Dale T McKinley
crossfire
African National Congress MP Ben Turok (“A conflict is looming between two worlds”, February 16 to 22) tries very hard to emulate those liberal capitalists-cum-sensitive human beings who always want to have it both ways.
In Turok’s case, he waxes lyrical about the “new” anti-globalisation social movements taking on nasty capitalist governments across the world while simultaneously telling us (with an air of seriousness) that the South African government wants to use its position in international political and economic bodies (the very ones most of the social movements are trying to destroy) to “our own advantage and for the benefit of mankind generally”. What hypocritical nonsense.
Since when did lefties join the shrill chorus of capitalist liberalism and decide that South Africa is now an “our”? Has Turok forgotten that South Africa is one of the most unequal societies in the world? We do not have to look far to see that the real divide is between a small minority of capitalists and associated political appendages, and a growing majority of the excluded and poor.
Likewise, the track record of the South African government on the international front has not been consistent with realising benefits for “mankind generally”. Or, are “we” to understand that the Saudi royal family, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, the Iranian ayatollahs or the publicly celebrated capitalist buddies of President Thabo Mbeki and Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel are part of one big happy family of mankind seeking common relief?
In one breath it’s about how everything is the fault of Western whitey capitalists; in the next it’s telling the citizenry that it’s okay to become a “good” (Third World) capitalist. Talk about strategic schizophrenia.
With this contorted “left” perspective it is no wonder that Turok highlights the role played at the World Social Forum by what he calls the “serious critics who are deeply concerned about the current forms of globalisation and neo-liberalism”, while dismissing the rest as “ultra-leftists” or “anarchists”. If it was not for thousands of activists honest enough to engage in hard-nosed anti-capitalist struggles, there would be no movement for such “serious critics” to latch on to.
Do the billions of human beings who are daily crushed by the barbarism of capitalism really need “an abundance of evidence” showing the connection between their experience and increasing inequality/poverty? Is it not self-evident? Maybe government bureaucrats, institutionalised intellectuals and corporate NGO types need to discuss such “evidence”. But the actual “subjects” need no convincing.
Anti-globalisation has become fashionable, even among arch capitalists such as George Soros and Bill Gates. Even worse are “left” European and political leaders from the developing world who decry the excesses of globalisation but screw the poor at home anyway.
How can European parliamentarians be taken seriously in Porto Alegre when the poor on their continent are daily smashed by the kinder, gentler face of capitalism they daily help sustain but do not confront?
Ben, a global parliamentary network is simply not going to cut it in the fight against the ravages of capitalist globalisation. In South Africa most parliamentarians can’t even pluck up the courage to fend off a ludicrous and expensive arms deal. Where is the support for loudly proclaimed “citizen’s social movement initiatives” from progressive South African MPs when people in Alexandra are dumped in the open veld and told to wait for housing “delivery”?
It was not the “diligent researchers” and left luminaries who made Porto Alegre a potentially powerful starting point for a more committed anti- capitalism (although some of their efforts were useful). It was the ordinary activists, students and peasants who carry the fight.
In reality, the last thing Porto Alegre was about was the “search for an alternative model” Turok speaks of. Rather, the World Social Forum suggested the possibilities of a different world (a different country) lie in the daily struggles of the billions of poor.
What good is “recovering the right to a sustainable development path” on a global scale when so-called progressives in positions of power seem more interested in ensuring the sustenance of their personal “developmental rights” (not to mention political positions).
If such “lefties” can’t lift a finger to stop the privatisation of Johannesburg’s water supplies or of mass public transport systems then they have no business engaging in grandiose talk about “sustainable development, social movements” and even less so about strategies for the left.