tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post1442991929159871629..comments2024-03-27T09:14:27.496+00:00Comments on All That Is Solid ...: The Indolence of British CapitalismPhilhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06298147857234479278noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-14458942223575029402016-09-18T13:48:37.066+01:002016-09-18T13:48:37.066+01:00Reading Shinwell's autobiography, totally supp...Reading Shinwell's autobiography, totally supported Imperialism and the Empire on the basis of the gains made by the UK working classes, the benefits of Imperial Citizenship I suppose, think the phrase Free, White and Twenty One was still used up to the 60's or 70's. jim mcleannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-37060197394420654072016-09-17T19:58:49.878+01:002016-09-17T19:58:49.878+01:00Yes David, you're right. The lesson there is n...Yes David, you're right. The lesson there is never write something for a blog post set to a self-imposed deadline so tight that there is no room left for revision. Philhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06298147857234479278noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-57948259906424736792016-09-17T10:49:02.271+01:002016-09-17T10:49:02.271+01:00"This is why hard Brexiteers are insouciant a..."This is why hard Brexiteers are insouciant about the lack of trade negotiators and other technocrats. What looks to most of us like a problem looks to them like a golden opportunity to cut back the Whiggish state under the guise of quitting the EU."<br /><br />Yes, it's a form of social-Darwinism, which is why it tends to remain on the political fringe. <br /><br />As David points out, even Thatcherism effectively increased the scope of the state. Its political 'skill' was in using the rhetoric of 'laissez-faire' and competition in order to focus on its enemies, such as organised labour and public sector interests. I think it's a bit daft to see British capitalism as 'lazy' or 'rubbish' when on their own terms they have been very successful. We shouldn't fall into the thinking of the likes of Will Hutton whereby there is some form of capitalism that is ideal for all or we just need to copy some model that seems to 'work' elsewhere.Igor Belanovnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-15992361495804656102016-09-16T12:20:28.140+01:002016-09-16T12:20:28.140+01:00I don't think you've adequately answered y...I don't think you've adequately answered your own question, which is about the state apparatus rather than the capitalist class. In other words, what social and political developments have led to a situation in which "the state too is infected and inflected with a hands-off outlook" and consequently doesn't work to create and manage markets?<br /><br />Given that the history of the 20th century is one of increasing state intervention in the market and social control (and Thatcherism was a continuation of this tendency, not a break from it, as is Mayism as far as we can tell early-doors), is it even accurate to characterise the UK state as "hands-off"? <br /><br />Many Conservative historians would insist that the last century was characterised by an excess of state intervention that "crowded out" industrial investment. Some, like Corelli Barnett, would even attribute this to the pernicious influence of christian charity undermining the hardheadedness of the early Victorians (i.e. the bourgeoisie got soft).<br /><br />This is part of a strand of history that characterises relative decline as the product of social decadence. A slightly less intemperate example would be Martin Weiner's 'English Culture and the Decline of the Industrial Spirit, 1850-1980', which identified the problem as the continued social pre-eminence of aristocratic values (anti-industrial and anti-mercantile), which then infected the emerging middle class through gentrification.<br /><br />I'm using these two examples to point out that the "decadence" criticised by Liam Fox is not some barking saloon-bar guff but part of a long tradition of Tory thought that goes back to the Corn Laws. It might be wrong (there are plenty of counter-narratives that show Britain remained a leader in technology and that postwar welfare spending was in line with competitor nations), but it represents a genuine anxiety.<br /><br />While this may be expressed in fears that UK businesses will fail to step up to the plate, at root it stems from a belief that the state remains a Whiggish preserve. This is why hard Brexiteers are insouciant about the lack of trade negotiators and other technocrats. What looks to most of us like a problem looks to them like a golden opportunity to cut back the Whiggish state under the guise of quitting the EU.David Timoneyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03568348438980023320noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-62411013369422474442016-09-16T10:22:25.938+01:002016-09-16T10:22:25.938+01:00Spot on. Perry Anderson's good on this too. Th...Spot on. Perry Anderson's good on this too. The question is, how were Germany and the US able to overtake Britain towards the end of the 19th Century despite Britain having 50-100 years head start and an Empire? The answer, as you suggest, is that a) Empire made us lazy: By 1938 we were sending 47% of our exports to the Empire under the guise of Imperial Preference, 78% of South African imports came from Britain. This guaranteed market, when opened to international competition, had declined to 10% by the 1970s - Orwell and Samuel are good on this, b) We didn't produce our own Henry Fords i.e. we didn't build a consumer society, preferring to retain feudal practices in an industrial society and c) We don't invest in the long-term. <br /><br />Here's Samuel:<br /><br />Territorially, the British Empire reached its maximum extent in the 1920s. (86)<br />Well before the Ottowa Agreement of 1932, and the advent of a system of imperial preference, Britain’s overseas trade was becoming increasingly autarkic…In 1913 Britain was sending 22 per cent of her exports to the Empire; by the 1938 the percentage had more than doubled, to 47 per cent. The comparable figures for imports were also striking, rising from 27 per cent in the years 1920-24 to a peak of 37.9 per cent in 1938. The reorientation of overseas investment was even more dramatic…by 1938 the colonies and dominions accounted for some 99 per cent of this country’s overseas investmentPaul Ewarthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00057355765883155749noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4486641877026778105.post-77844380265668102682016-09-16T10:03:00.645+01:002016-09-16T10:03:00.645+01:00Very interesting. However - iI can;t see how the l...Very interesting. However - iI can;t see how the labour movement can make a difference. Any change will come from within the bourgeoise. <br /><br />The UK is going the way of the US and Singapore - it has a long way to fall - and until the bourgeois class starts to be affected itself (although I think with Brexit that may happen relatively soon - but still, did it flinch over student loans? Will it flinch over privatised health? Grammar schools are a sop to its values). <br /><br />It is interesting, isn't it, following your thesis, China is a the ultimate state run capitalist system. India, too driven by class and caste on the other hand, appears to be following the model of its former imperial masters. <br /><br />What this suggests to me, is that the EU is well rid of the UK and could, in time, because increasingly affluent and equal, while, sorry - the UK looks an increasingly hopeless case. Speedynoreply@blogger.com