Chris Bertram

Julian Sanchez has a post up complaining about all us horrible lefties who are deriving great enjoyment from the fact that, in the Koch/Cato bunfight, shills for the rights of private property are being stiffed by those same private property rights. Corey Robin has a pretty good reply, so go read Corey.

Sanchez:

bq. when it comes to the ongoing Koch/Cato conflict, there’s a bafflingly widespread round of herp-derpery rippling through blogs on the left and the right, wherein people imagine it’s clever to point out the supposed irony of libertarian scholars failing to enthusiastically embrace a couple billionaires’ putative property rights over the institution. This is just strange. …I’m not arguing that Congress should intervene somehow. I’m arguing that exercising those rights as they seemingly intend to is a bad idea; that their direct control would, in itself, be damaging to Cato’s credibility; and that I’m not interested in working for the Republican talking-point factory that all evidence suggests they envision. Like rain on your wedding day and other infamous Alanisisms, that’s kind of crappy, but not “ironic” in any recognizable sense. I realize progressives think libertarianism is just code for uncritical worship of rich people, but as that’s not actually the case, the only irony here is that people think they’re scoring some kind of gotcha point when they’re actually exposing the silliness of their own caricature.

Well of course Sanchez is correct. Libertarians are as free as anyone else to criticize people for the way they exercise their rights, they just don’t think the state should coerce people to act in various ways. They can deplore Scrooge like selfishness just as sincerely as any leftie, they just think it would be wrong of the state to force Scrooge to be be nice to the poor. So it goes.

No doubt there are some soft and cuddly propertarians out there who insist on the rights to private property (and hence oppose enforceable positive duties) but who privately devote their time, money and other resources to helping the global (and local) poor. To those libertarians, I apologise in advance. However, to those libertarians who have spent ink and energy arguing that not only would it be _wrong_ to force to rich to help the poor but also that it would be _pointless_ or _counterproductive_ I do not. And then there are those libertarians who don’t even both with _pointless_ or _counterproductive_ but who argue that the strong helping the weak is just _wrong_, namely the Randians. So, pure-in-spirit rights-defenders (of whom Julian Sanchez may be one): just take it on the chin for now and spend some time arguing with the wealthy that, whilst they have a perfect right to spend their money funding Cato (or Heritage, or the AEI) they really could make better use of their rights by sending their cash to the sub-Saharan poor or similar. (See also, this “very old post of mine”:https://crookedtimber.org/2005/06/14/if-youre-a-libertarian-how-come-youre-so-mean/ ).

We’ve now received and published all the contributions in our online seminar on David Graeber’s _Debt: The First 5000 Years_ . For those wanting a handy index the posts are:

Chris Bertram, “Introduction”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/22/seminar-on-david-graebers-debt-the-first-5000-years-introduction/
John Quiggin, “The unmourned death of the double coincidence”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/22/the-unmourned-death-of-the-double-coincidence/
Henry Farrell: “The world economy is not a tribute system”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/22/the-world-economy-is-not-a-tribute-system/
Barry Finger “Debt jubilee or global deleveraging”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/22/debt-jubilee-or-global-deleveraging/
John Quiggin (slight return): “The end of debt”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/22/the-end-of-debt/
Neville Morley: “The return of grand narrative in the human sciences”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/22/the-return-of-grand-narrative-in-the-human-sciences/
Malcolm Harris: “The dangers of pricing the infinite”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/23/the-dangers-of-pricing-the-infinite/
Daniel Davies “Too big to fail: the first 5000 years”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/25/too-big-to-fail-the-first-5000-years/
Lou Brown: “Good to think with”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/26/good-to-think-with/
Richard Ashcroft: “Money out of place: ‘debt’ and incentives”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/26/money-out-of-place-debt-and-incentives/
Rob Horning: “Debt on the 12th planet”:https://crookedtimber.org/2012/02/28/debt-on-the-12th-planet/

Stay tuned, as we’re hoping that David Graeber will be able to write a response to some of this soon, but that won’t happen for at least a week or so.

David Graeber’s Debt: The First 5000 Years begins with a conversation in a London churchyard about debt and morality and takes us all the way from ancient Sumeria, through Roman slavery, the vast empires of the “Axial age”, medieval monasteries, New World conquest and slavery to the 2008 financial collapse. The breadth of material Graeber covers is extraordinarily impressive and, though anchored in the perspective of social anthropology, he also draws on economics and finance, law, history, classics, sociology and the history of ideas. I’m guessing that most of us can’t keep up and that we lack, to some degree, his erudition and multidisciplinary competence. Anyway, I do. But I hope that a Crooked Timber symposium can draw on experts and scholars from enough of these different disciplines to provide some critical perspective. My own background is in political philosophy and the history of political thought: so that naturally informs my own reactions as do my political engagements and sympathies. So mine is merely one take on some of the book’s themes.

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Today’s Observer (at the Guardian website) has a review of Roman Polanski’s new film Carnage by Philip French. Here’s what Mr French had to say about Polanski’s past:

bq. At the age of six, Polanski began a life of persecution, flight and the threat of incarceration – first from the Nazi invaders of Poland, then an oppressive communist regime, and finally the American criminal justice system after his newfound sense of freedom led him into transgression. The world must seem a prison, society a succession of traps, civilised values a deceptive veneer, life itself a battle against fate.

Like a number of other people, I posted a comment on the site. I can’t reproduce my comment exactly, because it has now been deleted for “violation of community standards” but it read something like “What? ‘transgression’ hardly seems to be an appropriate word.” Other commenters have been deleted, again for “violation of community standards” merely for quoting Mr French’s exculpatory paragraph _in extenso_ and say that it is “ludicrous”. The Guardian’s guidelines on “community standards” are here. They are not unreasonable and contain the assurance:

bq. In short: – If you act with maturity and consideration for other users, you should have no problems.

It is hard, therefore, to see why politely objecting to Mr French’s words should provoke deletion. Apparently, the Guardian thinks otherwise.

At this time of year, we traditionally have an open thread on the Six Nations (if only to permit some deluded North American commenter to make the same lame joke about the Iroquois as has been made on previous occasions). I can’t really see beyond France, though they do have the capacity to collapse for no discernible reason. One of the first games is Scotland-England at Murrayfield, where most people seem to expect the Scots to win. I’ll be rooting for England, myself, despite a recent discovery that one of the Corries was a distant cousin. Thoughts, opinions, … anyone feeling optimistic about Ireland or Wales?

Any spat between Alain de Botton and Richard Dawkins is one where I’m kind of rooting for both of them to lose. On the other hand, Dawkins has some genuine achievements to his name and has written some pretty decent books, so there’s some compensation when he acts like an arse, whereas in de Botton’s case ….

De Botton’s latest plans (h/t Alex):

bq. to build a £1m “temple for atheists” among the international banks and medieval church spires of the City of London have sparked a clash between two of Britain’s most prominent non-believers. The philosopher and writer Alain de Botton is proposing to build a 46-metre (151ft) tower to celebrate a “new atheism” as an antidote to what he describes as Professor Richard Dawkins’s “aggressive” and “destructive” approach to non-belief. Rather than attack religion, De Botton said he wants to borrow the idea of awe-inspiring buildings that give people a better sense of perspective on life.

Not a runner, I think. Though there’s at least one happy precedent: Auguste Comte’s Chapel of Humanity, which Maria blogged about in 2003.

I’m asking the question, because I don’t know, but the signs are extremely worrying. When NATO intervention was first mooted, I wrote a piece here expressing concern that, if the successor government came about thanks to NATO intervention it would lack legitimacy in the eyes of the Libyan people. I’m not sure that I was right about the reasons for that, but the conclusion about the lack of legitimacy itself (much mocked in some quarters) looks to be increasingly vindicated by events. One reason to intervene was to prevent severe human rights violations, including the possibility of massacre in Benghazi. Well a cruel and vicious regime with a dreadful human-rights record has gone, but seems to have been replaced by a squabbling coalition of militias, little inclined to submit to the authority of a central government, with Ghaddafi-loyalists making a comeback. Moreover, said militias seem to be engaged in serious human rights violations themselves, abuses that have been going on pretty much since “victory”. Those who were most enthusiastic for intervention don’t seem to be saying much about these worrying recent developments. An intervention predicated on defending human rights certainly won’t have been justified if the successor regime ends up presiding over similar persecutings, detainings, torturings and killings itself.

Last week’s nef event on shorter working week, which I blogged about a few days ago, is now available to watch via the LSE channel. Enjoy.

In an attempt to demonstrate their credentials as the takers of “tough decisions”, British Labour leader Ed Miliband (whom I backed as leader) and his shadow Chancellor Ed Balls have been telling the world that a future Labour government can’t guarantee to reverse Tory public expenditure cuts, and favour a public sector pay freeze, and even pay cuts for public sector workers (to save jobs, apparently). Well it is a funny world where a sign of your toughness is your willingness to pander to the right-wing commentariat. Of course I understand that a future Labour government will have to cope with the world it inherits and that difficult choices will have to be made. But in the interim, people are fighting to stop the coalition from vandalising Britain’s public services and punishing the poorest and most vulnerable. Faced with Miliband and Balls “signalling” (or whatever), those negotiating to defend workers will be told by their managements that “even” the Labour leadership concede the necessity for cuts and concessions. This simply cuts the ground from under the feet of trade unionists and campaigners. It also validates Tory policies in the eyes of large parts of the electorate. Well they’ve made their choice and I’ve made mine. It is a small one, and Ed and Ed won’t even notice, but I have left the party.

Last Wednesday I attended an event at LSE (under the auspices of the New Economics Foundation) exploring the idea of working-time reduction with an eventual goal of moving to a normal working week of 21 hours. Various people asked me to write up the event, so that’s what I’m doing, though I claim no special expertise in the surrounding economics and social science. The lectures were filmed, so I expect that they’ll be up somewhere to watch soon, which will make my comments superfluous. Tom Walker of Ecological Headstand was also present, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see some remarks from him there soon.
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The position of the last British detainee at Guantanamo, Shaker Aamer, is in the UK news today. He’s never been charged with anything and was “cleared for release” under the Bush administration. He is in failing health. For protesting about his own treatment and that of others, he is confined to the punishment block. It seems the reason the Aamer can’t be released today is that the US Congress has imposed absurd certification requirements on the US Secretary of Defense, such that Panetta would be personally reponsible for any future criminal actions by the released inmate. One of the reasons why the US Congress has put these obstacles up is because of claims made by the US military about “recidivism”, claims that also get some scrutiny in the report. It would seem that subsequent protests about conditions in the camp, writing a book about it or making a film, are counted as instances of “recidivism”. Astonishing. You can listen to a BBC radio report here (start at 7′ 40″) (I’d been thinking about Guantanamo anyway, because of the “superb and moving article by Lakhdar Boumediene in the New York Times, “:http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/opinion/sunday/my-guantanamo-nightmare.html which you should also read.)

Whilst it is good to see this issue getting more coverage in the mainstream media in the UK and the US, it is depressing how little uptake there has been among politicians and, indeed, the online community. The long-term detention, mistreatment and probable torture of people who have never been convicted of anything, ought to be a matter uniting people across the political spectrum who care about human rights. Unfortunately, outside of a small coterie of activists, the best you get is indifference or even active hostility. Indeed, those who campaign on behalf of the inmates have themselves been villified (by conservatives or the “decent left”) for such “crimes” as comparing the Guantanamo regime to past totalitarian governments (as if such comparison is more offensive than the acual treatment of the detainees). Depressing.

There’s a very interesting interview with Brian Leiter over at 3:AM Magazine. Read the whole thing, as they say. Interesting and entertaining though Brian’s thoughts are, I reacted somewhat negatively to his promotion of “realism” over “moralism” and to the somewhat dismissive (though sugar-coated) remarks he makes about Jerry Cohen. Jerry actually did have some “realist” things to say about society and politics, most notably in parts of _Self-Ownership, Freedom and Equality_ and in chapter 11 of _Karl Marx’s Theory of History_, but his work can speak for itself. More worrying, I think, is Brian’s apparent desire to abolish large parts of philosophy altogether when he write approvingly of:

bq. those who think the aim of philosophy should be to get as clear as possible about the way things really are, that is, about the actual causal structure of the natural and human world, how societies and economies work, what motivates politicians and ordinary people to do what they do ….

My question here is: why’s that an aim of _philosophy_ ? The people investigating the actual causal structure of the natural world are natural scientists, not philosophers; the people investigating the actual causal structure of the human world are social scientists, not philosophers.

Update: Brian assures me that he has no desire that the moralists be “purged” (my work was “abolished”). I’m happy to hear that, but it remains that he thinks that we moralists are pursuing an agenda that is other than he believes the aim of philosophy ought to be.

David Cameron’s use of the veto in the recent EU summit opens an era of deep uncertainty (and possible catastrophe) for British and European politics. Two things seem to be true: Cameron is an incompetent opportunist in thrall to his backbenchers and the proposed treaty is a disaster for the Eurozone countries themselves. The fact that it is a disaster (a fact recognized by Francois Hollande’s declared intention to renegotiate) might seem to give some support to Cameron. But of course it doesn’t, since the remaining 26 countries will just go ahead without the UK. All Cameron has done is isolate and exclude himself. As one MEP is reported as saying today, “If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu.”

Cameron vetoed the proposed EU treaty on the basis, or pretext, that other countries wouldn’t agree to “safeguards” for the City of London. The reason he was asking for these was essentially just because his backbenchers had demanded he show the “bulldog spirit” and, since EU treaties need unanimity, he thought he could extract some symbolic gain to satisfy them. He didn’t clear this with Merkel or Sarkozy in advance and would have been inhibited in doing so because the British Tories withdrew from the mainstream Euro conservative grouping in order to hob-nob with a bunch of extreme nutters and anti-semites. Sarkozy, who wanted a more integrated core Europe without Britain in any case, took the opportunity to call Cameron’s bluff. All very good for Sarko in the run-up the the Presidential elections. Exit Cameron stage right, claiming to have stood up to the EU – and getting praised by the UK’s tabloid press and an opinion-poll boost – but actually exposing the City to further regulation under qualified majority voting. He’s also chucked away decades of British policy which favoured EU expansion with the new accession countries serving as a counterweight to the Franco-German axis. Where are the other countries now? Lined up with the French and Germans.

The Euro treaty itself, assuming it goes ahead as planned and is enforced, mandates balanced budgets and empowers the Eurocrats to vet national budgets and punish offenders. Social democracy is thereby effectively rendered illegal in the Eurozone in both its “social” and “democracy” aspects. Daniel put it “thus”:https://crookedtimber.org/2011/12/09/euro-kremlinology/comment-page-2/#comment-391547 :

bq. a takeover of Europe by the neoliberal “permanent government” who failed to get their way by democratic means. All of the nationalism and anti-German sentiment is a distraction from the real scandal here. The ‘technocrats’ (which is apparently what they want to be called, although frankly I am seeing a lot of ideology and not much technical ability) want to reorganise the whole of Europe on neoliberal lines (ironically, to basically replicate the Irish economic transformation

One might think, then, that the left should be happy to be well away from it and that Cameron has inadvertently done us a favour. However, the short-term consequences in British politics could well be awful. My worst-case fantasy scenario has Cameron calling a snap General Election on nationalist themes, getting a majority dominated by swivel-eyed propertarian xenophobes and dismantling the welfare state, the Health Service, the BBC etc. Riots and civil disorder would be met with force, and those driven to resistance or crime would be incarcerated in giant new prisons. The Scots would then, understandably, opt for independence, and England and Wales would be left at the mercy of the crazies for several decades. Texas-on-Thames, in short.

And Nick Clegg? Well I wonder if even Daragh McDowell will make a case for him now.

I’m re-reading Samuel Scheffler’s paper “Immigration and the Significance of Culture”, _Philosophy and Public Affairs_ 2007. From the footnotes, the list of “races” into which the US immigration authorities divided humanity in 1914:

bq. African (black), Armenian, Bohemian, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Cuban, Dalmatian, Dutch, East Indian, English, Finnish, Flemish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Herzogovinian, Irish, Italian (North), Italian (South), Japanese, Korean, Lithuanian, Magyar, Mexican, Montenegrin, Moravian, Pacific Islander, Polish, Portuguese, Roumanian, Russian, Ruthenian (Russniak), Scandinavian (Norwegians, Danes, and Swedes), Scotch, Servian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Spanish-American, Syrian, Turkish, Welsh, West Indian.