Monday, May 30 2011 - 04:44 PM
Open borders and free markets
In response to my statement that “I believe that it is I who remains this forum’s only advocate of open borders,” avbornbred asked “Can you tell me what the benefits [would be] of having open borders?”
First of all, my support of open borders – of their being no borders at all – is not something that stands within the framework of capitalist society, but rather within that of a futuristic socialist commonwealth. Yes, as I alluded to through my having listed Albert Einstein’s famous The splitting of the atom has changed everything save for our mode of thinking…as a result we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe, the now outmoded notion of sovereign states is both artificial and dangerous. But, since capitalism still exists, the notion of the state is not outmoded. In other words, were borders to be deleted anytime soon, it would surely and quickly lead to socioeconomic disaster. The irony here, I think, is that, if open borders were to come to fruition within the existing economic order, it would come about by way of the political or plutocratic state rather than the demands of socialists because the US capitalist class would then be able to use unchecked immigration as a tool of socioeconomic terrorism against workers just as it does now to one degree or another. (That, however, is not to say that the ever-present downward pressure upon wages would not endure were it not for undocumented immigration for it would so endure – for the downward spiral of workers’ wages is an inherent and inescapable contradiction of the capitalist system that is in no way dependent upon any one factor, including undocumented immigration. It is only to say that undocumented immigration and even documented immigration tend to exacerbate the downward pressure upon wages.)
I believe that as it now stands, the American plutocracy largely enforces current immigration laws ostensibly for the benefit of its citizenry but, in actuality, for the benefit of capital and therefore the capitalist class. Yet that could change very rapidly given the capitalist class’ capricious economic “needs.”
Additionally, although some capitalist societies are in possession of the room with which to expand their populations and workforces, others do not. Great Britain, for instance, happens to be dangerously overpopulated as are the Netherlands, Japan and Italy. Where this condition exists, the respective political states are saddled with a prevailing duty to deter further overpopulation in the name of their citizenry’s but in real service to economic stability and thus to the benefit of their respective capitalist classes.
So, no, this Marxian socialist does not suppport the opening or borders while capitalism continues on. Doing so, to answer avbornbred’s question, would benefit no one outside of the capitalist class and its hangers-on. Nonetheless, it would do us good to recall Albert Einstein’s statement from time to time in order to remind ourselves that time is indeed of the essence.
Now of course none of this precludes our helping workers in other countries, such as Mexico, who are being forced into mass emigration due to antisocial trade agreements the likes of NAFTA and CAFTA. Putting pressure on politicians to rescind those horribly one-sided agreements would go a long way toward both stemming the flow of undocumented immigration and improvIng the lives of American workers. Beyond that, one thing is for certain; that all of the demands for more stringent border enforcement, all of the Minutemen-like protest rallies, and all of the vigilante border patrols will do little to so much as stem the flow of undocumented immigration simply because desperate human beings will always find ways of doing desperate things.
As a Marxian socialist, I will say that, if we workers do not put an end to capitalism and all of its social relations, including nationalism, everywhere, the chances of complete social breakdown coupled with the growing possibility of a global nuclear holocaust are great.
In his book Daniel De Leon: Internationalist (New York Labor News, 1944), the late Arnold Petersen (a past national secretary of the Socialist Labor Party) wrote: Capitalism cannot survive as we understand the term. What will survive (on a worldwide scale) will consolidate itself as an international economic imperialism; and this we know also: In such a world the workers will continue as industrial serfs, their social status further degraded, their individual liberties further restricted, and their hope of early emancipation from economic serfdom, from wage slavery, deferred to an uncertain future – the distance of which none would be able to foretell. Yes, Arnold Perersen wrote that in 1944, before the beginning of America’s so-called halcyon days of the 1940s and 1950s, but how thoroughly modern-sounding it is, no?

*

Within AV Town Crier’s thread entitled L.A. Times article, PKShaw wrote: The market provides its own moratorium; builders respond to market demand. In response, Matt Keltner wrote: Yeah, the ‘free market’ also turned the Antelope Valley into the Section 8 capitol of Southern California…Section 8 people wouldn’t have come to the Antelope Valley in the numbers they did had their not been ample housing. That ample housing was driven by greedy landowners and power brokers here that were more concerned about fattening their bank accounts than about the overall health and social stability of the local community. Is it just a coincidence that most of them no longer live where they made their money? That’s the ‘free market’ for you! Make money without accountability.

Quite true, Matt. For the free market – the freedom of a tiny minority of individuals to ride roughshod over the social majority – has demonstrated its propensity for failing the social majority time and time again. Whether it be the robber barons of the late nineteenth century, America’s copious number of economic recessions and depressions, the 1980’s Savings and Loan disgrace, or the recent housing bubble crisis which spawned this discussion, the free market/capitlism has shown itself to be irrational from the perspective of workers – the social majority. So it is of little wonder that capitalists and petty capitalists, such as the owners of, say, the Kaufman and Broad Homes Corp., and Frank Visco, have remained utterly committed to the idea of the so-called free market despite the social havoc left in their wake. But, after all, the interests of capitalists are seldom if ever in line with the interests of workers. Therein lies capitalism’s chief inherent contradiction, and therein lies the nexus of not only the Antelope Valley’s housing debacle but also of America’s housing debacle in general.
I believe that the problem with free market cheerleaders the likes of PKShaw, Matt, is that they adhere to an ideology while believing that ideology to be a theory, that is to say, if capitalism were representative of free markets, then, by logical extension, there would exist efficiency and economic growth within those markets, and everyone would benefit. But, as noted by Matt’s well-stated analysis of the Antelope Valley’s housing market, and as reinforced by PKShaw’s groundless “The free market provides its own moratorium…” that is strictly a belief, it is not a fact.
Moreover, their ideology is used to protect and perpetuate a misanthropic economic system that is firmly predicated upon endless accumulation as well as one that now has precious little to do with production but, rather, with speculation – speculation which, amongst other such things, has led to the deindustrialization of American
society and the subsequent loss of millions of well-paying jobs.
Finally, I am of the mind that Matt’s sobering interpretation of the Antelope Valley’s housing glut has furnished us with an insight having to do with the deficiencies of the ideology held by PKShaw and millions of others, which has held sway over the American mindset since at least the early 1980s, and which has vowed to lift all boats; but instead has greatly weakened the standard of living of tens of millions of workers, and heightened social inequality and social insecurity within the Antelope Valley as well as within the rest of American society. This, then, leaves us with the question: What type of economic system would truly serve the needs of human beings?

Yours in revolution..
Guy R. Marsh..
Lancaster, 93535..
Member-at-large (since 1990):
Socialist Labor Party of America (est. 1890)

Would you like to comment on this blog post? Login to talk back!