Some Thoughts On Resilience and Transition

My knowledge of the Transition Town Movement (TTM) has until now been meager. So I am very thankful to Esther and Samuel for providing us with so much information on it and pointing out the aspects that require sympathetic criticism. Here is the link:

http://simplicityinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/TransitionMovement.pdf

    In the 1980s, I was enabled by the United Nations University (Tokyo) to make a participatory research study of the (at that time) New Social Movements (NSM) in West Germany plus a study of the origin, development and “end” of the German green party Die Grünen.^* I guess it might be useful for all concerned to hear what thoughts went through my head – 30 years later – while and after reading Esther and Samuel’s solid paper.

    I do not want to mention the points with which I concur. So below I am making some other points, only those, which have not been made in the paper and which I consider to be important for developing a strategy for bringing about the changes we want. They are based on my studies as well as experience both in India and Germany, both as an activist and as participant in discussions.

    Problems with the goal

    1. Discussions on strategy presuppose that the participants at least roughly agree on the goals that are to be attained by means of the strategy.

    The goal of the TTM is to make society resilient against the shocks that are coming and are partly ongoing. Specifically mentioned are peak oil, global climate change, and global financial and  economic crisis. Many other less important issues have been mentioned too: localization, social justice, solidarity, inclusiveness etc. They are goals as well as means to attain the main goal. Esther & Sam’s paper shows how problematic the resilience discourse is. The TTM wants to make society resilient, in order that it does not totally break down. The goal is not to change the present social system that not only has caused the shock-like problems the TTM is addressing but is also totally inadequate for the purpose. It is, moreover, an unjust social system. That is too little and too bad. I contend that nothing less than a fundamentally new social system must replace the existing one, so that the shocks in question can be successfully weathered.

    That means, in short, movements like the TTM ought to pursue a greater goal, which, apart from being good in itself, is necessary to attract people and encourage them to join it. We need not set an ideal society as our goal. An ideal will perhaps always remain an ideal. But an acceptably good and peaceful world society is possible and can therefore be our goal. (This naturally requires elaboration and detailed discussion.) Very important here is the term world society. To make Totnes or even one country (England or Germany or Italy) resilient and its society good and peaceful, and to forget the others, would not be a great goal, but a selfish one unworthy of a big social movement. Moreover, the efforts to achieve it would also be a futile one. The wretched of the earth are already storming the gates of these and similar countries in search of a safe haven. Neo-Nazis and xenophobic right reactionary parties are already gaining ground in such countries.

    Despite this criticism, I praise the TTM. It is better than the NSM of Germany of the 1980s. The latter was a conglomeration of several one-point movements. One of it, the ecology movement, was also a conglomeration of various and separate one-point movements: the anti-nuclear-energy movement, the movement against dying of forests, movement for better air quality, movement for protecting endangered species etc. Compared to that, the TTM has a broader spectrum of goals. That is some progress. On the other hand, the TTM is worse than the NSM; for it seems to avoid the subjects of consumption and economic growth, which most activists in the NSM (particularly in the ecology movement as a whole) used to consider as very important. But that was before the mid 1980s, when opportunists of Die Grünen started talking of the possibility of ecologizing industrial society, i.e. capitalist industrial society.

    In Die Grünen, a large number of leftists (including communists)  from various backgrounds had sought to combine ecological goals with their societal goals. Their ultimate vision was some sort of an eco-socialist society (the term was also used). But they were pushed out of the party by the opportunistic majority, who wanted the party to become a governing party.

    2. Another thing to be noted in connection with the goal-question is this: The greatest difficulty in attracting the masses to a genuinely ecological movement is its goal itself. The ecology movement is the only social movement that promises, if successful, a lowering of the standard of living of all, even curtailing to some extent various freedoms: for instance, the freedom to travel, freedom to consume luxury goods and goods imported from far away (e.g. to eat pineapple in Norway), the freedom to publish one’s own newspaper (there will be a scarcity of paper) and, generally speaking, all freedoms which involve a high degree of resource consumption. All other social movements, who assume that economic growth will continue, promise an improvement in these respects. Indeed, for a long time, higher wage demands of the working class movement could regularly be fulfilled. Also their non-material demands can be fulfilled more or less easily. The wishes of the civil rights movement can be granted, women can enjoy more rights, gays can be given the right to marry, immigrants can be given long-term resident permits and even communal voting rights etc. etc.  But the ecology movement opposes economic growth; what is worse, it demands economic contraction. But, although millions of people know about the serious ecological crisis, no one has ever rioted for austerity, as Esther and Sam write. That is also the reason that the trade unions were opponents of die Grünen in the latter’s early years. That is why less developed countries, especially China and India, are vehemently refusing to commit themselves to reducing their CO₂ - emission.  

    3. Of course, this difficulty can be overcome by spreading illusions of sustainable development, green growth, technological solutions to ecological problems (e.g. renewable energies/resources), green capitalism etc. But genuine eco-activists are not (should not be) interested in ephemeral gains in public support based on such illusions. They must tell the ecological truth. So what can they offer to attract more support from people. They can offer the prospect of a peaceful, egalitarian, exploitation- and oppression-free world as compensation for a lower standard of living. They can offer that in their good society nobody will be involuntarily unemployed, nobody will be discriminated against on any grounds, nobody will be tortured by the police. These too are material things. Anybody who has suffered unemployment or insecurity, anybody who has lived in the midst of war or civil war, anybody who has experienced the threat of being evicted from her home or has not been able to take out a medical insurance knows the value of these security guarantees. They will, in such a society, also feel freer to speak out against government policy. Of course, entrepreneur type of people, those who want to produce and sell something, anything, or speculate with stocks and currencies in order to become rich will not be attracted by this vision. We have to ignore them. They are being criticized even in the present system, even by average people.

    I am convinced that for achieving the goals of genuine ecologists capitalism must be overcome and an eco-socialist society must be built up. (For details of my argumentation see my book Eco-Socialism or Eco-Capitalism?**)

    4. One very important point I missed in the program of the TTM (as summarized by E & S) as well as in the critique thereof  is the population problem. In Europe and other rich countries of the North (including those down under), it is a common blind spot in most discussions on the ecology crises and questions of poverty. The reason for this is evident: Firstly, the problem does not exist any more in these countries. And secondly, they are afraid of mentioning it lest the people of the less developed countries (mostly black and brown to boot), where the population is still growing, get furious. After all, even the ecologists of the rich countries of the North, most of them, enjoy their much higher standard of living and are not doing their best to save the planet. Bu no program for saving the planet is convincing unless also the population problem is addressed.

    Problems with Strategy

    5. I share the TTM’s view that at present not much can be expected from the states and the ruling politicians. The latter are careerists. At present, in a democracy of the kind we have in place, any politician will be voted out of power if she dares to speak of the necessity of stopping economic growth, let alone to advocate economic contraction. Even those who are not in power want to be reelected. Politics is after all their profession. So they too would not stand up against economic growth. The simple truth is that the great majority of the voters are not better than the politicians. And a people gets politicians that it deserves.  But some people must do this, i.e. tell the ecological truth. They may be criticized as imagining themselves to be the avant-garde. But nothing will happen unless an avant-garde takes the initiative. Such people must be free from the temptation and/or requirement of getting their projects funded by established foundations or government agencies, so that they remain truly free to tell the ecological truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. The ecological truth and the logical and compelling proposals for solving the problems must be widely disseminated, so that in a few years time the intellectual and journalistic hegemony in the sense of Gramsci can be achieved (Gramsci talked of cultural hegemony). The activists of the TTM do not seem to be doing that, not at the moment at least. They are victims of some illusions that they are themselves spreading. 

    When the intellectual and journalistic hegemony has been achieved, it would be manifested e.g. in sentences like this: Yes, you are right with your ecological truths, but what can I do? I am only an ordinary person. We could then hope that voters would not vote a politician out of parliament if she expresses the views that genuine ecologists hold. Later we might have grounds to hope that no matter which politician and which party comes to power, the parliamentary majority would not be afraid to take measures in the direction of true ecological sustainability. This hope can be compared with the situation today. No matter which politicians and which parties govern a country, the government will continue to pursue neoliberal globalized capitalist policies, because this line of economic thought  gained hegemony in the 1990s and is still holding its ground.

    All this may take too much time, in which case the collapse cannot be prevented. But an armed revolution is not possible, because the well-paid and well-armed professional soldiers and policemen of the ruling classes are ready to kill revolutionaries and ordinary people when ordered. The coming collapse will probably lead to some sort of dictatorship, most probably one of right reactionaries. They will try to tackle the problems in their own way and with their own methods and would not care for the state of the planet, welfare of the future generations etc. etc.

    6. In contrast to my top-down strategy of first achieving intellectual and journalistic hegemony which will hopefully lead an increasing number of parliamentarians of the ruling parties to support our ideas, there are also bottom-up strategies for change.  The TTM’s strategy for building up resilience at the local level is a concrete example thereof. But the TTM’s objective is not any systemic change. That is why it is (it would be) easy to co-opt it. In fact, all reformist movements for change can be easily co-opted. History is full of examples of this process. In Germany, today, both the remnants of the NSM (the big ecological associations) and the Party die Grünen are partners of the ruling classes.

    In the 1980s, in Germany, several communes – both rural and urban – were founded by revolutionary young people. They lived and worked there (in the students’ communes, however, the main activity was discussing theory and psychological issues). Their idea was to anticipate and try out the communist society of the future. The point I want to make here is that most of them soon failed. Moreover, most of them were no examples of a self-reliant, self-organizing grassroots economic unit. They were comfortably embedded in a prosperous welfare state. Many members of the communes received transfer payments from the state. They were not responses to any challenge.

    Ted Trainer’s grassroots, self-organizing, radical-democratic (i.e. anarchistic) communes (or communities) must however be self-reliant, because Ted visualizes them as coming up in response to the (impending) collapse of the state. It seems to me that Ted thinks collapse is unavoidable. I would rather still try to prevent it through my strategy. But it is true, mankind does not have much time left for the purpose. So it is rational to exert ourselves at both ends, at the top as well as at the bottom, simultaneously.

    At least in our times, no commune or community would truly be self-sufficient; we are not living and would not like to live in the Amazon jungle. All communities would need things that they cannot themselves produce, salt for example. So some kind of more or less long-distance exchange must take place, and some state-like organization must regulate exchange and maintain order. It would be good if this organization were a socialist one. For when the collapse is there, it will be necessary to share whatever is available. That is why it would be good to promote an eco- socialist perspective and strengthen egalitarian thinking. These are moreover inspiring ideas, as we know from history. We should prepare ourselves for the collapse and subsequent actions. We must also be ready with a convincing perspective and an activities plan.

    7. One last point: Can individuals as individuals do something, i.e. contribute to the project of saving the planet and making human society better? It has often been suggested that reducing one’s own consumption is an effective means of achieving our goal. The great advantage of this strategy is that to do this the private person does not need a law passed by a majority in the parliament. Nor does she need a lot of money from parents or big donors, as most big bottom-up projects like rural communes, eco-villages etc. do. Many sensitive eco-friendly people are indeed practicing this non-consumption strategy; it can also be called a simple lifestyle strategy. However, there are limits to what even a determined non-consumptionist can do. The compulsions arising from living in a present-day capitalist industrial society are many. For example, one must today have a PC with internet connection in order just to be able to communicate with relatives, friends and comrades. Even the good old telephony inflicts a lot of damage to the environment. A person living in a village must have a car. The one area in which a person has more scope is food and clothing. But to forgo e.g. meat is very difficult for a westerner and to forgo sugary snacks is very difficult for a Bengali. After all, it would not be a happy world if people are unhappy even in such simple matters of life like eating. Having said that, it cannot be denied that a wide-spread non-consumption movement would surely have at least some effect on politics and economy. Eco-activists must however refrain from nagging friends and relatives for their eco-sins. That is the surest way to lose sympathizers. Let everybody do what she can and hope that others would emulate her example.  

*

Green-Alternative Politics in West Germany:

Vol. I. The New Social Movements (1993)

Vol. II, The Greens (1994)

Both published by The United Nations University Press (Tokyo)

**

Eco-Socialism or Eco-Capitalism ?– A Critical Analysis of Humanity’s Fundamental Choices. (1999). London: Zed Books.

Completed  on 13.08.2014

"God's Warriors" Against the Secular State -- On Boko Haram and ISIS

Nowadays, something is happening before our eyes that is difficult to understand. But we must understand it if we still want to work for our political vision.

     In Nigeria, a big gang of Islamic fundamentalists, namely Boko Haram, is fighting for a “state of God”, killing civilians of other faiths, destroying educational institutions and abducting girls. And the secular state Nigeria – the most populous country and economic power number one in Africa –is powerless against it. Something similar is happening in Iraq. A relatively small militia of Islamist jihadists called ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) – according to estimates of Western experts, (along with allied militant Sunni groups) about ten thousand strong – invaded northwestern Iraq, and the soldiers of the Iraqi army – in all about two hundred thousand strong – who were stationed there took flight in a panic, totally without a fight. They even threw away their uniforms and helmets, and ran (probably) straight back home. The fact that the units in question were taken by surprise cannot be the only explanation for the flight. For even on the following days, the army could not stop the advance of the ISIS-fighters.

    This total powerlessness of the armies of the concerned States is remarkable. In terms of military equipment too, there is no superiority of the “warriors of God”. The only thing that comes to mind to explain the different fighting strength of the soldiers of the two sides, comes from the area of psychology, morale, and character. The ones, “God’s warriors”, are highly motivated fighters for a cause they have dedicated their lives to. They know no fear, are always ready to die for their cause – if necessary, even as suicide bombers. The others are just ordinary people who have found a job in the army. They gladly take the pay, but they do not want to risk their lives.

    We have observed this contrast also in Afghanistan and Somalia. The Taliban and Al-Shabab had easily vanquished the diverse politicians, clan chiefs and warlords with their soldiers and put them to flight. It required a veritable invasion of the Americans and the armies of the neighboring states supported by the Americans to drive out the Taliban and Al-Shabab respectively from the cities. But the latter are not beaten at all. They continue to fight, now as guerrillas. Al-Shabab fighters even perpetrate attacks deep in enemy territory, namely in Kenya.

    Undoubtedly, this tenacity and this fighting power come mainly from the fact that these warriors – at least their leaders – pursue, in their view, the highest conceivable goal: They strive for nothing less than the establishment of a "state of God". All those who stand in the way in their pursuit of this goal are to be destroyed. As against that, what is demanded of the soldiers of the state armies is only that they fight against those whom the ruler(s) of the day consider as enemies.

    Maliki cannot make his soldiers believe that he as the national leader is pursuing some higher goal. Moreover, the Iraqi Shiites did not come to power through something approximately like an armed uprising of their own in the sense of a liberation struggle, but only through accepting the American invasion, letting the Yankees put an end to the Saddam regime, and, lastly, simply by being a large majority of the population. (The Kurds, of course, collaborated with the Americans, but, before 2003, they had fought for many years for their own Kurdish nation state.). So it is no wonder that now the ayatollahs and imams appear on the scene and call upon Shia young men to volunteer go to war for defending their sacred pilgrimage sites.

    In the two previous years, we have also seen in Syria that neither the professional state army of Syria was in a position to crush the armed uprising, nor could the secular soldiers and officers of the Free Syrian Army overthrow Assad from power. That is why finally, on the one hand, the Shiite warriors of Hezbollah had to rush to the aid of the Assad regime, and, on the other hand, the Sunni “holy warriors” of Al Nusra Front and ISIS had to engage themselves in the struggle against the Assad regime. Both sides were able to achieve successes. Hezbollah fighters were able to save the Assad regime, and the Al Nusra and ISIS fighters could liberate large parts of northern Iraq.

    We now know enough about the corrupt ruling elite of Nigeria. It is also known that the soldiers lack motivation. In 2014, one can read the following about the state of the Nigerian Army:

"The opposition in Nigeria accuses … the government and the military of total failure. The army is in a rotten state. The morale of the soldiers is bad, inter alia, because they often have to wait for weeks for their pay. The equipment of the military is neglected and internal communication chaotic. Discipline of the troops is weak. Venal officers collaborate with Boko Haram. In May 2014, nine generals were under criminal investigation on charges of arms sales to Boko Haram. After an attack on May 13, 2014 on a raiding party of the 7th Infantry Division, during the subsequent visit of the commanding general to the troops, his car was shot at by his own soldiers. The soldiers suspect their own commander of collaborating with Boko Haram. "(Wikipedia - German)

And one can read the following opinions on the condition of the Iraqi Army:

„Recent assessments by Western officials and military experts indicate that about a quarter of Iraq’s military forces are ‘combat ineffective’, its air force is minuscule, morale among troops is low and its leadership suffers from widespread corruption. ... 60 out of 243 Iraqi Army combat battalions ‘cannot be accounted for, and all of their equipment is lost’. ... Five of the Iraqi Army’s 14 divisions were ‘combat ineffective’, including the two that were overrun in Mosul. … Iraq's army is [essentially only a] ‘checkpoint’ army, but …. they do not have the equipment nor willingness to do even that in the precise and effective way US troops did while there. …. Iraqi soldiers discounted their future. They were interested in a paycheck. But the Iraqi civilians were scared to death, … .” (Rubin & Gordon 2014)

About the ISIS fighters one reads the following:

“A commander of the Iraqi army said: ‘ISIS are in small numbers, but they are well trained, … ISIS fighters have a will to die so they don’t show fear.’ … Western officials describe ISIS as a far tougher enemy than the one the American military faced when it was battling Al Qaeda in Iraq … . They also appear dedicated to their cause of vanquishing the forces of the modern world and returning the territory they take to an earlier form of Islam. … So far the fighters seem impervious to combat losses, quickly replenishing their ranks with fighters from Syria, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Chechnya and Europe, who appear to be drawn by the successes in Iraq.” (ibid)

Two unknown (probably American) readers of the article I have just quoted from commented as follows:

“I find this amazing given the fact they were trained by the military of the United States. Why and how did the US allow this happen? The Iraqis were trained by the best, then they should also be the best. I don't get it?” And

 “What type of training did they do that caused the Iraqi army to run away faster than a TV cartoon character at the first sign of fighting?”(ibid.)?

To this I would like to say that these two commentators have not understood that commitment and morale cannot be injected through training nor through a pay.

Deeper causes of the rise of Boko Haram and ISIS

But if it has come so far that the ruling elite of Nigeria cannot even pay the soldiers regularly even though the country is Africa's economic power number one, then it's no wonder that this army cannot defeat the fighters of Boko Haram, who are fighting for a cause out of political-religious conviction.

    It must, however, also be said here that corruption among the ruling elite is not the only cause of soldiers not getting paid regularly, which is, no doubt, the most important factor in their declining morale. There are also some deeper, namely material-economic, causes. In an English newspaper article (Ahmed 2014), one reads:

 „But while corruption and ageing infrastructure play an important role, the end of cheap oil is the real elephant in the room. One study by two Nigerian scholars concluded in 2011 that ‘there is an imminent decline in Nigeria's oil reserve since peaking could have occurred or just about to occur.’… ‘According to one senior Shell official, in March this year, crude oil production decline rates are ‘as high as 15 to 20 per cent.’

    The author also refers to ‘Nigeria's intensifying energy crisis.’ He writes: ‘In recent months, the country has faced a fuel crisis partly due to the government slashing previously high fuel subsidies, contributing to increasing public anger and civil unrest.’ (ibid).

    This is a pure economic crisis. If we add to this the rapid population growth – 159 Million people in 2010 with an annual growth rate of 3% (Wikipedia–English) – then we understand how bad the economic situation in Nigeria is.

    That is not all. The author of the above quotes also writes:

“Instability in Nigeria, however, has been growing steadily over the last decade, and one reason is climate change. In 2009, a UK Department for International Development (Dfid) study warned that climate change could contribute to increasing resource shortages in the country due to land scarcity from desertification, water shortages, and mounting crop failures.

    A more recent study by the … US Institute for Peace confirmed a ‘basic causal mechanism’ that ‘links climate change with violence in Nigeria.’ The report concludes: ‘...poor responses to climatic shifts create shortages of resources such as land and water. Shortages are followed by negative secondary impacts, such as more sickness, hunger, and joblessness. Poor responses to these, in turn, open the door to conflict.’

    According to the late Prof Sabo Bako of Ahmadu Bello University, the 1980s ‘forerunner’ to Boko Haram was the Maitatsine sect in northern Nigeria, whose members included many victims of ecological disasters leaving them in ‘a chaotic state of absolute poverty and social dislocation in search of food, water, shelter, jobs, and means of livelihood.’

    A year after the USIP study, Africa Review reported that many Boko Haram foot soldiers happen to be people displaced by severe drought and food shortages in neighboring Niger and Chad. Some 200,000 farmers and herdsmen had lost their livelihoods and, facing starvation, crossed the border to Nigeria. (ibid)

    As for the rise of ISIL and other militant Sunni groups that are now so successfully fighting in Iraq, its cause may not only be the general rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the whole Islamic world. It also has something to do with the economic situation in Iraq. Oil extraction in the OPEC’s second largest producer country has largely recovered from the setbacks suffered in the previous decade. But apart from crude oil export and some oil related industries, that are the mainstay of the country’s economy, there are not enough other employment opportunities to absorb the growing number of young people seeking gainful employment. Iraq’s population – 31.234 Million in 2009 – is growing at the annual rate of 2.29 percent (2013 figure). 25 percent of the country’s work force are unemployed, and 25 percent live below the poverty line (cf. Wikipedia–English). Maliki’s Shia-dominated government has also not done enough to assuage the feelings of the Sunni youth that they are being discriminated against in economy and politics. This is also a reason that many Sunnis who are not fundamentalists support the Sunni “holy warriors” led by the fundamentalist ISIS.

Outlook

I remember TV reports from the Congo, when the country was still called Zaire and its ruler Mobutu. The soldiers often did not get any pay from the kleptocratic rulers of the minerals-rich country. They therefore now and then mutinied and looted the shops and residents of the capital, so as to collect their pay in an alternative way. We know that in the following years Zaire sank in chaos. The eastern part of the country soon became the hunting ground of resource robbers. Currently, chaos also prevails in Iraq, although it is a somewhat different kind of chaos. It is likely that the country will fall apart. And then on its territory will originate three new states that will be fiercely fighting for the rich oil resources of the region. The oil fields of Kirkuk are already objects of serious dispute.

    It is possible that at some point Nigeria too will be overtaken by the same fate. Just as the Iraqi people are divided into religious and ethnic groups, so also the Nigerian (Muslims, Christians, Ogonis, Adonis etc.). In Iraq, the Kurds have already achieved a high degree of autonomy; they now want to create a real state of their own. In Nigeria, the Ogonis are demanding political and economic autonomy as well as environmental protection, all connected with oil extraction in their region. So there are religious conflicts in Nigeria – Muslims (Boko Haram) against Christians – but also ethnic ones. In1993, a violent conflict flared up between the Ogonis and the Adonis, as a result of which about 1000 Ogonis were killed and 30,000 were forced to flee.

    I am afraid wherever such a constellation exists – different religious and/or ethnic and/or linguistic groups living in one country – there, potential for more or less serious conflict also exists. It may be a poor country or a (potentially) rich one, it may be an overpopulated country or not, the potential is there. Three examples occur to me immediately: Sudan and then South Sudan (different religious and ethnic groups, poor but oil-rich), Belgium (two major linguistic groups, rich, and same religion with insignificant denominational difference), and the Ukraine (two linguistic groups, relatively poor, two denominations of Christianity, different histories).

    Of course, in Nigeria as well as in Iraq, conflict over power and wealth distribution has been playing a major role. But the long-term, that is, the real goal of ISIS, Boko Haram and other fundamentalist-Islamist groups is to establish a "a state of God” on the basis of the Sharia and their particular interpretation of Islam. Will they be successful? In the medium term, they could win, at least in the Muslim majority countries. Because they are devotedly fighting for an ideal, but not their opponents. Theo van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker, who was murdered by a fanatical Islamist in 2004 because he had insulted Islam, gave another reason: There is a promise in Islam that he who dies as a martyr would directly ascend to heaven and enjoy there a most beautiful life. The “holy warriors” of Islam firmly believe it. For their opponents and for fighters of other faiths, there is no such promise; actually, nowadays most of them do not really believe fully in their respective religion.

    In Afghanistan, before the American invasion of 2001, they were already successful. Their moderate brothers, elected by the people, are today ruling in Turkey. Until a year ago, also elected by the people, they ruled for a short time in Egypt. In Gaza-strip they could very easily drive away their secular opponents.

     In the long term, however, they too will fail. For, firstly, there is no God who could help them when the earthly problems would become more acute. These are already acute and are becoming ever more acute. This was concretely demonstrated one year ago in Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood failed. And secondly, faith and Sharia alone cannot satisfy the growing material needs and desires of a growing population. Turkey is a special case. It was already a relatively developed country, when the AKP party came to power.

    The Western model of a democratic secular state is in the retreat – generally in the whole world, and particularly in the Islamic countries. In the long term, it will also fail. We could again make this model attractive, if, and only if, we could free it from its current liaison with capitalism. In conjunction with eco-socialism it could again become an attractive model, and a goal, for which to fight with dedication would be worthwhile. This goal could take the wind out of the Islamists’ sails.

Literature

Ahmed, Nafeez (2014) ”Behind the Rise of Boko Haram – Ecological Disaster, Oil Crisis, Spy Games.” In: The Guardian. Com 9.05.2014.

Rubin. Alissa J. & Michael R. Gordon (2014) “Iraq’s Military Seen as Unlikely to Turn the Tide”. In: The New York Times (online), 22.06 2014.

PS. In this context, I also recommend the following reading: The Power of the Religions and the Helplessness of the Leftists, by Saral Sarkar.

http://eco-socialist.blogspot.de/search?q=religions

 

Krugman's Illusion: We Becoming Richer, But Not Damaging The Environment

About a week ago I read/ heard German media stories on the fifth IPCC report on climate change, especially on the third and last part of it. In the meantime we have all got used, almost insensitive, to the regular bad tidings coming from the IPCC. But a statement made by Ottmar Edenhofer, one of the three co-chairs of its third working group, made us sit up and take notice. He said: “It would not cost the world to save the planet;” the cost of limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius would be only 0.06 percent less yearly growth than what would otherwise be possible.

Then, a few days later, I read an article by Paul Krugman (Nobel Laureate in Economics) in the New York Times (17.04.2014) entitled Climate Change:Salvation Gets Cheap. Referring to the glad tidings on the cost of saving the planet coming from the IPCC, Krugman wrote he thinks the climate threat is solved. He went even further. He wrote: “… there’s no reason we can’t become richer while reducing our impact on the environment.”

One could perhaps be hopeful about humanity somehow solving the climate threat at the last moment. But I think it is impossible that we can all become richer while reducing our impact on the environment. These are two different things, though related.

Are the renewable energies emissions free?

Krugman refers to a study of the Department of Energy entitled Revolution Now and comments: “That sounds like hyperbole, but you realize that it isn’t when you learn that the price of solar panels has fallen more than 75 percent just since 2008.” Let us assume that this particular piece of information is reliable. But what has that to do with solving the climate threat? In all cases of industrial production, there are costs, called externalities, that are not borne or not borne fully by the firms that produce the commodities in question and are therefore also not passed over to the buyers through higher prices. Atmospheric and maritime pollution are best examples thereof. Such costs are either not borne at all, by nobody, or they are socialized, i.e. borne by all members of a community – a village, a country, a region, neighboring communities, or the whole world community. As German ecologists say, prices do not tell the whole truth about costs. Socialized costs may involve some immediate money costs for the affected community, but it may also be that the future generations would someday have to bear these costs in some form or other – either as some money costs (e.g. for repairing the damages done) or as deteriorating health and/or as environmental destruction of various kinds.

Since in the case of climate change we are today suffering the negative impact of large-scale externalization of costs, both past and present, i.e. emission of green house gases in the atmosphere, it is particularly important to ask whether or not all the industries involved in the production (or extraction) of the raw materials and equipments used for producing the renewable energies – solar panels, wind turbines, rotors, palm oil etc. etc. – themselves emit green house gases into the atmosphere. There is no doubt that they do, because such industries mostly (if not wholly) use conventional energy generated by burning fossil fuels.

We also know that in the case of photovoltaic-solar and wind energy, at the very last stage of production, in which sunshine and wind are converted directly into electricity, no green house gas emission takes place. But the process of delivering that electricity to the consumers again generates green house gases, because copper cables, Transformers, storage facilities like batteries etc. etc. are produced by industries that use mostly (if not wholly) conventional energy produced by burning fossil fuels.

It may be argued that, on the whole, for producing and delivering a given quantity of electricity, the renewable energy technologies emit less green house gases than the fossil fuel burning power plants (because the former do not burn fossil fuels at the last stage of production). That may or may not be true. I do not know of any comparative figures on this question. It must be very difficult to work out reliable figures on this question. But we may get some indication when we consider the energy cost of production of renewable energies.

Price versus energy cost of energy, or the EROEI

Any economist knows that the price of a commodity depends on many factors: supply and demand, cost of production, the state of competition at the relevant markets, normal profit expectation, whether or not firms producing the commodity are getting subsidies and other favors (e.g. through protective duty) from their state etc. Cost of production of a commodity depends largely on the state of technology, wages and salaries, scale of production, prices of the needed raw materials and intermediate goods ( such as energy),which in turn depend on all these factors.

    But when we talk about production of energy, then we have to consider another matter. We want light in the evening, for which we spend energy (in the form of electricity or a flame on an oil lamp). Light and energy are two different things. We may be willing to spend any amount of energy to get the desired intensity of light. But when we want to produce energy by spending energy, then it would not make any sense if we produce, say, 9 units of energy by spending 10 units of energy.

    We also have to differentiate between different forms of energy. In thermal (or nuclear) power plants, electrical energy is produced by using heat energy obtained by burning coal, oil or gas (or by splitting atoms). Since we absolutely need electrical energy for hundreds of kinds of work – e.g. using a computer – we may be willing to spend any amount of heat energy to get the required quantity of electrical energy. We also produce electrical energy by using the energy of falling water (hydroelectricity). After electrical energy is produced in these ways, it is delivered to millions of factories, households etc, where it is used for various kinds of work.

    Now comes the point relevant to our present topic. Factories that produce photovoltaic panels or wind turbines or rotors use electricity. Even if they need some heat energy for particular steps in the production process, they generally use electricity to produce that heat. Since photovoltaic panels, wind turbines etc. produce electrical energy, i.e. the same form of energy that is used to produce these equipments, they only make sense if they produce in their lifespan of ca. 15 to 20 years more energy than what is needed to manufacture them – in other words, if their energy balance is positive. In our days, one also speaks of EROEI to indicate the ratio between energy return on energy invested.

    There is much uncertainty about the energy balance (EROEI) of both photovoltaic and wind-turbine technology for producing electricity. There are people (including myself) who doubt that the energy balance of photovoltaic technology is at all positive. As for wind energy technology, these people think that its energy balance is positive (2– ?/1), but not positive enough to successfully compete with thermal power plants.

    These uncertainties and doubts persist because it is very difficult, possibly even impossible, to work out exact figures on the EROEI of these technologies. Too many aspects of the studies made to arrive at the currently known figures had to be based on assumptions and guess work. I have been reading reports on these studies since about the early 1990s. I found that in 1991, some researchers asserted that, in European climates, the energy pay- back time (EPBT) of photovoltaic technology – the time it takes for a photovoltaic panel to harvest the quantity of energy that was invested in manufacturing it – was 1.2 to 2.1 years. These figures were by and large comparable to those of large-scale thermal and nuclear power plants; i.e. they were ostensibly already then competitive. But in 1995 – after four years of further research and development – another researcher stated that this figure (i.e. EPBT of photovoltaic panels in European climates) was 9 years. Similarly, while a study made in 1984 found that the EROEI of photovoltaic technology was 1.7/1 to 10/1 (obviously in different areas), another study ascertained in 1996 that it was 0.41/1 (that is, negative). The latest figure I have is from an article written by Ted Trainer (in April 2014), who too has been studying this matter since long. He writes cautiously: “… several recent studies have found that when all relevant factors are included, the ratio of energy produced by a PV[photovoltaic] module in its lifetime to the energy needed to produce it is not 10/1 as is commonly thought, or 60/1 as some advocates have claimed, but probably between 4/1 and 2.4/1.”  (EROEI and EPBT figures are from Sarkar 1999: chapter 4; Heinberg 2003: 152f., Trainer 2014)

    These results are inexact not only because they had to be largely based on guesswork and many assumptions, but probably also because the researchers did not use the same methodology. Also time (relevant for technological development) and place (relevant for quantity and intensity of sunshine) of the studies varied. In such a situation, I think it is permissible to apply logic and common sense in order to get an approximately true picture of the prospects and promises of renewable energies. Then one can’t help asking a few questions:

    If solar panels have become so cheap since 2008, why do energy companies still insist on building new coal- or oil-fired thermal power plants? And why do oil companies are still searching for oil at enormous costs deep under the ocean bed in the Atlantic or the Arctic Ocean? Why does the Japanese government want to recommission the nuclear power plants that had been shut down in the wake of the Fukushima catastrophe? Why hasn’t India, which is very rich in sunshine and wind and has a long coastline, yet decided to bid farewell to conventional coal and uranium based power technologies? Why is it still paying every year a huge oil import bill? And why must renewable electricity producers of Germany still demand and enjoy the privilege of guaranteed sale and guaranteed prices that are much higher than the prices of conventionally produced electricity? Obviously, renewable energy technologies cannot yet compete with conventional energies.

Prospects for renewable energies

But will they soon be able to outcompete the conventional energy technologies? Or can they in near future make the latter superfluous and supply all the energy needs of our industrial societies? I think the prospects are negative. We know that easily accessible and easily exploitable sources of raw materials, particularly those of conventional fossil fuels, are getting exhausted and new finds are unable to compensate for the exhausted quantities. The geographical and geological conditions under which these resources are being found and exploited are progressively worsening. We cannot change them. Think of extracting oil from the bottom of the Arctic Ocean! As a result, more and more energy has to be invested for extracting raw materials – coal, oil, gas, uranium, metal ores, rare earths etc. That means, their energy cost of production (also partly reflected in their financial costs) is steadily rising. Now it is exactly with such raw materials that all the equipments of all renewable energy industries –solar and wind power plants as well as bio fuel factories – are built. That means, the energy investment required for building such power plants is continuously rising. But the average energy content of sunshine and the fact that the sun does not shine in the night are cosmological constants. Climate scientists are predicting (and we are noticing it already) that, with climate change, wind velocity during storms will strongly rise. But that will be of little use to wind power plants, because in such cases the generators must be shut off. Such being the facts, the EROEI of renewable energy technologies cannot rise in future. It will rather go down – in spite of small technological developments that might still take place. Miracles do not happen.

    But one question still remains: How come prices of solar panels have sharply fallen? As stated above, prices of commodities depend on several factors. In the case of solar panels, it is well known that the main cause of the drop-off in price is that Chinese producers have entered the world market in a big way. They haven’t achieved any technological breakthrough. But their wages are much lower than those in Europe and America, they have less environmental and other conditions imposed on them, and the state is granting them subsidies and other favors. What is more, they are offering their products at dumping prices. The five or six German producers that recently went bankrupt and those that are threatened with bankruptcy, give these reasons for their misery. They complained to the European Commission and asked it to impose restrictions on Chinese exports of the product to Europe. The case ended with a compromise, but that did not help the German companies that were already bankrupt. Another explanation for the drop in prices is the enlargement of the scale of production, which was made possible by the promotional measures taken by states in the rich countries.

    I think the dispute will be settled in the next ten years through facts on the ground. "In the meantime also renewable energy enthusiasts concede", writes a Green Party intellectual, "that one cannot reckon with permanently profitable solar electricity production north of the Mediterranean Sea (Wiesenthal 2013: 29).

The difference between “feasible” and “viable”

 “But”, renewable energy enthusiasts ask me, “why do you altogether rule out that one day industrial societies will succeed in fully replacing non-renewable energies with renewable ones?” Of course, in principle, that too can happen. The future is in principle always uncertain. But we have to begin to act today in order to prevent foreseeable catastrophes in not all too distant future. That means, we have to act on the basis of less than 100 percent certain knowledge. In order to act effectively, we must then know, or try to infer from known facts, what is probable and what not. I think it is improbable that even the best renewable energy technologies of the future will someday be able to supply the whole energy needs of industrial societies.

    If we could be satisfied with light from oil lamps and do all work using only manual and animal labor power plus heat energy from burning wood, then our economy could be fully based on renewable energy. But that would not be an industrial economy, which cannot function without electricity and liquid or gaseous fuel. To get all of these latter forms of energy from sunshine or wind is not possible. A law of nature, the entropy law, stands in the way.

    Sun’s energy reaches us in a high entropy state, i.e. in a highly dissipated form. That is sufficient for agriculture and plant growth, from which we can get wood for fire. But for producing electricity we have to concentrate a large quantity of highly dissipated sunshine with the help of photovoltaic panels or aluminum mirrors. Production of these equipments themselves consume a large amount of concentrated, i.e. low entropy energy that we mostly get from fossil fuels found in nature. That means we can use this method of producing electricity only as long as sufficient quantities of easily extractable fossil fuels (or uranium) are available. That is why Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen (1978) called solar electricity technologies parasites. It is more or less so also with wind energy. That means, solar electricity technologies are feasible but not viable. They would only be viable, if the second generation of renewable power plants, i.e. all the needed equipments from A to Z – solar panels, aluminum mirrors, wind turbines, factories, roads, vehicles etc. etc.etc. – could be built/manufactured with solar or wind energy only. That would not be possible if the EROEI of (net energy produced by) solar and wind energy technologies remain so low as it is today. If we assume, as Ted Trainer writes, that the EROEI of solar panels is 2/1, then, after we have consumed this energy for our daily living and the other usual activities, no surplus would be left for investing in the production of the second generation of solar power plants. Trainer writes: “Estimates in the literature are that the ratio [EROEI] must be at least 7/1 for a technology to be viable.” It is very improbable that that would be the case in future, because, as I have argued above, the trend is pointing in the opposite direction.

    This problem cannot be solved even if we try to use the enormous quantity of high intensity sunshine available in the deserts of the earth. One such project, the Desertec project of some of the biggest European corporations, is today on its deathbed.

Conclusion

Today, in Germany, the result of years of promoting renewable energy technologies through subsidies (collected from the consumers including smaller businesses) and other favors is that electricity price has increased so much that tens of thousands of poor Germans cannot pay their electricity bills and are getting their grid connection cut off (coal price rises have also contributed something to it). The present federal government is therefore trying to arrest this extraordinary price rise by reducing to some extent the guaranteed subsidized prices paid to the producers of renewable energies. So we see that even the so-called “Energiewende” (energy-system-change) of the Germans aimed at reducing the emission of greenhouse gases is faltering, and the government is being criticized by pseudo-environmentalists for putting on the brakes against it.

    Krugman thinks we can all become richer while reducing our impact on the environment. This is also the mantra of many other pseudo-greens and pseudo-environmentalists all over the world, who propagate illusions of green growth, sustainable growth, green New Deal etc. etc. Edenhofer, the IPCC man, naively assumes in the midst of a stagnation-crisis that the world economy would regularly grow at a yearly rate of two percent (Süddeutsche Zeitung, 14.04.2014). But Krugman, the star economist, ought to have known better than to persistently demand policies for pushing economic growth. He argues: “Other things equal, more G.D.P. tends to mean more pollution. What transformed China into the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases? Explosive economic growth. But other things don’t have to be equal. There’s no necessary one-to-one relationship between growth and pollution.” That’s right. But other things can also become worse than before, so that the environment can also be destroyed without economic growth. Even at zero percent rate of growth an industrial economy continues its work of polluting and degrading the environment.

    The environment is more than just the climate, which Krugman thinks can be saved by substituting renewable energies for conventional energies. And the environmental crisis is a much bigger matter than the climate crisis. It includes, apart from the state of the climate, also the state of the oceans, the rivers, agricultural lands, forests, biodiversity and many other things. Krugman does not seem to know that if we all are to become richer, that will require much more than installing more solar panels and wind turbines. That will require extracting more fossil fuels, more mineral ores, building more dams, more factories, more roads, more houses, more stadia, more cars, more airplanes and so on. That will give the environment the final death blow. We shall then see that one cannot eat money.

    My hope is that it – all getting richer – will not be possible any more. For not only has oil extraction reached its peak, but also the other resources are getting depleted very fast. I recently saw a documentary film that shows that even the most ordinary resource sand has become so scarce that it is being stolen. For big building projects even sand on the seabed is being excavated, as a result of which the strands are vanishing under the water. Actually, we should be talking about preparing ourselves for a frugal lifestyle.

    Maybe we should be preparing ourselves for much worse things. Recently, a team of American scientists carried out a research project to ascertain the conditions that led to the collapse of past human civilizations. The project was partly funded by NASA, the organization whose purpose was to put man on the moon. The scientists concluded that there are strong indications that our present civilization is headed for collapse(Ahmed 2014).

Literature

Ahmed, Nafeez (Dr.) (2014) “Nasa-Funded Study: Industrial Civilisation Headed For 'Irreversible Collapse'?” in: www.the guardian.com/environment/earth-insight (14.03.2014).

Heinberg, Richard (2003) The Party’s Over. Forest Row: Clairview.

Sarkar, Saral (1999) Eco-Socialism or Eco-Capitalism? A Critical Analysis of Humanity’s Fundamental Choices. London: Zed Books.

Trainer, Ted (2014) Relax! Solar energy can save us.  Krugman says so. (unpublished article).

Wiesenthal, Helmut (2013) ''Der Solarstrom – Lackmustest grüner Energiepolitik', in Böll Thema – Es grünt, Berlin, Nr. 1.

 

 

The Mess in the Ukraine -- National Self-Determination Or Economics?

Will there soon be another war in Europe? The politicians assuage our fears: no, it will not go that far. But with Russian military support, Crimea has already declared independence, while the NATO countries and Russia threaten each other with sanctions and counter-sanctions. Reason for great worry therefore remains. Let's try to understand the mess.

Legal or Illegal – They don’t give a damn

It does not take us any further, if one says a particular action is legal or illegal, constitutional or unconstitutional. Or if one says the action contravenes international law, or it doesn’t. That's pointless. In political colloquial German there is a witty saying: "legal or illegal; I don’t give a damn." Moreover, no putsch, no ousting of a President, no tyrannicide, no revolution, no unilateral declaration of independence is legal or constitutional. And the demonstrators on Kiev’s Maidan did not claim that their “revolution” has been constitutional. Ben Ali and Mubarak were rightful presidents of their country – in accordance with some law in force at the time. Even the despotically ruling King of Saudi Arabia, one of the best friends of the West, is a rightful ruler. Yanukovych was even a properly elected president. But who cares? After some time, the normative power of facts comes into force. Whether the referendum in Crimea and the stand of the Russians there have been constitutional or in accordance with international law, does not matter. The Russians have enumerated to the Americans, how many illegal invasions the latter have perpetrated in recent decades – from Panama and Grenada up to Iraq. Even a Washington Post columnist admitted that the U.S. had no moral right to accuse Russia of anything in this regard. Merkel too has no such right. Gerhard Schroeder, her predecessor in the office of the Chancellor of the German government, recently said that Germany too violated international law when it, under his Chancellorship, bombarded Serbia. That's why he could not blame his friend Putin for Russia’s stand on Crimea. Sometimes the great powers also talk plain truth. The Americans often cite their "vital interest" to defend an invasion. In the current conflict over Crimea, the Russians have openly said that they will defend their interests. But we ordinary people might perhaps be allowed to ask whether an action is at least justified, whether it could contribute something to the preservation or promotion of peace in the world and to the good of the people concerned.

Responsibility to Protect

When we ask these questions, we leave the ground of law and international law and enter the ground of ethics and reasonableness. Under German law, in certain circumstances, failure to render help can be a punishable offense. In international law, there is no such duty. Precisely for this reason, after the genocide in Rwanda (1994), the ethical principle of "responsibility to protect" was postulated. Of course, great powers can also abuse this ethical principle, as recently happened in Libya. But it is at least theoretically better than strict observance of the legal principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of a state. By all means, in 1994, the armies of the neighboring states should have intervened in Rwanda to stop the genocide. In private life, we do intervene when, for example, in the neighboring house an angry husband threatens to kill his wife.

According to the Russian version of the story, the "revolution" in Kiev was in fact a fascist coup d’état, stoked up by Western powers, against the Russia-friendly elected president. That's why, according to them, this coup was not only a threat to the legitimate interests of Russia (naval base in Sevastopol, defense against the encirclement policy of the NATO etc.), but also a threat to the ethnic Russian people of the Ukraine. This, according to the Russians, justified their stand and compelled them to take action to protect the ethnic Russians in Crimea.

Principle of National Self-determination

One can also invoke the principle of national self-determination and, with a clear conscience, justify the decision of the Crimean Russians, who constitute the majority of the population on the peninsula, to hold a referendum. In Crimea the ethnic Russians make up 58 percent of the population. Therefore, it was no surprise that in the referendum – even without manipulation – the majority of those who cast their ballot opted for secession from the Ukraine. But the problem is not so easily solved. The remaining 40 percent – the Crimean Tatars and the ethnic Ukrainians –are, or can be, afraid of being persecuted or discriminated against under Russian rule. Generally, going-on about principles and a stubborn enforcement of a referendum or a stubborn refusal thereof are not sensible politics. Especially in such situations as in Crimea, it is better to act reasonably and seek an amicable solution to the problem.

I think the Crimean Russians had enough justification for their declaration of independence. They, firstly, constitute the majority of the population. And, secondly, the desire to break up or break away from a bigger political entity is neither bad per se nor uncommon. The Soviet Union was broken up with the consent of the leaders of at least the bigger constituent republics. The former Czechoslovakia was split up peacefully at the request of the Slovaks, after which the two succession states are till today living peacefully side by side. If the Scots decide in the already scheduled referendum to dissolve their union with England and Wales, the people of the latter two and the government of the UK will accept that decision.

Yet these examples should not mislead us into thinking that dividing up a state into smaller independent states is always and everywhere possible without much trouble. Modern history shows that such an attempt can also end in a catastrophe. There are several examples for this: Biafra (Nigeria), Katanga (Democratic Republic of Congo), the Tamilian northern part of Sri Lanka. In Europe, the Basque region of Spain and France has gone through several decades of murderous guerilla war. Even where such attempts have in the end been successful – in 1947 in India (Pakistan), 1971 in Pakistan (Bangladesh), in the 1990s in the former Yugoslavia, recently in Sudan (South Sudan) – in every case the process was accompanied by bloody wars and large-scale massacres of civilians. The only pure exception is Czechoslovakia. The breaking up of the Soviet Union was preceded by political and economic breakdown, a military putsch attempt, and the ouster of Gorbachev from power. And if the Scots vote for independence, the English and the Welshmen will, of course, accept their decision, but there will definitely be conflict over sharing the revenues from the North Sea oil, over Scotland using the pound sterling as its currency, and over Scotland’s membership of the EU.

It is easy to feel sympathy for the separatist independence struggle of a constituent part of the population of a state when the majority of the former inhabit a roughly definable part of the country. But, as the examples above show, it is very difficult to carve a new state out of an already established one or to completely liquidate the latter as it happened in the case of Yugoslavia. Despite these negative examples such attempts are still being made – in northern Italy and in Spain, where not only the Basques but also the Catalans are trying to break away and create an independent state of their own. Such attempts are today very unwise. For today, there is hardly a country or even a larger part of a country (a province or even a district) where one does not find different ethnic, religious or language groups living strongly mixed up side by side. I once asked a Turkish expat, a leader of a left political group in Germany, whether he supported the independence struggle of the Turkish Kurds. He said, no. He would not mind, he said, if the Kurdish regions would secede from Turkey, but then, he added, the Kurds would also be forced to leave Istanbul, Ankara and the other bigger cities. How would that possibly end?

A similar problem exists in the Indian part of Kashmir. The Hindu minority, that had been living for generations in the midst of the predominantly Muslim population of Kashmir valley, has long been forced to leave that part of the state. But in the south, in the province of Jammu, Hindus and other non-Muslims constitute the majority. And the Buddhist Ladakhis  live in the north. If now the Muslim inhabitants of the Indian part of Kashmir declare that they cannot live in India as it is a predominantly Hindu country, and if they somehow succeed in splitting the territory out of India and integrate it into the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, then the Hindus in the greater part of India might tell the Muslims living scattered throughout India they should also go to Pakistan. A large-scale and cruel expulsion of the Muslims could then be the result, the second after 1947. Also the small peoples living in small states in northeast India – the Nagas the Mijos, the Manipuris – would have a big problem if they somehow succeed in their effort to gain independence. The majority of Indians might then tell them: we don’t want to have anything to do with you any more. See how you cope with your independence. These small states are situated far away from any seashore. Without cooperation with India, they would not be able to carry on foreign trade or receive foreign investment. Geography is also a part of fate.

National Independence or Economics?

What I want to say with all these examples is that it is necessary to assess each concrete problematic case separately and against the background of the given context and constellation. Political activists like us – eco-socialists, eco-anarchists etc. – have a vision of an ideal future world in which such problems would no longer exist. But the problems with which we are confronted, are problems of today's bad, imperfect world.

In the current case of Ukraine-Crimea, we must remember that what at the beginning stood in the foreground was the economic problem. President Yanukovych decided after much deliberation that for the Ukraine, on balance, an economic association with Russia would be more advantageous than one with the EU. The EU's offer was too meager. In a situation where the Ukraine is broke, where the country needs $30 billion in this year and the next just to avert bankruptcy, the EU offered initially only 800 million Euros in emergency aid. It was obvious that Russia's offer of assistance – $ 15 billion emergency aid plus a discount of 33 per cent in gas price – was comparatively much better. Yanukovych also had to consider that Russia is a major export market for Ukraine’s industrial products.

The President acted like a prudent father, who wanted to marry his daughter (the Ukraine) to a rich groom. But the daughter (more specifically, only the western part of the Ukraine) was determined to marry her loved one, the EU. The real world is simply so. Not all people act in a rational way, comparing the economic advantages and disadvantages of a decision with those of another. Strong irrational feelings and emotions are also there, and there is national pride, even in politics.

Western Ukrainians are generally known to have a long-standing antipathy towards (even hatred of) Russians. History is hard to forget. And it is true that Ukrainians suffered much under the Tsars and during the Stalin era. Even so, economically, it would probably have been better for the Ukraine if she had not made herself so dependent on the EU. As a member of the EU she would lose much of her independence – a problem that is already troubling the people of many member countries, e.g. the people of the UK and Germany (there, especially Bavaria ). The EU and the IMF will certainly give her the urgently needed rescue loans, as they have also given Greece. But under the same conditions that must be fulfilled by Greece. The state will be saved from bankruptcy, but Ukrainian society will suffer the same tragic fate as Greek society is already suffering. Even if later, for geo-strategic reasons, the Western creditors forgive part of their national debt, the Ukrainians would "enjoy" the same bad living conditions as the Bulgarians and Romanians do today, especially after they have lost their goods and labor markets in Russia. The Germans will soon grumble at the allegedly lazy and corrupt Ukrainians as much as they have done for the last few years at the Greeks. But the Western Ukrainians were not bothered about such future prospects. They have fallen in love. They are now elated at the prospect of visa-free travel to many countries and job opportunities in Germany, France or the UK.

As for Crimean Russians, apart from succumbing to their national feelings, they also acted rationally in leaving a sinking ship. The Ukraine is broke, but not Russia, which still possesses huge energy and other resources, the world market prices of which are rising continuously. As citizens of Russia they will get higher salaries and pensions, better medical care etc. Great power Russia is willing and will able to bear these extra costs. The Ukraine should, if only for this reason, let the Crimean Russians go and wish them well. The peninsula has no highly valuable mineral resources, nor is it the location of major industries. The only condition that she and the so-called international community should try to impose on Crimea and Russia is a guarantee of equal rights and equal treatment of ethnic Tatars and Ukrainians. For similar economic reasons, also the Kashmiri Muslims should opt for continuing to live in India rather than for becoming citizens of Pakistan, an obviously and increasingly failing state.

Economics has generally been the most important (though not the only) factor in questions of this kind. Most relatively poor European countries that joined the EU before 2008 (i.e. when the current world economic crisis broke out) – Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Poland – clearly did that in expectation of all kinds of development aid and investments from the core EU countries of those days. They hoped they would, in this way, be able to economically catch up with, say, Germany. They were willing to sacrifice part of their independence in exchange. Things have however changed since then. Today’s poorer EU members and aspirants for membership cannot expect that much help any more and cannot hope to be able to catch up with Germany. Big corporations may invest there, but only if wages and taxes are sufficiently low. Even Greece, an old member of the EU, has been compelled to lower wages, cut salaries and pensions, cut medical aid etc. in order to attract investments

Economics has also been the most important factor in many past cases where a part of an existing state wanted to break away and become independent. Some examples thereof have been mentioned above: the copper-rich province of Katanga in the D.R. of Congo, the oil-rich province of Biafra in Nigeria, oil-rich South Sudan. Further back in history, the imperialists created small client states around large oil deposits. Examples: Brunei and Kuwait. More recently, in the case of the Slovenians and Croatians, Catalonians and North Italians, their desire for independence arose from their higher level of prosperity that they no longer want(ed) to share with the rest of their countrymen. And for the Scots, as they themselves say, the prospect of getting a higher share of the North Sea oil revenues is a strong motivation for seeking independence. But we should not make the matter so simple. In all these cases, definitely, sub-nationalism also played an important role.

In recent history, there is also a case in which a small island “nation”, for economic reasons, refused an offer of independence from colonial rule: Mayotte, one of the four Comoro Islands in the Indian Ocean, had been a French colony until 1974, when France organized a referendum for self-determination. The other three decided to become independent, but not Mayotte, which voted to retain French suzerainty. Through a referendum held in 2009, Mayotte even officially became France’s 101^st department.

Conclusion

Of course, it would have been much better if the conflict between the great powers Russia and the EU could have been resolved consensually and peacefully, so that the Ukraine would not have been compelled to choose between the EU’s association agreement and Russia’s Eurasian customs union. But for Janukovych it was an either-or choice. The current Crimea conflict, however, came up only after the Russians both in Crimea and Russia saw that fascists and Russian-haters succeeded in making their putsch and became a strong component of the new government.

This political crisis in Europe will have tragic consequences. It has already made all Europeans forget the other great crises: the ecological crisis, the climate crisis, the resource crisis, and the economic crisis. It has made them forget all the other urgent problems of Europe and the world: the poverty problem, the unemployment problem, the refugee problem, the xenophobia problem, and the problem of the rise of the right radicals. Our political movements for a better world have been set back by many years.

But one may also see something positive in this negative development: When the Ukrainians are compelled to stop living beyond their means and when the Western European and Russian economies experience another recession because of the imminent economic war by means of sanctions, counter-sanctions and gas price increases, then that will be good for the environment.

Today (21.03.2014) I saw two celebrations: The EU leaders celebrated with the acting Ukrainian Prime Minister the signing of the political part of their association agreement, the original cause of the conflict. And the Russians celebrated with much firework the reunification of Crimea with the motherland. But they may all have celebrated too early. In the EU, in several countries including even France and the UK right radicals are threatening to undermine the much vaunted Western values. The fascists of the Ukraine would join them soon. The Ukraine will soon sink to the level of Greece. Russia’s oil and gas wealth will also be exhausted, some day. And they have until now failed to pacify the Islamist independence fighters in the Caucasus.

This crisis has reminded me once again of a picture that used to be commonly drawn in the ecology movement until some years ago: a large leaf is drifting on the Niagara River in the direction of the Niagara Falls. Drifting along on the leaf are a few ants. They are fighting against each other for power.

 

Finished on 23.03.2014.