The neoliberal order has given birth to a popular movement to eliminate federalism - now called the Deep State, to eliminate the regulation of commerce, industry, communication, health, and more. It’s called conservatism but it’s laissez faire-ism. The majority opposes this movement and, when the majority regains control of Congress, a strong federal government will return with a strong commitment to the separation of powers and the elimination of the College of Electors. This may sound like wishful thinking. Be reminded that the manipulation of the elector system is not supported by the vast majority. It is a foot race between tearing down federalism and the return to federalism and with it constitutional government. The majority has to fight for a return to constitutional federalism. It won’t happen by itself as our present crises in democracy proves. Taking democracy for granted has to come to an end.
As for the class-dictated legislation of the postwar period, the Taft-Hartley Act, with its strikebreaking injunction club and its harsh restrictive clauses, stands out as one of the most vicious. The potentialities of this law as an instrument to straitjacket the workers are virtually limitless. Business Week, December 18, 1946, said in an editorial that the "Taft-Hartley Act “crossed the narrow line separating a law which aims only to regulate from one which could destroy. Given a few million unemployed in America, given an administration in Washington which was not pro-union - and the Taft-Hartley Act conceivably could wreck the labor movement.” American Socialist Eric Hass, October 1950
Of course, it's always about giving enough concession while maintaining ultimate control. Economic concessions in return for continued if not strengthened political control. This is what a capitalist ruling class does.
@@larshofler8298 Basically you are saying the capitalists give enough "reform rope" to hang the socialist movement. Then they pour on the anti-communist propaganda.
@@larshofler8298 I thought as much. Far too many socialist believe that through reforms to capitalism we will arrive at socialism. I have always doubted that it would ever happen.
@@JohnT.4321 Yea. My point being, it is the change of political consciousness and opening up space for political mobilization that matter, so the Left must pursue them. I'm not opposed to demanding reform as a way to politicize a previously de-politicized field and mobilize popular discontent, the point is people have to unconditionally insist on their demand as an ethical imperative. Not just "what should be done", but "what must be done"...
Very interesting discussion. But China was oddly absent -- both as an impetus for neoliberalism (opening up of China under Nixon/Carter made Russia much less menacing) and also as a new impetus moving forward today as China becomes the prime geostrategic rival. Given such a rich and stimulating discussion from someone clearly well informed it seemed very odd that China was not mentioned.
@@larshofler8298 I tried to explain. They were discussing how geopolitics affects domestic politics and talked a lot of Russia but didn't mention China once. I think this is a big omission. First, Maoism was important before the 70s on the left in the West. Then there's rapprochement with China under Nixon/Carter which was a major turning point in the Cold War. Soon after it became a big engine of global deflation, of major importance to the viability of the neoliberal order. I could go on. But they didn't mention it at all. Odd I thought.
@@cuttysark57 That was the 1960's and a whole different story. China was apparently viewed as another Colony to be exploited. If Japan could overcome the Chinese the US should be able to handle them. Neo- colonialism was beginning to get popular, Iran, Korea, Japan, and soon to be another Colony was Vietnam ...... But they ran out of Money.
Coffee shop workers have no skills that make them irreplaceable. They can be replaced by automation. If they want autonomy they need to revert to the model of employment at founding of the republic which is self employment. In new economic model unskilled labor has no power. Capital has power.
"By 1960 the average CEO of a US Corporation was making 20 times more than the average factory worker. By 2000 he was making 300 times what the average factory worker was making." 🤔
Mr Gerstle is also very informative on FDR, the Southern Democrats and Civil Rights, US v. USSR, the failure of Soviet Communism & its effect on US Socialism, on the rise of Neo-Liberalism, its failure and the significance of Occupy and today's striking workers. (from Green Fire, UK) 🌈🦉
As long as America continues in the paradigm of capitalism with its elites there will be struggles between a class of workers and a class of capitalists. No matter the progress, where the elites see a need to compromise, there will always be a retrenchment of capital-elites and the slide into a society of rich and poor. The paradigm must be changed for new struggles and efforts to begin. The people (res publica) must control both the means of production, to produce for human needs and benefits, and the government which construct the laws for a just society and its administration.
“Wherever capitalism appears, in pursuit of its mission of exploitation, there will Socialism, fertilized by misery, watered by tears, and vitalized by agitation be also found, unfurling its class-struggle banner and proclaiming its mission of emancipation.” -Eugene V. Debs
@@flutieflambert What would the lot of humanity be if capitalism had never evolved, presumably a continuation of thousands more years of stone-ages? What Debs et al are agonizing about is human nature and the left's unhinged conviction that they can change it, thankfully whilst they are theorising about a non-existent Utopia somebody else creates the wealth that corrupt politicians can tax to engage in various wars , rip-offs and bribes to the non-productive to keep them in office
My question/concern: America today, unlike in the 30s, is de-industrialized. Can worker movements in the service sector provide the same magnitude of disruption that, say, a factory strike in the 30s could have?
I still think the Left must find a way to unite with industrial workers, many of them located in Asia. The primary division of labor today is between "intellectual labor" in the West (and the US in particular) and "physical labor" in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The US has been divorced from actual production processes for too long now, Americans are actually surprised to learn that their economy depends on sweatshops in Asia that practices 19th century standards. For God's sake, that's all part of the deal. You can't divorce America's "clean records" from the dirty businesses it does by the hands of non-American intermediaries. It's one and the same system.
@@jason8434 Industries have not disappeared at all. They are just outsourced to the other side of the globe, kept out of sight. "De-industrialization" is such a bad term, it makes people forget about the obvious fact that the material world is still produced by actual workers, it does not just come out of a computer.
@@jason8434 I don't believe in blockchain or other techno-solutions to sociopolitical problems. I've heard a lot about those supposed novelties, but so far I don't see how they could help humanity liberate themselves. Instead, I think they reinforce capitalist tendencies of exclusivity, individual isolation, and denial of the Commons. While the Left should not abandon social media, social media itself is not "democratic", that is, it represents the return of feudalist tendency in today's capitalism. I recommend the concept of neo-feudalism, proposed on the Left by Jodi Dean. As to what you referred to as "people living in their own ideologies", I think you vastly underestimated how it was the same for people in the 19th century and the 20th century. In fact, Socialism itself fell victim to nationalism, as mainstream Socialists supported their each country against others in WWI, something that shocked Lenin so much that he began to depart from Socialism. Basically, communism, or emancipatory struggles fighting for universal freedom, has to by definition overcome thousands of years of divisions, segregations, etc. If we simply surrender to how things are and accept people's ideological state as an unchanging natural fact per empiricism, then we have already lost.
One of the decisive motivating factors in school integration was winning the public relations battle with the Soviet Union as well. This is meticulously documented in international relations theory expert Mary Dudziak’s ‘Desegregation as a Cold War Imperative’ (Stanford Law Review, 1988). Doubt we would’ve landed on the Moon either absent Sputnik.
The biggest unanswered question for me is, what's next? Great show again. I really enjoyed the history. I think we really need to learn all about the New Deal to put the last 5-6 decades in perspective. In one way, DT's slogan make america great again is really a reference to the time when the New Deal made America a more egalitarian country. People remember that. Not sure whether we can have a new deal without a decade of organized struggle from the bottom. Neoliberalism is coming to an end, but whether we will go in a more fascist direction or a more egalitarian direction is not clear to me at this time. The most unexpected thing was the pandemic. And as the speaker said, the government's response was pretty great, even if it was an anachronism in the moment. Perhaps we will stumble into a better future accidentally.
@Russ Ingram As FDR said, he was saving capitalism. And he did. And capitalism also leads to its own destruction. But will we continually rebuild a failed system? Or choose a better way forward? It's difficult for us to even imagine another way unfortunately.
I think the term "political order" as the Professor describes it is not at all helpful in understanding US politics. It seems generally to mean what is acceptable in the mainstream of US politics at a given time. That Eisenhower did not try to roll back the power of labor is not meaningful, when the job had been done for him early in the Truman administration by the Taft-Harley Law. That he did not try to undermine Social Security was understandable when, in Europe, still recovering from WW2, the social security net that had been put in place was already far more protective of the public than our SS and has remained so ever since. The marginal tax rate of over 90% continued from WW2 was a headline grabber, only. The wealthy were able to use the US tax-code to avoid it without much difficulty. The interstate highway system was a wasteful use of public money that could have far more wisely have been spent improving the passenger railway system and mass, public transit in the cities. Instead, cities were neglected in favor of suburban development that allowed tax payers to desert the cities and let them decay. These programs were favored by the wealthy capitalist political class. They were not demonstrations of what Gerstle calls the New Deal Order by capitulation of the oposition's president to its inexorable sway. As for the growth and influence of the military and the secret state, they were well entrenched with Eisenhower in the persons of the Dulles brothers. They had eggregious successes in the coups in Iran, Guatemala, the massacres in Indonesia, the intensifiation of the Cold War, and the hostility towards the PRC until Nixon.
Though I do not claim credentials as an historian, I did live through the period of what Mr Gerstle calls the New Deal Order. I disagree with his timing of it. If we look at the power of unions as one clock, unions were severely undermined as early as June, 1947, when the Taft-Hartley Act was passed into law. This was during the Truman Administration, scarcely more than two years after the death of FDR. Unions were further restrained by the advent of anti-Communism as a threatening force to anyone on the Left, be he simply a trade-unionist, a writer, a member of the entertainment industry, an academician. Unions, the principal lobbyists for federal regualtion of capitalist institutions, were hamstrung not to appear anti-capitalist - almost equivalent to Communist. It is true that the death knell to government as the protector of the "little guy" came with Carter and more so with Reagan - especially with the firing of the air-traffic controllers' on strike - but the election of Ronald Reagan to the White House alone was a clear signal that the New Deal Order had long before past away. Indeed, the defeat of George McGovern by his own Party's betrahal was a flashing light. The end of the New Deal Order was determined by the Cold War and the rise of militarism and the Secret State. Even Eisenhower, who foretold its consequences, could do nothing more to hinder it that to make a warning in his farewell address - after an eight year presidency in January, 1961, The Cold War, the Secret State, the MIC, are the roots of the Neoliberal Order that came into bloom in the 1980s.
Ike spoke out against the MIC and wanted a defense theory built around nukes with minimal conventional forces. US was not supposed to fight wars in Vietnam. Ike wanted Vietnam to fight those wars. Ike recognized military spending hurt economic competitiveness. JFK ran on non-existent missile and bomber gaps and a flexible response for military with large conventional forces. Dont buy the case that end of USSR brought about global trade for first time in 75 years. WWI was bought on by global competition in trade. WWII was a similar competition among economic competitors. USSR represented such a small segment of potential global trade that was constrained by communism. Occupy Wall Street had no more influence than the bonus army encampments in DC that were squashed. The progressive movement who I once advocated for under Bernie has ZERO influence. Chinese capitalism using it to advance the people of the state instead of maximizing shareholder wealth is the competition that will cause the US to fix its out dated form of capitalism for the Chinese model. Labor has no specialized skills necessary to recognize in coffee shop or other service workers. They can be trained in a day unlike people who worked in manufacturing. Labor has no power in strikes because they have no skills. Fire and replace will be the response to a strike or automation. You dont explain what power labor has to create a rise in labor power. Movements rise because of inherent increase in power with a movement. Service workers have no power because they have no irreplaceable skills. Occupy Wall Street was smashed because capital knows they dont need those protesters.
Fascinating discussion. What concerns me is that Capital will drift into an unyielding position of proto-fascism. For a lack of better terms Trumpism. This is a right-wing grievance based politics which is laced with conspiracies,climate denial, populism, racism, and market based solutions.
I listened to the whole show on the podcast version. This is a major part of it. I expect they will post the whole show and the other parts broken up as well.
I think on the topic of climate change forcing the hand of capitalists, one of the nightmare scenarios is that it will force their hand too early or in the wrong direction. Capitalism is a force that demands growth, but there is no growth to be found on a dying earth. OTOH, green energy and green industries DO offer capitalists new growth potential, at least in the short term, and possibly in the long term if the transition is fast enough to avoid climate collapse. At the end of the day, capitalists will be willing to contemplate a transition to eco-fascism or eco-feudalism once they see opportunities for growth disappearing...but it's also possible to manage a green transition that will remove that possibility from the bargaining table. This is why IMO the IRA may be one of the most important pieces of legislation this century: it's disappointing af compared to BBB, but it at least offers capitalism a path to transition. It buys time. The worker's movement isn't strong enough yet to force real concessions from capital, which is why tackling the climate crisis - by any means short of abject surrender - is ultimately a good move. There is no socialism on a dying earth. So yeah, the climate crisis might be a looming threat that forces capital concessions...or it might be an accelerant towards a political economy even qorse than capitalism. It could be an inflection point in either direction. I think we should all be wary of thinking of the climate crisis as JUST an opportunity to win concessions for workers. It can be, but that will depend on the speed and scale of the crisis.
Stannard Baker, in his account of Wilson at Versailles, noted that on the return trip to American from Paris, he found that most of the American Versailles Party believed that Communism was definitely going to significantly out perform American capitalism. Just why they all felt that way is hard to say, other than that they probably all had spent time reading Marx because the Russian were not present at the Versailles Treaty discussions.
The rise of social enterprises, social impact, ESG, etc. are small indicators of such a new order. Though these may be how the neoliberal order is trying to fit into the new/future order.
One should not overlook the fact that the South China Sea has significant oil and gas reserves. I am not sure when they were first discovered, but there was no reason that as soon as the Gulf of Mexico was found to be oil rich that the South China Sea would have almost immediately become a focus for investigation and search for these resources. As it is, Russia got the deal because we lost the war.
Eisenhower got rid of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation the development bank that maintained the competitiveness of the United States. This was the beginning of the role back of the New Deal.
Much like capital was willing to compromise with labor in the face of growing Soviet influence abroad it's possible capital will be willing to compromise with labor in the face of growing Chinese influence however I'm hope it doesn't come to that.
Isn't all this pretty well known and established? Have people forgotten these basic historical facts? The only new angle I can see here is the suggestion that Totalitarianism was somehow not all that serious, which is a novel idea to say the least.
Very useful points on the threat of communism shaping the bargaining power of the working class in relation to capitalist elites during the New Deal order. But neither person in this talk refer to the atrocities under Stalin and Mao when, toward the end of the video, they talk about reviving the good elements of the Soviet Union without redoing its bad elements. This video ends with probably what is the most important question: how emancipatory movements are to be built in the 2020s and beyond. A follow-up talk on that topic would help.
Why is it that most people ignore the atrocities that the US has done in other countries in the name of "democracy"? Professor Grover Furr has some interesting writings on what really happened during the Stalin period. Professor Furr had access to the Soviet Archives with the permission of the Russian government.
When I traveled in the former East block around the turn of the 20th Century I noticed a nostalgia for the Breshnev years. It was self-aware of how kitsch it all was in retrospect, but wistful about the relative level of comfort and security. You could maybe find a parallel with the voluntary simplicity idea in western societies: work and consume less.
The atrocities of Mao et al. are only relevant from a capitalist perspective and is why capitalists were so willing to concede to labor because they envisioned communism as a threat to liberty (eg the atrocities to which you refer). From a socialist perspective, those atrocities were cautionary examples of socialist states that failed to enact central pillars of socialism.
@@flutieflambert I would say, "so-called atrocities" considering the capitalist media would push that propaganda while ignoring the US atrocities in it's imperialist domination over weaker countries with coups and puppet regimes. If you would check out Socialism for All's channel here on You Tube, then you would learn why it was difficult to establish the lower phase of communism in those countries. On the other hand, no socialist movement has occurred here in the West where labor and ordinary people own and run the means of production and distribution. There is a plan that would work in order for people to own and run production and distribution through Socialist Industrial Unions. The people who are for this type of collective ownership are anti-communist and anti-Maoist. Also, they have isolated themselves from other Leftist When a political party excludes themselves from other socialists, your not going anywhere anytime soon.
I dont believe speaker defines marginal tax rate. That does not mean ALL income for a person taxed at that rate. It is in effect a salary cap. All income above a certain amount is taxed at that rate. Income lower than that level is taxed at lower marginal rates. Example if 100K was the amount where the highest marginal rate kicked in then all income over 100K taxed at 91%.
What a wonderful discussion. Thanks! I'm not quite sure, though, whether it is encouraging or not to those on the left. I do agree that the environmental crisis is the most likely candidate for what will force us toward a new social and economic order. But what is it that will move us in a good rather than a negative direction here? Something else may be needed. Crazy as it sounds, it might be that something like the current psychedelic renaissance (and spiritual-EXPERIENCE, as opposed to dogma, renaissance) will contribute. Just read, for example, the work of Roland Griffiths coming out of Johns Hopkins. Or consider the exponential increase in near-death experiences, due to the advance of resuscitation technology (at present about 10% of the Western population has apparently had one or more NDE). The key here is how utterly life-transforming and values-transforming these deep spiritual experiences are. Religion tried and failed. Communism tried and failed. Now perhaps direct spiritual engagement will make more progress. This is nothing really but a return to Plato and the Presocratic worldview.
@@jeffm.5071 Fortunately, all the evidence suggests this trend is well underway and is only going to continue. To sum up this research: It seems that this new generation of seekers want direct experience, not doctrine or dogma or some stone tablet of dos and don'ts.
@@milanalexich2136 These deep spiritual experiences have a very strong statistical record of altering an individual's live in quite radical ways. For example, people who have NDEs will frequently change careers (say from banker to teacher), change values about money and material accumulation, and even change relationships over these issues. They become less "materialistic" and more, well, "spiritual." One research psychologist, Dr. Bruce Greyson, has remarked that he knows of no more powerful way to transform and heal people psychologically. Read his work. It's fascinating.
Government managing capitalism… ughhhh Capitalists didn’t need help. The rest of the world was done with the depression by 34. Ours lasted longer because the new deal. WW2 got rid of his disastrous policies due to needing actual production.
The New Deal wouldn't have been struck without segregation. I have an alternative or parallel theory about neoliberalism. Socialism for white people was fine. When civil rights were being faught for, the racists who were socialist turned to capitalism in order to maintain their disparity. I am suggesting that they were so racist they abandoned socialism to avoid equality of skin/race. Just like democracy for white people only, they wanted socialism for white people only. And if they can't have these, then the only method for maintaining disparity is through corporate capture of government
Yes Fdr did, and no that is not a bad thing. I think in previous generations ideas were more welcomed and thus borrowed from. Yesthey where also considered the witchcraft of there time as foreign ideas or anything that is not from the book of American propegganda, but recent times we have been more territorial with our ideas with everything and it is left us mush more rigid in thaugh and open to blind spot in our rational.
Before I listen, let me share my to be confirmed bias... It took WWII for unions to get support in most European countries (except for Germany, they had a be different history). It took into the wall was taken down for all the associated social benefits to be attacked by the same ppl who built the union movement that had been crushed until 1945. What was the underlying history, communism looked attractive in 1945, more than ever due to the courage of the workers army, communism was defeated in 89.
Jedna časť parcely ktora nemohla prebehnuť dedičke konanie spochxbnovana darovaciu zmluvou druhe časti prvu čast dedičke konanie ne može byť pravne platna automatically spojeni cela čast parcely
Viet Nam was not just a geopolitical chess piece, owing to fear from some sort of eternal totalitarian state being established. It was because American fossil fuel cartels wanted access to the vast off-shore oil deposits, which China & the Philippines are locking horns over today in the South China Sea. BTW, the Chinese regime is NOT a socialist or communist one. It is an oligarchy of the so called, Central Committee, which has set up institutions that can best be described as paranoid Monarchism..... I lived & worked there for 8 years, & there are few signs of mass organization, except for the military & the mindless hold of their pseudo-religious clinging to social tradition..... China is not problematic because of Socialism. It is problematic, because it's China. This "scholar" is not a very deep thinker, & engages in cliché' tropes. Go back to school Gary !!!!!
![Global Capitalism: On Labor - A May Day 2024 Special [May 1st, 2024]](/img/n.gif)
I so hope folks keep getting the message more and more that their labour makes them so very powerful.
The neoliberal order has given birth to a popular movement to eliminate federalism - now called the Deep State, to eliminate the regulation of commerce, industry, communication, health, and more. It’s called conservatism but it’s laissez faire-ism. The majority opposes this movement and, when the majority regains control of Congress, a strong federal government will return with a strong commitment to the separation of powers and the elimination of the College of Electors. This may sound like wishful thinking. Be reminded that the manipulation of the elector system is not supported by the vast majority. It is a foot race between tearing down federalism and the return to federalism and with it constitutional government. The majority has to fight for a return to constitutional federalism. It won’t happen by itself as our present crises in democracy proves. Taking democracy for granted has to come to an end.
As for the class-dictated legislation of the postwar period, the Taft-Hartley Act, with
its strikebreaking injunction club and its harsh restrictive clauses, stands out as
one of the most vicious. The potentialities of this law as an instrument to straitjacket the workers are virtually limitless. Business Week, December 18, 1946, said in an editorial that the "Taft-Hartley Act “crossed the narrow line separating a law which aims only to regulate from one which could destroy. Given a few million unemployed in America, given an administration in Washington which was not pro-union - and the Taft-Hartley Act conceivably could wreck the labor movement.”
American Socialist Eric Hass, October 1950
Of course, it's always about giving enough concession while maintaining ultimate control. Economic concessions in return for continued if not strengthened political control. This is what a capitalist ruling class does.
@@larshofler8298 Basically you are saying the capitalists give enough "reform rope" to hang the socialist movement. Then they pour on the anti-communist propaganda.
@@JohnT.4321 Basically
@@larshofler8298 I thought as much. Far too many socialist believe that through reforms to capitalism we will arrive at socialism. I have always doubted that it would ever happen.
@@JohnT.4321 Yea. My point being, it is the change of political consciousness and opening up space for political mobilization that matter, so the Left must pursue them. I'm not opposed to demanding reform as a way to politicize a previously de-politicized field and mobilize popular discontent, the point is people have to unconditionally insist on their demand as an ethical imperative. Not just "what should be done", but "what must be done"...
Very interesting discussion. But China was oddly absent -- both as an impetus for neoliberalism (opening up of China under Nixon/Carter made Russia much less menacing) and also as a new impetus moving forward today as China becomes the prime geostrategic rival. Given such a rich and stimulating discussion from someone clearly well informed it seemed very odd that China was not mentioned.
How do you want China to be included into this? I don't see your point.
@@larshofler8298 I tried to explain. They were discussing how geopolitics affects domestic politics and talked a lot of Russia but didn't mention China once. I think this is a big omission. First, Maoism was important before the 70s on the left in the West. Then there's rapprochement with China under Nixon/Carter which was a major turning point in the Cold War. Soon after it became a big engine of global deflation, of major importance to the viability of the neoliberal order. I could go on. But they didn't mention it at all. Odd I thought.
@@cuttysark57 That was the 1960's and a whole different story.
China was apparently viewed as another Colony to be exploited.
If Japan could overcome the Chinese the US should be able to handle them.
Neo- colonialism was beginning to get popular, Iran, Korea, Japan,
and soon to be another Colony was Vietnam ......
But they ran out of Money.
Thank you. There is a lot of struggle ahead of us. I’m discouraged as I am getting older but rejuvenating by informing like this.
Coffee shop workers have no skills that make them irreplaceable. They can be replaced by automation. If they want autonomy they need to revert to the model of employment at founding of the republic which is self employment. In new economic model unskilled labor has no power. Capital has power.
"By 1960 the average CEO of a US Corporation was making 20 times more than the average factory worker. By 2000 he was making 300 times what the average factory worker was making." 🤔
Mr Gerstle is also very informative on FDR, the Southern Democrats and Civil Rights, US v. USSR, the failure of Soviet Communism & its effect on US Socialism, on the rise of Neo-Liberalism, its failure and the significance of Occupy and today's striking workers.
(from Green Fire, UK) 🌈🦉
I didn't like his most recent book, but because of how he presents here, will take another look at it. Thank you
As long as America continues in the paradigm of capitalism with its elites there will be struggles between a class of workers and a class of capitalists. No matter the progress, where the elites see a need to compromise, there will always be a retrenchment of capital-elites and the slide into a society of rich and poor. The paradigm must be changed for new struggles and efforts to begin. The people (res publica) must control both the means of production, to produce for human needs and benefits, and the government which construct the laws for a just society and its administration.
“Wherever capitalism appears, in pursuit of its mission of exploitation, there will Socialism, fertilized by misery, watered by tears, and vitalized by agitation be also found, unfurling its class-struggle banner and proclaiming its mission of emancipation.”
-Eugene V. Debs
Capitalism, in whatever form--neoliberal, Keynesian, whatever--has feet of clay. There will always be crisis.
al,
@@flutieflambert
What would the lot of humanity be if capitalism had never evolved, presumably a continuation of thousands more years of stone-ages?
What Debs et al are agonizing about is human nature and the left's unhinged conviction that they can change it, thankfully whilst they are theorising about a non-existent Utopia somebody else creates the wealth that corrupt politicians can tax to engage in various wars , rip-offs and bribes to the non-productive to keep them in office
Socialism, venturing democracy into ALL of life. Economics and workplace too. Why do Americans find this so scary? I feel capitalism is FAR scarier
Capitalism is the absurd belief that the most wickedest of men doing the most wickedest of things will result in the most good for all
My question/concern: America today, unlike in the 30s, is de-industrialized. Can worker movements in the service sector provide the same magnitude of disruption that, say, a factory strike in the 30s could have?
I still think the Left must find a way to unite with industrial workers, many of them located in Asia. The primary division of labor today is between "intellectual labor" in the West (and the US in particular) and "physical labor" in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The US has been divorced from actual production processes for too long now, Americans are actually surprised to learn that their economy depends on sweatshops in Asia that practices 19th century standards. For God's sake, that's all part of the deal. You can't divorce America's "clean records" from the dirty businesses it does by the hands of non-American intermediaries. It's one and the same system.
@@jason8434 Industries have not disappeared at all. They are just outsourced to the other side of the globe, kept out of sight. "De-industrialization" is such a bad term, it makes people forget about the obvious fact that the material world is still produced by actual workers, it does not just come out of a computer.
@@jason8434 I don't believe in blockchain or other techno-solutions to sociopolitical problems. I've heard a lot about those supposed novelties, but so far I don't see how they could help humanity liberate themselves. Instead, I think they reinforce capitalist tendencies of exclusivity, individual isolation, and denial of the Commons. While the Left should not abandon social media, social media itself is not "democratic", that is, it represents the return of feudalist tendency in today's capitalism. I recommend the concept of neo-feudalism, proposed on the Left by Jodi Dean.
As to what you referred to as "people living in their own ideologies", I think you vastly underestimated how it was the same for people in the 19th century and the 20th century. In fact, Socialism itself fell victim to nationalism, as mainstream Socialists supported their each country against others in WWI, something that shocked Lenin so much that he began to depart from Socialism. Basically, communism, or emancipatory struggles fighting for universal freedom, has to by definition overcome thousands of years of divisions, segregations, etc. If we simply surrender to how things are and accept people's ideological state as an unchanging natural fact per empiricism, then we have already lost.
Great show
One of the decisive motivating factors in school integration was winning the public relations battle with the Soviet Union as well. This is meticulously documented in international relations theory expert Mary Dudziak’s ‘Desegregation as a Cold War Imperative’ (Stanford Law Review, 1988).
Doubt we would’ve landed on the Moon either absent Sputnik.
good work
The biggest unanswered question for me is, what's next?
Great show again.
I really enjoyed the history. I think we really need to learn all about the New Deal to put the last 5-6 decades in perspective.
In one way, DT's slogan make america great again is really a reference to the time when the New Deal made America a more egalitarian country. People remember that.
Not sure whether we can have a new deal without a decade of organized struggle from the bottom.
Neoliberalism is coming to an end, but whether we will go in a more fascist direction or a more egalitarian direction is not clear to me at this time.
The most unexpected thing was the pandemic. And as the speaker said, the government's response was pretty great, even if it was an anachronism in the moment. Perhaps we will stumble into a better future accidentally.
@Russ Ingram
As FDR said, he was saving capitalism. And he did. And capitalism also leads to its own destruction.
But will we continually rebuild a failed system? Or choose a better way forward? It's difficult for us to even imagine another way unfortunately.
I think the term "political order" as the Professor describes it is not at all helpful in understanding US politics. It seems generally to mean what is acceptable in the mainstream of US politics at a given time. That Eisenhower did not try to roll back the power of labor is not meaningful, when the job had been done for him early in the Truman administration by the Taft-Harley Law. That he did not try to undermine Social Security was understandable when, in Europe, still recovering from WW2, the social security net that had been put in place was already far more protective of the public than our SS and has remained so ever since. The marginal tax rate of over 90% continued from WW2 was a headline grabber, only. The wealthy were able to use the US tax-code to avoid it without much difficulty. The interstate highway system was a wasteful use of public money that could have far more wisely have been spent improving the passenger railway system and mass, public transit in the cities. Instead, cities were neglected in favor of suburban development that allowed tax payers to desert the cities and let them decay. These programs were favored by the wealthy capitalist political class. They were not demonstrations of what Gerstle calls the New Deal Order by capitulation of the oposition's president to its inexorable sway. As for the growth and influence of the military and the secret state, they were well entrenched with Eisenhower in the persons of the Dulles brothers. They had eggregious successes in the coups in Iran, Guatemala, the massacres in Indonesia, the intensifiation of the Cold War, and the hostility towards the PRC until Nixon.
Though I do not claim credentials as an historian, I did live through the period of what Mr Gerstle calls the New Deal Order. I disagree with his timing of it. If we look at the power of unions as one clock, unions were severely undermined as early as June, 1947, when the Taft-Hartley Act was passed into law. This was during the Truman Administration, scarcely more than two years after the death of FDR. Unions were further restrained by the advent of anti-Communism as a threatening force to anyone on the Left, be he simply a trade-unionist, a writer, a member of the entertainment industry, an academician. Unions, the principal lobbyists for federal regualtion of capitalist institutions, were hamstrung not to appear anti-capitalist - almost equivalent to Communist. It is true that the death knell to government as the protector of the "little guy" came with Carter and more so with Reagan - especially with the firing of the air-traffic controllers' on strike - but the election of Ronald Reagan to the White House alone was a clear signal that the New Deal Order had long before past away. Indeed, the defeat of George McGovern by his own Party's betrahal was a flashing light. The end of the New Deal Order was determined by the Cold War and the rise of militarism and the Secret State. Even Eisenhower, who foretold its consequences, could do nothing more to hinder it that to make a warning in his farewell address - after an eight year presidency in January, 1961, The Cold War, the Secret State, the MIC, are the roots of the Neoliberal Order that came into bloom in the 1980s.
Ike spoke out against the MIC and wanted a defense theory built around nukes with minimal conventional forces. US was not supposed to fight wars in Vietnam. Ike wanted Vietnam to fight those wars. Ike recognized military spending hurt economic competitiveness. JFK ran on non-existent missile and bomber gaps and a flexible response for military with large conventional forces. Dont buy the case that end of USSR brought about global trade for first time in 75 years. WWI was bought on by global competition in trade. WWII was a similar competition among economic competitors. USSR represented such a small segment of potential global trade that was constrained by communism. Occupy Wall Street had no more influence than the bonus army encampments in DC that were squashed. The progressive movement who I once advocated for under Bernie has ZERO influence. Chinese capitalism using it to advance the people of the state instead of maximizing shareholder wealth is the competition that will cause the US to fix its out dated form of capitalism for the Chinese model. Labor has no specialized skills necessary to recognize in coffee shop or other service workers. They can be trained in a day unlike people who worked in manufacturing. Labor has no power in strikes because they have no skills. Fire and replace will be the response to a strike or automation. You dont explain what power labor has to create a rise in labor power. Movements rise because of inherent increase in power with a movement. Service workers have no power because they have no irreplaceable skills. Occupy Wall Street was smashed because capital knows they dont need those protesters.
Jen is so fine
Fascinating discussion. What concerns me is that Capital will drift into an unyielding position of proto-fascism. For a lack of better terms Trumpism. This is a right-wing grievance based politics which is laced with conspiracies,climate denial, populism, racism, and market based solutions.
Railroad workers prevented strike this year
I was raised Republican but became a Socialist is better for common man
What happened to The New Deal Order & The Spectre of Communism w/ Gary Gerstle,
Liza Featherstone | Jacobin Show?
I listened to the whole show on the podcast version. This is a major part of it. I expect they will post the whole show and the other parts broken up as well.
Eisenhower was my dad's commander along with Patton
I think on the topic of climate change forcing the hand of capitalists, one of the nightmare scenarios is that it will force their hand too early or in the wrong direction. Capitalism is a force that demands growth, but there is no growth to be found on a dying earth. OTOH, green energy and green industries DO offer capitalists new growth potential, at least in the short term, and possibly in the long term if the transition is fast enough to avoid climate collapse. At the end of the day, capitalists will be willing to contemplate a transition to eco-fascism or eco-feudalism once they see opportunities for growth disappearing...but it's also possible to manage a green transition that will remove that possibility from the bargaining table.
This is why IMO the IRA may be one of the most important pieces of legislation this century: it's disappointing af compared to BBB, but it at least offers capitalism a path to transition. It buys time. The worker's movement isn't strong enough yet to force real concessions from capital, which is why tackling the climate crisis - by any means short of abject surrender - is ultimately a good move. There is no socialism on a dying earth.
So yeah, the climate crisis might be a looming threat that forces capital concessions...or it might be an accelerant towards a political economy even qorse than capitalism. It could be an inflection point in either direction. I think we should all be wary of thinking of the climate crisis as JUST an opportunity to win concessions for workers. It can be, but that will depend on the speed and scale of the crisis.
I learned at 19 that Capitalism with infinite growth on a finite planet isn't logiçal thus became a Buddhist
Stannard Baker, in his account of Wilson at Versailles, noted that on the return trip to American from Paris, he found that most of the American Versailles Party believed that Communism was definitely going to significantly out perform American capitalism. Just why they all felt that way is hard to say, other than that they probably all had spent time reading Marx because the Russian were not present at the Versailles Treaty discussions.
The rise of social enterprises, social impact, ESG, etc. are small indicators of such a new order. Though these may be how the neoliberal order is trying to fit into the new/future order.
One should not overlook the fact that the South China Sea has significant oil and gas reserves. I am not sure when they were first discovered, but there was no reason that as soon as the Gulf of Mexico was found to be oil rich that the South China Sea would have almost immediately become a focus for investigation and search for these resources. As it is, Russia got the deal because we lost the war.
Eisenhower got rid of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation the development bank that maintained the competitiveness of the United States. This was the beginning of the role back of the New Deal.
Enjoy what's coming, the confesional State!
I was raised in the heart of Republican party from 1956-1976
Taft Hartley Act thus Taft is a "dirty word"!
let it collapse on itself.
Much like capital was willing to compromise with labor in the face of growing Soviet influence abroad it's possible capital will be willing to compromise with labor in the face of growing Chinese influence however I'm hope it doesn't come to that.
The US has to get out of Ukraine first. Then it can consider War with China!
Eisenhower loved his common soldier
Isn't all this pretty well known and established? Have people forgotten these basic historical facts?
The only new angle I can see here is the suggestion that Totalitarianism was somehow not all that serious, which is a novel idea to say the least.
Defunded public schools and Southern racism.
You don't need an 100% original idea to make an academic contribution to the literature. As you stated, he has his own angle, which is enough.
Very useful points on the threat of communism shaping the bargaining power of the working class in relation to capitalist elites during the New Deal order.
But neither person in this talk refer to the atrocities under Stalin and Mao when, toward the end of the video, they talk about reviving the good elements of the Soviet Union without redoing its bad elements.
This video ends with probably what is the most important question: how emancipatory movements are to be built in the 2020s and beyond.
A follow-up talk on that topic would help.
Why is it that most people ignore the atrocities that the US has done in other countries in the name of "democracy"? Professor Grover Furr has some interesting writings on what really happened during the Stalin period. Professor Furr had access to the Soviet Archives with the permission of the Russian government.
When I traveled in the former East block around the turn of the 20th Century I noticed a nostalgia for the Breshnev years. It was self-aware of how kitsch it all was in retrospect, but wistful about the relative level of comfort and security.
You could maybe find a parallel with the voluntary simplicity idea in western societies: work and consume less.
@@JohnT.4321 That guy is probably the only person on earth who believed the statement: "throughout its history, Russia has never attacked anyone".
The atrocities of Mao et al. are only relevant from a capitalist perspective and is why capitalists were so willing to concede to labor because they envisioned communism as a threat to liberty (eg the atrocities to which you refer). From a socialist perspective, those atrocities were cautionary examples of socialist states that failed to enact central pillars of socialism.
@@flutieflambert I would say, "so-called atrocities" considering the capitalist media would push that propaganda while ignoring the US atrocities in it's imperialist domination over weaker countries with coups and puppet regimes. If you would check out Socialism for All's channel here on You Tube, then you would learn why it was difficult to establish the lower phase of communism in those countries. On the other hand, no socialist movement has occurred here in the West where labor and ordinary people own and run the means of production and distribution. There is a plan that would work in order for people to own and run production and distribution through Socialist Industrial Unions. The people who are for this type of collective ownership are anti-communist and anti-Maoist. Also, they have isolated themselves from other Leftist When a political party excludes themselves from other socialists, your not going anywhere anytime soon.
It began during The Great Republican Depression, after the rich took over the Federal Reserve instituted in 1913 on Jekyll Island.
I dont believe speaker defines marginal tax rate. That does not mean ALL income for a person taxed at that rate. It is in effect a salary cap. All income above a certain amount is taxed at that rate. Income lower than that level is taxed at lower marginal rates. Example if 100K was the amount where the highest marginal rate kicked in then all income over 100K taxed at 91%.
What a wonderful discussion. Thanks! I'm not quite sure, though, whether it is encouraging or not to those on the left. I do agree that the environmental crisis is the most likely candidate for what will force us toward a new social and economic order. But what is it that will move us in a good rather than a negative direction here? Something else may be needed. Crazy as it sounds, it might be that something like the current psychedelic renaissance (and spiritual-EXPERIENCE, as opposed to dogma, renaissance) will contribute. Just read, for example, the work of Roland Griffiths coming out of Johns Hopkins. Or consider the exponential increase in near-death experiences, due to the advance of resuscitation technology (at present about 10% of the Western population has apparently had one or more NDE). The key here is how utterly life-transforming and values-transforming these deep spiritual experiences are. Religion tried and failed. Communism tried and failed. Now perhaps direct spiritual engagement will make more progress. This is nothing really but a return to Plato and the Presocratic worldview.
What is life transforming?
I’ve been saying we need a non denominational spiritual revival for years. Love and compassion are powerful weapons for good
@@jeffm.5071 Fortunately, all the evidence suggests this trend is well underway and is only going to continue. To sum up this research: It seems that this new generation of seekers want direct experience, not doctrine or dogma or some stone tablet of dos and don'ts.
@@milanalexich2136 These deep spiritual experiences have a very strong statistical record of altering an individual's live in quite radical ways. For example, people who have NDEs will frequently change careers (say from banker to teacher), change values about money and material accumulation, and even change relationships over these issues. They become less "materialistic" and more, well, "spiritual." One research psychologist, Dr. Bruce Greyson, has remarked that he knows of no more powerful way to transform and heal people psychologically. Read his work. It's fascinating.
Public Good
Government managing capitalism… ughhhh
Capitalists didn’t need help. The rest of the world was done with the depression by 34.
Ours lasted longer because the new deal. WW2 got rid of his disastrous policies due to needing actual production.
The New Deal wouldn't have been struck without segregation. I have an alternative or parallel theory about neoliberalism. Socialism for white people was fine. When civil rights were being faught for, the racists who were socialist turned to capitalism in order to maintain their disparity. I am suggesting that they were so racist they abandoned socialism to avoid equality of skin/race. Just like democracy for white people only, they wanted socialism for white people only. And if they can't have these, then the only method for maintaining disparity is through corporate capture of government
Yes Fdr did, and no that is not a bad thing. I think in previous generations ideas were more welcomed and thus borrowed from. Yesthey where also considered the witchcraft of there time as foreign ideas or anything that is not from the book of American propegganda, but recent times we have been more territorial with our ideas with everything and it is left us mush more rigid in thaugh and open to blind spot in our rational.
Keď je niekto živi nemože aby mohlo prebehlo dedičke konanie
to musel asi ako že zaplatit za niečo asi tsk aby ne oficialne skurupovany sudny System
Before I listen, let me share my to be confirmed bias...
It took WWII for unions to get support in most European countries (except for Germany, they had a be different history).
It took into the wall was taken down for all the associated social benefits to be attacked by the same ppl who built the union movement that had been crushed until 1945.
What was the underlying history, communism looked attractive in 1945, more than ever due to the courage of the workers army, communism was defeated in 89.
Jedna časť parcely ktora nemohla prebehnuť dedičke konanie spochxbnovana darovaciu zmluvou druhe časti prvu čast dedičke konanie ne može byť pravne platna automatically spojeni cela čast parcely
po živom ktory žije nemože prebehnuť dedičke konanie
Bez ohľadu na rodini stav
In general what he says is correct, but gets many of the details dead wrong.
Pullman workers
Taka zmluva prišla na Slovensko
Viet Nam was not just a geopolitical chess piece, owing to fear from some sort of eternal totalitarian state being established. It was because American fossil fuel cartels wanted access to the vast off-shore oil deposits, which China & the Philippines are locking horns over today in the South China Sea. BTW, the Chinese regime is NOT a socialist or communist one. It is an oligarchy of the so called, Central Committee, which has set up institutions that can best be described as paranoid Monarchism..... I lived & worked there for 8 years, & there are few signs of mass organization, except for the military & the mindless hold of their pseudo-religious clinging to social tradition..... China is not problematic because of Socialism. It is problematic, because it's China. This "scholar" is not a very deep thinker, & engages in cliché' tropes. Go back to school Gary !!!!!
No. It gave us the new deal. Period. The title is tone deaf.
Communism? You mean the Soviet regime.
ADVOKAT vyhlasil živeho za mrtveho a tak prebehlo dedičke konanie
Don't watch it they're going to divert your attention right at the end
Austerity propaganda.
mrtvy nemože darovať
46+ minutes? Really?
Hate to say it but I can hardly hear what you are saying lately. It's very slurry