> Milliken is a nationalist capitalist. Buchanan is a nationalist
> capitalist politician. Most of the people I know who are going to A16
> are neither of those creatures. Most are antiracist and
> antiimperialist, and quite a few are anticapitalist. Why do you
> insist on conflating them?
Well if they are arguing for social clauses, I don't agree. If they're there to fight PNTR and protect American jobs, I am quite ambivalent. Max seems confused about what I am saying, which is simply that American capital probably needs the expanded base of Chinese labor to avoid a breakdown crisis of overaccumulation (watch the pick up in US accumulation after some of those postal funds are released into the global securities markets); if he wants to hasten that crisis, he should oppose PNTR, not because it will save American jobs but because it will do the opposite.
If leftists are there to demand shut down of IMF, then I need to have some idea of how exchange rate crises and panic capital outflows are going to be dealt with because I don't think in the absence of IMF policies, those sorts of things are not going to happen--Brad has been making this point. If they're there to protest structural adjusment programs, fine, that makes more sense in my opinion.
If they had been there to stop the Wall Street Treasury complex from forcing capital liberalization on any and all countries, that would have been a lot more sense. After all, they're in Washington, permanent home of the Treasury. But they'd probably find more support for that within the World Bank than the US Congress, no?
Prove that I am wrong: With exception of a few groupings which may be inspired by Patrick Bond or Walden Bello, most of the organizations do not really have well thought out or valid reasons for why they are opposed to whatever they are protesting.
Which means (to repeat myself one more time) that they are easily dupes for capitalists who already have duty free access to the US market if they locate in Mexico. Why the hell do they want free trade, phase out of MFA--they just want others' trade barriers to be lowered. To be antiglobalization easily means to be proregionalization. It means obstruction of global integration, subsidization of the most reactionary sectors of the US capitalist class, unfair trade at the expense of countries suffering liberalization in its pure form.
Sweeney, Buchanan, etc don't want a bunch of poor indebted countries having to export, which will then induce a quick phase out of MFA and regionalist protectionist barriers. It's not that labor standards are better in Mexico or Honduras (or whichever country now enjoys a good quota); it's that other countries' exports may devalue American capitalists' investments and foreign partners' enterprises which are protected by regional agreements or quotas.
The Sweeney/Buchanan alliance, the Nader/Buchanan alliance is indeed an advocacy group for protectionism.
The crucial thing is that labor has been forced to carry the burden of this agenda. That is, like always, labor is having to clean up after capital and its contradictions. Everyone is blaming labor for free trade obstructionism. But the real opponent to multilaterial trading is capital itself. The capitalist class is just too cowardly to admit it, while they hide behind the popular protests they bankroll.
Yours, Rakesh