One of the themes of this year's CIVICUS assembly, in Montreal, is Economic Justice. What is economic justice? I am sure that there are some accepted definitions, but, none of them come from economics! So, my definition is: simply ensuring that everyone has access to, due to the fair allocation of: land, jobs, money, even opportunity; that no one is denied water, food, a home, a job. . . the basic needs and more .. . because they fit a "category" of people that are to be exploited or robbed. One should not be denied the right to basic needs (including education and healthcare) because one is black, lives in Africa, or South Asia, are a woman or a child, or belong to the wrong class, caste or tribe. So one needs the freedom to participate, to demand, to lobby, to organize and one needs education and a kind of optimism -- that things can be fairly allocated, can be just, can be distributed differently.
One of the things that holds back economic justice is a failure to consider all economic models. Most (but not all) of the world has adopted some form of capitalism. We say (at least in North America) "the economy" as if we mean it is some unchangeable force of nature. Jim Stanford - a Canadian economist - wrote a book called "Economics for Everyone". In it, he argues that we have a capitalist economic system and he writes about how it works. He does not propose socialism, or any other model, but does suggest that we should all understand that it is just one possible model, and that the constructs underpinning the "economy" can be changed. He also suggests that we should understand how "the economy" works, in order not be bamboozled by governments and economists into thinking that a restructuring of priorities and social organization are impossible.
He has a great website to accompany the book - Economics for Everyone - in which he says ". . . It provides a comprehensive description (and critique) of free-market economics." This is not your usual "economics text" but is written for the average "activist" to understand. The site actually includes slides, study guides, teacher's notes etc to run a course on how the economy works, and in my own experience, Jimbo is absolutely willing to help if you are trying to put the course together.
One of the things that he does not cover is those things that are not counted in the economy but should be. . . As Einstein famously said: Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.
For that, I turn to a great book by Raj Patel - "The Value of Nothing" - again there is a website to accompany the book - The Value of Nothing - that site says in part:
Opening with Oscar Wilde’s observation that “nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing,” Patel shows how our faith in prices as a way of valuing the world is misplaced. He reveals the hidden ecological and social costs of a hamburger (as much as $200), and asks how we came to have markets in the first place. Both the corporate capture of government and our current financial crisis, Patel argues, are a result of our democratically bankrupt political system.
In what way? Because, he argues, in most countries corporations have become defined as "legal people" , and, because, in addition, we have been engaging for thirty years in "enclosure" -- owning and allowing ownership of more and more "things" - intellectual property, common lands, seed, water etc. More and more people are being ignored. We know, as he says, quoting Oscar Wilde, "the Price of Everything and the Value of Nothing". He says (p. 172/73):
"over the past thirty years, the accelerating price of enclosure, and the increasing scale of the theft, have brought our planet to the edge of destruction. Internationally, environmental costs have been shunted from rich to poor, most notably though not exclusively from global warming. A recent report offers a very conservative estimate of the number of people harmed by climate change today at 325 million, every year. The number of deaths from weather changes alone is set to exceed 500,000 people per year.. . and most of these deaths will happen among those who have had the least to do with causing pollution, people whose countries were colonized by the very same powers that have caused this new catastrophe. . . Handing the matter over to capitalism is, however, likely to prove as good an idea as asking the iceberg to fix the Titanic."
Patel does not argue that there can be no markets. On the contrary he argues that they have always existed and that what has changed is the way that we organize markets, what has value in them, and how we decide what to work on. Unfortunately too often our political decisions are based on profit, the marketplace and return on investment. He does say that alternatives are difficult to implement - how do we remove "corporate rapacity" from government and "the bleak weight of consumerism from our political imaginations." However, he does suggest that it IS possible and worth working on.
Great video overview of his thesis at:
Speaking of great videos and having just mentioned the weight of consumerism - another site, if you have not seen it, that is worth watching is:
the Story of Stuff. In it, Annie Leonard not only tells us what is wrong with the way that we are organized economically - but at least for me, she offers some direction for solution, including the fact that you don't have to work on everything - but need to working on some part of the "fix". . . the whole video is 20 minutes long - but it is worth it! Please take the time.
The site, with other issues , videos and resources is at: Story of Stuff
If economic justice is going to be achieved then we in the north (or, if you prefer the west or the so-called "developed" nations) have an obligation to pay our share, and more than our share now, since we have, as a community, been stealing from the rest of the world for a couple of centuries. As an example you can see my post on Haiti - Haiti - which describe the theft from Haiti, and it is just one example.
All of these issues need to be debated, discussed and consideration has to be given, re how to improve economic justice and distribution. Can Canadians ever demand, in large numbers, that we: democratize our economic system; that we give up some privilege/luxury (out of the car and onto the bus . . . people, eat local. . . people) to ensure better international distribution; that we collect taxes, but use them to help others we have traditionally stolen from; that we agree to provide a lot more in aid/development assistance; that we reduce our carbon footprint and allow others to increase theirs; to more radically open our doors to economic and climate migrants?. . . If not I fear the world is headed to overheating, plankton loss, and ocean death, and eventually the end of human life.
I wrote a little about international access to water, yesterday; and this morning, there it is, in the news. . . Funny how these things hang around in the ether. . .
The story was in the The Toronto Star this morning and the head was:UN to vote on right to water: ‘Historic’ chance to ease human suffering, says Canadian activist
The "activist" in question is Maude Barlow - the founder of the Council of Canadians. The article says in part:
A United Nations vote to recognize water as a basic human right is a “historic” chance for the global community to ease human suffering, according to a Canadian activist in the thick of a last-ditch lobbying effort.
“We’re running out of water and the crisis is getting worse,” Maude Barlow said Monday from New York, on the eve of a vote expected as early as Wednesday at the UN General Assembly.
“If we don’t make a statement that we don’t want entire populations left behind, what does it say about us? About our humanity?”
Barlow, former senior adviser on water at the UN and chair of the Council of Canadians citizens group, is optimistic the resolution will pass by majority vote.
However, it appears powerful nations — including Canada — either will not support it or will push for a version that Barlow says would continue to allow water to be bought and sold as a commodity.
Of course Canada, emphasizing free market policies and lauding corporations over the needs of people, that our government has become, would not want to say that water is not a commodity and cannot be bought and sold - they would privatize the air I think, if they could. I want to re-write the headlines - Canada votes to deny water to the poor, shareholders of water corporations are gonna' party like its 1999.
When did "shareholder's interests" become more important than citizen interests? At least once we pretended that this was not the case and so if you caught a government out, voting for corporate interests, over the public, you could point it out and changes might happen. Now it is like everyone is a Reagan Clone -- everyone buys trickle down or class mobility- trickle down in that (even though it has proven over and over again that it only leads to greater disparities between rich and poor) when corporations do well - they employ more people etc and so everyone benefits - the rising tide lifts all boats theory. . . and then there is class mobility and people believe that they can be lifted beyond the next level to the top - this is people who vote and support what is good for the rich because they believe that they will "be there someday".
Anyway, shouldn't water and food and shelter be accessible to everyone? It is not. We should agree that we are going distribute the wealth of this world in a way that means that everyone has the basics covered. We will have to do with less, as others need more. Yes where there is drought or famine for some other reason (often war) we need to get water and food to people - this is much easier if no one owns the water. Then international support can help drill for the water, put in a well or pipes to move it around. When water is privatized, the water corp. has to make sure that a profit is made, which increases the price on every well dug, every pipe laid. . . So why is Canada not agreeing to declare that water is a human right - more from the Star article:
Foreign Affairs spokesperson said in an email Tuesday that Canada already “recognizes there are linkages between access to safe drinking water and certain existing human rights obligations,” and supports further study on the issue of water as a right.
The email also said Canada asserts “its international human rights obligations in no way limit its sovereign right to manage its own resources.”
Barlow dismisses the argument that Canada’s water resources could be jeopardized by the proposed UN resolution. She says the sweeping 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights doesn’t mean Canada has to guarantee jobs or pensions for every country.
. . .
Time is critical, says Barlow, because the world is facing “a double whammy”: continued lack of water through poverty and the growing physical and ecological crisis that deprives the world of clean water.
After mentioning SEWA yesterday I wanted to follow up with more information about why I love them and think they are a great model. I would love to know more about them.
SEWA is the "Self-employed women's association" of India - of course the poor in India, as elsewhere, are for the most part not employed. By that I do not mean that they are "unemployed" but that they are small resellers of goods, subsistence farmers, makers of crafts, drivers of taxi's - that is they are self-employed. Some estimates are, that 80% of the world population are "not employees". So SEWA has been a very successful model in assisting women in India that are in this category - they say on their website:
SEWA is a trade union registered in 1972. It is an organisation of poor, self-employed women workers. These are women who earn a living through their own labour or small businesses. They do not obtain regular salaried employment with welfare benefits like workers in the organised sector. They are the unprotected labour force of our country. Constituting 93% of the labour force, these are workers of the unorganised sector. Of the female labour force in India, more than 94% are in the unorganised sector. However their work is not counted and hence remains invisible.
One story I heard some time ago - but it may be somewhere on their website [later: found the detail at: http://www.sewa.org/Rudi Products And Rudi Multi Trading Co Ltd.asp] or I may have read it elsewhere is about one of the things that SEWA does -- is that many women are subsistence farmers. When food is harvested, sometimes they have surplus that cannot be eaten or stored. However, let's say on any given day you have 10 tomatoes - 10 tomatoes will get you say 50 rupees at the market, but the bus ride to and from the market is 30-50 rupees - so it is not worth going - you cannot earn cash from your surplus as it too small an amount - so SEWA runs a truck that drives through these remote places and buys the surplus at the same rate the women would get if they could get to the market - providing cash income. I don't know why that seems like such a simple.good idea but I really thought it was terrific as the subsistence farmers in India do not do well, although it represents so much of the country.
Cannot believe that the Cons are still holding out on the Long Form census - from the perspective of most "ordinary " folks - this looks like a big mistake - apparently, it is just pandering to the Con "base" who are to the right of Atilla the Hun! Those same folks who want shareholder rights to be paramount, who want more actions made crimes, who want to lock more people up for longer, who want to give the police more powers, privatize our jails etc. But, eliminating the census also insures that there will never be reliable, acceptable data to prove that we have poor people, aboriginal people, people who speak other languages at home, people who have health problems - among other groups with needs. . . what a travesty . . . Most recent CBC update at:Clement, Sheikh to testify about census reform
First something wonderful! You may remember Travelling with Matt. His website, "Where the Hell is Matt?" showed him dancing, badly, around the world. The video of his travels, and dancing with people in many countries, was very inspiring and uplifting, and brought us all together. Now he has a video where he is dancing with children in Gaza. Watching the kids dance, and reading about them having a good time at summer camp, made me very happy.
___________________________________________________________________ Another great thing that is happening in Canada. . .
I hope I can attend this assembly. CIVICUS 9th Annual World Assembly, which this year is in Montreal. See: http://civicus.org/world-assembly Sounds very appealing. . . It will be interesting, and much would be new to me. I want to participate and would hope for increasing my knowledge base about development issues, and to participate in making decisions about future outcomes fro the organization and its members.
The following workshop interests me in particular--
Abstract:
In the backdrop of increasing economic inequalities threatening to arrest social cohesion and harmony, the search for solution-oriented interventions to secure economic justice has gained centre-stage in the global development debate and practice. At the proposed workshop, participants will have the opportunity to share experiences, learn and gain practical tips from a highly experienced panel of civil society practitioners about the criticality of participatory governance approaches in promoting equitable economic development policies, securing economic rights of people and achieve inclusive growth. Specifically, participants will be exposed to tools and approaches such as Participatory Budgeting, Public Expenditure Tracking, Social Audits and so on. A part of the panel discussion will be driven by a video documentary produced by the International Budget Partnership (IBP)
Presenters:
Manjunath Sadashiva, CIVICUS Participatory Governance Programme, India Anu Pekkonen, CIVICUS Participatory Governance Programme, Finland Helena Hofbauer, International Budget Partnership, South Africa Elizabeth Pinnington, Pinnington Training and Research, Canada Yogesh Kumar, Samarthan, India
In India, I saw so much more participation in parties and politics. . . and it seemed like everyone had a real analysis of what was going on. . . So I would really like to engage in that discussion - how can they increase participation in India, especially among the poor - who demonstrate but get excluded from party politics - and, how can it be emulated in other countries?
That CIVICUS Assembly is being followed by something else, that's free (Civicus is expensive - $600.) and also looks interesting. . . is the Citizen's Media Rendevouz The website says, in part:
In an era where mass media is increasingly fragile (declining advertizing revenues, financial crisis, digital revolution, fragmenting audiences, etc.), citizen media have an unprecedented opportunity to occupy the public sphere, particularly due to the advancement of social media and the democratization of modes of production.
For this second edition, the Citizen Media Rendez-Vous seeks to advance innovative practices within citizen media’s landscape, here and elsewhere in world. How can the public access and appropriate new media projects to better inform and mobilize itself? How can citizen media be used in the defense of human rights?
The Citizen Media Rendez-Vous gathers bloggers, engaged filmmakers, photographers and citizen journalists, media experts, alternative and independent media practitioners, web entrepreneurs, as well as others from the media landscape in turmoil. The Citizen Media Rendez-Vous is a space that promotes the sharing of ideas and practices. It invites new perspectives and encourages new collaborations. Lively exchanges among panelists and participants will touch subjects such as the creation of content, the containers within which content is placed (technology platforms) and different community organizational models.
I am planning to go to Montreal for these events. I have registered for the Rendevous and applied to be a volunteer blogger for the CIVICUS Assembly, as I cannot afford the registration fee. ___________________________________________________________________
Last link suggestion today . . . and another happy one is to a story in the NY Times
The story is about a poor Indian woman from Gujarat who was selected by SEWA (Self-Employed Women's Association) to come to NY to promote Indian handicrafts. I am particularly impressed with SEWA (have been for some time) who have helped organize women in India using a kind of trade union model. They also have a very successful and profitable bank that serves those who were originally thought to not need a bank - micro credit is now used in lots of places. Anyway, it was a story that made me laugh and cry. I won't spell it out - just follow the link -From Untouchable to Businesswoman - and go read it for yourself.
I cried partly because in lots of India, and Africa too, it is hard for people to find clean drinking water. Today Kevin and I went for a hike through an area that once housed many people on a "poor Farm" outside Halifax, NS. We were thinking and talking about the model of having a "poor farm" where you went to work and eat if you were too poor to feed yourself, and worrying that we have not come much further - too poor to feed yourself you can get welfare which will leave you well below the Canadian low income cut offs and not able to feed, house, and transport yourself. . . Eventually it became a "mental institution" instead, and we know how those services are available and serve us well (not!) The farm had a reservoir, which we found, but the water was very "dirty' looking and it started us thinking about people who have to drink water that is not clean and safe, and who even have to feed it to their children. . . it is the kind of thing that SEWA helps with, in India.
Nova Scotia. Yesterday, the Halifax Chronicle Herald ran a story about the decisions that the provincial government has to make, about the 12% increase in rates that N.S. Power is asking for. . . It appears that there are not many options to save us from this increase, except possibly reducing the demands on reducing pollution, and increasing alternative power that the province and regulator have demanded of the utility. That is because neither newspaper nor government seems to perceive any alternative but to pass on the increase to consumers.
Since 1991 and the sell off (death of a public utility - short term gain for long term pain for everyone in the province) of Nova Scotia Power - the utility has made a bundle - not just in income, but in profit - certainly over a billion dollars and probably more.
Aren't shareholders supposed to be taking a "risk" when they invest? (OK I know that is no longer true and certainly NSPI would be considered, at least in N.S., "too big to fail".) Still - why can't the shareholders take some of the hit in terms of reducing "pollution" - it's a privately owned "public utility" - that is everyone needs it and there is no competition and it can be regulated publicly - I say - let the shareholders take some of the burden. I am not suggesting that they be put out of business with regulations (although I would buy it back for the public if I could . . . see Bruce Wark's editorial -- in the Coast - Utility Sales Never a Good Idea. ) but just that it be OK to reduce profit in the public interest.
Then today the province announces - see story in the Chronicle Herald - that they will push back the dates for reducing pollution for NSP - esp mercury - article says in part:
Premier Darrell Dexter said Thursday that the province will extend until 2014 the 2010 deadline for lowering mercury emissions to 65 kilograms a year, down from 168, in an attempt to reduce the utility’s projected double-digit rate hikes for next year.
That's so that they don't pass on a price increase to consumers - but couldn't the province regulate the emissions and refuse a rate increase? Why not? Somehow "corporations" and their profits, and the interests of their shareholders, are more important than the health or costs for the average consumer. How did we get here? And more importantly can we change it?
Another item today. . . speaking of making change. . . something I just love and think could be emulated and serve as a model for organizing --
In Uttar Pradesh (UP) one of the poorest states in India there is a movement that few of us had heard about (Good facebook coverage the last couple of days!) that has had quite a bit of success over the last 4-5 years.
India is witnessing a rise of vigilante groups, the most sensational of which is the gulabi,or pinkgang, operating in the Bundelkhand district of the Uttar Pradesh state, one of the poorest districts of India. Some gangs have started what Indian journalists describe as a "mini-revolution" on behalf of women. . .. . .The gulabis, whose members say they are a "gang for justice," started in 2006 as a sisterhood of sorts that looked out for victims of domestic abuse, a problem the United Nations estimates affects two in three married Indian women. Named after their hot-pink sari uniforms, the gang paid visits to abusive husbands and demanded they stop the beatings. When obstinate men refused to listen, the gulabis would return with large bamboo sticks called laathis and "persuade" them to change their ways. . . . . . Pal's group now has more than 20,000 members, and the number is growing. Making her way from one far-flung village to another on an old rusty bicycle, she holds daily gatherings under shady banyan trees, near makeshift tea-stalls selling the sweet Indian drink chai and other popular village hangouts to discuss local problems and attract new recruits.
Or for more click on pic below from an article on the BBC site:
Women practicing with laathi's - they chase and beat men and go after corrupt officials - hundreds even thousands of them - if only we could organize women to be so effective everywhere.
First, here's a great article - American Psychosis - from Adbusters Magazine - by Chris Hedges, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for the New York Times, who is the author of a book - Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle. I was just trying to get through the book, before it has to be returned to the library, but I think this article is a bit of a precis - saving me some time! In part, he says:
Our culture of flagrant self-exaltation, hardwired in the American character, permits the humiliation of all those who oppose us. We believe, after all, that because we have the capacity to wage war we have a right to wage war. Those who lose deserve to be erased. Those who fail, those who are deemed ugly, ignorant or poor, should be belittled and mocked. Human beings are used and discarded like Styrofoam boxes that held junk food. And the numbers of superfluous human beings are swelling the unemployment offices, the prisons and the soup kitchens.
It is the cult of self that is killing the United States. This cult has within it the classic traits of psychopaths: superficial charm, grandiosity and self-importance; a need for constant stimulation; a penchant for lying, deception and manipulation; and the incapacity for remorse or guilt. Michael Jackson, from his phony marriages to the portraits of himself dressed as royalty to his insatiable hunger for new toys to his questionable relationships with young boys, had all these qualities. And this is also the ethic promoted by corporations. It is the ethic of unfettered capitalism. It is the misguided belief that personal style and personal advancement, mistaken for individualism, are the same as democratic equality. It is the nationwide celebration of image over substance, of illusion over truth. And it is why investment bankers blink in confusion when questioned about the morality of the billions in profits they made by selling worthless toxic assets to investors. . .
. . . The belief that democracy lies in the choice between competing brands and the accumulation of vast sums of personal wealth at the expense of others is exposed as a fraud. Freedom can no longer be conflated with the free market. The travails of the poor are rapidly becoming the travails of the middle class, especially as unemployment insurance runs out. And class warfare, once buried under the happy illusion that we were all going to enter an age of prosperity with unfettered capitalism, is returning with a vengeance.
Unfortunately, given his great analysis, Hedges really suggests no cure, no respite. He, in fact, suggests that Americans should start thinking like people under the Apartheid regime in South Africa or dissidents in the Soviet Union. He suggests the emergence of a corporate state and ultimately a fascist state is nigh upon us. . . He says:
Resistance movements will have to look now at the long night of slavery, the decades of oppression in the Soviet Union and the curse of fascism for models. The goal will no longer be the possibility of reforming the system but of protecting truth, civility and culture from mass contamination. It will require the kind of schizophrenic lifestyle that characterizes all totalitarian societies. Our private and public demeanors will often have to stand in stark contrast. Acts of defiance will often be subtle and nuanced. They will be carried out not for short term gain but the assertion of our integrity. Rebellion will have an ultimate if not easily definable purpose. The more we retreat from the culture at large the more room we will have to carve out lives of meaning, the more we will be able to wall off the flood of illusions disseminated by mass culture and the more we will retain sanity in an insane world. The goal will become the ability to endure.
But I remain more of an optimist - or maybe it is that I live in Canada (alright not as optimistic as I would have been before I saw the police state emerge and not be denounced by all at the G20) and not in the U.S., but I still believe that there is hope - although if we moved to a true democratic state that worked for people I guess that the U.S. might feel compelled to bring their military to bear. . . but that doesn't seem immediately likely - at least not while our Prime Minister is busy buying 9 BILLION dollars worth of fighter jets that cannot reach the arctic but work great on air craft carriers of which we have precisely ZERO!
I still think it is possible that we can build a state that at the very least moderates (if not eliminates) the "free market", that works for people instead of corporations and that can find a way to keep all children out of poverty (their parents, and people without children, too!) I have been to India, and Kerela really is a miracle - a miracle born not of increased development but of improved distribution!
It is possible to have jails/prisons but to keep them humane and to assume that every one in them is innocent until proven guilty - a point I embarrassingly must admit I got from Conrad Black and that got driven home by the detention situation at the G20; but also by a friend who was arrested and jailed over night because he "forgot" (with good reason if you knew the whole story) about a trial in which he was the witness - he was the victim of a crime and wanted to go to court and testify - anyway he got locked up , cold, no food, no coffee etc. Pretty bad scene, and something that can and should be fixed.
Instead I do think it is true that TV, The Web, social networking video games etc keep everyone distracted and living under an "illusion" that things are OK as they are and that they don't require fixing - just tweaking - until it is your child or friend who arrested, or fired or becomes homeless - and then the system seems to need a kick! Let's start kicking and screaming, instead of going to bed, getting high and watching another reality TV show!
Just a little story that usually gets away - I happened to notice this and cannot believe (well OK I can believe it) that this is not bigger news. Story is that Wall Street, specifically the Wachovia Bank, now merged with Wells Fargo, is laundering drug money, making a fortune and getting away with it - because - get this! - these banks are too big to fail , and as Smith says in this article:
No big U.S. bank . . . has ever been indicted for violating the Bank Secrecy Act or any other federal law. Instead, the Justice Department settles criminal charges by using deferred-prosecution agreements, in which a bank pays a fine and promises not to break the law again . . . . Large banks are protected from indictments by a variant of the too-big-to-fail theory. Indicting a big bank could trigger a mad dash by investors to dump shares and cause panic in financial markets.
Here is some of the detail - but you can read the whole story at Bloomberg.com
Wachovia, it turns out, had made a habit of helping move money for Mexican drug smugglers. Wells Fargo & Co., which bought Wachovia in 2008, has admitted in court that its unit failed to monitor and report suspected money laundering by narcotics traffickers -- including the cash used to buy four planes that shipped a total of 22 tons of cocaine.
The admission came in an agreement that Charlotte, North Carolina-based Wachovia struck with federal prosecutors in March, and it sheds light on the largely undocumented role of U.S. banks in contributing to the violent drug trade that has convulsed Mexico for the past four years. . .
. . .
Wachovia admitted it didn’t do enough to spot illicit funds in handling $378.4 billion for Mexican-currency-exchange houses from 2004 to 2007. That’s the largest violation of the Bank Secrecy Act, an anti-money-laundering law, in U.S. history -- a sum equal to one-third of Mexico’s current gross domestic product. . .
“Wachovia’s blatant disregard for our banking laws gave international cocaine cartels a virtual carte blanche to finance their operations,” says Jeffrey Sloman, the federal prosecutor who handled the case. . .
“It’s the banks laundering money for the cartels that finances the tragedy,” says Martin Woods, director of Wachovia’s anti-money-laundering unit in London from 2006 to 2009. Woods says he quit the bank in disgust after executives ignored his documentation that drug dealers were funneling money through Wachovia’s branch network. . .
The bank didn’t react quickly enough to the prosecutors’ requests and failed to hire enough investigators, the U.S. Treasury Department said in March. After a 22-month investigation, the Justice Department on March 12 charged Wachovia with violating the Bank Secrecy Act by failing to run an effective anti-money-laundering program.
Five days later, Wells Fargo promised in a Miami federal courtroom to revamp its detection systems. Wachovia’s new owner paid $160 million in fines and penalties, less than 2 percent of its $12.3 billion profit in 2009.
If Wells Fargo keeps its pledge, the U.S. government will, according to the agreement, drop all charges against the bank in March 2011.
Additionally there is more analysis of the story at: Alternet
There are not many other stories except on blogs, and a reprint of the Bloomberg story in the Edmonton Journal. Sigh - peaceful protesters go to jail and banks can launder billions for Drug Cartels and simply get away with it because they are too big too fail.
Most people have now seen the clip on Youtube of a young woman getting told she will be arrested for assault if a bubble touches an officer -
but I was pleased to see that it was actually covered in a story today in the National Post!!! and sympathetic to the bubble blower - who was later arrested for having eye wash in her back pack.
Saw a fabulous film today called The Iron Wall - if you get a chance see it - even though it is 5 years old - it is a fabulous history of Israeli Zionism and Palestine and I did not know how things were (and now they are worse) in Hebron. I cannot imagine. Break the Siege of Gaza!! Free Palestine. There is little hope left for a two state solution but I am an optimist! You can see the whole thing here but it is a poor copy from google video. I suggest that you order your own copy from the Palestine Store and support the film makers - or have a look at the website at: THE IRON WALL
____________________________________________________________________ And lastly comes this story, in the Toronto Star, about an NGO in Afghanistan called in the article Team Canada because the real name cannot be used - the reporter says to keep the workers safe - but I am suspicious of this whole thing and I don't know why - maybe because they all are ex-military - they may be heroes but they may be mercenaries - I cannot figure it out - so I am looking for feedback. . . anyone been in Afghanistan and know this makes sense - sounds like they have a lot of money to spend - and I just worry that it is more military - and also its paying people to dig ditches - literally - but at least they don't just fill them in again. . . and what about the women?
OK, so I am a "newbie" - a CFA. (That's comes from away for those you not in the Atlantic Provinces.) I have lived here for only 4 1/2 years. That is very new, in Nova Scotia. Nowhere else that I have lived (N.B., B.C., Ontario, Quebec and Sask.) do so many people have roots that go back 100's of years. That may suggest that I may be unreliable in some of my analysis of what's going on in Nova Scotia, but it also provides an opportunity to do some analysis from a position of both inside and outside - visitor and resident
I realized after the events of June27th/28th in Toronto, where I lived before moving to Nova Scotia, (and I have lived in 3 other provinces as well) that part of me still feels like a Torontonian and that it felt like "my city" and my friends were under siege and being arrested, at the G20.
. . . but this post is not about that (sighs of relief all round), but about what I see as the benefits and down-sides of living here, in Nova Scotia - what I am giving up and what I gain. I am not sitting back in Nova Scotia, I am very involved in party politics, in neighbourhood organizations, the labour movement and human rights support work. So I have met a lot of people, and not just a few. My job as an adult educator and my union involvement have brought me in touch with hundreds, possibly thousands, of Nova Scotians. Every year I am paid to drive (on major highways granted) from Sydney to Yarmouth and I consider myself privileged to do so. First, the things I miss about Toronto (for all you who hate it, and think that it has no redeeming features!)
1) Movies - In Toronto, I could see a lot of Indie and Int'l (sub-titled) films that simply never make it here. On the UP side - the Film festival in Halifax each September is easy to attend, you don't need to be standing in line for hours to get tickets and there are lots of great films! I just have to wait until they come out on DVD to see those features that I will miss in the theatre. http://www.cinemaclock.com/toronto.html
2) Flights to there. . . As near as I can determine, in the winter, out of Halifax (Iceland, Paris and Frankfort seem to be added in the summer months) one can fly to southern destinations on charter flights and to London, and of course to other Canadian and some U.S. destinations - but in Toronto I could fly to many destinations in the world. See: Halifax Airport Up side -- airport is small, well organized and since all the construction is over, easy to get in and out of! Also when it comes to summer vacations, you cannot go wrong staying in the province, attending festivals, daytripping, or going to the end of the earth, or just driving a back road to find some vista you have never before seen. See: Tourism Nova Scotia or Nova Scotia.com
3) Cheap and cheerful restaurants with interesting flavourful food. . . We used to eat out at least a couple of times a week - going for Japanese or Indian we could spend $30 for dinners including both of us having a beer - not true in Halifax-Dartmouth. Thai was more, but not as pricey as here and the "good' restaurants here, are all just too expensive - when we go out we seem to spend $80-100 with tax and tip - so we eat most nights at home. Upside - I have learned to cook! and Lobster at $4-8/lb, fresh scallops, mussels, clams and oysters all at an affordable price (OK the oysters, even here, are a luxury) makes up for it!
4) Diversity of the population, hearing a myriad of languages every day, and stories about and from many different countries. This is the reason most people here give me for hating Toronto - (too many people of different races and accents - if one more person tries to explain what is wrong with Toronto by describe their experience of being "the only white person on the subway car" I am going to scream out loud) but, I missed this especially during the World Cup. My last office in Toronto was downtown and during World Cup each country's contingent could be counted upon to be running and/or driving down the road waving the appropriate country flag and singing and chanting - what fun! Further downside. . . although I would not swear that Torontonians are less racist than Nova Scotians (or specifically Haligonians), they know that they should not speak racist statements aloud - or expect to catch hell for it, immediately. Here, I still hear people utter incredible racist stereotypes, and have no idea that they should apologize for saying that "the Chinese are bad drivers" or that "Paki's" (a term few people seem to realize is a slur - and which is applied to all South Asians and others - whether Indian, Nepali, Tibetan, Bangladeshi, or sometimes Afghani and even Fillipinos) are poor housekeepers, or most recently that Iranians are pigs (from a B&B operator who had one family of Iranians stay with her, and who I cannot convince do not represent the whole nation!) Things that I love about Nova Scotia and that totally make up for the above. . .
1) The ocean. At my house the tide literally rises and falls in my backyard. One morning a deer swam across the inlet right in front of my house. I can drink my tea while the sun climbs in the sky and watch birds. In March and April there are ducks - many varieties, by July the cormorants and Great Blue Herons are back and in the summer we often see Osprey and eagles. I can kayak in the morning before work, or ride my bike on trails through woods, and/or along the ocean inlets, and in the evening, if there is a low tide, I can sit on the deck and watch the sunset while the whimbrels, and willets, and maybe godwits, go by fishing in the rocks and shallows. From the shore in front of my house I see fish jump, small white crabs and large red legged crabs along with shrimp and eels. Not to mention the clams, and mussels and and periwinkles. You can watch swifts and turns swoop, and you can watch cormorants dive and come up eating fish.
2) The beaches (but where is the signage, people?) The beaches are amazing and there is great variety. You can (and I live only a few km's from) go to Lawrencetown Beach which is rocky but has change rooms, lifeguards and a canteen in the summer months and where there is surfing all year long. In fact, in the winter the surfing they say is better - with more storms the surf is up and the water is "thicker". Rainbow Haven Beach is sandy and has the same amenities but is safer for kids. Just stay away from looks like a river but is where the tide goes in and out rushing quickly.
And Conrad Beach (left) is a long crescent of sand and a beach with sand bars - they say the "undertow" is strong, but with the kids in close to shore it feels pretty safe - and oh the sand castles we have built, and the kites we have flown.
3) Friendly, helpful, generous people. Never, anywhere in Canada have I met such generous helpful and friendly people. (OK - actually I think NFLD may get the prize, but I have never lived there so cannot compare!) Every one speaks to everyone. After a couple for years here, and lots of time spent on trails and beaches, I returned to Toronto, and walked the Mimico Linear Park - which had been promised all the time I lived in Mimico but never completed. . . I said hello to everyone on the trail until I realized I was scaring the Toronto natives, when one woman looked aghast at me and literally ran away (I am a middle aged woman and don't think anything about me looks scary!) It just seems to be true that speaking to strangers in most circumstances in Canada's biggest city makes people assume that you are mentally ill.
4) The Annapolis Valley in the summertime - farms and farm markets, Ross Creek Centre and a whole lot more. Now it is true that I could be in Niagara in an hour out of Toronto, but somehow the Annapolis valley seems so much more accessible - and there is no rush hour, getting out of town, no backlog of Friday evening drivers trying to get away. . .
5) Old stuff - there has been habitation here for a long time - friendly. helpful first nations and early European settlement (yeah I realize that it was colonialism but it is still interesting) like in Annapolis Royal. . . (Pictured below)
6) The view from almost anywhere - Everyone knows about the Cabot Trail and the Southshore but the Eastern Shore and the mainland highlands - esp Cape George - Parrsboro, the Northumberland Shore, everywhere you look the natural Beauty is stunning. There is almost no drive you can take that does not result in some fabulous site.
So although there are things that I miss (my mother and sister, good friends and long time colleagues) there is lots to make me happy and keep me here. And I have not mentioned that N.S. also elected an NDP government (jury is still out but they are going gangbusters on the environment - except for the burning of wood for commercial power.) who I hope will make improvements in some of the social ills and poverty that still plague this province.
OK - so I am still a little upset by the events of the G20 police actions, in Toronto. In fact, I cannot erase it from my mind. It torments me night and day. Maybe the Black Bloc successfully accomplished what they were attempting by showing that the might of the state is authoritarian, and it will come down on your head, without due process, and 1000+ people now know what that feels like. . .
I fear that we are at the beginning (or maybe in the middle) of what I, in later years, will see more clearly as a "police state" - when common protest - taking to the streets is somehow perceived by too many as dangerous, out of the mainstream and not representative of their needs or views. I do not know immediately how to change the direction of the country - but I am thinking about it (and you are being subjected to reading about it) and I know I am not alone - but too few people are troubled.
I was reading a lot about corruption in India, this morning, and some of the attempts to "clean it up". It is still pretty bad - but I thought, in a lot of ways maybe they are more honest about their politicians' and bureaucrats' corruption. There, they have investigative journalism - more than one weekly magazine dedicated to exposing corruption and theft from "the people". These are not far left publications - more like McLeans - but exposing what is going on. I think of all of the horrible things that I know about from reading "alternative" news sources, Twitter, Blogs and yes I suppose left analysis; from Canadian Mining Companies' behavior in Canada and around the world (esp exploiting first nations - see: http://www.miningwatch.ca/) to the behaviour of our federal government - refusing to uphold democratic principles and acting like a dictator. . . e.g from James Travers in the Star : The Star, by the way, has had some decent stories and columns around the city losses, destruction and out of control policing. . . )
The Martin book will chronicle how Harper has come to be the master controller, dominating every aspect of governance. It will assess his accomplishments and failings and his effect on the workings of the democratic system.
The "democratic deficit," as it is sometimes called, has become an issue of such concern to Canadians that they recently staged nationwide protests over Harper's decision to suspend parliament. The book will chart how, since Pierre Trudeau, Canada has seen a steep decline in its democratic standards.
So, we know, and I think can all agree, that we are slowly eroding our democracy and that governments, now govern for the "owners" and for the corporations and their shareholders - those of us who earn a living (80% of us) get little, and indeed, less all the time.
But, after three decades, the evidence shows the neoliberal game-plan just didn’t deliver, at least for most of us. Still, we were running too fast to gripe much about it, or perhaps we were distracted by our ridiculously cheap baubles and toys… when along came a global financial meltdown. That turned the “less government, more market” mindset on its head -- at least for a time.
But now that we’ve spent $66 billion in Canada stabilizing what we have repeatedly been told is the world’s best financial system, that damn mantra is back – “less government, more market” – just in time to tell the people who are the collateral damage of neoliberalism what we can’t afford to do: help them.
What we really can no longer afford, however, is the discredited, corrupt idea of neoliberalism. It didn’t deliver prosperity to the majority of Canadians. Instead, it brought:
a huge tax shift -- from corporations to households, from richer people to poorer ones; from taxing incomes to taxing spending; from taxing income flows from savings and capital gains to shielding those forms of income;
the lowest rates of spending and revenue collection by the federal government since late 1940s (as a share of the economy);
a vastly smaller safety net, and more expensive basic services like education and housing;
less collective action through governments, and less collective action outside governments (unionization rates today are at same level as 1961, 31.4%; the peak was 36.5% in mid-1980s; today only about 18% of private sector workers are covered by collective agreements, about 75% of public employees);
a shrinking share of jobs from the two traditional sources of middle-class employment, manufacturing and public sector;
median wages stagnant for 30 years;
greater inequality: the bottom 40% of Canadian families raising kids are worse off now than their predecessors 30 years ago, though they are better educated and working more; only the top 10% have seen significant gains;
record household indebtedness;
less regulation and oversight on investments and credit creation;
more foreign ownership of our enterprises (and more Canadian capitalists owning stuff offshore);
climate change (and a disregard for it);
economic collapse; and
workers hating other workers more than the people who wrecked the system: ("I don't have what you have, so why should you have it?")
Also, in a paper by Ed Broadbent - in case you need any more convincing that we, the working people of this country, are not doing well ,and that there is a war against us, going on. . .
It’s important to note that, even at the peak of the deficit problem, alternative policies were available. In continental Europe, it is widely accepted that higher and more progressive taxation is needed to maintain an equal social rights-based notion of citizenship. Even in the U.S., in dealing with a similar deficit problem in the 1990s, President Bill Clinton (although he did further deregulate the financial sector) made few changes in social policy. Instead, he dealt with the U.S. deficit by relying on economic growth and tax increases on upper-income Americans.
The scale of the increase in inequality and the reduction of social rights, beginning in the last decade of the 20th century, is immense. Keep in mind that most Western economies, including Canada, had experienced the best decade of economic growth in 40 years, a period which the trickle-down soothsayers said would benefit everyone. Between 1998 and 2007, the average wage of full-time workers rose from $33,000 to $40,000, but that was less than the rate of inflation. During the same period, the top 1% of Canadians increased by 100% their share of total wages and salaries, and the compensation of the top 100 CEOs tripled, from an annual average of $3.5 million to $10.4 million.
The vast majority of Canadians actually experienced a downward shift in their share of the national income that they had worked to create. Seventy per cent of Canadian households have a smaller share now than they had at the end of the 1970s. A final statistic: excluding the elderly, the bottom 50% of Canadians have lower after-tax incomes than their equivalents in the late 1970s.
I don't know what else to do besides sign petitions, write letters, send emails and rant in blogs. I go to protests, and I have not stopped, but I really do feel like hitting the streets is not effective any more. If, as the recent poll, reported in the Toronto Star suggests,
The Angus Reid poll, which surveyed 1,003 Canadians and 503 Torontonians, found that 73 per cent of Torontonians and two-thirds of Canadians believe police treatment of protesters was justified during the G20 summit.
It is no way to get the public onside! So how do we turn this around?
What news are these folks watching? Could they have got the impression that those arrested were the same folks who were smashing windows, burning cars and generally using violence and (property) damage? I suppose that they could be - 'cause we know that the city (or someone in charge) did not send the fire department, but let a police car burn for 2 hours to make sure that all of the news gathering agencies "got their shot". . . but I am not sure that "the public" just feels like "protesters" are "someone else" - that they do not represent their (the public's) interests - why is that? Probably because TV news (where most folks get their news these days, although there is lots of "multi -sources" of news - TV, radio, newspapers, the Internet) is big in Canada esp among those who access only one news source - But if you are listening to talk radio, getting your news from yahoo.com or just reading newspapers online - National Post.com - you may be getting multiple sources but you are not getting multiple viewpoints.
I am too lazy today to put in the links to prove some points, but if you have doubts - send me a message and I will make that attempt - but I have been adding info to a previous blog about the G20 - if you want some evidence, about police atrocities. At this point it is questions of another nature - not proving that something was "fishy" and undemocratic and totalitarian - you'll have to accept that at the moment. And then I can move on. . .
to exploring how we can get Canadians to rise up, to question, to make demands . . .
There is this great video about how the questions need to be reframed. . .
Because I want somehow to influence the public, I no longer donate to "charities" - After years of donating a day's pay a year to the United Way, all of my annual donation money now goes to groups in other countries like Navdanya.org in India; in Canad to think tanks and alternative news. Rabble.ca, The Dominion (Media Co-op) and CCPA get monthly donations - along with the provincial and federal NDP - but sometimes I don't know why I bother with the NDP . . . certainly I have for 25 years been disappointed with NDP governments - although most (but not all) are not much better than their Liberal counterparts -- but I don't know how to refrain from electoral politics . . . I work in every election, but even when "we win" somehow it doesn't feel much different. Sure would like to try a federal NDP government but not convinced that they would be willing to do anything militant or radical and I suppose - how can they control or change what happens at the provincial level?
So, musing today -- really just bummed about the world, the country I live in (no pride here - no Happy Canada Day) and wondering why no one pays attention - I think I'd best go read Ralph Milliband again . . .
Hm m m interesting. . . In The State in Capitalist Society, Ralph says p. 4/5 (OK - I am demonstrating my age here -- he wrote in 1969 and 1973 but it had a big influence on how I see the state , capitalism and the world)
. . . But most Western 'students of politics', tend to start, judging from their work, with the assumption that power, in Western societies, is competitive, fragmented and diffused; everybody, directly or through organized groups, has power and nobody has, or can have too much of it. In these societies citizens enjoy universal suffrage, free and regular elections, representative institutions, effective citizen rights, including the right of free speech, association and opposition; and both individuals and groups take ample advantage of those rights, under the protection of the law, an independent judiciary and a free political culture. As a result, the argument goes, no government, acting on behalf of the state, can fail, in the not very long run, to respond to the wishes and demands of competing interests. In the end, everybody, including those at the end of the queue get served. . . its [believing in this liberal-pluralist view] first result is to exclude , by definition, the notion that the state might be a rather special institution, whose main purpose is to defend the predominance of a particular class. "
So maybe people don't believe that there is a dominant class - maybe they believe in that bourgeois democracy, or that there is fragmentation among groups and classes - but my personal experience (esp canvassing in elections where you get to talk to everybody) is that people now believe that there is a dominant/elite class, and they know that they are not part of it; but they believe (however erroneously) that there is class mobility and they want the rich to benefit because everyone (well too many people) believes that they may be rich before their life is over. . . So we don't have to convince "the public" that there is a class that benefits from the state's power - we simply have to convince them that they are not part of that class or that they are unlikely to have "upward mobility" any longer.
On the other hand, having said all that, maybe we have little to complain about in N.A. - maybe although we are worse off en masse, than we were twenty five years ago - maybe we don't notice because of the human exploitation in other countries that allows us to get our food, our clothes, electronics and and our baubles, made by people who are far worse off than us -- at low cost. Maybe we should be thinking about the exploitation of others, in other countries, but supported by this state - like where the clothes we wear are made, or where Canadian mining companies are exploiting children, or raping the land, and how that may be putting money into our RRSPs, from our mutual funds (for those of you that have such a thing!)
Maybe we don't think about the international distribution of wealth BECAUSE we feel that we are hard done by - that we didn't get as much as someone else - that we are lacking, have unmet needs, and so we think only about getting our due and not about the Human Rights, and progressive economics, combined with progressive legislation and regulation - that might make the world a better place and in the long run,make us happier by making us less alienated, and more collective, less of a consumer, more of a citizen, less of an atomized individual and more a community member. . . that's the world I want to head for - I just don't know how to get there or how to get the great mass of people to care enough, or believe it is possible enough, to come with me.
I wasn't born in Canada (Scotland) but I have lived here since I was a toddler, (see picture - me and my Mom circa 1955/56) and so know no other country as home. ( I could carry a UK/EU passport, but I do not, I carry, and have always carried a Canadian one) Other than wide open spaces (the reason for my parents immigration - my father was a hiker, fisherman and mountain climber and found Canada's wilderness compelling. ) I don't think I was a lot better off here than in Scotland, where I would have received a much cheaper education and still had state health care . . . Anyway, I was thinking about Canada on this day when my Facebook friends are all congratulating each other for living in such a great country - and I do wish everyone a very Happy Canada Day. . . and I have to face it - I have a nice house with a great view and a loving family and although we suffer occasionally from a number of maladies and misfortunes - we are better off than 80% of the people in the world. But if you, like me, don't feel free if others are imprisoned, are not satisfied if people are hungry, are not warm knowing others are cold . . . then it is hard. . . I feel connected to the others in the world. All their ills, I feel strongly are partly my fault, my choices help or hinder them. . . so on musing about that . . .
But, imagine my surprise to learn in that article in the Star that Canada is blocking debt relief, not because of child exploitation and/or Human Right's Abuses, but because the government in Kinshasa has closed a Canadian Mine --
But a decision on the debt by the World Bank has been put off temporarily at Canada’s request because of concerns arising from a dispute between the Kinshasa government and a Canadian mining company, Vancouver-based First Quantum Minerals.
“Canada remains concerned about the recent cancellation of mining contracts by the DRC government, and believes that the international dispute settlement mechanism initiated by First Quantum Minerals should be allowed to run its course,” a spokesperson for Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said.
Nope, Canada asked for debt relief to be cancelled or postponed, until the alleged unfair treatment of a Canadian Mining company is resolved. "First Quantum Minerals is seeking international arbitration after the DRC government closed its $700 million (U.S.) Kolwezi copper tailings project following a review."
I do hope that some of the unfair mining practices, the rape of the land, and the exploitation of mineral resources, war, violence and rape and exploitation of children is assisted in this - otherwise - Canada is, on this Canada Day, not a whole lot better than some pretty foul places in the world.
So on this Canada Day, I ask you, please, my Canadian brothers and sisters, who share my values, and I believe that is most of you. . . stand up for the rights of people over corporations; people's needs over corporate profits; and the rights of women and children (and men) to live without violence; and make Canada not just the true north strong and free but a strong, free country that stands up for the freedom (starting with the freedom to be sheltered, fed and live without violence)of people throughout the world; strong in defense of women and children, and a country that sends peace keepers not war bringers.
On this Canada Day, I wish I believed in a guy in the sky because I want to pray for change I fear this week, (Toronto police actions, G20 generally, 28 war ships in the Harbour, visiting unelected heads of state; and a valourization of war, children beaten by police in Bangladesh, 10,000 farmers committing suicide in India, continuing control of Monsanto over food, and private corporations over water, climate change and no will to stop it, increasing poverty and alienation in Canada) will never come without divine intervention.
In the meantime though, I ask you to mull over what we need to fix, and how we can fix it, and start with this great column by Murray Dobbin reproduced on Rabble . . . Is this What a Police State Looks Like? Demand an inquiry into what happened in Toronto - this is not just a problem for the Toronto Police, this was Police forces from across the country participating in actions led by the ISU/RCMP.
I wish I believed in a guy in the sky because I want to pray for change I fear this week, (Toronto police actions, G20 generally, 28 war ships in the Harbour, visiting unelected heads of state; and a valourization of war, children beaten by police in Bangladesh, 10,000 farmers committing suicide in India, continuing control of Monsanto over food, and private corporations over water, climate change and no will to stop it, increasing poverty and alienation in Canada) will never come without divine intervention.