Naomi Klein - The Shock Doctrine

[padraig (u.s.)]

So, for instance, the question of architecture for Foucault-influenced critic would be how it works in space, how it arranges space, how it channels movement, whereas the question for a Marxist critic would be: What concealed forces does it form betray?

I dunno but it seems to me like the former would encompass the latter.

 

[crackerjack]

New interview with the subject of the thread (if that's still relevant) here

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article5798580.ece

 

[josef k.]

I dunno but it seems to me like the former would encompass the latter.

I agree...

 

[scottdisco]

linked to neutrally, without comment

a while back i was responsible for a minor derail on another thread when i posted this review from Zionist puffery sheet TNR

 

[vimothy]

I like the way Klein describes the current crisis as vindicating her thesis -- very amusing.

 

[crackerjack]

I like the way Klein describes the current crisis as vindicating her thesis -- very amusing.

I think the writer is putting words in her mouth there, and she does admit to it "complicating" her thesis.

The 38-year-old Canadian is wary of gloating (“I don't feel any sense of gratification about a financial crisis which is proving to be an epic disaster”), but after some clarification (“the thesis of the book isn't simply ‘capitalism is bad'; it's about how catastrophes such as natural disasters and economic crises are exploited to push through unpopular free-market policies”) and numerous caveats (“the current economic crisis presents complications to my thesis in that it is deeply understood to be a result of free-market logic”), she admits to feeling some vindication. “When the book came out the analysis was seen as extreme, certainly by financial writers, but if the book came out right now, perhaps the reception would be different.”

It's a shame she doesn't explain what that last sentence means - I guess it's just that people are more eager to hear about capitalism's flaws. Hard to see how it connects to Shock Doc at all.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

New interview with the subject of the thread (if that's still relevant) here

http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/the_way_we_live/article5798580.ece

a while back i was responsible for a minor derail on another thread when i posted this review from Zionist puffery sheet TNR

aye, there's the rub - when push comes to shove I'll still take Klein (& more importantly what she represents) over most, if not all, if the people criticizing. cos, though the "politics of good intentions" may indeed be quite infuriating on a frequent basis - 1) the intentions are after still good & 2) when a line is drawn I know which side I stand on. which is surely reductionist, vastly overly simplistic, etc. etc. ad infinitum. but nonetheless.

 

[vimothy]

But where is the line? With Klein, I am not at all sure.

Also, do good intentions justify bad outcomes?

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

It's a shame she doesn't explain what that last sentence means - I guess it's just that people are more eager to hear about capitalism's flaws. Hard to see how it connects to Shock Doc at all.

I don't know how it was in Britain but here leading right up to financial crises - even in the beginning stages back in like August/September - no one, but no one, was talking recession, collapsing housing market & that. in the financial world I mean, at least that I'm aware of - it was all rosy good times & anyone who said different was laughed at. which I guess is emblamatic of a lot of things wrong with the "financial world" - feedback loop & that. I remember reading this article by Michael Lewis (perhaps a bit too populist for all you post-structuralist dons though) a couple months later about that very phenomenon amongst other things.

 

[vimothy]

Actually, I'm a massive fan of Michael Lewis. There were, of course, quite a few others who predicted what was going to happen with various degrees of accuracy and specificity. You're right about them being laughed at, though.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

But where is the line? With Klein, I am not at all sure.

me neither. thankfully push has not to come shove in this country in my lifetime. listen to her talk though "If the Left don't rise to the occasion the alternative is fascism". I'm not saying I endorse that, mind, just that in such a case...I remember back in '04 I had more than one friend who was adamant that if Bush II lost there would be a military coup d'etat. which was very unlikely, I think, but not outside the realm of possibility.

Also, do good intentions justify bad outcomes?

I'm sure you know as well as me that the answer depends on both the intentions & the outcomes, as well as a host of other factors. in short, case by case, like most anything.

 

[crackerjack]

I don't know how it was in Britain but here leading right up to financial crises - even in the beginning stages back in like August/September - no one, but no one, was talking recession, collapsing housing market & that. in the financial world I mean, at least that I'm aware of - it was all rosy good times & anyone who said different was laughed at. which I guess is emblamatic of a lot of things wrong with the "financial world" - feedback loop & that. I remember reading this article by Michael Lewis (perhaps a bit too populist for all you post-structuralist dons though) a couple months later about that very phenomenon amongst other things.

That's surprising - it's been a topic here since Northern Rock went down late '07.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

Actually, I'm a massive fan of Michael Lewis. There were, of course, quite a few others who predicted what was going to happen with various degrees of accuracy and specificity. You're right about them being laughed at, though.

yeah Peter Schiff was the one big exception I was thinking of. and yeah there were others but you know what I mean.

also on a happier topic perhaps a Michael Lewis thread is in order over at Art Literature & Film. the SR of sports writing I reckon. I lived in Oakland for a long time (if you read Moneyball the Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane is the "hero" so to speak) & got back into baseball for awhile pretty much off of reading Moneyball.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

That's surprising - it's been a topic here since Northern Rock went down late '07.

well I mean there were some people issuing warnings but the prevailing attitude was overwhelmingly positive well into 2008.

 

[nomadthethird]

yeah this is ace, really.

The problem with it is that it assumes a) that all "Marxists" are actually Trotskyites-cum-academics, and b) that these "Marxists" don't actually agree with Weber on class. (?)

 

[crackerjack]

well I mean there were some people issuing warnings but the prevailing attitude was overwhelmingly positive well into 2008.

But it's alright now, because the FSA will ban anything it can't grasp.

Financial regulators may in the future ban financial products if they are too risky to understand, Lord Turner, chairman of the Financial Services Authority, said today.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/feb/25/fsa-banking-revolution

How does that sentence even make sense? Something can't be too risky to understand - too complex to understand, too risky to justify, or too risky to understand why a bank would take such a risk.

 

[nomadthethird]

Speaking on behalf of any abstract category is problematic. "Work" is meant to be understood, as suggested, in a binary Marxist sense: the workers work, the owners of capital lap it up. But who are these workers? As soon as you look at them in any detail, the categories collapse into one another. The claim to seek universal justice (as opposed to practicing mere philosophy) really involves another claim, which is in fact this taxonomy dividing us into workers and the owners of capital. Moreover, this effects of this claim produces benefits for the claimant(s) -- not necessarily monetary benefits, but then, there are other forms of capital...

Way to totally negate your point by playing into the hands of the opposing ideology at the end there.

 

[vimothy]

I suppose it's a personal preference, but I'm not sure how much I value good intentions. At any rate, you can't eat them -- at least, not for long.

With regards to Klein, what, actually, are her politics? There's little sustained critique of neoliberal policies and/or principles in her book (as far as I can tell); rather, her focus is on a specific narrative and how the theory and policies relate to that. She is, I guess, in favour of 1970s-style "Keynesian" welfare spending and social democracy. Doesn't sound particularly radical to me. Hell, economics is filled with scary neoliberals who are also, basically, Keynesians, like wing-nut economist and shill for Bush, N. Gregory Mankiw, or Keynesian neoliberal shill for Clinton, Bradford J. DeLong.

 

[vimothy]

Way to totally negate your point by playing into the hands of the opposing ideology at the end there.

What point was that?

 

[crackerjack]

a while back i was responsible for a minor derail on another thread when i posted this review from Zionist puffery sheet TNR

thanks
I'll read this, thus making myself even better qualified to comment on Naomi Klein's book