killing free Paradox

Xian fox vix ppt5

2) Paradoxically, the advent of the atomic era and the
progressive intensification of the processes resulting in global
climate change coincide with the creation of a set of multilateral
institutions and, over time, of regional international agreements
of various kinds: the United Nations and its various agencies,
the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the European
Economic Community, NATO, the Council for Mutual Economic
Assistance (COMECON), the Warsaw Pact, ASEAN and so on.
Never as in the post-Second World War period has international
society been so widely structured and institutionalised. And,
another paradox, never as in the Second World War period has
international society denied the legitimacy of war as a means of
resolving disputes between states and affirming the right of
peoples and individuals to equality, freedom, self-determination
and even certain economic and social rights.
This while nuclear missiles, military alliances and the dynamics
of economic power have severely limited – where they existed
(that is in a small part of the world) – the extent and possibilities
of the exercise of democratic rights and the sovereignty of
people.
These paradoxes demonstrate the contradictory nature of social
forms of modernity: a promise of progress and liberation, but at
the same time an intensification of risks and problems on a
global scale.
The fact is that the real globalisation is not of economics or
politics but is of risks and problems. While the incorporation of
the nuclear weapon in missiles, the development of capitalism
and the industrialisation of totalitarian pseudo-socialism have
produced global risks and problems for the whole of humanity,
institutions of power have remained particular and national,
albeit with a radius of action that goes beyond territorial
boundaries and with dense diplomatic relations.
The shape and dynamics of world society are not static but
continue to be based on reproduction of the differences in levels
of socio-economic development and economic and political
power. While interdependence grows, social inequality is
reproduced and its forms become complicated.
It follows that the answer to global risks and problems cannot be
at the national level. Or rather, the territorial state constitutes the
area in which political action begins a process of change –
overthrowing the institutions of power – but can only fully and
permanently achieve its objectives at higher levels: regional,
continental and global.
Fear and insecurity
3) Consideration on Savio’s “greed and fear”.
In our times, fear and insecurity are powerful forces into which
more fears blend: the precariousness of work and
unemployment, the future of children, the mortgage, the
immigrant and terrorism. The insecurity and fear of the
immigrant demonstrated by many European citizens are the
result of precise European economic and social policies,
articulated in the different EU states and the euro zone. Fear of
the immigrant is equivalent to the definition of a scapegoat, to a
false target.
Regional and national policies, in turn, have inscribed in them a
given structural configuration of macroeconomic imbalances
according to which, schematically, the United States is the pole
of world demand and Germany, China and Japan the poles of
world supply. The precariousness of employment in Europe is
therefore the result both of a structure and of political decisions
(and non-decisions). And it is this precariousness, moved by
greed, which in turn feeds the fear of immigration.
Remaining at the national level, how is it possible to solve a dual
problem which results from both a structure of the world
economy and from policies and institutions operating on a
regional, almost continental level?
If the dual problem of fear of the immigrant and of the greed that
produces precariousness cannot be solved at a national level, it
is at the regional level that we can start to deal with it. However,
not from a nationalist point of view and by putting the cart before
the horse, that is not, for example, by demanding to leave the
European Union.
We have to start facing it with partial and sectoral struggles, with
defensive movements, but which with their unification start to
change the balance of forces with national economic and
political power. Only then can the question of national
government and of the relationship with the other governments
of the European Union be raised.
In addition to it being ridiculous to set the goal of leaving the
European Union when you are not even able to conduct
defensive struggles or have a political entity that can govern (the
cart before the horse referred to above), any social movement
and any government that seriously intends to fight fear and
greed must be able to relate to other movements and possibly
other governments of Europe.
In other words, problems like those of precariousness and
immigration cannot be solved effectively if not on a continental
scale. What we need to fight for is not the destruction of the
European Union. The fact is that what is missing is a common
budget, and social and economic policy, aimed at satisfying the
needs of citizens rather than those of competitiveness between
states of the region and in the world. In other words: we must
fight for the United States of Europe.
This is a process that must be thought of as conflicting and
unequal, and the outcome of which depends a great deal not on
closing up a priori inside presumed national independence.
Wherever the process begins, we need to act as a stimulus for
all European workers and citizens so that movements converge
on the fundamental objectives. If this were to happen,
objectively the pillars of the economic and political power of
capitalism and imperialism of European states would also be
questioned: the United States of Europe is impossible within the
framework of the various European capitalisms and
imperialisms.
And this is all the more necessary for the following reasons: first,
precariousness does not result from either technology or
immigration as such, but from policies that do not have
employment as an objective; and secondly because, in its turn,
extra-EU immigration is not only the result of the demographic
growth of underdeveloped countries – which is also certainly a
problem – but also of their poverty.
"Helping them at home" is not a mistaken idea, but it rings as
completely hypocritical and powerless when it does not translate
into ways other than the imperialistic exploitation of people and
natural resources.
Economic crisis and large progressive social movements
4) The foregoing is evidently not on the agenda, but to me it
seems much more realistic than alternative positions closed in
the national state that conceive internationalism as a mere sum
of national movements. The latter is a perspective long since
surpassed by the development of capitalism and even its very
imperfect international institutions: to place oneself below the
historical level reached by the adversary means devoting
oneself to impotence – or worse, contributing to the diffusion of
a reactionary mentality.
If and when something happens in the future that comes close
to the synchronism of the crusading movements of the 60s and
70s, the possibility of the United States of Europe will also be
put to the test. This is an eventuality that nobody can foresee
and never determine, but which I consider probable precisely
because interdependence is stronger today than half a century
ago.
It should come as no surprise that this did not occur in the midst
of the 2008 financial crisis, despite its seriousness. Or perhaps
also for this reason: it is known – except in the minds of those
who want to delude themselves – that there is no automatic
correlation between economic crisis and large progressive
social movements. The rise in unemployment is not favourable
to mobilisation, let alone when the series of defeats is lengthy.
However, here we are not interested in a sociological discourse
on the conditions and dynamics of workers' mobilisation, which
can become a fatalistic alibi. The crux of the historical problem
of the passivity of European citizens noted by Roberto Savio is
part of a larger problem.
We already know how strong the system is and what are its
destructuring and restructuring capabilities – which historically
pass through crises and disasters – with regard to both socio-
economic and political relationships. I will not dwell on the
reasons and the dynamics of post-democracy and the society of
entertainment, and on the atomising effect that social networks
can have.