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Deutschland Uber Alles, after all?
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Message 1.Ìý
Posted by baz (U14258304) on Saturday, 19th November 2011
With the Greek and Italian governments changing hands, and with the British govt under fire from Germany, is it likely that Germany will finally rule Europa?
Speaking personally, I would rather have Germans running our country than the inbred old-school-tie mob who are currently bungling things. But is there a kind of historical inevitability about Germany's rise? -
Message 2
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Saturday, 19th November 2011
baz
But the "old school tie" culture in the decades down to 1914 was based upon a Germanization of British culture.. the school reforms of the late 1860's and 1870's being heavily modelled on the Prussian ones.
Interestingly I have wondered on recent days whether to post something about what I am now reading at the end of the complete stories of Katherine Mansfield- her first published stories that she later renounced.
The collective title was "In a German Pension". They were published as a collection in 1911 having been published in a periodical "The New Age" during the previous two years. They were evidently based upon her own experiences of those German "cures" that were all the rage. Edward VII took an annual cure in Germant for the sake of his health.
In the very first story a Traveller at dinner said to her:
"I suppose you are frightened of an invasion too, eh? Oh, that's good. I've been reading all about your English play in a newspaper. Did you see it?"
"Yes." I sat upright. "I assure you we are not afraid."
"Well, then, you ought to be," said Herr Rat. "You have got no army at all- a few little boys with their veins full of nicotine poisoning."
"Don't be afraid," Herr Hoffmann said." We don't want England. If we did we would have had her long ago. We really do not want you."
He waved his spoon airily, looking across at me as though I were a little child whom he would keep or dismiss as he pleased.
"We certainly do not want Germany," I said.
****
The book had considerable success and went through three editions, before the publsher went bankrupt. John Middleton Murray a subsequent publisher struggled to convince her to republish but she wished to disown them for ever- having refused offers once the war broke out and there was (as JMM put it) "a general detestation of things German". Mansfield recognised her work as the product of youthful bitterness and crude cynicism. But I think that she recognised (as in this quote- when she sat upright to defend "England") the way that her "Lost Generation" had had beligerence and militarism drilled into them not least by what G.M. Trevelyan described in 1912 as a Germanic period of English history.
Cass -
Message 3
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Saturday, 19th November 2011
is it likely that Germany will finally rule Europa?Ìý
Have you been asleep then Baz? Germany already is the dominant power in Europe, and has been for a while now. -
Message 4
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Saturday, 19th November 2011
What is perhaps more significant than the question of which Nation or State? is what kind of people?.
The German model was largely based upon the work of Bismarck- not a politician as we understand the term, but a royal minister who had no time for representative democracy. It has been pointed out on previous threads about the IWW that really by the summer of 1914 the effective power and decision making in Germany was in the hands of the German military. The German Army that was strongly based around the Prussian one was a far more trusted institution than any German parliament- hence A.J.P.Taylor's "War By Time-table" thesis. The First World War started because of the war plans of the German Army.
But in the half-century before 1914 "social-Darwinism" had stressed that the struggle for the survival of the fittest in its most basic form lay at the heart of evolution and progress..
The First World War created many doubters as did the subsequent World Chaos in the global economy after 1929. During the Nazi era and during the Second World War, however, it was obvious to many that- if you ignore the political extremism of Hitler and the Nazis- Gemany undoubtedly had got a great deal right- especially in its pursuit of science and technology, and the building of new infrastructure- the face of the Future. The Nazi regime managed to harness Science and Technology to its purposes, and those who engaged in that struggle had to meet that challenge.
By 1944-45 by common consent at least in the UK the theme was to "Win the peace the way that we won the war"- and that meant through a great increase in State power and the use of experts and "boffins" rather than democratically elected politicians.. with economic growth and stability number one priorities.
Hence the New Europe and its customs union- that the British Cabinet was afraid that Hitler might offer to Europe in 1940 after the fall of France- and various increases in State involvement in Society and the Economy, in line with Bismarck's ideas of providing for the common people just to keep them quescent after 60+ years of the Age of Revolution.
But the secret of power in this "Brave New World was/is Finance: and, as Mrs Merkel acknowledged yesterday, even the German Chancellor or the whole EU does not have credible power in the face of the Financial markets.
Cass -
Message 5
Posted by Thomas (U14985443) on Tuesday, 22nd November 2011
In reply to islanddawn:
is it likely that Germany will finally rule Europa?
Ìý Have you been asleep then Baz? Germany already is the dominant power in Europe, and has been for a while now.Ìý
We´re not ruling Europe and please don´t forget the French in this for they´d do as well in the above term. The British had have also their opportunity to rule Europe but they are too idle and rather blame Europe for many things instead to take part in it. -
Message 6
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Tuesday, 22nd November 2011
We´re not ruling Europe and please don´t forget the French in this for they´d do as well in the above term. The British had have also their opportunity to rule Europe but they are too idle and rather blame Europe for many things instead to take part in it.Ìý
Hi Thomas,
I didn't say Germany was ruling Europe, I said they were currently dominant. As the economically strongest country in the EU at present Germany is certainly calling most of the shots, especially considering the current financial difficulties of many member states. France comes in second best, imo.
I agree re Britain though, too much criticising and working against, instead of working with in what is supposed to be a Union. If Britain wants to be taken seriously, instead of just yapping on the sidelines, it would be more beneficial if they find an ally. It would definitely give some balance to the German/French alliance. -
Message 7
Posted by ritajoh (U10855204) on Tuesday, 22nd November 2011
Britain comes in for a lot of critizing and sniping from other countries why?. If we are that insignificent why are they taking so much notice of us.
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Message 8
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Tuesday, 22nd November 2011
ritajoh
I think that the answer has quite a lot to do with the fact that Britain has been built upon English traditions of "commonweal", partnership and teamwork.
Tony Blair picked up the idea of partnership for New Labour to replace the Old Labour heavy-handed top-down State that the British Labour movement had copied from the German Socialist Party in the early 1890's.
In his "Principles of Social and Political Theory" (1951) Professor Ernest Barker postulated that really some kind of Society- some tradition within a population of "sticking together" voluntarily and by choice- needs to exist before a successful State can be created. Because a State must work by coercion and compulsion, which is intolerable when the Social ties and the tradition of sticking together does not exist.
Professor Barker's thesis is a very English one. Voltaire said that French Society was created by the Sun King Louis XIV because he created a social system in which the Royal Court defined everyone's position and the way that they should behave to their superiors and inferiors.
One could argue, in fact, that France was created by the Medieval King Saint Louis who set out a legal framework to cover the region that we know as France, which still (in my experience- and in accordance with the authoritative study by the Oxford Professor of French History Theodore Zeldin) has no real overall sense of Social unity. More commonly the French refer to a shared French culture. And France fell into its constituent social units during the German occupation.
In fact Unifications within Europe seem to be based upon aspirations rather than realities- both the unification of Germany and Italy during the Nineteenth Century and the dream of a European Union.. And one might also say that such utilitarian political and economic dreams perhaps also applied to those who created Great Britain.
Utilitarianism owed a great deal to Jeremy Bentham's "Panopticon Model" which has inspired so much government and economic activity over the last 200 years.
Bentham came up with the design, I believe, in order to help his brother who had the task of keeping vast numbers of prisoners imprisonned. So he came up with the design (used in Strangeways and many other prisons) which placed one prison warder at the hub of a number of corridors with cells lined up on either side. Thus one warder could see instantly whether any of the inmates was escaping from their cell. Cheap because of the advantage of large-scale. But centralised and totally impersonal ignoring all the human needs of the prisoners- merely tackling the most basic problem of keeping their bodies locked up. The advantages of scale, which could be reaped by the emerging Middle Class (material and intellectual) were much more obvious to "informed opinion" than the dehumanisation that it implied for "the masses".
Nevertheless- the giant centralised mechanism became the ideal for "Germanised British people" like Sidney and Beatrice Webb.
But actually I believe that people in Europe- especially perhaps France- respect that, whatever theoretical plans and systems clever people can come up with, the "English" have a special talent for making things work.
Some years ago this point was made to me by a French Professor of Aircraft noise, who ran regular post-graduate courses especially for French and "English" graduates. The French, he said, loved beautiful theories and abstract ideas, while the "English" sat bored. It was when they moved to practical applications and designs that the "English" students really came into their own.
Cass -
Message 9
Posted by wiseraphael (U14258190) on Wednesday, 23rd November 2011
The next time the British have to rescue Europe from someone like Philip of Spain, Bonaparte, Kaiser Wilhelm, Adolf Hitler, among many others, they'll still say Britain is not really "European"!
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Message 10
Posted by baz (U14258304) on Wednesday, 23rd November 2011
Just think, we could have " England Uber Alles" as the national anthem; as well as watching Coronation Strasse, Emmerthal, Big Bruder, and Ich Bin Ein Celebrity, Let mich los!
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Message 11
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Wednesday, 23rd November 2011
They do? When exactly?
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Message 12
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Saturday, 26th November 2011
The fact is England had its great opportunity in 1945; however, England were just licking their wounds from WW2.
Germany is dominant in Europe because the German people have done everything right since WW2. They have worked hard, saved hard, never going for fancy show stuff and now their treasury is full and they have all the 'Lolly.'
Why are Britain and France nowhere in the game; because they preferred the easy way of living off the EU's Agricultural payment for France and off the Anglo-Saxon alliance for Britain ( they got a lot of benefits from that).
I do not understand why Germany allowed themselves to be suckered into a common currency, when the Deutschmark was so strong. They did not need a common currency. What they needed was the original purpose of the Common Market, a 'Common Market.'
It was only weak economies, who wanted to borrow at the low-interest rate that a common currency brought with it, like Greece and Ireland. Once they got these very low interest rates they just kept on borrowing.
Germans since WW2 have always got suckered into these various deals as a common currency on the alter of European Unity; they are always the only people being asked to pay for this unity: The Common agricultural policy (France), The East German pensions ( East Germany), the Euro (Greece, Portugal, Ireland, Spain, Italy, France). The frugal German taxpayer is always being asked to write out the checks. I think it is time the German people realized that Enough for European Unity; they should start worrying about the German people.
The people who ruined Germany and Europe, the Nazis, are long gone and how long will the other Europeans continue to demand sacrifices from the German people for their own elegant lifestyle?
Tas -
Message 13
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Saturday, 26th November 2011
Tas
Now with your background I believe that you should have a particular insight into German history.
Born in the British Raj you have often written upon the benefits of the impact of Britain upon the declining Moghul Empire, with Company Rule for almost a century before the formal creation of the British Raj. In fact it is significant for this theme that Queen Victoria only took the title Kaisar i Hind after her daughter had pointed out that she now outranked her mother being the wife of a Kaiser herself, for Germany had just tried to revive the great German Empire of the Middle Ages.
It was a time when History was focussed on the "Big Story" that of Civilizations and their rise and fall. Britain hoped to revive Indian Civilization and made sure that its ruling elite embraced Roman Values. Germany- thanks to the work of historians like Von Ranke- tried to reconnect with the Teutonic folk heritage both in the time of the Roman Empire and the later age of the Holy Roman Emperors.
As you have often observed Britain gave up its Empire, not least because of the "class war" connections of that Roman-inspired ruling elite. Carreers like the forces and the Indian Civil Service carreers of first choice for younger sons who had to earn their own way in the world and sons of people of only modest incomes who seized the concepts of Meritocracy in order to be counted among some of the best brains of their age -- eventually many being regarded as the Flowers of a Lost Generation.
But British India post 1945, like Germany, was subject to Partition and the pain, disruption and military consequences that involved. You worked for some years in a divided Germany that school history text-books in the UK observed looked very much like never being united. In fact David Cameron and George Osborne have often referred to themselves as part of the Berlin Wall Generation. But 1989 was not the end but the beginning of a new process and it is quite surprising just how quickly people are taking for granted the existence of a united Germany, let alone the prospect of a United Europe.
So- to take another of your regular themes- whereas it has been possible for English people especially to have faith in the Inevitability of gradualness (Drake spotting the Armada on Plymouth Ho when the Armada was spotted and saying that there was time to finish his game of bowls), it must seem to German people that life is all about getting things going again: and people with shoulders to the wheel almost inevitably keep their heads down and focus on just keeping the wheels moving.
Cass -
Message 14
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Saturday, 26th November 2011
Hi Cass,
The British Empire is now gone; although most Britons do not even now realize what it achieved, not only for the Brits in the British Isle, but all over the Empire.
Subsequent to WW2, Germany was totally demolished. The Nazis, by their policy of hyper-nationalism had created in Europe a dislike of Germany as never before. And for a long time the German people were licking their wounds as they tried to resurrect their economy form the ashes of WW2. Fortunately, in times of crisis, the Germans become very strong, because they are experts at working hard through a crisis and they all put their shoulder to the wheels.
After WW2, Britain had an opportunity to take charge of Europe as they were the only European country standing tall; The French had been demolished as had the Germans. However, all their exertions from the war had made Britain unable to take up that opportunity, as they also missed the opportunity revive their still living Empire. They got sucked into the easy way, with the Anglo-American Alliance.
The Germans never had that opportunity to the extent of the Brits; They kept plugging on with their economy. Slowly it started to rise and gradually became the strongest in Europe even in the 1950s. The French saw an opportunity to suck the Germans into a Common Market. The Germans needed a sheet anchor to make people forget their bad behavior in WW2. So they joined the CM. It was a good idea for the original six European countries and it was quite successful.
Macmillan saw this useful thing going on in Europe and asked to join in, but was blocked by that eccentric French Statesman, Charles De Gaul, who had experienced many insults from the Anglo-Saxons, principally the Americans. He blocked Britain's way into the CM. Eventually Britain did get in but on the terms of the French; a common agricultural policy, very favorable to the French, and no British Commonwealth. Britain was so eager to join the Common Market that it ditched its long and fruitful relationship with its Commonwealth, including New Zealand butter. The Commonwealth was set adrift.
Very fortunately, Britain survived all the siren calls for a common currency, The Euro. That was a very shrewd thing to do by the Brits. However, when everything could have been integrated on British terms, they are essentially outside. The poor German tax payers are the one footing the bill for South European profligacy.
If I was German, I would chuck all these responsibilities for the Euro and the EU, and become a "Little German lander (akin to little Englanders)." They have already proved them selves as the best Europeans . They no longer owe any body a dime. Let the South Europeans minister to their own economy and let the Italians and the others burn in the fires of their own creation. That is the way Capitalism works; you are responsible for your own actions.
Tas -
Message 15
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Saturday, 26th November 2011
Tas
Actually I am not sure that Chancellor Merkel is really as hostile to David Cameron's position as some of the Media reports would have us believe.. To some extent the whole modern German project from the time of the French invasions during the Revolutionary Wars has been based upon an appreciation that England has got many things right over the years- but (as I have often quoted French friends and interlocuters as remarking to me) England has had the advantage of a largely island status and borders that are mostly defined by Nature.. In spite of the ongoing tensions of England's relations with its Celtic neighbours, the Germans might well prefer to have had those advantages- the French too.
But the fact that the UK- with its great past- is not prepared to write out blank cheques for the EU does make it easier in a way for Frau Merkel to resist pressures for Germany to do so.
As for Britain after 1945 I believe that the need for economic reconstruction was hampered by a backward looking "reparations" policy that was more concerned with History than the Present or the Future, as I have said there was this view that "the ruling class" had got all the benefits from the Empire and the Industrial Revolution, and it was now "pay back time".
Almost sixty years later the whole redistribution of Income situation that was greatly accelerated under the Attlee Government is very much under review. A recent Â鶹ԼÅÄ TV programme on taxes and how they are spent was also connected to a web-site on which people could work out their own cost and benefit situation in the UK.
I worked out from the figures given by the National Office of Statistics that the lowest earning 30% of the UK population pays £13, 402 in tax on a household basis and receives £44, 651 in benefits. The 30% highest earning households pay £68,249 in tax and receive £23, 816 in benefits.
Of course the logic of this European Social Contract is that the only way to make such a situation sustainable in the long run has been to borrow money beyond National Income in order to be able to afford giving out in benefits three and a half times as much as people pay for, while also not taxing those who only receive back in benefits about a third of what they pay for enough to force them and their earnings potential out of the country.
Originally such things were justified in terms of Christain Socialism, but in a global economy is it Christian to pay for a situation in which it was revealed today that British women are the most obese in Europe- (over 25%).
Of course as Professor Ernest Barker observed in his 1951 "Principles of Social and Political Theory" (that I have quoted to you before) there has to normally be some kind of Society, some sense of "sticking together", before a population can form a State. This was the case for a long time in England, and it was hoped that especially "standing alone" as "The British People" during the Second World War would have created a long-term sense of "sticking together".. By the time of Professor Barker's book that already seemed unlikely.
Cass -
Message 16
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Saturday, 26th November 2011
Tas,
"they no longer owe anybody a dime"
Look at Germany:
Have a look to Germany, UK, India, Belgium, France and to the European Union !!!excluding intra EU-trade:
Look at page 54 Germany: trade by main partner countries (billion EUR):
Tas, I think you have a bit of a simplistic view, the world is changed since the Sixties. And I suppose Germany after his "Sonderweg" is now fully embedded in Europe.
On the French history messageboard that I frequent there is a geopolitical forum, where it is allowed to discuss nowadays history, but not here. Thus I will not hijack this thread about German history with German actuality.
"If I was German, I would chuck all these responsibilities for the Euro and the EU, and become a "Little German lander (akin to little Englanders)." They have already proved them selves as the best Europeans . They no longer owe any body a dime. Let the South Europeans minister to their own economy and let the Italians and the others burn in the fires of their own creation. That is the way Capitalism works; you are responsible for your own actions."
"That is the way Capitalism works: you are responsablle for your own actions"
I think you see it a bit from an American? view? Europe is still working I suppose along the Keynesian model? Socialist model in the eyes of the Americans? Will the low-wage-countries as China and India, where work circumstances are very poor will murder the wellfare state of Europe and later this of the US due to the neo-liberal views of competition till dead? Dead for the mass, but not for the rich neo-liberals? A bit of balance is always welcome.
Kind regards,
Paul. -
Message 17
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Saturday, 26th November 2011
Hi Paul,
I am not saying that the Italians and the Portuguese, the Spaniards and the Irish should give up their Welfare States, but these countries must only promise to their people what their countries can earn. It seems absurd for them to be running their welfare states on money they don't have, on the basis of loans they extract at relatively low interest rates because they are in the Euro.
I think it was a big mistake for the Germans to participate in creating the 'Euro.' The only party the Euro has significantly helped, as we now clearly see, are the French.
The Germans have long been suckered into the EU by the French and I hope they now realize that their policy of full integration with Europe is no longer needed. Everyone is an adult now and these southern European Countries can look after themselves. If they borrow money, the collector should come to their house and put a lien on their property. Why should the frugal German tax-payer be involved? It is as simple as that.
Tas -
Message 18
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
A bit of balance is always welcome.Ìý
Never a truer word said Paul, and thankyou for injecting a modicum of reality and truth into this very surreal thread.
Tas, Germany has not GIVEN money to anyone. Germany has BORROWED money at 1.5% interest, it is being repaid by Greece at 5% interest. Portugal, I think, is repaying at 2.5% interest. You need to stop watching Fox news. -
Message 19
Posted by baz (U14258304) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Will the low-wage-countries as China and India, where work circumstances are very poor will murder the wellfare state of Europe and later this of the US due to the neo-liberal views of competition till dead? Ìý
The media keeps harping on about how we in the west must accept a lower standard of life, when we should be needling the Chinese and Indian kleptocracies to give their downtrodden masses a better deal. This consensus between the Beijing communists and the western capitalists to further degrade the living standards of the poor is the biggest threat to freedom since the Ribbentrop- Molotov pact.
We can no longer, as a planet, afford the mega-rich or the mega-powerful...time for a purge? -
Message 20
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Hi Islanddawn,
They no longer owe any body a dime. Ìý
I think you have misinterpreted most of my messages. of course many countries, even those with full treasuries borrow money; However, it is the rate interest that they are required to pay tells you in the Market, if it is sound borrowing or whether a countries bonds are at the level of junk bonds.
The markets lend money to the South European countries at the exorbitant rate of 7%, where as they lend money to Germany and America and even Britain at much lower rates, because they are more confident in being able to recover their money.
The world's markets were aware the Greeks were borrowing too much but they were lulled into security because they thought the Greeks would have to pay them back in Euros, a relatively strong currency, because it is backed by the stronger economies of Europe, e.g. the Netherlands and Germany. They understood the the Greeks would not be able to get out of their quandary by simply printing more drachmas. That is why the Greeks got the relatively low rates of borrowing.
Their governments promised their people the world, without any risk of pain; the best welfare state money could buy, and so the Greeks went on this "shopping binge" like a shopaholic
They gave themselves huge pensions, long holidays, everything money can buy. Now that it is like "the morning after the night before" for a thoroughly inebriated person, they think it is the Germans sticking it to them. If that is in fact so, why do they not refuse any bailout, and default on their loans. Because their creditors would be at their doors looking of their money and the interest on it.
Why should the Germans, like saintly Christians (turning the other cheek), take all the abuse while providing the profligate Greeks the fruits of their labor? That is the essence of the question and I do not think one is moving away from "balance" to expect the perpetrators to foot the bill for their own profligacy.
Tas -
Message 21
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Actually baz
My theory is that we are witnessing the HongKongisation of China.. When HK was handed back after c150 years on lease to GB it was probably just about the most valuable piece of real-estate in the World- and a very-interesting synthesis of East and West..
The Chinese CP looked at the model much the same as the Japanese used to take Western cars apart to find out how they worked- and now they are mass-producing Hong Kongs all over China.
Meanwhile the people taking full advantage of the Chinese poor are the people in the developed world who feel that they are entitled to a subsidised standard of living- based upon the purchasing power that is enhanced by the low cost goods produced by the Chinese for the mass Western market (as used to happen with 'Made in Hong Kong' and 'Made in Japan', and the tax incomes for redistribution plus the creditworthyness of those countries like the UK that invest heavily in developing economies that helps to pay for Welfare States is heavily based upon the high returns gained in places like China and India.
Of course the models that we have come to depend upon and which create such situations are faulty..Ideally Europe would like to achieve "The Rediscovery of Social Man" to quote something that I wrote c10 years ago.
But people have got rather used to working with and for money, and thus find it difficuly to see how things could be different.. The Chinese may well yet show us for the people of Hong Kong- in my experience and reading- were still proud of their Chinese Civilization and customs, as arguably the most successful and enduring community in the history of the world.
Cass -
Message 22
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Tas I have no intention of arguing with you, you know as well as I that this is a history board and current affairs are against rules and off topic.
You'll either get your facts correct before you deign to lecture others on their political and economic situations or you won't and so continue to sound, well a bit silly really. The choice is yours, but it was good for a laugh anyway. -
Message 23
Posted by baz (U14258304) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Casseroleon
If I read your post right, you are arguing in favour of us in the west becoming less materialistic (I'm no economist, but I think that's the gist of what you are saying), and, if so, I am in full agreement: who needs an economic system that can produce umpteen types of shampoo but where 5 million people, in the UK alone, are waiting for decent housing? What is the point of a system that produces a media that worries about holiday flights from Heathrow, when pensioners are freezing in their homes or when teachers are striking for a decent pension?
I'm no radical, but I believe that our young folk outside St Paul's are a historical inevitability - they are not going to put up with the mega-rich berating them from their tv screens for not producing cheap asparagus for their dinner parties in Mayfair: Gaddafi's fate is almost a re-run of 1917...beware, the rich. -
Message 24
Posted by ritajoh (U10855204) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Thought just entered my head, if great britain had never joined the common market, if we had just concerened ourseves with our own affairs and commonwealth, would we have prospered as a small country.
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Message 25
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Hi Ritajoh,
if great britain had never joined the common market, if we had just concerened ourseves with our own affairs and commonwealth, would we have prospered as a small country.Ìý
I think it was correct to try to enter the Common Market, but it should have been on better terms, keeping the Commonwealth link in tact. You would then have had the luxury of two common markets: that of the Commonwealth and of Europe.
You were pretty astute to keep out of the Euro-zone. Not much damage done to Britain there.
Tas -
Message 26
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Perhaps it would have been better to discuss the Common Market within the Common wealth and then negotiated with the Europeans on an extended Common Market: Europe and the Common wealth. You would be offering the Europeans a huge market and would have gotten many more concessions.
Perhaps you should have taken the lead in creating such a market in the late 1940s. And if the French did not play along, turned the tables on them and kept them out.
Tas -
Message 27
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
baz
The essence of the trouble is that for over 200 years people have increasingly embraced the idea of Adam Smith in his "Wealth of Nations" that the whole point of living is producing wealth and re-organising society in order to maximise wealth creation.. Then with the wealth you can pay for and/or buy whatever you need individually or collectively.
But of course people very quickly realised that the pursuit of wealth destroyed human relations, as the windfall opportunities of the age favoured massive and large-scale economies that depersonalised work and made the social fabric irrelevant, while asset-stripping the Earth for the sake of a few generations.
Almost all that I write personally tries to expose this tragic inheritance and show how things could be different, and I could put links to many of my pieces- for my pursuit of history over the last 56 years has been in search of a different understanding and just how we might be able to put humanity "back on track".
Cass -
Message 28
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Tas,
" am not saying that the Italians and the Portuguese, the Spaniards and the Irish should give up their Welfare States, but these countries must only promise to their people what their countries can earn. It seems absurd for them to be running their welfare states on money they don't have, on the basis of loans they extract at relatively low interest rates because they are in the Euro."
You can easely add the Greeks, while as Italy, Portugal, Spain and Ireland from history out they constitute Europe. The same for Germany.
"but these countries must only promise to their people what their countries can earn"
Which politicians don't do that, even in the US? And perhaps they have borrowed too much for the wrong purposes? But now comes the correction, jammed as they are between the rating-bureaux and the neo-liberal pressure of the globalization. And they have to correct even as an independent nation-state more and more under the economical guardian-ship of Europe and also the IMF the global player. And it is logical that one looks to the best performing economy for examples? But as all the constituting countries of Europe have the same basic social attitudes it is perhaps more easier to come to a compromise?
And you speak about Germany as it is nowadays historical formed, but have the Germans not the same difficulties within their own country? As the former BRD and the former DDR? The Italians not the same difficulties between North and South-Italy? The Germans with the French? But there you have the difficulty of common measurements of two nation-states, which came nevertheless in the last decades nearer together both political and economical.
As I see it, if we Europeans survive this economical difficult times, we, as we are obliged to streamline the economies and social behaviour of the constituting nations we will be better off than before. And that because we all in Europe from fundamentals on don't differ that much.
We had yesterday a final debate about the Belgian budget for the forming of a government. And as in Europe it was between Liberals and Socialists and finally they came to a compromise, something for the Liberals for the competition within the neo-liberal world and something for the Socialists as for a lesser degradation of the welfare state.
And I know that there are excesses on these welfare, as Cass gave an example of percents in the UK. I have only to look around me to see how many abuse the system allthough in reality they don't need it. And the controling organisms although they can act within the law are so careless. Perhaps that will be change now by the pressure of the circumstances?
But as I look around me the rich entrepreneurs (and other independents to say no more) are also constructing legal and illegal ways to avoid to contribute to the common welfare. (Don't know it in English: "black circuits?")
But as it was prepared during WWII in Britain and flourished, we haven't for some neo-liberal reasons to completely abandon it? There is always a question of balance, especially for the mass which is essentially the "people", but I agree within the limits of the possibilities. But these possibilities are shaped in a global market, where even nation-states haven't an impact on? Perhaps this global crisis will also be an opportunity to seek for compromises and balances in the world?
And now I start a bit to sound as Cass?
Kind regards,
Paul.
PS. And yes I understand why Madame Kasner (Merkel) don't push the Eurobonds, allthough that would be a signal to the rating-bureaux about the unity of the Eurozone. The German voter from whom she depends, will not be pleased that the low loan cost will increase in favour of the average of the total of the loan costs of the Eurozone. It is all question of solidarity and unity in this case. And can that be expected from one part of that whole, especially while it is a nation-state? -
Message 29
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Tas,
"and then negotiated with the Europeans"
Tas, the Brits are Europeans!!!.
Couldn't resist....it was stronger than myself...
Kind regards from your friend,
Paul. -
Message 30
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Paul
As I see it the whole "problem" comes from the end of the Cold war..
The Second World War was THE solution to the economic problems of the inter-war period. The USA found its role and "pareto effieciency" as the "workshop of the free world", and after the war- amidst all the devastation rebuilding what had already existed was a relatively easy "economic project" that produced spectacular figures for economic growth- especially in "economic miracle countries" like Germany and Japan- already major industrial powers by 1939.
But the Cold War threat from Communism meant two things
(a) an ungoing massive spending on armaments in order to defend Capitalism and Private Ownership. An estimated 20% of US GDP was arms-related.
(b) as Communism sought to appeal to the poorest and lowest paid, it made strategic sense to raise the standard of living of these people in a "bidding war" against Communism.
As I have written many times a popular British slogan during the war was that "we would win the peace the way that we won the war".. But since c1696 England and then Britain had won wars by means of building up the National Debt. In most of those wars the war aims settled after the wars had started had fixed on things that would actually increase the countries earnings potential once peace arrived, and indeed there were several attempts to pay off the National Debt. Perhaps people hoped that this would happen in the Brave New World after 1945.
Keynesian Economics argued that the States could/should borrow in order to invest in the Future on behalf of the whole people, and State planning was all the rage in the early phases of the Common Market, and in my days at University in the Sixties,when Soviet State Planning was my specialist topic..
But "economists" and other experts in the science of economics and management that were going to produce new industrial revolutions, belong to that post-war age of infinite and cheap atomic energy powering automated factories where machines would do all the work and people could enjoy endess leisure like "basket-weaving".
Anyway eventually the Cold War ended and I listened amusedly as Liberal Americans considered what would be done with the "Peace Dividend"- now that the USA no longer needed to spend so much on defence it would be possible to do so many "good works".
Well the people who had paid top-rate taxes in the nation's hour of need (95% in the UK) felt that they had done their duty. And all those industries related to defence faced closure etc. And as for the "poor and needy", they could no longer hold the threat of Communism/Socialism over the heads of the wealthy, and surely it was about time that they stopped being "poor and needy". The whole idea had been to "give them a chance" not a living for life to hand on to future generation infinitely.
For there were plenty more even more poor and needy around the world- people who had never had Welfare States and subsidised incomes and services. In fact there was much of the world crying out for Capital Investment, and a new generation of "Carpet Baggers" descended on "the Third World" and even the ex-Communist "Second World"- just as businessmen from the Union went down to "help" the ex_Confederate States now being run by the ex-slaves in accordance with the Jim Crow Laws.
There were now huge fortunes to be made for global Finance and eventually the Western Citizen had two values- (a) to provide homes/bases for the Finance Industries, and (b) shop windows for the consumerism that could now be held before the Poor and needy around the World who also could be told "It could be you", only right now you are only producing the goods for the affluent world.
Of course many Financial Institutions were awash with cash at times and keen to invest it in the West more political and legal stability. And as the Westerner was now essentially just a consumer interested in and show-casing leisure lifestyles, several State-economies invested in the tourist industries and the growing demand for second homes for holidays and time-shares. In the current economic downturn, the States that now are rated as "junk" ,or nearly , seem to be all of those that could hope to benefit from the leisure culture of the Northern more industrial regions- Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Ireland.
Cass -
Message 31
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Sunday, 27th November 2011
Hi Paul,
We in America say "to form a more perfect Union." The way that the EU is at present, it is far from a perfect Union. How can you have States taking on themselves as much debt as they want; yes, not need but want, and yet have a common currency?
You know we all have paper currencies these days and paper currency is only as good as the word of the Government issuing that currency. In the case of the Euro, you have about seventeen government and there is always a tendency for a government to cheat to get more votes. If you really want unity, you must unite completely, so the Federal Government determines how much welfare it can afford for a particular area. Anything less than that and you open your doors to outright cheating and near disaster.
The Common European bonds will not help much because the countries that get away with their cheating will try again and again, in more and more sophisticated ways. To cure a child of dishonesty, you have to have some consequences from bad actions. That is the way it is. THERE IS NO FREE LUNCH.
Tas -
Message 32
Posted by Tas (U11050591) on Monday, 28th November 2011
Hi Paul,
It looks from here as if, to use another analogy, some one is gambling in a gambling Casino in Las Vegas, and he is asking the "house" in the form of the owner of the Casino, to issue a line of credit, because the 'gambler' has a rich uncle who dotes on him; the Casino owner continues to give him a line of credit until the gambling is finished. And then the gambler is asking for a loan from his rich uncle (Germany). If the Uncle does not lay out some very strong terms, like requiring the gambler to hand over the keys to his car,the gambler will rush back to the Casino at the first opportunity.
And notice why the French are playing a more liberal role than the Germans; because it is their banks that have have given the huge line of credit to the weak economies of Europe. If these economies default, it will be the French who will be most severely affected for their risky practices. That is, in short, the quandary of Europe.
Motto: Spend only the money that you earn; don't rely on your rich uncle.
Tas -
Message 33
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Monday, 28th November 2011
What, even the rich uncle won't give a FREE LUNCH? Stingy old sod.
-
Message 34
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Monday, 28th November 2011
Re: Message 31 and 32.
Thank you Tas for the two replies. I will not further discuss as I have given my point of view in my message 28. I think that as they seem to say in English: We agree to disagree.
Kind regards, Paul.
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