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That reminds me. James Heartfield has put links on his site to both our review and our recording of the meeting. He has added photo of his own. See http://www.heartfield.org/

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Young Master Smeet wrote:

When you think returns are less than investment, such slow growth in what we would call capital formation is quite astounding, and cuts to the heart of the current crisis.

Great minds (and consultancies) think alike. Here is an article by Paul Lachowycz of Fathom Consulting that appeared in the Times on 26 November:http://www.fathom-consulting.com/Insightnews/Opinionpieces/2012-11-26/Forget-the-grand-designs/Look at the table there, which shows a drop in "the real rate of return on fixed capital investment"  from 4% in 2008 to about 0.5% today and note his comment:

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The centrepiece of the Coalition’s ‘growth strategy’ is already focused on encouraging the private sector to get involved in infrastructure spending. The main plan has been to kick start investment for around 500 proposed infrastructure projects with pension fund capital worth £20bn. So far the proposals have completely failed to take-off. The government has been unable to encourage the private sector to invest in new roads, housing or anything else for that matter. Official data show that infrastructure spending is down 11% from a year ago and the government has raised less than £1bn.We are not surprised it has failed. Not because as the CBI claims the government has failed to provide insurance. There is a simpler explanation – the chronically low rate of return. At Fathom Consulting we calculate that the real rate of return on all fixed capital expenditure has collapsed in recent years and stands at just 0.5%. For infrastructure specifically, it is lower still, and may even be negative. No wonder the private sector wants a blanket guarantee to pass the risks completely to the public sector.

Yes, no wonder the capitalist firms that make up the CBI are not prepared to invest in infrastructure projects (and so much for the capitalist apologists' justification for profits as a reward for risk-taking).We'll be commenting on this in more detail in the January Socialist Standard.

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Young Master Smeet wrote:

Some fascinating stats from the 2011 census:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20677321

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The second-most common category was "No religion", comprising more than a quarter of the population (25.1%; 14.1 million), up from 7.7 million (14.8%) in 2001.

Eat your heart out, Robin !

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DJP wrote:

If you have the texts for these this can soon be rectified.

Sent you the Morris review. The other one, on Chavism, will have to be scanned (unless you can copy it from the on-line PDF version).This passage from Morris from the January 1887 Commonweal, quoted in both the book and the review, is a fine statement of the socialist case on war:

Quote:

Meantime if war really becomes imminent our duties as socialists are clear enough, and do not differ from those we have to act on ordinarily. To further the spread of international feeling between workers by all means possible; to point out to our own workmen that foreign competition and rivalry, or commercial war, culminating at last in open war, are necessities of the plundering classes, and that the race and commercial quarrels of these classes only concern us so far as we can use them as opportunities for fostering discontent and revolution;. that the interests of the workmen are the same in all countries and they can never really be the enemies of each other; that the men of our labouring classes, therefore, should turn a deaf ear to the recruiting sergeant, and refuse to allow themselves be dressed up in red and be taught to form a part of the modern killing machine for the honour and glory of a country in which they have only a dog's share of many kicks and a few halfpence, – all this we have to preach always, though in the event of imminent war we may have to preach it more emphatically.

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Book review from Socialist Standard here:http://www.myspace.com/socialiststandard/blog/438301718For some reason this (and another book review) don't appear in the html on-line version.

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I went to the introductory meeting this morning. Plenty of Hyde Park habitués there exchanging reminiscences. Looks like an interesting and worthwhile  project. I don't think there is any danger of us being ignored, as one of the volunteers involved in the project is a Party member and our Archives Dept has been in contact with the organisers to offer them access to our archive of photos which they have accepted. Some interest was expressed in other speaking places in London (Tower Hill, Lincolns Inn, etc) which have died out.There will be two free training days on Tuesday 18 December and Tuesday 29 January from 11am to 4pm at the Bishopsgate Institute to which people are urged to "bring old photographs, documents, articles and recordings of Speakers' Corner or anything else you might have for the archive" and "learn about archiving, cataloguing and conservation from specialist staff at Bishopsgate Institute". Comrade Richard Headicar was said to be coming to the one in January.

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alanjjohnstone wrote:

Sadly another example of banks make money out of nothing , this time by Professor of Binary Economics at Trisakti University, Jakarta, Indonesia, Rodney Shakespeare is a Cambridge MA, a qualified UK Barrister, a co-founder of the Global Justice Movement and  a member of the Christian Council for Monetary Justice.

Yes, the "Christian Council for Monetary Justice" has been spreading their ideas in the Occupy Movement, particularly through Quaker (and Labour Party member) John Courtneidge who we clashed with at one of the recent New Putney Debates. Their chairman, Cannon Peter Challen, was one of the panel at a meeting organised by the Occupy at the Bank of Ideas last January. He was one of those who refused to describe himself as anti-capitalist. Basically, they are against interest, which they denounce as "usury", but not against any other aspects of capitalism, as if capitalism could function without interest.Their President is Labour MP Austin Mitchell, one of two openly currency-crank MPs. The other is Tory Douglas Carswell.

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He seems to be some sort of Kiwi Trot who thinks that Venezuela is a workers' paradise and so can't say anything about what a "socialist" society might look like. And doesn't.

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Young Master Smeet wrote:

So, as Hip as Zeitgeist…

Truer than might be thought. He was a bit of a Technocrat himself (perhaps more so than Zeitgeist) as this extract from this article shows:

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Scientific Administration of Social AffairsBordiga saw the relationship between the party and the working class under capitalism as analogous with that of the brain to the other parts of a biological organism. Similarly, he envisaged the relationship between the scientifically organised central administration and the rest of socialist society in much the same terms.(…)Thus the scientifically organised central administration in socialism would be, in a very real sense for Bordiga – who was a firm partisan of the view that human society is best understood as being a kind of organism – the 'social brain', a specialised social organ charged with managing the general affairs of society. Though it would be acting in the interest of the social organism as a whole, it would not be elected by the individual members of socialist society, any more than the human brain is elected by the individual cells of the human body.Quite apart from accepting this biological metaphor, Bordiga took the view that it would not be appropriate in socialism to have recourse to elections to fill administrative posts, nor to take social decisions by 'the counting of heads'. For him, administrative posts were best filled by those most capable of doing the job, not by the most popular; similarly, what was the best solution to a particular problem was something to be determined scientifically by experts in the field and not a matter of majority opinion to be settled by a vote.What was important for Bordiga was not so much the personnel who would perform socialist administrative functions as the fact that there would need to be an administrative organ in socialism functioning as a social brain and that this organ would be organised on a 'scientific' rather than a 'democratic' basis.Bordiga's conception of socialism was 'non-democratic' rather than 'undemocratic'. He was in effect defining socialism as not 'the democratic social control of the means of production by and in the interest of society as a whole', but simply as 'the social control of the means of production in the interest of society as a whole'.

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Brian wrote:

It's already starting to contradict itself by attempting to distance TZM from "class war" when not so long ago Peter Joseph acknowledged in a tv interview on Russia Today that TZM like the Civil Rights Movement it models itself on is a participant in the class war.

I'm not so sure about this. Already in the passage already quoted they recognise that the vast majority are oppressed (subject to "indirect violence") by "social stratification":

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TZM's advocated train of thought, on the other hand, sources advancements in human studies. It finds, for example, that social stratification, which is inherent to the capitalist/market model, to actually be a form of indirect violence against the vast majority as a result of the evolutionary psychology we humans naturally posses.(their emphasis)

Earlier on, on the first page of the introduction in fact, they had said:

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For instance, the current social model, while perpetuating enormous levels of corrosive economic inefficiency in general, as will be described in further essays, also intrinsically supports one economic group or "class" over another, perpetuating technically unnecessary imbalance and relative deprivation. This could be called "economic bigotry" in its effect and it is not no less insidious than discrimination rooted in gender, ethnicity, religion or creed. (their emphasis again).

It could also be called "exploitation". OK, this is apparently only placing class discrimination on a par with other forms of discrimination but it's a start.

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Ayn Rand was a fruit cake and nasty with it. Her ideas and those of other "libertarians" such as Murray Rothbard and Ludwig von Mises were popular in the 1980s and 1990s but have since been marginalised again even though she seems to still have a following in US Tea Party circles, as also mentioned in this article from last December's Socialist Standard:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2010s/2010/no-1276-december-2010/can-tea-party-save-american-dreamWe clashed during their heyday with their supporters in Britain, the Libertarian Alliance, Free Life and Libertarian Student. They seemed to like debating with us as we were the only group calling themselves socialist that was prepared to take up their criticism that a moneyless society couldn't work by arguing that it could.You can get a flavour of the debate from these:http://www.libertarian.co.uk/lapubs/econn/econn046.pdfhttp://www.la-articles.org.uk/FL-6-4-7.pdfThere's also this debate with them.To tell the truth, although these debates were entertaining basically they only allowed us to hone our anti-capitalist arguments. Most people out there can see that they are nutters without us needing to point this out.

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This talk of TS3, etc reminds me. What happened at the UK chapter meeting a week or so ago that Brian and Socialist Punk were going to take part in?

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Quote:

TZM's advocated benchmark for decision making is not a Moral Philosophy[65], which, when examined at its root, is essentially what Marxist philosophy was a manifestation of.TZM is not interested in the poetic, subjective & arbitrary notions of “a fair society”,”guaranteed freedom”, “world peace”, or “making a better world” simply because it sounds “right”, “humane” or “good”. Without a Technical Framework that has a direct physical referent to such terms, such moral relativism serves little to no long term purpose.Rather, TZM is interested in Scientific Application, as applied to societal sustainability, both physical and cultural.[66]As will be expressed in greater detail in further essays, the Method of Science is not restricted in its application within the “physical world”[67] and hence the social system, infrastructure, educational relevance and even understanding human behavior itself, all exist within the confines of scientific causality. In turn, there is a natural feedback system built into physical reality which will express itself very clearly in the context of what “works” and what doesn't over time,[68] guiding our conscious adaptation.Marxism is not based on this “calculated” worldview at all, even though there might be some scientifically based characteristics inherent. For example, the Marxist notion of a “classless society” was to overcome the capitalist originating “inhumanity” imposed on the working class or “proletariat”.

It is ironic, even amusing, that ZM should be in effect answering our characterisation of them as "Utopian Socialists" by adopting a more-scientific-than-thou attitude.This has some relevance to the debates we have had here and elsewhere as to whether socialism is a "moral" or "ethical" issue as well as a "class" and "scientific" one.  Rejecting "moral philosophy" and "moral relativism", ZM argue that the case for a classless, stateless, moneyless world society (which they call a "resource-based economy" and we call "socialism" or "communism") is based on a scientific understanding that "the capitalist/market model" is against empirically observed and scientifically validated "human nature":

Quote:

TZM's advocated train of thought, on the other hand, sources advancements in human studies. It finds, for example, that social stratification, which is inherent to the capitalist/market model, to actually be a form of indirect violence against the vast majority as a result of the evolutionary psychology we humans naturally posses[69]. It generates an unnecessary form of human suffering on many levels which is destabilizing and, by implication, technically unsustainable.

An interesting approach which we have been tempted to adopt but never have since we've been reluctant to accept any theory of a behaviour-determining fixed human nature.I wonder whether ZM has debates about whether the case for a resource-based economy is an ethical as well as a scientific issue. Probably not because their "Train of Thought" commits them to the view that there is only one answer to every problem and that this is to be found by scientific enquiry, conducted by scientists, and not by popular debate and vote. A legacy of their Technocracy origins.

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It will be interesting to see how, when it's published in full, this new Orientation Guide differs from the previous one. In the meantime here's how the new one tries to differentiate TZM from "Marxist Communism" (a must in America, it appears). It's a bit tortuous and even accuses Marxism of being a "Moral Philosophy" (which some here might like):

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The “Prima Facie” FallacyThe first is the “Prima Facie” association. This simply means “upon first appearance”; “before investigation”.[63] This is by far the most common type of objection.A classical case study is the common claim that the observations and solutions presented by TZM are simply rehashed “Marxist Communism”.Let's briefly explore this as an example. Referencing “The Communist Manifesto”[64] Marx and Engels present various observations with respect to the evolution of society, specifically the “class war”, inherent structural relationships regarding “capital”, along with a general logic as to how the social order will transition through “revolution” to a stateless, classless system, in part, while also noting a series of direct social changes, such as the “Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State”, “Equal liability of all to labour.” and other specifics. Marx creates players in the schema he suggests like the ongoing battle between the “Bourgeoisie and Proletarians”, expressing contempt for the inherent exploitation, which he says is essentially rooted in the idea of “private property”. In the end, the accumulated goal in general is in seeking a “stateless and classless society”.On the surface, reformations proposed in TZM's promoted solutions might appear to mirror attributes of “Marxism” if one was to completely ignore the underlying reasoning. The idea of a society “without classes”, “without universal property”, and the complete redefinition of what comprises the “State” might, on the surface, show confluence by the mere gestures themselves, especially since Western Academia commonly promotes a “duality” between “Communism” and “Capitalism” with the aforementioned character points noted as the core differences. However, the actual Train of Thought to support these seemingly similar conclusions is quite different.TZM's advocated benchmark for decision making is not a Moral Philosophy[65], which, when examined at its root, is essentially what Marxist philosophy was a manifestation of.TZM is not interested in the poetic, subjective & arbitrary notions of “a fair society”,”guaranteed freedom”, “world peace”, or “making a better world” simply because it sounds “right”, “humane” or “good”. Without a Technical Framework that has a direct physical referent to such terms, such moral relativism serves little to no long term purpose.Rather, TZM is interested in Scientific Application, as applied to societal sustainability, both physical and cultural.[66]As will be expressed in greater detail in further essays, the Method of Science is not restricted in its application within the “physical world”[67] and hence the social system, infrastructure, educational relevance and even understanding human behavior itself, all exist within the confines of scientific causality. In turn, there is a natural feedback system built into physical reality which will express itself very clearly in the context of what “works” and what doesn't over time,[68] guiding our conscious adaptation.Marxism is not based on this “calculated” worldview at all, even though there might be some scientifically based characteristics inherent. For example, the Marxist notion of a “classless society” was to overcome the capitalist originating “inhumanity” imposed on the working class or “proletariat”.TZM's advocated train of thought, on the other hand, sources advancements in human studies. It finds, for example, that social stratification, which is inherent to the capitalist/market model, to actually be a form of indirect violence against the vast majority as a result of the evolutionary psychology we humans naturally posses[69]. It generates an unnecessary form of human suffering on many levels which is destabilizing and, by implication, technically unsustainable.Another example is TZM's interest in removing Universal Property[70] and setting up a system of “Shared Access”. This is often quickly condemned to the Marxist idea of “Abolishing Private Property”. However, generally speaking, the Marxist logic relates the existence of private property to the perpetuation of the “bourgeois” and their ongoing exploitation of the “proletariat”. He states in the Manifesto “The distinguishing feature of Communism is not the abolition of property generally, but the abolition of bourgeois property.”TZM's advocated logic, on the other hand, relates the fact that the practice of universal, individual ownership of goods is environmentally inefficient, wasteful and ultimately unsustainable as a universal practice. This supports a restrictive system behavior and a great deal of unnecessary deprivation, and hence crime is common in societies with an unequal distribution of resources.At any rate, such “prima facie” allegations are very common and many more could be expressed. However, it is not the scope of this section to discusses all alleged connections between Marxism and TZM's advocated Train of Thought.[71]

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Maybe we've jumped the gun but here's what we've said on our blog this morning:http://socialismoryourmoneyback.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/marx-on-leveson.htmlIn other words, Marx said it all and we can leave the government and the press barons (and their employees) to slog it out over the issue of freedom of trade for newspaper sellers. It's not a "freedom of the press" issue.

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