The Joel Cosgrove Variety Hour recently interviewed Phil Ferguson who spoke at Workers Resistance 2009 on Karl Korshe and Historical Specificity. As well as Korshe this interview includes discussion of the current economic situation and Marxist economics. Download the MP3 here.
Spark Audio: Interview with Phil Ferguson
June 8, 2009
Leave a Comment » | 
Socialist Theory, Spark Audio | 
Permalink
Posted by Byron
“That capitalism is in crisis.”
May 11, 2009First in Victoria University Debating Society 2009 series of public debates on topical public policy issues. (Rutherford House, 6.30pm, 11 May 2009)
Third affirmative speaker Don Franks
Unfortunately capitalism is not on its deathbed, but it is in a state of crisis. You don’t have to take the word of a communist union organiser – just listen to the despairing of senior capitalist mouthpieces.
“Our world is broken—and I honestly don’t know what is going to replace it. The compass by which we steered as Americans has gone. The last time I saw anything like this, in the sense of disorientation and loss, was among my Russian friends when the Soviet Union broke up.” So said Bernie Sucher, Merrill Lynch operations head in Moscow, in the March 8th Financial Times.
In the same edition of the Financial Times Associate editor and chief economics commentator Martin Wolf despaired: “It is impossible at such a turning point to know where we are going… Yet the combination of financial collapse with a huge recession, if not something worse, will surely change the world. The legitimacy of the market will weaken. The credibility of the US will be damaged. The authority of China will rise. Globalization itself may founder. This is a time of upheaval.”
In the midst of this time of upheaval, Wolf continued clinging to the old capitalist mantra: “no credible alternative to the market economy exists…” Read the rest of this entry »
9 Comments | Economy, Socialist Theory | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
This is no alternative? Partnership or struggle
April 23, 2009There Is No Alternative?
A Workers Response to the Financial Crisis
A teach-in organised by the Workers Rights Campaign
Saturday May 2nd
1-00pm
Canterbury WEA, 59 Gloucester Street
Leave a Comment » | Industrial Relations Legislation, Socialist Theory, Workers in Struggle | Permalink
Posted by Byron
Capitalism’s currency craziness
December 11, 2008Philip Ferguson The Spark August 2006
Every few months exchange rates feature as a point of discussion about the state of the New Zealand economy. For many people it must seem odd that both a “high” and “low” New Zealand dollar are presented as problematic. What is going on? Does it really matter?
3 Comments | Economy, Socialist Theory | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
Imperialism after Lenin
December 8, 2008Philip Ferguson in a talk given in 2004 looks at the underlying forces driving world capitalism today.
In Capital, Marx notes that at a certain point of development the capitalist system itself, in particular the property form, becomes an obstacle to the further development of the production forces and even to the further development of capitalism itself. The chief barrier to capital turns out to be capital itself. At this point capital attempts to escape the limitations of its own natural laws of motion and find new ways of operating. This indicates that capitalism has reached the end of the road, and socialism is required.
In its own perverse way, capital begins to establish what Lenin called ‘transitional forms’ – forms which indicate that the means of production are trying to go beyond capitalism to a new form of society. Of course, they cannot, as long as capitalist property forms constrain them and the capitalist class holds political power. However they can last for a long time in the absence of a revolutionary challenge. As Lenin noted, there are no hopeless situations for capitalism in economic terms. In fact, in Imperialism, Lenin suggested that the imperialist epoch, the highest and final stage of capitalism, could last “for a fairly long period” if what he called the “opportunist abscess” in world politics, namely social democracy, was not decisively defeated.
1 Comment | Imperialism, Socialist Theory | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
Population is not the problem!
November 27, 2008-Mike Kay
The Green Party has caused some controversy recently by releasing its Population Policy for New Zealand just prior to the election. The Greens estimate the maximum population that Aotearoa can sustain at 5.7 million. In order that we do not exceed this figure, they propose policies including: “initiatives to raise awareness amongst parents and potential parents regarding the issue of sustainable global population levels.”
They also propose to “regularly review NZ’s immigration policy to ensure that we are retaining capacity to absorb climate change refugees and returning NZ citizens.”
It seems strange that the Greens should have made this an issue in a country that is sparsely populated with an ageing population. But in today’s political discourse, “sustainability” is becoming an essential green veneer to reactionary measures such as immigration controls and restricting working class people’s consumption.
Leave a Comment » | Immigration & Open Borders, Imperialism, NZ 2008 Elections, Socialist Theory | Tagged: Green Party, Malthus | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
Marx in the 21st century
November 25, 2008Talk given by Tim Bowron at a public forum at the Christchurch WEA in November 2008 organised by the Workers Party.
It seems as though these days the only time you are likely to hear the name of Karl Marx mentioned is when he is being dismissed as the proponent of some outlandish utopian ideology which had marginal relevance in nineteenth century Europe but none at all now (the view of most standard history texts) or as a the prophet of capitalist globalisation who also had some rather funny ideas about workers and exploitation with which we need not concern ourselves too much (the view of more sophisticated bourgeois pundits such as the writers for The Economist).
It is indeed true that the idea that the working class of which Marx wrote so volubly is rapidly vanishing from the stage of history has some material basis (at least in first world countries like New Zealand). However while the number of workers directly engaged in the creation of surplus value in areas such as manufacturing and raw material extraction has certainly decreased in New Zealand over the past few decades, the amount of exploitation i.e. the mass of surplus value created by workers in these sectors and expropriated by the capitalists has not.
In addition, although the largest occupational group as measured in the 2006 New Zealand census were labelled as “professionals” (18.85%) followed by “managers” (17.14%), the relationship of these individuals to the means of production is clearly shown in the “status in employment” category where we learn that over 75% of the population are still dependent on selling their labour power in order to earn a living.
The real problem here then is not the absence of class but rather the collapse of working class consciousness (such that a supermarket checkout supervisor may now well consider themselves a “manager”, and various politicians can proclaim that we are “all middle class now”).
Leave a Comment » | Economy, Revolutionary History, Revolutionary Strategy, Socialist Theory | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
Nature vs Nurture – genes vs environment
November 19, 2008Talk given by Daphna Whitmore at the Marxism Conference in Auckland, June 2008
Every week a new gene is supposedly found for something. This week New Scientist has a headline: They’ve discovered the gene for religion. Dig a little and it’s clear that the claims are grossly inflated. Well, it turns out they haven’t quite found a gene for religion after all, but postulated it exists. The theory is based on a computer programme that predicts that if a small number of people have a genetic predisposition to pass along unverifiable information, that religion will flourish. And this passes for science somehow!
The popular notions of what genes do are interesting.
I caught part of a programme on TV a few weeks ago. It was about people’s behaviours and their sex lives. The participants were asked to record how many times a day they had a sexual thought. The results were a little mixed, but one male had a huge number of sexual thoughts, another male had a moderate number which was about the same as one of the women and one woman had very few. It was a small sample of only about 4 people, so not the most rigorous scientific study. The conclusion drawn by the programme narrator was that “men think about sex more than women, and this is because in evolutionary terms this is an advantage. A woman once pregnant gains nothing from further copulation, whereas a man can keep spreading his genes around to great evolutionary advantage.”
This sort of theorizing is rather typical these days. Yet in the sample there was as much difference between the two men as there was between one man and one woman. But hey, we all know that humans are driven by the need to spread their genes, don’t we? So how do we explain that bizarre anti-evolutionary practice of contraception?
The trouble with many of the crude genetic explanations is that they come about through a series of assumptions and are deeply coloured by social and historical context.
1 Comment | Science, Socialist Theory | Tagged: Dialectical Materialism, Richard Lewontin | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
Countdown trolley wrangler wants workers’ control
October 14, 2008- Alastair Reith
Defenders of capitalism often claim that it is the most efficient, productive and effective system on offer. That for all its flaws (such as the misery that most of humanity is forced to endure), capitalism is at least capable of ensuring that everything operates the way it should, and all the jobs get done. However, this doesn’t stack up to reality.
I spend every Sunday pushing trolleys in the Countdown carpark. It’s a boring, monotonous job with very little to stimulate my mind – I walk outside, get trolleys, take them back inside, and repeat the process. Every now and again I shake things up a bit by taking a trolley into the store, collecting baskets and taking them out to the foyer.
Last Sunday, though, something was different. I don’t enjoy my job that much, and I don’t exactly pour every drop of energy I have into it, but over time I have become reasonably good at it. I can usually ensure that at all but the busiest times there are trolleys and baskets in the foyer and no major problems to do with supply of shopping bags, till rolls, etc. I can pretty much just zone out and let the day take its course as I get into my usual routine.
Leave a Comment » | Socialist Theory, Workers in Struggle | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
The best type of government?
September 2, 2008The Workers Party recently received an enquiry from a high school student trying to get in touch with the New Zealand Communist Party. The year 9 student wanted to ask a few questions “concerning a project on whether democracy is the best type of government.”
Philip Ferguson replied:
We’re actually the Workers Party, not the Communist Party. The CP no longer exists and we are not descended from it. Our organisation contains a variety of views on historical questions – some people are pro-Mao, some are pro-Trotsky and some have no particular historical identifications.
Does your party support independence from Britain, and if so, how could this benefit New Zealand?
New Zealand is independent from Britain and has been for quite a long time. The British monarch may be the formal head of state, but that is a mere formality. For instance, the governor-general, in whose person the monarch’s (limited) power is vested, is appointed by the New Zealand government. In fact, New Zealand gained representative institutions back in the 1850s and the major decisions about what happens politically in New Zealand have been made by the New Zealand state, government and ruling class ever since then.
Leave a Comment » | NZ 2008 Elections, Revolutionary Strategy, Socialist Theory | Permalink
Posted by WP Admin
