Mike Davis to speak in Dublin and Belfast

by Gino - SWP Tue Mar 26, 2002 10:02

For everyones information.

by Socialism NOW for Anticapitalist movemnet Tue Mar 26, 2002 18:35

So it's official the SWP have become a middle class readers club. First it was George Mombiot and now some other middle class liberal type that will not be critisised by the SWP as it is all about building 'the movement'..... forget socialism

by Joeboy - Unapologetic revolutionary Tue Mar 26, 2002 19:05 Forget Baudrillard and the rest of the effete, elite, professioriat riding on his coat tails

Who the fuck is this hippy calling truckers and slaughter house workers Middle Class? Not that I personally care about what anyone's background is- more, what they do with there lives and for the movement. Mike Davis, in case ye don't know, was involved in the Friends of the Panthers in the late 60's in LA, spent time in Belfast at the height of the Troubles in 73 and 74, was a radical activist in the Trucker's Teamster Union and worked long years as a meat cutter. Why should we assume that all intellectuals are "middle class", as if people from a working class background are incapable of writing imaginative, provocative works of literature! Be japers, it's a good thing Brendan Behan wasn't nearby, young fella!

Here's some stuff on Mike, for those who reckon he's from the Ivory Towers of Academe. The rest of the story is continued at the link.

____________________________________
Unlike most writers on Southern California, Mike Davis is a native son. He was born in Fontana in 1946 and grew up in Bostonia, a now 'lost' hamlet east of San Diego. A former meatcutter and long distance truckdriver, he now teaches Urban Theory at the Southern California Institute of Architecture.

He is a co-editor of The Year Left: An American Socialist Yearbook and author of Prisoners of the American Dream (Verso 1986) and the brilliant City of Quartz, Excavating the Future in Los Angeles (Verso 1990), in which he recounts the story of Los Angeles with passion, wit and an acute eye for the absurd, the unjust and the dangerous. Davis' City of Quartz points to a future in which the sublime and the dreadful are inextricable; a future which does not belong to Southern California alone, but terrifyingly seems to belong to all of us.

His essay Beyond Blade Runner: Urban Control, the Ecology of Fear was first published in 1992 .

A 49-year-old native Californian and unrepentant Marxist, Davis drills through the sedimented myths of what the architectural critic Michael Sorkin has called "the most mediated town in America," returning us to the cold, hard bedrock of historical fact with a jarring thump. "If there is any cliche I wanted to undo," he told a Los Angeles Times writer, it was the one about "the insubstantiality of Los Angeles." An all too rare hybrid of activist intellectual, impeccable historian, and gifted storyteller with a blisteringly caustic wit, Davis is above all a very angry man with a rage to understand: every word of City of Quartz reads as if it were etched in an acid bath. William Gibson, who cites its influence in the acknowledgements to his novel, Virtual Light, pronounced it "more cyberpunk than any work of fiction could ever be." Forget Baudrillard and the rest of the effete, elite, professioriat riding on his coattails; mesmerized by the vapor trails of pure theory, they turn a blind eye to the ever grimmer human reality behind the hyperreality. For them, as Davis notes, "What was once anguish seems to have become fun." Live, from ground zero, City of Quartz and Davis's two brief dispatches from the frontlines---Beyond Blade Runner: Urban Control/The Ecology of Fear and L.A. Was Just the Beginning/ Urban Revolt in the United States: A Thousand Points of Light (both published by the Open Magazine pamphlet series)---begin to theorize a way out of this place.

Delving into the past, he unearths the market forces and social engineering that have made Los Angeles what it is: a megalopolitan sprawl straight out of Gibson's Virtual Light--- economically and ecologically moribund, ravaged by social polarization and racial tensions that have provided fertile ground for the criminalizing of non-whites, urban youth, and the homeless; the militarizing of a notoriously brutal police force; the privatizing of public space; and the proliferation of fortified suburban enclaves whose lawns bristle with warnings of "Armed Response."

In so doing, Davis---true to the book's title---excavates a worst-case scenario for the future of urban America: a 21st century Los Angeles in which the government and private sectors have abdicated any vestige of responsibility to the dispossessed; where public space and civil rights have been willingly relinquished by homeowners fearful of racial unrest and gang violence; and where the upper- and middle-class citizenry has incarcerated itself in gated communities or, on family outings, in surveilled, privately patrolled malls, "historic districts," or theme parks. Already, as Davis notes in Beyond Blade Runner, Universal Studios has constructed a "parallel urban reality" called CityWalk, repackaging "the best features of Olvera Street, Hollywood, and the West Side" in what its designer calls "'easy, bite-sized pieces' for consumption by tourists and residents who 'don't need the excitement of dodging bullets...in the Third World country' that Los Angeles has become."

On Beyond Blade Runner's final page, he asks, "Will the ecology of fear become the natural order of the 21st-century American city?" The forecast, to Davis, is not auspicious. "If we continue to allow our central cities to degenerate into criminalized Third Worlds," he writes, "all the ingenious security technology, present and future, will not safeguard the anxious middle class. The sound of that first car bomb on Rodeo Drive or in front of City Hall will wake us from our mere bad dream and confront us with our real nightmare."

http://www.streetgangs.com/bibliography/mdavis.html

by Andrew Wed Mar 27, 2002 13:26

I'm not sure it actually matters all that much but in the interests of accuracy George Monbiot is not what I would call middle class. Rather as a highly paid intellectual and the son of the Tory party chairman he is a member of the ruling class, albet a dissident one who doesn't agree with current policy. He's not unique in that respect, there are a number of other ruling class types* from George Soros to Bono who have come out in opposition to neo liberalism, in fact in Porto Alegre there were no less then 4 French cabinet ministers.

The problem with Monbiot is that some on the left, notably the SWP/GR have worked very hard at making him an (unaccountable) spokesperson for 'the movement' and he has used this position to attack revolutionary sections of the movement. But despite this he can (and does) still make some useful contributions as an individual.

* I'm using ruling class here to mean people who informally or formally rule over us. This can be because of personal wealth or because they have been given a position of power by the state or capital. Some journalists and academics are in that position, they effectively are in charge of the production of ideology for the masses

by Joe Carolan - Globalise Resistance Wed Mar 27, 2002 15:01 globalise_resistance at yahoo dot com The Other World Which is Possible 087 9032281

Mike Davis article from the New Left Review

Premonitions and hallucinations of the fate of the Twin Towers, from H. G. Wells to Ernst Bloch, John Dos Passos to Sayyid Qutb. Today’s Palmer raids and tomorrow’s ‘security cities’ as first instalments in the globalization of fear.

http://www.newleftreview.net/NLR24602.shtml

by Brian Cahill - Socialist Party Wed Mar 27, 2002 15:38 nigel_irritable at yahoo dot com

I am not a fan of the SWP. I am not a fan of George Monbiot, for exactly the same reasons that Andrew points out - that he is promoted (partially by the SWP/GR but more often by himself and the right wing press) as an unaccountable, unelected would be spokesperson for the anticapitalist movement.

That said, Mike Davis is an interesting and very left wing writer. Although he isn't as unapologetically a Marxist as someone like David Harvey, he is more consistently radical than the likes of Monbiot any day. And, he is insistent on placing the working class near the centre of his arguments. He isn't perfect by any means, but as far as this kind of big name speaker goes he's pretty much as good as you are going to get.

There are plenty of reasons to criticise the SWP. Bringing Davis in to speak emphatically isn't one of them.

by Andrew Wed Mar 27, 2002 17:06

I agree that providing a platform for Mike to speak when he is over is a good idea. I suspect the high level of SWP criticism here - as on indymedia UK - is a reflection of the way they piss off large numbers of activists. As such its their problem rather then indymedias or anyone elses.

by Gino - SWP Wed Mar 27, 2002 17:45 swp at clubi dot ie

Golly, look at the trouble I've been starting with my posts over the last period! All my posts (3 or 4) start major verbals in cyberspace or what. A case of quality not quantity to put a dialectical materialist turn on it!!

by barney Wed Mar 27, 2002 20:18

Mike Davis is not a swimmer he is as William Gibson points out the best cyberpunk writer ever

by Inbred Jed - Johnny cash Appreciation Society Wed Mar 27, 2002 20:32 First swamp past the bayou

Cousin Mick is my coz and he lives in the swamp
and i know he's a swimmer and a cowpunk to boot

by Dave Lordan - SWP Thu Mar 28, 2002 00:08

As well as being the best cyberpunk writer ever Mike Davis is member of the swp and will be living in Ireland in the near future
great news i should think for socialists and cyberpunks in this country. Maybe we'll get an irish book out of him

As for andrew from the wsm who seems to be doing swpwatch on every e-mail list in the country i find it amusing to see your naive view of history and the left posted under every article to do with our party( the wsm are so cute aren't they)
Andrew says trhe swppiss of a lot of activists which is in th eproud and long tradoion of anarchism an orthodoxy in direct contradiction to the facts.
The SWP is the largest collective of left wing activists in the country, and i would say is about forty or fifty times the size of Andrews little coterie inthe WSM. We also work in coalitions on a huge range of issues, from anti-privatisation of local services and amenities,to anti capitalism, whicch involve co-operating with hundreds if not thousands of activists beyond ourselves. If we piss activists off can andrew explain why this is the case and why the wsm is in contrast so tiny and so incapable of working with others.

by Andrew Thu Mar 28, 2002 11:41

Hi Dave,

hope your little outburst made you feel better, sounds like you have been bottling it up for a rather unhealthy period of time. I'm fascianted to hear of the enormous membership of the SWP, perhaps in future you could get say 10% of these to turn up to demonstrations. In any case comparative size is irrelevant, the SWP is an authoratarain Leninist organisation, the WSM is an anarchist one. Presumably people will decide which to join on a political basis, if they want something big then Fianna Fail will take them in any day.

As to the record of the SWP pissing people off I don't need to demonstrate this, indymedia does it quite well enough. This is a problem for SWP members like yourself to deal with, if you want to believe its all my fault you have only yourself to blame when disillusionment finally sets in.

Anyone interested in getting an idea of the range of groups the WSM is working with can look at the news section of our page at http://struggle.ws/wsm/news.html

by Brian Cahill - Socialist Party Thu Mar 28, 2002 16:25 [email protected]

A few points:

1) Indymedia would be much improved if participants could express their disagreements in a reasonable way. This is particularly true in relation to criticisms of the SWP. I know that they arouse a great deal of hostility in many other activists, and I know that such hostility has often been hard earned, but screaming abuse at them is not very productive. Indymedia UK has now developed a caustic anti-SWP atmosphere and any SWPer who posts anything on it, even something completely sensible, is jumped all over. I don't think that is very healthy.

I am not calling on people to avoid raising criticisms, or taking a leaf from the SWPs "discussing disagreements is sectarian, get out and leaflet" approach. Discussing our differences is healthy and necessary. Such discussions are more useful when carried out in reasonable way.

It also helps when criticisms are relevant and raised on appropriate issues. For instance, I genuinely don't think that there is much to complain about in the SWP providing a platform for an interesting left wing writer and social theorist - beyond the probably correct assumption that the SWP at these meetings will avoid much mention of socialism or the working class.

2) Dave Lordan's claim that the WSM cannot work with anybody else is completely ridiculous. The WSM have a long record of involvement in wider struggles alongside wider forces. Despite many disagreements politically, Socialist Party activists have often found the WSM to be relatively easy to work with - most obviously on the Water Tax and now Bin Tax struggles.

I am surprised, to put it mildly, that an SWPer would choose to compare his organisations record on working collaboratively with others with that of the WSM. In relative terms, the WSM is likely to come out of such a comparison smelling of roses.

3) I was also surprised to see the SWP described as "the largest collective of left wing activists in Ireland". I don't want to get into a boring and crass competition over who has more activists, the Socialist Party or the SWP, I am more interested in the self description as a "collective of activists". Is this really Dave's view of his organisation? Isn't there a little more to it than that?

by Gino - SWP Thu Mar 28, 2002 16:58

..i'll try to intervene reasonably. Brian is right, lets try to cool it a bit. I'm coming up from the country to see this guy tonight. I've read "Ecology of Fear" and found it very interesting and have ordered "City of Quartz" off Amazon. And yes before anyone jumps in, Mike Davis did join our organisation Left Turn in the States, which was totally his decision, I’m sure. If he is coming to live in Ireland then I am looking forward to having him as a comrade. Lets stop the scraps.

many thanks

Gino

by Brian Cahill - Socialist Party Thu Mar 28, 2002 17:36 nigel_irritable at yahoo dot com

I would agree with Gino about "Ecology of Fear" and also about some of Davis' other writings. His stuff is very interesting, if often flawed. If I was in Dublin at the moment, I would definitely go along to hear what he has to say.

On the subject of him joining the American equivalent of the SWP, the picture is a little murkier. I've seen posts here before on the topic of "Left Turn" and also on other email lists. Left Turn is promoted by the British SWP as its American sister organisation, but doesn't appear to return the favour. Maybe somebody could ask Davis about it after the meeting.

Anyway I hope the meeting goes well - and I hope that some emphasis is placed on socialism and the working class rather than just on the importance of the anti-capitalist movement. I suppose that we will probably get a report on indymedia.

by sean Thu Mar 28, 2002 17:59

What part of newswire do any of the comments to this post fit into.

Announcing a meeting fair enough but then after that:
My organisation is better than yours
No its not, mines bigger than yours
I'm really cool cos I don't have an organisation and I don't want one.

The real news the press just won't cover I suppose.
Yawn

by i hate recliam the streets Fri Mar 29, 2002 21:33

Andrew yes the WSM are invovled in many campaigns that they are all set up by you and involve you. what about darg. anv didyou not vote for an FGler.
Listen join the the SITUTATIONIST GROUP (IRELAND)

by Red Eye Sat Mar 30, 2002 17:53

Brian,
If 'disagreements are healthy and necessary', wht then do the SP and SWP forcibly remove members of the DSG, often with the assistance of campus cops, from their forums? So much for workers democracy, eh?

by Andrew Tue Apr 02, 2002 12:09

Question for 'ihaterts'.

What is wrong with setting up campaigns? Surely if you want to do something about an issue then the most obvious thing is to set up a structure through which you can work with others. DARG for instance organised the 10,000 to 15,000 strong X-case march back in 1991 that had an enormous impact not only on that case but on a lot of the 'liberal agenda'. BTW you might want to take this thread to irishanarchism or global_irl for discussion as its getting lost in the archives here.

BTW your wrong on the FG thing, the SWP must have misinformed you. No surprise there!

by Finghin - Socialist Youth Fri Apr 05, 2002 13:48

Regarding the Sparticists. I think I know the event that you are talking about, It was the SY conference back in September. For those that do not know what happened I'll retell the story.

Before the conference SY had organised a rally with many internation speakers, the DSG attended this and sold their paper and we had no problem at all with this. However when the conference proper began, which of course was closed to members of SY only, (I don't see haw anyone could have a problem with this) they initially refused to leave the room, at no point were 'campus cops' called in by SY. Later there were some groundsmen asked them what they were doing on the DCU campus, but that is all.

We have no problem with any group attending our meetings etc. The fact is that the Sparts are a sect that is seen as a bunch of nutcases by a vast majority of those that come into contact with them.