Fw: [marxist] THE LIMITS OF SELF-RELIANCE

-----Original Message-----
From: Jonathan Michael Feldman <JonathanMFeldman@hotmail.com>
To: marxist@egroups.com <marxist@egroups.com>
Date: Monday, January 15, 2001 3:08 AM
Subject: [marxist] THE LIMITS OF SELF-RELIANCE


>The Limits of Self-Reliance: An Overrated Concept
>by Jonathan Michael Feldman
>(Here is another thing I posted on Z-Net Earlier.)
>
>The Limits of Self-Reliance by Jonathan Michael Feldman
>
>The Left, especially some of the Green movement and so-called "Anarchists,"
>have pushed the concept of self-reliance.  This term appears to be about
>providing an alternative to the economy monopolized by centralized
corporate
>or global actors. Unfortunately, in practice the concept seems to celebrate
>the kind of small-scale community enterprises that are usually no match for
>global capital.  The Left has no hope for shaping the economy and
eventually
>political life unless it becomes part of global webs.  The Left needs to
>think about how trade among progressive cooperatives can extend the basis
of
>an alternative economy. Unfortunately, the concept of self-reliance is a
>romantic and defeatist notion which sounds a lot better than it is.
>Ultimately, it can smack of the kind of isolationism that downgrades the
>United Nations and celebrates the limited variety and service of small "mom
>and pop" grocery stores.  I have nothing against these stores, but they are
>at best marginalized unless they federate.  Some bookstores in New York are
>trying to federate to challenge the global bookstore giants.  Is that
>self-reliance? I don't think so as it is more about networking than
>localism.  Moreover, when Nicaraguans sell coffeee through fair trade
>campaigns, we who buy the coffee are hardly self-reliant.
>
>Interestingly, Kibbutzem in Israel are going global.  Global economies of
>scale are critical for accumulating power, something the Left (as my last
>commentary suggested) is not terribly interested in doing effectively.
>Self-reliance increasingly sounds more like romantic Republicanism (of the
>small grocery store variety of Republican Party adherents) than anarchism
>which has been tied to notions of mutual aid.  When mutualism goes global,
>the self-reliant crowd seems to get worried.  Operationally, they can not
>claim that they welcome transnational cooperation through trade because the
>concept is at odds with global trade.
>
>Vermont, a state I love, is the source of some of these ideas about
>self-reliance.  Yet, as a native New Yorker, a Manhattanite, I simply can't
>abandon the notion of the virtues of large, global communities or
>cosmopolitanism.  Recent work by AnnaLee Saxenian shows how immigrants from
>India and China have helped build up Silicon Valley firms and then return
to
>their home countries and build up firms there. Is that something the Left
>wants to oppose?  The real challenge is to challenge the design, products
>and work practices of these firms. That requires an alternative source of
>power and economic democracy, not "self-reliance."
>
>
>
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>--Marx, Capital, Vol. 1, Chapter 31
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