[lbo-talk] negative freedoms, perhaps better termed

[andie nachgeborenen]

No less misery? Let me take you on a tour of old Detroit and show you what the Reuthers' Treat of Detroit of the early 50s bought the unionized workers of Detroit -- huge, gorgeous AFFORDABLE housing now abandoned and gutted since the collapse of the Keynesian deal; 100K (in current $) salaries, rock-solid job security, pensions (remember them?)  that actually paid, pattern-bargained contracts. All gone now, with the post 73 crisis and replacement of Keynesianism by neoliberalism.

Btw the UAW (disclosure, I used to work for their legal department) has always been at the forefront of the unions' fight _for_ racial and gender quality, unlike some unions. The workers weren't less exploited -- well, the rate of exploitation was lower, that was part of the deal, but they were still exploited. But remember what Joan Robsinsin said, in capitalist economy, the only think worse than being exploited is not being exploited. 

I am not saying, no one here is, that Keynesianism is preferable to or a good substitute for socialism, although what socialism is you and I would probably disagree on, but it's a sight better than neoliberalism. So year, I'm pretty fond it. I've said for a long time that if we had what they have in France we'd think the revolution was over and we'd won, wouldn't be true, but social democracy, even diminished and under attack, would be so much better than what we now have and what we are likely to get that it would be worth the rest of our lives in struggle to get it. Hell, so would the New Deal or the Square Deal or the Great Society. (Don't start on Truman-McCarthyism, Korea, Vietnam -- you know what I mean.)

--- On Sat, 5/17/08, Eric <rayrena at realtime.net> wrote:


> From: Eric <rayrena at realtime.net>
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] negative freedoms, perhaps better termed
> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> Date: Saturday, May 17, 2008, 11:46 AM
> >They are moving back into the Realm of Necessity and
> away
> >from the Realm of Freedom, as Marx and Engels defined
> them. The Realm of
> >Necessity is where ruling classes control masses by
> conditioning
> >fulfillment of needs on exploited classes producing
> surpluses for the
> >exploiting, ruling classes.
> 
> But this is exactly what the Keynesian arrangements you and
> andie and 
> Harvey love so much did. And it did it very well. The labor
> truce may 
> have brought more guarantees but it didn't mean any
> less misery or 
> exploitation. And it specifically functioned along
> racialized and 
> genderized lines. Hard to see anything desirable in this.
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