tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post1483274943262463539..comments2024-03-28T21:25:08.138+13:00Comments on Bowalley Road: Endless Cycles.Chris Trotterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09081613281183460899noreply@blogger.comBlogger33125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-36740820103562188132017-02-09T14:17:51.467+13:002017-02-09T14:17:51.467+13:00Nick J
We are of one mind on that one.
I hope ...Nick J<br /><br />We are of one mind on that one. <br /><br />I hope there's room on the peg for a few more hats.Victornoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-49840503127089204182017-02-08T16:48:11.225+13:002017-02-08T16:48:11.225+13:00Nice Victor. On such fine run things can events tu...Nice Victor. On such fine run things can events turn. When back in the Jurassic I was at Uni we were made to read Toynbee and Braudel. Also Marx. It does incline you, even if you are against cyclical or linear predeterminism to look for megatrends. Zeitgeist. There is one I trend I will hang my hat on: energy and resource depletion. It is real and a certainty. It will drive events. Nuff said.Nick Jnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-35836743116443249862017-02-08T08:11:59.932+13:002017-02-08T08:11:59.932+13:00Jesus JH, I thought you might have at least addres...Jesus JH, I thought you might have at least addressed my criticism, but no – yet another cut-and-paste from some incomprehensible, nutty right wing hate group website. This is not an academic journal. It is not peer-reviewed. It is simply a series of opinion pieces. Why don't you go back to Alex Jones, he made more sense. Jesus wept, I wish I'd invested in tinfoil years ago.Guerilla Surgeonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03427876447124021423noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-62429327795691200602017-02-07T17:55:26.340+13:002017-02-07T17:55:26.340+13:00Olwyn
Great to have a genuine classicist on the t...Olwyn<br /><br />Great to have a genuine classicist on the team.Victornoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-1684073055088688902017-02-07T17:53:25.377+13:002017-02-07T17:53:25.377+13:00Adam
I agree.
Very little of human history, it s...Adam<br /><br />I agree.<br /><br />Very little of human history, it seems to me, can be described in terms of cycles of Aristocracy, Democracy and Autocracy.<br /><br />I can't see that this particular cycle applies hugely to feudal Europe or to Indian or Chinese history, though these have cycles of their own, such as China's recurring battles between centrifugal and centripedal forces. Nor does it seem to apply to pre-urban civilizations. <br /><br />Polybius's cycle certainly has relevance to an understanding of the politics of many city states, including those of Medieval and Renaissance Italy. And perhaps it also provides a very rough guide to the politics of the English Civil War and the French Revolution. This, though, might partly reflect the dominance of classical models on how historical actors saw themselves. Given the right education, you don't need a toga to think of yourself as Brutus. <br /><br />My fear is that we're now living through a cycle determined by the economics of advanced capitalism, in which globalising liberalism with all its inherent faults gives way periodically to authoritarian nationalism with its maybe even greater inherent faults. <br /><br />I hope I'm proved wrong.Victornoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-68972742906688717782017-02-07T17:31:09.078+13:002017-02-07T17:31:09.078+13:00Nick J
As so often, I sort of half agree with you...Nick J<br /><br />As so often, I sort of half agree with you. <br /><br />Even so, the question remains as to whether the US election result reflected a long term trend or was just an accident determined by "events, dear boy, events". <br /><br />Here's just a few counter-factual narratives that might plausibly have led to a different outcome: <br /><br />Firstly, Joe Biden's son does not pass away. The old war horse isn't stricken with grief and proceeds to throw his hat into the ring at an early stage. His links to Labor Unions, old time Democratic persona, back story as a widower, Irish roots, proven friendship with Obama and amazing dentistry combine to turn him into blue collar America's favourite son. And then he brings the coastal intelligentsia and the educated young on board by naming Elizabeth Warren as his running mate. I think he'd have romped home and would certainly have kept the Rust Belt blue.<br /><br />Secondly, let's assume Hillary had not been ill/tired and had not ceased campaigning for nearly a month after the Convention. Let's further assume that she'd (horror of horrors) actually spent that month in the Rust Belt. And let's also assume she'd chosen a Hispanic running mate instead of a rather lack-lusture WASP, who happened to speak Spanish. It's reasonable to assume that she'd then have held both the Rust Belt and Florida. <br /><br />Thirdly, let's assume that the FBI had not interfered in the election process by keeping the email farrago current (when it could probably have been cleared up in an afternoon). This too might have made a crucial difference.<br /><br />Interestingly, on this last point, a friend of mine, who's a Country and Western fan, was attending a convention in Nashville, Tennessee (of all glorious places)just a few weeks before the election. As one of the few foreigners present, he was pleasantly surprised to discover that his fellow fans (mainly culturally traditional and from the heartland) were all appalled by Trump and convinced that Hillary was going to win.<br /><br />Now, I understand the dangers of anecdotage and know all about the "Shy Republican" syndrome, but nevertheless suspect that something significant occurred in those last few weeks that kept Hillary's voters away from the polls, though not, of course, in sufficient numbers to deny her a firm majority of the popular vote. <br /><br />By the way, I've ommitted Bernie Sanders gaining the nomination and going on to score a landslide from my list of counter-factuals, as, even more than Trump's factual victory, it would suggest a Sea Change and not a quirk.<br /><br />But, of course, quirk or otherwise, Trump's victory has created a new and rather terrifying reality. The world IS now broken and it's going to take far more than a single electoral cycle to put it together again. <br /><br />And to take back the White House and/or the Hill, the Democrats will now have to distance themselves from even the slightest hint of "capture" by a derided establishment. If they fail in this, the political map of America will change radically and, probably, not for the better.Victornoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-5365870750807988412017-02-07T07:20:06.149+13:002017-02-07T07:20:06.149+13:00"There were few obvious benefits for the majo..."There were few obvious benefits for the majority of the population; unemployment was high, and there was considerable pressure to restructure the economy away from labour intensive manufacturing for the domestic market to capital intensive export industries. Given this, and given concerns about the diseconomies of growth so clearly indicated in the Whitlam years, and, most especially, given the lack of any widespread popular support for immigration, how was it that the Fraser [Liberal] Government was able to pursue its growth policy?<br />Perhaps it might seem more logical to begin by asking 'why', but this question has been well answered by Robert Birrell and his various co-writers. He points to a growth lobby centred around interests concerned with the growth of the domestic market in land development, housing, manufacturing and retailing, the interests of the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs in expanding its activities, the interests of some employers in migrant workers and, more recently, the interests of some migrant communities in pressing for family reunion. There are groups and individuals who have something to gain from population growth and their steady pressure provides an explanation for why immigration has proceeded. But why is it that groups and individuals who may feel that they pay the costs of growth have not organized themselves to try to block the programme? Why has there been no countervailing force? The absence of criticism and of organized opposition is the immediate answer to the question of 'how'; this book is an attempt to give reasons for the absence." <br />http://www.thesocialcontract.com/artman2/publish/tsc0104/article_56.shtml<br />And<br /><br />"Parr (2000) writes “[T]he views of New Zealanders are not conducive to the population of New Zealanders becoming more diversified globally.”<br /><br />From localism to globalism? New Zealand Sociology, 15(2), 304-. 335<br /><br />Suggest Oligarchy – misrule by the few. Include "no comments policies" and permanent bans on popular blogs.<br /><br />And I don't think we are seeing Ochlocracy, given a backlash in academia against Universities as agents of social change versus understanding human society. The latter have the better of the argument (based on evolutionary psychology rather than Marx).jhnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-5711337312132451202017-02-06T12:39:40.048+13:002017-02-06T12:39:40.048+13:00"2. All parties should present argument to th..."2. All parties should present argument to the standard GM's party does."<br />Perhaps you could take a leaf from their book then. Most of your stuff is incomprehensible, cut-and-paste, and completely out of context. Viz – you didn't even have a 1.Guerilla Surgeonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03427876447124021423noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-39419102418233457292017-02-06T12:24:55.833+13:002017-02-06T12:24:55.833+13:00"BTW Waitangi - Gareth Morgan has bought the ..."BTW Waitangi - Gareth Morgan has bought the identity politics swampland."<br /> <br />Wha'? You use identity politics all the time. Or is this a case of the American acronym IOKIYAR? Or I suppose you could try to make the argument that white people don't have an identity? Yeah right.Guerilla Surgeonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03427876447124021423noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-68048172227004297722017-02-06T11:17:42.685+13:002017-02-06T11:17:42.685+13:00This good message from NickJ:
"Relevance for...This good message from NickJ:<br /><i><br />"Relevance for NZ: huge. We need to understand that the future is about preserving what we can, especially in rebuilding a social contract between all to share what we can in a declining world. That puts all past "certainties" back on the table for debate and decision."</i><br /><br />What went before this and what brings us to the need to rebuild - pat said:<br /><i><br />Whereas the power of corporates, the influence of vested interests/monies and the disparity of treatment on that basis certainly fits the description of oligarchy....when we slid from one to the other - hard to pinpoint exactly but there is no doubting the current administration has corrupted our democratic institutions like none before them....and have perhaps destroyed any vestige of what was best and beneficially unique about NZ. <br />Fuck them and the horse they rode in on</i><br /><br />And Olwyn explains the reasons and the results of why our democracy is struggling in the polls, and the people struggling in their houses which aren't homes, and the street people are struggling in the streets by-passed by plump-faced men in BMWs with their faces averted. <br /><i> <br />There are a few problems with this idea, but I will just mention a couple. Firstly, by the time the population realises that the public good has been sidelined, the oligarchs have all the levers. Secondly, you cannot hold leaders to the public good if it is meant to be a side-effect rather than a core commitment. This by itself weakens the structures that one might use to prevent the rise of a tyrant.<br /><br />As to New Zealand, it is a young country with a background of settler colonisation, and I do not think its democracy runs very deep.If it did, we would not have followed the neoliberal model to the extent that we have. </i><br /><br />And this from Olwyn's comment means - 'trickle-down': <i>if it is meant to be a side-effect rather than a core commitment.</i><br />If we were a democracy with deep-thinking, realistic roots we wouldn't have had our childish, selfish belief in trickle-down benefits from the rich as we would have seen that clearly as being dependent on alms from the better-off (the wealthy and self-styled 'tall poppies').greywarblernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-3778688321616756962017-02-06T07:55:39.258+13:002017-02-06T07:55:39.258+13:00I agree with Nick j. Is endless growth possible (o...I agree with Nick j. Is endless growth possible (or even desirable)? I think progress has stalled in line with ecological principles. Peaceful states are those where people and resources are in harmony, but also human nature likes to belong to a place and a group (change shold happend slowly with mutual advantage). The diversity thing is an unfortunate experiment pushed on the west by those who don't understand human nature.<br />.,,,,<br />BTW Waitangi - Gareth Morgan has bought the identity politics swampland.<br /><br />2. All parties should present argument to the standard GM's party does.jhnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-5481055207673198552017-02-05T09:48:55.226+13:002017-02-05T09:48:55.226+13:00Paul Spoonley
PS: New Zealand is absolutely better...Paul Spoonley<br />PS: New Zealand is absolutely better off with immigration, it's connecting us with parts of the world that are important to us for economic reasons and also making us a more diverse society. Can you say that diversity is of benefit to New Zealand? No, probably not. But in terms of innovation, in terms of skilled labour and in terms of making us a more exciting, dynamic place, I think you can say immigration is definitely making New Zealand better off.<br />........<br />http://m.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11788667<br /><br />So his answer hinges on excitement and dynamism. I recall Winston Peters being button holed by Campbell Live: "where's Sin City Mr Peters?", "where's Sin City Mr Peters?" (like a parrott).jhnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-37362236072258605882017-02-04T07:41:59.226+13:002017-02-04T07:41:59.226+13:00"We are a functioning democracy, with accepte..."We are a functioning democracy, with accepted standards of voting age, eligibility for everyone to have a vote, the holding of fair elections and the peaceful transfer of power our political history." Polly 31/1/17 16:48<br /><br />But are we?..At first glance we certainly present democracy until you scratch beneath the surface to find a quarter of the population disengaged from voting in general elections (a cynic may say actively discouraged), policy formed by lobbyist think tanks, referenda non binding and ignored and the active governing for the benefit of certain segments of society to the great disadvantage of others.....and all ignoring the cost to future generations . That doesn't sound like a "functioning" democracy to me, perhaps a dysfunctional one at best.<br /><br />Whereas the power of corporates, the influence of vested interests/monies and the disparity of treatment on that basis certainly fits the description of oligarchy....when we slid from one to the other hard to pinpoint exactly but there is no doubting the current administration has corrupted our democratic institutions like none before them....and have perhaps destroyed any vestige of what was best and beneficially unique about NZ. Fuck them and the horse they rode in onpathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08727942156598555852noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-20234314015840157422017-02-04T02:25:30.032+13:002017-02-04T02:25:30.032+13:00Isn't the underlay of the carpet of democracy ...Isn't the underlay of the carpet of democracy wealth, Chris?<br /><br />Genuine enquiry.<br /><br />Given how rare it has been.<br /><br />Isn't tosh the primary theme since the hunter-gatherers. <br /><br />Aren't we all operating against the great bullshit-splatterer of the subjective human consciousness. Thus, nae hope.volnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-60194922012469069262017-02-02T13:45:39.207+13:002017-02-02T13:45:39.207+13:00Call me old fashioned, but I would have thought in...Call me old fashioned, but I would have thought in many ways the Byzantine Empire was the death of this idea. A Empire which lasted for almost a thousand years. Yes it had it's swings and round abouts, but it rocked on through them all, always balancing the desires of the mob, the will of the Emperor, and the force of the church. <br /><br />Just thinking out loud.adamnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-53134524301205300892017-02-02T12:46:11.350+13:002017-02-02T12:46:11.350+13:00https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/01/to...https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/01/totalitarianism-in-age-donald-trump-lessons-from-hannah-arendt-protests<br />theGuerilla Surgeonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03427876447124021423noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-21872999562335334232017-02-02T09:33:56.145+13:002017-02-02T09:33:56.145+13:00The interesting thing about Polybius's analysi...The interesting thing about Polybius's analysis is that the status of the public good is central to it - any of the three forms of government he considers is capable of either upholding or abandoning the public good. It is worth remembering that in the early stages of neoliberalism, it was claimed that privileging the return to the shareholder was a better way of guarding the public good than aiming at it directly. Wealthy, well-paid-and-housed non-socialist countries were lined up as examples. <br /><br />There are a few problems with this idea, but I will just mention a couple. Firstly, by the time the population realises that the public good has been sidelined, the oligarchs have all the levers. Secondly, you cannot hold leaders to the public good if it is meant to be a side-effect rather than a core commitment. This by itself weakens the structures that one might use to prevent the rise of a tyrant. <br /><br />As to New Zealand, it is a young country with a background of settler colonisation, and I do not think its democracy runs very deep.If it did, we would not have followed the neoliberal model to the extent that we have. Olwynnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-4425377999817786132017-02-02T08:46:11.602+13:002017-02-02T08:46:11.602+13:00I'm not sure that Michael Hudson http://michae...I'm not sure that Michael Hudson http://michael-hudson.com/2017/01/the-land-belongs-to-god/ doesn't provide a better explanation. But perhaps his 1explanation is not inconsistent with that of Polybius. mikeshnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-74305992734259262182017-02-02T07:31:31.495+13:002017-02-02T07:31:31.495+13:00Victor, I dont disagree with your analysis of who ...Victor, I dont disagree with your analysis of who voted Trump, in fact from what I have read it was as much in many states a rejection of Hillary by the middle classes. <br /><br />I was referring to something far more discombobulating:certainty and direction. The events tell me that people saw no certainty with the Washington establishment, the press, the media, the whole political economic establishment. They had tested reality against received wisdom and rejected the latter. They saw no valid direction that tbey wanted from the Dems so either voted Trump or stayed home. The world was broken, one person took advantage. Nick Jnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-7580946363236958902017-02-02T07:08:07.192+13:002017-02-02T07:08:07.192+13:00This explains what is going on
http://www-bcf.usc...This explains what is going on<br /><br />http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~jessegra/papers/haidt.graham.2009.planet-of-the-durkheimians.proofs.pdfJhnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-59437300193267426272017-02-01T22:01:41.743+13:002017-02-01T22:01:41.743+13:00Victor
Sorry about my spelling. A fair elemen...Victor<br /><br /> Sorry about my spelling. A fair element of external interference in all examples I think, and maybe this is common. But yes , an invasion rather than an uprising in his case.<br /> D J SDavid Stonenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-34051838651160440372017-02-01T12:59:34.430+13:002017-02-01T12:59:34.430+13:00Chris
I'm no classicist but wasn't Polybi...Chris<br /><br />I'm no classicist but wasn't Polybius writing, to some extent at least, about direct democracies rather than representative ones? Doesn't that alter things a bit? <br /><br />Nick J <br /><br />I too have my doubts about both Marxian and classical/recurrence theories of political change. <br /><br />But I also have doubts over the narrative that annoints Trump as the unworthy and unlikely albeit effective champion of the dispossessed. <br /><br />Firstly, many, perhaps most, of those voting for him would have voted for whomsoever the GOP chose as its candidate, particularly if he/she promised tax cuts.<br /><br />Secondly, the poorest and most clearly dispossessed tended either not to vote or to vote for his opponent, often for those very identity-centered reasons that you seem to see as the purlieu of the less desperate.<br /><br />Thirdly, the tiny but decisive majorities he chalked up in the rust belt states tell us a hell of a lot about the dire circumstances of those states (and the neglect thereof) but not a great deal about much of the rest of America.<br /><br />Fourthly, his vote was skewed towards older age groups whilst unemployment,debt and homelessness tend more often, these days, to be the lot of the young. <br /><br />David Stone<br /><br />Who is the "Husein" to whom you refer? <br /><br />If you're talking about Saddam Hussein, he was overthrown by an invasion of Anglophone powers and not by his own people.<br /><br />I agree, though, that a weakening of autocratic rule is often the occasion for the overthrowing of autocracy. <br /><br />Whether this is a good or bad thing will depend on the nature of the society concerned (e.g. the presence or absence of tribalism and/or religious strife), on the awfulness or otherwise of the preceding autocracy and on plain, old fashioned "events".<br /><br />Polly<br /><br />You're quite right. At a formal level at least, New Zealand is a very fine democracy, and all the more so since we introduced MMP (which I foolishly opposed to at the time). <br /><br />The US is somewhat less of a democracy, because of the power of the lobbies, the mega-bucks needed to get elected and, of course, FPP. But it is a country ruled, ultimately, by "laws" rather than "men". Moreover, it's a country that reveres its constitutional arrangements with an almost religious fervour. <br /><br />Yet things seem to be unravelling amazingly quickly there and the same could happen here before too long.<br /><br />It's all too uncomfortably reminiscent of the awful second quarter of the twentieth century.Victornoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-21231132004802940082017-02-01T11:58:33.011+13:002017-02-01T11:58:33.011+13:00David
Neither Hadrian's Wall nor the Great Wa...David<br /><br />Neither Hadrian's Wall nor the Great Wall of China kept the 'Barbarians' out for ever. Nor, for that matter, did the latter wall bring about a permanent end to Han Chinese expansion.<br /><br />Israel's wall has, thus far, reduced terrorism but not eliminated it. And then there was the Maginot Line.......Victornoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-21800195158193555142017-01-31T20:54:21.974+13:002017-01-31T20:54:21.974+13:00Great writing Mr Trotter.
http://www.anacyclosis....Great writing Mr Trotter.<br /><br />http://www.anacyclosis.org/content/ourmission/ajnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3753486518085091399.post-65097759797204375102017-01-31T20:41:16.699+13:002017-01-31T20:41:16.699+13:00having said he want's peace I have to refer re...having said he want's peace I have to refer readers to the first two items on Information Clearing house. That's no good.<br />D J SDavid Stonenoreply@blogger.com