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smit se divio lenjinu a hana arent hajdegeru. to njega ne cini komunistom a nju nacistom :)na jednom drugom topiku sam preporucio knjizicu/prepisku nolte-fire neprijateljska bliskost o odnosu komunizma i fasizma u XX veku.

daleko od toga da sam to tvrdio, ili želeo da anticipiram. moj komentar je bio usmeren na nešto drugo, što sad možda načelno nije tema - na onu povezanost između teorijskog i praktičkog u filozofskom promišljanju, gde i nacoš poput hajdegera pokušava u mraku svog tubitkovanja da napipa nešto što mu je izgleda promaklo. kasnije će levinas odlično primetiti u svojoj kritici fenomenologije huserla i hajdegera, da se taj diskurs o modelu kartezijanske meditacije, na koji pretenduje huserl, mora izmestiti u sferu intersubjektivnosti, što sa sobom nosi automatski prelazak u područije etičkog. o tome govori i adorno kad ih naziva metafizičkim beskućnicima, koji kao da vire kroz puškarnice nekog tornja na crno nebo na kojem treba da se pojavi zvezda ideje ili bitka. itd, primera je mnogo. na kraju krajeva, još i fihte sugeriše na odluku između metafizike i revolucije.

[kim_philby]

daleko od toga da sam to tvrdio, ili želeo da anticipiram. moj komentar je bio usmeren na nešto drugo, što sad možda načelno nije tema - na onu povezanost između teorijskog i praktičkog u filozofskom promišljanju, gde i nacoš poput hajdegera pokušava u mraku svog tubitkovanja da napipa nešto što mu je izgleda promaklo. kasnije će levinas odlično primetiti u svojoj kritici fenomenologije huserla i hajdegera, da se taj diskurs o modelu kartezijanske meditacije, na koji pretenduje huserl, mora izmestiti u sferu intersubjektivnosti, što sa sobom nosi automatski prelazak u područije etičkog. o tome govori i adorno kad ih naziva metafizičkim beskućnicima, koji kao da vire kroz puškarnice nekog tornja na crno nebo na kojem treba da se pojavi zvezda ideje ili bitka. itd, primera je mnogo. na kraju krajeva, još i fihte sugeriše na odluku između metafizike i revolucije.

nacelno se slazem. inace kritika hitlerizma je jedino sto sam citao od levinasa (kako bi se reklo bez posrednika). jako lep citat adorna. bas za fragmente.edit: pa da adornova kritika hajdegera se moze primeniti i na badijua (odnosno njegov dogadjaj). to mi do sada nije bilo palo na pamet. Edited April 28, 2011 by kim_philby

[transcending]

nacelno se slazem. inace kritika hitlerizma je jedino sto sam citao od levinasa (kako bi se reklo bez posrednika). jako lep citat adorna. bas za fragmente.edit: pa da adornova kritika hajdegera se moze primeniti i na badijua (odnosno njegov dogadjaj). to mi do sada nije bilo palo na pamet.

može i ovo:

Negative DialecticsBy Theodor AdornoSuhrkamp Verlag © 1970 Frankfurt am MainOriginal text is copyright ©1997 by Suhrkamp Verlag. The text of thistranslation is copyright ©2001 Dennis RedmondEveryplace the world is preparing to pass over into the horror of social order, not into what the apologetic philosophies overtly or covertly lament as its opposite. That freedom remained largely an ideology; that human beings are powerless before the system and are not capable of determining their life and that of the whole through reason; indeed that they cannot even think the thought of such, without suffering even more, ensorcels their rebellion into its inverted form: they invidiously prefer the worse to the appearance [schein] of something better. The contemporary philosophies have their share in contributing to this. They already feel themselves in tune with the dawning order of the mightiest interests, while they, like Hitler, tragically bear the lonely risk. That they pose as metaphysically homeless and bound up in nothingness, is the ideology of justification as much as of the social order, which causes humanity to despair and threatens it with physical extermination.

inače, ovo adornovo neodoljivo podseća na ono ničeovo objašnjenje o mogućnosti da slab moral (hrišćanstvo) bude trijumfujući - "lieber will der mensch noch das nichts wollen, als nicht wollen". a hajdeger se polomi da nam objasni kako niče, kritikujući platonizam, na zadnja vrata ulazi u metafiziku; i da se navodno kod ničea radi o prekretanju platonizma. a isti taj ključ, vezano za prelaz u polje etike, može da se primeni i na ničea, kada se govori o njegovoj kritici ontologije.

[hazard]

komunisticki eksperiment se zaista zavrsio nizom katastrofa ali on nije ni prvi ni poslednji kome se to desilo. nista nam ne garantuje da slicna sudbina ne ceka i evropske socijaldemokratije (koje su vec jedared zavrsile u fasizmu) ili kineski autoritarni kapitalizam.

Naravno da nam nista ne garantuje, ali ja samo navodim neke nepobitne istorijske cinjenice. Imas rezultate "velikog skoka napred" s jedne strane, a sa druge strane imas rezultate socijalizma sa kineskim karakteristikama iliti socijalisticku trzisnu ekonomiju. Sve vrlo lepo, crno na belo. Vidi se sta je efektivnije eliminisalo siromastvo i podizalo standard stanovnistva, sto je inace glavno ono sto socijalizam (i komunizam) tvrdi da nudi.

socijaldemokratije su osim odricanja od revolucionarne borbe takodje donele i jednu progresivisticku teleologiju koju je kasnije i staljinizam usvojio: radio ne radio svira ti radio. odnosno, pobeda socijalisticke (komunisticke) ideje je neizbezna, svet nezadrzivo ide napred i sada je sve stvar jednostavne dijalektike i rada sa gradjanima. problem je sto nedugo zatim desio istorijski sunovrat drugog svetskog rata. ili kao primecuje benjamin 'kada masine ne zanju one bacaju bombe'.

Da ali su mnoge socijaldemokrate odbacile i takve ideje s novom generacijom politicara 80ih i 90ih gde je konacno i odbacena ta socijalisticka/komunisticka ideja u ekonomskom smislu potpuno i kada je poceo da dominira "Third Way" (vidi pod New Labour i sl.). Tako da imamo progres levice od socijalistickih/komunistickih revolucionara do demokratskih socijalista i gradualista do socijaldemokrata frankfurtske deklaracije do treceputasa. Menjstrim levicarske politicke stranke su prosle put od toga da traze da radnici kontrolisu proizvodnju (komunizam) preko toga kroz demokratske institucije polako preuzimaju kontrolu nad ekonomijom i implementiraju svoj program (gradualizam koji ti spominjes) do toga da drzava treba da kontrolise veliki deo ekonomije koja je u srzi kapitalisticka i da intervenise zestoko (etatizam francuskog tipa recimo) do toga da je najbolje ekonomiju pustiti da radi po svojim, kapitalistickim slobodno trzisnim zakonitostima, a da drzava treba da bude tu da kroz redistribuciju pomaze siromasnima i nadje se ljudima kada su u nevolji, kada su bez posla itd. (treceputastvo).Ja tu vidim jedno kontinuirano prilagodjavanje levicarskih politickih snaga liberalnom slobodno-trzisnom kapitalizmu, do konacnog shvatanja da od toga, sto se ekonomije tice, nema boljeg a da je drzava tu da pomogne i usmeri pomalo ali ne i da komanduje (treceputastvo, dakle).

dakle, u momentu kada je roza luksemburg napisala: ili socijalizam ili varvarstvo ona je bila (objektivno, istorijski) u pravu. odnosno prilicno tacno je anticipirala nadolazecu plimu fasizma kome mora da se suprotstave drugi oblici ljudske solidarnosti do onih zasnovanih na (uglavnom) imaginarnim zajednicama krvi i tla.

Ja i dalje kazem da nije bila upravu. Ti spominjes oblike ljudske solidarnosti koji "moraju" da se suprotstave fasizmu - i na taj nacin si zarobljen fakticki u kolektivistickom nacinu razmisljanja. Vidis levi kolektivizam (socijalizam/komunizam) kao jedino sto moze biti opozicija desnom kolektivizmu (fasizam/nacizam) pritom uopste ne uzimajuci u obzir da je odgovor ne nekakav drugaciji kolektivizam, ili totalitarizam, nego upravo susta suprotnost - individualisticki liberalizam. Odgovor na trazenje prava "organskog" kolektiva (nacija/rasa) nije pravljenje "klasnog" kolektiva (radnici/seljaci) i njegovog prava nego insistiranje na pravu pojedinca i pravu slobodne asocijacije izmedju ljudi. Drugim recima, postovanje individualizma i prava na *dobrovoljni* a ne nametnuti (klasni ili rasni) kolektivizam.Dakle ja kazem opet, to je trazenje odgovora na pogresnom mestu. Jer sa kolektivizmima, desnim ili levim, pravila igre su ista (postavka te igre je naravno, razlicita). U principu ti kazes ako igramo fudbal, ako oni igraju preko bokova mi treba da igramo kroz sredinu, a ja ti kazem, treba da odemo sa stadiona i igramo tenis, i da prevucemo gledaoce da dodju nas da gledaju a ne njih.

sto se jugoslovenskog komunistickog eksperimenta tice i on se zavrsio u neuspehu ali mi se tu vec ne slazemo na druom topiku i pitanje ja sta mu je bila alternativa i sta konstituise neuspeh. tokom samog rata i revolucije vec se videlo da je jedina viabilna alternativa pan-jugoslovneskom socijalizmu tribalisticko varvarstvo (sa zlicicom monarhizma). otuda je antikomunizam u drugom ratu na ovim prostorima fakticki i bio anti-antifasizam.

Ovde se ne slazemo uopste ali to je vec za drugi topik. Mozemo da otvorimo sbb-kbb topik o Jugoslaviji bez komunista pa da diskutujemo tamo. Socijalizam je doneo svoja varvarstva preko kojih je posle predjeno a isto tako bi bilo i sa nacionalistickim varvarstvima.

bolje receno ovako: u poslednja dva veke leve (ili levo-liberalne) ideje su one koje su pokusavale da emancipuju i ukljuce sto je veci broj ljudi (zene, robovi, kolonije...). sto bi rekao drug mao: komunizam je biti protiv reakcionara.

Ali sta su "levo-liberalne" ideje i sta su reakcionari? Neko ko je 1950. "reakcionar" i "konzervativac" je mozda 1800. najveci revolucionar i progresivista. Ne moze da se citira "drug Mao" i da se tako sve sto je napredno svrstava pod komunizam, ne ide. Komunizam nije napredak niti progres vec jedan vrlo specifican sistem cija je ekonomska komponenta najbitniji deo cele price. Ideje o emancipaciji zena, robova itd. su vrlo liberalne ideje koje se zasnivaju na principima individualne slobode i dostojanstva. Pazi Linkoln je bio republikanac, na jugu su demokrate bile za ropstvo, a republikanci pored, a na severu su demokrate bile za to da se na lokalu "demokratski" (naravno bez ucesca robova) odlucuje da li ce se robovi osloboditi ili ne. I kakav je udeo marksizma u celoj toj debati npr.? Skoro pa nikakav. I onda opet u vreme borbe za civilna prava, juzni demokrati (dakle levi deo spektra, sindikati tralalala) su za nastavak segregacije. Tako da nije sve uvek tako crno-belo. Naravno, ne sporim guranje korisnih i pozeljnih drustvenih reformi od strane levice, ali kazem to nije jedino njihova zasluga i ne mozemo sve progresivne ideje proglasiti za "leve" a kamoli za socijalisticke.

kao sto rekoh: mi jos uvek cekamo racun za ovaj eksperiment. paternalizam i sovinizam putinove rusije, probudjeni kineski nacionalizam (bio je na pescaniku lep tekst o mladim kineskim filozofima koji citaju karla smita) ili nesto vec trece je takodje posledica ovog trenda. andre malro je lepo primetio da niko u moskvi 1934. godine nije ni mogao da zamisli uzase velike cistke i da je sve licilo na atmosferu pariskih salona. opet, ovde kazem da ti imas jedan 'naucan' stav prema ljudskoj buducnosti. na primeru ovog suvinovog teksta vidimo da postoji i jedna druga linija (filozofskog) marksizma koja kaze da je buducnost otvorena. ili da parafraziramo marksa: istorija napreduje ali ne uvek dobrom stranom. nesretni indi nista od ovoga nije razumeo. btw, ova rasprava koju vodimo nije za ovaj topik. na ovom topiku bi trebalo da se prica o 11 tezi o fojerbahu i o zadatku filozofije i odnosu filozofije i marksizma kao samoproklamovanog ukidanja filozofskog misljenja i tako dalje. tekstovi koje sam ovde kacio (sa izuzetkom mocnikovog ali i on je dobra ilustracija) su ilustracije promisljanja koja su od izuzetne vaznosti za ova pitanja.

Prvo mislim da ne treba da mesamo Rusiju u to drustvo, to nije slobodno-trzisni kapitalizam. Oni su prosli kroz fazu oligarho-kapitalisticke pljackaske tranzicije pod Jeljcinom da bi zbog iste zavrsili u Putinovom oligarho-etatistickom korporatizmu. Doduse tamo bar postoji simulakrum demokratije pa ima nade da ce se u nekom trenutku nesto i promeniti na bolje (nadam se). Mada su i Kina i Rusija dobar primer autoritarne drzave izasle iz komunizma koja pokusava da se prilagodi novoj ekonomskoj realnosti, manje ili vise uspesno. S tim sto Kina pokusava da zadrzi kom./soc. boju na svom autoritarizmu dok je u Rusiji na delu ogoljeni autoritarizam koji se naravno vise hvata za naciju, patriotizam i slicno. Ali je u sustini vise etatisticki nego nacionalisticki. Dalje, kakve god minuse mozemo pripisati Kini, sada ili ubuduce, ne mozemo te minuse prepisati liberalizmu ili liberalnoj demokratiji, jer je za to potrebno vise od slobodnog trzisnog uredjenja iliti "kapitalizma", to je jedan set drustvenih odnosa, ne samo ekonomskih. Ako Kina zavrsi u nekom fasizmu to ce biti zbog toga sto njihova autoritarna drzava ne zeli da se odrekne vlasti a ne zato sto je to nuzan ishod trzisne ekonomije.Medjutim, mi imamo primere autoritarnih drzava sa liberalnijim ekonomijama koje su se posle liberalizovale i politicki i postale demokratije: J. Koreja, Tajvan, Cile a donekle mozemo da ubrojimo i Portugaliju i Spaniju (mada su to vec druge specificnosti, izlazak iz bona fide fasizma, itd.). Tako da mozemo da kazemo da ekonomske slobode u nekom trenutku dovode do zahteva i za politickim slobodama.

pa pitanje je i sta je progresivizam uopste? ovde se radi, kao sto je suvin rekao, o pokusaju da se da predlog za novo zajednistvo ili bolje receno kolektivne politike solidarnosti koje plediraju na to da je svet jedan. i to se onda stvara u hiljadama mikro politika: rad sa radnicima bez papira u francuskoj, borba protiv proterivanja roma, podrska zenama izlozenim rasistickom sikaniranju zato sto nose burke i tako dalje. to sto pojedini marksisti (poput badijua) ne zele da prepuste rec komunizam istoriji i sto bastine nasledje koje ide od velikih revolucija XIX veka do danas je stvar borbe za taj pojam i pokusaja da se emancipatorskim politikama da rec oko koje mogu da se skupe.

Ali to ti kazem, ne mozemo sve sto je progresivno proglasavati za komunizam. To je pokusaj da se jedna porazena ideologija "prikaci" na ono sto ide napred i time "spere" svoje promasaje. Sa druge strane bilo kojoj emancipatorskoj politici izrazito steti bilo kakva asocijacija sa komunizmom. Ako govorimo samo o drustvenom aspektu, emancipacija je liberalizam, i tu ne treba dozvoliti jednoj diskreditovanoj ideologiji da se "proslepa".

[Indy]

Istorijski fragmentWorld loses last World War I combat veteran after death of Perth digger Claude Choules

Mr Choules, who celebrated his 110th birthday in March, was believed to be the world's last surviving WWI combat veteran. His daughter Daphne Edinger confirmed Mr Choules - nicknamed ''Chuckles'' by comrades - died in his Perth nursing home last night.Joined up ... the young Claude Choules all those years ago. Mr Choules was declared the last known male survivor of more than 70 million military personnel during WWI, after American veteran Frank Buckles passed away earlier this year, also aged 110. The only other surviving WWI veteran is believed to be Britain's Florence Green, who served with the Royal Air Force in a non-combat role and is now aged 110.

Born in England in 1901, Mr Choules served with Britain's Royal Navy onboard the HMS Impregnable in 1916 at the age of 15. He joined the battleship HMS Revenge in 1917 and witnessed the surrender of the German Fleet near Firth of Forth in Scotland in 1918. Mr Choules moved to Fremantle where he was seconded to the Royal Australian Navy in 1926. He was a commissioning crew member of the HMAS Canberra and served with the vessel until 1931 when he discharged from the RAN before rejoining as a torpedo and anti-submarine instructor in 1932. As the acting torpedo officer at Fremantle in WWII, Mr Choules disposed of the first German mine to wash up on Australian soil during WWII, near Esperance on WA's south coast. He was also tasked with destroying harbour and oil storage tanks at the Fremantle port in case of a Japanese invasion. Mr Choules remained in the RAN after WWII, spending his final working years at the Naval Dockyard Police and joining the crayfishing industry at Safety Bay, south of Perth.

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Adrian Choules said his father did not speak highly of war, and he was renowned for flouting Anzac Day parades. As the years passed, Mr Choules refused to be interviewed, and shunned the very thing that made him who he was – the great wars. "He always said that the old men make the decisions that send the young men into war," Adrian said. "He used to say, if it was the other way around, and the old pollies were off fighting, then there would never be any wars."

[kim_philby]

Zašto je Karl Marx bio u pravuTerry Eagelton, jedan od najznačajnijih suvremenih teoretičara kulture na ovogodišnjem Subversive Film Festivalu predstavlja knjigu 'Zašto je Marx bio u pravu'. Povodom njegovog gostovanja u Zagrebu, prenosimo ulomak iz knjige "Zašto je Marx bio u pravu" u izdanju Naklade Ljevak.S marksizmom je gotovo. Shvatljivo je da je možda imao neko značenje u svijetu tvornica i ustanaka zbog hrane, u svijetu rudara i dimnjačara, raširene bijede i brojne radničke klase. Ali definitivno nema značenja u današnjim besklasnim i društveno mobilnim postindustrijskim zapadnjačkim društvima. Tvrdoglavi, bojažljivi ili obmanuti teško prihvaćaju da se svijet korjenito promijenio, u oba značenja te riječi.Teza da je s marksizmom gotovo bila bi melem za uši marksista u cijelom svijetu. Mogli bi prekinuti prosvjede i marševe, vratiti se u krilo svojih ožalošćenih obitelji i uživati u večeri provedenoj kod kuće umjesto na još jednom dosadnom i zamornom sastanku. Marksisti ne žele ništa drugo doli prestati biti marksisti. U tom kontekstu, biti marksist nije isto što i biti budist ili milijarder; to je srodnije zvanju liječnika. Liječnici su perverzna, izopačena stvorenja koja si ukidaju posao time što liječe pacijente koji ih onda više ne trebaju. Slično tome, zadatak političkih radikala jest doći do točke u kojoj više neće biti potrebni, s obzirom da će njihovi ciljevi biti ispunjeni. Oni će tada biti slobodni dati ostavku, spaliti postere Che Guevare, ponovno uzeti u ruke davno odbačeno violončelo i razgovarati o nečem mnogo zanimljivijem od azijskog načina proizvodnje. Ako za dvadesetak godina još uvijek bude bilo marksista ili feministica, bit će to tužna budućnost. Marksizam je trebao biti privremen pokret, zbog čega svatko tko ulaže cijeli svoj identitet u njega promašuje smisao. Čitava je poenta marksizma u tome da postoji život nakon marksizma.Najdublja kritika kapitalizmaPostoji samo jedan problem s ovom inače očaravajućom vizijom. Marksizam je kritika kapitalizma - najdublja, najoštrija, najobuhvatnija kritika takve vrste koja je ikad postojala. To je također i jedina takva kritika koja je preobrazila velik dio planeta. Iz toga slijedi da je, sve dok je kapitalizam i dalje prisutan, također prisutan i marksizam. Jedino odbacujući svojeg protivnika on može odbaciti i samoga sebe. A kako sada izgleda, kapitalizam se čini živahnijim nego ikad.Većina suvremenih kritičara marksizma ne osporavaju ovu tezu. Umjesto toga, oni tvrde kako se sustav promijenio do granica neprepoznatljivosti od Marxova vremena te da zbog toga njegove ideje više nisu relevantne. Prije nego što ovu tvrdnju malo detaljnije razmotrimo, treba spomenuti da je sam Marx bio savršeno svjestan vječno promjenjive naravi sustava protiv kojeg je govorio. Upravo marksizmu dugujemo koncept različitih historijskih oblika kapitala: trgovačkog, poljoprivrednog, industrijskog, monopolskog, financijskog, imperijalnog itd. Dakle, zbog čega bi činjenica da se posljednjih desetljeća promijenilo obličje kapitalizma diskreditiralo teoriju koja promjenu shvaća kao svoju navlastitu bit? Osim toga, sam Marx je predvidio raspad radničke klase i ogromno povećanje bijelih ovratnika. Tome ćemo se posvetiti malo kasnije. On je također predvidio tzv. globalizaciju - neobično za čovjeka čiju se misao doživljava kao arhaičnu. No možda je upravo Marxova "arhaična" odlika ono što ga danas čini relevantnim. Oni koji ga optužuju da je zastario perjanice su kapitalizma koji se ubrzano okreće prema starim viktorijanskim oblicima nejednakosti.Marx kao 'kapitalistički plaćenik'Godine 1976. velik dio ljudi sa Zapada smatrao je da marksizam ima o čemu raspravljati. Već od 1986. mnogi od njih više to nisu smatrali. Što se točno dogodilo u međuvremenu? Jesu li ti ljudi jednostavno zakopani ispod gomile žutokljunaca? Je li marksistička teorija razotkrivena kao lažna nekim uznemirujućim novim istraživanjima? Jesmo li promijenili stav zbog otkrića nekog Marxova rukopisa u kojem on priznaje kako je sve to bila samo šala? Nismo tek sada otkrili, na naše veliko žaljenje, da je Marx bio kapitalistički plaćenik; znali smo to oduvijek. Bez tvrtke Ermen & Engels u Salfordu koju je posjedovao Engelsov otac, proizvođač tekstila, kronično siromašan Marx možda ne bi mogao dovoljno dugo poživjeti da napiše tekstove protiv proizvođačâ tekstila.Nešto se doista dogodilo u razdoblju koje razmatramo. Od sredine 1970-ih naovamo, zapadnjački sustav doživio je neke vitalne promjene. Došlo je do obrata od tradicionalne industrijske manufakture do "postindustrijske" kulture konzumerizma, komunikacija, informacijske tehnologije i uslužnih djelatnosti. U trendu su bila manja, decentralizirana, raznovrsna, nehijerarhijski ustrojena poduzeća. Tržište je bilo deregulirano, a pokret za prava radničke klase doživio je brutalan pravni i politički napad. Tradicionalna klasna solidarnost je oslabjela, dok su lokalni, rodni i etnički identiteti postali sve snažniji i ustrajniji. Politikom se u sve većoj mjeri počelo upravljati i manipulirati.Ratoborni stav kapitalizma zbog manične depresije sustavaNove informacijske tehnologije odigrale su ključnu ulogu u sve većem globaliziranju sustava, u vidu šačice transnacionalnih korporacija koje su distribuirale proizvodnju i ulaganja diljem planeta težeći za maksimalnim profitom. Velik dio industrijske proizvodnje premješten je na jeftinije lokacije s manjim plaćama u "nerazvijenom" svijetu, po čemu su neki uskogrudni zapadnjaci zaključili da je teška industrija nestala iz cijelog svijeta. S nastankom takve globalne mobilnosti došlo je do velike međunarodne migracije radne snage, a s njima je ponovno izbio rasizam i fašizam kad su siromašni imigranti došli u ekonomski puno razvijenije zemlje. I dok su "periferne" zemlje prisiljene na težak i mučan rad, privatizirana dobra, nepostojanje blagostanja i iznimno nepravedne uvjete trgovine, neobrijani menadžeri u moćnim zemljama razdrljili su kravate, otkopčali košulje i brinuli se za duhovno blagostanje svojih zaposlenika.Ništa od navedenog nije se dogodilo zato jer je kapitalistički sustav bio pun života i bezbrižan. Posve suprotno, njegov nov ratoboran stav, poput većine oblika agresije, izvirao je iz duboke tjeskobe. Ako je sustav postao maničan, to je zbog toga što je bio u latentnoj depresiji. Ovakvu reorganizaciju ponajprije je iznjedrilo iznenadno slabljenje poslijeratnog razvoja. Sve intenzivnije međunarodno natjecanje smanjivalo je profit, presušujući izvore ulaganja i usporavajući brzinu rasta. Čak je i socijaldemokracija sada bila suviše radikalna i skupa politička opcija. Stoga je pripremljen teren za Reagana i Thatcher koji su pomogli u razaranju tradicionalne industrije, uzdrmali radničke pokrete, dopustili da se tržište rascijepi, ojačavajući represivnu šapu države i ustoličujući novu društvenu filozofiju poznatu kao drsku pohlepu. Premještanje ulaganja od proizvodnje prema uslužnim djelatnostima, financijskim i komunikacijskim industrijama bila je reakcija na dugotrajnu ekonomsku krizu, a ne skok iz lošeg svijeta u vrli novi svijet.Izostanak vjere u alternativuČak i uzevši to u obzir, dvojbena je teza da je većina radikala koji su promijenili stav o sustavu između 70-ih i 80-ih to učinili jednostavno zato jer je sada bilo manje tvornica tekstila. To nije bilo ono što ih je odvelo do pokapanja marksizma zajedno s njihovim zaliscima i vrpcama oko glave, nego je to bilo rastuće uvjerenje da je režim s kojim su se sukobili bio prejak da bi ga se moglo slomiti. Nisu to bile iluzije o novom kapitalizmu, već razočaranje zbog nemogućnosti da ga se promijeni, što se pokazalo presudnim. Budimo sigurni, bilo je mnogo bivših socijalista koji su racionalizirali svoju potištenost tvrdeći da ako se sustav već ne može promijeniti, onda ga ni ne treba mijenjati. No odlučujućim se pokazao izostanak vjere u alternativu. S obzirom na to da je pokret za radnička prava razbijen i oskvrnjen, a politička ljevica grubo vraćena u prvobitno stanje, činilo se da je budućnost nestala bez traga. Za neke s ljevice, raspad sovjetskog bloka krajem 1980-ih još je više produbio razočaranje. Nije pomogla ni činjenica da je najuspješnija radikalna struja modernog doba - revolucionarni nacionalizam - u to vrijeme bio prilično iscrpljen. Kulturu postmodernizma s njegovim odbacivanjem takozvanih velikih pripovijesti i trijumfalne najave kraja povijesti hranilo je ponajprije uvjerenje da će odsad budućnost biti malo više od sadašnjosti. Ili, kako je to jedan entuzijastičan postmodernist kazao: "Sadašnjost plus više opcija."Osjećaj političke impotencijeDiskreditiranju marksizma je ponajprije pomogao polako nadolazeći osjećaj političke impotencije. Teško je zadržati vjeru u promjene kad se promjena uopće ne nalazi na dnevnom redu, čak i ako bismo je tada trebali najviše podržavati. Naposljetku, ako se ne odupirete onom što je očigledno neizbježno, nikada nećete znati koliko je ono doista bilo neizbježno. Da su se oni kojima je ponestalo hrabrosti uspjeli pridržavati starih stavova i u naredna dva desetljeća, svjedočili bi toliko trijumfalnom i nesavladivom kapitalizmu kakav je 2008. uspio tek u tome da bankomate na glavnim ulicama drži otvorenima. Vidjeli bi također i kako cijeli kontinent južno od Panamskog kanala odlučno skreće ulijevo. Kraj povijesti sada je došao do kraja. U svakom slučaju, marksisti bi se trebali dobro privikavati na poraze. Svjedočili su i većim katastrofama od ove. Politička prevaga uvijek će biti na strani onih na vlasti, zato jer ima više tenkova od vas. Ali nesmotrene vizije i radosne nade s kraja 60-ih učinile su ovaj preokret osobito gorkom pilulom koju će oni koji su preživjeli to razdoblje morati progutati.Zastarjelo vatrogastvo...Dakle, ono što je marksizam učinilo neprihvatljivim nije činjenica da je kapitalizam promijenio svoje punktove. Stvar je upravo suprotna. Bila je to činjenica da je, koliko god sustav daleko otišao, sve bilo po starom, pa čak i više od toga. Ironično je što je isto ono što je odgurnulo marksizam također iznjedrilo i kredibilitet njegovim tvrdnjama. Bio je pogurnut na marginu jer je društveni poredak kojem se suprotstavio, umjesto da postane umjeren i dobroćudan, postao drastično okrutniji i ekstremniji negoli prije. A upravo je to marksističku kritiku učinilo još značajnijom. Na globalnoj razini, kapitalizam je bio mnogo više koncentriran i grabežljiviji negoli ikad prije, a radnička se klasa zapravo brojčano povećala. Postalo je moguće zamisliti budućnost u kojoj će ultrabogati imati skrovište u naoružanim i ograđenim zajednicama, dok će otprilike milijardu ljudi u slamovima biti okruženi u svojim derutnim nastambama stražarnicama i bodljikavom žicom. U takvim okolnostima tvrditi da je marksizam stvar prošlosti isto je kao tvrditi da je vatrogastvo zastarjelo jer su piromani sve vještiji i imaju više pomagala na raspolaganju nego ikad prije.U naše doba, kao što je Marx predvidio, dramatično su se produbile nejednakosti u imovinskom stanju. Samo jedan meksički milijarder ima prihode u razini zarade čak sedamnaest milijuna njegovih najsiromašnijih sunarodnjaka. Kapitalizam je stvorio više prosperiteta nego što ga je ikad bilo u povijesti, ali je cijena toga (naposljetku, ne samo u siromaštvu milijardu ljudi) bila astronomska. Prema izvještaju Svjetske banke, 2,74 milijarde ljudi u 2001. godini živjelo je s manje od dva dolara na dan. Suočeni smo s mogućom budućnošću država koje imaju nuklearno naoružanje i sukobljavaju se oko oskudnih resursa, a takva je oskudnost uvelike posljedica samog kapitalizma. Po prvi put u povijesti oblik života koji je prevladao ima moć ne samo da uzgaja rasizam i širi kulturni kretenizam, povede nas u rat ili nas zatvori u radne logore, već da nas zbriše s lica zemlje. Kapitalizam će se ponašati antidruštveno ako mu je to profitabilno, a to danas može značiti uništenje čovječanstva na nezamislivoj razini. Ono što je nekad bila apokaliptička fantazija, danas je postala okrutna stvarnost. Klasični ljevičarski slogan "socijalizam ili barbarizam" nikad nije bio toliko svirepo prikladan, nikad u manjoj mjeri retorička figura. U takvim groznim uvjetima, kako piše Fredric Jameson, "marksizam nužno mora ponovno postati istinski".Smrdljive planine smećaIzrazite nejednakosti u bogatstvu i moći, imperijalno ratovanje, intenzivnija eksploatacija, sve snažnija represivna država: ako su sve ovo karakteristike današnjeg svijeta, istodobno su i problemi protiv kojih se marksizam borio i koja je promišljao gotovo dva stoljeća. Iz toga bismo mogli očekivati da je donio i neke pouke za sadašnjost. Marx je napose bio osupnut izrazito nasilnim postupcima kojima je urbana radnička klasa oblikovana iz iskorijenjenog seljaštva u Engleskoj, njegovoj doseljeničkoj zemlji - to je proces koji se danas zbiva u Brazilu, Kini, Rusiji i Indiji. Tristram Hunt ukazuje na to da se knjiga Mikea Davisa Planet slamova, koja svjedoči o "smrdljivim planinama smeća" poznatim kao slamovi koje možemo naći u današnjem Lagosu ili Dhaki, može shvatiti kao nova verzija Engelsova djela Položaj radničke klase u Engleskoj. S obzirom na to da Kina postaje svjetska tvornica, Hunt kaže kako "zasebne ekonomske zone Guangdonga i Šangaja stravično podsjećaju na Manchester ili Glasgow iz 1840-ih godina".Što ako nije zastario marksizam, nego kapitalizam? Već u viktorijanskoj Engleskoj Marx je vidio da tom sustavu ponestaje daha. Zagovarajući društveni razvoj u svom zenitu, sada je djelovao kao njegov teret. Marx je kapitalističko društvo vidio kao društvo preplavljeno fantazijama i fetišizmom, mitom i idolatrijom, bez obzira koliko se ono ponosilo vlastitom modernošću. Njegova samodopadna vjera u vlastitu superiornu racionalnost kao oblik navlastitog prosvjetljenja bila je neka vrsta praznovjerja. Ako je ono bilo sposobno ostvariti zadivljujući napredak, istodobno je moralo vrlo naporno raditi kako bi ostalo na mjestu. Marx je jednom rekao da je krajnja granica kapitalizma sam kapital, neprestana reprodukcija granice koju se ne može premostiti. Stoga postoji nešto neobično statično i ponavljajuće u ovom najdinamičnijem od svih poredaka u povijesti. Činjenica da logika koja ga podupire ostaje prilično konstantna jedan je od razloga zbog čega marksistička kritika kapitalizma ostaje i dalje uvelike ispravna. Jedino ako bi sustav istinski bio u stanju prekoračiti vlastite granice, inaugurirajući nešto posve novo, onda to više ne bi bilo tako. Ali kapitalizam nije sposoban izmisliti budućnost koja ne bi ritualno reproducirala njegovu sadašnjost. Zajedno sa, ne treba to ni spominjati, više mogućnosti...Detektivi i kriminalciKapitalizam je iznjedrio veliki materijalni napredak. No iako je ovaj oblik organiziranja našeg djelovanja imao mnogo vremena da dokaže kako je u stanju zadovoljiti potrebe čovječanstva, čini se da danas nije ništa bliži tom idealu. Koliko smo dugo spremni čekati da dođe s dobrim vijestima? Zašto i dalje pristajemo uz mit da će iznimno bogatstvo koje generira ovaj način proizvodnje jednoga dana postati dostupno svima? Bi li svijet jednako tako tretirao slične tvrdnje ljevice s takvim srdačnim, "hajde da pričekamo i vidimo" odgađanjem? Desničari koji priznaju kako će u sustavu uvijek biti velikih nejednakosti, ali da je to - koliko god okrutno - još uvijek bolje od alternativa, barem su iskreni u svojem drskom stavu, za razliku od onih koji propovijedaju da će se sustav naposljetku popraviti. Ako postoje bogati i siromašni ljudi, kao što postoje crni i bijeli, onda će se blagostanje bogatih s vremenom možda preliti i na siromašne. Međutim, ukazati na to da su neki ljudi siromašni, a neki bogati isto je kao i tvrditi da u svijetu postoje i detektivi i kriminalci. Naravno da je tako, ali to zamagljuje istinu da detektivi postoje zato jer postoje kriminalci...

Edited May 21, 2011 by kim_philby

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Kapitalizam je iznjedrio veliki materijalni napredak. No iako je ovaj oblik organiziranja našeg djelovanja imao mnogo vremena da dokaže kako je u stanju zadovoljiti potrebe čovječanstva, čini se da danas nije ništa bliži tom idealu. Koliko smo dugo spremni čekati da dođe s dobrim vijestima? Zašto i dalje pristajemo uz mit da će iznimno bogatstvo koje generira ovaj način proizvodnje jednoga dana postati dostupno svima? Bi li svijet jednako tako tretirao slične tvrdnje ljevice s takvim srdačnim, "hajde da pričekamo i vidimo" odgađanjem?

Interesantan stav koji ukazuje da autor ipak gleda na svet kroz ideoloski obojene naocare.Kapitalizam je na Zapadu imao nekih 200 godina (pa u nekim zemljama i vise) da se pokaze i dokaze. I mislim da se ne moze osporiti da se pokazao vrlo dobro. Zapadne zemlje su zemlje sa najvisim zivotnim standardom, najvisim prihodima, najvise se tamo brine o siromasnima, invalidima, zivotinjama, o ekologiji i uopste milion drugih stvari za koje bi marksista ili kriticar kapitalizma rekao da okrutni kapitalizam ignorise.S druge strane, vidim da autor najvise kritikuje kapitalizam u trecem svetu, i poredi danasnju Kinu sa 19.-vekovnom Engleskom. I kaze, dokle da cekamo na rezultate tog kapitalizma. Pa taj kapitalizam je u toj Kini aktuelan (i to ne u svojoj 'cistoj' formi) tek od kraja 70ih, u Indiji zapravo tek od 80ih i 90ih, isto mozemo reci i za mnoge druge zemlje gde je tek u povoju (recimo, Vijetnam). S druge strane, ako pogledamo zemlje koje su krenule sa "primenom" kapitalizma odma izda drugog svetskog rata, kao sto je Juzna Koreja npr., imamo dobre rezultate. J. Koreji je manje trebalo da prodje razvoj od stadijuma Engleske 19. veka do stadijuma Engleske 21. veka nego sto je to trebalo samoj Engleskoj. Dakle, ako Kina danas lici na Englesku sredinom 19. veka, onda se mozemo nadati da ce za par decenija liciti na Englesku sredinom 21. veka. Sto uopste nije lose, zar ne?S druge strane, komunizam je isto imao vremena da se dokaze. Sirio se i autohtonim revolucijama (Rusija, Kina) i vojnom silom ('osvajanje' istocne Evrope od strane SSSR). Vojno je bio mocan, i nije mu pretilo osvajanje od strane kapitalistickih zemalja, osim Koreje 50ih nigde neki domaci komunisticki rezim (a da je bio znacajan) nije izbacen direktnom intervencijom stranih kapitalistickih sila (u Vijetnamu se pokusalo, pa cvrc) i sta se desilo? SSSR i njegovi sateliti su se urusili sami od sebe, pod unutrasnjim pritiskom, a Kina i neke druge zemlje krenule su put kapitalizma.Od 1918./1945. i kapitalizam i komunizam su igrali tu igru cekanja, i komunizam je tu igru, sam od sebe i sam zbog sebe, izgubio.Nego da ubacimo ovde malo neku temu koja nema veze sa izlizanom raspravom marksizam-kapitalizam:http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-bacevich/the-end-of-military-histo_b_663548.html

Andrew BacevichAuthor of The Limits of Power: The End of American ExceptionalismPosted: July 29, 2010 10:01 AMThe End of (Military) History? The United States, Israel, and the Failure of the Western Way of War“In watching the flow of events over the past decade or so, it is hard to avoid the feeling that something very fundamental has happened in world history.” This sentiment, introducing the essay that made Francis Fukuyama a household name, commands renewed attention today, albeit from a different perspective.Developments during the 1980s, above all the winding down of the Cold War, had convinced Fukuyama that the “end of history” was at hand. “The triumph of the West, of the Western idea,” he wrote in 1989, “is evident… in the total exhaustion of viable systematic alternatives to Western liberalism.” Today the West no longer looks quite so triumphant. Yet events during the first decade of the present century have delivered history to another endpoint of sorts. Although Western liberalism may retain considerable appeal, the Western way of war has run its course.For Fukuyama, history implied ideological competition, a contest pitting democratic capitalism against fascism and communism. When he wrote his famous essay, that contest was reaching an apparently definitive conclusion. Yet from start to finish, military might had determined that competition’s course as much as ideology. Throughout much of the twentieth century, great powers had vied with one another to create new, or more effective, instruments of coercion. Military innovation assumed many forms. Most obviously, there were the weapons: dreadnoughts and aircraft carriers, rockets and missiles, poison gas, and atomic bombs -- the list is a long one. In their effort to gain an edge, however, nations devoted equal attention to other factors: doctrine and organization, training systems and mobilization schemes, intelligence collection and war plans. All of this furious activity, whether undertaken by France or Great Britain, Russia or Germany, Japan or the United States, derived from a common belief in the plausibility of victory. Expressed in simplest terms, the Western military tradition could be reduced to this proposition: war remains a viable instrument of statecraft, the accoutrements of modernity serving, if anything, to enhance its utility. Grand IllusionsThat was theory. Reality, above all the two world wars of the last century, told a decidedly different story. Armed conflict in the industrial age reached new heights of lethality and destructiveness. Once begun, wars devoured everything, inflicting staggering material, psychological, and moral damage. Pain vastly exceeded gain. In that regard, the war of 1914-1918 became emblematic: even the winners ended up losers. When fighting eventually stopped, the victors were left not to celebrate but to mourn. As a consequence, well before Fukuyama penned his essay, faith in war’s problem-solving capacity had begun to erode. As early as 1945, among several great powers -- thanks to war, now great in name only -- that faith disappeared altogether.Among nations classified as liberal democracies, only two resisted this trend. One was the United States, the sole major belligerent to emerge from the Second World War stronger, richer, and more confident. The second was Israel, created as a direct consequence of the horrors unleashed by that cataclysm. By the 1950s, both countries subscribed to this common conviction: national security (and, arguably, national survival) demanded unambiguous military superiority. In the lexicon of American and Israeli politics, “peace” was a codeword. The essential prerequisite for peace was for any and all adversaries, real or potential, to accept a condition of permanent inferiority. In this regard, the two nations -- not yet intimate allies -- stood apart from the rest of the Western world.So even as they professed their devotion to peace, civilian and military elites in the United States and Israel prepared obsessively for war. They saw no contradiction between rhetoric and reality. Yet belief in the efficacy of military power almost inevitably breeds the temptation to put that power to work. “Peace through strength” easily enough becomes “peace through war.” Israel succumbed to this temptation in 1967. For Israelis, the Six Day War proved a turning point. Plucky David defeated, and then became, Goliath. Even as the United States was flailing about in Vietnam, Israel had evidently succeeded in definitively mastering war. A quarter-century later, U.S. forces seemingly caught up. In 1991, Operation Desert Storm, George H.W. Bush’s war against Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, showed that American troops like Israeli soldiers knew how to win quickly, cheaply, and humanely. Generals like H. Norman Schwarzkopf persuaded themselves that their brief desert campaign against Iraq had replicated -- even eclipsed -- the battlefield exploits of such famous Israeli warriors as Moshe Dayan and Yitzhak Rabin. Vietnam faded into irrelevance. For both Israel and the United States, however, appearances proved deceptive. Apart from fostering grand illusions, the splendid wars of 1967 and 1991 decided little. In both cases, victory turned out to be more apparent than real. Worse, triumphalism fostered massive future miscalculation. On the Golan Heights, in Gaza, and throughout the West Bank, proponents of a Greater Israel -- disregarding Washington’s objections -- set out to assert permanent control over territory that Israel had seized. Yet “facts on the ground” created by successive waves of Jewish settlers did little to enhance Israeli security. They succeeded chiefly in shackling Israel to a rapidly growing and resentful Palestinian population that it could neither pacify nor assimilate. In the Persian Gulf, the benefits reaped by the United States after 1991 likewise turned out to be ephemeral. Saddam Hussein survived and became in the eyes of successive American administrations an imminent threat to regional stability. This perception prompted (or provided a pretext for) a radical reorientation of strategy in Washington. No longer content to prevent an unfriendly outside power from controlling the oil-rich Persian Gulf, Washington now sought to dominate the entire Greater Middle East. Hegemony became the aim. Yet the United States proved no more successful than Israel in imposing its writ. During the 1990s, the Pentagon embarked willy-nilly upon what became its own variant of a settlement policy. Yet U.S. bases dotting the Islamic world and U.S. forces operating in the region proved hardly more welcome than the Israeli settlements dotting the occupied territories and the soldiers of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) assigned to protect them. In both cases, presence provoked (or provided a pretext for) resistance. Just as Palestinians vented their anger at the Zionists in their midst, radical Islamists targeted Americans whom they regarded as neo-colonial infidels. StuckNo one doubted that Israelis (regionally) and Americans (globally) enjoyed unquestioned military dominance. Throughout Israel’s near abroad, its tanks, fighter-bombers, and warships operated at will. So, too, did American tanks, fighter-bombers, and warships wherever they were sent. So what? Events made it increasingly evident that military dominance did not translate into concrete political advantage. Rather than enhancing the prospects for peace, coercion produced ever more complications. No matter how badly battered and beaten, the “terrorists” (a catch-all term applied to anyone resisting Israeli or American authority) weren’t intimidated, remained unrepentant, and kept coming back for more. Israel ran smack into this problem during Operation Peace for Galilee, its 1982 intervention in Lebanon. U.S. forces encountered it a decade later during Operation Restore Hope, the West’s gloriously titled foray into Somalia. Lebanon possessed a puny army; Somalia had none at all. Rather than producing peace or restoring hope, however, both operations ended in frustration, embarrassment, and failure. And those operations proved but harbingers of worse to come. By the 1980s, the IDF’s glory days were past. Rather than lightning strikes deep into the enemy rear, the narrative of Israeli military history became a cheerless recital of dirty wars -- unconventional conflicts against irregular forces yielding problematic results. The First Intifada (1987-1993), the Second Intifada (2000-2005), a second Lebanon War (2006), and Operation Cast Lead, the notorious 2008-2009 incursion into Gaza, all conformed to this pattern. Meanwhile, the differential between Palestinian and Jewish Israeli birth rates emerged as a looming threat -- a “demographic bomb,” Benjamin Netanyahu called it. Here were new facts on the ground that military forces, unless employed pursuant to a policy of ethnic cleansing, could do little to redress. Even as the IDF tried repeatedly and futilely to bludgeon Hamas and Hezbollah into submission, demographic trends continued to suggest that within a generation a majority of the population within Israel and the occupied territories would be Arab.Trailing a decade or so behind Israel, the United States military nonetheless succeeded in duplicating the IDF’s experience. Moments of glory remained, but they would prove fleeting indeed. After 9/11, Washington’s efforts to transform (or “liberate”) the Greater Middle East kicked into high gear. In Afghanistan and Iraq, George W. Bush’s Global War on Terror began impressively enough, as U.S. forces operated with a speed and élan that had once been an Israeli trademark. Thanks to “shock and awe,” Kabul fell, followed less than a year and a half later by Baghdad. As one senior Army general explained to Congress in 2004, the Pentagon had war all figured out:“We are now able to create decision superiority that is enabled by networked systems, new sensors and command and control capabilities that are producing unprecedented near real time situational awareness, increased information availability, and an ability to deliver precision munitions throughout the breadth and depth of the battlespace… Combined, these capabilities of the future networked force will leverage information dominance, speed and precision, and result in decision superiority.”The key phrase in this mass of techno-blather was the one that occurred twice: “decision superiority.” At that moment, the officer corps, like the Bush administration, was still convinced that it knew how to win.Such claims of success, however, proved obscenely premature. Campaigns advertised as being wrapped up in weeks dragged on for years, while American troops struggled with their own intifadas. When it came to achieving decisions that actually stuck, the Pentagon (like the IDF) remained clueless.WinlessIf any overarching conclusion emerges from the Afghan and Iraq Wars (and from their Israeli equivalents), it’s this: victory is a chimera. Counting on today’s enemy to yield in the face of superior force makes about as much sense as buying lottery tickets to pay the mortgage: you better be really lucky. Meanwhile, as the U.S. economy went into a tailspin, Americans contemplated their equivalent of Israel’s “demographic bomb” -- a “fiscal bomb.” Ingrained habits of profligacy, both individual and collective, held out the prospect of long-term stagnation: no growth, no jobs, no fun. Out-of-control spending on endless wars exacerbated that threat. By 2007, the American officer corps itself gave up on victory, although without giving up on war. First in Iraq, then in Afghanistan, priorities shifted. High-ranking generals shelved their expectations of winning -- at least as a Rabin or Schwarzkopf would have understood that term. They sought instead to not lose. In Washington as in U.S. military command posts, the avoidance of outright defeat emerged as the new gold standard of success. As a consequence, U.S. troops today sally forth from their base camps not to defeat the enemy, but to “protect the people,” consistent with the latest doctrinal fashion. Meanwhile, tea-sipping U.S. commanders cut deals with warlords and tribal chieftains in hopes of persuading guerrillas to lay down their arms.A new conventional wisdom has taken hold, endorsed by everyone from new Afghan War commander General David Petraeus, the most celebrated soldier of this American age, to Barack Obama, commander-in-chief and Nobel Peace Prize laureate. For the conflicts in which the United States finds itself enmeshed, “military solutions” do not exist. As Petraeus himself has emphasized, “we can’t kill our way out of" the fix we’re in. In this way, he also pronounced a eulogy on the Western conception of warfare of the last two centuries.The Unasked QuestionWhat then are the implications of arriving at the end of Western military history? In his famous essay, Fukuyama cautioned against thinking that the end of ideological history heralded the arrival of global peace and harmony. Peoples and nations, he predicted, would still find plenty to squabble about. With the end of military history, a similar expectation applies. Politically motivated violence will persist and may in specific instances even retain marginal utility. Yet the prospect of Big Wars solving Big Problems is probably gone for good. Certainly, no one in their right mind, Israeli or American, can believe that a continued resort to force will remedy whatever it is that fuels anti-Israeli or anti-American antagonism throughout much of the Islamic world. To expect persistence to produce something different or better is moonshine. It remains to be seen whether Israel and the United States can come to terms with the end of military history. Other nations have long since done so, accommodating themselves to the changing rhythms of international politics. That they do so is evidence not of virtue, but of shrewdness. China, for example, shows little eagerness to disarm. Yet as Beijing expands its reach and influence, it emphasizes trade, investment, and development assistance. Meanwhile, the People’s Liberation Army stays home. China has stolen a page from an old American playbook, having become today the preeminent practitioner of “dollar diplomacy.” The collapse of the Western military tradition confronts Israel with limited choices, none of them attractive. Given the history of Judaism and the history of Israel itself, a reluctance of Israeli Jews to entrust their safety and security to the good will of their neighbors or the warm regards of the international community is understandable. In a mere six decades, the Zionist project has produced a vibrant, flourishing state. Why put all that at risk? Although the demographic bomb may be ticking, no one really knows how much time remains on the clock. If Israelis are inclined to continue putting their trust in (American-supplied) Israeli arms while hoping for the best, who can blame them?In theory, the United States, sharing none of Israel’s demographic or geographic constraints and, far more richly endowed, should enjoy far greater freedom of action. Unfortunately, Washington has a vested interest in preserving the status quo, no matter how much it costs or where it leads. For the military-industrial complex, there are contracts to win and buckets of money to be made. For those who dwell in the bowels of the national security state, there are prerogatives to protect. For elected officials, there are campaign contributors to satisfy. For appointed officials, civilian and military, there are ambitions to be pursued.And always there is a chattering claque of militarists, calling for jihad and insisting on ever greater exertions, while remaining alert to any hint of backsliding. In Washington, members of this militarist camp, by no means coincidentally including many of the voices that most insistently defend Israeli bellicosity, tacitly collaborate in excluding or marginalizing views that they deem heretical. As a consequence, what passes for debate on matters relating to national security is a sham. Thus are we invited to believe, for example, that General Petraeus’s appointment as the umpteenth U.S. commander in Afghanistan constitutes a milestone on the way to ultimate success. Nearly 20 years ago, a querulous Madeleine Albright demanded to know: “What's the point of having this superb military you're always talking about if we can't use it?” Today, an altogether different question deserves our attention: What’s the point of constantly using our superb military if doing so doesn’t actually work? Washington’s refusal to pose that question provides a measure of the corruption and dishonesty permeating our politics.

[kim_philby]

Youth Was Not Silent Early Writings, 1910-1917by Walter BenjaminBelknap Press, 320 pp., $27.95IN APRIL 1911, the eighteen-year-old Walter Benjamin took a hiking trip with a friend in the Thuringian Forest. His diary of the trip is one of the first items included in this latest volume to appear in Harvard University Press’s Benjamin edition—an exemplary scholarly project that has now been ongoing for twenty-five years. Nothing especially noteworthy seems to have happened on the trip, and the diary, which is just a few pages long, contains fairly cursory accounts of the natural splendors Benjamin saw (“The sunset was marvelous after the rain … the woods were irradiated with red, and individual branches and tree trunks along the path were glowing”). The most interesting thing about the diary is its Jewish subtext. Benjamin notes that it is Passover, and that the pension in which he is staying in is owned by a Jewish man who “kept saying, ‘So, what do we make for Yontev?’” Benjamin parses the word in a way that suggests it is new to him: “One does not say ‘Good day’ but ‘Good Yontev.’”Similarly, the proprietor subscribes to the Israelitisches Familienblatt, or Jewish Family Journal, and Benjamin notes that the magazine contains advertisements for “dishes for the Seder.” It takes his traveling companion to explain to him what these Seder plates are: “The latter are used for the Passover feast and have different compartments for different foods. So says Steinfeld.” Later Benjamin complains, “with coffee there was matzoh, and that’s how it will be; for … we are in Pesach week.” But while the pension seems to keep kosher for Passover, there is no actual Seder, which seems to both relieve Benjamin and disappoint him: “Thank God they didn’t do Seder. It might well have been very interesting and might even have moved me, but it would have seemed to me like theater, nothing holy.”Much can be gleaned about Benjamin’s Jewishness, and that of his whole class, from this short diary. He is evidently completely unobservant—more, ignorant of the basic details of Jewish practice—and he feels a nervous disinclination to be “claimed” in any way by Judaism. A fully modern man, he could find “nothing holy” in organized religion. Yet at the same time it is impossible not to notice that Benjamin is surrounded by Jewishness like a fish by water. His traveling companion is Jewish; the house he is staying in is Jewish. As his friend Gershom (born Gerhard) Scholem, a product of a similar background, would later note, it was quite normal for assimilated German Jews never to enter a Gentile home or invite a Gentile to theirs. Jewish identity was much more durable than Jewish belief.This would be of merely sociological interest were it not for the complicated ways that Jewishness and Judaism informed Benjamin’s brilliant and vastly influential work. His best-known writings—on Proust and Kafka, nineteenth-century Paris, the movies, “the age of mechanical reproduction”—came after the period covered by Early Writings. But even in these seven years, from the ages of eighteen to twenty-five, it is possible to see Benjamin develop from a precocious, pompous adolescent into a daring and deep thinker. The last pieces in the book—in particular “The Life of Students,” “Trauerspiel and Tragedy,” and “On Language as Such and the Language of Man”—lead directly to his most important insights into the nature of literature and history. In fact, the last of these, never published in Benjamin’s lifetime, can be seen as a kind of skeleton key to his mature work, full of overtly mystical beliefs that would go underground when Benjamin became a professed Communist.Benjamin was not merely young when he wrote the pieces in this book; as an activist in the German Youth Movement, he was, one might say, professionally young. The youth movement was a loosely organized phenomenon with many tendencies—its adherents were interested in curriculum reform, sexual liberation, and nationalist renewal, among other causes, and there is a definite flavor of the 1960s in its vague, tumultuous commitment to change. Benjamin was first exposed to it when he was thirteen, when he began to attend the Free School Community—an experimental, progressive school founded by the prominent reformer Gustav Wyneken, who became his mentor. Until the outbreak of World War I, Benjamin was active in youth organizations—he was president of the Berlin University chapter of the Independent Students’ Association, and several of the essays in the book first appeared in movement journals.In these pieces, we sometimes find Benjamin writing as a muckraker, holding the German education system up to ridicule for its pedantry and mindless authoritarianism. In “Teaching and Valuation,” he complains of the “pious reiteration or regurgitation of unrelated or superficially related facts” and offers a “blacklist” of teacherly philistinism: “Apropos of Horace: ‘We have to read Horace in this class. It doesn’t matter whether we like it or not; it’s on the syllabus.’” When Benjamin quotes a teacher at a classical Gymnasium telling a student, “Please don’t think that anyone believes this enthusiasm of yours for the ancient world,” it is hard to avoid suspecting that he himself was the student.In response, Benjamin calls, in fairly platitudinous terms, for “a classical secondary school we could love,” where teaching would be related “to living values of the present.” But at heart he was much too utopian to be contented with any actually existing reform movement. The title of his dispatch from a major youth retreat in 1913 is “Youth Was Silent”: “Excursions, ceremonial attire, folk dances are nothing new and … still nothing spiritual … we will continue, in the name of youth, to weigh the Youth Congress against the demands of the spirit.” It didn’t help that German youth were just as prone to anti-Semitism as their parents: “When the prizes for sports were being awarded, the name Isaacsohn was announced. Laughter rang out from a minority,” Benjamin notes.The further one reads, however, the clearer it becomes that what Benjamin was really seeking, in the guise of school reform, was spiritual and social rebirth. Thus, in an essay on “Moral Education,” he concludes that “all morality and religiosity originates in solitude with God”—a prescription that seems to leave little role for school reform, or for schools in general. The tension between Benjamin’s private and public agendas becomes even clearer in the unpublished pieces in Early Writings, the poems and stories and sketches he showed only to a few friends. There, the rhetoric of the youth-movement essays clouds over into the dense, tormented prose that would be so characteristic of the adult Benjamin. In “The Metaphysics of Youth,” for instance, he writes: “Greatness is the eternal silence after conversation. It is to take the rhythm of one’s own words in the empty space.” There is also a good deal of unresolved sexual anguish at work; Benjamin writes portentously about “the prostitute,” as in, “The woman is the guardian of the conversations. She receives the silence, and the prostitute receives the creator of what has been.”Benjamin’s disenchantment with the youth movement did not become official until the beginning of World War I. He was disgusted by the way the allegedly progressive movement rallied around the kaiser. Personally, he wanted nothing to do with the war, and he went to great lengths to avoid the draft, finally moving to Switzerland. In terms of his intellectual development, however, this disillusionment was a blessing, allowing him to unyoke his true concerns from the official cause of “youth” (and by 1914 he wasn’t so young any more). “The Life of Students,” from 1915, shows Benjamin bidding farewell to the student movement, while drawing on his experiences to frame a new, radically utopian vision of progress:History rests concentrated, as in a focal point, something seen from time immemorial in the utopian images of thinkers. The elements of the ultimate condition do not manifest themselves as formless progressive tendencies, but are deeply embedded in every present in the form of the most endangered, excoriated, and ridiculed ideas. The historical task is to give shape to this immanent state of perfection and make it absolute, make it visible and ascendant in the present.Already in these lines, one detects the messianic tones of Benjamin’s “Theses on the Philosophy of History,” his last work, which he would write in 1940, just before he committed suicide in the face of the Nazi onslaught:It is well-known that the Jews were forbidden to look into the future. The Torah and the prayers instructed them, by contrast, in remembrance. This disenchanted those who fell prey to the future, who sought advice from the soothsayers. For that reason the future did not, however, turn into a homogenous and empty time for the Jews. For in it every second was the narrow gate, through which the Messiah could enter.When it came to his deepest political hopes, Benjamin seemed to fall instinctively into a Jewish vocabulary of messianism. So, too, with language and literature. “On Language as Such and the Language of Man” has at its core a reading of Genesis and advances an idea of divine language that sounds amazingly like kabbalism: “Language is therefore that which creates and that which completes; it is word and name. In God, name is creative because it is word, and God’s word is knowing because it is name.” One of the things that makes Benjamin so fascinating is the way he seems to translate Jewish ways of thinking into a post-Jewish intellectual culture. Early Writings shows that this fertile dualism was present from the beginning.This piece was originally published in Tablet.Adam Kirsch is a senior editor at The New Republic.

@hazard: slazem se, doduse problem je sto mislis progresivisticki (kao socijaldemokrata ;)). to sto je kina danas poput britanije u XIX veku (a nije vec je kineski kapitalizam XIX vekovni) ne znaci da ce za koju deceniju biti kao britanija danas. stavise ako ne vodimo racuna o tome svako stucanje tog sistema bas na primeru kine se moze pokazati kao kobno. Edited May 22, 2011 by kim_philby

[Dionysos]

колор фотке совјетских војника из другог светског рата

[kim_philby]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tnUyh0CpsgTerry Eagleton: Mythologies of Marx, 21st May 2011, Subversive film festival Zagreb Edited May 29, 2011 by kim_philby

[Agni]

Ehem, ovo nije bas filozofija stricto sensu, ali ne znam gde drugde ga turim. Radi se o nekoliko probranih odlomaka iz 4. poglavlja knjige My Search for Absolutes (1967) nemackog teologa P. Tillich-a.

The Two Concepts of Religion Is the encounter with the Absolute-itself restricted to experiences within what traditionally is called "religion"?My answer is: Certainly not. I have already discovered and described absolutes outside religion in my two previous chapters. Here I can say that something is holy to everyone, even to those who deny that they have experienced the holy.This leads us to distinguish two concepts of religion, a larger concept and a narrower one, and the different ways in which the Absolute is experienced in them. The larger concept of religion has appeared as the dimension of ultimate reality in the different realms of man’s encounter with reality. It is, to use a metaphor, the dimension of depth itself, the inexhaustible depth of being, but it appeared indirectly in these realms. What was experienced directly was knowledge, or the moral imperative, or social justice, or aesthetic expressiveness; but the holy was present in all these secular structures, although hidden in them. For this is how one experiences the holy, through secular structures. Religion in this basic and universal sense I have called "being grasped by an ultimate concern."This definition, however, is also valid for the narrower concept of religion. The difference is that here the experience of the Ultimate is direct. I have usually described it as the experience of the holy in a particular presence, place, or time, in a particular person, book, or image, in a particular ritual act, spoken word, or sacramental object. These direct experiences are found in unity with a sacred community, in the Western world usually called a church, a monastic group, or a religious movement. Such a community expresses the particular character of its experience of the holy in its special symbols of imagination and cult and in special rules that determine its ethical and social life. This is religion in the narrower, the traditional sense.The relation of the two concepts is obvious. The first, the larger one, represents the Absolute beyond religion and non-religion. The second, the narrower one, represents the Absolute in a direct concrete symbolization. This relationship has many consequences for human existence, of which the most important is that the Absolute, the Holy-itself, transcends and judges every religion. The ultimate in being and meaning cannot be limited, cannot be caught in any particular religion, in any particular sacred place or by any particular sacred action.But even this statement, that God cannot be caught in any particular religion, could have been made only on the basis of a particular religion, a religion able to transcend its own particularity and, because it can do this, having perhaps a critical power in relation to other religions.In any case, the larger concept of religion is the basis of the narrower concept and judges those religions described by the narrower concept. This insight has important consequences, both for the relation of religions to one another and for their relation to the secular realm. It gives, among other things, a positive religious meaning to secularism, which usually is condemned in sermons and publications of the church.Demonization of ReligionThere is a phenomenon we could call "the demonization of religion." When we speak of "the demonic" we mean more than failure and distortion, more than intentional evil. The demonic is a negative absolute. It is the elevation of something relative and ambiguous (something in which the negative and the positive are united) to absoluteness. The ambiguous, in which positive and negative, creative and destructive elements are mingled, is considered sacred in itself, is deified. In the case of religion, the deification of the relative and the ambiguous means that a particular religion claims to be identical with the religious Absolute and rejects judgment against itself. This leads, internally, to demonic suppression of doubt, criticism, and honest search for truth within the particular religion itself; and it leads, externally, to the most demonic and destructive of all wars, religious wars. Such evils are unavoidable if a particular manifestation of the holy is identified with the holy itself.The Quasi-ReligionsThe process of secular relativization has now reached an almost unsurpassable stage in both theory and practice, as I admitted in Chapter Two. However, this stage in which we find ourselves today has produced a counter-movement, a movement toward new absolutes on the basis of secularism. We find these absolutes in the quasi-religions and their consequences, quasi-religious wars (one of which we are living through today).Anyone who has seen, as I have, the rush toward new absolutes in the period of the rise of Fascism, Nazism, and Communism, especially by the younger generation of that time, has understood the quasi-religious character of these movements. Like traditional religions, they elevate their basic dogmas beyond question and make them refer to all areas of man’s life. Ethical decisions are determined by commandments imposed externally at first, then (and this is more dangerous) internalized in the consciences of the people. These commandments are also internalized in the legal and social structures which now depend on the implications of the basic dogma, in the ritual forms which sanction the whole, and in the artistic expressions which are now means to propagate the system’s truth and glory. The result is systems of life with an all-pervasive absolute, under an authority that is absolute, and generating absolutes in all parts of themselves. We live among such systems today.Besides Fascism (Nazism) and Communism there is a third political-cultural system, the so-called "West," meaning, particularly, the Anglo-Saxon nations and, even more particularly, ourselves. It is a system quasi-religious in nature, and it can be called "liberal humanism."This system has fought in the name of its absolutes, liberalism and humanism, against the other two absolutes, Fascism and Communism. It has conquered the first, at least so far, and continues to oppose the other. The superiority of our system is its attempt to find a way that bypasses, on the one hand, the self-negating absolute of relativism and, on the other, the demonized absolutes of Fascism and Communism. However, let us not have any doubt about ourselves. Ours is a quasi-religious system also. Its absolute is most impressively embodied in the Constitution, which permeates all areas of our lives. A delicate balance has been achieved between this basic absolute and an almost limitless relativity; but we should recognize that this balance is always threatened. In its struggles against the other absolutes, liberal humanism can easily model itself on its adversaries. It, too, can suppress -- by indirect means -- liberal criticism coming from its own citizens. From outside, it can be maneuvered into a position in which it has to defend humanism by means that by their very nature are inhuman. Liberal humanism can sacrifice, out of tragic necessity, its liberalism internally and its humanism externally. Or, in the hope of avoiding these consequences, it can surrender its own absolutes and fall into complete theoretical and practical relativism.

[Otto Katz]

Naletjeh jutros na fragment iz Protektorata Češke i Moravske o stanovitom novinaru po imenu Rostislav Korčák. Frajer je pisao za režimski list Venkov (Selo), a istovremeno je izdavao ilegalno glasilo pokreta otpora u kojem je oštro kritizirao vlastite članke iz Venkova. :D Danju Nagib, noću Ragib, Rosťu je na kraju zatvorio Gestapo, u zatvoru je oslijepio, ali je kao jedan od nekoliko uhapšenih pripadnika pokreta otpora ipak doživio kraj rata.Tako tipično češki. Kao kad poručnik Lukáš kaže Švejku, ja sam isto Čeh, ali ne mora to niko znati. Ili kad je kod drugog iračkog rata predsjednik Češke izričito podržao vojnu akciju, a premijer je osudio.

[kim_philby]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDT3bMq0UJo&feature=related

[Otto Katz]

Verstand=understanding? Ne koristi se u engleskom intellect? Jebote kojom brzinom se frajer fata za nos, da mu se priključi kakav dinamo da pokreće ventilator. Opasku o Hegelu kao većem kantijancu od Kanta bi se moglo proširiti na sve filozofe koje je ovaj obuhvatio u povijest filozofije, tačnije u filozofiju povijesti filozofije. Hegel je veći stocist od stoika etc., ultimativna istina svijuh. Zapravo logičan i vrlo poznat zaključak, čudi da to Žižek posebno ističe.

[kim_philby]

Verstand=understanding? Ne koristi se u engleskom intellect? Jebote kojom brzinom se frajer fata za nos, da mu se priključi kakav dinamo da pokreće ventilator. Opasku o Hegelu kao većem kantijancu od Kanta bi se moglo proširiti na sve filozofe koje je ovaj obuhvatio u povijest filozofije, tačnije u filozofiju povijesti filozofije. Hegel je veći stocist od stoika etc., ultimativna istina svijuh. Zapravo logičan i vrlo poznat zaključak, čudi da to Žižek posebno ističe.

mislim da zizek bolje govori nemacki. inace ova o hegelu kao vecem kantijancu od kanta je valjda nesto na sta je resio da podseti ove studente.btw, super je onaj fragmen o rostislavu. postoji li neki wiki ili tekst na engleskom?