[Reader-list] 2011: An Arab Springtime? Samir Amin

[Venugopalan K M]

 Sunday June 19th, 2011
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2011: An Arab Springtime? Samir Amin<http://monthlyreview.org/author/samiramin>



"....They are in reality a component of the comprador bourgeoisie. They have
taken their stand against large strikes by the working class and against the
struggles of poor peasants to hold on to their lands. So the Muslim
Brotherhood are “moderate” only in the double sense that they refuse to
present any sort of economic and social program, thus in fact accepting
without question reactionary neoliberal policies, and that they are
submissive *de facto* to the enforcement of U.S, control over the region and
the world. They thus are useful allies for Washington (and does the U.S.
have a better ally than their patron, the Saudis?) which now vouches for
their “democratic credentials....
”...Political Islam throughout the Muslim world is quite assuredly a
strategic ally of the United States and its NATO minority partners.
Washington armed and financed the Taliban, who they called “Freedom
Fighters,” in their war against the national/popular regime (termed
“communist”) in Afghanistan before, during, and after the Soviet
intervention. When the Taliban shut the girls’ schools created by the
“communists” there were “democrats” and even “feminists” at hand to claim
that it was necessary to “respect traditions!”...."

...."Finally. some words about “corruption.” Most speech from the
“transition regime” concentrates on denouncing it and threatening
prosecution (Mubarak, his wife, and some others arrested, but what will
actually happen remaining to be seen). This discourse is certainly well
received, especially by the major part of naïve public opinion. But they
take care not to analyze its deeper causes and to teach that “corruption”
(presented in the moralizing style of American speech as individual
immorality) is an organic and necessary component in the formation of the
bourgeoisie. And not merely in the case of Egypt and of the Southern
countries in general, where if a comprador bourgeoisie is to be formed the
sole way for that to take place is in association with the state apparatus.
I maintain that at the stage of generalized monopoly capitalism corruption
has become a basic organic component in the reproduction of its accumulation
model: rent-seeking monopolies require the active complicity of the State.
Its ideological discourse (the “liberal virus”) proclaims “state hands off
the economy” while its practice is “state in service to the monopolies.”...

".. The ongoing U.S. project of military control over the planet by its
armed forces, supported by their NATO lieutenants, the erosion of democracy
in the imperialist core countries, and the medievalistical rejection of
democracy within Southern countries in revolt (taking the form of
“fundamentalist” semi-religious delusions disseminated by political Islam,
political Hinduism, political Buddhism) all work together toward that
dreadful outcome. At the current time the struggle for secularist
democratization is crucial for the perspective of popular emancipation,
crucial for opposition to the perspective of generalized barbarism."






You cannot build anything on the foundations of caste. You cannot build up a
nation, you cannot build up a morality. Anything that you will build on the
foundations of caste will crack and will never be a whole.
-AMBEDKAR



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