Boycott Foxconn

Foxconn, the Chinese company that produces the iphone, the ipod and the ipad
has been described as "a forced labour camp" by a 2010 report.

Foxconn makes electronic components for :
Apple
Hewlett-Packard
Dell
Nintendo
Nokia
Sony Ericsson

The company's largest operation is "Foxconn City", a cramped, walled
compound in Shenzhen, which contains 400 000 workers in 15 plants,
complete with its own over-crowded dormitories, fire brigade, bank,
grocery store (where workers must buy their groceries), hospital and
library. The Chinese police is not allowed to enter "Foxconn City" which
has its own "security agency".
Very, very serious allegations of human rights abuses keep emerging from
Foxconn city (see 2010 report). Foxconn city has its own internal
television network which broadcasts only within the complex.
The surrounding technical colleges have a partnership with Foxconn,
where they furnish thousands of students to work on the assembly lines
for long hours and no pay, and the schools get a subsidy from Foxconn.

In October, 2010, a report by 20 Chinese universities described Foxconn
factories as labour camps and detailed widespread worker abuse and
illegal overtime. Workers who fell asleep due to exhaustion were beaten,
forced to write out lines a thousand times. Before getting up from
his/her post a worker has to ask permission from the supervisor. No
worker is allowed to mover more than 50 meters from his work post. No
talking, chatting or laughter is allowed at any time. Going to the
toilet is timed and is added to the worker's work time. Some workers
have to work up to 17 hours a day for months at a time, with no overtime
pay.

The report was a huge reaction to a spate of worker suicides where
fourteen died in 2010. These 14 workers committed suicide by jumping
from high buildings.

In response to the suicides, Foxconn installed suicide-prevention
netting at some facilities. It also hired an American firm to make
"psychological profiles" of employees, in order to weed out those "who
are incapable of dealing with stressful working conditions."

Leave comments if you have any suggestions as to the best way to
boycott Foxconn. Again, the biggest problem seems to be the fact that they
manufacture most of the components that go into the iphone and ipod.
The workers of the world are cut off from each other in the process of production,
and only come into contact indirectly through the exchange of commodities
in the market. Working class solidarity must stripe the veil that covers the
production of most of the commodities we use in our everyday lives.

Marxism and Buddhism

Buddhism and Marxism have quite a good deal in common.

On Marxmail, Greg McDonald wrote :

Buddhists have lots of good ideas, if you can
separate the wheat from the chaff.

Agreed. Both are materialist philosophies, both hold inter-personal relationships as
the material basis for causality, both downplay the role of the individual ego and
ascribe it to a nexus of factors caused by external causality, both envision
change as a complex, dialectical process.
The main difference of course, is that Buddhism, while sympathetic to Marxism,
sees a change within the relationships of production as insufficient to achieve
true "enlightenment". Buddhism focuses on the recognition by an individual that
his/her "self" does not really exist but is the result of attachment to identity brought
about by external sensory stimuli. There is no "me", there is just constant
thought brought about by external stimuli.
Marxists, while regarding this emphasis on understanding the non-existence of the ego as
irrelevant, will have nothing to object to Buddhist psychology as such.
Stimuli-like/dislike-craving/hatred-idea of "self"-reaction-new inter-personal causality which
restarts the cycle. The only way to freedom is not through God, according to Buddhists, but through
recognizing that the "self" is not static, but a process of stimuli/reaction ."Letting go of attachments" is the way to happiness according to Buddhism.
This is a very, very long process (dozens of years of arduous self-reflection), before an individual can attain "nirvana".

La khowf ba’ad al-yowm !

I certainly hope that workers' councils will evolve in Tunisia, but I don't know if they will/can come out of neighborhood watches.
The mass movement of unemployed workers must continue to push - through both daily rallies and through conscious efforts at self-organization.

Wild cat strikes have long been a favourite of Tunisian workers, who would occupy the buildings of the main UGTT buildings to force the union to take up their grievances.
In the last two decades, many wild cat strikes prompted prolonged confrontation with riot police and the mukhabarat, who always managed to cordon off and contain the unrest (kids throwing stones, workers on indefinite strike, women camping in front of ministries) to certain
sectors.
To escape from the terrible repression that inevitably followed such uprisings, many Tunisians workers were then forced to flee abroad and to try to make their way to "fortress Europe".
Those who were deported back to Tunisia were tortured by the regime.
Those who managed to remain in Europe joined the many Tunisian Socialist organizations in exile.
So there is a very strong tradition of workers' solidarity and a culture of voicing grievances in Tunisia. That's why the Ben Ali regime was so determined to stamp out any dissidence and that's why it was an extremely repressive police state. The Mukhabarat, the sinister Tunisian
secret police, was/is very skilled at containing dissidence and instilling fear. No wonder the slogan on the streets yesterday was :"No More Fear !" La khowf ba’ad al-yowm !
The tourism industry is/was a constant concern for Tunisian leaders. It is thought that 80% of Tunisian taxi drivers were/are Mukhabarat informers and a similar percentage of Hotel owners. The Mukhabarat also maintains/maintained an impressive network of informants throughout
Tunisia and extensively monitored all cell phone and internet-based communications.

The regime and the private interests that are closely intertwined with its very existence will now try to appease the crowds with promises of FREE AND FAIR ELECTIONS, and by coopting a few moderate left-wing opposition figures from the many political leaders in exile.
France supported Ben Ali to the bitter end, and will now put its weight behind an "interim" government, providing Tunisian troops with weaponry and funding. France previously announced it was ready to send military advisors and special units to "help any new Tunisian government cope".
The old CDR regime will probably have to change its name, despite the presence of a few hard-core "loyalists", but the same nexus of corrupt politicians and financial interests intends to continue dominating the country, with French help.
France's role in Tunisian history has always been pivotal and will unfortunately remain so (the entire Tunisian elite was and is still being educated in Paris). I really hope Tunisian workers (either employed or unemployed) continue to push hard and manage to overthrow
the whole establishment.
So far the homes of corrupt businessmen have been set alight, those notoriously connected to the Ben Ali family. The Army now seems to have stopped such outbursts.

Gay service(wo)men in the US army

An exchange that took place on the Marxmail list :

I cant' believe that you guys are still fooling around with whether gay
people should be allowed to serve in the US Army.
The answer is of course YES.
Gay soldiers should be allowed to get hit by Kalashinkov (or M-16) fire.
What makes them cleverer than heterosexuals, Blacks, women, Irish,
Indians, Asians, and any other recognized group that has enlisted ?
Homosexuals are just as capable of slaughter when commanded to do so.

Mark Lause wrote :

"participation in the military, among other reasons,is often the best chance
the poor have of getting anywhere different in this society. It's the key to
an education, to a decent job, to the kind of future that some may well be taking
for granted."

No, I beg to disagree. Willingly choosing to kill people when ordered to do so by
the state can never be excused, even though it brings short-term money in.
And all those soldiers will NOT get a "decent job and diplomas" when they come back. That is a lie.
They will not get the equivalent of the GI Bill of 1945 enabling them to go to college for free. That is a lie.
They will return with nothing to show for killing 60,000 to 120,000 civilians in Irak (give or take).

Whether an external threat or an internal threat, the Army will always
do its duty as loyal servant to those who yield power (privileges).

It is the basic hierarchical structure of the armed forces we object to.
I mean we, Libertarian Marxists, not we, "anything goes" Marxists.

The Army is a harmful institution that is purposefully disjointed from
the people, and purposefully entrusted with powerful weapons to subdue
the people.

Mid-term elections in the US

Who will win the next elections is synonymous with who will betray the working class's hopes and aspirations ?

The answer is : those who seek power above and over the working class.

To encourage the working class to vote for them is to participate in reinforcing the apathy of the working class by telling workers that they count for nothing and that their role is simply to "vote right" (no pun intended).

Working class consciousness is always battered and ridiculed, as the question arises for whom to vote ?
For him ! For her ! For them ! Vote against conservatism !
The social relationships that characterize the commodity mode of production breed passivity and resignation.
The day workers renounce representative democracy will be the day they take charge of running their own lives.
Control over one's life and working conditions is much more than casting a vote in favour of one group of people intent on harvesting surplus value.
It can only be achieved through One Big Union, and I may add, a union based on self-management and which eschews "representative democracy".

Reflections on the situation in France

It's not time for a post-mortem just yet, but the protest movement in
France is winding down.

"Only" 2 million people took to the streets on Thursday, as opposed to 3.5
million two weeks ago. 

The bosses are still in a state of shock though. They revealed on Wednesday
that for the last two weeks, 50% of French industry had been halted
because of a lack of raw materials and fuel. Today, Thursday, 25% of
factories were still "experiencing major production delays and were
unable to keep shipment deadlines, causing even more losses through
contract-clause related penalties". As many trade unionists
commented :"when they start talking about losses, that means we are on
the verge of winning".

And strikes are still ongoing in most French refineries. Despite
Government propaganda that announced that five out of twelve refineries
were now running, it appears that this is yet another lie. Seven
refineries are on strike until Saturday, two refineries are shut down
and in a state of lock out, three refineries voted to resume work (after
management offered them a pay increase and the payment of all their days
of strike) but are unable to process anything as the pipelines from the
oil terminals in the ports of Marseille and Le Havre are still blocked
by striking dockers. So actually, not a single litre of petrol is coming
out of any of the twelve refineries right now.

But the mood is undeniably pessimistic, especially after the betrayal of
the CFDT and certain segments of the CGT. The CFDT has accepted to meet
the bosses to discuss "unemployment and wages". A clear indication that
the time has come for a sell-out (sigh, another one).

As I said, the time for forensic examination of living labour has not
yet come. However, analyses (plural of analysis, just checking) of the
10/10 events are beginning to circulate.

Some characteristics of the "pension revolt" have been pointed out by
most commentators on the left :
- strikers were from "old heavy-industry" : railways, steel workers,
auto workers, transport, energy or "intellectual workers" : teachers,
health workers, bank employees, students. That is, workers employed in
businesses with over 50 employees. People working in small (under 50
employees) businesses just couldn't organize. Neither could workers
working in shopping malls, supermarkerts, telemarketing, services, etc.
(commerce, services and information technologies industries).
Wherever casualization of the working force was most prominent, people
COULD NOT AFFORD (in their own words) to strike, because they feared for
their livelihoods.
- this situation led to what "Mouvement Communiste" in their analysis of
the French strikes (published in France and in English on Libcom.org)
called "strike by proxy schizophrenia". Instead of going on strike
themselves, 2/3rds of the working class applauded while a minority went
on strike. "Strike by proxy is a great danger for the working class".
There are many points in "Mouvement Communiste"'s paper that I, and many
workers on the road blocks, find debatable. They are far too pessimistic and

tend to impose their own brand of Autonomous Marxism on a complex situation.
- It was always clear that "pension reform" was just one of the reasons
why people went on strike anyway. Actually, most workers talked about
feelings of rage and frustration, feelings of powerlessness in the face
of a Leviathan that any spark would ignite.
-The union bureaucracy and left-wing parties (especially the NPA and
LEft Party) initially played a major role in organizing the general
strike. However, the movement rapidly became truly inter-sectorial and
saw workers from very different industries unite in collectively
blocking the economy. In every city and neighbourhood, workers began
blocking fuel depots and major highways leading to industrial parks.
This will remain one of the highlights of 10/10. From the very
beginning, it was all about shutting down production and consumption and
hitting the bourgeoisie hard, and all those who participated were
conscious of the need to bring the country to a standstill and happy to
see production stop and Capitalist profits decline (be it for 17 days).
-In many cities (Perpignan, Rennes, some Paris "arrondissements"),
though not in my hometown, General Meetings of all striking workers were
convened daily and organized road blocks and many other protests. These
protests included (depending on the region): toll-free highways during
the mid-term vacations, collecting refuse with the help of striking
garbage collectors and dumping it in front of the homes of leading
business people, university cafeteria workers providing free meals for
students, shutting down of tax office buildings  (which surprisingly
turned out to be quite unpopular, people late in paying their taxes were
close to panic when they heard that they couldn't enter the tax office
buildings), etc.
- A very considerable amount of money was collected all over the country
to support the striking refinery workers. Again, "strike by proxy" as
some would say.
- However, the "General Meetings of all striking workers" did not
include some sectors of heavy industry who were highly unionized and
where the union bureaucracy scorned such initiatives preferring to let
"the unions do their job of co-ordinating protests". In most cities,
including my own "heavy industry red redoubt", unions simply did not
care for the idea of "Workers' councils". Nonetheless, striking workers
from different industries quickly came to befriend each other, exchanged
e-mails, cell phone numbers and facebook pages. Even "Mouvement
Communiste" admits that "these inter-sector contacts will serve in the
future".
- The Union bureaucracy predictably "betrayed" the movement. The funny
thing is, all the workers I talked to were fully expecting this and
showed no surprise when the CFDT offered a truce.
"They always do that. They've been doing that for forty years. 
Urge people to go on strike, wave red flags and then negotiate with the
bosses. But who gives a damn about the union bureaucrats ? It's not
about them, is it ? At least we're fighting and that's all that counts.
Won't be a revolution, but it might be the only chance we will get for a
long time to show them what we think. So we can't be too picky, see what
I mean ?" was the sentiment I got again and again from auto workers,
truckers and railway workers.

So I don't think workers and students were really "fooled" by the union
bureaucracies, because they knew exactly what to expect from the
beginning. Even young workers in their 20s. 

The fact is that despite all the rejoicing, it was felt that there was
an iron weight weighing on the working class : people need a paycheck
and a majority of the working class is angry but just doesn't believe
that change is possible.
A worker on his way home from work
stopped to chat with us at a road block. He told us : : "The supervisor
came to the workshop. He saw we were all kind of idle because no
deliveries had come in for three days. He said to me : 'Go out with one
of the truck and try and get some supplies from the storage facility'. I
said to him : 'Excuse me sir, but I'm not a strike-breaker. If you send
me out, I'll just stop the truck on the highway and join the strikers,
so you'd better give me something else to do'. And I think it's a bloody
shame. It's a shame that we didn't go out on strike in my factory, it's
a shame that the oil workers are striking for the rest of us, whereas we
should all of us be out demonstrating. You know ... So I know this
movement won't succeed. Because most of us are just too afraid to
strike..."

And you know what, I don't find this statement pessimistic. Working
class consciousness in France has received a tremendous boost from the
events from October 11th onwards. All the arrogant journalists from
Liberation, TF1, Le Monde, etc. have been forced to recognize that
something has changed in France, although on the surface nothing has
changed. Events didn't unfold in the Senate, they unfolded on the
streets. 
So now what ? Of course, Unions have vowed "to continue the protests"
but at the same time, they are talking about engaging in talks with
business leaders on "a broad range of issues including unemployment,
youth and pay".
New (or rather old) forms of protest have emerged : blocking the
economy, hitting the bourgeoisie's wallet, inter-sectorial solidarity.
This time, workers didn't just block their own work places : they went
out and collectively helped block the whole production and consumption
system. The government contend this is a sign of weakness on the part of
the working class ("unions are no longer capable of calling for a real
general strike, they just call out the most radical elements from
different sectors to block the economy. It is a case of increased
radicalism compensating for a fall in the number of unionized workers
over the last twenty years").
But it could also be regarded as a sign of strength, especially given
the fact that for 17 days, 71% of the working class approved of blocking
the economy according to polls.

In Belgium, Unions block Fuel Depots in solidarity with French strikers !

Great news ! On Tuesday 26 October, Belgium trade unions started blocking fuel depots in Belgium in a show of solidarity with French strikers.
Exasperated by the fact that Belgium fuel depots have been used extensively over
the weekend to re-supply French service stations on the other side of the border, the FGBT (Federation Generale Belge du Travail) is preventing tank trucks from entering the depots of Feluy and Tertre in central Belgium.
"Sarkozy is threatening the right of French workers to strike by forcing strikers
 to work against their will. He is also trying to break workers' solidarity by sending tank trucks to fill up with petrol in Belgium." a Belgium trade unionist told Le Monde (see the article here)