Mandela’s Tarnished Legacy (making a deal with the neoliberal devil)

[yurbud]

One of the heart-breaking things reading Naomi Klein's THE SHOCK DOCTRINE was how neoliberal bankers took the most triumphant moments of 80's and 90's and turned them to dust in people's mouths, from the Solidarity movement in Poland, the collapse of the Soviet Union--to the end of Apartheid in South Africa.

The demands of international bankers and the corporate order made the democratic and racial equality gains of the people moot because wages and worker's rights had to be kept down, as did spending on programs to reduce poverty.

Sound familiar?

We have to fight that agenda whatever party or person it comes from.

by John Pilger

...Around the same time, Mandela was conducting his own secret negotiations. In 1982, he had been moved from Robben Island to Pollsmoor Prison, where he could receive and entertain people. The apartheid regime’s aim was to split the ANC between the “moderates” they could “do business with” (Mandela, Thabo Mbeki and Oliver Tambo) and those in the frontline townships who led the United Democratic Front (UDF). On 5 July, 1989, Mandela was spirited out of prison to meet P.W. Botha, the white minority president known as the Groot Krokodil (Big Crocodile). Mandela was delighted that Botha poured the tea.

With democratic elections in 1994, racial apartheid was ended, and economic apartheid had a new face. During the 1980s, the Botha regime had offered black businessmen generous loans, allowing them set up companies outside the Bantustans. A new black bourgeoisie emerged quickly, along with a rampant cronyism. ANC chieftains moved into mansions in “golf and country estates”. As disparities between white and black narrowed, they widened between black and black.

The familiar refrain that the new wealth would “trickle down” and “create jobs” was lost in dodgy merger deals and “restructuring” that cost jobs. For foreign companies, a black face on the board often ensured that nothing had changed. In 2001, George Soros told the Davos Economic Forum, “South Africa is in the hands of international capital.”

In the townships, people felt little change and were subjected to apartheid-era evictions; some expressed nostalgia for the “order” of the old regime. The post-apartheid achievements in de-segregating daily life in South Africa, including schools, were undercut by the extremes and corruption of a “neoliberalism” to which the ANC devoted itself. This led directly to state crimes such as the massacre of 34 miners at Marikana in 2012, which evoked the infamous Sharpeville massacre more than half a century earlier. Both had been protests about injustice.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/07/11/mandelas-tarnished-legacy/

[struggle4progress]

1. It's the usual BS from holier-than-thou Counterpunch. I stopped reading them

back during the reign of King Bush the Halfwit: their loosely-strung and strident "analysis" is always based on sweeping generalities with a smattering of barely-related fact -- not in any way helpful to organizing efforts. I consider them psychotic disruptors

[yurbud]

2. Have you heard of John Pilger? Do you have any factual problems with the piece?

[struggle4progress]

3. You may have difficulty with what I say here. Yes, I do know who John Pilger is.

And, in fact, at a purely philosophical level I am often rather inclined to agree with the general views he appears to express. But when I read his columns, I ask myself whether he is providing useful facts in support of an useful analysis leading to his conclusions, and my reaction is almost always that he does not. And when I ask myself what the effect of his writing will be, my conclusion is typically, not that he's helping my side, but rather that he's actually helping the rightwing

I think a journalist's suspicions can be a good thing, especially if those suspicions lead to careful fact-based investigative reporting, and from time to time Pilger seems to have used his suspicions productively, motivating him to quality reporting. Suspicion alone, however, does not produce useful journalism -- careful collection of facts, and an uncompromising intellectual honesty in assembling those facts, are essential

I have spent much of my life trying to think contrary to mainstream. In my view, there is nothing wrong with contrarian thinking: coupled with a careful attention to fact and intellectual honest analysis, it can serve as an important antidote to mind-numbing group-think. But it is really only useful if the contrarian instinct does not degenerate into a simple and predictable reflex: contrarian thought can be helpful if it brings attention to important assumptions that have consequences for our decisions but have become invisibly second-nature to those making the assumptions, so that we overlook other possibilities

I believe activists should cultivate a certain healthy paranoia -- but by healthy I mean a habit of thinking concretely about specific details, being careful not to self-indulgently succumb either to empty idealism or sweeping pessimism about the roles played by various people or the meanings of events

The struggle against apartheid was long and arduous -- and in its final decade, it was simply brilliant. It exhibits a clear and uncompromising moral statement against the system, well-informed analysis of the various social sectors, careful efforts to coordinate different groups with different tendencies and different visions of the struggle, constant work to raise the political consciousness of the masses of South Africa until intelligent almost-spontaneous direct action supporting long-term goals became possible, and a willingness to compromise when it was possible. The ANC stared down the racist nationalists by bringing S Africa to the brink of revolutionary crisis, then averted the bloodbath of a civil war by extending a hand in genuine friendship to their enemies. Of course, no messianic golden era followed, but the messianic golden era would not have followed along any other path either: it is not a time and place to which we living men and women can travel but a shining star on which we keep one eye as we seek to navigate turbulent seas without capsizing or wrecking on the rocky shores. I find the accomplishment of the ANC, and its leadership, without parallel in our time: there is a history well worth studying in detail for its lessons

You would hold up Pilger at his worst. Ignoring the terrible complexities of the S African political landscape during the apartheid years, Pilger would reintroduce an anachronistic suspicion into our discussions of Mandela and Mandela's motives; perhaps Pilger imagines himself a clever contrarian here; he values psychological paranoia itself, rather than the alertness and careful thinking that a carefully-limited slightly paranoid habit can bring. His details teach us nothing: Mandela looked sleepy; his shoes were untied; he patted Pilger on the arm. Pilger here is not helping us learn useful lessons from the enormous achievement of the ANC but rather he is playing the role of a disruptor, who wants us to notice, not that the ANC really forced the racist nationalists to negotiate with Mandela, but that (horrors!) Mandela did negotiate with the racist nationalists and that these negotiations did not bring the messianic golden era. It is idiocy on my view and worth little attention

[yurbud]

4. No one expected a "messianic golden era," but neoliberals stole the chance to improve the

lives of most black South Africans and neutered their democracy in the crib.

It's interesting that you could write all that and not address the very real neoliberal economics that has a stranglehold not just on South Africa but most of the world, including the US.

Do you think that letting banks and Wall Street dictate to democracy rather than being subordinate to it is a good thing?

I don't.

That was the whole point of my post, and you seem to have missed it.

[yurbud]

5. Read THE SHOCK DOCTRINE for more details on what international finance did at the end of Apartheid

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1016&pid=80214

What details is Pilger missing?

[geek tragedy]

6. Pilger is a racist so not surprising to see him

smear Mandela for not being the kind of black man that Pilger expected him to be.

Same asshole called Barack Obama an "Uncle Tom" and disparaged the issue of marriage equality.

Fuck John Pilger.

[yurbud]

7. do you have links for both of those? Calling Obama an Uncle Tom is not the same as being a racist

any more than criticizing Israel's treatment of Palestinians makes someone an anti-Semite.

[geek tragedy]

9. A white guy calling Obama an Uncle Tom is racist

as anyone with a modicum of decency would know. White people do NOT have the right to tell a black man that he is not acting like a proper black man.

The comparison to criticizing Israel is idiotic--calling him an 'Uncle Tom' is not policy criticism-it's degrading him on the basis of race.
Go ahead and call him an 'Uncle Tom' and see what the reaction is from admins here. Or, better yet , try dropping that phrase on a black acquaintance.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=John+Pilger+Barack+Obama+Uncle+Tom+#seen

People who approve of such slurs are extreme assholes, with zero exceptions. Zero. And, yes, there are such extreme assholes on the left, as Pilger and his apologists prove. They have the racial sensitivity of Ayman Al-Zawahiri:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7737710.stm

[JustAnotherGen]

10. gt - you always find a beautiful way

To drive home a point -

White people do NOT have the right to tell a black man that he is not acting like a proper black man.

Amen. Amen.



I think think he described him as a "glossy" uncle Tom.

[geek tragedy]

11. Here's his "STFU about equality, you troublesome bourgeois women and gay people" column

http://johnpilger.com/articles/never-forget-that-bradley-manning-not-gay-marriage-is-the-issue

Never forget that Bradley Manning, not gay marriage, is the issue

The award of the Nobel Prize to the first black president because he "offered hope" was both absurd and an authentic expression of the lifestyle liberalism that controls much of political debate in the west. Same-sex marriage is one such distraction. No "issue" diverts attention as successfully as this: not the free vote in Parliament on lowering the age of gay consent promoted by the noted libertarian and war criminal Tony Blair: not the cracks in "glass ceilings" that contribute nothing to women's liberation and merely amplify the demands of bourgeois privilege.

Legal obstacles should not prevent people marrying each other, regardless of gender. But this is a civil and private matter; bourgeois acceptability is not yet a human right. The rights historically associated with marriage are those of property: capitalism itself. Elevating the "right" of marriage above the right to life and real justice is as profane as seeking allies among those who deny life and justice to so many, from Afghanistan to Palestine.

As I've said, John Pilger can fuck himself--he's a bigoted ideologue with zero empathy for anyone whose priorities aren't Marxist revolution, not a progressive.

[yurbud]

13. the context of those comments is crucial: gay marriage will be cold comfort if you and your spouse

are forced to live under a bridge because your house has been foreclosed, your job outsourced, and your new job pays so little you can't even afford rent.

That was the only point he was making: we have to focus on these economic issues or gay or straight, black or white, we are all screwed.

That's not being an ideologue, that's triage to save our lives.

[geek tragedy]

14. Nope, it's a hardcore assholitarian ideologue dismissing minority rights

The award of the Nobel Prize to the first black president because he "offered hope" was both absurd and an authentic expression of the lifestyle liberalism that controls much of political debate in the west. Same-sex marriage is one such distraction. No "issue" diverts attention as successfully as this: not the free vote in Parliament on lowering the age of gay consent promoted by the noted libertarian and war criminal Tony Blair: not the cracks in "glass ceilings" that contribute nothing to women's liberation and merely amplify the demands of bourgeois privilege.

Legal obstacles should not prevent people marrying each other, regardless of gender. But this is a civil and private matter; bourgeois acceptability is not yet a human right. The rights historically associated with marriage are those of property: capitalism itself. Elevating the "right" of marriage above the right to life and real justice is as profane as seeking allies among those who deny life and justice to so many, from Afghanistan to Palestine.

Mixed in with the boilerplate Marxist nonsense (stating that marriage is capitalism) is this gem:

bourgeois acceptability is not yet a human right

Straight man telling women and GLBT folks that equality is not a human right, that their pursuit of equality is a 'distraction' to real issues, i.e. what John Pilger and Karl Marx deem important.

Also, Chelsea Manning has jack shit to do with feeding people, but Pilger claims Chelsea Manning is the real issue, not the human rights of GLBT citizens. So spare me the dishonest apologia for this bigoted asshole.

He doesn't care about equal rights for GLBT human beings or women, so he disparages them as a distraction.

That's not ideology.

That's being a white heterosexual male privileged asshole who wallows in that privilege.

[yurbud]

12. it is not in the same category as slurs that imply the whole race is inferior or untrustworthy

[geek tragedy]

15. Sure, just like Rick Santorum isn't as homophobic as Fred Phelps nt

[idwiyo]

8. k&r Thank you for posting this.

[Blue_Tires]

16. Pilger? Seriously?