Re: Streeck, Taking Back Control (2024)

I haven't read Streeck, so I don't know the arguments in which he embeds these observations. But anyway, here are some reactions to what he says. Certainly, the new class divide is between those who are beneficiaries of globalisation, and those who are not. I am just not sure about what I gather are Steeck's solutions. Such things as free trade are not themselves intrinsically bad or against the interests of the working class. (I take no rigid ideological stance on free trade versus tariffs, but a policy of tariffs for my country would be utterly disastrous right now, and everyone here knows it.) What is bad is the breakdown of a wider framework that enabled countries to pursue a social democratic course. The mobility of capital was the culprit here, and the lack of any political will to curtail the freedom of capital to maximise profit for the sake of wider social objectives. And this was also a failure of the left to be sufficiently radical when faced with the changed market conditions in the late 70s. When Streeck says that the global elite are in favour of migration as a pool of cheap labour, I would make a couple of points: (1) nearly all studies that I have read suggest either that migrants have no impact at all on wages, or only a very marginal effect. After all, migrants spend money as well; they create jobs, start businesses, and pay taxes (when they are permitted to create wealth). Nor can I see how it is possible to maintain social services at even their current, and very inadequate, level, with a shrinking tax base. Of course, it may be possible for radical policies to bring about a return to more traditional family structures and an increase in fertility; but until this is achieved, it would be rash for Europe to refuse the assistance that is available as a result of the higher fertility rates of the rest of the world. (2) I don't know how Streeck would deal with the moral argument for open borders; namely, by what right do we deny others the economic opportunities that we take for granted, simply because they had the misfortune to be born on the wrong side of an imaginary line? Do I care about the erosion of "Englishness" by migrant communities? If it were the old England, I think I would care, at least I would care enough to be worried about the potential impact of other cultures on the native English culture. But the real threat to English culture came from the US, and it has swept all before it. And the resultant modern England of total surveillance and endless sex hysteria is not something in which I am able to find anything worthy of preservation. But if I am not mistaken, the era of globalisation is over anyway. Nationalism has taken over, though it does not at the moment look as though it is going to benefit the working class. Still, despite the general awfulness of the new dispensation, I am pleased that America is following a new nationalist course, because it weakens the whole Western alliance, and thus furthers the cause of the more globally democratic world that must come before the end of the century if humanity is to avoid the total destruction of the biosphere from nuclear war. A country like the US can pursue a nationalist path. But the "little bits of nations" (Russell, 1923) into which Europe is divided can hardly be expected to win out if they pursue the same path. One of the advantages of the EU is that it enables the countries of Europe to obtain far more favourable trade deals with other blocs than would be possible if each nation were negotiating its own trade deal separately. With regard to second paragraph of what you quote, it is indeed significant that the new middle class has control over the media. 75 years ago, the British middle class thought itself morally superior to the upper and working class, but they had no ambition to change them. Different classes, with different values, were regarded as a fact of life. In other words, society was more Pluralistic. The new moral imperialism is not just within society, but a global imperialism, in which it is felt necessary to export American values (for "Western" values really just means values that spring from America) around the world. Feminism is part of these entrenched values that America feels compelled to spread elsewhere, with the inevitable concomitant persecution of adult erotic and romantic interest in the young. To me, the globalisation that is undesirable is everything that is linked with the Anglosphere spreading its cultural tentacles around the world. This is linked to its desire to retain privileged access to the world's raw materials, to leverage its ownership of capital to exploit other countries whilst keeping them relatively poor, and to create global trade rules favourable to itself. All this is now being challenged by the rise of BRICS and the Global South. Insofar as globalisation is a euphemism for Anglosphere domination, I certainly think we should oppose it. But this surely has little to do with migration by the "poor beggars" (Pope Francis) of the world to the Anglosphere and Europe (except insofar as Western bombing of poor countries creates refugees). On the contrary, one of the complaints of the Right (which Streeck seems to endorse) is that migration is domestically eroding the very "Western values" that the Anglosphere seek to export to others. To me, that's an argument for more migration, not less. I am very much in favour of "localist-particularistic" obligations, but for this to be possible there must be genuine communities. What is needed is more power both upwards (to challenge the supremacy of capital) and downwards (to build communities based on self-government) - but the latter are precarious without the former. So I would say less power to the nation state, rather than more. I am not at all sure about this new Leftism that seeks to combine Leftism with Nationalism. To me, a return to the little nation state will make it more difficult for states to challenge globally mobile capital, not less.