Amid Democratic Revolutions Abroad, Authoritarian Revolutions at Home

By Jackie Smith
As Egyptians and other democracy advocates around the Middle East celebrate their gains in winning concessions from authoritarian regimes, at home we are witnessing a revolution of authoritarianism. Republican governors across the country are seeking to simultaneously seize authority from state legislatures and undermine the ability of ordinary citizens to affect the decisions that shape their lives.

In Wisconsin, Scott Walker’s controversial legislation proposes not just to eliminate worker rights and benefits but also to undercut legislative oversight of key decisions. Similarly, in a highly under-reported development, the Michigan legislature just advanced a bill that would allow the state to take over struggling municipal agencies. Emergency financial managers trained in corporate management logic would be empowered to end existing contracts, take over pension plans, reorganize departments, restructure debt, and dissolve or consolidate fiscally troubled towns and schools. The justification for their decisions is based on economic efficiency, not community well being. But as a writer in the Michigan Messenger asks: “What values will guide these individuals or firms as they work to balance budgets? How will a manager decide whether to sell off an ice rink or a library?” (http://michiganmessenger.com/47013/bill-offers-no-guidelines-for-use-of-emergency-managers-powers)

Labor Rights in Mideast and Mid-West Are Key to Counter-terrorism

by Jackie Smith

As popular groups around the Middle East challenge authoritarian rulers long supported by the West, U.S. officials are resisting our own democratic movements to defend basic rights and freedoms. The simultaneity of these struggles is no coincidence. Along with militant fundamentalism, they are responses to the current moment of crisis, which grows from the basic limits of U.S. power.

The United States and its allies have supported dictators in the Middle East in order to ensure stable and secure supplies of cheap oil. Low-cost energy fueled the industrial growth that allowed many in the rich countries of the world to enjoy rising standards of living. But we’re now seeing the limits to this economic expansion in the form of peak oil, water scarcity, rising food prices, and chronic unemployment.

GOP Anti-Union Strategy Won’t Solve Economic Woes

by Jackie Smith

After three decades of stagnant wages, declining opportunities to join unions, and rising income inequality, American workers are being bullied into making even more sacrifices to their health and well-being so that the super-rich and corporations can continue to enjoy large profit margins.

The latest challenge to American workers is the threat to the basic right to form and join trade unions in order to bargain with their employers collectively, rather than as isolated individuals. This right is being threatened in several states and is part of a concerted national effort led by Republican officials and their corporate funders (such as the Koch brothers). State legislatures in Wisconsin, Ohio, and Indiana, among others are seeking to eliminate public workers’ rights to organize.

Many Protests, One Revolution

by Jackie Smith
PUBLISHED at: https://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/02/14-9

The massive rise of popular protests around the Middle East and North Africa coincides with the convening of the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal. While the former are the subject of deserved and extensive media attention, the latter has been virtually ignored by mainstream media. Yet all these gatherings of activists should be seen as part of a single, global movement that has been unfolding for over a decade.

While protesters in Egypt seek to topple corrupt and authoritarian rulers, activists at the World Social Forum have been doing the long-term and painstaking work of building a global movement to transform the basic structures of our world economy. It is those structures that both enable the greed and brutality of individual leaders and maintain the conditions against which Egyptians, Jordanians, Yemenis as well as Ecuadorans, Indians, and Detroiters are all resisting.

World Social Forum Convenes in Dakar Senegal Feb. 6-11

The World Social Forum takes place in Dakar, Senegal February 6-11. It is the second World Social Forum to be held in Africa; the 2007 World Social Forum met in Nairobi. The fact that the Forum takes place as the world is mesmerized by tenacious protests around the Middle East highlights links between the dominant model of globalization and a variety of popular modes of resistance. The simultaneity of these gatherings is no coincidence, and it reflects the underlying contradictions and crises of the current world order.