A piglet went to market

A piglet’s journey to market in October, 2010 helped expose the other face of microfinance that promised to make poverty archaic.

A bdnews24.com/Reuters news report, datelined Vladivostok, Oct. 15, said: The seven-month old piglet’s journey to holy market was to pay off a woman’s micro debt of $432 to a bank in Russia, part of former Soviet Union. The ignorant piglet was seized by powerful officers from the unfortunate woman as she failed to pay off her debt within 10 days. It was put up for sale to recuperate a portion of the debt. A court survey assessed that the piglet was her most valuable asset. The commodity, the piglet, was awaiting a buyer at Primorye, a place made famous by a song telling the victorious march of the poor men’s Red Army in 1917, at the time of dispatching the news.

To make the news meaningful, the news agency added the following backgrounder: “Consumer debt in Russia has crippled local economies in some of the country’s poor rural and industrial areas”. (bdnews24.com/lq/2032h)

The piglet-story is not a lone example of microfinance’s “merciful” face.  A vernacular Dhaka daily informed: In late-October in Galachipa, a southern Bangladesh locality, an organisation engaged with micro credit grabbed the house of a poor family and dismantled it. The reason: failure to repay a debt of Tk 12,000 (approximately $172). (The Daily Ittefaq, Oct. 22, 2010, p.2) The full “story” is more illogical and cruel. [Not included here considering word limit of the article].

While one microfinance story originated in Russia, an economy embracing capitalism, the other one was from Bangladesh, claiming to be the cradle of credit micro in size. These two were accompanied by another story from India, an emerging economy with millions of poor in its base.

The Hindu, April 19, 2010 news report said: “Some Collectors sent reports about the harassment of borrowers, intimidation, manhandling, abusing and outraging the modesty of women and extreme punishment like making defaulters stand in the hot sun, tying them to trees and making them run in open grounds.” (http://www.hindu.com/2010/04/19/stories/2010041960410600.htm) It was in the rural areas of Andhra Pradesh, a southern state.

In a similar situation in Andhra Pradesh in 2005-06, the state government appointed a committee as micro credit debtors caught in the debt trap were committing suicide. The committee recommended “to crack the whip on the [Micro Financing Institutions] for grossly violating the human rights of borrowers in the name of loan recovery…”

These are only three examples of many that show a trend. Committing suicide by thousands of debt-ridden farmers in India made news headlines in the Indian press for a number of times. Bangladesh holds many examples, a few of which were documented/referred by mainstream studies/researches. (Those are not being mentioned here as that may appear singling out organisations and individuals.)

This reality has forced Devinder Sharma, an Indian expert, to ask: The ugly face of microfinance was never in doubt. But now even the dark underbelly is coming out in the open. I wonder how much more evidence is required to put a stop to this barbaric activity that goes on unchecked in the name of empowering the poorest of the poor. (“The Barbaric Ways of Micro-finance”, Countercurrents, April 21, 2010)

A few questions may crop up from these incidents. What is the reason behind that failed the Russian rural lady pay back her debt? What is the perspective that forced the Bangladesh MFI act in the way the news story mentioned? Why the MFIs harass, intimidate, manhandle their debtors in India? Is this the deal a pauper, a poor debtor deserves? Are these simply stray incidents, mere exceptions? Are these news a part of disinformation? Or, are there grains of reality? Are these the symptoms of a disease? Do these questions qualify for a serious enquiry?

There is an easy escape way from these questions, if these haunt a serene “conscience”: just ignore the news and forget the questions.

But, shall that be a matured, as an individual and as a society, posture? History of matured rulers and of arrogant tyrants provides the answer. The British shahibs, the powerful colonial rulers representing a mighty empire, ultimately failed to ignore indigo planters’ acts of torments that brewed up the Indigo Rebellion, a rising made by underfed, apparently subdued and meek Bengal peasants. Dynamics of oppression and protest made the humble victor and compelled the repressors to retreat. Till now, history has denied to revolve in a different way, has denied to take a different path.

This article published as an opinion at bdnews24, Bangladesh's first online newspaper.November 14, 2010

Strong Unions Are The Best Hope Inside Capitalism

The San Jose Mine incident in Chile has again brought forward old questions related to labor and capital. In the backdrop of the San Jose Mine incident, the 33 miners' struggle to win life, Michael D Yates , Associate Editor of Monthly Review , was interviewed by Farooque Chowdhury. Michael D Yates was for many years professor of economics at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown , USA . He is the author of In and Out of the Working Class (2009), (with Fred Magdoff) The ABCs of the Economic Crisis (2009), Cheap Motels and a Hotplate (2007), Naming the System (2004), Why Unions Matter (1998), Longer Hours, Fewer Jobs (1994), all published by Monthly Review Press. Following are Michael Yates' responses to the questions:

Question : From your writings it stands that miners' life is well known to you. What's your reaction to the episode that the world witnessed in the San Jose Mine in Chile ?

Michael D Yates : There is a special solidarity in mining communities, because of the danger of working underground, where at any time you could die.  People live in constant fear of this.  My reaction was to assume that the owners were lax in terms of safety, and this appears to be the case. Hopefully this episode will fuel more militancy among the miners and their communities.  On a purely human level, I cannot imagine what it must have been like to be trapped like that.  But now the men will be expected to work as always, and the fame they have now will soon enough fade. They will be affected in many negative ways, psychologically not the least.  However, the media won't be around to report on that, and the concern the world has now will disappear.

On the basis of statistics it can be deduced that mining is one of the deadliest occupations. Then, why people enter into mine? What is the hard fact?

People work in mines because they need work.  Their mobility is not great, and if their communities have always sent men into the mines (I don't know if women work in the mines there or not), then it is a natural thing for young men to follow suit.  There may even be notions that mining is a way to win your manhood.  Then too unions are usually strong in mining, so the pay, etc, are usually above average.  Working class life is hard and full of dangers in any event.  It is not as if the average worker has unlimited opportunities.  Quite the contrary.

As one searches the pages of mining history one will find that a lot of changes have entered into mining, and into miners' life. On the contrary, a lot of “things” have not changed. What are those, on both sides, changes and unaltered?

Mining technology has changed considerably, with a good deal of mechanization replacing hand labor.  Much more of this should occur, so as few people as possible have to be miners.  This won't happen under capitalism, however.  What has remained the same in most of the world is the constant danger, the callousness of the owners, and the collusion between the owners and the government.  Where the unions of miners are strong, conditions are always better, but this is a constant struggle that waxes and wanes over time.

What are the reasons behind?

Always the profit motive, the goal of accumulating capital is behind nearly everything that matters in working class life.  You see what happens when capitals is in charge in a country like China , where mining disasters are not at all uncommon, all the roe so as the nation becomes increasingly capitalist.

Is there no way out from the life miners are entrapped into?

Strong unions are the best hope inside capitalism.  Only the abolition of capitalism can liberate miners and all other workers. 

What are the hindrances in improving the working and living conditions of miners?

They are the same as for all workers: the power of capital, the power of the state, divisions of all sorts among the workers.  As miners overcome their divisions and come to see more clearly the root causes of their oppression, they begin to take actions to get out of the trap. 

Is improving working and living conditions for miners costlier than the “cost” for lives? How it affects productivity and, essentially returns?

Of course, a life is always worth more than profits. The owners don't see it this way, and that is why the miners must organize and force the owners to accept a different calculus.  Then the owners will try to keep profits up in the face of higher wages and better conditions, including safety.  The owners always have the upper hand at the workplace since they own the capital.  So miners have to organize politically as well. In purely technical terms, union miners are probably more productive as they will be better trained, etc. But they may not be more profitable.  Hence, there is constant class struggle .

In Capital, Marx refers to a note by Liebig that tells the mine owners compelled the miners to consume bread and bean though the miners disliked beans which was liked by horses. But the owners' choice was dictated by the interest of return as beans provided the power the miners needed to bring up metal load from deep down. Now, it seems, labor is less important than material, the support systems in mines, and the life they have been pushed into, meager wages, ramshackle congested homes without water, sewage system, and proper ventilation system, diseases, etc., constant fear of unemployment, the abject poverty. In many lands, these are not different from the condition of the working class in England Engels described, rather miserable than that. These are now a bit documented. Even the mainstream media sometimes mention this fact. Is it that miners' living condition is now not a factor for capital regeneration as there is a huge reserve army of labor?

This may be true in many parts of the world.  We have to expect owners to calculate costs with no concern for the workers, as they think of the workers as implements of production, no different that the materials and machines used. Whatever lowers costs and raises profits will be done, absent strong class organization.

And, has that intensified the rate of appropriation of surplus labor?

Yes, it always does.

We know legendary John Henry, the “steel-driving man”, who swung a 4.4-kg sledge hammer with each hand for 12 hours a day, pounding steel chisels as deep as 14 ft 4.2 m into solid rock. He is a hero of labor, and a symbol of humanity's determination. How the San Jose miners shall be remembered by the present period that finds deep in the Moon and the Mars being explored, and by posterity?

Unless the miners force the issue by radically strengthening their organization, they will be just another footnote in history.

And, how humanity shall remember this crude, callous capital that called in this cruelty in the San Jose mine?

The answer is the same as for the previous question. As Mother Jones, the legendary miners' angel and organizer, said, Don't mourn, organize.

Thank you.   

You are welcome!  Solidarity ! 
 -----
This article published at Monthly Review, an Independent Socialist Magazine
A different version of the same interview was first published in the 4 November 2010 issue of New Age, one of the leading English dailies in Bangladesh. 

Labour market recession

Protesters dressed as bankers and traders take part in an EU-wide demonstration against austerity on September 29, 2010 in Brussels. Placard at the centre reads: "Leave our earnings" and at right: "Don't touch our benefits."

The Great Financial Crisis generated by stagnation in the matured capitalist economies has pushed labour into a troubled time that has increased tension in socio-political scenario. Long “labour market recession” worsens social outlook in many countries, says ILO’s “World of Work Report 2010 – from one crisis to the next?”

It’s not only poor countries that are facing this reality. The advanced capitalist nations are also having similar experience. The United States, UK, France, Germany, Japan are passing through a tense socio-political situation. China, the newly emerged economic power, and countries across Europe, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Italy, Poland, are experiencing the same.

Quickly vanishing social benefits, decreasing real wages, widening income inequality, and slashed down employment are an old “story” in advanced capitalist countries. Cutting down wages, pensions, etc., are now the “wise” austerity measures being taken by capital. The day before yesterday, it was in Greece; yesterday, it was in France; and today, it is in Britain. This is actually a violation of contract, and an act of snatching away of a portion of wage earners’ income. The austerity measures, planned/implemented, are creating turmoil as labour finds no alternative other than fight for its rights that were achieved long ago. The easiest way capital finds is to put its burden on labour, its inherent tact. But “fiscal policy shifted to austerity …,” the ILO report said, “if badly designed, will prolong the job crisis.”

Europe has witnessed reactions to austerity measures on September 29, 2010. France has experienced this in September, and is witnessing in October, 2010. Spain and Portugal are not exceptions. Austerity cutbacks, however, are an economic “disaster”, said Nobel Prize winner economist Joseph Stiglitz in early September. “If that [austerity] happens … the economic downturn will last far longer and human suffering will be all the greater.” He warned that Europe was heading towards more economic difficulties if politicians cut back spending rather than calm down the financial markets. “If the UK, Germany or other countries [follow austerity policies], then it is going to have systemic consequences for Europe and the whole world.” A country like Bangladesh cannot escape the impact either.

The ILO study said: employment “prospects have worsened significantly in many countries”. If the present policies persist, a recovery in employment to pre-crisis levels will be delayed until 2015 in advanced economies. A year ago it was projected to be 2013. More than 8 million new jobs are still needed to return to pre-crisis levels in the emerging and underdeveloped countries.

This is the limit capital is bound within. “Unemployment” as Michal Kalecki wrote, “is an integral part of the ‘normal’ capitalist system” (“Political Aspects of Full Employment”). The Great Financial Crisis has only reiterated this fact.

“In … 35 countries … nearly 40 per cent of jobseekers have been without work for more than one year…”, the ILO report said. Labour hence faces “significant risks of demoralisation, loss of self-esteem and mental health problems.” Since the onset of the crisis, 29.4 million jobs were lost in 68 countries. Of these, the “Advanced countries” lost 18 million jobs. It was followed by the former Soviet republics, and the central and eastern Europe: 4.7 million. They were followed by Latin America and the Caribbean: 3.1 million. In Asia and the Pacific, and Africa the numbers were 2 million and 1.6 million respectively.

In at least 25 countries, ILO has found cases of social unrest related to the financial and economic crisis. A number of recovering emerging economies experienced social unrest over the level of wages and working conditions.

Protests, expanding horizontally and vertically, are increasing in frequency and force. Occupation of plants and blockades by workers are now a common feature in advanced bourgeois democracies. “Strikes for wage increases and improvements in conditions of work would create political tension” (Kalecki, op. cit.).

The ILO report informs that by the end of 2009, more than four million jobseekers had stopped looking for work in different countries for which information is available. This information speaks of a frustrating situation in the life of job seekers.

In more than three-quarters of 82 countries, the report said, people perceive that their quality of life and standard of living declined in 2009 compared to similar data from 2006. Satisfaction at work has deteriorated significantly among the people having job. A sense of unfairness was growing in 46 countries. In 36 countries, people have less confidence in governments now than prior to the crisis.

ILO suggests stimulating job creation, better-quality economic growth, strengthening of job-centred and active labour market policies, support vulnerable groups. It also suggests promoting a closer link between wages and productivity gains in surplus countries, and financial reform. The report said: Income-led growth depends on reinforced collective bargaining and social dialogue, well-designed minimum wage policies, and social protection systems.

The report, however, misses the fundamental flaws, repeatedly discussed by Paul Baran, Paul Sweezy, John Bellamy Foster, Fred Magdoff since long, in the matured capitalist economies: 1. the secular stagnation, 2. absence of opportunity for profit in the so-called real economy, 3. financialisation, and 4. shift of centre of gravity from productive economy to finance sector.

Labour is being blackmailed with threat of relocating plants to countries with low wages, low union intensity, and lax regulations. Labour is being compelled by capital to enter into new contracts with lower wages, longer working hours, etc. Workers, a few years back, in the Siemens factories in Rhineland Westphalia (Germany) had to accept extension of their workweek from 35 hours to 40 hours without additional compensation and revoking bonuses for Christmas and vacations. In return, the company promised not to relocate its factories to Hungary. Hundreds of companies are now in that bandwagon. DaimlerChrysler, Bosch, MAN and others moved with personnel cuts, longer working days/weeks, etc. Some European leaders consider the measures taken by multinationals as “corporate blackmail.” Cutting down of unemployment insurance payments from 32 months to a maximum of 12 months have been done in some European countries. In France, small companies revoked the 35-hour workweek. In an automobile plant in Spain, workers had to agree to work an average of 37 minutes more each day, by shortening their break periods. Out sourcing, sub-contracting, export processing zone, special economic zones, etc. measures are well known weapons of capital to press labour.

Years ago Fred Magdoff and Harry Magdoff wrote: “These are difficult times for workers. … [L]abor is struggling to maintain existing wages and benefits … while conditions of workers in the periphery are even more difficult. (“Disposable Workers: Today’s Reserve Army of Labor”)

This article published as an opinion at bdnews24, Bangladesh's first online newspaper.October 29, 2010
 

Flaming France

Probably, today’s France will put a lesson before the section of scholars despising political protests in poor countries that narrow down or snatch away democratic space and distort political process, and will show a portion of politicians that the French politicians are not accusing external actors of hatching plots to torpedo the French economy,

FRANCE, now flaming with popular discontent, shows the limits of matured bourgeois democracy in an advanced capitalist country encountering financial and economic crises. Workers and students, millions in number, across the country are virtually repudiating neo-liberal measures.
   Crippling general strikes for days, and demonstrations by about 3.5 million people that took a violent and radical face, have made France the centre of attention. The pension reform is being opposed as protests are polarising the political-scape with frequent press reports of ‘politicians’ extravagance including exclusive Cuban cigars and liberal use of private jets at the state’s expense.’ The width of the protests was producing news almost every few hours.
   According to some estimates, the raising of the retirement age would bring one million job losses. Decreasing wages, increasing poverty, soaring unemployment, deplorable working condition, anguish against the class ‘favoured by society’, and rejection of rightist politics prepared the perspective of this protest.
   Imports of electricity—5,990 megawatts were imported in one hour on Wednesday, which was equivalent to the output of six nuclear reactors—by the French authorities in the face of dwindling fuel supply show the wide impact of the protest. Striking 12 refinery workers and tanker drivers drying oil supplies, shut down thousands of schools, walked out students blocking school and university entrances and suburban youths clashing with the police in cities added force to the fight workers from public and private sectors are waging.
   A survey, published in Le Monde, found a quarter of French youth ‘want a radical transformation of society through revolutionary change.’ Students marched alongside labour union activists and leftist militants in a highly charged situation when the middle class is feeling insecure and losing confidence in the present regime. Use of the term ‘children of revolution’ by an international news organisation speaks of the active role the students are taking in the present protest.
   Blockaded entrances to airports by protesters, hundreds of cancelled flights, stayed away trains and commuter services, stranded ships, about 70, in ports striking for 17 days, were part of the series of protests in this month that tell a showdown between labour defending their rights and social benefits and President Sarkozy at the head of an increasingly divided ruling class. The class is facing pressure both from the present world financial crisis, and from its competitors within Europe. Its attempt to put its burden on the common people in the name of austerity is part of its incapacity to get rid of its own problem that has been created by its economy. The problems in economy are intruding the arena of politics. Ironically, it itself is mobilising broader sections of the society against its economic programme!
   At least 244 demonstrations all over France show the breadth of the protest. It was reported that some police personnel joined the protests in Paris which are spreading from below. The strike by the Eiffel Tower staff shows, symbolically, France is in turmoil, which has found about 1,500 people detained and 62 police officers injured.
   The turmoil began in late May. The summer break widened the movement, in frequency and number, with millions participating in October in an economy still shaky since the Great Financial Crisis. ‘Renewable’ strikes in railways, education, ports and refineries, each day workers in mass assembly decide continuing the action, are intensifying class struggle. ‘What the parliament does, the street can undo,’ read a patch on one protester’s arm, which is in reference to actions in the legislature and onto streets.
   From press reports it appear that disgusted conservative supporters are also turning supporters of the socialists while a shaken Sarkozy government used police to break the blockades of the oil refineries and oil depots. The protesters re-imposed blockade within hours the police broke the first blockade that reflects their attitude. The fuel crisis has intensified as workers in nuclear power plants have slowed down power generation.
   The incidents will influence the next presidential election in 2012, and future political equations. One poll in October found Sarkozy’s approval rating down to 30 per cent, the lowest for three years. Even mainstream press carries comments and interviews that strongly indicate moving mood towards further radicalisation with slogans: tax the rich, expropriate the banks, job for all, no more austerity. Financial Times found ‘A flavour of 1968 radicalism.’ The union leaders are feeling the pressure of the mass movement. One of the major unions is now openly calling for a general strike. But a number of factors in this turmoil are still unidentified.
   The current movement is the most militant and powerful struggle since the 2006 uprising. Protesters occupied the Marseille Chamber of Commerce. They were, however, later pushed out.
   Europe is now witnessing resurgence of labour actions in the continent. The French protest is the most intensive and wide among those. Changes are going on in the balance of forces between the working class and capital in a deeper way making France an important country for further development of class struggle in Europe.
   France has gone through intensive debates over the decades: nuclear power, medical ethics, fast food chain and halal meat, housing problem, immigrants, and burqa. Even its football team generated debate and anger reflecting a divided politics. Le Pen, the far-right National Front leader, stunned France by reaching the final round of the presidential election. The 2005 riot in the poor, predominantly immigrant communities showed deprivation, divide, and a sterile culture. ‘It is individualism, selfishness, every man for himself, with the only value of human success being how much you get at the end of the month,’ said Jérôme Cahuzac, a Socialist MP. These factors, in society, psychology, and politics, are also influencing the present movement.
   The 1995 general strike stopped the ‘Juppé Plan’, programme of welfare cutbacks. But none is sure of the success of the present protest in stopping the pension age legislation. Authorities, it seems, are still confident of its strength to successfully push through their neo-liberal agenda: dismantle social security system. The working people now have no alternative other than rise up in protest. But lack of political platform, matured political steps, coordination, and failure in further widening of their fold may send them back home after days of violent protest, which is still lurching in the precinct of spontaneity.
   There is no basis to imagine that the present protest will bring down the French capital. But it shows limits of the capital and its politics: it is incapable of resolving the contradictions in the realm of distribution, neither in economy nor in politics, and its political process is failing to accommodate needs of the people, which has pushed the protesters onto the streets, into actions of torching vehicles, smashing shops, and rampaging.
   The present French furore reminds today’s mid-age persons of Paris in 1968, the largest and longest general strike in European history that rocked France. There were the student insurrection in May, De Gaulle’s flight to Germany, workers occupation of plants, slogans for a ‘people’s government’, ministers burning secret documents, workers taking control of cities, roads and public transport, and issuing food coupons. That movement stumbled over. The present movement has not still reached to that level.
   Probably, today’s France will put a lesson before the section of scholars despising political protests in poor countries that narrow down or snatch away democratic space and distort political process, and will show a portion of politicians that the French politicians are not accusing external actors of hatching plots to torpedo the French economy.
   Success or abortive effort of the present French protest will not be the last act of the French people opposing neo-liberalism. The movement, if subdued by force and tricks, and compelled to retreat, will learn lessons and equip itself for future rising for a fair share in economy and politics.

This editorial published at The NEWAGE, Daily newspaper, one of the leading English dailies in Bangladesh

Chilean miners who defied death

Trapped Chilean miners

An October witnessed: labour stands unvanquished in Chile. And, the mines there symbolize cruel capital, whose motive force is profit.

The 33 miners defied death brought down by hundreds of thousands of tons of rock, and essentially, by profit-hunger. The mining magnates stood against miners, bent on breaking their backbones. But they, the billionaires, failed. The miners rode up from deep underground, stood under the sun, under the star studded sky, and proclaimed: “We have to change the way we work. The working world needs lots of changes. We, the miners, we won’t let it rest.”

The undaunted San Jose miners in the Atacama Desert brought to light plight the miners pass through, the compulsions created by the reality of profit and deprivation, the compulsions that compel them to work in places feared even by death. These miners now stand as heroes of our time.

Time, a mainstream US weekly, however, informs: “Chile rarely if ever regarded labourers as heroes …Chilean workers need 60 percent more earning power to afford [the higher cost of living]. Chile’s working class…has a high rate of stomach cancer, which doctors attribute in no small part to a lack of vegetables in their diet…Only 10 percent of Chile’s workforce is unionised.” The minimum wage of about $300 a month tells of inhuman hardship. “Produce for export”, the motto attractive to almost all the poor countries, denies the poor to get hold of many essentials of life. Vegetables are one of the major commodities that Chile exports. A study last year cited Chilean employers’ pervasive distrust “in the ability of workers” to justify “to keep wages low.”

Now, president PiÑera, a billionaire with stakes in mining, real estate, etc., admits needs for labour reforms: “We have to adopt the [labour] standards of the developed world…Our principal wealth… is …the miners.” To him also the work condition “in the San Jose mine and … in many other places” is inhumane. (The Santiago Times, Oct. 15, 2010) He now tells the truth: It is the labour that produces wealth, and the inhuman condition for labour carries conditions for less regeneration of capital. His message is directed at the crude capital in Chile, the mineral rich country with memories of prosperity after the opening of the Panama Canal, the country once a chief source of natural nitrate and iodine.

Risking lives into the unstable mines for just about $1,600 a month comes forward as an easy option for many poor as the salary is better than construction. Death is a frequent visitor in mines. Since 2000, about 34 people have died every year on average in mining accidents in Chile — with a high of 43 in 2008. That is roughly about 3-4 deaths a month. The unofficial data provide a higher rate. All this is for gold, for copper, for profit, profit in exchange of “expendable” human life.

The miners’ relatives vigorously oppose working in mines. But the miners could not be stopped. “If they need the work”, said a press report quoting a miner’s relative, “they will return to the mine.” Miners, as all workers followed by a huge reserve army of labour, have no choice between low wages and weak safety standards. A Roman Catholic priest told The New York Times: “These miners are …victims of a great injustice in work conditions”. But the “innocent” mine magnates’ “minds” are “transparent”! Alejandro Bohn, Time reported, the San José mine owner, “is claiming bankruptcy even though a judge has ruled he has almost $2 million on hand with which to aid the 33 miners and their families.”

The San José mine was closed for safety concerns in 2007. But it was reopened in 2008. No explanation has been provided. There was no ladder, mandated by government, for escape shafts in the mine, the dungeon from which miners made the epic march. Many of the mines use “techniques that are little changed from the 19th century.” The owners don’t buy better overalls and install ventilation and support systems; the workers have to strip down to bare chests in heat that sometimes exceeds 120 degrees F. Only 16 safety auditors for about 4,000 mines, and only four for the 844 registered mines in the desolate Atacama Desert! (The Santiago Times, Oct. 15, 2010)

Jonathan Vega, brother of Alex Vega, one of the trapped miners, worked in the San José mine from 2003 to 2008. A safety check was made once a year “if you were lucky”, he told The Santiago Times. Accidents are neighbours of miners in a land where the mining magnates and many-made-billions-of-dollars under General Pinochet, a land sharply divided along class line, a land that experienced the “shock therapy” by the “famous” Chicago Boys, the disciples of Friedman.

The entrapped San José miners faced difficult time for about 70 days. One can draw a parallel: Spartacus’ days into a desert mine. Spartacus knew the only desire was “to endure, to survive …” So, he did not gulped water given to him, he sipped “it for hours, so that every possible drop of it may sink into the tissues of his body …every small speck and stain of food is survival.” He survived the hellish mine, he survived to revolt against Rome. The Chilean miners have survived, unparallel in human history. They thus symbolise labour’s strength and endurance, labour’s unity and hope, labour’s determination and courage.

Then, as the miners were struggling every moment for survival about half-a mile beneath the earth, where no human being has ever lived, came in money and valuable sexy gifts for their poverty stricken relatives and children. There in the desolate desert stepped in profit driven media with tempting offers for interviews, etc. Capitalist connections spread its web among the agonised humanity. Alluring money began corrupting human spirit with its destructive and corrupting power. Media started selling stories with lurid linings. Entrapped miners were made subject of saucy stories. A naked show of hunger for profit! José Zalaquett, a prominent Chilean human rights lawyer, professor of international law at the Universidad de Chile, and former president of the International Executive Committee of Amnesty International, said: “It is reprehensible that the private life and personal communication of the miners and their families have not been respected.” (La Tercera, Oct. 12, 2010) A free liberal media indeed!

But defying all obstacles, denying all unbearable pain and corrupt system the miners emerged from the chamber of death. The system, it seems, Bottom of still has failed to corrupt them. The brave 33 have decided to equitably distribute the earnings that are expected to come from interviews, media appearances, movies, books. A triumphant Urzua, one of Los mineros de Chi-LE, Miners of Chile, the foreman who led the survival saga said: “We have done what the entire world was waiting for. The 70 days that we fought so hard were not in vain. We had strength, we had spirit, we wanted to fight … and that was the greatest thing.” Then, there in the desert reverberated: A man can be destroyed but not defeated.

This article published as an opinion at bdnews24, Bangladesh's first online newspaper.October 19, 2010

Worker resistance on the rise globally

‘WORKING people are hardly prepared to face the present financial crisis, writes Dan La Botz. But they are now resisting. Their resistance to the assaults by capital is on the rise globally as corporations are using the crisis as a cover for laying off workers and restructuring labour markets through plant relocations and wage cuts.
   Dan, who teaches history and Latin American studies at Miami University in Ohio, writes: ‘The working class does not have independent organizations with which it can fight for itself and for society at large…. Labor unions in most countries have long been subordinated to capital and government, and have become thoroughly bureaucratic and unresponsive to workers’ needs. In some places company and gangster unions dominate the scene, while in other countries the so-called unions are really state institutions created to control workers (‘The Global Crisis and the World Labor Movement’, The Economic Crisis Reader, Economic Affairs Bureau, Boston, 2009). But this has failed to eliminate the process of protest. Dan observes: ‘History suggests that from the onset of a depression to the beginning of a mass movement it may take years for the working class to absorb intellectually and emotionally what has happened to them and then finally assert their righteous indignation and begin to act.’
   Capitalism in the twenty-first century has ‘expanded, and its penetration of peoples, states, and regions of the world has deepened…. [A]lmost everywhere the system has reduced government social welfare budgets and reorganized social welfare programs. In the course of these developments, capital has transformed its relationship to unions in the workplace and to labor parties in society’ (ibid). But the transformation of the relationship could not transform the relationship between labour and capital. Capital’s all out effort is to appropriate labour. ‘The fall of … the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe … opened up that region to private capitalist investment from the West. The collapse of … the Soviet Union, China’s evolution to a capitalist economy, and the opening up of India’s economy have brought about what Thomas L. Friedman called “the great doubling” of the world capitalist labor force, adding 1.3 billion workers.’
   The crisis is putting its cruel signature in the lives of the working class. According to Marianne Hill, an economist, in the US, ‘[t]he share of unemployed workers receiving benefits gradually shrunk since the 1970s. In 1975, over half of unemployed workers received regular benefits. But in 2008, only 37% of the unemployed did; in some states the figure was less than 25%. And, so-called “discouraged workers”, those who want but are not actively seeking employment, are not considered part of the labor force and so are not even included in these figures’ (‘Unemployment Insurance: A Broken System’, ibid).
   ‘Studies have found a rise in suicide rates, mental and physical illness, and domestic and other violence among the unemployed. These problems become widespread during recessions and become a burden on society, not just on individual families’ (ibid.)
   But financial incidents in the US do not stay only in that country; ‘the actions of traders in New York City will mean hunger for children in Nairobi,’ writes Smriti Rao, who teaches economics at Assumption College in Worcester, Massachusetts. (‘Putting the “Global” in the Global Economic Crisis’, ibid) She asks: ‘What could be more ironic than the billions of dollars in capital flowing every year from developing countries with unfunded domestic needs to developed countries, which then failed to meet even their minimum obligations with respect to foreign aid?” Smriti informs: ‘Africa … has actually been a net creditor to the United States for some time, suggesting that the underlying dynamic of the world economy today is not that different from the colonialism of past centuries.’ The mainstream probably feels ashamed as it recollects the globalisation, the present world economy, it praised profusely.
   But the poor suffer while capital gets fat. Marianne informs: ‘Taxes can increase inequality. Sales taxes … absorb a greater percentage of income of low-income families than of high-income families, and so increase inequality. Figures on [US] federal corporate taxation are especially disturbing for this reason: 30% of U.S. corporations with gross receipts of $50 million or more paid no taxes over the 1998-2005 period, according to the GAO. If smaller corporations are included as well, 65% paid no U.S. corporate income tax’ (‘State Budget Blues’, ibid). ‘Corporations also avoid state taxes. The Multistate Tax Commission found that large, multi-state corporations avoided about $7 billion in state corporate taxes, due to such tactics as shifting their reported profits from high-tax states to low tax states’ (ibid).
   The crisis has not spared wealth also. It has appropriated wealth (measured in monetary term), the act capitalists despise. The Economic Crisis Reader (Gerald Friedman, Fred Moseley Chris Sturr ed), while discussing aspects of the crisis including monetary and fiscal policies, mentions that ‘fifteen trillion dollars of wealth seemingly “disappeared” in the first year of the recession, the sharpest wealth decline in over 50 years of modern record.’ The editors mention that ‘[n]ot only did orthodox economists fail to anticipate the crisis, they have been unable to understand it since it began and unable to ameliorate it.’ The heterodox economists whose articles, originally published in Dollars & Sense, The Nation and New Politics, the book carries ‘deny that recessions and crises are unusual events caused by “exogenous shocks”. Instead crises are endogenous to a capitalist economy: they come from the economic system.’ The present crisis ‘did not start with finance, and it won’t end with finance,’ writes Richard D Wolf, who teaches economics at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. Wolf argues: ‘It is a systemic crisis whose first serious symptom happened to be finance. But this crisis has its economic roots and its effects in manufacturing, services, and, to be sure, finance. It grows out of the relation of wages to profits across the economy. It has profound social roots in America’s households and families and political roots in government policies’ (‘Capitalism Hits the Fan’, ibid).
   The reality of crisis is not devoid of labour. So the aspect of labour has not been missed by the Reader. Immanuel Ness, professor of political science at Brooklyn College-City University, New York, and Stacy Warner Madder, PhD candidate at the University of Connecticut, mention in their article in the Reader that the last decade witnessed sit-down strikes largely in Latin America and in the global South, where workers occupied factories in response to economic collapse. ‘But the tide of direct action by workers … seems to be moving north. Workers in global North are now engaging in a wave of factory occupations and other militant actions. Many of these actions are in the syndicalist tradition of workers directly taking power….’
   Workers in Europe are resisting employers arbitrarily shutting down plants. Immanuel and Stacy tells us: ‘While we have yet to witness the recurrence of factory takeovers on a scale akin to the Italian Bienno-Rosso (“Red Year”) of 1919-1920, when some 500,000 factory workers seized and operated factories, mostly without official sanction, today a resurgence of rank-and-file militancy is palpable. Just in the last year [2008], a growing number of workers who had until recently been viewed as conservative and quiescent have begun to take matters into their own hands, engaging in the most militant of activities’ (‘Worker Direct Action Grows in Wake of Financial Meltdown’). ‘[I]n Europe … the new militancy is already most pronounced. … [D]irect actions are emerging in different countries from factory occupations in Britain and Ireland to “bossnappings” in France.’
   The Economic Crisis Reader along with discussing international aspects of the crisis also informs heroic acts of workers. Workers occupied three auto parts plants in Britain and Ireland, in Belfast, Basildon and Enfield. They received extensive public support. Ireland, considered Europe’s economic dynamo over the last decade, witnessed many sit-ins and factory occupations. In Dundee, Scotland, in March 2009, workers occupied a packaging factory to force their employer to pay legally required severance payments, following the company’s decision to lay off its entire workforce and withhold severance pay, holiday pay, and back wages. Seven women and five men workers took control of the factory to prevent the company from removing potentially valuable materials and equipment. After a 51-day occupation and significant community support … the managing director of the company resigned and plans for an independent worker-management cooperative went into effect: On May 1, Discovery Packaging and Design Ltd opened for business with the support of the community and private donations.
   ‘In France, workers demands are even more militant than in Britain and Ireland, as workers are demanding that employers keep factories open and challenging owner claims as to the financial viability of the firms.’ In February 2009, workers at FCI Microconnections, an electronics manufacturer in France, came to know that the management was planning for mass layoffs. But the management denied having any such plan. The workers went on strike and occupied the factory, preventing any removal of equipment. The occupation continued for seven weeks, even after the government issued an order to the workers to end the strike. Workers intensified the pressure on management to keep the plant open by travelling to the company headquarters in Versailles where they set up a barricade preventing the chief executive and corporate staff from leaving for four hours. The union produced an internal document showing that the FCI had developed a plant-closure plan for November 2009. After the company’s plans were finally revealed and management finally agreed to negotiate the facility’s future, striking workers gained greater support. The agreement between the workers and the management was: ‘the factory will remain open until 2014 with no job cuts before 2011. FCI workers also won payment for 27 of their 34 striking days’ (Immanuel and Stacy).
   On March 6, 2009, 3,000 workers at a Gross International plant in Nantes occupied the plant for five days until the management offered assurances that certain operations at the plant could be maintained and they would fight to save ‘as many jobs as possible.’ In March 2009, workers at a Caterpillar plant in the French Alps held five managers captive in a dispute over severance pay. The incident was the third time in three weeks that French Caterpillar workers had detained their bosses to protest against job losses. In the following weeks workers held a 3M executive overnight, forcing management to discuss job cuts. Workers at Sony’s French division held the chief executive and the director of human relations for a day. Two managers from a Kleber-Michelin machine-parts factory were also locked up and held by workers demanding negotiations over lay-offs (ibid).
   In Canada, workers occupied the Aradco, a privately-owned auto parts plant that provides parts for Chrysler as the auto-giant ‘threatened to withdraw from its Canadian operations unless unionized workers made substantial concessions and lowered overall parts cost.’ Twelve workers welded the doors shut from inside, ‘promising not to leave until they were paid….Chrysler stepped in and doubled [the severance pay]’ (ibid). The Republic Window and Door sit-in strike in Chicago in December 2008 and the threatened factory occupation of Hartmarx, the men’s suit manufacturer in Des Plaines, Illinois, in May 2009 made international news headlines.
   In South America, workers are demanding their right to control plants that have been shut down by their owners. In Argentina and Venezuela, workers, operating some factories without corporate managers for nearly a decade, are now demanding that ‘their governments pass legislation legitimizing the expropriation of factories under worker control’ (ibid).
   Thus the Reader provides an aspect of the crisis that stands as an example to the utter infantile tendency of capital, essentially lumpen in character, in some poor societies: workers protests, even concerns for ecology are termed anti-national activity planned to torpedo national economy. The style tries to distort development of contradictions. But the attempted distortion ultimately will harm the dominating interests replete with immaturity.
   Farooque Chowdhury contributes on socioeconomic issues. Age of Crisis is one of his latest books.

This editorial published at The NEWAGE, Daily newspaper, Bangladesh.