sebastian on Thu, 25 Jun 2020 09:33:19 +0200 (CEST)


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Re: <nettime> What is a global energy regime shift?


> On Jun 23, 2020, at 10:41 AM, Felix Stalder <felix@openflows.com> wrote:
> 
>> The notion of climate justice is
>> beginning to build bridges between different social movements.
> 
> This, as I understand is, is the entire purpose of the green new deal
> and marks a substantial change from traditional green politics. And, at
> least in the German speaking context, it appears to build bridges into
> the unions and the traditional -- industry-oriented -- social democratic
> parties. Of course, this is uneven, but it is different from 10 years ago.

I would go even further and claim that the basic idea - the unavoidable EU-wide
bail-out must be a bold green new deal - is a reformist proposal that will
build bridges between Antifa and CEOs. The state of necessity(1) implies it,
and it's pretty much exactly what Varoufakis suggested years ago:

"Who do you think would benefit from [a fragmentation of European capitalism]?
A progressive left, that will rise Phoenix-like from the ashes of Europe's
public institutions? Or the Golden Dawn Nazis, the assorted neofascists, the
xenophobes and the spivs? I have absolutely no doubt as to which of the two
will do best from a disintegration of the eurozone. I, for one, am not prepared
to blow fresh wind into the sails of this postmodern version of the 1930s. If
this means that it is we, the suitably erratic Marxists, who must try to save
European capitalism from itself, so be it. Not out of love for European
capitalism, for the eurozone, for Brussels, or for the European Central Bank,
but just because we want to minimise the unnecessary human toll from this
crisis."(2)

And the crisis in question is not a virus. That virus is just a parable. The
crisis is exponential capitalism: the accelerating rise of global temperatures, 
that pyramid scheme named "too big to fail," and an economy that has become so 
abstact that when a bat shits on a pig in China(3), everything falls apart.

(1) https://lundi.am/What-the-virus-said

(2) https://www.theguardian.com/news/2015/feb/18/yanis-varoufakis-how-i-became-an-erratic-marxist

(3) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_China_ist_ein_Sack_Reis_umgefallen


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