Green Left Infoasis

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Food is not just another commodity — it is absolutely essential for human survival. The very least that humanity should expect from any government or social system is that it try to prevent starvation — and above all that it not promote policies that deny food to hungry people.
That’s why Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez was absolutely correct on April 24, to describe the food crisis as “the greatest demonstration of the historical failure of the capitalist model.”

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Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Evo Morales: 10 Commandments to Save the Earth

Climate and Capitalism, April 21, 2008

Speaking at the United Nations today, Bolivian president Evo Morales proposed 10 commandments to save the planet, life and humanity.
1.Acabar con el sistema capitalista
Putting an end to the capitalist system
2. Renunciar a las guerras
Renouncing wars
3. Un mundo sin imperialismo ni colonialismo
A world without imperialism or colonialism
4. Derecho al agua
Right to water
5. Desarrollo de energías limpias
Development of clean energies
6. Respeto a la madre tierra
Respect for Mother Earth
7. Servicios básicos como derechos humanos
Treat basic services as human rights
8. Combatir las desigualdades
Fighting inequalities
9. Promover la diversidad de culturas y economías
Promoting diversity of cultures and economies
10.Vivir bien, no vivir mejor a costa del otro
Living well, not living better at the expense of others

LINK

Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Ecology, Green, Imperialism, Indigenous, Latin America, Water

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

King Commemoration and Revisionism

By Mel Reeves, Black Agenda Report, April 16, 2008

If Martin Luther King were to return 40 years after his assassination, he might not recognize himself. Revising and repackaging Dr. King's politics in order to render the human rights leader harmless, even quaint, is a twice-yearly game played mainly by those who would preserve the very system MLK sought to overcome. While old enemies of Dr. King, like Republican presidential candidate John McCain, spin convoluted myths that totally distort American history and Dr. King's central place in it, the two Democratic contenders paint superficial pictures of King's time and mission. The best antidote for revisionist histories of Dr. King are the words of the man, himself.

Continue reading 'King Commemoration and Revisionism'. . .

Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Democrats, Imperialism, Racism, Republicans

Monday, March 31, 2008

Indian Social Science Congress Resolution on Global Warming

Delhi Platform, March 29, 2008

(Note: This resolution was presented as a draft at the Indian Social Science Congress in Mumbai on 30 December 2007, and finalized after discussion among and feedback from the audience there. Being a broad political resolution, it does not contain specifics, even though these are important – Delhi Platform)
1. We agree with the overwhelming body of evidence and the broad consensus arrived at within the global scientific community that large-scale human activities since the Industrial Revolution – industry, transport, power generation, deforestation, etc – are the primary causes of global warming and the resultant unpredictable climate change, through increasing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, beyond the Earth’s natural capacity to absorb these gases.
2. There is an extremely urgent need to make sharp cuts in the emissions of greenhouse gases worldwide, starting immediately, since the world is potentially close to dangerous levels of global warming.

Continue reading 'Indian Social Science Congress Resolution on Global Warming'. . .

Labels: Anticapitalism, Asia, Capitalism, Ecology, Green

Who Gains from the Green Economy?

The people most affected by the injustices of the polluting economy are already helping to lead the way.
By Preeti Mangala Shekar and Tram Nguyen, Color Lines, March/April 2008

Last year, the Oakland-based Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, with a minuscule staff and budget, worked relentlessly to pass the Green Jobs Act in Congress-a bill that if authorized will direct $125 million to green the nation's workforce and train 35,000 people each year for "green-collar jobs." That summer, Ella Baker Center and the Oakland Alliance also secured $250,000 from the city to build the Oakland Green Jobs Corp, a training program that promises to explicitly serve what is probably the most underutilized resource of Oakland: young workingclass men and women of color.
In these efforts lay a hopeful vision-that the crises-ridden worlds of economics and environmentalism would converge to address the other huge crisis-racism in the United States. It is what some of its advocates call a potential paradigm shift that, necessitated by the earth's climate crisis, can point the way out of "gray capitalism" and into a green, more equitable economy. The engine of this model is driven by the young and proactive leadership of people of color who intend to build a different solution for communities of color.
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"An authentic green economics system is one that would mark the end of capitalism," notes B. Jess Clarke, editor of Race, Poverty and the Environment. And one that would ensure labor rights and organizing, collective ownership and equality are all at the heart of it, he adds. "The real green movement has not started yet."
A movement toward economic justice requires the mobilizing and organizing of the poorest people for greater economic and political power.
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"Green economics can create a momentum-a political moment akin to the civil rights movement. But unless workers are organized, any success is likely to be marginal. So the key problem is in organizing a political base," adds Clarke. Green economics, then, is not just a green version of current economic models but a fundamental transformation, outlines Brian Milani, a Canadian academic and environmental expert who has written extensively on green economics. He writes in his book Designing the Green Economy: "Green economics is the economics of the real world-the world of work, human needs, the earth's materials, and how they mesh together most harmoniously. It is primarily about 'use value,' not 'exchange value' or money. It is about quality, not quantity, for the sake of it. It is about regeneration-of individuals, communities, and ecosystems-not about accumulation, of either money or material."
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Environmental racism is rooted in a dirty energy economy, a reckless linear model that terminates with the dumping of toxins and wastes in poor communities of color that have the least access to political power to change this linear path to destruction.
Defining and then refining green economics as a way to steer it toward bigger change is at the root of understanding the socio-political and economic possibilities of this moment.

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Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Ecology, Ecosocialism, Green, Labor, Race, Racism

Monday, March 24, 2008

Toward a Better World: Interview with Mike Davis

By Ben Terrall, Dissident Voice, March 10, 2008

Mike Davis is a veteran writer and activist who cut his progressive teeth in the 1960s civil rights and anti-war movements.
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Davis’s lively prose style, combined with an intellectual curiosity and ease with science, the humanities, radical history and much else, makes for engaging writing chock full of eccentric, surprising information. Davis’s fellow Lannan Foundation award winner Susan Straight recently said, “he writes everything [and] he knows everything about everything.”
Mike Davis was good enough to give me a phone interview in early February. In the background, Mike’s twin toddlers scurried around his San Diego home as he graciously let me pick his brain for an hour.

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Labels: Anticapitalism, Biofuels, California, Capitalism, Ecology, Green, Immigration, Imperialism, Labor, Los Angeles

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Writer Mike Davis on Challenges Facing US

By Benjamin Terrall, Oh My News, March 23, 2008

Mike Davis is a veteran writer and activist who cut his progressive teeth in the 1960s civil rights and anti-war movements.
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Recently Davis spoke to me over the phone from his home in San Diego. His twin toddlers scurried around his house as he graciously let me pick his brain for an hour. His wide-ranging comments covered everything from the dangers of biofuel production and the UN military occupation of Haiti to the great science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson.
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Davis has often criticized well-to-do environmentalists for ignoring the problems of working people. To that end, he argues that activists should link "every environmental demand to a specific proposal that improves quality of life in working class areas ... that employs people, that creates more park space, that addresses what I think is the most single profound crisis in California, which is that in a rich state our children are poor."

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Labels: Anticapitalism, California, Capitalism, Ecology, Labor

Sunday, March 09, 2008

Fourth International Draft Resolution on Climate Change

This draft resolution was approved by a leadership committee of the Fourth International, following a five-day seminar on climate change held in the Netherlands in February.

Draft Resolution on Climate Change (Revised)

The IC approves the general points of orientation developed by the seminar on climate change organized by the IIRE from 22 to 27 February, 2008:

1. The various capitalist proposals that are under discussion working toward a climate agreement going beyond 2012 (in particular the “climate package” of the European Commission for 2013-2020, the Stern Report, the proposed Warner Lieberman law in the USA) are completely insufficient to avoid a rise in the temperature of the surface of the globe higher than the probable threshold of danger (+2°C compared to the pre-industrial period).

2. There is a criminal cynicism and irresponsibility of the capitalist system and its political representatives of all tendencies who, in spite of scientific evidence that cannot be ignored concerning the acceleration of global warming and its consequences, are endangering the life, the health, the food, the water resources and the jobs of hundreds of millions of human beings, causing irreversible damage to the biosphere. They prefer technologies that are dangerous (nuclear energy), destructive (massive production of biofuels), or derisory — but sometimes fraught with social consequences — (carbon sinks) rather than calling into question the growth of capital and the race for profits.

3. A positive world movement of struggle for the climate has emerged, concretized in particular by the demonstrations of December 2006 and 2007 in London, June 2007 in the Spanish State (”day of the sun”) and November 2007 in Australia, and in a general way, by the action of the Global Climate Campaign — an example to be followed, in particular within the framework of the two years of negotiations that are supposed to lead in December 2009 to a new climate treaty.

4. The broadest unity of action is needed, on a worldwide scale, in order to mobilize mass pressure to force governments to act at least in accordance with the three recommendations of the IPCC (1° — the greenhouse gas emissions of the industrialized countries must decrease by between 25 and 40 per cent between now and 2020; 2° — global emissions must culminate in the coming 10 to 15 years; 3° — global emissions must decrease by between 50 and 85 per cent between now and 2050), while simultaneously respecting social and democratic rights as well as the right of everyone to a human existence worthy of the name.

5. Basing ourselves on the need for caution, and taking into account the margins of uncertainty in the projections that have been made using scientific models of the climate, it is essential to fix the objectives of reduction at the higher levels on the scale of recommendations of the IPCC, in order to limit the damage as much as possible — though some damage is unfortunately inevitable due to the fact that global warming is already a reality.

6. There are numerous social movements, contributing to the development of an alternative to capitalist productivism (fighting in particular against oil and gas exploitation, for the maintenance of tropical forests, for the rights of traditional communities, for an ecological peasant agriculture, for an alternative policy of waste disposal that prioritizes recycling, against the uncontrolled expansion of road, maritime and air transport, for free quality public transport, for a sober approach to energy use, against the nuclear and armaments industries, against flexibility and the growth of temporary and part-time work, for a rational use of water — and the free access to it as a public good, which not can be privatized —against advertising and overconsumption, for a non-commodity-oriented sharing of technology and knowledge). These movements should be encouraged to enter directly into the world struggle to save the climate.

7. The fight to defend the climate cannot be won without active participation by the exploited and oppressed who constitute an immense majority of the population. It must, therefore, incorporate their legitimate demands and social aspirations, in particular concerning employment and social protection. Particular attention should be paid to the participation of workers’ and peasants’ organizations, of the women’s movement, of indigenous communities, of popular organizations for defence of the environment, as well as young people and marginalized social layers, so that their demands influence the objectives and the forms of action.

8. We reject capitalist recipes (markets in pollution rights, carbon taxes, “clean” investments that generate carbon credits, subsidies to companies, subordination of research to capitalist interests, dismantling of social protection and of regulations of all kinds…). Both in the fight against climate change and in efforts to adapt to its effects, such measures inevitably reinforce imperialist domination along with capitalist competition and violence, and therefore also exploitation, oppression, competition between workers, violation of rights and the stranglehold of the ruling class on all conditions of life.

9. Nuclear energy, for many reasons (in particular the absence of solutions for disposal of waste, the link with military industries and the risk of proliferation, weak energy efficiency, a mediocre carbon balance sheet on the level of the entire process, an extreme centralization which is the opposite of decentralization and recovery of heat) does not constitute a defence against climate change. The movement must combat the pressure of the lobbies in favour of the development of this industry.

10. Climate change raises an alarming new and increased threat of wars arising from inter-imperialist and inter-capitalist competition for the control of resources, in particular of the fossil energy resources, as well as in defence of oil rent and other privileges related to it.

11. We reject the rise in certain bourgeois circles of a neo-Malthusian ideology based on a barbarian and sabre-rattling capitalist management of the climate crisis — to the detriment of the poorest peoples, of the poor generally, of the working class, of the victims of catastrophes, of those driven to emigrate, and of women in particular.

12. We likewise reject any attempt to impute climate change to demographic growth, particularly in the developing countries. There is an undeniable link between development and demographic transition. We forcefully reaffirm a woman’s right to decide to have or not to have children, a right which implies that women have free access to techniques of birth control and to abortion.

13. The developed countries must respond positively to the generous and responsible offer of Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa who, in order to protect biodiversity and contribute to stabilizing the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, proposes not to exploit an important deposit of oil located in the tropical forest in exchange for partial compensation for the loss of revenue for his country. In this context we have also to stress the point, that the industrialized countries of the North have to assume their historic responsibility for the catastrophes, which occur in the countries of the South, caused by Climate Change.

14. Faced with the logic of capitalism, aggravated by neo-liberal policies, it is urgent to develop a world plan combining an energy revolution (sparing use of resources, increased energy efficiency, abandonment of fossil energy sources in favour of renewable energies — geothermal and solar in its various forms — decentralization, a radical reorganization of the system of transport of goods and people…) with indispensable measures of adaptation and reconversion, independently of costs and of profit, respecting the equal right of all human beings to consume and emit carbon within the biological and physical limits of the biosphere.

15. The implementation of such a plan requires a break with the logic of growth, with capitalist globalization and consumption (suppression of sectors of activity that are useless or harmful such as armaments and advertising, dismantling the industrial complex based on the use of fossil fuels, retraining of workers and a radical reduction of working time, partial relocation of agricultural production and consumption), the renewal of the public sector, collective ownership of energy resources, a very broad redistribution of wealth between countries and classes (cancellation of the debt of the South, heavy taxation of the profits of the energy sector and of inheritances…) as well as the involvement of the masses through democratic practices of control.

16. The Left, including the Fourth International, is seriously late on the question of the climate. We must, consequently, undertake to follow what is happening concerning the climate and climate policy consistently, through Inprecor and IVP. Sections of the FI need to incorporate this question into their propaganda and activity. We will organize a new climate change seminar in February 2010.

17. The energy/climate crisis makes even more necessary a major redefinition of the socialist project as a global ecosocialist project (incorporating both the satisfaction of real human needs, democratically decided, and the precautionary management of the biosphere). The formation of the international ecosocialist network represents an important step.

18. The next world congress of the International will consider a draft resolution on the fight against climate change, programmatic alternatives, and their implications for the socialist project.

IC, February 2008

Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Ecology, Ecosocialism, Green

Monday, March 03, 2008

Masters of Greenwash: B.C.’s Carbon Tax Is No Answer to Climate Change

By Roger Annis, Socialist Voice, March 3, 2008

When it comes to the greenwashing of politics, no government in Canada can equal the Liberal Party government here, headed by Premier Gordon Campbell.
Last year, Campbell made a much ballyhooed announcement that his government intended to legislate a 33% reduction in carbon emissions by the year 2020 and aim for an 80% reduction by 2050. No plan for how to achieve these lofty goals accompanied the announcement, and the province’s residents are still waiting for one.
In a budget released on February 19, the government announced a new “carbon tax” that now occupies centre-stage of its carbon reduction goals. The province becomes the first jurisdiction in North America to introduce such a tax.
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Consumption taxes like the B.C. government’s carbon tax cannot solve the earth’s looming environmental calamity. They punish the poorest people in society for the follies and excesses of the wealthiest.

Read all of 'Masters of Greenwash: B.C.’s Carbon Tax Is No Answer to Climate Change'. . .

Labels: Anticapitalism, Canada, Capitalism, Ecology, Green

Monday, February 11, 2008

Venezuela: Chavez Reflects on Social Gains

By Stuart Munckton, Green Left Weekly, Fenruary 7, 2008

“Celebrating the completion of nine years in office, Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez presented what he considered to be some of the main economic achievements of his government” according to a February 4 Venezuelanalysis.com article.
“Among these were the lowering of inflation, of poverty, and of inequality, and the increase in school attendance and in access to drinking water, among other things.”

Continue reading 'Venezuela: Chavez Reflects on Social Gains'. . .

Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Imperialism, Latin America

Saturday, February 09, 2008

The (Un?) Sustainability of Growth

By Athanassios K. Boudalis, Scenso, 2007

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Prosperity is indeed a perennial social demand, but consumption is just one of its components. No mainstream economic indicator makes a quantitative assessment of other components of prosperity: the purity of the air we breathe, of the water we drink, or the food we eat; the level of fulfillment from one's profession; the communal spirit; the quality of our familial or social relationships; our physical and mental health.
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Market and capitalist economics (as well as those of Soviet Socialism, for that matter) seem inept to quantify and assess all the abovementioned components of prosperity. Instead, they focus on growth which is easily measurable with their current tools. That this is detrimental to societies and their environment is of secondary importance. maybe we should rethink their utility as a tool in our quest for prosperity.

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Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Ecology, Green

ALBA: Creating a Regional Alternative to Neo-Liberalism?

By Shawn Hattingh, MR Zine, February 7, 2008

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Since the late 1990s, the US has been trying to secure a regional "free" trade agreement with Latin American countries, known as the Free Trade Area for the Americas (FTAA). In 2001, under the Chavez government's leadership, a number of Latin American states, trade unions, and social movements successfully banded together to block the FTAA. With this, the US state and its corporate allies' hopes were smashed. However, the Chavez government was not satisfied with blocking the FTAA -- it wanted to create a viable regional alternative to "free" trade. Under Venezuela's leadership, ALBA was born in late 2004.
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Although ALBA represents a progressive project, it does have a number of contradictions.
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Despite these contradictions, ALBA forms the basis of a move by a group of countries to gain economic independence from the US. As such, ALBA is a challenge to US imperialism. Perhaps even more important, ALBA offers real possibilities for future widespread alternatives to the current neo-liberal system. This means that ALBA is of great symbolic value. It shows that there is an alternative to neo-liberalism, which the governments of the South -- including those in Asia and Africa -- could embark upon. Thus, when we are told by the US, the EU, the IMF, and the World Bank -- and many of the governments in the South -- that there are no alternatives to neo-liberalism, we now know that this is a hollow lie. ALBA proves that.

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Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Latin America

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

Capitalism as the Engine of Global Crisis

By Richard Mynick, OpEd News, January 28, 2008

It's increasingly evident to thoughtful persons that humanity has entered a period of unusual danger on multiple fronts. The months and years ahead may bring catastrophe through military conflagration, environmental disaster, economic collapse, or any combination of these. This essay will argue that these problems are all ultimately linked; that they are fundamentally rooted in corporate capitalism, and moreover that none of them can be solved within the framework of capitalism.
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Capitalism seeks to maximize growth. "Growth" is calculated in a way that overlooks fundamental quality-of-life determinants such as the social cohesiveness of communities, clean air and water, access to healthcare and education, well-maintained parks, leisure time, and the like. Meanwhile, such noxious "goods and services" as mind-numbing TV commercials, hideous real-estate development, and high-tech weapons systems are counted as "positive contributions" to GDP.

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Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Roy Wilkes on Unions and Eco-Politics

Climate and Capitalism, February 4, 2008

Roy Wilkes lives in Manchester, England. He is secretary of the organizing committee of the Campaign against Climate Change Trade Union Conference that will take place in London on February 9.
Roy is also a member of Respect Renewal and of the International Socialist Group. He was interviewed by Richard Searle of Red Pepper magazine.

Continue reading 'Roy Wilkes on Unions and Eco-Politics'. . .

Labels: Anticapitalism, Capitalism, Ecology, Ecosocialism, Green, Labor

Monday, February 04, 2008

Latin America's Democratic Revolution and the Greening of the Left

By Daniel Denvir, AILA, Latin America in Movement, January 26, 2008

Global warming, indigenous rights, energy sovereignty and Latin America's democratic revolution were on the top of Ecuador's colloquium celebrating the Action Week / 2008World Social Forum here in the capital.
The set of panel discussions, entitled "Another Latin America: Where Are the New Revolutions Going?" took place on Friday January 25th, at the Simon Bolívar Andean University.
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The Correa government is considered a step in the right direction by most social movement activists but is bitterly opposed by the nation's wealthy and largely European elite.
The first panel of the colloquium focused on the environment, indigenous rights and the necessity of building alternatives to the system of industrial capitalism where "growth" is premised on resource extraction.
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The indigenous and campesino leadership of Ecuador's Left is one of the main reasons that social movements here have such a green hue.

Read all of 'Latin America's Democratic Revolution and the Greening of the Left'. . .

Labels: Anticapitalism, Ecosocialism, Indigenous, Latin America

Sunday, January 27, 2008

How to Avoid Action on Climate Change

By Ian Angus, Climate and Capitalism, January 26, 2008

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Yes, the world can watch and learn from Canada, because if there is one thing that Canadian politicians and business leaders do well, it is this.
They can teach the world how to avoid action on climate change.

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Labels: Anticapitalism, Canada, Capitalism, Ecology, Green

Monday, January 21, 2008

Creative Commons and Socialism

By Dave Riley, Left Click, January 21, 2008

I've become a dedicated exponent of open source software -- in my case, Ubuntu (a Linux distribution) especially. When you begin such a journey you are exposed to a lot of different experiences in regard to 'ownership', 'copyright' and 'patent'.
The bogeyman you soon learn to embrace and celebrate is that nemesis of capitalism -- 'sharing'.

Continue reading 'Creative Commons and Socialism'. . .

Labels: Anticapitalism, Audio/Video, Capitalism

GLI is a site of news, views, info, and interviews edited and maintained by a socialist Green Party member living in Los Angeles, California, USA who would like to see a democratic, classless, ecologically sustainable society come to be that is built on liberty, equality, solidarity, justice, and the commons.