[Reader-list] Guardian Unlimited: Daring to dream

[Keith Hart]

Sanjay,

I know that food, clothing and shelter are basic needs and that an 
obscene proportion of humanity lacks adequate supplies of them. In a 
recent article, 'The political economy of food in an unequal world'  
http://www.thememorybank.co.uk/papers/polecon_food, I tried to show that 
western dominance of global food markets was the principal obstacle to 
the development of poor countries and the lynchpin of a racist 
international division of labour. Textliles, stimulants and construction 
are always the lead sectors in the early stages of capitalist 
development. But the market for information services is huge and 
growing. Yesterday, in an anti-piracy tract issued by the Motion Picture 
Association posted to this list, they claimed that "the US motion 
picture industry loses in excess of $3 billion annually in potential 
world revenue due to piracy". Imagine how much they make, if this is 
what they lost. The coercive system of intellectual property rights and 
most of the asociated legal action is designed to protect rents 
extracted from this sector, after the drugs industry of course. There 
would not be so much anxiety in the western media about the loss of 
'middle class' jobs to India and elsewhere, if this were not a strategic 
area for contemporary capital. I agree that priorities look different 
from the opposite end of the economic scale. But it might pay Africans 
to try to sell more cultural products that they already excel in, such 
as music, rather than competeer in overcrowded world markets for raw 
materials.

I hold no brief for the British empire. Indeed I left Britain because my 
countrymen appear to be incapable of waking up from their long 
post-imperial hangover. I was simply drawing attention to India's 
strategic centrality to the global political economy of the 19th 
century. In 1870, 17 out of 20 British civil servants worked in India. 
The other European powers did everything they could to break the link 
between the two places. The Suez canal was built to strengthen it. And 
the Commonwealth is a considerable organization that, in my view, could 
benefit from more active Indian leadership. If in the 20th century the 
peoples forced to join world society by western imperialism fought back 
to claim at least their nominal independence, India has played a leading 
role in that movement and could play an even bigger one. My 'fantasy' 
explores a scenario in which your country throws its weight around 
rather more than it has so far. Do we all depend on the American 
electorate or, to bring us back to the origin of this exchange, the 
European Union, to save us from global fascism?

Keith

www.thememorybank.co.uk


sanjay ghosh wrote:

>Dear Keith,
>
>You haven't even remotely offended me. I broadly agree with the 'content' of your Rifkin critique. Vaguely repeating myself again, I think we should nourish positive thoughts and not let our egos get in the way of the content. I see myself as a vehicle for an idea, ideas are much bigger than people.  
>
>You seem to have a very evolved projection / fantasy of the future. Even if the drift of manufacturing centres don't dent the western domination, negative population growth would certainly do the white race in. My views and projections are rather down to earth. I personally don't think very highly of the 'Anglo-Indian superstate'. I think it was an exploitative arrangement and whatever merits we assign to it it postumously, were essentially unmanageable side effects.
>
>The relevant part of my 'ancient roots' were essentially spiritual. I think 7-8 centuries of foreign domination and one bad social experiment (caste structuring) has completely destroyed the 'great' part of the great ancient Indian civilisation. At least it has been wiped out of the public space. The best parts have gone underground and only surface posturings remain visible. As regarding the religion that this place (unlike 'religions') brought to this world, I think it's present form is a cruel joke. This doesn't mean that other religions are in any better state. We live in a world where Bush Jr is setting the standards for 'christian values'. External posturings have become so overwhelming that the spiritual component of religion has completely vapourised. In these circumstances, the 'material world' intellectuals can't even figure what we've lost. That's why I say we live in the ghost of an ancient civilisation.
>
>My benchmark for information services is that you can't eat information. Indian primary standards are 'roti, kapta. makaan' (bread, clothing, shelter) of which the last 2 are essentially the same. You can live without information but you can't live without food, even shelter.
>
>Best of luck with your book.
>Sanjay
>
>  
>