Capitalism

This is a brief review of the current all-round crisis in Pakistan, the worst in the country’s history.  It is the compounded form of all the previous accumulated politico-economic problems, issues, and crises, since its independence in 1947 that were, and are, both the result of the objective structure of the feudal-capitalist-dependent politico-economic system, as well as of the wrong, incompetent, and corrupt leaderships, policies, and actions. 

All the diverse symptoms of the current crisis indicate that Pakistan is rapidly becoming a failed state and a failed nation. 

The focus of this paper is on the conceptual analysis of the politico-economic and sociological processes, which can be substantiated by empirical, statistical, and other data.  However, these data have not been included here, as it will result in a much longer article.

The conclusion of this analysis shows that only an Islamic-socialist revolution can now stop and reverse the process of failure and disaster.  Such a revolution can happen in two forms:

1.  Mass-based.  2.  Military coup d’etat by Islamic-socialist officers and soldiers. 

The ‘Triple Bottom Line’ (TBL) is a major and increasingly used socio-environmental accounting framework. However, critical academic examinations of this model have been remained scarce and most importantly, no real alternatives have been developed. Thus this theoretical paper provides a contribution to fill this gap. Through a critical analysis of the TBL, we argue that it suffers from severe limitations. In particular, it does not protect human and natural capital (HNC). As an answer to these problems, we propose and discuss another accounting framework, the ‘Triple Depreciation Line’ (TDL), which extends to HNC the powerful capitalist accounting tool for preserving financial capital – the historical cost accounting (HCA) and its planned depreciation. To this end, we analyse and (re-)define the concept of capital in an ecological accounting context. We clearly specify the assumptions on which the TDL relies, to facilitate comparisons or dialogues with other accounting models and to avoid misunderstanding as in the case of the TBL. These axioms concern what we call the ‘social’ (axioms SA1–2) and ‘corporate’ (axioms AA1–4) capital maintenance. While the two first appeal to the most precise ontological investigation possible of HNC, the others imply mainly the recourse to the HCA and its depreciation.

Note: The following paper was given as an annual invited presentation, the esteemed Cobetto Lecture, at University of Pittsburgh, Greensburg, PA in 2013. It was accompanied by a photography exhibit that can be found here: http://thewrenchphilosleft.blogspot.com/2013/10/pretending-to-forget-whats-right-under.html.
Abstract:

Such, some argue, is the genius of capitalist enterprise: if each of us as workers and consumers can be convinced that what matters is the product—and not the process required to achieve it—we might be able to be persuaded to participate in all manner of atrocity. What we have to believe is that the product is something we can’t live without, or that it makes us better, or that wanting it is our moral or religious or patriotic duty.

That such an extortion of consent requires the appropriation of reason to the task of “how” over “why” is certainly an enormous task—one that arguably epitomizes a variety of modern fascism as the corporatist domination of the state.  Put in simpler terms, what effective marketing depends on is a kind of perverse social contract, one in which we collectively agree to forget just what sort of wounds we are willing to call mere “process” for the sake of a product upon which our dependence—however real—is made not of need but of created need. And that is not the same thing at all—but, I’ll argue, it’s vital to the extraction industries that we should forget the difference. Enter EXCO Resources, Inc, a natural gas corporation who, like all of its compatriots engaged in the Marcellus Shale Play, locates its raison d’être in the assumption that our need for fossil fuels is so great that we will sanction—forget—whatever EXCO does to get to the gas.

Like the addict who vanquishes all memory of the crimes they committed to get the heroin into their veins, so too EXCO counts on each of us—leased and un-leased, Shalers or non, gas field workers or ordinary consumers—to forego remembering the dirty lineage of that gas. The past, after all, portends the future; better to forget the past. The trouble is that when that future is climate change or war over access to the very water perversely fueled by the gas extraction process that destroyed it, the past will as surely return to haunt us as the name of the future is ecocide.

This paper offers an explanation of the current Greek crisis, it disputes the mainstream “debt crisis” explanation and argues that it is a twin crisis: a crisis of capital overaccumulation aggravated by the participation in the EU. The first part analyses the turbulent historical course of Greek capitalism through the main phases of its development, their crises and resulting restructurings. In particular, it pinpoints its status as a second-generation middle-range capitalist country with limited imperialist abilities. The third section analyses the position of Greek capitalism within the European imperialist bloc and the advantages but also the dangers stemming from its participation in it. The fourth section focuses on the current global crisis and how it has been expressed in Greece. The last section concludes with the current situation of the Greek economy after the imposition of the IMF-ECB-EU Memorandum.

SynTalk thinks about the meanings, implications and the future of coexistence between & amongst the several biological species on earth. The interaction space between species is explored via known strategies such as symbiosis, predation, parasitism, antagonism, mutualism, commensalism, & competition, while constantly wondering if ‘nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of ‘selfishness’’. The concepts are derived off / from Sushruta, Charak, Hegel, Malthus, Darwin, Hamilton, Kropotkin, Gandhi, Dobzhansky, Hawking, & Dawkins, among others. Is there often selfishness in nature without the ‘self’. Why does the host change its genetic makeup to coexist with the parasite? Why do most species exist in communitarian groups? Why does a predator never run out of prey in nature (in stable equilibrium)? How it may be unavoidable to ‘tolerate the most intolerable’. How sickle cell anaemia developed as a response to malaria. What is the difference between the antibiotic and aseptic conditions, in the context of the coexistence of different species? The links between human beings, mosquitoes, Chernobyl disaster, raptor birds, Ayurveda, dinosaurs, consciousness, natural selection, Tom & Jerry, oranges, sibling rivalry, wolves, & tribes. How do dominant & exploitative social structures result from the ensemble of unevenly evolved groups (in terms of techno economic capacity). How autonomy of certain groups (the weakest doing menial jobs, say) that had their pristine existence can be annihilated, incorporated, subordinated, subjected, or even destroyed institutionally. How cooperation amongst the uneven develop? Does consciousness promote cooperation? Is culture (merely) a survival strategy? How (bacterial) mitochondria and chloroplasts (green alga) getting incorporated into eukaryotic cells was a significant evolutionary event. Are plants and animals also cruel? How Toxoplasma gondii insidiously finds its way back into the cat (the definitive host) from the rodents (the dead end). Can there be sacrifice in the Darwinian world? How culture is a complex mix up of both material & ideological practices. Can we truly understand the concept of queen bee (without the metonymy)? Is resource abundance always temporary in the biological world? Why kids don’t always agree with their mothers? Why does each orange segment often have one dominant seed? Does the critical self reflexive faculty of human beings make them fundamentally different? Is techno capitalism likely to be a key actor? Will human beings go out and colonize other celestial bodies, even as we coexist on Earth with other species? How human consciousness, survival instinct and (the bacterial) gut instinct could be the ultimate assets for the future? The SynTalkrs are: Prof. K.N. Ganeshaiah (agricultural sciences, writing, UAS, Bangalore), Prof. Rajan Gurukkal (history, social theory, IISc, Bangalore), & Prof. Swati Patankar (molecular microbiology, IITB, Mumbai).

Нашенскому ширпотребу - широкое русское "да"! Кто против-то? Но почему же у нас в России вечно вот так? Неизбывная чичиковщина  плюс изрядная доля всегдашней хлестаковщины - и опять выходит какая-нибудь брынцаловщина... А можно ли просто недорогих и качественных товаров - без президентства в нагрузку?

Review of Andrew Feenberg's 2014 book The Philosophy of Praxis: Marx, Lukács and the Frankfurt School (London and New York: Verso), a substantial revision of his original 1981 book Lukács, Marx and the Sources of Critical Theory. Published in Marx & Philosophy Review of Books (February 14, 2015).

Vor dem Greuel des kapitalistischen Todes soll das Proletariat die Greuel des kapitalistischen Lebens vergessen und dass beide unzertrennlich miteinander verbunden sind. Vor den Experimenten der SS-Ärzte soll vergessen werden, dass der Kapitalismus im grossen Massstab mit Alkohol, mit krebserregenden Produkten, mit den Strahlungen der "demokratischen" Atombomben usw. experimentiert. Man zeigt die Lampenschirme aus Menschenhaut, damit vergessen wird, dass der Kapitalismus aus dem lebendigen Menschen, seiner Arbeitskraft, einen Lampenschirm macht. Vor den Bergen von Haaren, Goldzähnen, vor dem zur Ware gewordenen Körper des toten Menschen soll man vergessen, dass der Kapitalismus das Leben der Menschen selbst, die Arbeit, zur Ware gemacht hat. Hier ist die Quelle allen Unglücks. Dies hinter den Leichen der Opfer des Kapitals verstecken zu wollen, diese Leichen zum Schutz des Kapitals zu verwenden, das ist wirklich die abscheulichste Art, sie bis zu Ende auszunutzen.

Este texto de caráter teórico tem por objetivo problematizar a relação entre as empresas juniores e a universidade pública a partir do resgate do acúmulo histórico de debates realizados sobre a temática no Departamento de Psicologia e no Centro de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas da Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina durante os anos de 2011 e 2013. Discutimos a adequação das empresas juniores às universidades públicas enquanto forma de organização estudantil, instrumento pedagógico e agente de extensão universitária. Questionamos dois aspectos centrais às propostas de empresas juniores: o discurso do empreendedorismo e o processo de empresariamento das instituições educacionais no Brasil. A partir de uma perspectiva crítica, situada teoricamente nos campos dos conhecimentos marxista e sócio-histórico, discutimos a função social das universidades públicas no Brasil. Ao fim da exposição, concluímos que tanto a ideologia empreendedora como a sua expressão, na forma de empresariamento da educação, são incompatíveis com uma universidade que se proponha a produzir conhecimento efetivamente crítico e a formar sujeitos capazes de pensar e atuar criticamente sobre as contradições do capitalismo e seus reflexos nas condições de trabalho e emprego em nossa sociedade. Constatamos que as empresas juniores cumprem papel fundamental em difundir uma visão de universidade subjugada aos ditames e demandas do mercado, que forma sujeitos meramente adequados a tal realidade.

After failing to defeat the forces of Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria by massive aerial bombardments of the US and its Arab and Western allies, the American President, Barack Obama, has announced sending the American troops there for that purpose, again demonstrating his extraordinary trapeze abilities.  Such escalation will inevitably lead to predicable results and reactions.  The US and its above-mentioned allies are already heavily involved in funding, arming, and training of the so-called moderate anti-government groups in Syria, out of which the Islamic State emerged, to begin with.  Fighters from other groups and other nations, including the US and Europe, have been increasingly joining the IS in its various campaigns.  Such growth and development of IS forces is very likely to multiply after the involvement of US ground forces.  Whatever the US imperialism does in that region creates more and more sinister destructions and losses of life and means of living.  None of this would have happened if the US had left Iraq alone and not invaded it. 

Examining the enthusiastic reception of the Robinsonade genre in Germany during the Long Eighteenth Century reveals the anti-urban, and thus anti-modern, sentiments of the nascent German bourgeoisie. This may, in turn, begin to explain the lack of the emergence of a significant novelistic tradition in Germany, especially compared to that of England and France, until after World War II.