Happy mid-autumn festival...after the fact

I had a great holiday weekend, three days of relaxation and reading. I spent Saturday with friends eating wonderful Wuhanese food then two days of sleeping, reading and listening on online broadcasts about 9-11 commemorations on Pacifica. I was particularly interested in the debates between truthers and anti-truthers. The discussions and call ins really got me thinking about the economic , the political and ecological crises facing not only the US but the world as the implications of rampant unchecked neoliberal global restructuring become clear. Also interesting is the widespread unease with rationality, positivism and other artifacts of modernity in a period of post-modernity that seemed to be the coded subtext of these conversations against the backdrop of high unemployment and natural disasters. What I find troubling is the extent to which China bashing has entered into public discourse rather than questions concerning globalization and capitalism. This discouse privileges nation-states as principal actors rather than classes, and precludes discussion of emeging political spaces at multiple scales. Ten years ago, these questions were being raised by the global justice movement, but cut short by Sept 11. I noticed than in the discussion surrounding September 11 on WBAI and across the Pacifica network, this issue was not raised, Sept 11th marked the death of the post-seattle moment and the re-emergence of traditional progressive organizational and protest forms. The forms of the global justice movement were uncomfortable for many in the traditional liberal left, shifting the point of action and analysis away from workplaces and onto communities, reproduction rather than production, performace rather than narrative. Thje Arab spring has more in common with the emergent forms prefigured by Seattle and the many to many forms of communication afforded by the internet.

Anyway happt belated Autumn Festival!