Mandela the Revolutionary

"Mandela may or may not be forgotten, but he will certainly be distorted, starting now." As I write, the obituary portraits are being updated and given the requisite spin. For official politics it will be Saint Mandela, the liberal hero. For the hard right it will be Mandela the terrorist, the man who waged a brutal war against the authorities. And for the far left, it's Mandela the sell-out - the leader who oversaw neoliberalism in South Africa and the supplying of arms to anyone who could pay. The figure of Mandela is contested because he is, perhaps, all these things. And more.

One aspect that will be glossed over is Mandela's period as an underground revolutionary just prior to his capture and celebrated, if that's the right word, imprisonment. It was Mandela who convinced the ANC leadership to wage armed guerilla struggle. It was Mandela who worked closely with South African communists and co-founded the paramilitary 'Spear of the Nation' (MK) organisation. It was Mandela who sourced weaponry for MK, and led bombing campaigns - albeit with the express intention of minimising civilian casualties. And once at Robben Island, Mandela became the head of a cadre school for ANC and SACP revolutionaries, not many of whom passed on to legalistic, non-violent political action.

And yes, this revolutionary activity was entirely justified. At that particular time, in that particular place, when change couldn't be carried by peaceful social movements and the ballot box there was nothing else left. Politics will always find a way. As such, the ANC's resistance to the apartheid regime is a chapter of history written in the anguish of the tortured and the blood of the fallen. But it was this intense struggle that kept Mandela as its figurehead, and his own incarceration as its example.

The crisis of the apartheid regime was bought by the blood price the ANC paid. It was the revolutionary struggle that forced the government around the negotiating table. Then was the right time for the ANC's strategy to switch from armed confrontation and insurrection to winning political and cultural hegemony around a post-Apartheid project. The subsequent truth and reconciliation process, which saw some of apartheid's worst criminals escape justice, has proven its worth by consolidating the transfer to majority rule. Like any good revolutionary, Mandela knew 'by any means necessary' meant just that.

Like all revolutionaries, Mandela was a flawed human being forced by event and circumstance to fall short of of his ideals. But his work and the movement he led opened South Africa up to democracy and tolerance. It is not paradise, far from it. The 'rainbow nation' is beset by political tensions and economic problems - but the path of achieving permanent progressive social change is much smoother than it would be were it not for his efforts.

Read more ...

The Conservative Record in Government

A reminder.

Read more ...

2121 by Susan Greenfield

Unlike Helen Lewis, I was able to make my way through the entirety of Susan Greenfield's debut novel, 2121. What Helen has to say about the prose and the lack of plotting is spot-on, so I won't be expending any wordage on the book's stylistic merits. If that's the right phrase. What I'm particularly interested in are the ideas Greenfield pushes, and the trap she and many scientists and science fiction authors fall into.

Just so you know, this isn't really a novel. It's a thought experiment and polemic dressed up as one. Set in the eponymous 2121 (itself, a pun on 20:20 vision - one that Greenfield had to explain in the postface), human society has schismed. On the one hand you have the Neo-Puritans, a group of dull, grey bureaucrat-philosopher-scientists who plan everything to the nth degree. Who they marry. What they do for work. How they spend their time at home. For them, the iron cage Max Weber prattled about is less a danger and more a security blanket. And over the mountains exist others or, rather, Others. Theirs is a technologically advanced society that sees everyone plugged into their own personal VR space near enough from birth.

The two societies are irreconcilable. The NP's are dedicated to pursuing personal (and social) growth through the power of thought. The Others exist in worlds of their own, living lives of pure sensation.

The plot, such as it is, involves the NP's sending their top man - Fred - over to study The Others. The powers that be are concerned that the existence of The Others is the greatest threat to the human race. As creatures of the moment, the grey beards back at home want to know if an Other can be prised away from their technology and develop normally. When Fred arrives at a nearby Other settlement, we are told they live together in domed Dwellings (capital D). One or two are designated carers by the faceless automative mechanisms that holds their society together, and a handful of the women are tasked with giving birth (via IV treatments). But crucially, everyone barely has anything to do with one another. So addicted are they to their VR machines that they haven't the time to build any kind of social relationships. Nor is there any wish to.

The lead character on the Other side is Zelda. A middle-aged Other who can remember a time before the all-immersive VR came along, we're often treated to reminiscences about her grandparents who, as teachers, were made obsolete by advancing technology. But unlike the other, um, Others, because she has a memory and was brought up "the old way" she retains a sense of self, albeit a melancholic one.

The third protagonist is Sim, Zelda's birth-daughter and object of her maternal affections. Sim is a typical Other. She is fully immersed in the daily barrage of digital sensations, loud music and flashing lights. She is but a bundle of narcissistic sense-impressions. It is only when Fred latches on to the pair that his experiments begin and slowly, over time, Sim's cognitive abilities are boosted and a sense of self starts coming through. Yet in the mean time, Fred's isolation from NP Land sees him slip from the ingrained puritan routines. The loud music, the flashing lights, the bright clothes, the Others' "Yakawow" slip their nihilistic tendrils around his mind. Like a Ying and Yang metaphor covered in fag burns and then dragged through a hedge backwards, everything balances out as one new person is born and another is destroyed.

I don't know if 2121 is a parable of the author's own addiction to Twitter. But her account has vanished of late, so perhaps. Yet, Greenfield has form. Rather than using her celebrity science status to investigate the issue scientifically, she has inveighed against the danger our media technologies pose toward the young. Too much sensation, apparently, bludgeons and destroys young brains. The Others are merely an extrapolation of what's happening to our kids today. Since the Walkman started out on its quest to inflict humans with premature hearing loss, technology has entered into increasingly intimate relationships with us. At the risk of sounding like an extropian surfer dude, our society has long been a cybernetic one; a vast community of humans and machines that depend on each other as condition of our mutual survival. Though, of course, machines aren't self-aware. Yet.

So, yes. This is yet another trip into Terminator/Matrix territory, but without killer robots and genocidal computers. It's a warning of the sinister potentialities inside every innocent-looking Wii U, Kindle, and iPhone. As Arthur and Marilouise Kroker might put it, Greenfield's vision is the end point of a civilisation in recline. But what is at risk is not the obliteration of the planet or even of our species. It's our souls that are up for forfeit.

It's cobblers, of course. There is absolutely no sense of agency in Greenfield's book. Fred meets his demise because the loud music and flashy colours are too much. They relentlessly dissolve the boundaries of his sense of self until he becomes an indistinguishable twitching body swathed in technology, his consciousness wrecked by the sensations pouring into his mind. Likewise, Greenfield's premise is devoid of it. Society splits between those who don't want owt to do with "the screens" and those who carry on Facebookin'. There is no sense of the social uses to which we put technology, how it is and always has been used to create new experiences, enjoy life, educate, and make new connections. Yes, in the age where social media is on its way to becoming the hegemonic way we use technology to mediate our relationship with the world (as papers, radio and TV have done in the past) it is amazing that Greenfield's Others have withdrawn into pure sensation, when communication is the most ecstatic pleasure of all.

On another level, Greenfield's novel does annoy me. The NP's are dull bureaucrats. The Others are mindless hedonists. But no thought at all has been given to the sociological basis of these societies, or the social processes that drove her great schism in the first place. Well, nothing more than lifestyle choice which, sadly, is a much-invoked trick science fiction authors like to call upon when speculating about the future divisions of the human race. In his otherwise super-hard SF Eon, Greg Bear has our descendants falling out over the use of technology. Inexplicably the technophobes refer to themselves as 'Naderites'. Yes, after that Ralph Nader.

What Greenfield lacks, like so many other scientists and sci-fi authors is a sense of the sociological imagination. Scrupulous attention can be paid to the science (be it speculative or otherwise) of space travel, of astrobiology, of computing, biomedicine and, in Greenfield's case, neuroscience; but the naivete when it comes to the understanding of social dynamics, social forces, and social formations is inexcusable. It's so lacking it's embarrassing. And on all three of these levels, 2121 shows its ignorance on page after turgid page.

Read more ...

Marx on the Power of Money

That which is for me through the medium of money - that for which I can pay (i.e. which money can buy) - that am I, the possessor of the money. The extent of the power of the money is the extent of my power. Money's properties are my properties and essential powers - the properties and powers of its possessor, Thus, what I am and am capable of is by no means determined by my individuality, I am ugly, but I can buy for myself the most beautiful of women. Therefore, I am not ugly for the effect of ugliness - its deterrent power - is nullified by money. I, in my character as an individual, am lame, but money furnishes me with twenty-four feet. Therefore I am not lame, I am bad, dishonest, unscrupulous, stupid; but money is honoured, and therefore so is its possessor. Money is the supreme good, therefore its possessor is good. Money, besides, saves me the trouble of being dishonest: I am therefore presumed honest.

- Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844. Harmondsworth: Penguin, p.128

Read more ...

Dave and Energy Bills

They just aren't switched on. Since Ed Miliband announced Labour's plans for an 18 month energy price freeze should he be forming a government in 2015, the Tories have not been able to properly respond. Shouting "Marxism!" had zero effect, their whinging about wholesale gas prices has been unconvincing - especially when the Big Six energy companies are posting burgeoning profits, and attempt to dub the 'energy price freeze' as the 'energy price con' has gone nowhere. Even Dave's pledge to reduce bills by cutting the "green crap" requiring companies to invest in sustainable energy sources has had no discernible impact.

And in the week the government have been exposed for trying to redefine fuel poverty, the Tories have unveiled what they think is a masterful counterstroke. The average £120 increase on bills this year will be cushioned by a £50 bung from the government to the energy companies, which will be passed on to the consumer. That's right, you won't pay on the bill but you will pay for the "discount" via your taxes. They have also announced a £1,000 green grant for new home buyers to help towards insulation and other energy-saving costs. How helpful.

The problem for Dave is the Tories are still seen as the party of the rich. Most people think he and his party kowtow to big business, and his gyrations over energy prices bears this out. He appears determined to protect the Big Six from any measure that will reduce their profits, even though four of the six are foreign-owned. But as far as consumers are concerned, people who are fed up with seeing their bills go up while pensioners die from the cold; they want to see the energy companies punished.

This is why Labour energy price freeze has resonance. Because it will hurt the likes of British Gas and EDF Energy. Dave's jiggery-pokery with tax and green investment doesn't wash because it keeps the Big Six in the sphere of non-punishment.

Read more ...

New Left Blogs November/December 2013

New month. New blogs.

1. Ancient Ribs (Unaligned)
2. Andrew's NUT Blog (Unaligned/NUT)
3. Carter the Blogger (Unaligned)
4. chekov.org (Ireland - Unaligned) (Twitter)
5. Democratic Revolution Syria (Unaligned/Syria Opposition)
6. Keep Our NHS Public South Warwickshire (Unaligned) (Twitter)
7. Left Blog (Ukraine - Unaligned) (Twitter)
8. Left Unity Milton Keynes (Left Unity)
9. London Campaign Against Police and State Violence (Unaligned)
10. Raised on a Diet of Broken Biscuits (Unaligned/Feminist) (Twitter)
11. Social Abjection (Unaligned) (Twitter)
12. Socialist Project (Canada - Unaligned)
13. South London Anti-Fascists (Unaligned)
14. South London Communists (Revolutionary Communist Group)
15. Trade Onion by Jon Bigger (Unaligned) (Twitter)
16. Trudie McGuinness (Labour) (Twitter)
17. Useful Nuisance (Unaligned) (Twitter)

That's your lot for November/December. If you know of any new blogs that haven't featured before then drop me a line via the comments, email or Twitter. Please note I'm looking for blogs that have started within the last 12 months. The new blog round up appears on the first Sunday of every month, and is also cross-posted to Socialist Unity.

Read more ...

Five Most Popular Posts for November

The five most read posts of the month were:

1. It's Time to Scrap Pairing
2. How London-Centric is Political Blogging?
3. Stoke Labour and Political Crisis
4. Day of the Doctor - Review
5. Capitalism, Asperger's and Autism

Nice to see some political commentary rise to the top in November. But what has left me non-plussed is the inexplicable popularity of the piece about Stoke-on-Trent's local politics. Well, perhaps inexplicable is the wrong word. We're not talking flying saucers or anything. I hypothesise that either the audience for blogs about Stoke's political scene is bigger than I thought, or, since Stoke North MP Joan Walley announced her retirement, would-be successors from across the country are treating it as a crash course in all things Stokie. Who knows?

Two plugs for those that missed the top five, just because I can. The first is Campaign for a Permanent Labour Majority, which isn't as trite as it sounds. 'Politics and Social Engineering' would be a more accurate title for the piece. The second is Stupid Empiricism and the Conservative Party.

Read more ...