Monthly Archives: October 2020

ROSARIO, Argentina – On Saturday, two of Pope Francis’ most trusted advisers participated in the latest edition of the World Meeting of Popular Movements, which has been supported by the Pope since the early days of his pontificate.

The meeting brings together grassroots organizations from five continents working with the poor and marginalized, with the aim of letting them become the protagonists of their own stories.

Cardinal Peter Turkson, Prefect of the Vatican Dicastery for the Promotion of Integral Human Development, was one of the people who addressed the meeting this year, held online due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“There are inequalities, a lack of access to health, cruel economic systems, which is why the [COVID-19] the virus exposes us to many other pandemics that need to be treated, ”he said.

All of these other pandemics, Turkson said, “all have one thing in common: they undermine human dignity.”

Turkson said that Pope Francis’ latest document, the encyclical Fratelli Tutti is an appropriate response to these shortcomings.

RELATED: Does Pope Francis Lean Left, Right, or Neither? A story of two speeches

The World Meeting met several times, the first time in Rome in 2014. Francis participated in some of them, including two in Rome and one in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia.

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Cardinal Michael Czerny recalled that this new meeting was part of the encounter culture “Essential for progress” and an opportunity “to learn in a new context” of pandemics. He issued a clear invitation to personal conversion, asking those gathered to ask themselves a series of questions asked by Francis in Fratelli Tutti, like “how much love have I put into my job? “And” how much social peace have I sowed? “

Participants at the meeting released a seven-page document that will be presented at an economic event hosted by Pope Francis to take place next November.

“We know that nothing of what we propose is possible with the current balance of power which determines the relations between the nations and within them”, they recognized in the document. “We know the power of money to subordinate governments, maintain the status quo, expand elite privileges, and reduce majority rights.”

“We also have confidence in the ability of peoples to resist injustice and transform reality,” the document said. “We therefore assume the task of building popular power so that the workers and the poor become the protagonists of the change that the world needs, because, as Francis said,” in your hands, in our hands, lies the ‘future of humanity’. “

The proposals revolve around five main axes: Integral ecology and common goods; economic democracy; land, shelter and work; education, health, communication and technology; sovereignty, human mobility and peace.

The document, entitled “The Economy of Francis”, argues that it is necessary to imagine an alternative system to the “globally hegemonic capitalist system”, to eradicate “the global idolatry of money which structures the world economy” , to advance an economy centered “on nature, on men and women.

During these meetings, supported the members of the popular movements, they were able to hear the “revolutionary preaching of a shepherd of the peoples who calls the poorest to be protagonists of their own destiny and who calls them to lead the process of change. that all mankind needs.

“We are aware that certain sectors seek to domesticate its thought and to confine it within the narrow margins of the administration of what already exists”, they write.

Recognizing that they cannot claim to have the only correct interpretation of the pontiff’s thoughts, the group offers a vision that they deem to be in tune with the radicality of Francis’s teaching and the revolutionary nature of Christianity.

Most of the proposals are those expected for such a document: Access to drinking water as a right for all; a serious campaign to reduce the carbon footprint; the planting of native trees; recycling; and international minimum income; the elimination of tax havens which allow the richest in the world to escape their obligations; and the implementation of a fiscal policy aimed at “all industries which undermine the physical or mental health of the population”, from arms manufacturers to gambling, fast food and alcohol, to create a fund to provide free access to health care at all levels.

Others are a little more outlandish, notably a new international currency issued by the United Nations, under the control not of one nation but of all countries, so that “the dollar and the euro will no longer be used in international transactions or as a source of speculation, since they create international inequalities and promote speculative attacks against national currencies; to implement a Popular Agrarian Reform, to distribute the land to all those who want to work it, with a maximum area of ​​agricultural property; and the elimination of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to replace them with institutions that serve the international community and not the “colonial interests of powerful countries”.

Still others are even more radical, such as the promotion of alternatives to private property, such as “state property, cooperative property or community property”.

Follow Inés San Martín on Twitter: @inesanma

By Bhabani Shankar Nayak *

Neoliberal economic policies and its austerity plans are dead, but its political infrastructure is alive and well and thriving

Accountability and transparency are two dangers for capitalism. Therefore, capitalism does not engage in any responsible and transparent system. But unfortunately, the whole model of neoliberal governance is designed to protect the shareholders of capitalism.
It is also not responsible to the work and the environment which produce profit for capitalism. Enduring values ​​are anathema to capitalism. It destroys everything that is durable.
Profit under capitalism is not based on creative destruction. It is based on the absolute annihilation of all the creative capacities of work and of nature. It requires repetitive work, which operates under a regulatory regime based on compliance. Dead capital is free but works with life in bondage. He treats labor and nature as commodities.
Neoliberal economic policies and its austerity plans are dead, but the neoliberal political infrastructure is alive and well and thriving. Authoritarian and right-wing political regimes are developing and giving a respite to capitalism at the cost of lives and the environment.
Therefore, any form of economic re-imagining of an economic alternative must reinvent the political system. Alternative political economy in the post-pandemic world must focus on the conditions of production, distribution and exchange relations. The market can be based on the direct relationship between producers and consumers using information technology.

The Fourth Industrial Revolution and its economic system must follow models of worker cooperatives based on human needs and desires concomitant with environmental sustainability. These principles are fundamental to the “great rest” of the post-pandemic economy, politics and society.
Shared progress, peace, prosperity, human health and dignity, and environmental sustainability depend on human capacities to overthrow capitalism and its rotten system. The survival of the planet, of the peoples and of prosperity depends on the forward march of humanity towards the ideals of equality, freedom, justice, fraternity in a world free from all forms of exploitation.
—
* Coventry University, UK

• The United States’ response to the COVID-19 pandemic has been a disaster compared to other countries.
• This is because our political system values ​​economic production above all other considerations, including public health.
• Leaders from other countries, like New Zealand, have shown how to prioritize public health and have been politically rewarded.
• But given our system, public opinion that prioritizes public health priorities has been overwhelmed by the economic concerns of our political leaders.
• George Pearkes is the global macro strategist for Tailor-made investment group.
• This is an opinion column. The thoughts expressed are those of the author.
• Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.

As COVID-19 continues to ravage the United States and hundreds of thousands of Americans have died, the question of why the country has failed to contain the virus has become a concern. This question is particularly troubling given that the range of countries around the world have managed to prevent its arrival and contain any epidemic that may arise.

It is common, depending on your political orientation, to blame the president, or China, or the victims of the pandemic themselves. But the disastrous impact of the pandemic is far more likely the product of structural forces in American society than of those in the White House or where the virus originated.

The United States’ response to COVID – and in particular the apparent disconnect between public opinion and the policies being implemented to combat the pandemic – is a function of the pre-COVID political economy and how our society is. organized.

Priorities matter

American political institutions (broadly defined as institutions that allow one group to exercise power over another) have been narrowly focused on one goal: to maximize income or economic output.

Governors, businesses, civic organizations, and entire academic disciplines have accepted the idea that a cost-benefit analysis based on some measure of material well-being is by far the best – if not the only – way to measure validity of a given policy.

In other words, US institutions value increased GDP over other measures of well-being.

This is not a value neutral choice, but an expression of what our political process values. Relatively similar companies like Australia or New Zealand have chosen to make a different choice during the COVID pandemic.

In New Zealand, Prime Minister Jacinda Arden is expected at cruising towards his re-election this week as polls suggest his left-wing Labor party will win nearly half of the country’s votes. This would be a big improvement from the 37% of work recorded in 2017.

New Zealand has unique advantages when it comes to containing COVID, such as its relatively small population, island geography, and well-developed public health infrastructure. But the country has also taken an unusually aggressive approach to imposing blockages that prevent the community from spreading.

“Level 4” closures force residents to stay home unless they are a critical worker, shopping for food, or briefly exercising outside. The use of lockdowns both locally and nationally has resulted in an incredible suppression of COVID-19. Kiwis have suffered less than 400 cases per million population in total during the pandemic. For the United States, that many cases are currently being reported every three days!

In Australia, the Liberal / National coalition led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison has also been much less afraid to ask citizens to shut up in their homes and as a result only around 1% of the Australian population has tested positive over the course of the pandemic. While a recent poll shows faltering support, until August the share of the Liberal / National coalition polls had risen by around 4 points and propelled them to the top of the Australian Labor Party, in stark contrast. from what they were in February.

Less developed economies that also pursued aggressive lockdowns also saw extremely low numbers of cases. The best example may be Mongolia. Neighboring China’s fierce response to the initial outbreak has allowed more than half a billion domestic travelers to roam the country freely in the recent Golden week holiday.

Public opinion versus public institutions

Sitting in North Carolina, these results are hard to believe. My state saw armed bands parade in the capital about a stay at home order. This week, federal authorities indicted a gang who kidnap project the governors of Michigan and Virginia, largely in backlash against those states’ policies to contain the spread of COVID.

Based on reports, it would appear that Americans are more than willing to suffer public health consequences in order to keep the economy moving. But looking at public polls, that kind of backlash to lockdown orders is a minority position.

At the height of the closures in April, Americans were more worried about restrictions lifted too quickly rather than quickly enough by a margin of 2 to 1, and Morning Consult the data found that in early October, more than half of adults believe the U.S. government is not doing enough to tackle the COVID outbreak. This included the majority of all income brackets, non-whites, Christians, commuters, the self-employed, and military households.

Despite strong evidence that Americans want outcomes that are more like the New Zealand model, our political infrastructure has focused on minimizing costs to economic activity rather than public health outcomes.

The impact of lockdowns or other restrictions on consumers and businesses is somehow no greater in the United States than in other countries. But the preferences of businesses and certain groups of consumers carry much more weight here.

States like Arizona, Texas and Florida initially controlled the growth of cases, but a rush to reopen for the summer has sent new cases per capita into a range few countries in the world have endured. The federal government’s response has been haphazard at best, and outright denial of the epidemic at worst.

As it stands, voters in aggressively responding countries like New Zealand and Australia appear to support decisions made by their elected leaders. While Americans generally seem to be in favor of a more aggressive response here, our political system fails to make the tough decisions and deliver what public opinion wants.

Of course, the United States is not the only one not facing COVID. New cases in the UK are now growing faster relative to population than new US cases at their summer peak, while EU policies from the Czech Republic to Spain have seen huge increases in cases this fall .

The UK is an instructive example of another country with political institutions apparently failing to deliver what public opinion wants, and not just on COVID.

After Tory Prime Minister David Cameron staged a Brexit referendum to protect his party from UK Independence Party defections, Leave unexpectedly won in 2016 and sparked years of disputes over how to move forward which have not been resolved with the existing British political party. lines. The country is still trying to reach an internal consensus on how to deal with its departure from the EU after multiple ostensibly framed elections over how to get Brexit done.

COVID and Brexit are very different challenges, but in both cases existing UK institutions were put under pressure to arbitrate what different political actors wanted; that was ultimately the challenge for the United States as well.

Eventually, the virus will become less prominent in the daily headlines, but the United States will still face the challenge of political institutions that do not represent the popular will. The geographic bias of the U.S. Senate, life-time Supreme Court appointments, or the bipartisan system itself are other examples of this disconnect at play.

Fortunately, the US and UK both have systems designed to be plastic. Americans have rewritten their Constitution seventeen times since Madison led the Bill of Rights in 1789. Specific institutions are even more open to change, such as Senate majority rules maintained by the body itself.

Across the pond, the UK doesn’t even have a formal written constitution to compel the reimagining of political institutions. There is nothing permanent about the political structures that govern either country.

The question is whether the popular will is strong enough to realize that what is broken needs to be fixed.

“We went from 0 to 60 in five seconds,” said Kim Guadagno, Managing Director and President of Fulfill. Hurricane Sandy in 2012 was devastating, she said, but it’s worse because “the need is widespread, with no end in sight.”

Last year, before the pandemic, Feeding America, the country’s largest network of food banks, fed 40 million people, many of them children, said Claire Babineaux-Fontenot, the executive director. “It highlights the fact that so many people in our country live on a precipice,” she said.

Housing is also less secure. A recent poll by SurveyMonkey and Apartment List, a San Francisco-based online rental marketplace, showed that a quarter of renters paid only part or none of their rent this month.

“These figures are extremely worrying,” said Igor Popov, chief economist of Apartment List. “In a typical economic downturn, when incomes decline, many families may downsize or move in together to minimize their rent payments. At a time when we shelter in place, even trips to downgrading housing are difficult. “

Those who have been in a hurry the most can expect to be in a hurry even more.

Prior to the coronavirus outbreak, Destination: Home, a Silicon Valley nonprofit that works to prevent homelessness, was on track to provide $ 7 million in financial assistance to around 1,000 families. In March, the organization raised an additional $ 11 million for coronavirus relief, but was overwhelmed with demand – 4,500 applications in three days – and stopped accepting applications. The waiting list has nearly 10,000 people and is growing every day.

“I thought there was nothing I wasn’t involved in regarding roaming,” said Jennifer Loving, CEO of Destination: Home, “but it’s incomprehensibly catastrophic.”

In a report on the economic impact of the coronavirus, the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond warns that the biggest burdens will fall on those who are already the most vulnerable – those in low-paying and precarious jobs.