<div dir="ltr"><br><div class="gmail_quote">---------- Forwarded message ----------<br>From: <b class="gmail_sendername">peter waterman</b> <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:peterwaterman1936@gmail.com">peterwaterman1936@gmail.com</a>></span><br>Date: Fri, Oct 3, 2014 at 10:02 PM<br>Subject: [Networkedlabour] Hong Kong: Cartalucci, Global Research, Treats Activists only as pawns<br>To: <a href="mailto:networkedlabour@lists.contrast.org">networkedlabour@lists.contrast.org</a><br><br><br><div dir="ltr"><div style="font-size:small"><br><div>
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<strong><font face="Helvetica">This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only.</font></strong>
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</p><div>Weekend Edition October 3-5, 2014</div>
<div>Hong Kong Should Decide Its Own Fate</div>
<div>On Occupy Central and the NED</div>
<div>by MING CHUN TANG </div>
<div><p>Numerous alternative media outlets, including <a href="https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/517593582153519104" target="_blank">WikiLeaks</a>, have pointed out the <a title=" US State Dept Funding and Occupy Central, the Ties that Bind " href="http://revolution-news.com/occupy-central-us-state-dept-funding-of-hong-kong-pro-democracy-movement/" target="_blank">connections between Occupy Central and the United States government</a> through
an organization called the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). I am
not surprised at this, nor do I welcome it, given the United States’
questionable record (to put it nicely) at bringing “democracy” to
countries where it has intervened in the past. It is most likely in Hong
Kongers’ best interests that the US withdraw its monetary support for
Occupy Central, as unlikely as this is to happen.</p>
<p>The same outlets, however, have been openly hostile towards Occupy Central for these reasons alone. <a title="US Openly Approves Hong Kong Chaos it Created" href="http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-openly-approves-hong-kong-chaos-it-created/5405387" target="_blank">Tony Cartalucci recently claimed</a> that
the protests “masquerade as a “pro-democracy” movement seeking
“universal suffrage” and “full democracy,” but are really backed by “a
deep and insidious network of foreign financial, political, and media
support”. This assessment doesn’t do Hong Kong justice for two reasons:
firstly, it portrays Hong Kongers’ grievances at the status quo as
fictional and illegitimate, when they are in fact real, and it treats
the protesters as pawns, when many in fact are taking to the streets of
their own accord. Secondly, by treating the US as the sole independent
actor in the movement and focusing entirely on analyzing and criticizing
its actions in other countries, it only strengthens a United
States-centred worldview that the mainstream media likewise seeks to
disseminate.</p>
<p>None of the support provided by the NED for Occupy Central changes
the reality of the economic situation facing middle- and working-class
Hong Kongers today, brought about by the most extreme form of capitalism
that the world has ever seen – to the extent that the
extreme-right-wing Heritage Foundation dubs it “<a title="2014 Index of Economic Freedom" href="http://www.heritage.org/index/ranking" target="_blank">the world’s freest economy</a>”
year after year. It is poor journalism to even attempt to analyze the
roots of discontent in Hong Kong while paying no attention to the
structural factors involved, and yet the alternative media, like the
mainstream media, have been guilty of doing so. Foreign writers who
claim the movement is orchestrated purely by Americans are naive to
believe Hong Kongers can simply be co-opted by an external force to
demonstrate. This type of thinking is unfortunately symptomatic of a
neocolonial conviction that somehow only “Westerners” are capable of
thinking for themselves and acting of their own accord. Hong Kongers,
like the Ukrainians, Syrians, Iraqis, Libyans and Venezuelans, are
merely being manipulated by the “West”. Of course they are. After all,
only those protesting against regimes in the “West” or backed by the
“West” are legitimate – the rest are mere agents for “regime change”!</p>
<p>I will admit that I am not at all optimistic about the prospects of
Occupy Central bringing genuine social change to Hong Kong. These
prospects are only diminished by the involvement of the United States,
with its own neoliberal and far-less-than-democratic agenda. They are
further diminished by the absence of any radical groups calling
explicitly for a more equitable distribution of income and wealth and
end to the state’s collusion with established local and Chinese elites.
But what is evident is that the status quo leaves no room for Hong
Kongers to decide on how their territory is run, and that attaining the
vote provides the opportunity, though far from a guarantee, for genuine
socioeconomic reform, by deposing the established political and economic
elite from their position of power. Who we will replace them with must
be ours to choose, and that is precisely why the United States, as with
China, must step back and allow Hong Kongers to decide their own fate.</p>
<p><em><strong>Ming Chun Tang</strong> is a Hong Kong-born writer and a
student at Hamilton College (New York), currently at the London School
of Economics. He blogs at <a href="http://clearingtherubble.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Clearing the Rubble</a>.</em></p><span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888">
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</font></span></div><span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><br clear="all"></font></span></div><span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><br>-- <br><div dir="ltr"><ol><li><b><font><span></span><font size="1"><span><span>EBook, November 2012:</span> <a href="http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/recovering_internationalism/" target="_blank">Recovering
Internationalism</a>. </span><span><font color="#ff0000">[A compilation of papers from the new millenium. Now free in two download formats]</font></span><span><span><a href="http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/world_social_forum/" target="_blank"></span></span><span style="background-color:rgb(255,0,0)"><span></a></span></span><span><span><a href="http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/world_social_forum/" target="_blank"></span></span><span style="background-color:rgb(255,0,0)"><span></a></span></span></font></font></b></li><li><b><font size="1"><span><span>EBook (co-editor), February 2013: World Social Forum: Critical Explorations <a href="http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/world_social_forum/" target="_blank"></font>http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/world_social_forum/<font color="#ff0000"> </a></span></span><span><span><br></span></span></font></b></li><li><b><font size="1"><span>Interface
Journal<span> Special (co-editor), November 2012:</span> </span><span style="font-weight:normal"><a href="http://www.interfacejournal.net/current/" target="_blank">For the Global Emancipation of Labour</a></span></font></b>
</li><li><b><font size="1"><span lang="NL">Blog:</span><span lang="NL"> <a href="http://www.unionbook.org/profile/peterwaterman." target="_blank">http://www.unionbook.org/profile/peterwaterman.</a>
</span></font></b></li><li><b><font size="1">Interface Journal Special (Co-Editor) Social Movement Internationalisms. <a href="http://www.interfacejournal.net/" target="_blank">See Call for Papers</a>, <font color="#ff0000">(Deadline: May 1, 2014). </font></font></b></li><li><b><font size="1"><font color="#ff0000"><a href="http://interfacejournal.nuim.ie/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Interface-1-2-pp255-262-Waterman.pdf" target="_blank"></font></font></span></font><font color="#000000">Needed: a Global Labour Charter Movement<span style="color:rgb(255,0,0)"><font color="#000000"> <font color="#ff0000">(2005-Now!)<br></a></font></font></b></li><li><b><font size="1"><font color="#ff0000"><font color="#000000"><a href="http://www.into-ebooks.com/book/under-against-beyond/" target="_blank"><font color="red"><b>MailScanner has detected a possible fraud attempt from "www.into-ebooks.com" claiming to be</b></font> Under, Against, Beyond: Labour and Social Movements Confront a Globalised, Informatised Capitalism </a>(2011) <font color="#ff0000">Almost 1,000 pages of Working Papers, free, from the <a href="tel:1980" value="+661980" target="_blank">1980</a>'s-90's</font>.</font></font></font></b></li><li><b><font size="1"><font color="#ff0000"><font color="#000000">Google Scholar Citation Index:</font></font></font></b><br><span style="display:block"> <b><font size="1"><a href="http://scholar.google.com.pe/citations?user=e0e6Qa4AAAAJ" target="_blank">http://scholar.google.com.pe/citations?user=e0e6Qa4AAAAJ</a> </font></b><br></span></li></ol><ul><li><table cellpadding="0"><tbody><tr></tr></tbody></table></li></ul><font size="1">
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