April 2016 - P2P-Foundation - lists.ourproject.org

Fwd: [opennetcoalition] Open Letter from the OLN to the WP29 and the European Parliament on the Privacy Shield
by Michel Bauwens 07 Apr '16

07 Apr '16

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: La Quadrature du Net <contact(a)laquadrature.net> Date: Thu, Apr 7, 2016 at 11:08 PM Subject: [opennetcoalition] Open Letter from the OLN to the WP29 and the European Parliament on the Privacy Shield To: opennetcoalition(a)laquadrature.net Press Release *Tags :* PRIVACY SHIELD, SAFE HARBOR, WP29, PRIVACY, DATA PROTECTION La Quadrature du Net — For immediate release Permanent link: https://www.laquadrature.net/en/open-letter-oln-wp29-privacy-shield <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=510&…> Open Letter from the OLN to the WP29 and the European Parliament on the Privacy Shield Paris, 7 April 2016 — *The Privacy Shield, a framework for personal data transfers towards US-based companies, is currently under negotiation. This new agreement follows the invalidation of the Safe Harbor by the European Court of Justice (ECJ), who ruled that it did not uphold a substantially equivalent protection for personal data of people protected under European law, and suggested new measures to address it. Since the draft Privacy Shield does not take these measures into account, the resulting agreement is bound to reduce the fundamental rights of Europeans.* Joint communiqué from the *Observatoire des Libertés et du Numérique* (Freedoms and Digital Observatory)1 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=511&…> Dear Mrs President, Dear Mr President, Dear Members of the LIBE Committee, Following its signature by the European Commission in 2000, the Safe Harbor agreement2 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=512&…> was supposed to certify that transaltantic companies complied with data protection standards of similar effect as the European standards, despite the scepticism from the WP29 especially regarding US law. Edward Snowden's revelations in 20133 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=513&…> showed the world the scope of US surveillance using the Patriot Act, concerning data processed and hosted on their territory (or on foreign ground) by international companies. Consequently, on the 6 October 2015, the ECJ has invalidated the Safe Harbor with its Schrems ruling4 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=514&…>. This ruling set the basis for a new agreement, by laying down the minimum criteria that the Commission should follow. Unfortunately, the new agreement's draft, called the Privacy Shield5 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=515&…>, does not include all the guarantees deemed necessary by the ECJ. If signed as it is today, the agreement would joepardise the protection of fundamental rights to data protection and to privacy, required by the Court of justice. In particular, the ECJ highlighted the following points: - the need that such an agreement should foresee the*"possibility for an individual to pursue legal remedies in order to have access to personal data relating to him, or to obtain the rectification or erasureof such data"*6 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=516&…>. This possibility does not exist in the draft agreement, that merely bemoans the weakness of existing legal remedies7 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=517&…>, or merely refers to some US laws allowing access requests for information from US federal agencies, without the possibility for rectification8 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=518&…>. To address this lacuna, the draft agreement should at least lay down the *specific conditions* for national data protection authorities to suspend transfers 9 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=519&…> ; - such possibility must be accompanied by "the *existence of effective legal protection against interference*"10 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=520&…>. In theory, the draft Privacy Shield sets up a ombudsman in the US to deal with requests by European authorities investigating surveillance cases. But in practice, its independence has been called into question11 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=521&…> by the European Ombudsman12 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=522&…>. Furthermore, the competences of the Ombudsman should not be limited to surveillance; - the Court's *fundamental opposition to mass surveillance*. The Court has also required that the soon-to-be agreement would not allow "public authorities to have access on a generalised basis to the content of electronic communications"13 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=523&…>, nor the retention "on a generalised basis, storage of all the personal data of all the persons whose data has been transferred from the European Union to the United States"14 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=524&…>. However, the commitments made by the US refer to six15 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=525&…> purposes allowing them to keep on proceeding to the undiscriminated collection of data from users of services such as those provided by Google or Facebook. The Commission explicitly underlines in the draft of the agreement that access to collected data will be strictly limited to specific and legitimate national defence purposes16 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=526&…>. However, this is not reflected at all in any law or political commitment made by the US. The ECJ had invalidated the Safe Harbor, for it did not protect the data transferred to the US from Europe against American mass surveillance. But the European Commission is about to accept a new agreement that does not provide better protection of Europeans' personal data. Similarly, the European Commission refused to investigate the national security policies of Member States in terms of mass data collection, thus going against all decisions of the ECJ17 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=527&…> . Finally, the *legal value* of this text is only relative, and largely based on political promises that the up-coming presidential elections might sweep away18 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=528&…>, as some MEPs pointed out during the expert hearing at the European Parliament of 17 March. Therefore, this agreement, that is not ratified by the US Congress, gives absolutely no guarantees to people whose personal data is being transferred to the US. *L'Observatoire des Libertés et du Numérique (OLN) supports the reservations made by the WP29 and the European Parliament, and calls to maintain the pressure on the European Commission in order to incite it to produce a legal analysis on the compliance of the draft with existing European legislation on data protection19 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=529&…>. On this basis, the OLN calls for resuming negotiations with US authorities in order to properly examine the compliance of existing transfers.* *This draft agreement is dangerous and does not live up to the standards of the protection of fundamental rights in Europe. As it is now, there is no doubt that the text would once again be challenged and invalidated by the ECJ, resulting in a legal instability that undermines trust in the digital economy. Going back to the negotiation table is hence crucial for the protection of our fundamental rights!* - 1. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=530&…> The *Observatoire des Libertés et du Numérique* includes: Amnesty International France <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=531&…>, the Cecil <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=532&…>, Creis-Terminal <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=533&…>, the Human Rights League <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=534&…>, the *Syndicat de la magistrature* <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=535&…>, the *Syndicat des Avocats de France* <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=536&…> and La Quadrature du Net. - 2. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=537&…> The decision of the 20 July 2000 by the European Commission: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32000D0520&fro… <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=538&…> - 3. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=539&…> Article in French newspaper Le Monde on Snowden: https://www.laquadrature.net/en/node/8925 <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=540&…> - 4. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=541&…> To read the decision see: http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=169195&pageI… <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=542&…> - 5. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=543&…> See the draft of the Privacy Shield: http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/files/privacy-shield-adequacy-d… <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=544&…> - 6. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=545&…> Paragraph 95 of the above mentioned Schrems ruling. - 7. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=546&…> Paragraphs 98 and 99 of the aforementioned draft Privacy Shield. - 8. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=547&…> Paragraphs 96 to 104 of the draft Privacy Shield. - 9. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=548&…> Mentioned in point 44 of the draft agreement - 10. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=549&…> Paragraph 89 of the Schrems ruling. - 11. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=550&…> http://www.ombudsman.europa.eu/en/resources/otherdocument.faces/en/64157/ht… <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=551&…> - 12. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=552&…> Indeed, Annex III of the draft Privacy Shield establishes the mandate of the Ombudsman, but does not include the obligation to inform the European authority whether the individual who requested the investigation is indeed under surveillance or not. By the same token, it does not include an obligation to inform the authority on how the violation against the natural person's privacy was ended, in case of illegal surveillance. - 13. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=553&…> Paragraph 94 of the Schrems ruling. - 14. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=554&…> Paragraph 93 of the Schrems ruling. - 15. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=555&…> Paragraph 61 of the draft Privacy Shield. - 16. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=556&…> Paragraph 63 of the draft Privacy Shield. - 17. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=557&…> Digital Rights ruling ( http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=150642&pa... <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=558&…> ) and Schrems ruling ( http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=169195&pa... <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=542&…> ). - 18. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=559&…> Video of D. Trump on his first decisions if he was to be elected president of the USA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HmLxrbIrjc&t=0m9s <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=560&…> - 19. <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=561&…> This analysis should be carried out in light of the "Safe Harbor" ruling (already mentioned), of the 1995 Directive on Data Protection, of the upcoming Regulation on Data Protection, and of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU. About La Quadrature du Net La Quadrature du Net is an advocacy group that defends the rights and freedoms of citizens on the Internet. More specifically, it advocates for the adaptation of French and European legislations to respect the founding principles of the Internet, most notably the free circulation of knowledge. In addition to its advocacy work, the group also aims to foster a better understanding of legislative processes among citizens. Through specific and pertinent information and tools, La Quadrature du Net hopes to encourage citizens' participation in the public debate on rights and freedoms in the digital age. La Quadrature du Net is supported by French, European and international NGOs including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Open Society Institute and Privacy International. List of supporting organisations: https://www.laquadrature.net/en/they-support-la-quadrature-du-net <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=562&…> Press contact and press room contact(a)laquadrature.net – +33 (0)972 294 426 https://www.laquadrature.net/en/press-room <http://www.laquadrature.net/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=563&…> *To unsubscribe, click here <http://www.laquadrature.net/civicrm/mailing/optout?reset=1&jid=152&qid=4611…>* *La Quadrature du Net60, rue des OrteauxParis, 75020* _______________________________________________ Opennetcoalition mailing list Opennetcoalition(a)laquadrature.net https://lists.laquadrature.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/opennetcoalition -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Re: [P2P-F] [NetworkedLabour] Fwd: Looking the Basic Income Gift Horse in the Mouth
by Kevin Carson 06 Apr '16

06 Apr '16

Henry George's argument was that the supply of land is fixed, so an increase in spending power in a community results in bidding up rents. The result is that as social wealth increases, an increasing share of it goes down the rat hole of rents to unproductive landlords whose properties appreciate through nothing they've done other than sitting on them. On Wed, Apr 6, 2016 at 1:41 AM, peter waterman <peterwaterman1936(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Kevin > > Could you spell out your land value tax caveat? > > Best, > > PeterW > > On Wed, Apr 6, 2016 at 3:46 AM, Kevin Carson > <free.market.anticapitalist(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >> I have mixed feelings about this. >> >> The point about conservatives hoping to put the floor as low as >> possible are well taken. But compared to most family income support >> programs in the U.S. even $1000/month is actually fairly decent. >> >> And I think an unconditional Basic Income, with no means-testing, >> would have the effect of raising wages just from all the people on the >> margin who would prefer living on it to working a fast food or nursing >> home job, or cut their hours back to part-time because of Basic >> Income, or the people who thanks to Basic Income were just marginally >> less afraid of losing their job or were able to hold out a few extra >> weeks while waiting for a better offer. The overall effect would be to >> reduce the number of people competing for work, and at least >> marginally increase the average worker's ability to walk away from the >> bargaining table. >> >> And eliminating the demeaning, intrusive welfare bureaucracies is a >> feature, not a bug. >> >> As for "full employment," that kind of workerism is a throwback to the >> most atavistic Old Left models of the mass production age. If >> anything, decoupling work from income and sharply reducing the amount >> of work is one of the main selling points. The goal of a >> post-scarcity, post-capitalist economy should be to eliminate as much >> waste production, bureaucratic overhead and embedded rents as >> possible, so that the costs of goods and services implode -- and so >> does the average work week. A Basic Income would encourage the >> shifting of a lot of production from wage labor to direct production >> for use in the social economy. >> >> My own biggest caveat is that a Basic Income should be coupled with a >> land value tax, or a major part of any increase in purchasing power >> will simply go to bid up landlord rent. >> >> On Tue, Apr 5, 2016 at 9:02 AM, Anna Harris <anna(a)shsh.co.uk> wrote: >> > Thank you for this Peter. It is clear that every tool can be turned to >> > the >> > service of capitalist austerity. Locally to me we have seen the rise of >> > Junk >> > Food Projects, with the admirable aim of sourcing waste food to feed >> > hungry >> > people. But it ends up being middle class do-gooders papering over the >> > cracks in the system so supporting its existence rather than challenging >> > it: >> > the modern version of the 19th Century charity system. Meanwhile the >> > waste >> > food is still imported from low cost areas overseas, with appalling >> > working >> > conditions, creating pollution and consuming local scarce resources. >> > >> > Anna >> > >> > On 4 Apr 2016, at 07:43, peter waterman <peterwaterman1936(a)gmail.com> >> > wrote: >> > >> > >> > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- >> > From: Sid Shniad <shniad(a)gmail.com> >> > Date: Mon, Apr 4, 2016 at 4:31 AM >> > Subject: Looking the Basic Income Gift Horse in the Mouth >> > To: >> > >> > >> > http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/1241.php#continue >> > >> > The B u l l e t • Socialist Project • E-Bulletin No. 1241 • April 1, >> > 2016 >> > >> > Looking the Basic Income Gift Horse in the Mouth >> > >> > John Clarke >> > >> > <image.png> >> > >> > Both the Trudeau Liberals in Ottawa and the Wynne Government at Queen's >> > Park >> > in Toronto have been making noises of late on the subject of Basic >> > Income. >> > The last Ontario Budget, in fact, declared an intention to carry out a >> > pilot >> > project in a community still to be announced. While no clear details are >> > yet >> > available, it is very likely that we will soon be dealing with a >> > practical >> > initiative that we will have to respond to. We will have to consider how >> > we >> > view the possibility of the Liberals moving in the direction of a Basic >> > Income system. >> > >> > After decades of intensifying austerity and the erosion of systems of >> > income >> > support, with social assistance in Ontario now providing such wretchedly >> > inadequate benefits that people are unable to feed themselves properly >> > and >> > retain their housing, the notion of a basic level of income that all are >> > entitled to can't fail to generate a level of interest and raise some >> > hopes. >> > However, I am convinced that a good hard look in the mouth of this >> > particular gift horse is well advised. What are the different notions of >> > how >> > a Basic Income system might work? Why are governments now considering it >> > more seriously? What form would it be likely to take in the present >> > economic >> > and political context? >> > >> > Looking Deeper Into the Gift Horse >> > >> > As soon as you start to look into the question of Basic Income or, as it >> > was >> > often called in the past, Guaranteed Annual Income (GAI), you are >> > immediately struck by the ease and enthusiasm with which free market >> > thinkers and warriors of the neoliberal order have embraced the concept. >> > From Milton Friedman to Charles Murray, the idea has found warm support >> > on >> > the political right. There are some clear and obvious reasons why this >> > is >> > so. Firstly, the very idea of a basic level of income is about >> > establishing >> > a floor and right wing proponents are confident they can locate it in >> > the >> > basement. A low and inadequate social minimum seems to them a great way >> > of >> > folding in existing, relatively adequate programs so as to, precisely, >> > drive >> > people into deeper poverty. >> > >> > Another attraction offered by a low universal payment to those who take >> > the >> > side of the capitalists is the potential role it could play in >> > depressing >> > wages. In a recent contribution to the Union Research blog on the issue >> > of >> > Basic Income, Toby Sanger, draws attention to the Speenhamland System, a >> > wage supplement arrangement put in place under the English Poor Laws >> > between >> > 1795-1834, and the role it played in driving down wages. Low wage paying >> > employers could rely on the tax base to pay their workers wages and >> > employers who had been paying higher wages were under an incentive to >> > lower >> > them in order to obtain the same benefit. In the present context of >> > vastly >> > expanding low wage precarious work, this danger is one that should not >> > be >> > underestimated. >> > >> > The right wing Basic Income agenda, however, sets its sights on more >> > than >> > cutting benefit levels for people in poverty and depressing the wages of >> > the >> > lowest paid workers. Potentially, it is a means to gut social programs >> > and >> > to decimate the workforce that delivers them. The notion is to use the >> > basic >> > payment to advance the pace of privatization enormously. This kind of >> > payment would replace public services and all who received it would >> > become >> > customers shopping for their social needs in the private market. Not >> > just >> > income support systems, but public housing, healthcare, education and >> > transportation are threatened by the parsimonious universal payment >> > envisaged by free market Basic Income. >> > >> > A Different Kind of Basic Income? >> > >> > Of course, the political right's version of a system of basic social >> > payments is countered by those with more progressive concepts. There is >> > a >> > notion of Basic Income that stresses income adequacy, the need to >> > advance >> > full employment and the importance of preserving and strengthening a >> > range >> > of other elements of the social infrastructure. Without doubting the >> > good >> > intentions of advocates of a progressive Basic Income, it does need to >> > be >> > pointed out that the question of which version is to be adopted will not >> > be >> > decided by an impartial court of the common good but by present day >> > governments. The people running the show on Parliament Hill and at >> > Queen's >> > Park have some history behind them when it comes to the implementation >> > of >> > measures of austerity and privatization. Their recent experience in bold >> > new >> > social policies that raise the living standards of working class people >> > and >> > increase their share of the social wealth is significantly less. >> > >> > The austerity agenda, which we can trace back to the 1970s but which has >> > intensified following the international crisis of 2008, has placed a >> > central >> > strategic importance on weakening the adequacy of income support >> > programs. >> > In addition to the massive undermining of federal unemployment >> > insurance, >> > provincial social assistance has been enormously weakened. People on >> > Ontario >> > Works (OW) and the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) have seen >> > the >> > spending power of their income reduced by up to 60 per cent since the >> > infamous Tory cuts of the mid 90s. Not only have income levels been >> > driven >> > down but rules and policies have been adopted that have made programs >> > harder >> > to access and more uncertain for those receiving them. The increased >> > poverty >> > and the climate of desperation that this attack has generated have been >> > of >> > central importance in ensuring an astounding growth of low wage, >> > precarious >> > employment in Ontario. >> > >> > As the Liberals, political chameleons that they are, posture on the >> > issue of >> > Basic Income, we must avoid the trap of thinking that a rational and >> > socially just approach is going to be won on the strength of good >> > arguments. >> > The idea that Basic Income is so sensible that everyone on both sides of >> > the >> > class divide will want to get behind it and make it work in the best >> > interests of all is profoundly mistaken. If the concept is being >> > advanced in >> > Ontario by the very provincial government that has led the way in >> > program >> > reduction and austerity, it is not because they want to reverse the >> > undermining of income support, the proliferation of precarious >> > employment >> > and the privatizing of public services but for the very opposite reason. >> > They are looking with great interest at the possibility of using Basic >> > Income as a stalking horse for their regressive social agenda and it >> > will be >> > the version that Bay Street has in mind that will win out over notions >> > of >> > progressive redistribution. As the announcement in the Ontario Budget >> > acknowledges: >> > >> > “The pilot would also test whether a basic income would provide a more >> > efficient way of delivering income support, strengthen the attachment to >> > the >> > labour force, and achieve savings in other areas, such as healthcare and >> > housing supports” [page 132]. >> > >> > >> > We are in a period when capitalism and the governments that represent >> > its >> > interests are increasing the rate of exploitation and reducing the level >> > of >> > social provision. That is not about to change and any redesign of income >> > support systems we confront will be all about furthering, not limiting, >> > levels of social inequality. This is a particularly bad time for the >> > lamb to >> > accept an invitation from the lion to lie down. Basic Income will be no >> > panacea and the fight for income adequacy will continue, of necessity, >> > to >> > take the form of social mobilization against an agenda of austerity and >> > regression. >> > >> > Social programs that have emerged in capitalist societies, especially >> > those >> > devoted to income support, have always been reluctant concessions. Their >> > design, effectiveness and contradictions have reflected the prevailing >> > economic and political situation and the balance of class forces in >> > society. >> > For decades, we have been fighting a largely defensive struggle to >> > prevent >> > the decimation of systems of social provision. We are not in a period >> > when >> > bold new redistributive programs are on the drawing board. The Liberals >> > will >> > be only too happy if we give up our fight to defend the systems that >> > have >> > been won in previous struggles and join them, as ‘stakeholders’ at the >> > consultative round table. A decade of experience in maintaining an empty >> > discussion of ‘poverty reduction’ has turned them into experts in such >> > diversionary tactics. At the end of the process, however, if we allow >> > them, >> > they will put in place a version of Basic Income that will give Milton >> > Friedman very little reason to turn over in his grave. >> > >> > John Clarke is an organizer with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty >> > (OCAP). >> > >> > -- >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >> > Groups >> > "Labour-l" group. >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >> > an >> > email to labour-l+unsubscribe(a)googlegroups.com. >> > To post to this group, send email to labour-l(a)googlegroups.com. >> > To view this discussion on the web visit >> > >> > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/labour-l/CACKppcyU0rWJ_iiEsETkQJxD%3Dx6oP…. >> > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> > >> > >> > >> > -- >> > Click for recent writings: >> > >> > >> > https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwAVbfM6AWJpUmloOEhtUlppSnM/view?usp=shari… >> > >> > _______________________________________________ >> > NetworkedLabour mailing list >> > NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org >> > http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour >> > >> > >> > _______________________________________________ >> > NetworkedLabour mailing list >> > NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org >> > http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour >> > >> >> >> >> -- >> Kevin Carson >> Senior Fellow, Karl Hess Scholar in Social Theory >> Center for a Stateless Society http://c4ss.org >> >> "You have no authority that we are bound to respect" -- John Perry Barlow >> "We are legion. We never forgive. We never forget. Expect us" -- Anonymous >> >> Homebrew Industrial Revolution: A Low-Overhead Manifesto >> http://homebrewindustrialrevolution.wordpress.com >> Desktop Regulatory State http://desktopregulatorystate.wordpress.com >> _______________________________________________ >> NetworkedLabour mailing list >> NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org >> http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour > > > > > -- > Click for recent writings: > > https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwAVbfM6AWJpUmloOEhtUlppSnM/view?usp=shari… -- Kevin Carson Senior Fellow, Karl Hess Scholar in Social Theory Center for a Stateless Society http://c4ss.org "You have no authority that we are bound to respect" -- John Perry Barlow "We are legion. We never forgive. We never forget. Expect us" -- Anonymous Homebrew Industrial Revolution: A Low-Overhead Manifesto http://homebrewindustrialrevolution.wordpress.com Desktop Regulatory State http://desktopregulatorystate.wordpress.com

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Re: [P2P-F] [NetworkedLabour] Fwd: Looking the Basic Income Gift Horse in the Mouth
by Anna Harris 06 Apr '16

06 Apr '16

Thank you for this Peter. It is clear that every tool can be turned to the service of capitalist austerity. Locally to me we have seen the rise of Junk Food Projects, with the admirable aim of sourcing waste food to feed hungry people. But it ends up being middle class do-gooders papering over the cracks in the system so supporting its existence rather than challenging it: the modern version of the 19th Century charity system. Meanwhile the waste food is still imported from low cost areas overseas, with appalling working conditions, creating pollution and consuming local scarce resources. Anna > On 4 Apr 2016, at 07:43, peter waterman <peterwaterman1936(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: Sid Shniad <shniad(a)gmail.com> > Date: Mon, Apr 4, 2016 at 4:31 AM > Subject: Looking the Basic Income Gift Horse in the Mouth > To: > > > http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/1241.php#continue > > The B u l l e t • Socialist Project • E-Bulletin No. 1241 • April 1, 2016 > > Looking the Basic Income Gift Horse in the Mouth > > John Clarke > > <image.png> > > Both the Trudeau Liberals in Ottawa and the Wynne Government at Queen's Park in Toronto have been making noises of late on the subject of Basic Income. The last Ontario Budget, in fact, declared an intention to carry out a pilot project in a community still to be announced. While no clear details are yet available, it is very likely that we will soon be dealing with a practical initiative that we will have to respond to. We will have to consider how we view the possibility of the Liberals moving in the direction of a Basic Income system. > > After decades of intensifying austerity and the erosion of systems of income support, with social assistance in Ontario now providing such wretchedly inadequate benefits that people are unable to feed themselves properly and retain their housing, the notion of a basic level of income that all are entitled to can't fail to generate a level of interest and raise some hopes. However, I am convinced that a good hard look in the mouth of this particular gift horse is well advised. What are the different notions of how a Basic Income system might work? Why are governments now considering it more seriously? What form would it be likely to take in the present economic and political context? > > Looking Deeper Into the Gift Horse > > As soon as you start to look into the question of Basic Income or, as it was often called in the past, Guaranteed Annual Income (GAI), you are immediately struck by the ease and enthusiasm with which free market thinkers and warriors of the neoliberal order have embraced the concept. From Milton Friedman to Charles Murray, the idea has found warm support on the political right. There are some clear and obvious reasons why this is so. Firstly, the very idea of a basic level of income is about establishing a floor and right wing proponents are confident they can locate it in the basement. A low and inadequate social minimum seems to them a great way of folding in existing, relatively adequate programs so as to, precisely, drive people into deeper poverty. > > Another attraction offered by a low universal payment to those who take the side of the capitalists is the potential role it could play in depressing wages. In a recent contribution to the Union Research blog on the issue of Basic Income, Toby Sanger, draws attention to the Speenhamland System, a wage supplement arrangement put in place under the English Poor Laws between 1795-1834, and the role it played in driving down wages. Low wage paying employers could rely on the tax base to pay their workers wages and employers who had been paying higher wages were under an incentive to lower them in order to obtain the same benefit. In the present context of vastly expanding low wage precarious work, this danger is one that should not be underestimated. > > The right wing Basic Income agenda, however, sets its sights on more than cutting benefit levels for people in poverty and depressing the wages of the lowest paid workers. Potentially, it is a means to gut social programs and to decimate the workforce that delivers them. The notion is to use the basic payment to advance the pace of privatization enormously. This kind of payment would replace public services and all who received it would become customers shopping for their social needs in the private market. Not just income support systems, but public housing, healthcare, education and transportation are threatened by the parsimonious universal payment envisaged by free market Basic Income. > > A Different Kind of Basic Income? > > Of course, the political right's version of a system of basic social payments is countered by those with more progressive concepts. There is a notion of Basic Income that stresses income adequacy, the need to advance full employment and the importance of preserving and strengthening a range of other elements of the social infrastructure. Without doubting the good intentions of advocates of a progressive Basic Income, it does need to be pointed out that the question of which version is to be adopted will not be decided by an impartial court of the common good but by present day governments. The people running the show on Parliament Hill and at Queen's Park have some history behind them when it comes to the implementation of measures of austerity and privatization. Their recent experience in bold new social policies that raise the living standards of working class people and increase their share of the social wealth is significantly less. > > The austerity agenda, which we can trace back to the 1970s but which has intensified following the international crisis of 2008, has placed a central strategic importance on weakening the adequacy of income support programs. In addition to the massive undermining of federal unemployment insurance, provincial social assistance has been enormously weakened. People on Ontario Works (OW) and the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP) have seen the spending power of their income reduced by up to 60 per cent since the infamous Tory cuts of the mid 90s. Not only have income levels been driven down but rules and policies have been adopted that have made programs harder to access and more uncertain for those receiving them. The increased poverty and the climate of desperation that this attack has generated have been of central importance in ensuring an astounding growth of low wage, precarious employment in Ontario. > > As the Liberals, political chameleons that they are, posture on the issue of Basic Income, we must avoid the trap of thinking that a rational and socially just approach is going to be won on the strength of good arguments. The idea that Basic Income is so sensible that everyone on both sides of the class divide will want to get behind it and make it work in the best interests of all is profoundly mistaken. If the concept is being advanced in Ontario by the very provincial government that has led the way in program reduction and austerity, it is not because they want to reverse the undermining of income support, the proliferation of precarious employment and the privatizing of public services but for the very opposite reason. They are looking with great interest at the possibility of using Basic Income as a stalking horse for their regressive social agenda and it will be the version that Bay Street has in mind that will win out over notions of progressive redistribution. As the announcement in the Ontario Budget acknowledges: > > “The pilot would also test whether a basic income would provide a more efficient way of delivering income support, strengthen the attachment to the labour force, and achieve savings in other areas, such as healthcare and housing supports” [page 132]. > > We are in a period when capitalism and the governments that represent its interests are increasing the rate of exploitation and reducing the level of social provision. That is not about to change and any redesign of income support systems we confront will be all about furthering, not limiting, levels of social inequality. This is a particularly bad time for the lamb to accept an invitation from the lion to lie down. Basic Income will be no panacea and the fight for income adequacy will continue, of necessity, to take the form of social mobilization against an agenda of austerity and regression. > > Social programs that have emerged in capitalist societies, especially those devoted to income support, have always been reluctant concessions. Their design, effectiveness and contradictions have reflected the prevailing economic and political situation and the balance of class forces in society. For decades, we have been fighting a largely defensive struggle to prevent the decimation of systems of social provision. We are not in a period when bold new redistributive programs are on the drawing board. The Liberals will be only too happy if we give up our fight to defend the systems that have been won in previous struggles and join them, as ‘stakeholders’ at the consultative round table. A decade of experience in maintaining an empty discussion of ‘poverty reduction’ has turned them into experts in such diversionary tactics. At the end of the process, however, if we allow them, they will put in place a version of Basic Income that will give Milton Friedman very little reason to turn over in his grave. > > John Clarke is an organizer with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP). > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Labour-l" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to labour-l+unsubscribe(a)googlegroups.com. > To post to this group, send email to labour-l(a)googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/labour-l/CACKppcyU0rWJ_iiEsETkQJxD%3Dx6oP…. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > > > -- > Click for recent writings: > > https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwAVbfM6AWJpUmloOEhtUlppSnM/view?usp=shari… > _______________________________________________ > NetworkedLabour mailing list > NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org > http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour

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Article 27: Algorithmic politics.
by furtherfield 05 Apr '16

05 Apr '16

Sorry for any cross posting... Article 27: Algorithmic politics. By Eugenio Tisselli. Eugenio Tisselli shares his thoughts on global, financial dictatorship and Necrocapitalism, where politics itself is reduced to market related executables based on algorithms of finance. “The global financial dictatorship presents us with a paradox: while the economic transactions capable of shifting the destinies of entire countries are the result of performative language, it is language itself that, in turn, is transformed and subjected by the flows of financial markets. Such a paradox may be understood as a negative feedback loop: a relational process in which one of the actors of the relationship is amplified and expanded (the economy) while the other is weakened and submitted (language). The effects of this paradoxical feedback loop on politics are evident and clear: the linguistic exchange which feeds the public sphere, and therefore the possibility of thinking about the democratic organization of society, diminishes and becomes neutralized because of its submission to the market, up to the point of canceling politics itself.” http://bit.ly/1N6qhmy

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Re: [P2P-F] [NetworkedLabour] [chinaconcern] FW: A New Quarterly on Chinese Labour, Civil Society, and Rights - ISSUE 1 - [email protected] - Gmail
by Anna Harris 05 Apr '16

05 Apr '16

I can't open it Peter. It just goes to Google mail. Just a comment about how the funding is used: I wanted to look at the magazine to see whether it gave a fair picture. Now that is obviously a judgement call on my part, particularly as a I know very little about what goes on in China, except what is printed in the western press which tends to be fairly hostile. But I think it is possible to tell whether it is being used to discredit Chinese government by focussing on the repressive measures, etc. Or really giving information about working conditions in China. If it is the former, which I suspect, then this funding is being used probably in the way it was intended, ie. it is being provided by some large corporations to discredit Chinese govt. rather than being a way to connect and collaborate with workers in China. Xx > On 5 Apr 2016, at 11:40, Peter Waterman <peterwaterman1936(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/153e5458bca6a1df > _______________________________________________ > NetworkedLabour mailing list > NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org > http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour

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Fwd: [NetworkedLabour] Fwd: [Debate-List] China unleashes ‘white terror’ against protesting workers
by Michel Bauwens 04 Apr '16

04 Apr '16

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Orsan Senalp <orsan1234(a)gmail.com> Date: Mon, Apr 4, 2016 at 8:35 PM Subject: [NetworkedLabour] Fwd: [Debate-List] China unleashes ‘white terror’ against protesting workers To: Nw Labour discuss <networkedlabour(a)lists.contrast.org> Begin forwarded message: *From:* John Devenish <Devenishj(a)ukzn.ac.za> *Date:* 4 Apr 2016 14:13:01 GMT+2 *To:* "debate-list(a)fahamu.org" <debate-list(a)fahamu.org> *Subject:* *[Debate-List] China unleashes ‘white terror’ against protesting workers* *China unleashes ‘white terror’ against protesting workers* <image001.gif> <image002.png> <image003.png> *Wave of repression – over 30 mineworkers arrested after Shuangyashan strike *China Worker 3 April 2016 The so-called ‘Shuangyashan incident’ – a six-day strike by around 10,000 coal miners in March – has shaken the dictatorship of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party). It has also, predictably, brought forth a wave of repression. In the city of Shuangyashan itself, with a population of just over 1 million, over 30 workers have been arrested on suspicion of organising the strike and street protests. The city’s Public Security Bureau has reportedly circulated a ‘wanted list’ with photographs of 75 people they want to detain. *“We are not rioters”* The crackdown in this city close to China’s border with Russia is a reminder of the high stakes for workers in China if they engage in strikes or industrial action. This is the case even though – as in most other strikes in China – workers are only demanding to be paid for their labour. “We are not rioters, we simply want to get back what we have worked so hard for,” one Heilongjiang mineworker told Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post. In the case of the Shuangyashan miners, employed by the giant Longmay Group which is owned by the government of Heilongjiang province, some workers are still owed wages from 2014. In a political system where unions are illegal and protest of any kind is punishable by severe repression, workers have many risks to weigh up before taking strike action. Nevertheless, the number of strikes has increased dramatically. Strikes last year more than doubled from the previous year, to almost 2,800. Four-fifths of all strikes were concerned with recovering unpaid wages. The CCP regime has stepped up its repression against workers. It fears the growth of workers’ self-organisation and an independent labour movement more than any other challenge to its rule. Last year it initiated a province-wide crackdown on labour rights activists and NGOs in Guangdong province. In Sichuan province recently the authorities went a step further, publicly parading and shaming eight construction workers in retribution for a strike they organised last year. News of this punishment created outrage from right-minded people on social media. http://ccs.ukzn.ac.za/default.asp?2,27,3,3692 -- To view previous posts, create a Google account with your current email and log in using gmail to access the archives. https://accounts.google.com/newaccount?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups " debate-list(a)fahamu.org" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to debate-list+unsubscribe(a)fahamu.org. To post to this group, send email to debate-list(a)fahamu.org. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/a/fahamu.org/group/debate-list/. _______________________________________________ NetworkedLabour mailing list NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Fwd: Launching Off Grid Festival 2016
by Michel Bauwens 04 Apr '16

04 Apr '16

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Off Grid Festival <info.offgridevents(a)gmail.com> Date: Mon, Apr 4, 2016 at 11:11 PM Subject: Launching Off Grid Festival 2016 To: info(a)offgrid-festival.co.uk *Dear Member of the New Economy,* I hope this email finds you well and that you won’t object to me emailing like this. I’m writing to let you know about the relaunch of the *Off Grid Festival* <http://www.offgrid-festival.co.uk> in 2016. Off Grid ran between 2009 and 2014 as an annual gathering in Somerset with the intention of showcasing solutions, exploring radical alternatives to the mainstream and personally empowering attendees through a range of workshops, skill-shares and more. The event is a unique crossover between festival and conference, a chance to have fun in a field with likeminded people sharing ideas, skills and wisdom. A chance to celebrate life whilst building for a better future. Over the years the event has trialled many exciting innovations, including running its own *complementary currency*, the SOL (Symbol of Life) based on local economies already existent in the UK. A centrepiece of the event is the *Off Grid College*, a 12 module course in low-impact and sustainable living, focused on practical applications of knowledge ranging from Permaculture techniques to DIY 12v technology; Eco Build skills to wild food and medicine foraging; natural waste and water systems to making your own biogas system. Alongside this there is an annual conference covering topics as diverse as the New Economy; smallscale farming and food production; low impact law; One Planet development; Cooperatives and Organisational Structures and much more. All this and more in festival surroundings with childrens area; main stage; organic food and drink; permaculture gardens; forest school; bushcraft space; traditional crafts and alternative technology area and much more besides. *Off Grid* plans to return in 2016 as part of a new venture, The Biophilia Project, on a 96-acre farm on the very edge of *Exeter*. It’s an amazing location where the owner has a clear vision to showcase Another World is Possible through demonstration of innovative land management techniques, hosting community activity and by providing a haven in touching distance of urban areas for those seeking solutions. Contributors to the event include *Shift Bristol**,* *Transition Exeter *and* Exeter Community Energy*, whilst the *Exeter Pound* itself will act as the special site currency for the weekend. We’re currently running a Crowdfund campaign to get the event back off the ground, encouraging people to sign up as Members/Buy Tickets and participate in this year’s Gathering. The crowdfund campaign runs until 19th April seeking to raise £6000 towards costs of the event. It can be found here: http://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/off-grid-festival-2016 along with a video about the event. *If you would be interested in attending the event in some capacity, please let us know. We’d love to hear from you and your organisation. Any help in promoting to your friends, family and networks is very much appreciated.* Yours sincerely, Dan Hurring Event Coordinator Off Grid Festival www. offgrid-festival.co.uk info(a)offgrid-festival.co.uk -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Re: [P2P-F] [NetworkedLabour] Fwd: Methodology for a New Politics
by Orsan Senalp 03 Apr '16

03 Apr '16

And this is an open letter critic to Varfurakis and Diem25's method of new politics: "In the following open letter, George Souvlis and Samuele Mazzolini respond to the recent DiEM launch in Rome. Dear Yanis, We decided to write you this letter after following closely the launch of DiEM 25 in Rome on 23 March. The missive aims to discuss a series of issues regarding your initiative that we found unconvincing by offering a well-intentioned criticism of it. We clarify at this point that our aim is neither to dismiss a priori the project nor to appear like smarty pants that know better than anyone else how things should be done, something not totally foreign within the universe of the Left. Rather, with this letter we wish to raise some questions publicly that we suspect many may have already thought about and discussed informally and that could be used as sparks for the amelioration of the initiative. http://www.criticatac.ro/lefteast/an-open-letter-to-yanis-varoufakis/" > On 03 Apr 2016, at 12:11, peter waterman <peterwaterman1936(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Peter sez: > > Challenging argument: terrible projection design. Can anyone re-do this to make it more accessible to human-beings? > > P > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: LeftStreamed <info(a)socialistproject.ca> > Date: Sun, Apr 3, 2016 at 4:59 AM > Subject: Methodology for a New Politics > To: pwaterma(a)gmail.com > > > LeftStreamed — Recorded in Toronto, 24 March 2016 > > Methodology for a New Politics: > Changing the 'Operating System' of the Left after the Greek experience of 2015 > > The Greek case leaves no doubt about Europe's present situation: democracy has been successfully limited and a new kind of despotism is fast emerging. In this lecture Karitzis outlines key aspects of the current sociopolitical environment and presents a diagnosis regarding the time lag of the Left. The main focus is with the modifications needed to the political practice of the Left based on the “SYRIZA experience”. This entails an upgrade its operational capacities to meet the requirements of present day antagonisms. Building popular power, restructuring political representation and reviving the notion of “transformation of the state” are all major themes addressed. Lessons from the Greek case may be broadly valuable, facilitating the Left in other countries to initiate a process of systematic preparation and adaptation. > > Moderated by Bryan Evans. Presentation by: > > Andreas Karitzis has a MSc in Mechanical Engineering and a PhD in Philosophy. He is the author of Logic and Method of a Left Government (in Greek) and a founding member of the “Hub” for social economy, empowerment and innovation. He was a member of the Political Secretariat of SYRIZA and of its Programme Committee until April of 2014. He was also a member of the SYRIZA's Central Committee until August of 2015. > The Phyllis Clarke Memorial Lecture is held annually to honour the memory of Phyllis Clarke, a member of the Ryerson University faculty from 1977 until her death in 1988. > > Click here to view presentation > > Share on Facebook > > LeftStreamed YouTube channel > > > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( LeftStreamed Production ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > Produced by the LeftStreamed Collective. Viewers are encouraged to > distribute widely. Comments on the video and suggestions are > welcome - write to info(a)socialistproject.ca > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > > > > If you do not want to receive any more newsletters: Unsubscribe > > If you wish to subscribe: this link > > Forward to a friend: this link > > To update your preferences: this link > powered by phpList > > > > -- > Click for recent writings: > > https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwAVbfM6AWJpUmloOEhtUlppSnM/view?usp=shari… > _______________________________________________ > NetworkedLabour mailing list > NetworkedLabour(a)lists.contrast.org > http://lists.contrast.org/mailman/listinfo/networkedlabour

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Fwd: invitation to sign multi author programmatic initiative
by Michel Bauwens 03 Apr '16

03 Apr '16

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Michael Albert <sysop(a)zmag.org> Date: Sat, Apr 2, 2016 at 8:52 PM Subject: invitation to sign multi author programmatic initiative To: Vijay Prashad <possiblehistory(a)gmail.com>, Leslie Cagan < lesliecagan(a)igc.org>, Laura Flanders <flanders.laura(a)gmail.com>, Michel Bauwens <michel(a)p2pfoundation.net>, Pauolo Hi, Don't you want to sign on to the collective programmatic document we have offered before it goes public? We have not heard your response... perhaps you never received your invitation? Or maybe we missed your reply? If so, there was an error and our apologies for that. At any rate, the document, included below, is hopefully self explanatory. It seeks to inspire and assist a wide effort to arrive at shared left program. It offers various ideas for possible program, culled from practice and diverse sources, but it mainly seeks participation in a far reaching discussion, debate, and exploration, that will hopefully refine, augment, and interweave lasting multi issue, multi constituency, program for the future. Please let us know by return email if you would like to add your name to the effort. If so, please also indicate any affiliation you would like listed. The current signers of the document are: Michael Albert, Z Communications / U.S. Greg Albo, Centre for Social Justice / Canada Gar Alperovitz, The Next System / U.S. Bridget Anderson, COMPAS / UK Kehinde Andrews, Organization of Black Unity / UK Gordon Asher, Scholar Activist / Scotland Walden Bello, Focus on the Global South / Philippines Peter Bohmer, Economics for Everyone / U.S. Noam Chomsky, Internationalist / U.S. Savvina Chowdhury, Rachel Corrie Foundation / U.S. Marjorie Cohn, Scholar Activist / U.S. Ben Dangl, Journalist/Editor / U.S. Heather Day, CAGJ, / U.S. Cindy Domingo, Electoral Activist / U.S. Steve Early, Labor organizer / U.S. Joe Emersberger, UNIFOR / Canada Barbara Epstein, Scholar Activist / U.S. Mark Evans, What About Classism / UK Vincent Emanuele, IVAW / U.S. Bill Fletcher, Talk Show Host / U.S. Bill Gallegos, Environmental Justice Trainer / U.S. Irene Gendzier, Scholar Activist / U.S. Andrej Grubacic, Global Commons / U.S./Balkans Thomas Herndon, Univ. of Mass. / U.S. Kathy Kelly, Voices for Creative Nonviolence / U.S. Matt Lester, Economics for Everyone, / U.S. Joris Leverink, ROAR / Netherlands/Turkey Rodolfo Leyva, Middlesex University / UK Auset Marian Lewis, Journalist / U.S. Mandisi Majavu, Activist/Negritude / South Africa David Marty, Scholar Activist / Spain Robert W. McChesney, Univ Illinois / U.S. Suren Moodliar, Global Action / U.S. Larry Mosqueda, Movement for Justice & Peace / U.S. John Narayan, University of Warwick / UK Immanuel Ness, CUNY / U.S. Eugene Nulman, Critical Social Research / UK Paul Ortiz, University of Florida / U.S. Garry Owens, Kindle the Flame / U.S. Leo Panitch, Socialist Register / Canada Cynthia Peters, World Education / U.S. Justin Podur, Activist/Scholar / Canada Nikos Raptis, Scholar Activist, Greece Jack Rasmus, St Marys College / U.S. Jerome Roos, ROAR Magazine / The Netherlands Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Internationalist / Portugal Lydia Sargent, Z Communications / U.S. Stephen Shalom, New Politics / U.S. Marina Sitrin, Lawyer/Author / U.S. Norman Solomon, RootsAction / U.S. Sarah Stockholm. Showing Up for Racial Justice / U.S. Paul Street, Journalist/Author / U.S. Verena Stresing, Scholar Activist, France/Germany David Swanson, WarIsACrime / U.S. Fernando Vegas, Retired Supreme Court Judge / Venezuela Tom Vouloumanos, NDP / Canada Greg Wilpert, Real News / Ecuador/U.S. Florian Zollmann, Scholar Activist / UK/Germany And here is the document… *Some Possible Ideas for Going Forward* Around the world powerful and diverse possibilities are in struggle. We the signers of "Some Possible Ideas for Going Forward" think one high priority for progress is activists developing, discussing, and settling on priorities around which to organize multi issue activism in coming months and years. We hope this document can help inspire more conversations within groups and movements that, over time, come to some synthesis. We do this in the spirit of self organization - and as a rejection of preformed inflexible programs and agendas imposed on activists from above. We believe only program that comes from below and is fully understood and owned by grassroots participants can win lasting change. To try to help, we have assembled some familiar programmatic ideas rooted in diverse movements and projects. We signers do not each individually necessarily support every single programmatic suggestion given here. Indeed, perhaps none of us supports every single suggestion much less all the specific wording. Instead, we all support having a widespread discussion of these worthy ideas and of other ideas that emerge from the process, to arrive at widely supported program for left activists. *Some Possible Economic Programmatic Ideas* A left agenda might, for example, pursue four central economic goals - better quality of daily economic experience, more fairness, better production priorities, and increased mutual compassion. For example, new economic program might seek: (1) a law forbidding capital export and relocation without community and worker agreement, and (2) a law delineating punishments for employers who impede nationally mandated economic reforms. Likewise, it could seek controls on work day and work week length - for example seeking 30 hours of work for 40 hours pay. It might demand that the maximum penalty for owners violating the spirit and intent of such laws would be nationalization of their businesses under the management of currently employed workers. Similarly, new economic program might propose: (1) reducing inequality, (2) reorienting productive potentials to meet social needs, and (3) enlarging economic democracy. For example, new economic program might propose sharply progressive property, asset, and income taxes, with no loopholes, as well as a dramatically-increased minimum wage, say $20 an hour, and perhaps a guaranteed income for all, coupled with a new profit tax that would be proportional to inequities in each firm’s pay scale. The more oppressive the pay scale, the higher the profit tax. Due to a new minimum wage law, minimum pay would rise dramatically. Due to a new pay equity tax, industries with a more equitable pay scale would have more after-tax resources. Not only could more equitably structured firms use these extra funds to further improve work conditions and increase their social contribution, they could generally out-compete less socially responsible firms. New property and asset taxes would dramatically diminish differences in wealth. New economic program might usefully label all these innovations redistributive and repeatedly explain why redistribution from the rich to the poor is both morally justified and socially essential. Perhaps this part of a new program could be called “reclamation of stolen riches.” New economic program could seek a comprehensive full employment policy arising from campaigns to rebuild infrastructure and, in particular, to attain sustainable energy policies, as well as via the shift to a shorter work week. It could include comprehensive adult education and job training, and a comprehensive social support system for those unable to work, whatever the reason. Moreover, beyond material equity, new economic program could also advocate that workers should all have work conditions and responsibilities suitable to their personal development and to their responsibility to contribute to society’s well being. Why should some people endure boring, dangerous, subordinate, and rote conditions, a new movement might ask, while other people enjoy challenging, fulfilling, empowering, and varied conditions? New program could reveal that fairness is not only attaining equity of wealth and pay, but also equity of conditions of work and life. Using this principle as a long term touchstone, new program could seek to build and support workers’ councils empowered to conceive, demand, and work to implement job redefinition as well as to win increasing say over the pace, goal, and organization of work for the workers who do it. Such a program could emphasize that work can and should be a demanding but rewarding part of people’s lives, rather than an alienating, debilitating, energy and dignity sapping affront to people’s life potentials. Regarding investment priorities, new economic program could propose tax incentives for socially useful production and tax disincentives and indeed, legal prosecution, for wasteful and socially harmful production. This would help foster production to meet real needs and potentials. Indeed, such a new program could indicate precisely how to successfully regulate, punish, and even nationalize under workers control any business or industry deemed by an independent citizens bureau and public plebiscite to be destructive of the public good. While this might initially point at Walmart scale businesses, in time, of course, it would get at capitalist institutions per se. Of course, major change in economic priorities that a new program could emphasize could include a massive cut in military spending. Further, new program could propose that existing military bases be converted to centers for ecological clean-up, to new schools for local communities, to workplaces for developing low income housing, or to new centers of clean transportation or energy production. Funding for the new centers of social creativity could persist simply being the old military funding now put to desirable ends and similarly resident GIs or others seeking new employment could be retrained on site, to work in the converted bases. Regarding economic democracy and participation, new program could work for the formation of consumer and worker organizations to watchdog product quality, guard against excessive pricing, advise about product redefinition, and participate in plant, industry, and community collective consumption decisions with open books and full investigative rights. Beyond these first steps, new program could clarify that the ultimate goal is the full democratization of economic decision making and the initiation of a national public project to develop new institutions for work, consumption, and allocation. In short, new economic program could: (1) ratify the public’s suspicion that the basic problem with our economy is that capitalist institutions make capitalists prefer war production, persistent unemployment, and homelessness to a working class able to demand a bigger piece of the pie and control over what kind of pie is baked; and, (2) propose uncompromising changes that redress existing grievances, create conditions more just and humane, and establish a new balance of power conducive to winning more fundamental changes, including new defining institutions in the future. *Some Possible Education Programmatic Ideas* A new education program could note that existing schools create subservient and exploitable future workers by providing most students minimal literacy, virtually no dignity or sense of self worth, plus maximum training in enduring boredom and obeying orders. New education program could explain that schools accomplish all this destruction and distortion by incorporating differences in teacher-student ratios, in resources per student, and in teacher expectations and training—all on top of different conditions of home life, community relations, access to information and comfortable learning conditions, that simply multiply the injustice. To foster educational change new program could highlight the need to overcome corporate agendas and existing institutional pressures with our own alternatives. It could reveal that to have good education for all we must have a society promising full employment at jobs that require and utilize people’s full capabilities, including facility at decision-making, ample knowledge about society, and expectations of success and participation. New education program could also pressure for specific pedagogic changes in how schools and classes are conducted both during school hours, and also for surrounding communities in off hours. To enumerate these changes, new program could advocate a national debate about curriculum reform, improved teaching methods and enriched teacher-student relations, improved resources for schools, and increased community involvement and benefit. New education program could also seek specific goals for education. For example, to reduce class size to a maximum of 20 students per teacher in all schools and to equalize resources per student across all schools, including architecture, computers, books, and food, and, of course, to guarantee free education (through college) for anyone who wants it. New education program could seek specific funds to staff all schools at night for community meetings and remedial and adult education. Space to meet, to engage with others, is a huge factor in successful community organizing, and perhaps public schools, at night, could become that space. And finally, new program could seek that funding for education comes from corporate profit taxes and from private progressive taxes collected at the national level to guarantee that regions attain educational parity. *Some Possible Race Programmatic Ideas* New program addressing the pivotal problem of race in the U.S. and societies around the world could seek to ensure that people can freely have multiple cultural and social backgrounds and commitments, including providing the space and resources necessary for people to positively express their views, celebrations, languages, and values. New program addressing race could explicitly recognize that rights and values exist regardless of race, religion, or cultural allegiances, so that while society protects all people’s right to affiliate freely, its core values are universal for every community. New program addressing race could guarantee free entry and exit to and from all cultural communities in society including affirming that communities that do have free entry and exit can be under the complete self determination of their members, so long as their policies and actions don't conflict with society's broader norms of equity and justice. This could include amnesty for immigrants and open borders for all refugees. But, mainly, new program addressing race could prioritize directly redressing violations of race equity and justice. For example, new program could emphasize confronting the institutions of racist and national oppression, seek community control of police, end mass incarceration, and could seek to reverse the legacies of these same phenomena by way of reparations for Black and Native American communities. New program might categorically reject the notion that "...a rising tide raises all boats..." and the notion that broad and progressive economic reforms such as those supported elsewhere in this call ipso facto resolve racist and national oppression. New Program addressing race could therefore go beyond universal aims to highlight specific measures needed to repair the damage of hundreds of years of oppression to racial and cultural communities. This would necessitate examining all areas of life including the economy, education, healthcare, politics and law enforcement, in each case seeking to determine innovations required beyond those that are universal for all, precisely to avoid bias that leaves racial communities with less than universally acclaimed and sought benefits. *Some Possible Gender/Kinship Programmatic Ideas* New program addressing the pivotal problems of gender and kinship could emphasize the need to not privilege certain types of family formation and sexuality over others but instead to actively support all types of families and lifestyles consistent with society’s other broad equitable norms and practices. It could promote children’s well-being and affirm society’s responsibility for all its children, including affirming the right of diverse types of families to have children and to provide them with love and a sense of rootedness and belonging. It could minimize or eliminate age-based permissions, preferring non-arbitrary means for determining when an individual is old or young enough to participate in economic, political or other activities, or to receive benefits/privileges. It could respect marriage and other lasting relations among adults as religious, cultural, or social practices, but reject marriage as a way to gain financial benefits or social status. It could respect care giving as a valuable function including making care giving a part of every citizen’s social responsibilities, or pursue other worthy means to ensure equitable burdens and benefits. It could affirm diverse expressions of sexual pleasure, personal identity, and mutual intimacy while ensuring that each person honors the autonomy, humanity, and rights of others. It could seek to provide diverse, empowering sex education, including legal prohibitions against all non-consensual sex. And mainly, given the world we now live in, new program addressing gender and kinship could fight to reverse decades of discrimination’s residual effects and persistent elements, including protecting the rights of women to control their own bodies on the one hand, and to enjoy equal benefits and responsibilities throughout all parts of society, thus seeking abortion rights, day care opportunities, and equal payment requirements. *Some Possible International Relations Programmatic Ideas * Today's policy makers view foreign policy as a way to maintain a flow of riches and wealth out of other countries into one’s own, while ensuring fealty and obedience, and curtailing efforts at establishing new relations of true national independence much less social renovation anywhere in the world to avoid their having a showcase effect. In contrast, a proper foreign policy for any country would respect the integrity of other nations and simultaneously seek a human-serving society at home. New foreign policy program could emphasize: • Cessation of all arms shipments abroad. • Cessation of any aid abroad intended for the hands of police or other potentially repressive agencies, such as occupying armies. • Elimination of all U.S. or other nations's overseas military bases with half the funds saved from such closings returned to the Home country for solving domestic problems and half applied to aid to poor countries in the form of no-strings attached infrastructure improvements, job and skills training, equipment grants, food aid, and privileged buyer status for many goods on the international market. • An end to the use of military force as an instrument of national policy. • Use of aid and trade, and foreign policy in general, to demonstrate and provide solidarity with struggles for social justice, democracy, and self determination everywhere in the world to benefit all parties, but mostly those who are weaker and poorer. *Some Possible Health Programmatic Ideas* A new health program could emphasize that civilized health care and conditions for our society must involve three main components: prevention, universal care for the ill, and cost cutting. At a minimum a new health program might seek: • Improved preventive medicine, including increased public education about health-care risks and prevention, a massive campaign around diet, laws against and penalties for corporate activity that subverts health in employees, consumers or neighbors, and provision for community centers for exercise and public health education. • Universal health care for the ill, including a single-payer system with the government providing comprehensive and equally fine coverage for all citizens. • Reassessment of training programs for doctors and nurses to expand the number of qualified health workers and to better utilize the talents of those already trained rather than simply aggrandize those at the top of the pyramid of all involved. • And, as well, civilian review over drug company policies including price controls and severe penalties for profit seeking at the expense of public health up to and including nationalization under civilian control and workers self management, plus similar attention to the medical impact of all institutions in society—for example, the health effects of work conditions and product definitions and components. Such a campaign could point out that the single-payer system would save tens of billions on billing, collection, and bureaucracy, but, perhaps even more important, would improve the quality of care for all and move us toward a caring and mutual aid conception of life, rather than me firsts. It could also advocate saving billions more, to be allotted to preventive medicine and treatment, by establishing limits on the incomes of health professionals and the profits pharmaceutical and other medical companies could earn. If additional funding was required, it could come from punitive taxes on unhealthful products such as cigarettes, alcohol, and unsafe automobiles, etc. The overall guideline for health program would be that illness should be reduced as much as possible, the quality of health care should be raised as much as possible, and the costs of these improvements should be paid by those who have gotten rich at others’ expense. *Some Possible Ecology Programmatic Ideas * A new ecological program could establish a department of ecological balance to develop a list of necessary clean-up steps, energy innovations, and steps to reduce global warming and mitigate its impact, and, in general, policy to preserve the ecology. Beyond this, new ecology program could argue that clean-up funds should come from a reparations tax on current polluters and prior beneficiaries of unclean industrial operations. The critical innovation in a new program’s approach to ecological sanity, however, could be to open a national public debate about the relation between our basic economic and social institutions and the environment. For example, new program could begin the process of clarifying that we need institutions attuned to ecological costs and benefits and that we must experiment with non-market approaches to allocation, rather than trying to police the inevitable ecological ill-effects that markets routinely produce. And, of course, new ecology program that was sane, much less highly worthy, would have to formulate a truly massive campaign to turn the tide against global warming, water depletion, and other life threatening trends. *Conclusion* Obviously the above list of programmatic possibilities, culled from projects and endeavors around the world, could be enlarged to include, for example, immigration program, drug program, infrastructure program, diversity program, arts and culture program, science program, and so on. In addition, the programs should be refined, improved, and altered as grassroots experiences require. Recent progressive electoral efforts and mass campaigns around the world have revealed a huge reservoir of desire and of creative willingness on the parts of large sectors of populations, and very especially young people, to seek change. Many of those newly participating in progressive activity are already within reach of supporting these and additional programmatic ideas as they would be refined and augmented by a wide intervention of grassroots voices. Ultimately attaining worthy new program will entail thinking outside the box, as many emerging struggles around the world have urged, noting that the box is capitalism, patriarchy, racism, and authoritarianism. The box is the imposed mental straitjacket of thoughts and practices typical of all too many countries' political life. As current prominent examples, why couldn’t the energy generated during Bernie Sanders’ campaign for president in the U.S., Jeremy Corbyn's victory as opposition party leader in the UK, or Podemos' electoral attempts in Spain come over to sustained, militant commitment to the suitably refined and improved kinds of programmatic ideas we propose in this document? Campaigns need money, often a serious stumbling block, but Sanders, for example in the U.S. case, has reached 5 million donors giving an average of over $25 each. Why couldn’t a program like that offered above, but adapted and improved, attract all those 5 million people and many more, and do comparably well elsewhere in the world, attracting aroused constituencies to contribute creatively to plans for on-going mass activism? Similarly, in the U.S., as the current prominent case, Sanders has suffered immeasurably at the hands of what he calls rigged elections, as have others here and elsewhere, but another general problem, beyond the structure of elections, is the corporately organized, profit seeking, and horribly motivated media that operates in country after country. Why couldn’t a prominent campaign built around new program include taking back communications in countries around the world, which is certainly a desirable aim in its own right, and also a bedrock step on the path to larger programmatic successes? Despite current progressive electoral energy and, in some places, major movement gains, there is a long way to go to win lasting fundamental change. Partly this is because vile institutions at the core of our society manipulatively and coercively twist our motives and awareness. Partly it is because a right wing surge is also occurring. And partly it is because the public has still not thrown off cynicism and a trembling fear of enduring even worse outcomes if we try to seek better. However, it is not impossible for people to take that crucial step. And the massive support many popular projects have lately revealed could become a foundation upon which to go further in the coming period. We offer the many programmatic thoughts in this document hoping to encourage a movement-wide discussion of where we go and what we stand for as we all attempt to counter the forces of darkness and irrationality with light, hope, and vision. -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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Re: [P2P-F] Wikileaks
by Michel Bauwens 02 Apr '16

02 Apr '16

today s wikileaks revelations on Greece. Here is an article by Paul Mason: https://medium.com/mosquito-ridge/imf-plots-new-credit-event-for-greece-534… -- Check out the Commons Transition Plan here at: http://commonstransition.org P2P Foundation: http://p2pfoundation.net - http://blog.p2pfoundation.net <http://lists.ourproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/p2p-foundation>Updates: http://twitter.com/mbauwens; http://www.facebook.com/mbauwens #82 on the (En)Rich list: http://enrichlist.org/the-complete-list/

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