Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

"In Turkey, the Regime Slides from Soft to Hard Totalitarianism"

San Francisco tech worker: 'I don't want to see homeless riff-raff' "The residents of this amazing city no longer feel safe. I know people are frustrated about gentrification happening in the city, but the reality is, we live in a free market society. The wealthy working people have earned their right to live in the city. They went out, got an education, work hard, and earned it. I shouldn’t have to worry about being accosted. I shouldn’t have to see the pain, struggle, and despair of homeless people to and from my way to work every day. I want my parents when they come visit to have a great experience, and enjoy this special place."

Modernism and Imperialism " But such is not the only restriction on the present topic: it also involves some restrictions that concern its other term — imperialism — which must also now be delimited. I take it, for instance, that only those theories of imperialism which acknowledge the Marxist problematic (in however heretical or revisionist a fashion) are of concern here, since it is only within that problematic that a coordination between political phenomena (violence, domination, control, state power) and economic phenomena (the market, investment, exploitation, underconsumption, crisis) is systematically pursued. Exclusively political theories of imperialism (such as Schumpeter’s) slip not merely towards moralizing, but also towards metaphysical notions of human nature (the lust for power or domination), which end up dissolving the historical specificity of the thing itself and disperse the phenomenon of imperialism throughout human history, wherever bloody conquests are to...

Tsai Ming-liang talks about ‘Stray Dogs’

Unmasking Global Capitalism

Investment, investment, investment

A letter from under Russian bombs in Aleppo

"'I'm not a great fan' of Netanyahu, Sanders admits; as a Jew, he had always admired a different Israeli leader, David Ben-Gurion, the social democrat."  David Ben-Gurion: "A partial Jewish State is not the end, but only the beginning. … I am certain that we well not be prevented from settling in the other parts of the country, either by mutual agreements with our Arab neighbors  or by some other means. . . [If the Arabs refuse] we shall have to speak to them in another language. But we shall only have another language if we have a state ." —  As quoted in   Chomsky, Noam,  Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel, and the Palestinians (Updated Edition) (South End Press Classics Series) . "If I knew that it was possible to save all the children of Germany by transporting them to England, and only half by transferring them to the Land of Israel, I would choose the latter, for before us lies not only the numbers of these children but the histor...

Top academics including Noam Chomsky, Judith Butler condemn Centre’s action at JNU

The list of those who have been involved in the big crimes is long...  Blood Traces: Bernie’s Iraq War Hypocrisy

Robert J Gordon and the rise and fall of American capitalism "[A]re we entering a new industrial revolution like the early 19 th  century that will give capitalism a new lease of life in developing the productive forces, even if it means loss of jobs for hundreds of millions and rising inequality of income and wealth?  Or are the new ‘disruptive technologies’ just a mirage that will change little in increasing economic growth and productivity, as Gordon argues?"

Toward a Political Economy of the Arab Uprisings (Part One) Toward a Political Economy of the Arab Uprisings (Part Two)

The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine President Franklin D. Roosevelt (enough time before the actual cleansing of Palestine)   put it in December 1942 ,  “I actually would put a barbed wire around Palestine, and I would begin to move the Arabs out of Palestine…. Each time we move out an Arab we would bring in another Jewish family…” And this was exactly what happened with planned massacres !! Also , The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine   (e-book)  My interview with Ilan Pappe  (audio)

From the archive: my  comment on an old article on the Economist A good piece. The Economist mentioning class and classes is interesting. Some hint to the failure of modernization and its consequnces. A cleverly woven arguments to put some of the causes on "socialism". At the end of the day, the Economist should tell us that neither "socialism or "Islamism" is the solution and should not tell us how the development of international capitalism impacts on the level of developments of the Arab countries. Mentioning China is very interesting although it is meant to serve the editorial line. China has achieved what she achieved not because "it embraced capitalism", but because of revolution, opening to the world market but with control of the commanding heights (see the Economist itself a couple of years ago). I consider the following as facts which the Economist (for idelologically reasons) cannot mention.  1. The general structure of the Ar...

The Goldman Sachs Theory of Capitalism Goldman Sachs economists are questioning the efficacy of capitalism — but for all the wrong reasons.

The enemy is at home

"The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them." — George Orwell

There are countless examples of imperialist hypocrisy... Here is the latest one: " Italian ministers claim they seek the truth—but which one? The truth about the man who dealt the killing blow or the system that is built on that blow?" Hollow Words: Egypt, Italy, and Justice for Giulio

The Phantasies of Kamel Daoud Also Cologne: Three out of 58 men arrested over mass sex attack on New Year's Eve were refugees from Syria or Iraq

Kamal Daoud and the Sexual Misery of the Arab World " Politicizing Arab and Muslim women’s sexual tragedies and the cultural mores that lead to violence and inequity as props for popular consumption is not advocacy. It’s not even an act of vulnerability. What is an act of vulnerability is an understanding that that patriarchal oppression here and social mores as they relate to sex are inextricably linked to other exploitative practices found in authoritarianism, colonialism, liberalism, religion, or yes, even secularism."

What would T E Lawrence do?

How the BBC Abandoned Investigative Reporting Investigations aim to hold power to account, and one of the most powerful institutions is the government. People ask me is the BBC biased, and my answer is that the fundamental corporate bias is pro-government, regardless of party. It’s the licence fee – stupid. Of course, not every story will be pro-government but the overwhelming narrative will be.

Benjamin's Critique of Violence “For a cause” Benjamin writes “becomes violent, in the precise sense of the word, when it enters into moral relations” (p. 236). Benjamin is thus not interested in force or violence of nature ( Naturgewalt ); but the violence present within the framework of the society, and ultimately, the state. If violence as a means is directed towards natural ends—as in the case of interstate war where one or more states use violence to ignore historically acknowledged laws such as borders—the violence will be lawmaking. This violence strives towards a “peace ceremony” that will constitute a new historically acknowledged law; new historically acknowledged borders. The distinction between lawmaking violence and law-preserving violence is however deconstructed in the body of the police and in capital punishment, whereby the “rotten” core of the law is revealed, namely, that law is a manifestation of violent domination for its own sake.  In both capita...

The British curriculum sanitises the history of slavery by isolating it as an aberration of evil. Slavery built the west. Acknowledging that is the first step to undoing its damage. "The (optional, rather than required) teaching on transatlantic slavery freezes its horrors as a past phenomenon of more barbarous times. In doing so, it provides a framing that allows white liberals to fondly reminisce about Britain’s heroes of abolition. The same logic is at work when ‘modern day’ slavery is described as the legacy of the African holocaust. Instead of addressing the actual legacy of the system of slavery – the continued oppression and structural disadvantagement of black populations in the west and the disconnection caused between the diaspora and African continent – this framing permits white liberals to embrace the abolitionist spirit of the past. It allows them to fight the good fight against ‘human trafficking’, perpetrated by those supposedly (and conveniently) coming from th...

Shunning Israeli goods to become criminal offence for public bodies and student unions "Evidently state involvement in economic decision making is acceptable for an ostensible "free market", provided of course such involvement goes some way to shoring up British relations with a colonial, criminal entity called Israel. The latter also being an important customer for British weapons exports." — Daniel Read

Scams we are still paying for T he big short , based on the best-selling book of the same name by Michael Lewis, is up for an Oscar this month. " The big short  makes no attempt to look at the wider picture: why did the housing market become a massive credit bubble that went bust and why did it spread across the globe into the worst economic slump since the 1930s."

India: The New Casteism

Researcher illegally shares millions of science papers free online to spread knowledge The UN Declaration of Human Rights  states that  "everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits".

Walter Benjamin in Palestine " It was impossible, for one thing, to forget how far the suffocation of Palestinian intellectual life that Israeli policy has aimed at does have effects, as surely as the neo-liberal economic and political regime of the Palestinian Authority has so visibly collaborated with the destruction of the environment, or as steadily as the influx of NGOs has sapped the grassroots organizations that sustained Palestinian resistance in previous moments of resistance."

"This isn’t about Sanders, per se, though nobody who funds or justifies colonization should be reduced to symbolism. It’s about an American tradition of subsuming the wretched to the practical needs of a corrupt electoral system. We have to consider ways to undermine notions of pragmatism that pretend to be innocuous and neutral while stifling the aspirations of multiple communities at home and abroad. Sanders has done important work, but his foreign policy platform, as exemplified by  his feeble position on Israel , gets in the way of his domestic program. Sanders also has  a record  of funding or rationalizing terrible violence. We shouldn’t whisk away that record. It’s a material example of Sanders’s performance as a senator and has direct consequences on the  lives of millions in the Middle East."

Can We Avoid the Oncoming Recession? "For Keynesians, you can create extra spending through money creation.  This leads to increased employment and then to increased income and growth and thus to more profits.  But the reality of the capitalist system is the other way round.  Only if profitability is sufficient, will investment increase and lead to more jobs and then incomes and consumption.  The demand for money will rise accordingly.  Artificial money creation by fiat from the government does not get round this – as the experience of ‘quantitative easing’ has already shown. Instead, we must look at what is happening with profits and profitability.  And as  I have shown in several previous posts , the profitability of business capital in the major economies is near historic post-1945 lows and the limited recovery in profitability since 2009 has come to an end.  Indeed, global corporate profit growth has ground to a halt and is now falling...

Ellen Meiksins Wood obituary Democracy Against Capitalism (1995) dissected the conflict between capitalism and democracy. Ellen showed that by legally relegating issues of property, ownership and work to the private sector, capitalism confines public power to electoral politics. In so doing, it empties democracy of its original meaning as the power of the common people, leaving workers precariously exposed to market forces. In order to counter this, she advised that we need to reimagine democracy as containing freedom from the dictates of the market. This would require democratic control by those who produce the wealth over the conditions of its production and distribution."

Capitalism: Competition, Conflict and Crises

Awled Amreeka? "It seems  Awled Moufida  provided a glimpse at gender and socioeconomic power in Tunisian relationships through popular media. Tunisia’s social ills are seen, however, through that familiar lens of Western appropriation. The topics Fehri chose to address in the series are of substance and pertinent to Tunisia’s social growth; however, when Fehri could have chosen to reject the notion of  hogra , he chose to endorse it. When he could have chosen to abandon damaging patriarchal gender roles, he, instead, chose to reinforce them.  Awled Moufida  gives a dim view of Tunisian society and turns mediocrity into sensationalism that ultimately serves imperial interests by diverting attention from the real issues facing the people of Tunisia: social and gender inequality and economic despair."

Rare Easter Rising photos show Dublin in rubble