[Nettime-bold] Re: <nettime> stiglitz is not the second digest [geer, hart]

[Benjamin Geer <ben@beroul.uklinux.net>]

On Tuesday 09 Jul 2002 00:13, ben moretti wrote:
> Naively I believe that the progressives in countries with much to
> struggle against, Brazil etc, are more easily able to achieve
> constructive things.

I think the Sem Terra movement has chosen an issue on which direct action 
can really work.  Poor farmers need land.  There's lots of unused land 
going to waste.  So they occupy it.  Of course there's a lot more to it 
than that (good planning and organisation, popular education, legal 
battles, alliances with other movements, etc.), but in essence, that's 
how direct action is supposed to work: the action itself contributes 
directly to solving the problem; its value isn't merely symbolic or 
rhetorical.

It's not too hard to see how to do that with land.  It's harder to see 
how to do it with financial markets, trade, or public services.

> Anyway, I think if the progressives in the West stopped talking so much
> about "stuff" and did some simple things, such as teaching computers to
> refugees or working at a women's shelter, then they would feel like
> they had more integration, as you say, with their theoretical chit
> chat.

OK, but how do you integrate the two?  In addition to helping organise 
public political chit-chat events, I could spend time teaching computers 
to refugees, etc.  I would learn more about the problems faced by 
refugees, and the refugees would learn about computers.  But how do you 
build a political movement out of that?  The Sem Terra movement isn't 
just obtaining land for farmers; it's also building political 
consciousness.  By carrying out these collective actions, the farmers 
learn how to size up the balance of forces in a particular situation, 
challenge their government, and win.  Surely that's a far cry from the 
individual refugee learning to use Microsoft Word (horrors!) in order to 
get a job.

So how, in the West, do you integrate small-scale work, meant to remedy 
immediate individual problems, with a political project?  I'm not saying 
it can't be done; but it needs a strategy.  Is there anyone who is doing 
this effectively?

Ben

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