From: gerald_a_levy (gerald_a_levy@msn.com)
Date: Wed Feb 19 2003 - 10:23:40 EST
Last night I attended a talk by George Caffentzis on "Not Just Blood for Oil: The Political Economy of the War Against Iraq" at ABC No Rio, a collectively-run center for art and activism in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. George is a professor at the University of Southern Maine (the same school as listrmember Bruce R) and is part of the Midnight Notes Collective. The talk was part of a film and discussion series at ABC No Rio called "Gulf Wars", presented by May Day Books and the Films and Popcorn Collective. (For more information on other events in this series, see the calendar at http://www.abcnorio.org ). The performance space where the talk was held was crowded with about seventy anti-war and anti-globalization activists who were energized by Saturday's demonstration. There was standing room only. The large turnout occurred despite the fact that the room was unheated and there was about 2 feet of snow on the ground outside. Despite the title of the talk, George defended the slogan "No Blood for Oil". A major part of his talk attempted to explain the connections between the anti-war movement and the anti- globalization movement. He argued, contra Cyrus's argument, that OPEC is a cartel and that the US's war aim should be seen as part of the Neo-Liberal privatization agenda. He argued, in particular, that a goal was to reverse the nationalizations of the oil industry that have occurred in many countries. The discussion afterwards was extraordinarily lively and intelligent as the activists attempted to dialogue with George and others about such topics as a class analysis of the anti-war movement (by, in part, discussing the differences in the composition of the anti-globalization and anti-war movements) and the divisions internationally among capitalists about the US war plans. A speaker from the floor asked about the importance of the pricing of oil in Euros (which George didn't mention in his talk). He seemed, at least to me, to downplay this factor and claimed instead that much of the tactical differences among governments were more related to what he claimed was a shift away from multilateralism and the use of the UN in the Clinton administration to the more unilateral tendencies of the Bush administration. I'm afraid I can't do justice to Caffentzis's explanation here (and, indeed, the speaker himself had to abbreviate his presentation to allow for more time for discussion). However, I introduced myself to him afterwards and asked him if he had a fuller electronic version of his talk so that I could forward it to OPE-L for discussion. He promised to send me a copy. Hopefully, it will stimulate discussion here -- especially since it presents a quite different analysis than that suggested by Hans [8448], Rakesh [8452], Cyrus [8481], and others. Solidarity, Jerry
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