



On April 2000, around 10,000 to 15,000 protesters demonstrated at the IMF, and World Bank meeting (official numbers are not tallied). International Forum on Globalization (IFG) held training at Foundry United Methodist Church. Police raided the Convergence Center, which was the staging warehouse and activists' meeting hall on Florida Avenue on April 15. The day before the larger protest scheduled on April 16, a smaller group of protesters demonstration against the Prison-Industrial Complex in the District of Columbia. Mass arrests were conducted; 678 people were arrested on April 15. Three-time Pulitzer Prize winning, Washington Post photographer Carol Guzy was detained by police and arrested on April 15, and two journalists for the Associated Press also reported being struck by police with batons. On April 16 and 17 the demonstrations and street actions around the IMF that followed, the number of those arrested grew to 1,300 people.

In September 2002, estimated number of 1,500 to 2,000 people gathered to demonstrate against the Annual Meetings of IMF and World Bank in the streets of Washington D.C. Protesting groups included the Anti-Capitalist Convergence, the Mobilization for Global Justice. 649 people were reported arrested, five were charged with destruction of property, while the others were charged with parading without a permit, or failing to obey police orders to disperse. At least 17 reporters were in the round-up.



Law enforcement reaction

Although local police were surprised by the size of N30, law enforcement agencies have since reacted worldwide to prevent the disruption of future events by a variety of tactics, including sheer weight of numbers, infiltrating the groups to determine their plans, and preparations for the use of force to remove protesters.

At the site of some of the protests, police have used tear gas, pepper spray, concussion grenades, rubber and wooden bullets, night sticks, water cannons, dogs, and horses to repel the protesters. After the November 2000 G20 protest in Montreal, at which many protesters were beaten, trampled, and arrested in what was intended to be a festive protest, the tactic of dividing protests into "green" (permitted), "yellow" (not officially permitted but with little confrontation and low risk of arrest), and "red" (involving direct confrontation) zones was introduced.

In Quebec City, municipal officials built a 3 metre (10 ft) high wall around the portion of the city where the Summit of the Americas was being held, which only residents, delegates to the summit, and certain accredited journalists were allowed to pass through.

Gothenburg



On June 15 and 16, 2001, a strong demonstration took place in Göteborg during the meeting of the European Council in the Swedish town. Clashes between police and protesters were exacerbated by the numerous vandalism of the extreme fringes of the demonstrators, the so-called black-blocs. Images of devastation bounced through the mass media, putting a negative shadow on the movement, and increasing a sense of fear through commons people.


Riots in Gothenburg Assignment by Gefle Dagblad. June 2001.

Genoa



The Genoa Group of Eight Summit protest from July 18 to July 22, 2001 was one of the bloodiest protests in Western Europe's recent history, as evidenced by the wounding of hundreds of policemen and civilians forced to lock themselves inside of their homes and the death of a young Genoese anarchist named Carlo Giuliani—who was shot while trying to throw a fire extinguisher on a policeman—during two days of violence and rioting by groups supported by the nonchalance of more consistent and peaceful masses of protesters, and the hospitalization of several of those peaceful demonstrators just mentioned. Police have subsequently been accused of brutality, torture and interference with the non-violent protests as a collateral damage provoked by the clash between the law enforcement ranks themselves and the more violent and brutal fringes of protesters, who repeatedly hid themselves amongst peaceful protesters of all ages and backgrounds. Several hundred peaceful demonstrators, rioters, and police were injured and hundreds were arrested during the days surrounding the G8 meeting; most of those arrested have been charged with some form of "criminal association" under Italy's anti-mafia and anti-terrorist laws.


Carlo Giuliani (Italian pronunciation: [ˈkarlo dʒuˈljani]; 14 March 1978 – 20 July 2001) was an Italian anti-globalization protester who was shot dead by a police officer while approaching him and his vehicle during the demonstrations against the Group of Eight summit that was held in Genoa from July 19 to July 21, 2001.



Criticism G8



Some criticism centres on the assertion that members of G8 do not do enough to help global problems such as Third World Debt, global warming and the AIDS epidemic—due to strict medicine patent policy and other issues related to globalization. In Unravelling Global Apartheid, the political analyst Titus Alexander described the G7, as it then was, as the 'cabinet' of global minority rule, with a coordinating role in world affairs.

The conservative Heritage Foundation has criticized the G8 for advocating food security without making room for economic freedom.



Criticisms of the IMF



Overseas Development Institute (ODI) research undertaken in 1980 included criticisms of the IMF which support the analysis that it is a pillar of what activist Titus Alexander calls global apartheid.[87]

Developed countries were seen to have a more dominant role and control over less developed countries (LDCs).
Secondly, the Fund worked on the incorrect assumption that all payments disequilibria were caused domestically. The Group of 24 (G-24), on behalf of LDC members, and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) complained that the IMF did not distinguish sufficiently between disequilibria with predominantly external as opposed to internal causes. This criticism was voiced in the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis. Then LDCs found themselves with payments deficits due to adverse changes in their terms of trade, with the Fund prescribing stabilisation programmes similar to those suggested for deficits caused by government over-spending. Faced with long-term, externally generated disequilibria, the G-24 argued for more time for LDCs to adjust their economies.
Some IMF policies may be anti-developmental; the report said that deflationary effects of IMF programmes quickly led to losses of output and employment in economies where incomes were low and unemployment was high. Moreover, the burden of the deflation is disproportionately borne by the poor.
Lastly is the suggestion that the IMF's policies lack a clear economic rationale. Its policy foundations were theoretical and unclear because of differing opinions and departmental rivalries whilst dealing with countries with widely varying economic circumstances.



Criticisms of the Worldbank



The World Bank has long been criticized by non-governmental organizations, such as the indigenous rights group Survival International, and academics, including its former Chief Economist Joseph Stiglitz, Henry Hazlitt and Ludwig Von Mises. Henry Hazlitt argued that the World Bank along with the monetary system it was designed within would promote world inflation and "a world in which international trade is State-dominated" when they were being advocated. Stiglitz argued that the so-called free market reform policies that the Bank advocates are often harmful to economic development if implemented badly, too quickly ("shock therapy"), in the wrong sequence or in weak, uncompetitive economies. Similarly, Carmine Guerriero notices that these reforms have introduced in developing countries regulatory institutions typical of the common law legal tradition because allegedly more efficient according to the legal origins theory. The latter however has been fiercely criticized since it does not take into account that the legal institutions transplanted during the European colonization have been then reformed. This issue makes the legal origins theory's inference unreliable and the Work Bank reforms detrimental.



One of the strongest criticisms of the World Bank has been the way in which it is governed. While the World Bank represents 188 countries, it is run by a small number of economically powerful countries. These countries (which also provide most of the institution's funding) choose the leadership and senior management of the World Bank, and so their interests dominate the bank. Titus Alexander argues that the unequal voting power of western countries and the World Bank's role in developing countries makes it similar to the South African Development Bank under apartheid, and therefore a pillar of global apartheid.


World Bank Group headquarters, Washington, DC.

In the 1990s, the World Bank and the IMF forged the Washington Consensus, policies that included deregulation and liberalization of markets, privatization and the downscaling of government. Though the Washington Consensus was conceived as a policy that would best promote development, it was criticized for ignoring equity, employment and how reforms like privatization were carried out. Joseph Stiglitz argued that the Washington Consensus placed too much emphasis on the growth of GDP, and not enough on the permanence of growth or on whether growth contributed to better living standards.

The United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations report criticized the World Bank and other international financial institutions for focusing too much "on issuing loans rather than on achieving concrete development results within a finite period of time" and called on the institution to "strengthen anti-corruption efforts".



James Ferguson has argued that the main effect of many development projects carried out by the World Bank and similar organizations is not the alleviation of poverty. Instead the projects often serve to expand the exercise of bureaucratic state power. Through his case-studies of development projects in Thaba-Tseka he shows that the World Bank's characterization of the economic conditions in Lesotho was flawed, and the Bank ignored the political and cultural character of the state in crafting their projects. As a result the projects failed to help the poor, but succeeded in expanding the government bureaucracy.



Criticism of the World BankWorld Bank and other organizations often takes the form of protesting as seen in recent events such as the World Bank Oslo 2002 Protests, the October Rebellion, and the Battle of Seattle. Such demonstrations have occurred all over the world, even among the Brazilian Kayapo people.

Another source of criticism has been the tradition of having an American head the bank, implemented because the United States provides the majority of World Bank funding. "When economists from the World Bank visit poor countries to dispense cash and advice", observed The Economist in 2012, "they routinely tell governments to reject cronyism and fill each important job with the best candidate available. It is good advice. The World Bank should take it." Jim Yong Kim, a Korean-American, is the most recently appointed president of the World Bank.



www.economist.com/news/leaders/21707926-globalisations-critics-say-it-benefits-only-elite-fact-less-open-world-would-hurt
democracyuprising.com/2007/04/01/anti-globalization-movement/



Left-wing populism



Left-wing populism is a political ideology which combines left-wing politics and populist rhetoric and themes. The rhetoric often consists of anti-elitist sentiments, opposition to the system and speaking for the "common people". Usually the important themes for left-wing populists include anti-capitalism, social justice, pacifism and anti-globalization, whereas class society ideology or socialist theory is not as important as it is to traditional left-wing parties. The criticism of capitalism and globalization is linked to anti-Americanism which has increased in the left populist movements as a result of unpopular US military operations, especially those in the Middle East.



It is considered that the populist left does not exclude others horizontally and relies on egalitarian ideals. Some scholars point out nationalist left-wing populist movements as well, a feature exhibited by Kemalism in Turkey for instance. For left-wing populist parties supportive of immigrant and LGBT rights among others, the term "inclusionary populism" has been used.


The Republican Peoples Party Emblem. The CHP is a Kemalist and social-democratic political party in Turkey, with socialist, nationalist and leftwing populist elements

With the rise of Greek Syriza and Spanish Podemos during the European debt crisis, there has been increased debate on new left-wing populism in Europe.


Supporters of the Greek Leftwing Populist Syriza party wave a Syriza flag

[pieter]

Philosophers and economists of the anti-Globalist movement






Naomi Klein



Naomi Klein (born May 8, 1970) is a Canadian author, social activist, and filmmaker known for her political analyses and criticism of corporate globalization and of capitalism. She first became known internationally for her book No Logo (1999); then for The Take, a documentary film about Argentina’s occupied factories that was written by Klein and directed by her husband Avi Lewis; and The Shock Doctrine (2007), a critical analysis of the history of neoliberal economics that was adapted into a six-minute companion film by Alfonso and Jonás Cuarón, as well as a feature-length documentary by Michael Winterbottom.



This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate (2014) was a New York Times non-fiction bestseller and the winner of the Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction in its year. In 2016 Klein was awarded the Sydney Peace Prize for her activism on climate justice. Klein frequently appears on global and national lists of top influential thinkers, including the 2014 Thought Leaders ranking compiled by the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute, Prospect magazine's world thinkers 2014 poll, and Maclean's 2014 Power List. She is a member of the board of directors of the climate activist group 350.org.

[pieter]

Noreena Hertz



Noreena Hertz (born 24 September 1967) is an English academic, economist, author and the Economics Editor of ITV News. In 2001 The Observer newspaper dubbed her "one of the world's leading young thinkers" and Vogue magazine described her as "one of the most inspiring women in the world.". In September 2013 Hertz was featured on the cover of Newsweek Magazine. Describing herself as "a campaigning academic", critics have called her "a do-gooder who moves like a grasshopper from one high-profile good cause to another."



Noreena Hertz has been called the 'Nigella Lawson of economics' by the UK media,"because she combines striking beauty with a formidable mind." Fast Company magazine has named her "one of the most influential economists on the international stage" and observed: "For more than two decades [her] economic predictions have been accurate and ahead of the curve." Vivienne Westwood has said of her writing: "That is what punk was all about".

Hertz's books are published in 22 languages.



Generation K (2015)



In 2015 Professor Hertz began researching what she has called Generation K - 13- to 20-year-olds. K is for Katniss Everdeen, the feisty heroine of the global franchise The Hunger Games. Noreena presented her initial thinking on Generation K in 2015 at the World Economic Forum and at the Women in the World Summit in New York City. Here she unveiled results from her 2015 study of 2000 American and British Teenagers. Key findings include that this Generation is more anxious than previous ones, more intent on being unique, and more concerned about inequality. She posits that they have been profoundly shaped not only by technology but also by the recession and an increasing sense of existential threat. She writes "unlike those currently aged between 20 and 30, the “Yes we can” generation, who grew up believing the world was their oyster, for Generation K the world is less oyster, more Hobbesian nightmare." Her initial findings in which she defines how this generation thinks and behaves, gained significant media attention and were featured in The Washington Post,The Daily Telegraph and The Financial Times.

[pieter]

Sharon Zukin



Sharon Zukin is a professor of sociology who specializes in modern urban life. She teaches at Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center, City University of New York. As of 2014, she was also a distinguished fellow in the Advanced Research Collaborative at the CUNY Graduate Center and chair of the Consumers and Consumption Section of the American Sociological Association. Zukin was a visiting professor at the University of Amsterdam in 2010–11.



Zukin's research and publications focus on cities, how they change and why, culture (especially consumer culture) and real estate markets, particularly in New York City. Her books trace how cities have been reshaped through deindustrialization, gentrification, and immigration. She also writes about the rise of the symbolic economy, which is based on cultural production and consumption.

[pieter]

Lori Wallach



Lori Wallach is the Director and Founder of Global Trade Watch, a division of Public Citizen. She is an expert and activist in global trade issues. Wallach has testified before Congress about the effect NAFTA, WTO, and other free trade agreements have on global citizens. She has played a significant role in the negotiations of many free trade agreements by acting as a consumer watch dog.

[pieter]

Slavoj Žižek



Slavoj Žižek (born 21 March 1949) is a continental philosopher. He is a senior researcher at the Institute for Sociology and Philosophy at the University of Ljubljana, Global Distinguished Professor of German at New York University, and international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities of the University of London. He works in subjects including continental philosophy, political theory, cultural studies, psychoanalysis, film criticism, Marxism, Hegelianism and theology.



Žižek in 1989 published his first English text, The Sublime Object of Ideology, in which he departed from traditional Marxist theory to develop a materialist conception of ideology that drew heavily on Lacanian psychoanalysis and Hegelian idealism. His early theoretical work became increasingly eclectic and political in the 1990s, dealing frequently in the critical analysis of disparate forms of popular culture and making him a popular figure of the academic left. A critic of capitalism, neoliberalism and political correctness, Žižek identifies as a political radical, and his work has been characterized as challenging orthodoxies of both the political right and the left-liberal academy.

[pieter]

Noam Chomsky



Avram Noam Chomsky (US: /æˈvrɑːm ˈnoʊm ˈtʃɒmski/ (About this sound listen) a-VRAHM NOHM CHOM-skee; born December 7, 1928) is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes described as "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He is Institute Professor Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he has worked since 1955, and is the author of over 100 books on topics such as linguistics, war, politics, and mass media. Ideologically, he aligns with anarcho-syndicalism and libertarian socialism.



Born to middle-class Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants in Philadelphia, Chomsky developed an early interest in anarchism from alternative bookstores in New York City. At the age of 16 he began studies at the University of Pennsylvania, taking courses in linguistics, mathematics, and philosophy. From 1951 to 1955 he was appointed to Harvard University's Society of Fellows, where he developed the theory of transformational grammar for which he was awarded his doctorate in 1955. That year he began teaching at MIT, in 1957 emerging as a significant figure in the field of linguistics for his landmark work Syntactic Structures, which remodeled the scientific study of language, while from 1958 to 1959 he was a National Science Foundation fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study. He is credited as the creator or co-creator of the universal grammar theory, the generative grammar theory, the Chomsky hierarchy, and the minimalist program. Chomsky also played a pivotal role in the decline of behaviorism, being particularly critical of the work of B. F. Skinner.

An outspoken opponent of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, which he saw as an act of American imperialism, in 1967 Chomsky attracted widespread public attention for his anti-war essay "The Responsibility of Intellectuals". Associated with the New Left, he was arrested multiple times for his activism and placed on President Richard Nixon's Enemies List. While expanding his work in linguistics over subsequent decades, he also became involved in the Linguistics Wars. In collaboration with Edward S. Herman, Chomsky later co-wrote an analysis articulating the propaganda model of media criticism, and worked to expose the Indonesian occupation of East Timor. However, his defense of unconditional freedom of speech – including for Holocaust deniers – generated significant controversy in the Faurisson affair of the early 1980s. Following his retirement from active teaching, he has continued his vocal political activism, including opposing the War on Terror and supporting the Occupy movement.

One of the most cited scholars in history, Chomsky has influenced a broad array of academic fields. He is widely recognized as a paradigm shifter who helped spark a major revolution in the human sciences, contributing to the development of a new cognitivistic framework for the study of language and the mind. In addition to his continued scholarly research, he remains a leading critic of U.S. foreign policy, neoliberalism and contemporary state capitalism, the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and mainstream news media. His ideas have proved highly significant within the anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist movements, but have also drawn criticism, with some accusing Chomsky of anti-Americanism.

[pieter]

Left



Left, In politics, the portion of the political spectrum associated in general with egalitarianism and popular or state control of the major institutions of political and economic life. The term dates from the 1790s, when in the French revolutionary parliament the socialist representatives sat to the presiding officer’s left. Leftists tend to be hostile to the interests of traditional elites, including the wealthy and members of the aristocracy, and to favour the interests of the working class (see proletariat). They tend to regard social welfare as the most important goal of government. Socialism is the standard leftist ideology in most countries of the world; communism is a more radical leftist ideology.

Far-left politics

Far-left or extreme-left politics are terms used to describe political positions farther to the left on the political spectrum than the standard political left. Since these are relative terms, there is no universal agreement on their application. Unlike the far right, experts are more likely to use more specific terms, such as social democratic, Stalinist or Maoist to categorize the Left. The term has also been used by socialists to describe groups even further to the left.

Europe

Dr. Luke March of the School of Social and Political Science at the University of Edinburgh defines the "far left" in Europe as those who place themselves to the left of social democracy, which they see as insufficiently left-wing. The two main sub-types are called the "radical left", due to their desire for fundamental change to the capitalist system while accepting of democracy, and the "extreme left" who are more hostile to liberal democracy and denounce any compromise with capitalism. March specifies four major subgroups within contemporary European far-left politics: communists, democratic socialists, populist socialists and social populists
Vít Hloušek and Lubomír Kopeček add secondary characteristics to those identified by March and Mudde, such as anti-Americanism, anti-globalization, opposition to NATO and rejection of European integration.

In France, the term extrême-gauche ("far left") is a generally accepted term for political groups that position themselves to the left of the Socialist Party, such as Trotskyists, Maoists, anarcho-communists and New Leftists. Some, as political scientist of marxist background Serge Cosseron, will limit the scope to the left of the French Communist Party[3], but there is no real consensus. Many leftists with strong anti-Americanism, anti-globalization, opposition to NATO and rejection of European integration try to avoid the negative and reductive impression associated with the "far left" categorization by using the parable la gauche de la gauche ("the left of the left"), reflecting what some might view as a cultural ambiguity.
In Germany, Eckhard Jesse, a political scientist, regards different kinds of Trotskyists, anarcho-syndicalists, anarcho-communists, national communists, authoritarian socialists, Maoists and autonomists as the local "far left". These people include both authoritarians and libertarians.

Far-Left terrorism

A number of far-left parties gave birth to militant organisations during the 1960s and 1970s, such as the Japanese Red Army (JRA) Red Brigades (Italy), the Red Army Faction (Baader-Meinhof-Gruppe) (Germany), Action Directe (France), The Communist Combatant Cells (CCC) (Belgium), and Revolutionary Organization 17 November in Greece. These groups generally aimed to overthrow capitalist systems and replace them with socialist societies.

[pieter]

[pieter]

[pieter]

[Jaga]

Pieter, I think the problem of leftist anti-globalism - it is considered elitist. While, conservatism populism, that is so popular in the US and Poland - is accepted by so called "everyday man"

[pieter]

Dear Jaga,

That is the strange and fascinating thing of time, that politics has turned upside down. Leftwing politics, Center left, left and radical left was always in the 19th and 20th century the politics of the common man, the working class, the people. Conservative politics, the right, conservative, conservative liberal (European liberal), conservative Christian Democratic politcs and the agrarian conservative parties always supported the status quo, the class society, and served the ruling elites.

In the 20th century due to the decades of parliamentarianism, and the professional center left, leftwing and radical left political party organisations, political youth organisations, student organisations, women organisations (of these parties), student organisations, Unions and scientific bureau's most center-left, leftwing and radical leftwing movements have created their own pillarised elites of professional academics, paid party members and functionaries (the party headquarters, bureau's and departments in various cities, towns, regions, provinces and member states in Federal countries like Germany -Bundesländer). So party functionaries of the Social-democratic, Communist, leftwing socialist ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacifist_Socialist_Party ), Radical, Social Populist (Leftwing populist) and leftwing nationalist parties, union functionaries, social workers, teachers, city council members, leftwing mayors and aldermen, sociologists, philosophers, professors of universities, journalists of the center left, left and radical left press and leftwing students and working youth and leftwing people of the working class, middle class and highclass (the sophisticated, upper class left, Gauche caviar ("Caviar left"), latte left, Chardonnay socialism, champagne socialism, latte liberalism en limousine liberalism. In the Netherlands we call the snob, elitist, arrogant, upperclass left Salon Socialist, in Finland they have the expressions: samppanjasosialismi (champagnesocialism) and salonkikommunisti (saloncommunist).

A few week back I talked with a quite intelligent and educated colleague of mine with a Social work, social sciences and social academy background (a study department and direction with a very leftwing heritage in the Netherlands, from Marxist, radical New Left to Social Democratic Labour roots) about politics in general and leftwing politics in general. This chap with a lot of experience with leftwing people, leftwing students, leftwing activists, leftwing politicians and leftwing ideology, politics and policies was very sceptical about leftwing politicians, leftwing political parties and what they achieve in the real world of reality in the pragmatic and practical sense of ruling, getting majorities for plans that work and implementation of these policies.

He told me, leftwingers, leftwing people are to pollarised to get things done. They always fight amongst themselves and quarrel. They might...., listen clearly (he said), they might be more intelligent than rightwing people, but they are to intellectual, to ideological, to stuck to their ideals, and to fanatic in their fight for their goals, that they can't make compromises, that they can't be pragmatic, that they can't cooperate with other leftwingers. And that competition between the Center-Left, left and radical left for the working class and middle class vote has always been there during the 20th and 21th century. Jaga, you have very good Social-democrats in Western-Europe, who always followed a center course between on one side their Communist enemies in the East (the SovjetUnion, the Comecon, Warsaw Pact and the Peoples republics in Central- and Eastern-Europe), the communist and leftwing socialist parties in Western-Europe and on the other side the rightwing political parties and movements in Europe (the Christian-Democrats, the conservative liberals, the conservatives, rightwing democrats and moderate nationalists). Today the Center left Social Democrasy is squeezed inbetween the Populist right and the Populist left in Europe.

My colleague told me that rightwingers are more opportunistic, pragmatic, clever, fact driven, materialistic, and power driven than the leftwingers. The rightwingers know how to use power, how to be pragmatic, how to combine ruling and cooping with the free market via macro economical instruments and tools. Rightwingers today have a large public support base than the left. Rightwingers are better at one liners, bringing the right message to voters and citizens, and they know to be tactical, strategic, people oriented or business oriented at the right times. Leftwingers have more problems with that due to their political leftwing conscience, ethical problems with some political deals (compromises) and their social heart. Ofcrourse there are a lot of leftwing and center left politicians who follow a very tough, neo-liberal, free market and conservative course once they are in power. That is why many Social Democratic and leftwing socialist voters became disillusioned: and disappointed in their leftwing parties and politicians. Today they are the fiercest supporters of Geert Wilders, Marine Le Pen and Alternative for Germany.

Conservative Populism both in Europe and the USA knows how to get the attention of the old leftwing voters, the blue collar worker. The workers of the old city neighborhoods of Western-Europe with it's migration problems, unemployment (the Industrial production moved out of Europe leaving behind an unemployed working class), silent poverty and other misery. Like the fact that certain old working class neighborhoods went into decline, with pauperization, vandalism, over populated apartment blocks (you call it the projects in the USA), a lot of low or uneducated people, vandalism, intimidation of youth groups and gangs, a feeling of unsafety, and thus frustrated, irritated, desperate, sad, disillusioned, vengeful, stressed and angry workers. Former communists (Marixists), leftwing socialists and Social Democrats who lost hope in the center left, left and radical leftwing political parties and moved to the right, towards rightwing populist, nationalist and xenophobic political parties and movements. There is a tribal, clan like element in that behavior. The white European working clas acts like an ethnic group, often with local, regional and national layers. Locally they speak the dialect of the city, town, borough or region, identity with that city or region as if it is a nation. And Nationally they identify as Dutch, Flemish, Belgian, German, Austrian, Danish or French. Most native European (white) workers and migrant communities don't mix or merge. In some cases you have mixed race and mixed ethnic (culture) marriages. But these people from mixed relations often choose the native European side (culture) or the migrant side (Turkish, Moroccan, Kurd, Iranian or Bosnian culture).


The left has lost it's traditional working class support base, and those who stayed are the leftwing academic intellectuals, the leftwing cultural-educational and political intelligentsia, academic people, and some leftwing union members, civil servants and old workers who stayedloyal to their party. Fact is that a lot of working class people with a traditional Red (European Social Democratic/Socialist, Labour) family background have turned brown, black or blue (in Europe the colour Brown is for fascism, nationalism, a national conservative stance, conservative, or rightwing liberal [liberal conservative]). These rightwing European rightwing populists and nationalists are very clever, smart and skilled in agtiprop. They merge a far right message with old fashionate leftwing socialist and leftwing populist paroles like egalitarian messages, anti-elitism, social security guarantee, a rightwing sort of class struggle, working class rhetorics. They appear ti be more social than the traditional center right and rightwing European parties and in the same time address the migration issue, the refugee crisis, criminal elements within the migrant communities, the fear of Islam, and resentment against non-Western immigration and presence in the old working class neighbourhoods in general. The nationalists and rightwing populists are good at exploring the mistrust of the political elites amongst the workers and their animosity towards the migrants in the old working class neighborhoods.

Cheers,
Pieter

[pieter]

Jaga,



The problem of leftist anti-globalism is a threat of a radical left minority, while the center left and left majority of the left don't oppose the positive notion of Globalisation, but stand critical towards the shadow side of it like human rights violations, explotation of Third World workers, child labour and environmental pollution. The radical left anti-globalists oppose all globalisation, because it is capitalist, moderate center left and lefting Social democrats and leftwing socialists accept Social Capitalism as a fact, but aim at state regulation of business and industry as sufficient to further economic growth and equitable income. The Center left Social democrats in the 20th and 21th centuries tried to shape a Social Capitalism with their Fabian Society in the UK (The Fabian Society founded the London School of Economics and Political Science in 1895 "for the betterment of society".), the Nordic Model in the Scandinavian countries, the Rhineland model in Germany (in cooperation with German Christian Democrats, center right conservative liberals, employers and unions), the Third Way in the USA and the UK and the Poldermodel in the Netherlands (like in Germany and Scandinavia a cooperation between politicians, employers and unions).




The problem of the Social democracy and radical left in Europe is that they have been to influential and powerful in Western-Europe for decades (sixties, seventies, eighties, nineties), and with their New Left, democratisation, Neo-Marxism, fierce, critical, razorblade sharp leftwing press and critics, and arrogant politicians, mayors, aldermen, ministers, state secretaries, top civil servants and party functionaries created a climate (in certain times) of leftwing domination, and the idea that leftwing thinking was right. The rejection of 'political correct' thinking by the Populist, national conservative, reactionary right today comes from that leftwing dominant climate of the seventies, eighties and nineties in certain parts of Europe and maybe also in the USA. In the Netherlands people talked about leftwing regents or socialist regents, meaning powerful Labour rulers, authoritarian aldermen, dominant mayors, arrogant ministers or state secretaries. That was from a time that almost all workers and working class families voted Labour, and a lot of people of the Middle class too (ofcourse part of that middle class had working class roots).



Typically of the Dutch Social Democracy was the notion of levelling, which means the spread of wealth and income over the population. A more egalitarian society, a smaller gap between rich and poor and removing the sharp edges of the class society was the aim of the Social Democracy. The Dutch Labour Party (PvdA) received a large blow during the last elections, minimalizing the support base and the amount of votes they received. But never underestimate Dutch Social Democrats nor the power of the European Social Democratic movement. The Social Democrats moved away from their roots in the nineties during the Purple coalitions in which they ruled in coalition governments with the center right conservative liberals (VVD) and the Centrist pragmatic Democrats '66. Moving away from their ideological roots, fundament and core task was a mistake, now Social Democracy has to go back to where they came from in the late 19th century ( August Bebel and Eduard Bernstein) and 20th century (advocating tenets of social justice coincided with the zeitgeist of Liberal reforms) and create a 21th century model for Social Democracy.


The Netherlands was ruled by Purple coalitions from 1994 until 2002

The Dutch Labour party (PvdA) wants to move away from the leftwing intellectual academic political party it is today of center left academics, professional politicians (carreer politicians), scientists, university professors, highschool teachers and some leftwing entrepreneurs to a broad peoples movement which attract workers, empoyee's, civil servants, middle class people and the Dutch people in general again. Labour lost to the leftwing Populist migrant party Denk (Think), GroenLinks (GreenLeft) and the Socialist Party on the left and D66 in the center and the PVV and VVD on the right. It will be a tough stuggle and a long road to win back the trust and the votes of the voters. But Labour has a lot of old parliamentarians, aldermen, mayors, ex-ministers, old state secretaries, secretary generals of ministries and departments, Social Democratic entrepreneurs with feeling for the market (the rightwing of the Labour party, the Labour marketeers) and ofcourse a Fresh new base of Young Socialists (Jonge Socialisten) and new young members who joined the party even after it lost so much votes and trust.



Today the right know how to sell themselves by combining traditional rightwing and leftwing political ideas and merging it with 21th century populism. It is easy to gain votes with xenophobia, nationalism, ethnocentrism, blaming the leftwing elites (the leftwing church as rightwing populists call it in the Netherlands), anti-Europeanism (Euroscepticism), an anti-Brussels stance, Pro-Brexit slogans (calling for a Nexit, like Geert Wilders does), and using old leftwing ideas for social security, health care, care for the elderly and education.



Conservatism populism is so popular in the US and Poland, because it merges so brilliantly good old ideas of the European Left and right and merges it with 21th century populism. That's why it is accepted by the so called "everyday man". But do they have real solutions, do they have experienced people like the old Democratic parties who have people with decades of experience, in both opposition and administration positions? It is easy to shout, to bark, to use one liners, to provoke, to make noise, but to take responsibility and to govern is another thing! Let's watch how the Trump administration will be doing in 4 years time!




Dutch Labour (de PvdA) may or may not recover, the same counts for the American Democrats, and maybe new progressive, liberal and social parties will come in their place? The European Social Democrats could learn something from Bernie Sanders campaign. the campaign of Jill Stein of the Green Party and Barack Obama in 2008.





Cheers,
Pieter

[pieter]

After World War II, social democratic parties came to power in several nations of western Europe—e.g., West Germany, Sweden, and Great Britain (in the Labour Party)—and laid the foundations for modern European social welfare programs. With its ascendancy, social democracy changed gradually, most notably in West Germany. These changes generally reflected a moderation of the 19th-century socialist doctrine of wholesale nationalization of business and industry.


German Social Democratic politicians and competitors for the possible Social Democrat Chancellor position (Bundeskanzler) in the coming administration after the elections



Although the principles of the various social democratic parties began to diverge somewhat, certain common fundamental principles emerged. In addition to abandoning violence and revolution as tools of social change, social democracy took a stand in opposition to totalitarianism. The Marxist view of democracy as a “bourgeois” facade for class rule was abandoned, and democracy was proclaimed essential for socialist ideals. Increasingly, social democracy adopted the goal of state regulation of business and industry as sufficient to further economic growth and equitable income.