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from the no-one's-leaving-until-we-have-unanimous-agreement dept.
The rise of populism has rattled the global political establishment. Brexit came as a shock, as did the victory of Donald Trump. Much head-scratching has resulted as leaders seek to work out why large chunks of their electorates are so cross.
...
The answer seems pretty simple. Populism is the result of economic failure. The 10 years since the financial crisis have shown that the system of economic governance which has held sway for the past four decades is broken. Some call this approach neoliberalism. Perhaps a better description would be unpopulism.Unpopulism meant tilting the balance of power in the workplace in favour of management and treating people like wage slaves. Unpopulism was rigged to ensure that the fruits of growth went to the few not to the many. Unpopulism decreed that those responsible for the global financial crisis got away with it while those who were innocent bore the brunt of austerity.
2017 Davos says: The 99% should just try harder.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by theluggage on Wednesday March 29 2017, @12:37PM (13 children)
Unpopulism meant tilting the balance of power in the workplace in favour of management and treating people like wage slaves.
Whereas populism means handing power to egalitarian, salt-of-the-earth, saints like hereditary property tycoons or the far right wing of the UK Conservative party, who we can trust to fight selflessly for the rights of the working masses...
What populism is actually achieving is weakening any large, powerful centre-rigtht/center-left blocs who try to temper capitalism with liberal/social values - like the US Federal Government or the European Union - and might just be big enough and ugly enough to stand up to big, international corporations and oligarchs. You think Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Money etc. are going to stand up for the wage slaves and discover "enlightened self-interest" once they're freed from pesky EU/Federal regulations on workers rights, environment, competition etc.? Really? You think that Theresa May or the Orange One aren't going to be at the beck and call of big business?
The EU is going to be seriously weakened by the departure of the UK, and its pretty obvious that the US government has been weakened and discredited by the antics of the Orange One who's only success in his first 3 months has been to drive wedges between his government, the states and the judiciary.
Never before have so many turkeys been persuaded to vote for Christmas. Get ready for the race-to-the-bottom as our new "populist" overlords try to offer the most management-friendly terms to businesses.
Now, I'm a great fan of Hanlon's Razor - cockup is more likely than conspiracy - but if you were a huge multinational or private plutocrat and wanted to run a divide-and-conquer campaign against your main opposition, the Brexit and Trump campaigns would be a pretty credible effort.
Of course, the US Democrats and UK Labour, Lib Dems and moderate Conservatives helped by abjectly failing to mount effective campaigns or field suitable candidates, and nobody in their right mind could not think that the EU had its own serious issues to solve. However, all Brexit has done is to give the EU another serious issue to solve that could quite easily destabilise the whole continent.
But, hey, I'm no millionaire but I'm lucky enough to have a small, portfolio which has been doing really, really well since the Brexit vote (of course, in 2 years time when Brexit actually happens and the pigs come home to roost in Trumpton it may be a different story, but yay for diversified portfolios) - so enjoy the 0.01% interest on your cash savings and when your car factory re-locates to Poland and May outsources the entire benefit and healthcare system to a Cayman Islands services company, don't blame me - I voted for Kodos. Except... no, I don't think that. I think it would be a bloody tragedy and I will be really, really happy if I turn out to be wrong.
The answer seems pretty simple.
Part of the problem is charlatans offering deceptively simple answers to complicated questions...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @12:57PM
Low base rates and credit expansion as a band-aid for deeper structural problems are part of what people are voting against. When Obama took office student loan debt (or "asset" as these morons call it) was $640 billion. It now totals $1.6 Trillion and forms over 25% of the Federal Governments "assets". While education served this example, the pattern has been ubiquitous. Unsecured credit results in price inflation which is a disaster in an economic environment combining low inflation and low growth.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Wednesday March 29 2017, @01:31PM
Don't forget Scotsit. 300 years of history and collaboration goes up in ****. So sad. Putin is smiling tho...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by sgleysti on Wednesday March 29 2017, @02:20PM (5 children)
I consider Bernie Sanders to be an actual populist (new deal democrat -- close enough), while Donald Trump is just a charlatan / con man / bullshitter.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @03:53PM (4 children)
Don't fool yourself. Donald Grump conforms to a long tradition of populism. In fact, authoritarian populism that ends up in hard-right policies lead by a cult-of-personality is probably the most common form of populism. Practically every african dictator followed that model. Ferdinand Marcos in the phillipines is another example. And of course Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao.
(Score: 2) by sgleysti on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:12PM (2 children)
Sure, but I don't count him a populist because I don't have confidence that he will do anything that substantially benefits the majority of American citizens.
In other words, kleptocracy is not populism, regardless of one's rhetoric.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @05:26PM (1 child)
Then your definition of "populist" is a personal definition disconnected from all common usage and thus of little use in communicating meaning to anyone else.
(Score: 2) by sgleysti on Wednesday March 29 2017, @05:51PM
As is common in these kinds of discussions, you and I were working from two different valid definitions, both of which are contained in the following linked article:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/populism [britannica.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @07:13PM
Stalin
Stalin was not exactly a populist. Stalin was Stalin. Putin is more of a populist than Stalin ever was. Stalin only cared about himself and the rest were disposable. He could have cared less about his popularity as long as everyone feared him. Trotsky, on the other hand, was a populist that opposed Stalin and ended up with an ice pick to the brain for his efforts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Trotsky [wikipedia.org]
The bottom line is Stalin directly murdered 10s of millions through his actions. When he took "direct control" over the army in WWII, Soviet Union almost collapsed. The guy is more of Roman Emperor Nero than of a populist.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 29 2017, @03:36PM (4 children)
Unpopulism meant tilting the balance of power in the workplace in favour of management and treating people like wage slaves.
Whereas populism means handing power to egalitarian, salt-of-the-earth, saints like hereditary property tycoons or the far right wing of the UK Conservative party, who we can trust to fight selflessly for the rights of the working masses...
They don't have to perfect, they merely need to appear better than the alternatives. And let's face it, by not having credible policies on key populist issues (such as immigration control which was the decisive factor in both Brexit and the Trump election), their opponents have conceded a great deal of ground.
What populism is actually achieving is weakening any large, powerful centre-rigtht/center-left blocs who try to temper capitalism with liberal/social values - like the US Federal Government or the European Union - and might just be big enough and ugly enough to stand up to big, international corporations and oligarchs.
Yes, that is a pleasant silver lining to this. Frankly, I think "big, international corporations and oligarchs" are just an Emmanuel Goldstein ruse, something to distract us with a two minute hate, while the true powers slowly take over. After all, the main threat of large businesses is that they can be used against us by the governments that control them. Weakening the largest governments helps reduce the potential harm.
And it's telling that the first serious democratic challenges in a while to this takeover are so viciously attacked. Democracy isn't pretty, but we should be glad when it works as advertised.
But, hey, I'm no millionaire but I'm lucky enough to have a small, portfolio which has been doing really, really well since the Brexit vote (of course, in 2 years time when Brexit actually happens and the pigs come home to roost in Trumpton it may be a different story, but yay for diversified portfolios) - so enjoy the 0.01% interest on your cash savings and when your car factory re-locates to Poland and May outsources the entire benefit and healthcare system to a Cayman Islands services company, don't blame me - I voted for Kodos. Except... no, I don't think that. I think it would be a bloody tragedy and I will be really, really happy if I turn out to be wrong.
Trump has been good for my US-based folio too. We'll see if pigs roost or not. But Trump at least has a pretty small hurdle to meet - reverse most of the policies of Obama and don't be terrible economically for however many terms he can cling on.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:05PM (3 children)
"I think "big, international corporations and oligarchs" are just an Emmanuel Goldstein ruse, something to distract us with a two minute hate, while the true powers slowly take over."
Actually, I think those corporations are just a front for the "true powers". Who are they, anyway? Well, look at "old money" first. Maybe some "new money" families count themselves among the elite, but the elite would look down on them.
http://yournewswire.com/former-kissinger-ceo-says-the-world-is-run-by-30-families/ [yournewswire.com]
https://www.msn.com/en-in/money/photos/the-world%E2%80%99s-richest-families-revealed/ss-BBmRgsr#image=1 [msn.com]
Hmmmm - who owns Monsanto, anyway? No, I don't mean small time stock holders - who owns and controls Monsanto?
http://naturalsociety.com/who-are-really-the-top-shareholders-of-monsanto/ [naturalsociety.com]
People like to talk nasty about Hugh Grant, Monsanto’s CEO, and obviously a shareholder. The same goes for Bill Gates. He purportedly owns millions of shares of Monsanto stock as well. But who are the real owners of Monsanto? The answer might be shocking.
The real owners of Monsanto stock are institutions, and people who hide behind those institutions, not individuals like Gates and Grant. According to multiple sources, five investment funds are the top shareholders in Monsanto, with the Vanguard Group, Inc. at the top. You can view the rest below.
(Score: 2) by fritsd on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:50PM
Maybe add to that list some companies that are just NEVER in the news:
Schlumberger [wikipedia.org] (everything you need to drill for oil),
Cargill [wikipedia.org] (agribusiness on the scale of Soylent Green)
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:57PM
The real owners of Monsanto stock are institutions, and people who hide behind those institutions, not individuals like Gates and Grant. According to multiple sources, five investment funds are the top shareholders in Monsanto, with the Vanguard Group, Inc. at the top. You can view the rest below.
I agree. I believe institutional investors are one of the key drivers for short term thinking in business today. It's not their money and hence, they ultimately aren't interested in the long term success of the business. But I don't think these people are "family". What I see here is the rise of the power of well-connected, unaccountable bureaucracies with government bureaucracies the worst of the lot.
The NSA isn't trampling the civil liberties of the world because it is running errands for the Rothschilds or whatever. It's because they can.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @10:47PM
They even got their own "brand name" "designed" by their staff https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plutonomy [wikipedia.org]