Cohn-Bendit: Politically Stateless?

by afew Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 08:14:24 AM EST

Libération publishes an internal note dated 24th February that Daniel Cohn-Bendit sent to Europe-Ecologie-les Verts (EELV) (a French movement he belongs to and was instrumental in starting up), in which he slaps EELV around, not because the presidential candidate, Eva Joly, is not the right one (he's already abundantly said that) but because of the decision of the three Green deputies to vote against the ESM ratification in the Assemblée Nationale.

What he says is that he is touched by the number of requests for him to support EELV candidates in the legislative elections that will follow the presidential, but that he intends to say what he thinks, so caveat emptor. And the main reason:

Cohn-Bendit se dit «politiquement apatride» - Libération		Cohn-Bendit declares himself "politically stateless" - Liberation
Les positions récentes contre le mécanisme européen de stabilité (MES) permettant, pour la première fois, d'aider concrètement les pays de la zone euro qui ne peuvent plus emprunter m'ont consterné. Au lieu d'argumenter, les élus d'EE se fondent indistinctement dans le slogan "Pas de cadeau à Sarkozy" au point de ne même plus savoir ce qu'ils font. Si demain, Sarkozy copiait son idole "Angie Merkel" en décidant de fermer 5 réacteurs nucléaires, le bon ton à gauche serait de s'y opposer! C'est tout simplement aberrant!!		The recent positions against the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), which enables, for the first time, to bring practical assistance to countries in the euro area which cannot borrow, appalled me. Instead of proposing a reasoned position, the EE representatives base their action indiscriminately in the slogan "No gifts for Sarkozy" to the point of not even knowing any more what they're doing. If tomorrow, Sarkozy were to copy his idol "Angie Merkel" in deciding to close five nuclear reactors, it would be in good taste for the left to oppose it! It's just ridiculous!!

Cohn-Bendit offered a more "reasoned position" before the vote, in an interview with Jean Quatremer. He says that the entire French left is "hypocritical" because the ESM is:

Cohn-Bendit: "sur la Grèce, la gauche française est hypocrite" - Coulisses de Bruxelles		Cohn-Bendit: "on Greece, the French left is hypocritical" - Backstage Brussels
l'une des rares choses positives qu'on a pu arracher au Conseil européen des chefs d'État et de gouvernement et surtout à l'Allemagne : il instaure une solidarité financière entre les pays de la zone euro dont on a besoin si l'on ne veut pas laisser sombrer le Portugal, l'Italie, l'Espagne ou la Grèce. Surtout, le MES est la porte d'entrée vers les obligations européennes.		one of the few positive things that it was possible to tear from the European Council of Heads of State and Government and especially from Germany: it establishes financial solidarity between countries of the euro area which is needed if we don't want to let Portugal, Italy, Spain or Greece go under. Above all, the MES is the gateway to European bonds.

Evidently, for Cohn-Bendit, the French left should have unanimously voted for ESM ratification. In fact, the Communist/Parti de Gauche deputies, the Greens, and twenty or so deputies on the left of the Parti Socialiste, voted against, and the other Socialists abstained. (Voting: 256 in favour, 44 against, 131 abstentions). The reason for this (albeit divided) position of the left is not the ESM in itself , but the strings attached: no country can access the funds of the ESM that has not ratified the associated "fiscal pact" that includes in particular the "debt brake" rule to be included in the constitution, which the left opposes. Further, François Hollande has stated that, if elected, he intends to renegotiate the fiscal pact. What does Cohn-Bendit have to say about this? The stumbling-block for the left, he argues

Cohn-Bendit: "sur la Grèce, la gauche française est hypocrite" - Coulisses de Bruxelles		Cohn-Bendit: "on Greece, the French left is hypocritical" - Backstage Brussels
c'est le lien qui est fait avec le traité sur « la stabilité, la coordination et la gouvernance dans l'Union économique et monétaire » que François Hollande veut renégocier. En votant le MES, la gauche estime qu'elle se lie les mains, ce qui est faux. D'une part, il faut avoir conscience qu'Angela Merkel n'a accepté de payer pour le MES qu'à la condition qu'on adopte le traité d'union budgétaire. D'autre part, Hollande, s'il est élu, pourra conditionner la ratification du traité budgétaire à l'adoption d'un second volet renforçant la solidarité financière et d'un plan d'investissement destiné à relancer l'économie européenne. La chancelière allemande sera alors dans une position très difficile, car son traité d'union budgétaire n'a de sens que s'il est ratifié par la France. Elle devra donc négocier avec la France, d'autant que cette dernière sera soutenue par une majorité du conseil européen et du Parlement européen, libéraux et conservateurs compris.		is the link that is made with the Treaty on "stability, coordination and governance in the EMU" that Francois Hollande wants to renegotiate. By voting the ESM, the left believes it is tying its hands for the future, which is not true. First, we must be aware that Angela Merkel has agreed to pay for the ESM only if the fiscal pact is adopted. On the other hand, Hollande, if elected, could make it a condition for the ratification of the fiscal pact that a second section be added strengthening financial solidarity and providing for an investment plan to stimulate the European economy. The German Chancellor would then be in a very difficult position, because her fiscal pact makes sense only if ratified by France. She has to deal with France, especially as the latter will be supported by a majority of the European Council and the European Parliament, including liberals and conservatives.

Cohn-Bendit is undoubtedly well-informed on the state of play in the European Parliament (and the European Council too?), but essentially he's saying that the austerity aspect of the fiscal pact (and the chains that bind the ESM to it) are lumps that have to be swallowed. TINA, Dany?

Cohn-Bendit: "sur la Grèce, la gauche française est hypocrite" - Coulisses de Bruxelles		Cohn-Bendit: "on Greece, the French left is hypocritical" - Backstage Brussels
François Hollande veut rétablir l’équilibre budgétaire dès 2013. Il est nécessaire que tous nos pays purgent leurs comptes publics parce qu’on ne pas continuer à endetter les générations futures. De toute façon, ce débat est derrière nous : le « six pack » qui réforme le pacte de stabilité et la gouvernance économique de la zone euro a été adopté l’année dernière. Le traité d’union budgétaire ne change pas grand-chose de ce point de vue, en dehors de la règle d’or qui n’est que la transcription au niveau national de ce qui existe au niveau européen. La réalité de l’Europe d’aujourd’hui c’est la culture de stabilité pour tous. Le débat ne porte donc pas sur la stabilité dont nous avons besoin, mais sur la façon d’organiser la solidarité.		Francois Hollande wants to restore fiscal balance from 2013. It is necessary that all our countries purge their public accounts because we can't go on indebting future generations. Anyway, this debate is over: the "six pack" reforming the Stability Pact and economic governance of the euro area was adopted last year. The budgetary union treaty (fiscal pact) does not change much from this point of view, beyond the debt brake that is only the transcription at national level of what exists at European level. The reality of Europe today is the culture of stability for all. The debate is not about the stability which we need, but on how to organize solidarity.

Well, that's that cleared up. Does it have to be pointed out to him that solidarity will be of quite relative use when austerity is plunging countries into recession that makes "balance" impossible? Can you apply mouth-to-mouth ressuscitation to a drowning person whose head you're holding underwater? That the most capable voice in the EP is accepting austerity as a done thing (which he justifies with a stock trope about future generations) is... appalling.

In the note he sent to EELV, Cohn-Bendit shows (no doubt understandable) irritation at a dig from French Vert deputy Noël Mamère who said, "Dany is Dany, he sees things from Germany". Cohn-Bendit says he's tired of having to justify his so-called "French" positions (he cites Bosnia and Libya, oops) when he's in Germany and his so-called "German" positions in France. He says he was born stateless in 1945, and now he is "politically stateless": "perhaps a kind of freedom..."

He does, however, in the Quatremer interview, point out German hypocrisy.

Cohn-Bendit: "sur la Grèce, la gauche française est hypocrite" - Coulisses de Bruxelles		Cohn-Bendit: "on Greece, the French left is hypocritical" - Backstage Brussels
l’opinion allemande a la mémoire courte : en voulant absolument punir les fautes grecques, elle oublie un peu vite que le monde a rapidement pardonné les atrocités commises par les Nazis. Pourtant, il existait, au lendemain de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, un plan américain, le plan Morgenthau, visant à démanteler l’Allemagne : il a finalement été abandonné au profit du plan Marshall et de l’annulation de la dette de guerre qui a permis à mon pays de se redresser rapidement. Aujourd’hui, la question est la même: veut-on anéantir la Grèce ou la relancer ?		German public opinion has a short memory: wishing absolutely to punish Greek [errors/faults/sins], it rather hurriedly forgets that the world quickly forgave the atrocities committed by the Nazis. Yet there was, in the aftermath of World War II, an American plan, the Morgenthau Plan, aimed at dismantling Germany: it was finally abandoned in favour of the Marshall Plan and the cancellation of the war debt which allowed my country to recover quickly. Today, the question is the same: do we want to destroy Greece or get it back on track again?

The tone of his note to EELV, however, indicates not only a goodbye to French political ecology and what he calls "the left of the left", but also to France, in favour of "my country". Or stateless freedom.

Cohn-Bendit: Politically Stateless? | 167 comments (166 topical, 1 editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Cohn-Bendit: Politically Stateless? (none / 0)

Cohn-Bendit publishes an op-ed with others today in Le Monde, but it's behind the subscription wall.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 08:05:20 AM EST

Daniel Cohn-Bendit is many things, and many of (none / 1)

these things I like and respect.

But, he is not an economist, and here, it shows.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 09:12:15 AM EST

Why? (4.00 / 4)

What is wrong with prioritizing solidarity and re-distribution as the main economic policy focus?

The fight against austerity is steeped in the growth mindset, which this site used to find less attractive in the past.

Rocard notes that beyond excess debt we'll have to deal with excess consumption of scarce resources.

Wind power

by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 10:10:34 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 5)

I disagree. The fight against the austerity programs that are currently practiced is a fight against a program that re-distributes upwards by denying lots of people access to fundamental goods and services in society. Military spending apparently must not be cut, neither may taxes be imposed on the rich. Austerity as practised can not be anything re-distributive to the rich.

But sure, that is not what DCB wishes for. What he does accept is the fiscal brakes and the frame that when government creates money it indebts future generations. Which translates into resource constraints being bourn by unemployment and the unemployed rather then by inflation and thus those who have money in the bank. I don't see the solidarity, nor really how it helps with the constant growth of ecological footprints until ecology collapses.

A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!

by A swedish kind of death on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 10:47:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 6)

Nothing wrong with the principle. The problem is that the choice of Europe at the moment is the German choice of austerity, which means that we are quite precisely not making solidarity and growth a priority.

DC-B seems to think we can tack solidarity and growth on the back of austerity. But neoliberal "reform" by force is the contrary of solidarity and growth.

As for resource constraints and growth, everything depends on what type of growth you want to promote, what type of growth you want to limit, and what metric for growth you choose.

Haven't these points too been constant themes on ET?

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 11:30:51 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (none / 0)

In addition, you have a realistic chance to tack on signficant changes only from a position of power. I don't think a President Hollande would be able to achieve much against the majority of the austerity party.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:59:12 AM EST
[ Parent ]

You like austerity (3.00 / 2)

I guess, like Cohn Bendit, you're German too...

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 12:27:11 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 2)

There is nothing wrong with abandoning both austerity and growth that inflation can't solve for you.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 01:10:35 PM EST
[ Parent ]

There is a certain strain of french socialist (4.00 / 3)

who has the same sort of inflation phobia as is commonly ascribed to Germans. Here's François Mitterand:

L'inflation, impôt pour les pauvres, prime pour les riches, est l'oxygène du système. Regardez-le qui s'époumone.

Or, translated, "Inflation, tax on the poor, boon to the rich, is the oxygen of the system. Look at it take a deep breath".

Mitterand, like Cohn-Bendit, is also worthy of admiration, but here too, he shows he is certainly not an economist.

And this sort of theological mantra, on the left no less, is simply unhelpful, and certainly does not facilitate solidarity.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 03:54:27 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: There is a certain strain of french socialist (4.00 / 3)

Inflation is a tax on rentiers.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 04:00:53 PM EST
[ Parent ]

On this we heartily agree. (4.00 / 2)

But, this is a longstanding dispute with Jérôme, one we've been debating since
way before the start of the financial crisis.

The important thing to note is that Jérôme is not alone, there is a strong strain, especially among the cadres, in the french socialist party, that still agrees with Mitterand on this (Rocard, for instance, and certainly not just him). Jérôme has said, though not lately, exactly the same thing.

It passes for economic logic, this inflation phobia, but I think you and I both know what it is: banker's logic. And Europe's got far too many bankers, and far too few real economists.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 04:19:48 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: On this we heartily agree. (4.00 / 2)

As JakeS has pointed out, democratic movements favour inflation, oligarchic movements deflation.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 04:34:55 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: There is a certain strain of french socialist (4.00 / 4)

To be fair (1): Mitterand wrote this (Google tells me) in l'Abeille et l'architecte in 1978, in the middle of a long run of two-figure (or some years almost) consumer price inflation. I don't remember suffering terribly from it, but I remember prices going faster than what I could earn (I was a farm worker at the time).

To be fair (2): not long after this, inflation's hash was settled by under-employment and attendant wage moderation, and it has been that way since.

To be fair (3): none of the "inflation is the enemy" freaks ever seemed to worry about asset price inflation.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 04:45:27 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: There is a certain strain of french socialist (4.00 / 3)

Of course there is a context, and in Mitterand's case, opportunism, the standard "non-lyrical" left critique of Barre/Giscard's economic record.

But what I'd like for these people to explain to me: how in heaven's name is inflation good for the rentier, monied classes?

In any event, wages are indexed, if not as matter of legal or conventional fact then as a result of the street and the strike. And government benefits generally are indexed. So, inflation may not be a friend, directly, of workers, but it isn't exactly an enemy either, even at 10% (which no one now is advocating).

Otoh, as Miguel points out, inflation hurts the rentiers, in large part those who have facilitated the mess we are in and still haven't started paying for it. And, it also hurts the professional classes, in lesser measure than the wealthy (the middle classes have less wealth, but are closer to it). So, the bourgeoisie, and the petite bourgeoisie perhaps even more, don't like inflation. (And the latter is a core consituency of the PS, of course).

The rest of us though?

Point taken on asset inflation, though there are left proposals for dealing with this as well.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 05:14:41 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: There is a certain strain of french socialist (none / 1)

redstar:

how in heaven's name is inflation good for the rentier, monied classes?

My points (2) and (3) addressed that. Wage inflation is bad for the big bucks; underemployment calms that down. Asset price inflation, otoh, is good for the big bucks, and we've seen plenty of that with the attendant result of rising income and wealth inequality.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 03:01:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: There is a certain strain of french socialist (4.00 / 3)

I was more responding to Mitterand than to you, as the economic environment he was addressing was one of wage and consumer price inflation and not asset price inflation, and yet he said those things. It was more to underline some residual muddled thinking in today's PS.

You are of course right about asset price inflations effects, assuming we're not talking about a bubble. What goes up must come down in that case, and it rests on the cleanness of the political system to ensure that when the bubble deflates, the right people eat the lossesm

That, unfortunately, is not the case in most places.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:28:57 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 5)

What is wrong with prioritizing solidarity and re-distribution as the main economic policy focus?

Nothing, provided that is in fact what you are doing, as opposed to what you hope some day to accomplish while unwittingly supporting a program that does the opposite because you have bought into a frame which, you do not realize, excludes the possibility of solidarity. From what has appeared here on Hollande he too is a prisoner of the neoliberal frame. Hope not, fear so.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 01:14:52 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 5)

What is wrong with prioritizing solidarity and re-distribution as the main economic policy focus?
Nothing, provided that is in fact what you are doing, as opposed to what you hope some day to accomplish while unwittingly supporting a program that does the opposite

How does one implement a programme of "solidarity and re-distribution" while reducing the public debt in a recessionary environment?

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 02:19:32 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 3)

By expressing 'solidarity' with the many from whom wealth is being extracted to pay the debt owed to a very few? Call it extreme unction.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 07:36:00 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 3)

By taxing bondholders.

Preferably to the tune of 100 % of their bondholdings.

Hey, I have an idea. Let's not-default by simply imposing a 100 % tax on all bonds issued before the second quarter of 2012.

There, instant government surplus, no default, everyone should be happy.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 02:49:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (none / 0)

Migeru:

How does one implement a programme of "solidarity and re-distribution" while reducing the public debt in a recessionary environment?

the article you pointed to the other day explains that: a giant rollout of green energy and attention to infrastructure, public transport etc.

it's not rocket science, but what is is doing it without the banksters fouling it all up by trying to extract uber-rents from it, or delaying it with their fraudulent gambling losses offloaded onto the poor, then saying we can't afford solar/wind incentives, (though mysteriously there is for nukes).

not to mention captured politicians and the massive money lobbying for the status quo with at best minor tweaks, instead of the paradigm shift that is needed.

that's what made the article solid gold, there is a way out of this, but no major politicians to push for it. at least the greens get it, better than nothing i guess...

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:45:19 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 3)

No, the article explains what could be done were it not for the balanced-budget austerity.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:47:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (none / 1)

Alternatively you could print a lot of money and use it to pay off debts whilst investing in infrastructure etc?

Index of Frank's Diaries

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot dotty communists) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 07:33:59 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 6)

You could print a lot of money to invest in green infrastructure and caring for dependents, and the debt would pay itself from the tax revenues from increased economic activity.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 07:39:03 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 2)

You have to spend before you tax to not risk incurring deflation. Else, you might adopt the theory that governments tax money into existence. But I think that would not be too popular with the wealthy.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 10:42:11 AM EST
[ Parent ]

PN n/t :) (none / 0)

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 05:36:54 AM EST
[ Parent ]

I don't think that one can actually (none / 1)

characterise as solidarity a law which imposes strict rules on fiscal policy in exchange for what amounts to austerity-conditioned chump change.

Noting in passing that malthusian dystopian thinking has been a staple of a certain bourgeois intellectual set even longer than the "France in decline" variation. Rocard seems to be taken by such thinking in his dotage but her, he's got posterity to think of. Of course, Malthus as all well and good but many of us have noticd that mankind has done quite well, despite the pessimism from the usual suspects, thank you.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 03:46:41 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 2)

Aye.

Brilliant Rocard interview by the way.

Keynesianism (demand based economics) works very well in a world with infinite resources. It is completely inappropriate for a "post-peak" world (or a world where resources have to be shared with "the Southern hemisphere").

The solution, in my view, is exactly as you say: "prioritizing solidarity and re-distribution as the main economic policy focus".

But, in the context of things, the spearhead against genocidal finance and corporatism (or fascism if you prefer), is being done with Keynesianism (a brilliant idea in an infinite world, by the way). Opposing Keynesianism will brand you "of the other side".

Keynesinism is losing because of the massive power of the other side - propaganda machine, money, etc. But on an even playing ground it would lose also: it is at odds with a reality where growth is impossible.

Any realistic model will have to include de-growth. De-growth with less inequality.

Future generations will have less to live with. That is not political, it is physical.

Interestingly a non-growth world puts re-distribution front-and-center: trickle-down is untenable in a constrained world. In a limited world, if the rich have too much, there is nothing to trickle-down due to physical limits.

by cagatacos on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:08:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (none / 1)

The solution, in my view, is exactly as you say: "prioritizing solidarity and re-distribution as the main economic policy focus".
...

Any realistic model will have to include de-growth. De-growth with less inequality.

How do we get there from here? It's much more likely that we'll end up with a highly unequal distribution of wealth and income.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:12:32 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (none / 1)

I do not know how we "get there". But I do know this: unless some massive technological change happens there will be less to share in the coming decades.

I do not believe the current "middle-class" European pattern of consumption is sustainable: The planet would not be enough if 7 billion would have access to it.

Therefore any solution will have to include austerity. Less consumption. I call this "gravity": like it or not it exists.

This relies on the idea that we are touching physical limits of the planet, of course. Keynesianism would be the correct answer in an infinite world.

If "growth" is needed for a fairer/better society then we are doomed (TM).

I do not think we need "growth". But we need to adjust our models for a scarcity mode.

by cagatacos on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:23:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 7)

Therefore any solution will have to include austerity. Less consumption. I call this "gravity": like it or not it exists.

Can we distinguish between material austerity and monetary austerity?

If we could all make a living wage telling jokes to each other our ecological footprint would go through the floor while keeping employment stable and GDP growing.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:26:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 6)

Therefore any solution will have to include austerity. Less consumption.

That is not austerity. Austerity is less spending, not less consumption. The two are only related in the neoliberal fantasy world where inflation is evil.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:36:21 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 3)

Negative growth in real terms is perfectly compatible with positive growth in nominal terms. And it is nominal, not real, growth that determines employment, distribution and financial stability. Keynesian economic policy targets nominal growth, not real growth.

You confuse nominal and real growth at the peril of talking nonsense.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:31:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 2)

But, of course, real quantities are more "intuituve" than nominal quantities, and if real and nominal diverge it must be a swindle by the people who advocate focusing on the nominal. And so triumphs common-sense conservatism.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 07:31:55 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Indeed. (4.00 / 2)

But that is not an argument for letting the assertion of such nonsense pass unchallenged.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 08:50:33 AM EST
[ Parent ]

You swindler (n/t) (none / 1)

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 09:40:16 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Why? (4.00 / 6)

But the austerity embraced by DCB isn't ecological.

European Tribune - Cohn-Bendit: Politically Stateless?

Francois Hollande wants to restore fiscal balance from 2013. It is necessary that all our countries purge their public accounts because we can't go on indebting future generations. Anyway, this debate is over: the "six pack" reforming the Stability Pact and economic governance of the euro area was adopted last year. The budgetary union treaty (fiscal pact) does not change much from this point of view, beyond the debt brake that is only the transcription at national level of what exists at European level. The reality of Europe today is the culture of stability for all. The debate is not about the stability which we need, but on how to organize solidarity.

This is accepting to limit governments printing of money, which benefits those that hold money or a government license to print themselves. It is not a limit on how much coal we dig up or burn, nor a limit on how much we destroy fishing for future generations (not to mention how the fish feel about being exterminated). If anything the argument that we can not afford to abstain from coal and fish will get more effective once people are denied working with providing services to each other (like all the government employees fired in Greece) and are desperate for a job.

A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!

by A swedish kind of death on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:46:50 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Cohn-Bendit: Politically Stateless? (4.00 / 7)

I guess that DC-B is not aware that the left on Greece is against the ESM and the fiscal pact because of the disaster being visited through them on the country's population. If the Greens were to follow DC-B suggestions they would be acting against the interests of the Greek workers and the parties of the left including the Greek Greens. It would have been a disgrace. Austerity is the vehicle to destroy Greece.

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 01:35:12 PM EST

The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 9)

seem to me to be more principled in this matter. And I think that principles count in the political sphere at various historical junctions - including now. Plus I think that the left-left has a better sense of the concept of solidarity - although their practice often lacks it.

No doubt that C-B has some admirers here at ET, and no doubt that I'm an old fogey; but he always made me nervous due to his flamboyance and his apparently impulsive nature. He just seems easily annoyed and a bit capricious - a contrarian, rather than a consistent leftist.

As to the ESM, I agree with those who find it fatally flawed. No doubt, my Marxist faith should tell me that it's another nail in the coffin of the ruling class in the mid- to long term; but I just cannot bring myself to acquiesce in their short-term victories.

Moreover, I cannot find any reason, historical or political, to think that support for their project can be transmuted to a positive outcome. How does that happen? Not a rhetorical question - please tell me the mechanism.

paul spencer

by paul spencer (spencerinthegorge AT yahoo DOT com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 02:03:08 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 4)

I suspect DCB is being what he considers realistic and pragmatic. Austerity is now a political done deal institutionalised by right wing Governments right across Europe and the best the European left can hope to achieve in the near future is to supplement/ameliorate its worth effects with a re-prioritising of growth and solidarity - because ultimately a collapse in demand damages the interests of the elite as well.

Probably any renegotiation of the fiscal past will be largely cosmetic - an increase in structural, cohesion, emissions reduction and regional funds or a greater PR focus on growth employment, R&D and infrastructural development projects. However the vast bulk of the heavy lifting required to regenerate EU peripheral economies will be left to "the markets" and "improved competitiveness" created by savage wage deflation.

I can't see this working for the PIIGS any time soon as the Eurozone is already in recession and sovereign and household debt sustainability is not improving. But what we are talking about here is a long term "rebalancing" of the European project in favour of Germany and perhaps France, but more particularly in favour of the financial elites. If the European left can't achieve greater cohesion and solidarity among its own constituent movements, what hope is there for the EU as a whole?

Index of Frank's Diaries

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot dotty communists) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 05:37:13 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Oh, there is no hope for the EU as a whole. In fact the EU has become a negative force.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 05:38:55 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Does that mean that the European Tribune has to be come the Post European Tribune or the Posthumous European Project?

Index of Frank's Diaries

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot dotty communists) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 06:00:10 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

No.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 06:12:53 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 6)

If there is no hope for the EU as presently constituted, and if Germany is the big kid on the block that will prevent any new European project (that we could recognize as positive) from emerging, what alternative remains but regression to individual sovereign nations and the old games of national interests and ad hoc alliances? (Yes, I recognize the trend in the EU has been in that direction for some time anyway, with the exception of the lack of monetary sovereignty). But what hope would there be that our individual nations, in a labour-glutted global economy, could avoid a competitive race to the bottom in terms of wages and social conditions while providing an adequate response to problems of resource constraints?

In other words, what's more positive than "negative"?

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 02:53:21 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

Agreed, certainly as far as small states like Ireland are concerned. The EU may have been gong in a negative direction for some time, but a return to the status quo ante seems even more retrogressive. The problem is that the "democratic deficit" has become a big hole...

Index of Frank's Diaries

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot dotty communists) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 03:35:11 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 4)

When even DCB (much more willing to think outside the box than Hollande) accepts that austerity will become an organizing principle of the EU, you know the "democratic deficit" is the least of our problems.
As IM tirelessly points out, austerity is hugely popular with the voting public. Like the death penalty.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:20:08 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 6)

It is. The narrative, the frame, the rhetoric of austerity is very popular. The actual political details not so much.

I am still optimistic, though: The death penalty is a lot less popular then in say 1950.

The problem with DCB and lot of the (german?) greens is that they like to conflate ecological sustainability with economic "sustainability", that is austerity.

by IM on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:01:49 AM EST
[ Parent ]

A tale of two Greens (4.00 / 8)

The problem with DCB and lot of the (german?) greens is that they like to conflate ecological sustainability with economic "sustainability", that is austerity.

Funny you should say that. About 5 months ago I almost wrote a diary called A Tale of Two Greens, because on the occasion of Barroso's proposal of a financial transaction tax there were blog posts by Sven Giegold and Pascal Canfin, the leading German and French MEPs on charge of the economics and finance portfolio for the European Greens group in the European Parliament.

Basically, Giegold had to put in the obligatory

We Greens are for binding limits on public debt and for a sharper Stability and Growth Pact.

whereas Canfin said

The stability pact is essentially an austerity pact, because its recessionary effects are not offset by any other European policy in the context of a "package".

The diary we're discussing here shows that Cohn-Bendit is more at home with the German than the French Greens when it comes to economics. It doesn't make him or Giegold bad people.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:15:20 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: A tale of two Greens (4.00 / 3)

The funny thing is that Giegold did lead for years the german attac. Was even the founding spokesman.

by IM on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:28:37 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: A tale of two Greens (4.00 / 3)

ATTAC are single-issue Tobin Tax advocates. There's very little in common among them other than that. One of the common things is the mistake of thinking that the Tobin Tax is supposed to be a revenue source.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:30:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: A tale of two Greens (none / 1)

As far I understand they do a lot more nowadays, never mind the original name. At least in Germany. It is a broad and diffuse movement, though.

by IM on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:37:05 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

In the case of the Irish right wing Fine Gael (Christian Democrat) party, austerity is actually to be welcomed on moral grounds. Giving social welfare entitlements to people undermines the work ethic and the relative social position of their bourgeois base.

The recession and the Troika are actually to be welcomed as a social and moral corrective. What's the world coming to when building workers could earn €1000 a week and spend it on their feckless ways?

Soon we will have a religious revival lauding the benefits of abstinence and self-flagellation. It's in our nature...

Index of Frank's Diaries

by Frank Schnittger (mail Frankschnittger at hot dotty communists) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 07:26:05 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 5)

Thus "austerity" is just a new name for the same shite the Serious have been peddling for years: cut government spending by reducing support and services for the working class and privatizing everything.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 07:35:49 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

what do you expect from them? same one-trick pony, just different riders...

same as the republicans in the USA, just here they're better, more polished liars about it.

shite all the same, as you say.

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 05:42:26 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 8)

what alternative remains but regression to individual sovereign nations and the old games of national interests and ad hoc alliances?

We all stay together out of a wish to be "good Europeans" and fear of being tarred with the brush of "destroyers of the Euro/EU". Meanwhile, the EU slowly evolves into a free market dystopia where the majority of the people live on Moldovan wages while the lucky few enjoy corporate socialism, governments spy on people while they rearrange chairs and the EU Commission makes lofty pronouncements about things such as health care tourism and how much citizens' lives have improved now that the EU has made it possible to can change garbage collection billing service providers from your iPad. Meanwhile, a generalised race to the bottom in taxes and public services has taken hold for which everyone blames their immediate neighbour to the south (the same one they travel to on weekends to buy cheap booze). Real sovereignty resides in the FIRE sector's cozy relation with the ECB as they collectively fix the tribute each government in Europe gets to pay for the privilege of continuing to exist. Every so often an ECB riot takes place, which everyone—rioters included—blames on the genetically-determined fecklessness of the rioting Euroregion. Oh, and Europe is a Christian land and all press is right-wing, except for online samizdat which you can't access without hacking your iPad which people can't do due to the generally low level of education.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:09:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

I get the impression you didn't read my comment.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:13:12 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

You said what alternative remains but regression to individual sovereign nations and the old games of national interests and ad hoc alliances?

and I replied

We all stay together out of a wish to be "good Europeans" and fear of being tarred with the brush of "destroyers of the Euro/EU".

Is that not an alternative?

Ok, wel, there were a couple of races-to-the bottom in there. But you have to admit that breaking the contintent into Euroregions spanning the current borders and making collective decision making reside in the FIRE sector is not business as usual.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:18:27 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Oh, right, you wanted a "more positive than negative" answer. Sorry, can't help there. Even DCB can't.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:19:24 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

I wanted to know what perspectives you see for Europe, beyond emigration to ???

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:20:35 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

what perspectives you see for Europe, beyond emigration to ???

Emigration within?

If you can't beat them, you go to work for the FIRE sector in the Blue Banana.

(By the way, I have a diary in my head about how the FIRE sector is the modern Dutch disease: all qualified workers will slowly migrate there and the real economy will wither and die)

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:23:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

Well, that the financial sector hoovers up the "brightest and the best" was one of the points of the "Anglo Disease" argument.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:26:53 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Can we stop it with the "Anglo" there?

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:27:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

Why? I'm referring back to a theme presented and discussed here. As an Anglo myself, I don't object to it.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:34:05 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

There's nothing Anglo to the destruction being visited upon Europe. More like Austrian. Complete with the Catholicism.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:35:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

The Anglo Disease theme concerned the international financial sector. Still there.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:37:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Still there, still going strong.

But now that the ECB/EU are more insane than the IMF (and the IMF is led/figureheaded by Frenchmen, anyway) how is any of this Anglo?

I always saw the "Anglo" in Jerome's "Anglo Disease" as "we're not responsible for this and all we need to do to fix it is stop following foreign ways". Which is a cop-out.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:45:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

I always understod the anglo disease as country overly dependent on the financial sector. Like the UK. And that is still true. (Was is ever true regarding Ireland?)

And isn't your "german disease" a similar narrative and cop out?

by IM on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:50:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 9)

What "German disease"? I don't call the Austerity drive a "German disease"

Now, about the FIRE disease, in the last 12 months or so I have seen a couple of younger physics students form my school in Madrid finish their PhDs and go into finance. An engineer friend in California, a few years my senior, after spending a couple of years retraining within engineering and job-hopping wound up with a Hedge Fund in Reno. Most of my department is composed of Mathematicians, Physicists, Engineers and Statisticians, hardly any of them with finance qualifications. I recently found out that somebody who used to frequent this job, after two or three engineering jobs in Switzerland, has moved on to finance. Two weeks ago I went to a student function at the local School of Industrial Engineering and later I was contacted by somebody who I tutored in math when she was getting ready to go to university and who now is a lecturer at the Engineering School with a PhD in... financial time series.

We're fucked, we're truly fucked.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:57:15 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

I recently found out that somebody who used to frequent this ~~job~~blog

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:19:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

This blog is the job we want to have, if only it would pay our bills! :-)

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 11:28:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 6)

The Dutch disease is not a disease because the country is dependent on a sector. It's a disease because the sector grows at the expense of the other sectors because it's more profitable and offers better career prospects. Then the rest of the economy withers and dies.

As far as economic sectors go, FIRE is even more useless than the Resource Extraction sector that the Dutch disease was about.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:59:12 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

I agree that the "virtuous Europe v the Anglo world" billing is wrong. But the reason always stated for the Anglo term was that Wall Street and the City are the principal hubs of global finance.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:55:42 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

The longer this manufactured crisis drags on, the more obvious it becomes how unfair to New York and London it is to not include Frankfurt on that list.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:07:30 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

So you believe in a german disease?

by IM on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:10:36 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

No.

But if you don't put a whole bunch of Frankfurt financial institutions on the list of companies that need to cease to exist, then you're kidding yourself.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:14:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

If FIRE is crowding out other sectors across EU then German disease misses the point. And since it already got the Anglo world, perhaps Western disease? To the extent the name is useful anymore at all.

A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!

by A swedish kind of death on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:17:50 AM EST
[ Parent ]

FIRE disease (n/t) (none / 1)

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:20:32 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

A swedish kind of death:

To the extent the name is useful anymore at all.

I don't think it is any more. Which doesn't mean imo that we should forget the global context.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:20:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 5)

The global context is that the Bank of England and the Fed are more Friedmanite monetarists than Hayekian austerians, and so they are doing much better in this crisis than Europe is. The irony is that during the last big crisis (1970s stagflation) the policy prescription of the Monetarists and Austerians coincided, against the Keynesian formula. Everyone forgot that Friedman disagreed with the Austerian policies of the 1930s when it came to the Great Depression. Now European Austerians get to call British Monetarists "crass Keynesians".

<sigh>

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:27:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

I included that under the "virtuous Europe v the Anglo world" that I said was wrong. All the same, Frankfurt is not globally as important as NY and London.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:16:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Catholicism or Protestant-work-ethicism?

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:37:58 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Dunno, Catholicism for the periphery and Protestantism for the Core, with a German pope for the Catholics?

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:43:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

I'm not saying the euro is an Anglo creation. But the fact that the global financial sector is there is relevant to my questions about the future of Europe as a set of separate sovereign nations.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:43:44 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

One of the points of being a sovereign nation is that you get to tell the international financial sector to fuck off and die.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:04:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Are there any sovereign nations left?

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:06:40 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

Russia. Arguably Iran. In some respects China and a smattering of Latin American countries.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:08:59 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

We're between a BRIC and a hard place.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:35:29 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

You're Argentina in a context of resource constraints that makes your agricultural resources increasingly valuable, you can do it and work your way out of it. You're a sovereign European nation, what's your weight in a globally competitive environment?

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:11:54 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 4)

And that's the problem, Without European solidarity, the prospects are bleak for the majority of Europeans. And let's not kid ourselves, the Treaties do little but pay lip service to solidarity.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:17:30 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

That I wholeheartedly agree with.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:18:31 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

You're Argentina in a context of resource constraints that makes your agricultural resources increasingly valuable, you can do it and work your way out of it. You're a sovereign European nation, what's your weight in a globally competitive environment?

Uh, pharmaceuticals? Manufacturing industry? Shipyards?

Europe does not precisely have a shortage of high value added, high quality manufacturing with price inelastic demand.

Yes, if you've allowed your industrial plant to be pillaged by complying with the pro-asset-stripping rules and colonial dictates of the EMU, you're fucked.

But that is because you allowed your industrial plant to be pillaged, not because there is any particular impediment to Europeans selling their products on international markets. Quite the other way around, actually.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:26:16 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

I'm not sure the examples you mention have "price inelastic demand". What happened to European shipyards, for example: the EMU or global labour cost arbitrage?

(But by and large I agree with investment in high quality manufacturing).

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:41:28 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

What happened to European shipyards, for example: the EMU or global labour cost arbitrage?

Neither: the EU's illegal state aid rules without a counterbalancing EU-wide industrial policy (which has been impossible for decades because of the competition and lack of solidarity among EU member states).

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:45:21 AM EST
[ Parent ]

What Mig said... (4.00 / 2)

... plus aggressive protectionist measures by neo-mercantilist industrialising countries.

And while I may not particularly begrudge Korea its shipyards, I do think it's a strategic mistake to wholly abandon civilian steel ship construction in Europe.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:59:47 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 1)

It's not wholly abandoned. After all, military procurement is the one loophole the EU allows in the state aid rules.

So, in our collective march to dystopia, the EU will grow its Military Industrial Complex alongside its FIR sector.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:01:45 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 1)

Hence the emphasis on civilian steel ship construction in my comment.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:03:12 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 1)

Oh, right. :P

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:05:21 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (4.00 / 2)

No, no. Ship building is a "competitive and strategic sector for europe."

At least that is the opinion of the commission:

http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/sectors/maritime/shipbuilding/index_en.htm

"There are around 150 large shipyards in Europe, with around 40 of them active in the global market for large sea-going commercial vessels. Around 120,000 people are directly employed by shipyards (civil and naval, new building and repair) in the European Union. With a market share of around 15% in volume terms, Europe is still vying (with South Korea) for global leadership in terms of the value of civilian ships produced (15 billion Euros in 2007)."

Is 15% much?

"Historically, the industry has suffered from the absence of global rules and a tendency of (state-supported) over-investment due to the fact that shipyards offer a wide range of technologies, employ a significant number of workers and generate foreign currency income (as the shipbuilding market is dollar-based and a global one)."

by IM on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:07:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Competitive. Strategic. Pick at most one. (n/t) (none / 1)

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:09:58 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Competitive. Strategic. Pick at most one. (4.00 / 7)

We need a green ship building commissioner. He would have said:

competitive, strategic and sustainable.

by IM on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:19:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Competitive. Strategic. Pick at most one. (4.00 / 8)

A not insignificant portion of that 15% market share are the offshore wind installation and transport vessels built in EU shipyards. (Though at least two RWE ships were/are being built in Korea.)

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaïs Nin

by Crazy Horse on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 11:39:35 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 0)

Europe is still vying (with South Korea) for global leadership in terms of the value of civilian ships produced (15 billion Euros in 2007)."

What is the relative size of the EU and South Korea?

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:10:26 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 0)

Wiki says 500 to 50.

A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!

by A swedish kind of death on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 09:22:46 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 0)

So the EU is vying to support an industry 1/10 the relative size of South Korea's.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 09:39:33 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (4.00 / 4)

I'm entirely in favour of strategic industrial policy favouring civilian ship construction in Europe.

Across this discussion I see:

the need for state aid - but this need seems to me to be because of the global context of labour arbitrage and aggressive mercantilism;
the need for a Europe-wide industrial policy rather than each European state setting its own policy and competing with the others;
the need for the industry to be (loaded and abused terms, but still) "green", "sustainable".

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:54:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (4.00 / 3)

The need for "state aid" is caused by the fact that heavy industry like shipyards only work in the context of an industrial policy. And the banksters and their ph.d. prostitutes have successfully branded all industrial policy "state aid."

Part of such an industrial policy would be to retaliate against mercantilist currency policy and similar funny-business.

The need for a Europe-wide industrial policy stems from the fact that EU rules prohibit state-level industrial policy. Yes, Europe-wide industrial policy would be preferable to state-level industrial policy, but in the absence of the former the latter would be perfectly workable.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 08:55:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 1)

EU-level industrial policy is where the WTO comes in.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 09:44:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (4.00 / 5)

But when it comes to WTO battles EU has afaik a pretty good record. After all, a WTO decision only gives the injured parties the right to retaliate, and EU with its inscrutable power structure is hard to injure politically.

The EU-US WTO Steel Dispute, pages 170-171:

Retaliatory action by the EU was permitted under the WTO DSU within 30 days after the publication and acceptance of the Appellate Body Report. President Bush therefore had until 10 December 2003 to decide upon his course of action before the EU's retaliatory measures were implemented. The President's policy dilemma was intensified by the US products targeted by the EU in its `long' list of retaliatory measures. This list included exports of Florida citrus, Louisiana rice, California nuts and North Carolina pyjamas, along with a large number of steel products (Crutsinger, 2003). The products on the `long' list had been specially selected by the EU because of their significance to key marginal states in the 2004 US Presidential Election. The President was therefore faced with a `negative sum' domestic policy game that required an irreconcilable choice to be made between two different sets of key marginal states. In addition, the United States also came under substantial international pressure to abide by the agreed WTO rules on trade, which it had been instrumental in negotiating.

Can't do that against the EU.

But then again that same power structure makes it hard for the citizens to affect the EU too, which leads to our current predicament.

A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!

by A swedish kind of death on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 10:04:34 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (4.00 / 5)

So your view is that each of our countries, severally and individually, having regained monetary sovereignty and an industrial policy that fights "funny business", can defend themselves on the global market.

Quite apart from the fact that they'd be competing against each other in a good number of cases, I don't think it would be as easy as you make it sound. Neolib ideology and practice really are out there, and labour cost arbitrage is not a mirage.

My point is that Europe-wide policy is not just better, it's necessary.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 09:49:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 0)

So your view is that each of our countries, severally and individually, having regained monetary sovereignty and an industrial policy that fights "funny business", can defend themselves on the global market.

Is it optimal? No. But is it possible? Yes.

labour cost arbitrage is not a mirage.

The thing about labour cost arbitrage is that you only really get to do that if the country whose labour you're arbitraging out of work allows itself to run a persistent foreign deficit.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 09:59:50 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (4.00 / 5)

A good EU wide policy is necessary. It's not immediately obvious that an insanely stupid one is better than everyone for themselves.

When things are good, we get austerity and reform. When things are bad we get reform and austerity.

by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 10:14:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (none / 0)

I don't think anyone is in favour of an insanely stupid policy.

But it's not obvious either that everyone for themselves would come up with a better one.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 03:18:33 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: What Mig said... (4.00 / 2)

At this point, allowing the 17 to try to swim separately looks like a better proposition than insisting that all 17 sink together.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 03:22:02 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

Migeru:

Emigration within?

poesiacastellana.es

En un viejo país ineficiente,
algo así como España entre dos guerras
civiles, en un pueblo junto al mar,
poseer una casa y poca hacienda
y memoria ninguna. No leer,
no sufrir, no escribir, no pagar cuentas,
y vivir cono un noble arruinado
entre las ruinas de mi inteligencia.

Works for me.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:31:21 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

That's only for people with adult children or no children.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:33:26 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

When I said "works" I meant in a realm of the imagination.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:34:49 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

Escapism is all we've got, and minor rebellions from our cubicles in the belly of the Blue Banana FIRE sector.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:36:01 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

I think we're ready for a remake of Brazil.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:36:49 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Is the old-age poetry of an exile from Franco's Spain the model for the future of the EU?

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:34:35 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

No.

So what's your model for the future of Europe (with or without the EU)?

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:36:05 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 4)

Migeru's first law of politics: you work with the people you have, not with the one you wish you had. Therefore I don't do utopia.

If I can't convince Jerome that austerity is macroeconomic nonsense even after giving him Minsky's Stabilizing and Unstable Economy as a birthday present, then I have a snowball's chance in Hell of affecting the political direction of this continent.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:42:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

I'm not asking for the impossible, just discussion.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:44:40 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

I like speculative repartee as much as the next guy, but back in my Physics student days I was already wary of speculative discussion which doesn't have a snowball's chance in Hell of connecting the the actually existing theories and experimental results. Same with politics. It's quite different to talk about macroeconomic principles and to formulate macroeconomic policy. The latter has to be grounded in how you actually get to implement it. Just like I don't like talking about alternative social organizations without the how to get from here to there.

Sorry.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 04:50:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 5)

If you've no notion of there I don't see how you work out how to get from here to.

So basically it looks like you see nothing but increasing dystopia, and nothing to be done.

I'm sorry too.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:08:19 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

The name of the game right now is damage limitation.

This does not require a vision for the endgame, or what comes after.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:11:11 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

OK, then damage limitation can be discussed.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:17:29 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

I see nothing but increasing dystopia because there's nothing to be done. Where are the levers?

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 05:33:24 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

Migeru:

Where are the levers?

yes that is the question.

perhaps we are still at the ideational stage, necessary before implementation.

you take it the most seriously, Migeru, and because you know so much, i take that seriously.

i am happy to see you are far from alone with your knowledge or your concerns, and here we are mostly converted anyway, but people like yourself are attaining readers, (steve keen, max keiser etc) building awareness show by show, blogpost by blog comment.

there has to be enough critical mass to readily implement change, and it's building, just much more slowly than we would wish.

then when all doubt is removed as to the incompetence/malice of sado-monetarist policies, by overwhelming proof visible by every tom dick and larry no matter how low-info or dumbed down, then all this wrangling, parsing and deconstructing will come into its strength, i believe.

till then we have to chew on our ties and watch how (and why) what shoudn't be done, be done, and all that's undone because of it...

if we don't wear ties, scarves work fine too.

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 05:58:40 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 4)

Oh, another brilliant idea of our betters is that the cohesion funds and structural funds will be used to pay interest on the debt, rather than to fund projects in the recipient countries.

Then they'll wonder why unemployment in the ~~recipient~~conduit countries doesn't improve despite the structural funds.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 06:09:18 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

But what hope would there be that our individual nations, in a labour-glutted global economy, could avoid a competitive race to the bottom in terms of wages and social conditions while providing an adequate response to problems of resource constraints?

Nothing inherently prevents France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Greece, etc. from forming a different monetary union, excluding Germany and incorporating a redistribution mechanism. Call the policy 'growth and solidarity'. Such a union could have its own central bank that created money as needed for projects that will obviously pay for themselves but tightly controls money creation for financial speculation. It could also have a judicial system that vigorously prosecutes fraud by anyone operating within its jurisdiction. One possible response would be military, but, as some have noted, Germany has not been militaristic since WW II.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 11:15:17 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

But instead, the leaders of Spain, Italy and France are doing their darnedest to "be in the core Euro". You have to be with the cool kids.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 12:11:54 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

What about the voters? Do any significant portion of them have a clue about what the EZ is doing to them and what they could do about it?

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 03:22:02 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

Spain just had an election and returned a solid parliamentary majority for the local EPP party. So we're in for an interesting 4 years as austerity is tried with conviction.

Italy is in no hurry to have early elections as Monti is widely respected. And rightly so, given that he appears to be able to stand up to Merkel even if not questioning the Austerity frame.

As for France, their Presidential election in 3 months' time is the backdrop of this diary. But Hollande is getting more accommodating of Merkel's position as the election approaches.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 03:25:06 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

Looks like we have seats at a continental scale economic train wreck. It would properly serve those who are pushing this agenda were mobs of hungry people to tear them into small pieces, but, instead, they will more likely 'elect' some post-modern authoritarian monsters.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 08:05:15 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 4)

Interestingly, the quite radical as far as their English language literature I've read, and party cadres I've met, Dutch Socialist Party seems to be leading the polls there if I'm not mistaken. This is a party to the left of the European Left Parties. But I'm not sure when they'll have elections in the Netherlands... As for Greece the stage is set where parties to the left of the Socialists will score big, but will be too fragmented to form a government. Still it will be interesting to have half the parliament shouting down the austeritarians and the banksters' tools. I heard Sinn Fein and the Left Beyond were doing quite well in Ireland, is that the case now?

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Sun Feb 26th, 2012 at 08:35:12 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

From what I gather from wikipedia, last was in 2010 and it is 4-5 years at maximum between elections, but snap elections because of the fall of a government appears rather common. So perhaps 2014 unless the government falls.

A vote for PES is a vote for EPP! A vote for EPP is a vote for PES! Support the coalition, vote EPP-PES in 2009!

by A swedish kind of death on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 03:59:00 AM EST
[ Parent ]

The socialists in the Netherlands (4.00 / 3)

are quite strong, and have been for some time, they scored exceedlingly well the election before last, and until recently also had the most attractive leader in the world (who even managed to make Dutch sound beautiful, and that's no mean feat!)

I don't think they're really out of the mainstream of the left, our Front de Gauche is similar in terms of outlook, Die Linke as well. They, like us, are most effective when engaging the popular classes properly, something that only the extreme right has been able to do for years. In the Netherlands, like in France, the alternative to the far right is not social democracy, which had produced nothing for over a generation to most people (thus their political disengagement and flirtation with the far right) but proper socialism.

We're getting there. Not there yet, not tomorrow, but day after tomorrow.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 05:58:52 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (4.00 / 5)

They're not out of the mainstream of the left, certainly they are the "most left" party leading opinion polls anywhere in the EU, they were just quite a bit more "Eurosceptic".

As to socialist vs. social democratic: I wonder in real terms, that is in terms of proposed policy, how much to the left of say, the German SDP of the early 90s they are. I think the left of the left is the only part of the political spectrum that really gives a damn about social Europe anymore.

BYW: Apparently Die Linke tonight led the fight against the loan agreement for Greece, as it should. Gregor Gysi pointed out that:

You're giving Greece Versailles when it needs a Marshall Plan

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 06:10:04 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (4.00 / 2)

Here he is:

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 06:34:31 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (none / 0)

This was long but it would be worth to quote from the first word to the last. (Should I translate it tonight, if I find the transscript?)

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 03:48:34 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (none / 0)

If you can, yes.

by afew (afew(a in a circle)eurotrib_dot_com) on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 04:04:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (4.00 / 2)

Done: Gysi on the EU "rescue package" for Greece. Its a personal record of 7378 words for me, but almost half of that is the German original.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 03:39:41 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (none / 0)

I'll second that "if you can". There is also a great public statement by Christine Buchholz titled "My No in the Bundestag is a Yes to resistance" which already is making the rounds in the Greek blogosphere, I can't find the original though...

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 05:24:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (none / 1)

That'd be great if you could swing a translation...

PS who is the whiny guy who butts in at about 11:30?

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 07:25:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The socialists in the Netherlands (none / 0)

That was excellent.

DoDo, I would realy appreciate it, too, if you coult translate this into a diary.

There are three stories about the euro crisis: the Republican story, the German story, and the truth. -- Paul Krugman

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 06:37:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Gysi transcript (none / 1)

Deutscher Bundestag: Stenografischer Bericht 160. Sitzung (Berlin, Montag, den 27. Februar 2012) [PDF, 60 Seiten]

Präsident Dr. Norbert Lammert:
Gregor Gysi ist der nächste Redner für die Fraktion Die Linke.
(Beifall bei der LINKEN)
Dr. Gregor Gysi (DIE LINKE):
Herr Präsident! Meine Damen und Herren! Frau Bundeskanzlerin, im ersten Satz Ihrer Rede haben Sie gesagt, es handele sich um eine Staatsschuldenkrise. Ich finde, das ist nicht die Wahrheit. Die Wahrheit ist, dass die Staatsschulden zugenommen haben, als wir eine Finanzkrise, ausgelöst durch Banken und Spekulanten, hatten. Das müssten Sie hinzufügen. Ansonsten denkt man, die Staaten seien schuld. Nein, erst einmal sind es die Banken und Spekulanten, auf die die Staaten allerdings völlig falsch reagieren.

usw, usw...

There are three stories about the euro crisis: the Republican story, the German story, and the truth. -- Paul Krugman

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 07:09:41 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Gysi transcript (none / 0)

Discussion of Versailles

Volker Beck (Köln) (BÜNDNIS 90/DIE GRÜNEN):
Ich möchte Sie fragen, was Sie uns gerade mit den Aussagen zum Versailler Frieden mitteilen wollten. Wollten Sie das intonieren im Sinne von ,,Weg mit dem Versailler Schandfrieden", wie das früher in der Weimarer Republik gefordert wurde?
(Zurufe von der LINKEN: Oh!) Ich bin wirklich ein bisschen entsetzt.
(Beifall beim BÜNDNIS 90/DIE GRÜNEN und bei der FDP sowie bei Abgeordneten der CDU/CSU)
Man kann doch diese Art von Parolen nicht ohne historischen Zusammenhang aufnehmen. Was war denn 1870/71, wie war die Vorgeschichte, und was ist mit dem historischen Kontext? Wie beurteilen Sie die Auseinandersetzungen zur Verantwortlichkeit im Hinblick auf den Ersten Weltkrieg?
(Beifall beim BÜNDNIS 90/DIE GRÜNEN - Daniel Bahr [Münster] [FDP]: Unglaublich!)
Dr. Gregor Gysi (DIE LINKE):
Das werde ich Ihnen sagen, obwohl ich jetzt keinen gesamthistorischen Vortrag halten kann; das würde ein bisschen zu weit führen. In Versailles saßen die Siegermächte zusammen. Das war völlig korrekt, ebenso dass sie einen Vertrag geschlossen haben. Aber sie sind viel zu weit gegangen, weil sie nicht aufhören konnten, zu siegen. Dadurch haben sie Deutschland wirtschaftlich, sozial und politisch in einem Grade gedemütigt, dass Hitler mit seiner Verbrecherpartei das Ganze nutzen konnte. Das ist das, was ich ihnen vorwerfe. Da waren die Westmächte nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg viel klüger,
(Thomas Oppermann [SPD]: Was hat das jetzt mit Griechenland zu tun?)
indem sie gesagt haben: So machen wir das nicht wieder, wir machen das anders. - Das ist das Entscheidende. Wenn Sie das nicht begriffen haben, dann tut es mir leid.
(Beifall bei der LINKEN - Thomas Oppermann [SPD]: Unmöglich! -
Jürgen Trittin [BÜND- NIS 90/DIE GRÜNEN]: Schämen Sie sich! Das ist wirklich relativ!)

by gk (g k quattro due due sette "at" gmail.com) on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 07:56:00 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Somehow, I knew that snivelling whiner (4.00 / 3)

was going to be a green.

Bedwetters.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 08:18:36 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Somehow, I knew that snivelling whiner (4.00 / 3)

Well I don't think being "whiny" is what should be held against a politician. (I can list any number of good leftist politicians with a bad style.) And this one interjection was merely missing the point (completely); the hecklers however (almost all from the SPD or Greens...) were dissing the point or the speaker himself (especially the SPD guy who "got the last word"; see my diary).

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 04:11:07 PM EST
[ Parent ]

I didn't know he was the human rights campaigner (none / 1)

Who got beat up in Moscow for campaigning for gay rights. So, the whiny demeanor masks his bravery.

But he really comes accross in the video as the concern troll..."How can you say such things without historical context?" As if Gysi had committed a major offence.

You are right, he was missing the point completely and in any event Gysi could easily have spelled out that context and very possibly would have spelled it out as I have here in the thread, as it is being spelled out in Greece today.

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Wed Feb 29th, 2012 at 03:53:58 AM EST
[ Parent ]

I saw Gysi's comments. He is right, of (4.00 / 4)

course, in my view not just on the immediate situation to which he refers, but also to imply historical context, one which limns the legacy of what happened in Greece at the end of the war and how that legacy has been a driving force in creating the Greece which is today. While the rest of Europe got Marshall Plan dollars and rebuilt their battered economy, the Greeks, at America's behest, got Marshall Plan dollars for the sole purpose of militarising in order to violently quash the left, and Greece's economy is still paying for this. If it is difficult to reform in Greece (and by reform I certainly do not mean the sort of economic "liberalisation" programme of social regression euphemestically refered to as "reform") I strongly suspect it is due to social clivages accentuated by the brutality meted out to the left in the aftermath of the war, in addition to the lack of economic revival those Marshal Plan dollars produced elsewhere on the continent, so Gysi is certainly making an apt commentary here, one which is telling in more ways than one.

In this sense, it is curious that some commentators are now refering to Greece as a colony, when in fact colonisation began long ago, what we are now seeing is Europeans assuming the role that the English and the Americans (speaking of just the past century) in various turns had once assumed, and they have their useful idiots in Athens just as the Americans had their generals. We're not going to get any progress under these conditions, that much is clear.

And, you are most assuredly right when you say that only the left is now taking European social model seriously, and refer to the SPD of the early nineties, though you probably know that it is not by chance that the SPD of the nineties in now Die Linke, Lafontaine and others having made the move rather than suffer the indignity of tolerating their party's lurch to the right in the great Europe-wide social-democratic ideological abdication known as "third wayism".

I would be ashamed to admit that I had risen from the ranks. When I rise it will be with the ranks, and not from them Eugene Debs

by redstar on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 04:22:58 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: I saw Gysi's comments. He is right, of (4.00 / 3)

Actually the Marshall plan in Greece helped build the clientilist state as well: The Marshall plan in Greece was co-opted by rapacious elites, some of them the black-marketeers of the Occupation period, and put to political use for themselves and the political parties that supported them. The connection between right-wing authoritarian regimes in the European South and fiscal problems has been discussed explicitly by Navarro
Yes indeed, the SPD of the nineties is now a main component of Die Linke. Which is what I'm saying: the real social achievements of European social democracy, are only supported by the Left anymore. The parties currently posing as social democratic are to a larger or lesser extent proponents of neoliberalism-light but often practitioners of turbo-neoliberalism...

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 05:48:00 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

Apparently Sinn Fein isn't doing too bad at all in the opinion polls either (and I imagine the referendum will give them space to grow further)... Which leads me to a diary request for Irish and Dutch eurotribers on the apparent opinion poll success of the non-compliant left in both countries... If and when they have time of course!

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 06:25:08 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 2)

Looks like we have seats at a continental scale economic train wreck.

Some of us have passenger seats.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 01:46:23 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

All here are passengers. And the pilots....

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 02:29:06 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (4.00 / 3)

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 03:02:27 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

Brilliant, Migs, and brilliant analogy.

(Wonder why it was called Zentropa when i saw it in the US?)

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." - Anaïs Nin

by Crazy Horse on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 07:44:54 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

Zentropa is the producer!

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 08:21:46 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

Europa (film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Europa was released as Zentropa in North America to avoid confusion with Europa Europa (1990).

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Feb 28th, 2012 at 03:50:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 0)

But see

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard: Spanish revolt brews as national economic rearmament begins in Europe: Spain's new prime minister has looked into the abyss and recoiled.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 06:01:00 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

i am slowly warming to some aspects of monti.

beyond the obvious relief that B is gone, or that M is not him, he has a calm that is all too rare in italians, and he gives off a vibe of 'good' austerity, ie he's not a vain, rabidly sensual, venal or corrupt man. how he reconciles his beliefs with some of what he's doing to italy, i have no clue, but the man is sound in some way no other politician on the italian stage is, excepting a very few.

sure he's the 'friendly face' for Goldman Sachs, but in his own way he has gained respect from the italians, especially for his demeanour.
does he have a major clue how to pull italy out of this mess? i wish i could say yes, as his ego seems of a tidy size, (in the land of nero, caligula and berlusconi that's already something!), but i see a cloud of puzzlement around him, even in his earnest, convincingly wonky style.

i think he really does believe we should be run by bankers, (but he still believes it would be for our own good).

so deluded yes, but basically a gentleman. this shows up grandly how many of the other italian polls very much aren't, though many are pretending more to be under his influence.

i think merkel defers to his banking experience, which appeals to the technocrat in her.

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 06:11:02 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: The greens and the left of the left (none / 1)

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sat Feb 25th, 2012 at 05:47:21 PM EST
[ Parent ]

anothe clue holder speaks (4.00 / 4)

Building a common Future without common Memories?

In fact "economic government" is a contradictio in objecto, as economics cannot be separated from politics. All economics is political. Instead of "economic governments" we should call it simply "government". A government is nothing else than an elected body that organises collective priorities. There is no such a thing as economics without politics - and this also applies to the EU.
In Europe, we will hopefully learn that we cannot differentiate between economic government and the rest of government, as all policies are budget relevant: from education to defence, from social policies to housing or gender policies: they all cost money. So are national decisions on defence spending part of the economic government in Europe or not? The fiscal compact and its golden rules are another example of this problem. Which parts of the national budget expenditure belong to the structural deficit - and which part is spending that succumbs to the austerity philosophy of the compact? We will continue to struggle to find answers to these sort of questions in the years to come.
Ernest Rénan, a 19^th century French sociologist, once wrote: `a nation is not about a common past, let alone common borders, but about a common future'. If we agree that we share our future in Europe is it possible to move from economic government to government? And what would be the cultural implications? The French historian Pierre Nora was pretty sceptical whether Europe has developed the necessary cultural resources and similarities that would allow deeper European integration - and this assessment included the French and the Germans, the power engine of Europe.

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 07:44:34 AM EST

Re: anothe clue holder speaks (none / 0)

Ditto.

tens of millions of people stand to see their lives ruined because the bureaucrats at the ECB don't understand introductory economics -- Dean Baker

by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 08:44:30 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: anothe clue holder speaks (none / 1)

A government is nothing else than an elected body that organises collective priorities.

One might think that this would be obvious to those who actually lead governments, but yet we have had resolute insistence on separating 'economic' aspects from 'political' aspects throughout the entire process of the creation of the EMU and the Euro. As Michael Hudson has noted, 'Whereever you encounter methodological madness there is always private interest at work.' If such leaders do not 'understand' such basics it is most likely explained by Upton Sinclair's familiar quote.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

by ARGeezer (ARGeezer a in a circle eurotrib daught com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 12:07:23 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Cohn-Bendit: Politically Stateless? (4.00 / 2)

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom - William Blake

by talos (mihalis at gmail dot com) on Mon Feb 27th, 2012 at 06:19:50 PM EST

Cohn-Bendit: Politically Stateless? | 167 comments (166 topical, 1 editorial, 0 hidden)

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