Critics from within and the Left - Part 1
by Max Bound

" Now, there are those who will mistake what I say for an anti-market tirade. They will be wrong. I love the market, I like trade, money markets, global economic patterns, all of it. It's like a game. It's fun for those who can afford to have a sense of humour. But I'm not fool enough to mistake these necessary and important narrow mechanisms for a broad, solid, conscious force that can lead society...... The important conundrum for us is to understand how we have come to so forget our own history that we are now compliantly acting in a suicidal manner, believing that economics can lead- where in the past it has always failed to do so."

John Ralston Saul 1995, Massey Lectures pub 1997

The above quoted Canadian economist and writer John Ralston Saul in his 1995 Massey Lectures states that there have been ".... a total of 75 million deaths over the past 35 years" in various wars." (Saul J.R. p11) (1) On page 12 Saul continues : "....Then there are the astonishing third world statistics. Two hundred million children aged four to fourteen are in the work force. Life expectancy in Central Africa is 43 and dropping. One-third of the children in the world are undernourished. Thirty five percent of the workforce is unemployed. The Third World debt crises has not eased. That number is now some $1.5 trillion."

Saul makes the point that : ".... the market place these days is into job elimination." and continues "But our crises isn't simply about jobs. The leader of the free world has 1.5 million people in jail .... More than double what it was fifteen years ago." He continues " The income of 75 million Americans is lower now than it was in 1966. Eighteen per cent live under the poverty line."

Another prominent North American, Robert B Reich, formerly of several National US Government administrations, after describing, in his 1991 book 'The Work of Nations, the use of cheap labour in Mexico', writes on page 210: " The same story is unfolding world wide. Until the late 1970s, AT&T had depended on routine producers in Shreveport, Louisiana, to assemble standard telephones. It then discovered that routine producers in Singapore would perform the same tasks at a far lower cost. Facing intense competition from other global webs.AT&T's strategic brokers felt compelled to switch. So in the early 1980s they stopped hiring routine producers in Shreveport and began hiring cheaper routine producers in Singapore. But under this kind of pressure for even lower high-volume production costs, today's Singaporean can easily end up as yesterday's Louisianan. By the late 1980s AT&T's strategic brokers found that routine producers in Thailand were eager to assemble telephones for a small fraction of the wages of routine producers in Singapore. Thus in 1989, AT&T stopped hiring Singaporeans to make telephones and began hiring even cheaper routine producers in Thailand."

"The search for even lower wages has not been confined to heavy industry. Routine data processing is equally footloose. ......."

A former Deputy Prime Minister of Canada, Paul Hellyer, during a recent visit to Australia said on the ABC Program, 'Background Briefing', 30th May 1999 : "...And you're seeing the big transnational corporations attempting and succeeding, and turning the social clock back 100 years to Dickensian times, and they're paying starvation wages in many Third World countries, no benefits, women working up to 13 hours a day, 7 days a week; if they get sick they're out, if they get pregnant, they're out. No holidays with pay, no pensions when they retire, nothing. In other words, 100 years of social progress by legislation and unionisation down the sink by going around this globalisation route."

Leftwing writers in describing the situation pictured in these quotes would perhaps present a more penetrating analysis, but the picture presented is truly devastating. The three public figures quoted above, and many others, are highly critical of the decline in health services, education and other public services. Saul's defence of the public sector includes : "I would suggest that today the problem of managerial dead weight is far greater in the private sector than in the public."(2)

REMEDIES

What then of the remedies offered by the above and other supporters of the capitalist system who are critical of current trends? These vary, The last quoted, Paul Hellyer talked in the Background Briefing Program of some monetary measures. Compared to the sweeping character of his brilliant exposure of the corporation's plans and actions, Hellyer's solutions appear inadequate. Robert B. Reich has resigned from the Clinton Cabinet and written another book which I have not yet read.

Saul's proposals cover a fairly wide canvass and appear to me to basically coincide with the sort of short term solutions most socialists would see as necessary steps towards a better world. This, I believe, is so, despite what are in my mind basic flaws in Saul's analytical framework, as set out in the Massey Lectures. The positive aspects of Saul's advocacy of change to current policy approaches are several and include that they are reaching a wide section of people, not only in America, but also in Australia. To wit Saul's one hour telecast on Australia's ABC earlier this year.

Saul calls for regulation of the market by Governments, increased taxes on the top end of town, a much stronger public sector, and public participation in deciding and administering the affairs of the nation. What serious minded socialist could but agree that these are critical and pressing issues? A weakness in Saul's position is that the form of public intervention he supports tends to be vague and on the sources of power he is even less explicit.

THE SOURCES OF POWER

Yet another American, the celebrated, if now aged economist, John Kenneth Galbraith is less vague on the critical issues of income and power. In the 'GOOD SOCIETY' he argues: "The basic need, however, is to accept the principle that a more equitable distribution of income must be a fundamental tenet of modern public policy in the good society, and to this end progressive taxation is central,"

"The distribution of income in the modern economy derives ultimately from the distribution of power, This, in turn, is both a cause and a consequence of the way income is shared. Power serves the acquisition of income: income accords power over the pecuniary reward of others. The good society recognises and seeks to respond to this traditionally closed circle. Its response is the empowerment and public protection of the powerless. In the market economy the natural focus of power is the employer, most often the business firm. The right of workers to join together and assert a countervailing authority must be central and accepted. .... In modern times, especially in the United States, the empowerment of workers has been diminishing in its general effect...."

Galbraith continues: "The good society seeks, where possible, to reverse this decline in trade union power, for worker organisation remains a major civilising factor in modern economic life. For many workers, however, organisation is not now a practical solution. This is especially so in the widely dispersed service industries. ....direct action by the state on behalf of those in need outside the unions is required, including provision for health insurance and unemployment compensation and currently most important, a socially adequate minimum wage. In the good society the last is an absolute essential". (Galbraith J.K. 1996) (3)

In contrast Saul suggests that the corporations throw the whole burden of taxes onto the shoulders of the middle class. (4) That the corporations act against middle class interests is beyond doubt. But for example the GST (Goods and Services Tax), which is not confined to Australia, is aimed above all at lowering the living standards of low paid workers and low income people in general.

PUBLIC CONTROL OF TECHNOLOGY

However Saul argues: "Like trade, social policy can first be established on a regional basis. What is described as the impossibility of international, social regulation is actually the unwillingness of the corporate elites to enter into such negotiations. It is there- fore a pure question of political will; that is of democratic will."

"Even in as vast an area as technology, our passivity is unnecessary. ......... The problem is not what science can discover, or applied science can develop, but whether we are willing to blindly subject our civilisation to the abstract demigod of inanimate objects." (5)

This plea for some public control over technology is laudable. But the question needs to be asked, do we allow ourselves to be blindly subject to "inanimate objects" or to the power over both objects and people which is exercised by the corporation chiefs? A little further on Saul argues that : "...our best hope ....lies not in incremental reforms but in changes to our dynamic, so our ability to understand that dynamic lies in our ability to use our consciousness and to move towards some sort of equilibrium." (6) This is closer to the real point.

Decisions about what technologies will be developed, and used, begin to be made at the level of the decisions as to in what areas, and to what purpose funds and other resources will be allocated for research. Currently governments make less and less, and private corporations make more and more of these decisions. Further it is not only a question of the role of bureaucracies, be they private or public, but the issue of openness and public accountability is a critical one. This requires an approach which runs directly in contradiction to the old favourite of commercial interest not allowing such openness and public accountability.

We certainly need to change the dynamic of society. My point of concern is that Saul appears to see the problem as essentially one of consciousness or lack of it. The power to act is not seriously examined by Saul. Consciousness is vital to those oppressed by the controllers of the market place. But consciousness needs to include recognition and understanding of the reality that possession and control of capital are key sources of power. Saul recognises the need for action by people and makes an important contribution to enhancing the possibilities for that action. My contention however is that, despite the importance of his presentation, he fails to adequately examine the complex web which sources the power of those who rule.

ATTITUDES TO MARXISM

Saul does not attempt to engage in a criticism of Marx. He merely attempts to ignore and to denigrate Marxist ideas with passing use of the word Marxism. At the same time Saul draws heavily and perhaps unwittingly, on the wisdom absorbed by the better sections of academia from Marx's insights. The essence of Saul's thesis, as I understand it, is that human consciousness and human action are the motors of human progress. Not very far from Marx. Excepting that Marx recognises that the objective conditions or material circumstances in which people find themselves play a basic role in influencing ideas and options for action.

Saul's Massey Lectures contain a scholarly examination of the historical development of democracy. But like many scholars of some renown in our society he fails to consider certain basic facts about material conditions and the sources of power. For example he discusses the development of democracy in early Greek and Roman societies. However the rather basic fact that had democratic rights been awarded to slaves they would no longer have been slaves does not feature in his discussion. A society without slaves is no longer a slave society.

Similarly capitalists can exist only if there is available to them the labour power of people who have no means to acquire a livelihood other than to sell their ability to labour. Capitalist societies depend on a situation in which the majority of citizens are deprived of control over the means of producing and distributing the necessities and permissible luxuries of life. Further the possession of capital in the form of the means of producing and distributing the means of livelihood affords to capitalists a substantial degree of control over the lives of other people. The growth of corporation power has sadly worsened a situation which was already inequitable, if relatively comfortable for many at the beginning of the second half of this century. However poverty and oppression were no strangers even in the developed countries and even in capitalism's heyday.

Understanding and explaining that the terrain in which people fight for democracy includes massive differences in the positions of those who need to be part of that fight is critical. Realistic opportunity for equal opportunity for all requires a recognition of the real sources of current inequities. There are certainly gender, race, cultural and social dimensions to inequity, but economics and ordinary peoples' lack of control over the production and distribution of goods and services are very much part of the inequities so many suffer. As Galbraith states above -; "In the market economy the natural focus of power is the employer" No discussion of democracy can be complete without an examination of the sources of power in its economic, social, cultural and political dimensions.

This and much more not-with-standing Saul places himself in the camp of action by people and their elected governments. : "Equilibrium, in the Western experience, is dependent not just on criticism, but on non-conformism in the public place." (7) The left has a long and complex history which includes successes as well as mistakes and failures. Recognition that we do not have a monopoly on wisdom, plus the seriousness and urgency of the situation, requires that the democratic left engage in intelligent two way debate with, and where possible joint actions with, the critics from within the capitalist system.

To be continued ...