[lbo-talk] a teacher in trouble, reply to Nathan

[Gar Lipow]

On 3/5/06, Jim Devine <jdevine03 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> there are (at least) two types of victories. There are those against
> the most blatant irrationality, things that aren't even good for
> capitalism. For example, even though a lot of capitalist interest
> groups want us to ignore global warming (uh, I mean "climate change"),
> avoiding global warming would make life under capitalism more
> bearable, even for capitalists. These are cases where what's good for
> capitalism (and those who have no choice but to live under it) is
> different from what's good for individual capitalists.
>
> Then there are those against capitalism itself, which increase the
> power of the working class and other groups subordinated and dominated
> by the system.

I personally don't think we can win the fight against global warming
without increasing "the  power of the working class and other groups
subordinated and dominated by the system". To avoid misinterpretation
I don't mean that winning the fight automatically increases that
power, but rather that increasing that power is a pre-condition of
winning the fight. Or to put it another way, the change in power
relations that would be required to  win single payer  health in the
U.S. would provide a very favorable context for winning other changes
required  to achieve a  minimum of sustainability.