The Education Welfare Service (which comprises both Education Welfare and Education Social Work Services) is a specialist education support service which seeks to maximise educational opportunities for children and young people.
To this end, the Education Welfare Service, as part of the Local Education Authority, works in partnership with children and young people, their families, schools, educational services and establishments, and other statutory and voluntary agencies.
1. The Association for Education Welfare Management (AEWM) is committed to the development of appropriate professional competencies, practices and social work skills within an educational setting.
2. This code of practice provides a framework of key principles and identifies areas of practice which are integral to the task and its context.
The aim is to facilitate and promote the continuing development of the profession in order that children and young people have access to services that meet their educational, social and developmental needs.
Education through regular and beneficial attendance at school or otherwise should be actively promoted.
The Education Welfare Service has a duty to protect children and young people from abuse and exploitation.
Children and young people who are not able to benefit from mainstream educational provision are entitled to access support from the Education Welfare Service.
The Education Welfare Service is committed to the provision of services and support to all children and young people.
Effective communication and joint working with other professionals and organisations should be promoted.
The Education Welfare Service maintains that children and young people are individuals in their own right and of equal worth whatever their race, culture, religion, gender, age, sexual orientation, disability, social background, or special educational needs.
Members of the service have a professional responsibility to respecting the rights and dignity of all individuals, acknowledging their entitlement to confidentiality and self determination, and to uphold the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Education and vocational information and guidance should be available and accessible to all children and young people.
It is an aim to achieve a fully qualified service.
The Education Welfare Service has a duty to challenge practices that do not accord with these principles.
a) To assist parents, schools and the Local Education Authority to meet the duties placed on them by relevant legislation.
b) To enable and enhance effective communication between and within families, schools, agencies, other services and the wider community.
c) To foster and maintain a climate in which members of the Education Welfare Service are able to fulfil this code of practice.
a) To acknowledge the rights of service users to access, advice and support from the Education Welfare Service in obtaining services to which they are entitled.
b) To act as advocate, where appropriate, for children, young people and families when they seek to obtain the services to which they are entitled.
a) To recognise that information entrusted to the Education Welfare Service should not be disclosed without the knowledge of the service user, other than where there is clear evidence of danger to the service user, EWS, other persons or the wider community.
b) To conduct working relationships with children, young people and parents in an open and honest way which allows for the proper sharing and recording of information.
a) To provide Education Welfare Service support on an equitable basis according to need, regardless of race, culture, religion, gender, age, sexual orientation, disability, social background, or special educational needs.
b) To promote equal opportunities within all aspects of work.
c) To confront discrimination whenever it may arise.
a) To ensure a co-ordinated and consistent approach to referral, recording and reporting systems.
b) To recognise the need for objectivity, accuracy and confidentiality where appropriate.
c) To recognise the requirements of both the legislation and the underlying principles related to data protection, access to personal files and pupil records.
d) To collate, analyse, interpret, and present data on issues relating to relevant aspects of Education Welfare Service work.
a) To establish a case management policy which incorporates a formal referral system.
b) To establish a system for case management which incorporates assessment, planning, monitoring and evaluation.
c) To establish and maintain clear systems for assessment, planning, monitoring and the evaluation of workloads, including self-evaluation, appraisal, and also feedback from service users.
d) To establish access to effective supervision and support from a line manager.
e) To establish a system for closing cases.
a) To facilitate the process of intervention through a full assessment of needs and consideration of the resources and methods available.
b) To make appropriate use of legal proceedings as part of a planned intervention.
c) To empower families where they seek to resolve their own difficulties.
d) To assist children and young people in maximising their educational opportunities.
a) To recognise that a course, leading to a professional social work qualification, as validated by the Central Council for Education and Training in Social Work (CCETSW) provides a basic minimum level of training.
Other courses offering full qualifying training to staff in the Education Welfare Service must be at an academic and professional level not less than the Diploma in Social Work.
There will also be a need for part qualifying opportunities which should be validated by a U.K. Higher Education (HE) Institution.
Post qualifying opportunities should also be available as recognised by CCETSW or a UK HE Institution.
b) To recognise that a programme of professional development is essential to provide an effective work-force and to ensure consistent standards of service delivery, against a background of changing needs and expectations.
c) To recognise that staff development programmes should include provision for the evaluation of performance and attainment of objectives in areas of work which affect personal development.
d) To recognise the importance of induction programmes for newly appointed and promoted staff.
e) To acknowledge that the Education Welfare Service competencies which have been set by the Training Advisory Group (TAG) will underpin professional development programmes.
Competence in Education Welfare Service/Education Social Work Service within the LEA is the product of knowledge, skills and values.
Members of the Service are expected to demonstrate the following practice requirements together with a commitment to engage in appropriate training programmes to enable Local Education Authorities and parents / carers to meet their duties, statutory and otherwise.
1. The ability to communicate and engage with children and young people their families, schools, educational services and establishments and other statutory and voluntary agencies, to promote education by regular and beneficial attendance at school or otherwise.
2. To develop the values, knowledge and skills that enable members of the service to respond effectively to non attendance at school in an organised and considered way.
3. The ability to promote regular school attendance and assist parents/carers in meeting their responsibilities in securing the education of children and young people.
4. The ability to assess and review children/young people and family circumstances and plan appropriate responses and intervention within the statutory framework and evaluate outcomes.
5. The ability to contribute to evaluation of the effectiveness and efficiency of the Service within a Local Education Authority.
6. To take personal responsibility in managing, evaluating and further developing professional competencies through effective use of supervision, appraisal and management of workload.
7. To have the knowledge and skills to promote the protection of children and young people from abuse and exploitation.
1. The purpose of this guidance is to promote good practice in the management of Education Supervision Orders (ES0s) made under Section 36 of the Children act 1989. It has implications for all levels within the Education Welfare Service. It will identify issues of management and organisation, define principles, and set out procedures.
2. This document is complementary to, and should be read in conjunction with the specific guidance on ES0s, published by the Department of Health and the Department of Education and Employment. It also embodies much that is contained in the Code of Principles and Practice issued by the two Professional Associations.
3. The guidance also reflects the broader principles which underpin all aspects of the Children Act 1989, of which the following are of particular importance.
a) In all proceedings under the Act the welfare of the child shall be the paramount consideration.
b) Intervention in a family should be in partnership with the parents whenever possible.
c) Children need to be involved in decisions made which may affect them.
d) It is of vital importance that agencies develop efficient and effective collaboration.
e) Courts should not grant a request for an order unless making an order would be better for the child than making no order.
f) It is important to establish whether a child is suffering, or is likely to suffer, significant harm.
4. In the light of the last principle it is essential that applications for ES0s should not be made unless services consistent with this guidance can be provided.
5. The term "parent" within the context of this guidance includes any person who is not the mother or father of the child concerned but who has parental responsibility, or someone who has care of the child (within the meaning of the Children Act 1989).
a) Be familiar with. and able to apply , a range of social work skills.
b) Have a good appreciation of education issues and their effect on children and families, and be knowledgeable of systems within the education service.
c) Have good organisational skills.
d) Be familiar with court systems and be able to command the respect of magistrates.
e) Be sensitive to issues of race, gender, culture and religion.
f) Be open to, and accountable through, a continuous programme of supervision by line managers.
a) Be able to meet all the requirements listed in the previous section.
b) Have a structured approach to staff supervision.
c) Act as a resource for the Supervising Officer through using their own knowledge, experience or resources at their own disposal or by enabling access to other resources.
d) Have an ability to appraise intervention, review the practice and formulate plans for change based on these processes.
e) Be able to identify training needs and access training resources.
f) Have access to senior management both within the LEA and other departments.
g) Be in a position to make a contribution to the development of policy in areas such as training, service development and resource allocation.
a) Specialist skills within the agency should be available to children and their families without an order being made.
b) Practice should be non-discriminatory.
c) There should be respect for the integrity of the family unit work with the child in isolation is likely to be contrary to the aim of establishing, complementing and strengthening parental responsibility.
d) Working relationships between supervising officers, their managers, and the parents and children subject to the order should be conducted in an open and honest manner.
e) Relationships with schools should allow effective negotiations with school staff without compromising the commitment to helping the child and parents.
f) The role of other agencies should be recognised. The supervisor should be alert to circumstances which indicate that another agency should become involved, and should have the knowledge and skill to enable effective referrals to be made.
g) As far as is possible the supervising officer should be the worker involved prior to the request for an order being considered, and the worker involved in the application for the order.
h) Approaches under an ESO should be essentially non-coercive. Whilst parents lose certain rights whilst an order is in force their views should always be taken into account. The primary purpose of an ESO should not be to override parental rights provided by other legislation.
i) Although the supervisor is empowered to make directions to the parents and/or child whilst an order is in place, such directions should not be made where the same result could be achieved through negotiation.
j) Directions should only be made after consideration with all affected parties and should follow procedures laid down within the department.
k) Parents and children should have prior warning of an intention to issue a direction.
1.Given the set duration of an ESO, intervention will need to be timelimited, structured and purposeful.
2. The primary objective of an ESO will be to ensure that the child attends school regularly. However, there are likely to be secondary objectives , concerned with enabling the parents to meet their responsibilities with regard to the education of the child concerned, ensuring that the child is provided with appropriate educational opportunities, and helping the child to benefit from those opportunities.
3. Contracts are likely to reflect the proposals outlined in the application for the ESO. Such contracts should incorporate a recognition of the contribution required by all involved parties, including the parents, the child, the school and the supervising officer.
4. Evaluation of the intervention should take place on a regular basis and should take full account of the views of the parents and child. It should include an assessment of the relative success or failure of the order, and an analysis of the reasons for the outcome.
a) It may be appropriate to adopt a different approach.
b) Consideration will need to be given as to whether a change of supervising officer would be helpful.
c) It may be that it no longer appears that an ESO was an appropriate response, and that a request for its discharge should be made.
d) There may be grounds for applying for an extension to the order.
e) It should be considered whether reasons behind the lack of success and their solution lay beyond the scope of the Education Welfare Service/ Education Social Work Service; In which case other support services may need to be involved.
f) The case should be referred to the SSD for investigation.
6. Where intervention succeeds more quickly than was anticipated the early discharge of the order should be considered.
1. Much of what constitutes good practice with regards to ES0s will be equally relevant in cases where there is no statutory order.
Accordingly where it is shown, during the conduct of an order, that certain types of practice have particular advantages or disadvantages, the opportunity should be taken to consider whether such lessons have a wider application.
2. It may also be that during the time an ESO is in place, matters arise that suggest that aspects of broader policy of the Education Welfare Service/ Education Social Work Service or the Education Department need revaluation. This needs to be addressed by the relevant senior managers.


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Three central issues facing the Catalan independence movement
The March 11 demonstration for "Republic Now," called by the Catalan National Assembly, drew 45,000 (municipal police figure) to Barcelona's portside Passeig de Colom.
Although parties supporting Catalonia's independence from the Spanish monarchy won a majority of deputies in the autonomous community's December 21 election, they have been unable to elect a Generalitat, or government, due in part to internal disagreements but primarily to blockages by the Spanish government and its courts.
A major obstacle is the fact that prominent leaders of the pro-independence forces are either imprisoned — four, including ANC leader Jordi Sànchez and ERC leader Oriol Junqueras, facing their 150th night in jail — or in European exile: former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont and four of his former ministers, as well as former CUP leader Anna Gabriel.
In the following article Martí Caussa, a Catalan editor of Viento Sur, a leading Marxist publication in the Spanish state, discusses the strategic dilemmas faced by the independentists and offers some important proposals as to how these difficulties can be overcome. My translation from the Spanish version of his article as published in Viento Sur.
– Richard Fidler
Political differences bog down the investiture of the Catalan government
By Martí Caussa
Original article in Catalan
In Catalonia, the two most important news items of the first week of March have been (1) Carles Puigdemont's withdrawal of his nomination for President of the autonomous region's government in order to propose Jordi Sànchez as a candidate for the presidency of the Generalitat and (2) the refusal of the CUP to support Sànchez.[1] The investiture therefore remains bogged down.
Puigdemont's step back is a factual recognition that the relationship of forces is lacking to make him president and establish the Republic. And the alternative solution proposed by JuntsxCat and ERC[2] was to combine an autonomous government headed by Sànchez with a Council of the Republic situated in Brussels.
This solution needed at least two votes in favor from the CUP if Sànchez was to be elected in the second round (assuming that the Constitutional Court did not prevent it).[3] But the anti-capitalists are only willing to abstain, because they do not want to support an autonomous government. They want the Republic proclaimed on October 27 to become effective and the transitional laws to be implemented.
The position of the CUP is not an absolute impediment to Sànchez's investiture — because it is still possible to negotiate and because Puigdemont and Comín[4] could renounce their oath as deputies and make way for two substitutes — but it is an indicator of the differences within the independentist movement. These differences are not limited to the parties, as the ANC has decided to call a demonstration on March 11[5] to demand the new government "obey the mandate of October 1 and implement the Transitional Act and institutions of the Republic."
This is not a discussion about individuals, therefore, but about basic political orientations. Vicent Partal has summed it up[6] as a "great background debate that is masked by the negotiations: do we need to move straight to building the republic or if it is necessary to first look to build whatever can be managed in the framework of regional government, accepting, therefore, the rules imposed by the coup d'état" of the central government in Madrid.
I too think the substantive debate is being concealed and that to make it visible, three central issues should be addressed: what has failed, where we really are now and what strategic direction is needed to advance towards the Republic. If this debate were to be held, I believe that the dilemma posed by Partal would be revealed as simplistic.
Three necessary debates
In my opinion we must begin by analyzing what really happened on October 1 and in the days that followed.
We have known for a long time that the fundamental factor in the success of the October 1 referendum vote was the people who wanted to have a referendum, whatever the outcome, and that not all of these people were pro-independence. We also know that the government did not plan either the occupation or the defense of the polling stations. And we have also seen confirmed (by new statements before Judge Llarena) that the government planned to stop the October 1 vote at noon, but we still do not know who was favorable and who, fortunately, resisted.
We also know that the government celebrated the outcome of the referendum, but had doubts about what to do with the victory; the general strike of October 3 was not a government initiative either, although it favored it. A week later, the combination of indecision, divergences and the fear of being overwhelmed by the movement led the government to tighten the brakes so as not to lose control.
In a long and interesting interview in RAC-1, Puigdemont said he made a mistake on October 10 when he proclaimed the Republic and left it suspended a few seconds later because he relied on promises of state dialogue. Now he believes that the Republic could have been proclaimed and "the position defended." This seems to me the beginning of an interesting reflection, but it is incomplete because you have to go a step further and say how you could have defended the position. This is a fundamental point if you do not want to repeat the same mistake in the future.
Taking into account what everyone now knows about the reaction of the Spanish State (and that could be foreseen prior to October 1), it is clear that a declaration of independence and the implementation of the transitional legislation would not have sufficed, because these are only words and papers. Nor would it have been enough to ask the Mossos [the Catalan police] to protect the government and the Parliament because, in the (uncertain) assumption that they would have obeyed massively, they were too small a force against which the State could mobilize (without using the army).
What was needed to effectively defend the Republic was not only more votes in favor, but a peaceful and massive uprising of the population, beyond the more than two million people who voted October 1, and in the Spanish state a movement of solidarity against the repression of the peoples. But it never occurred to the government to prepare something like that and, if it had been improvised at the last moment, it is not clear that it would have succeeded because its entire policy before October 1 did not facilitate but hindered a democratic uprising of this scope — both because of its economic policy contrary to the interests of the popular classes (for example, the most recent budgets), as well as its lack of democratic radicalism (for example, breaking the promise to start the participatory phase of the constituent process prior to the referendum).
In the days before and after the October 1 referendum, many people believed that a democratic revolution was beginning, but it seems clear that it was not the intention of the government to do anything like that. It sought only a demonstration of controlled force that would allow it to negotiate with the State. with the support of the European institutions. The King, Rajoy and the State apparatus had a better assessment of the situation, acting more quickly and more forcefully: with the implementation of article 155, the Spanish mobilizations and the police and judicial force.
In the aforementioned interview with RAC-1, Puigdemont acknowledges that on October 27 the relation of forces did not exist to make the Republic effective. Now we can suspect with foundation that there was never that intention. The one who has said it most clearly has been [former Catalan president] Artur Mas in statements before Judge Llarena: according to him all the deputies who voted the unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) — presumably this refers to the deputies of JuntsxCat and ERC, because the deputy of the CUP Mireia Boya has said explicitly otherwise — "knew that there was no real means [to implement it]."
And as proof that it was a purely symbolic "parliamentary action," the former president stressed to the judge of the Supreme Court that after this UDI the government of the Generalitat did not meet to make any decision. "In the world of politics there is a symbolic and aesthetic component. Often an argument is exaggerated or inflated in order to make a good impression on the public. Is this a deception or an exaggeration? It can be." We also know now that the dispersion of the government was not the result of any previously designed and agreed plan.
Why are all the shortcomings and mistakes not analyzed courageously? Wouldn't that be the best guarantee that they would not be repeated?
Nor is there a desire that the situation created on October 27 be acknowledged clearly . When the RAC-1 interviewers ask Puigdemont if the Republic is real, he answers with a riddle: it is in the minds of many Catalans; it is from an institutional point of view because it was declared in Parliament and has been validated in two elections; but there are no Republic structures.
The reality is that we only have a symbolic declaration of a Republic and that the abandonment of the government and of the institutions in the face of article 155 decreed by the adversary signified an important defeat. The dignity of non-surrender, defended both from prison and from Brussels, does not eliminate this defeat. The electoral victory of December 21, however much it once again demonstrates the will of the majority of the people of Catalonia and the undemocratic character of the State, is not enough to compensate for the defeat of October 27. This can only be overcome with a massive mobilization that forces the freeing of the prisoners, the return of the exiles and the elimination of all the consequences of article 155, and that is situated in a framework of struggle for more democracy and more social rights for the whole of the people of Catalonia, whether independentist or not, in the struggle for the Republic, without renouncing disobedience and unilateral measures when necessary to secure these demands.
Neither autonomism nor direct implementation of the Republic
Neither JuntsxCat nor ERC are promoting such an orientation. Their proposal places the fight for the freedom of the prisoners, the return of the exiles and the withdrawal of 155 in the framework of the normalization of an autonomous government combined with international pressure from the [exiled] Council of the Republic, hoping that in the future the conditions will improve for negotiating with the State (Puigdemont recognizes that his exile can last for years). This is not a realistic path for achieving the Catalan Republic, because none of the deficiencies that were revealed before and after October 1 are being corrected.
But this criticism does not mean that we can "move straight to building the republic" as claimed by Vicent Partal in the article I quoted, and by the CUP or the leadership of the ANC. In order to move forward, we must realistically acknowledge what the current situation is, and what is the point of departure. We must accept that this point is not the activation of the laws of transition, nor even the restitution of the legitimate president and government.
We must open the discussion on a path to the Republic that avoids the false starts of autonomism and proceeding directly to a republic — admitting that we have a problem and that there are disagreements, but avoiding condemnations. Ideas have already begun to emerge in this regard and it is appropriate to think about them, even if one does not agree with them. I will mention two.
Roger Palà has written: "The independence movement is at a crossroads: either continue feeding the theories of wishful thinking, or make some decisions based on pragmatism. There is no indication that the Republic proclaimed in October can be implemented imminently, that it exists beyond the legitimate longings of hundreds of thousands of people. ... From a rational point of view, recovering self-government — even if it is under the interventionist pressure of an unbridled PP [Spanish premier Rajoy's People's Party] — can be the necessary starting point to recover forces and rearm with ideas."
The other quote, more controversial, is Joan Tardà's: "However, the independence movement will only succeed if it understands that it must accumulate forces ('we are not enough,' we have repeated many times) ... republicanism must converge with the political forces that also defend the binding referendum, led by Xavier Domènech,[7] and must open channels of frank dialogue ... with the Catalan socialism of the PSC,[8] of a Miquel Iceta who has to decide whether to stick to or lend credence to the regression in rights and freedoms."
I do not believe that it is possible to open avenues of dialogue with the leaders of the PSC while they continue to defend article 155, although dialogue is possible with the PSC base. But it is evident that "we are not enough" and that means convergence in action with the Commons is essential in the fight against article 155, the defense of democracy and social demands, or the promotion of the debate on the constituent assembly (as Jaume López recently recalled).
In my opinion, it can be accepted that the effective government that can be had immediately is of an autonomous nature, provided that, at the same time, the struggle to defend the economic, social, democratic and cultural needs of the population with the aim of winning the Republic is set in motion. What is decisive, in my view, is to promote a plan of struggle of the movements and social entities, not to await what the government will say but to put demands on it, to promote disobedience and unilateralism when necessary, to aim for a mobilization that is more massive, autonomous and self-organized than October 1, with a national, democratic and social content, and that actively works as of now to win active solidarity from the peoples of the Spanish State (on the basis of opposition to the monarchical regime and the defense of the republic) and from Europe. It seems difficult and certainly it is, but we have already found that sometimes things that are presented as easy — like the passage to independence as "from one law to another" — are the most unreal.
[1] CUP, the Popular Unity Candidacy, an anticapitalist party. At least two of its four deputies in the Catalan parliament must vote with the two larger pro-independence parties to maintain a pro-Republic majority. Sànchez is the main leader of the Catalan National Assembly (ANC), the largest pro-independence social movement, and was elected to the parliament on December 21 on the Junts per Catalunya ticket although he is not a member of the PDeCAT, the party behind the JuntsxCat.
[2] ERC, the Republican Left of Catalonia, the oldest pro-independence party in Catalonia.
[3] On March 9, Supreme Court justice Pablo Llarena turned down Jordi Sànchez's request to attend the Catalan parliament's plenary session, where he was to be elected president.
[4] Antoni Comín, former Health minister in the Generalitat, now in exile in Belgium.
[5] The March 11 demonstration was the first in years not called jointly with Òmnium Cultural, the other large pro-independence social movement, though Òmnium vice-president Marcel Mauri was prominent in the front row.
[6] "Que s'acabe aquest trist espectacle de la investidura". An English translation, "Stop this sad investiture spectacle," can be found here.
[7] Podemos leader in Catalonia and leader of the CatECP in the Catalan parliament, aka "the Commons."
[8] PSC, Socialists' party of Catalonia, led by Miquel Iceta.
Posted by Richard Fidler at Thursday, March 15, 2018 No comments:
Prominent intellectuals, activists speak out in opposition to U.S., Canadian sanctions against Venezuela
The statement below, signed by more than 150 US and Canadian organizations and individuals, was released on March 9. It is being delivered to US Senators and Congress Members as well as Canadian Parliamentarians.
For further information on the Trudeau government's sanctions, see the web site of Global Affairs Canada, and this article by Yves Engler, "Who is in the right in the Canada-Venezuela Diplomatic Dispute?"
The statement's reference to mediation talks between the Venezuelan government and opposition parties is a bit dated. Although the talks came close to agreement in early February, following two years of dialogue, the opposition parties refused at the last minute to sign the draft text. President Danilo Medina of the Dominican Republic, whose government had hosted the talks, said they were now in a state of "indefinite recess."
Since then, the opposition has divided; Henri Falcón, a former supporter of the late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez, has announced he will enter the presidential elections, now scheduled to be held (along with municipal and state legislative elections) on May 20. President Nicolás Maduro will be running for re-election.
Open Letter in Support of Mediation in Venezuela, Not Sanctions
We urge the United States and Canadian governments to immediately remove their illegal* sanctions against Venezuela and to support efforts at mediation between the government of Venezuela and the nonviolent segments of the political opposition.
We, the undersigned organizations and individuals in the US and Canada, support hemispheric relations based on respect for the sovereignty of all peoples of the Americas. We are deeply concerned by the use of illegal sanctions, whose effect falls most heavily on the poorest and most marginal sectors of society, to coerce political and economic change in a sister democracy.
Polls in Venezuela show that the large majority of Venezuelans oppose sanctions, regardless of their opinion of the Maduro government. Sanctions merely complicate efforts by the Vatican, Dominican Republic, and other international actors to mediate a resolution to the deep polarization in Venezuela. Moreover, sanctions undermine efforts of the democratically elected government and Constituent Assembly to address critical economic issues and determine their own political destiny.
Despite the high-minded rhetoric of officials in Washington and Ottawa, it is not a genuine concern for democracy, human rights, and social justice that drives the belligerent interventionist posture towards Caracas. From President Obama's admittedly untrue presidential decree that Venezuela represents a national security threat to the United States, to UN Ambassador Nikki Haley's declaration that Venezuela is "an increasingly violent narco-state" that threatens the world, the use of hyperbole in diplomatic situations seldom contributes to peaceful solutions on the world stage.
It is no secret that Venezuela, unlike Mexico, Honduras, Colombia, Egypt, or Saudi Arabia, is targeted for regime change by the US precisely because of Venezuela's leadership in resisting US hegemony and the imposition of the neoliberal model in Latin America. And of course, Venezuela holds the largest oil reserves in the world, attracting more unwanted attention from Washington.
The US and Canada tried and failed to use the Organization of American States (OAS) to build a bloc to hypocritically evoke the Democratic Charter against Venezuela. Recently, Luis Almagro, the rogue Secretary General of the OAS, went so far as to publicly support the swearing in of a parallel Supreme Court unconstitutionally appointed by opposition legislators and allowed them to use the OAS headquarters in Washington DC for their ceremony – without the approval of any OAS member state. Almagro has thereby delegitimized the OAS, emboldened the most extreme and violent elements of the Venezuelan opposition, and side-lined efforts at mediation.
The US-Canadian sanctions represent a cynical use of coercive economic power to attack a nation that is already dealing with hyperinflation and shortages of basic commodities. While said to be in the name of advancing democracy and freedom, the sanctions violate the Venezuelan peoples' basic human right to sovereignty, as outlined in the UN and OAS Charters.
We call on the political leaders of the United States and Canada to reject overheated rhetoric and to contribute to the search for real solutions to Venezuela's political and economic problems. We urge the US and Canadian governments to rescind their sanctions and support the mediation efforts pursued by the Chancellor of the Dominican Republic Miguel Vargas, the President of Dominican Republic Danilo Medina, former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, the Vatican, and supported by a growing number of Latin American nations.
For the list of signers, see the statement as published here.
Posted by Richard Fidler at Wednesday, March 14, 2018 No comments:
Imperialism today: a critical assessment of Latin American dependency theory
Brazilian economist and sociologist Ruy Mauro Marini (1932-1997) was a prime exponent of what became known as dependency theory, an attempt to explain the systemic unequal relations of the Latin American countries in particular with the developed economies of the imperialist "North." He was a close collaborator of, among others, Vânia Bambirra and the recently-deceased Theotónio Dos Santos. Marini's best-known work, first published in Spanish in 1972, is Dialectics of Dependency.[1]
Marini was a founder of the Brazilian Marxist organization Política Operária and later, during his Chilean exile, a member of the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR). Forced into exile again after the Pinochet coup, he taught at the UNAM in Mexico for many years, returning to Brazil shortly before his death from cancer in 1997.
In the following essay, Argentine Marxist Claudio Katz analyzes Marini's work in light of contemporary developments in global capitalism. He assesses Marini's attempt to understand and explain the initial developments in neoliberal globalization and suggests some ways in which dependency theory might now be renewed and updated. And he comments critically on the work of some current proponents of versions of dependency theory.
Among Katz's most recent works is Bajo el imperio del capital, also published in French translation in Quebec.[2] Katz is a professor in the University of Buenos Aires, a member of the left economists' group (EDI), and a researcher with the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET).
Published by Katz on his web page, my translation from the Spanish.
Imperialism and dependency: similarities and differences with the Marini era
By Claudio Katz
The main theorist of dependency anticipated trends of neoliberal globalization. He analyzed productive globalization, the centrality of exploitation and the relative weight of surplus value transfers. But the employment crisis exceeds what was envisaged by Marini, in a scenario disrupted by the mutation of the United States, the collapse of the USSR and the rise of China.
The new national and social disparities emerge in an internationalized economy, without correlation in states and ruling classes. This absence of total transnationalization recreates dependency. The semiperipheries present an economic dimension differentiated from the geopolitical status of subimperialism. The "Global South" does not reincarnate the old periphery, nor does it include China. There are solid pillars to renew dependency theory.
In the final works of his intense career, Ruy Mauro Marini — the principal theoretician of dependency — explored the dynamics of globalization. He observed the beginning of a new period based on the internationalized functioning of capitalism (Marini, 1996: 231-252). Some interpreters are of the view that this research crowned his previous work and inaugurated the study of the political economy of globalization (Martins, 2013: 31-54).
This analytical shift confirmed Marini's enormous capacity to address the most relevant processes of each conjuncture. His findings anticipated several characteristics of the stage that followed his death. Evaluating those observations in light of what happened is a good way to update his theory.
PRODUCTIVE GLOBALIZATION
In the late 1980s Marini noted that capital was internationalizing in order to increase the surplus value extracted from workers. He analyzed from this standpoint the cheapening of transportation, the irruption of new technologies and the concentration of companies (Marini, 1993). He assessed in particular the new manufacturing-export model of the periphery as it was managed by multinational firms.
These companies secured common spaces between their headquarters and branches in order to expand the manufacturing process. They separated skilled activities from assembly-line operations and profited from national differences in productivity and wages. Marini understood that this operation on a global scale was a structural, not cyclical trend in accumulation.
Its scope is obvious today. Globalization introduces a qualitative change in the functioning of capitalism. It promotes the liberalization of trade and the adaptation of finances to the instantaneity of information. The Brazilian thinker rightly located the epicenter of this shift in globalized manufacturing. He recorded the close connection of internationalization with the flexible production pattern that replaces Fordism.
The transnational companies are visible protagonists of the current economic scenario. They fragment their production into a web of intermediate inputs and final goods destined for export. This framework operates under principles of intense competition, cost reduction and cheaper labor. The consequent offshoring has turned several Asian economies into the new workshop of the planet.
Transnational companies complement their direct investments with subcontracting and labor outsourcing. They make their suppliers responsible for control of the workers and the management of uncertain demand. In this way, they distribute risks and increase profits.
Marini experienced only the beginning of that process and highlighted its contradictions in very generic terms. He was unable to note the commercial imbalances, financial bubbles and overproduction of commodities that exploded with the 2008 crisis.
This shock destabilized the system without reversing productive globalization. It temporarily put into question the financial deregulation, which was preserved without any relevant change. The recent questioning of trade liberalization (Trump, Brexit) illustrates the reaction of those powers that are losing ground. They try to recover spaces by restoring a certain unilateralism, but they do not favour a return to the old protectionist blocs. The political economy of globalization — which Marini foresaw — persists as an appropriate approach to contemporary capitalism.
EXPLOITATION AND INDUSTRIAL REMODELING
The influence that the Brazilian theorist assigned to the increase in rates of surplus value has been confirmed in recent decades. The employers' offensive dispersed salaries, eliminated the defined wage rules, and segmented work. This reorganization maintains the stability required for the continuity of accumulation in the formal sector and generalizes the insecurity of employment and wages in the informal universe.
The main foundation of globalization is the reduction of labor costs. That is why the masses' incomes stagnate amidst prosperity and they decline in crises. The transnational firms are enriched by the low wages of the periphery and with the cheapening of the goods consumed by workers in the metropolis. They use offshoring to weaken unions and flatten salaries in all regions.
Firms profit especially from wage differences resulting from the structural unevenness produced by differences in population intensity. These disparities are stabilized by the absence of international mobility of workers. While in the initial period of globalization (1980-1998) foreign investment tripled, the total number of migrants hardly varied (Smith, 2010: 88-89). The work force is marginalized in all the movements that shake up the globalization scenario.
Marini recorded the first relocation of industry to the East. He witnessed the irruption of the so-called "Asian tigers" (Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea and Singapore). But he did not see the subsequent mutation that completely modified the manufacturing map.
China is the current epicenter of a growing installation of subsidiaries in Asia. The bulk of globalized production is generated there. Salaries range between 10 and 25% of what is paid in the metropolis for equivalent jobs.
The magnitude of the change is confirmed in the US consumption of manufactured goods. One third of these goods are currently manufactured abroad, which is double the average in effect in 1980 (Smith, 2010: 153-154, 222-227). The foundation of neoliberal globalization in the exploitation of workers is evident. Investments are shifted to countries that offer greater cost reduction, discipline and productivity of the workforce.
Marini also saw how the model of import substitution (which inspired his analysis of dependency) was replaced by a new pattern of manufacturing exports. But he noticed only the generic features of a pattern that has since been reconfigured by global value chains (GVCs) through which the entire manufacturing process is fragmented according to the comparative profitability offered by each activity. This division includes linkages directed by the manufacturer (aeronautical, automotive, IT firms) or ordered by the buyer (the Nike, Reebok or Gap trading emporiums) (Gereffi, 2001). The companies that head up these structures not only control the most profitable resource (brands, designs, technologies). They also dominate 80% of the world trade in these circuits.
This model differs radically from the one prevailing in the 1960s and '70s. Instead of integrated processes, the subdivision of parts predominates and national manufacturing is replaced by an assembly of imported components. The proximity and size of markets lose relevance in contrast to the comparative labour cost advantages. A new global division of labor (GDL) replaces its international precedent (IDT) (Martínez Peinado, 2012: 1-26).
In the activity of transnational corporations, the specific weight of intermediate goods is multiplied through linkage and mechanisms of vertical industrial specialization (Milberg, 2014: 151-155). These modalities introduce forms of export management that were unknown at the end of the last century.
THE CRISIS OF CAPITALISM
Marini analyzed the economy of globalization in the belief that capitalism had entered a long cycle of growth. That was the context in which he situated productive specializations and the emergence of the newly industrializing countries (NICs) of Asia. He considered that the processes of regional integration were re-emerging to widen the scale of markets (Marini, 1993). His dependentista colleague shared this reasoning, investigating the impact of new technologies on long waves (Dos Santos, 2011: 127-134).
The subsequent course of globalization did not confirm or refute the presence of this long-term upward cycle. The controversies between those who postulate or object to the applicability of these movements did not lead to clear conclusions. That is why we have emphasized the convenience of clarifying the qualitative transformations of the stage without insisting that this period conforms to a long wave (Katz, 2016: 366-368).
Marini inscribed his assessment in Marxist characterizations that highlighted the disruptive nature of accumulation. He emphasized the traumatic potential crises that globalization was generating and highlighted the presence of simultaneous tensions in the sphere of demand (retracted consumption) and valorisation (insufficient profitability). He emphasized both imbalances, with more observations on the first type of contradictions.
In recent decades those tremors have come to light. The explosive retraction of employment has also been verified, reinforced by the relative immobility of the labor force in the face of the vertiginous displacement of goods and capital.
That contradiction distinguishes the current globalization from the old European industrialization. Between 1850 and 1920 more than 70 million emigrants left the Old Continent. This massive transfer depleted the remaining population at one pole and generated new centers of accumulation in the areas receiving workers. An equivalent demographic movement would currently mean the entry of 800 million immigrants to the central countries (Smith, 2010: 105-110).
But the helpless are currently denied that displacement. The developed economies build fortresses against the dispossessed of the periphery and absorb only irrelevant contingents of skilled labor. The safety valve that in the past generated the accumulation process has itself been weakened.
The countries that conclude in an accelerated way their processes of primitive accumulation can not discharge their surplus population over other localities.
This restriction fosters further tensions in capitalism, such as the destruction of jobs due to the expansion of the digital universe. The parameters of profitability — which guide the introduction of new technologies — impose a dramatic elimination of jobs. Unemployment is growing with globalization.
At this stage there is less work for everyone than there was in the preceding phases. Available employment shrinks and its quality is decreasing in the underdeveloped regions. That is why the informal economy (lacking in state regulations) accounts for 50% of labor activity in Latin America, 48% in North Africa and 65% in Asia (Smith, 2010: 115-127).
Accelerated automation — and the expulsion of the agrarian population through technical development in the countryside — drastically reduce employment opportunities. Capitalism, which is based on exploitation — and which Marini studied so closely — can no longer help to reduce this suffering among the entire oppressed population.
IMPERIAL STAKEOUTS
The Brazilian theorist emphasized the relative weight of imperialism. He pointed out the inescapable function of that system of military domination in the preservation of capitalism. But he produced his texts at a time very distant from Lenin's scenario. He understood that the Cold War was qualitatively different from the old power clashes, and he drew attention to the unprecedented military supremacy of the United States. He noted the capacity of that empire to forge subaltern alliances, subordinating its rivals without destroying them.
Marini avoided parallels with classical imperialism. He understood the novelty of a period marked by the decline of protectionism, the post-war recovery of industrial protagonism and the reorientation of foreign investment towards developed economies. He synthesized these transformations with a notion (hegemonic cooperation) that he used to define the prevailing relationships among the central powers (Marini, 1991: 31-32).
The current context presents several continuities with this characterization. The framework forged around the Triad (United States, Europe and Japan) continues to ensure military custody of the neoliberal order. That military alliance has already caused the devastation of numerous regions of Africa and the Middle East. The Pentagon continues to play a primary role in the direction of the main military actions. But North American hegemony has lost the forcefulness it exhibited in the 1980s and '90s at the onset of globalization.
The United States played a key economic role in the takeoff of this process. It provided the state link required to generate accumulation on a world scale. Washington-based institutions internationalized financial instruments and underpinned productive globalization. They have played that role with greater intensity in the outcome of the crises of recent decades.
Banking regulation by the Federal Reserve, the operation of the dollar as a world currency, the reorganization of state budgets under the supervision of the IMF and Wall Street's stock exchange rulings strengthened globalization. That specific role was again noticeable in the outcome of the 2008 convulsion.
But the loss of US supremacy is currently corroborated by the country's trade deficit and external indebtedness. The United States maintains the management of the major banks and transnational companies. It also leads in the introduction of new digital technologies. But it has given up key positions in production and trade. Its neoliberal globalization impetus has ended up favoring China, which is now an unexpected global competitor.
The arrival of Trump illustrates that setback. The tycoon tries to recover US positions by rearranging the free trade agreements. But he faces enormous difficulties in rebuilding that economic leadership.
At the military level, the United States continues to prevail and lacks replacements for the custody of the capitalist order. But in the operations undertaken it fails to sustain its hegemony. That inoperability is very evident in the failure of all of its recent wars (Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria).
For these reasons, the relations of the primary power with its partners have changed. The total subordination that Marini witnessed has mutated into more complex entanglements. The European (Germany) and Asian (Japan) powers no longer accept Washington's orders with the same submissiveness. They develop their own strategies and are assertive in their conflicts with the North American giant (Smith A, 2014).
No partner questions the supremacy of the Pentagon, nor does any intend to create a conflicting military power. But the vassalage of the second half of the 20th century has been diluted. This shift is congruent with the North American inability to preserve the patronage that it deployed in the postwar period over the other capitalist economies (Carroll, 2012).
It will be necessary to see if in the future the Yankee leadership disappears, resurfaces or dissolves gradually. This uncertainty is a fact that was absent when the Dialectics of Dependency was published in 1973.
COLLAPSE OF THE USSR, RISE OF CHINA
The implosion of the Soviet Union and the conversion of China into a central power distinguish the current period from the Marini era. With the collapse of the USSR, the neoliberal offensive was strengthened. The ruling classes regained confidence and — in the absence of international counterweights — they resumed the typical outrages of unbridled capitalism.
The Brazilian theoretician was a Marxist critic of the Kremlin bureaucracy, committed to socialist renewal and not the collapse of the Soviet Union. Russia's regression to a capitalist regime — in a context of immobility, depoliticization and popular apathy — transformed the scenario envisaged by the Latin American fighter.
The second turn has been equally shocking. Marini could hardly imagine that the takeoff of Taiwan and South Korea anticipated the change undertaken in China. The per capita GDP of that country grew 22 times greater between 1980 and 2011 and its volume of trade doubles every four years.
China has not only maintained very high growth rates in the context of international crises. The help that gave the dollar (and the euro) prevented the conversion of the recession of 2009 into a global depression. The scale of the historical change under way is comparable to the steam revolution in England, the industrialization of the United States and the initial development of the Soviet Union. No other BRICS country is comparable in prosperity with China's conversion into a central power.
It is enough to observe its dominant role as investor, exporter, importer or creditor of the major countries of Africa or Latin America to measure the abysmal gap separating the Asian giant from its old peers in the Third World.
The new power does not share simple cooperative relations with its counterparts of the South. It exerts a clear supremacy that extends to its neighbors in the East. No other economy has so radically transformed its positioning in the global order.
China acts as an empire in formation that faces the strategic hostility of the Pentagon. It is forging its own capitalist model through a novel linkage with globalization. It does not pass through the old stages of initial takeoff based on the domestic market. It deploys an accumulation process directly connected to globalization.
To elucidate the specificity of its capitalism, we must resort to characterizations that were absent in Marini's time. The classic formulas of dependency theory do not encompass these questions.
POLARITIES AND NEUTRALIZATIONS
The dependency thinker highlighted the pre-eminence of polarization on a global scale. He considered that this discrepancy was inherent to capitalism, consistent with the international fractures observed by the classical Marxists of the early 20th century (Luxemburg, 1968: 58-190). The world-system theorists have also interpreted those disparities as intrinsic features of the current social regime.
Numerous empirical studies have corroborated this divide in the emergence of capitalism. The industrial revolution produced the greatest chasm in history between rising and declining poles. That "great divergence" accompanied the takeoff of the West. The developed countries converged in their average expansion, radically differentiated from that of the underdeveloped economies (Pritchett, 1997).
The initially limited differentiation became a monumental breach. Between 1750 and 1913 the leap in per capita GDP [total output divided by population] was as spectacular in England (from 10 to 115) and the United States (from 4 to 126) as the regression suffered by China (from 8 to 3) and India (from 7 to 2). Differences between nations expanded at a much faster rate than they did within countries (Rodrik, 2013).
Marini started from evidence of that kind to theorize the distances between advanced and underdeveloped economies, with reasoning inspired by unequal exchange. But he also perceived the changes in that tendency introduced by postwar late capitalism. In this model, the processes of accumulation in the industrialized periphery counterbalanced the previous polarizations (Mandel, 1978: chapter 2).
The scholar of dependency also noticed how the presence of the so-called socialist bloc compensated for the spontaneous international inequalities of accumulation. The existence of the USSR and its allies determined this neutralizing effect.
The result of these multiple trends was some stabilization of inequality between countries. The purely ascending gap of the 19th century took a more variable course and tended toward equilibrium between 1950 and 1990 (Bourguignon; Morrisson, 2002).
In that period, the polarities within countries declined due to reforms granted by the capitalist class with its widespread fear of socialist contagion. That panic determined the presence of Keynesian models, in a context of decolonization and the rise of anti-imperialism.
Marini recorded both the national and social disparities generated by capitalism, as well as the forces that limit these polarities. This combination of processes was significantly altered in the final decades of the 20th century by the subsequent dynamics of neoliberal globalization.
DIVERSE INEQUALITIES
Numerous studies coincide in highlighting the current widening of social fractures in all parts of the planet. A well-known analysis of this polarization in 30 countries shows that the 1% of the richest minority controls 25-35% of the total wealth in Europe and the United States (2010). In both regions, 10% of the inhabitants account for 60-70% of the wealth. Similar levels of inequality are found in other central, emerging or peripheral areas (Piketty, 2013).
But the course followed by inequality between countries is more controversial. This indicator is evaluated by comparing the different per capita GDPs with population weightings (Milanovic, 2014). In this way, the incidence of growth rates on global inequality is measured, taking into account the population involved. A substantial increase in GDP in India has very different effects than the same increase in New Zealand (Goda, 2013).
In recent decades the growing social gap has been accompanied by new polarities between countries. But if the population factor is included, the final result is varied. The growth of nations with great demographic weight narrowed the total national disparities. The course of inequalities within and outside borders — usually synthesized by the Theil coefficient — has been reduced by 24% since 1990. The 14% increase in inequality within those nations was offset by a 35% decrease in the disparity between countries (Bourguignon; Châteauneuf-Malclès, 2016).
Due to its large number of inhabitants, China altered the world indicator. While the global economy stagnated at around 2.7% per year (2000-2014), the Asian giant grew at 9.7%. Although this trajectory has similarities with the antecedents of Japan and South Korea, its effect on the polarity between countries is very different.
Amidst the explosion of social inequalities, the continuity of this shrinking of the global fracture is very doubtful. China rises at the expense of its Western rivals and reconfigures the framework of the dominant powers. But the remaining spectrum of the world hierarchy continues to be segmented into traditional compartments. There are few modifications in the world pyramid. A reversal of the "great divergence" developed during the nineteenth century should break that hierarchy.
In studies prior to the recent rise of China, world-system theorists expounded many examples of the enduring character of that structure. They illustrated the reduced international mobility of countries in the long term, exemplifying that permanence in 88 of 93 cases considered (Arrighi, 1990).
Another evaluation made at the beginning of globalization (1960-1998) observed the paradox of a growing participation of the new economies in productive globalization, with little effect on the relative level of per capita GDP.
This work showed that manufacturing production in these countries (as a percentage of the GDP of the First World) rose significantly (from 74.6 to 118%), compared to a per capita GDP (as a percentage of its equivalent in advanced countries), where it remained almost unchanged (from 4.5 to 4.6%). Industrial convergence did not translate into equivalent improvements in the standard of living (Arrighi; Silver; Brewer, 2003: 3-31). China's subsequent take-off has also been consummated, preserving great distances with the per capita GDP of its Western counterparts.
The course of global inequality is a determining factor in the center-periphery relations that Marini investigated with such attention. But operating on the different open trajectories are forces that are very different from those prevailing in the glory years of dependentism.
INTERNATIONALIZATION WITHOUT A POLITICAL COUNTERPART
The current widening of social inequalities as opposed to national inequalities unfolds in a very singular scenario: the internationalization of the economy has no equivalent correlative in the dominant classes and states. This contradiction was barely suggested in the 1960s. The coexistence of productive globalization with national-state structures is a conflict of the 21st century.
The gravitation of the global economic (IMF, WB, WTO) and geopolitical (UN, G 20) bodies does not reduce the disruptive scale of that divorce. The configuration of states forged at the outset of capitalism continues to play a central role. They ensure the localized management of the labor force, in a context of great global displacement of products and capital.
This strengthening of labor regulations at the national level has repercussions, in turn, on the specific identities of the different ruling classes. While they globalize their businesses, these groups maintain opposing political and cultural behaviors. The companies are internationalized, but their management is not delinked from the states of origin. For the same reasons, international competition to attract capital develops through consistently rewarding the nearest investors.
The neoliberal order expands a globalization administered through national structures. The same states analyzed by the classical and post-war Marxists now operate in a new framework of productive globalization.
In this scenario of global economic association, geopolitical confrontations unfold recreating relationships of dependency. The main powers renew that subjection in their areas of influence, while they dispute supremacy in the most coveted areas of the planet.
The United States tries to recapture its hegemony beginning with the regions that were traditionally under its control (Latin America). The operation of a common currency — between economies with huge differences in productivity — reinforces the supremacy of Germany in Europe. China widens the gaps with its Asian neighbors. The dependency studied by Marini adopts new forms and intensities.
PROBLEMS OF TRANSNATIONALISM
The current stage of productive globalization — without direct correspondence in the ruling classes and states — contradicts the thesis of a full transnationalization. This view assumes that the main subjects and institutions of the system have been divorced from their national pillars (Robinson, 2014). It holds that the old anchoring of companies in the national map has been dissolved.
This approach converts the long transitions of history into instantaneous transformations. It rightly observes that the internationalization of the economy generates dynamics of the same type in other spheres, but ignores the enormous temporal gaps that separate both processes. That a firm assumes transnational profiles in a few years does not imply the equivalent globalization of its owners. Nor does it presuppose processes of that type in the social groups or states that harbour the company.
Capitalism does not develop with automatic adjustments. It articulates the development of productive forces with the action of dominant classes molded to different state scenarios. The different spheres of this tripod maintain levels of connection that are as intense as they are autonomous.
Even in the Marini years some Marxist theorists (such as Poulantzas) perceived that productive internationalization did not entail identical sequences in the state or class superstructure. This point inspired the later characterization of globalization as a process rooted in the institutions of the most powerful state on the planet (Panitch, Gindin, 2014).
The transnationalist approach ignores this mediation of Washington in the gestation of the new stage. That is why it also ignores the current role of Beijing. The association between both powers coexists with an intense rivalry between very different state structures. The links between Chinese and American companies do not imply any kind of transnational dissolution.
It suffices to recall the complex trajectory of gestation of capitalism around pre-existing classes and states, to note how varied the patterns of change of these entities have been. The transnationalist thesis is in tune with historiographical currents that postulate the abrupt constitution of an integrated world capitalist system, forgetting the complex transition from multiple national trajectories (Wallerstein, 1984). In the same way that it conceives that untimely appearance 500 years ago, it supposes that the current globalization illuminates world classes and states with great rapidity.
The opposite tradition — which explores the differentiated paths followed by each national capitalism — records, instead, how subjects and local structures condition current globalization (Wood, 2002). It questions the existence of a synchronized irruption of global capitalism and demonstrates the pre-eminence of uncertain transitions guided by state intermediations. A generically common course of internationalization unfolds with a very high diversity of rhythms and conflicts.
Relationships of dependency persist precisely owing to the absence of a sudden process of complete globalization. The framework of center and periphery is remodeled without disappearing, in a context of globalized manufacturing and redistributions of value between competing classes and states. This diagnosis — consistent with Marini's tradition — is counterposed to the transnationalist vision.
SEMI-PERIPHERAL REORDERING
The Brazilian theorist studied international value transfers in order to analyze the dependent reproduction of Latin America. In his view the region recreated its subordinate status through the systematic drainage of resources towards the central countries. Commercial disadvantages, remittance of profits and interest payments on the debt perpetuated this submission.
But the Brazilian thinker did not limit himself to portraying the bipolar fracture (between center and periphery) generated by these hemorrhages. He investigated the new complexity introduced by the existence of intermediate formations. He investigated especially how industrialization placed certain countries in a semiperipheral segment. He observed this transformation in Brazil, which maintained its remoteness from the imperial centers without sharing in the extreme backwardness of the periphery (Marini 2013: 18). .
This characterization was shared by his colleague specializing in dependency, who differentiated the Latin American economies by their internal development and by the type of exported products (Bambirra, 1986: 23-30). The same approach confronted the main exponent of endogenist Marxism, by evaluating how unequal underdevelopment separated the most backward agrarian countries from the economies embarked on a certain industrial takeoff (Cueva, 2007).
These distinctions are very useful in analyzing the current context. The simple center-periphery polarity is less sufficient than in the past in understanding globalization. Value chains have enhanced the relative weight of the semiperipheral countries.
Multinational firms no longer prioritize the occupation of national markets to take advantage of subsidies and customs barriers. They hierarchize another type of external investments. In certain cases they ensure the capture of natural resources determined by the geology and climate of each place. In other situations, they take advantage of the existence of large contingents of a cheap and disciplined work force.
These two variants — appropriation of natural wealth and exploitation of employees — define the strategies of transnational corporations and the location of each economy in the global order.
Both the peripheries and the semiperipheries continue to be integrated into the conglomerate of the dependent countries. The subordinate role that Marini assigned to the two categories has not changed. They are inserted in the value chain, without participating in the most lucrative areas of that network. Nor do they exercise control of that structure. They act within globalized production under the mandate of the transnational companies.
This relegated positioning is corroborated even in those economies that managed to forge their own multinational companies (India, Brazil, South Korea). They entered a field that was monopolized by the center, without modifying their secondary status in globalized production (Milelli, 2013: 363-380).
Another indicator of this relegated positioning is the reduced participation of these countries in the direction of globalized institutions. This absence is consistent with the scarce representation of these regions in the management bodies of the transnationalized firms (Carroll; Carson, 2003: 67-102).
But two significant changes are to be observed compared to the time of Marini. The role of each semiperiphery in the value chain introduces a substantial element that is very definitive of its location in the global pyramid. In contrast to the past, it is not enough to record the level of per capita GDP or the magnitude of the domestic market.
On the other hand, the advance of the Asian economies (South Korea) and the retreat of their Latin American counterparts (Argentina, Brazil) is very evident within the semiperipheral segment. As the same rearrangement is observed in other regions, some authors suggest the introduction of new classifications to conceptualize the change (strong-weak, high-low, upper-lower semiperipheries) (Morales Ruvalcaba; Efren, 2013: 147-181). Marini could not foresee these transformations.
INCIDENCE OF SUB-IMPERIALISM
The Brazilian thinker analyzed the role of intermediate economies in the same years that the World Systems theoreticians studied the dual role of the semiperipheral countries. They felt that these countries mitigate global tensions and define the mutations of the global hierarchy. They highlighted how they moderate the fractures between center and periphery and how the protagonists are the ascending and descending mobilities that reshape the international division of labor.
The World Systems thinkers attributed this role to the intermediate nature of the semiperipheral states, which do not hold the power of the center and do not suffer from the extreme weaknesses of the relegated states. They described cases of ascent (Sweden, Prussia, United States), stagnation (Italy, Flanders), and retreat (Spain, Portugal) of that segment in the last five centuries. They postulated that their equidistant place allows them to lead great transformations, while balancing the world pyramid (Wallerstein, 1984: 247-33, 1999: 239-264, 2004: ch. 5).
Marini partially converged with this thesis in his evaluation of the intermediate countries. He used that lens to differentiate Brazil from France and Bolivia. But he also introduced the new concept of sub-imperialism, to characterize a band of regional powers with policies both associated with and autonomous from US imperialism.
With that notion he emphasized the disruptive role of these actors. Instead of observing them as buffers of global tensions, he analyzed their convulsive function. The high level of conflict in these regions was later attributed to the explosive coexistence of universes of welfare and neglect ("Bel-India" type) (Chase-Dunn, 1999).
Marini's approach was similar to the one used by an exceptional Marxist of the 20th century to explain the vulnerability of intermediate countries as the result of unequal and combined development (Trotsky, 1975). As those nations were incorporated into the accumulation race with great delay, they face imbalances superior to the center that are unknown by their immediate followers of the periphery. For this reason they concentrate potential locations of a socialist beginning. Like other thinkers of his time, Marini placed the dynamics of these formations on a horizon of confrontation between capitalism and socialism (Worsley, 1980).
But what he meant by sub-imperialism requires significant revision in the era of neoliberal globalization. The dependency theorist assigned to this category an economic dimension of external expansion and a geopolitical-military dimension of regional prominence. That simultaneity is not confirmed at present.
Contemporary sub-imperialism does not present the economic connotation observed by Marini. It is typical of the countries that fulfill a dual role of associated and autonomous gendarmes of the United States. Turkey and India play that role in the Middle East and South Asia. But Brazil does not play an equivalent role in Latin America and South Africa does not fulfill that role in its continent (Katz, 2017b).
The geopolitical aspect of sub-imperialism and the economic nature of the semi-periphery are more visible today than in the past. The first aspect is determined by military actions tending to increase the influence of the zonal powers. The second feature derives from the place occupied by each country in the value chain. Marini did not perceive this difference.
"GLOBAL SOUTH"?
The new combination of increasing internationalization of capital and continued nation-state configuration of classes and states forces us to revise other aspects of traditional dependency theory. Productive globalization is usually investigated by the exponents of that tradition, but the imperial geopolitical reconfiguration is often ignored. That omission is seen in the widespread use of the term "Global South."
This concept is postulated to highlight the persistence of the classic disparities between developed ("North") and underdeveloped ("South") countries. The displacement of production to the East and the capture of the new value generated by the West are presented as evidence of that overwhelming polarity (Smith, 2010: 241).
These characterizations rightly confront the successful future attributed by neoliberals (and often validated by the heterodox) to convergences between advanced and backward economies. They also show that the current model is based on the exploitation and transfer of surplus value to a handful of transnational corporations. They explain in detail the advantages that the most powerful countries maintain to capture the bulk of the benefits.
But these valuable insights do not clarify the problems of the period. The simple diagnosis of a counterpoint between South and North clashes with the difficulty of pigeon-holing China. In which of the two fields is that nation located?
Sometimes that country is excepted from the divide, with the same argument used twenty years ago to highlight the uniqueness of South Korea or Taiwan. But what was plausible for two small countries can not be extended to the second largest economy on the planet, which is home to a fifth of the world's population. If the transformation carried out by the Asian giant is ignored, it is impossible to characterize the capitalism of today.
Excellent research works wrongly place China in the bloc of underdeveloped countries. They consider that the surplus value extracted from its enormous proletariat is transferred to the West (Smith, 2010: 146-149). But it is unwise to include in this universe a power that comes to the aid of Western banks, upholds the dollar in crisis, accumulates a huge trade surplus with the United States and leads in foreign investments in Africa and Latin America.
Nor is it logical to infer that the mass of surplus value generated in China is fully transferred to the West and appropriated by the parent companies of globalized firms. A drainage of that type would have made impossible the high accumulation rates that characterize the country.
It is evident that a huge portion of the profit generated in China is captured by the local capitalist-bureaucrats. This monumental profit is mistakenly interpreted as a simple "slice" of what is appropriated by Western firms (Foster, 2015).
But China is defiant and not a puppet of the United States. Its dominant groups are far from a dependent bourgeoisie with little participation in the globalization cake. The new Asian rulers have no relationship to the old postwar national bourgeoisies.
The emerging eastern power has demonstrated capacity to limit the drainage of surplus value, while increasing its appropriation of the value generated in the periphery. None of these actions is consistent with its classification in the "Global South".
RENEWING DEPENDENCY THEORY
In his analyses of the political economy of globalization Marini laid the foundations to understand the current period. He highlighted three focuses of study: the exploitation of labor, value transfers and imperial restructuring. He left important clues, but not answers. The updating of his theory requires more complex inquiries than the simple corroboration of concepts enunciated half a century ago.
The pillar of this re-evaluation is the characterization of productive globalization in the new imperial geopolitics. This study requires that we note how the transfer of surplus value redesigns the map of the drainage, retention and capture of value flows. It is also essential to analyze the new relationships of subjugation, subordination and autonomy that emerge in the international mosaic. Marini has left us a monumental research project that is pending.
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-Chase-Dunn, Christopher (1999). Globalization: A World systems perspective, Journal of World-Systems Research, Vol V, 2.
- Cueva, Agustín (2007). Problemas y perspectivas de la teoría de la dependencia. Entre la ira y la esperanza CLACSO-Prometeo, Buenos Aires.
- Dos Santos, Theotonio, (2011). Marxismo y ciencias sociales. Una revisión crítica, Luxemburg, Buenos Aires .
- Foster, John Bellamy (2015). The New Imperialism of Globalized Monopoly-Finance Capital, Monthly Review, vol 67, Issue 3, july-August.
-Gereffi, Gary (2001) Las cadenas productivas como marco analítico. Problemas del Desarrollo , vol 32, n 125.
-Goda, Thomas (2013). Changes in income inequality from a global perspective: an overview, April, Post Keynesian Economics Study Group Working Paper 1303.
-Katz Claudio Neoliberalismo, Neodesarrollismo, Socialismo (2016), Batalla de Ideas Ediciones, Buenos Aires.
-Katz, Claudio (2017b). Las modalidades actuales del subimperialismo Tensões Mundiais / World Tensions v. 12 n. 23, Jul./Dez, Fortaleza.
- Luxemburg, Rosa (1968). La acumulación del capital. Editoral sin especificación, Buenos Aires.
-Mandel, Ernest (1978). El capitalismo tardío, ERA, México.
-Marini, Ruy Mauro (1973). Dialéctica de la dependencia, ERA, México.
-Marini, Ruy Mauro (1991). Memoria, http://www.marini-escritos.unam.mx/002_memoria_marini_esp.html.
- Marini, Ruy Mauro (1993). La crisis teórica, en América Latina: integración y democracia, Editorial Nueva Sociedad, Caracas
-Marini, Ruy Mauro (1996) . Procesos y tendencias de la globalización capitalista, Prometeo, Buenos Aires.
-Marini, Ruy Mauro (2013). En torno a la dialéctica de la dependencia, "Post-Sriptum," Revista Argumentos vol.26 no.72 may-ago. 2013, México.
-Martínez Peinado, Javier (2012). La estructura teórica Centro/Periferia y el análisis del Sistema Económico Global: ¿obsoleta o necesaria?", enero.
-Martins, Carlos Eduardo (2013) . El pensamiento de Ruy Mauro Marini y su actualidad para las ciencias sociales, Revista Argumentos, vol.26, n 72, México.
-Milanovic, Branko (2014). Las cifras de la desigualdad mundial en las rentas Historia y presente. Globalización y desarrollo, nº 880, Septiembre-Octubre.
- Milberg, William; Jiang Xiao; Gereffi, Gary (2014). Industrial policy in the era 5 of vertically specialized industrialization, http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---dgreports/---inst/documents/publication/wcms_315670.pdf.
-Milelli, Christian (2013). L'émergence des firmes multinationales en provenance du « Sud ». La mondialisation, stade supreme du capitalisme, Hommage a Charles Albert Michalet , Pu.Paris-10.
-Morales Ruvalcaba, Daniel Efrén (2013). En las entrañas de los BRCIS Revista Brasileira de Estratégia e Relações Internacionais v.2, n.4, Jul-Dez.
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[1] Although only 40-plus pages in length, to my knowledge this seminal essay has never been translated into English.
[2] Sous l'empire du capital (M Éditeur, 2014).
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La piràmide de Meidum és una piramide situada al llogaret de Meidum, al sud de Memfis (Egipte). Fou construïda probablement per Huni, al final de la dinastia III de l'antic Egipte i fou modificada per Snefru, primer faraó de la dinastia IV. La seva datació, això no obstant, és controvertida, i molts egiptòlegs pensen que va ser construïda per Snefru. El nom d'Huni mai s'ha trobat a la piràmide o a la vora. Les mastabes de la vora, principalment la mastaba 16 i la mastaba 17, foren probablement construïdes per als fills del faraó Snefru.

La piràmide va ser inicialment esglaonada de fins a 8 esglaons (una primera fase de 7 i més tard se'n va afegir un vuitè). Va ser la segona piràmide esglaonada més gran de les acabades. Snefru la va modificar per convertir-la en una piràmide pura. L'altura amb 8 escalons degué ser d'uns 85 metres. Al convertir-la en piràmide sembla que no va resistir i llavors Snefru va construir la piràmide de Dashur. Les investigacions arquitectòniques però no han trobat cap rastre que permeti assegurar la modificació i l'ensorrament, i si va passar potser no fou durant la construcció afegida per Snefru sinó més tard; alguns fins i tot pensen que les parts que manquen es van arrencar per fer servir en altres monuments.

Actualment només la part superior resta visible, del quart al vuitè esglaó, però modificats de manera que el quart i el cinquè formen un de sol; del setè només resta una part; i ha desaparegut el vuitè, de manera que sembla una torre de tres esglaons.
L'estructura interna és simple en comparació amb altres piràmides posteriors, però va suposar una innovació al seu temps. L'entrada està situada al primer esglaó, al nord, i acaba en un corredor horitzontal. Dos petits nínxols se situen a esquerra i dreta. Al final del corredor un tub vertical porta a la cambra mortuòria a nivell del tercer esglaó. Per fer front a la pressió que empenyia cap a sota a la cambra, es va utilitzar una tècnica consistent en encorbar la teulada del compartiment que es projectava cap a dins i cap dalt. La cambra mortuòria mesura 6 x 2,5 metres, i no conté cap sarcòfag ni signes d'enterrament. El temple funerari era un petit santuari o capella de 9 x 9 metres a la cara est amb dos esteles que representaven al rei, el cos del qual no hi era present. A la part sud hi havia una petita piràmide subsidiària. El recinte de la piràmide estava tancat per paret d'uns 236 x 218 metres.

La mastaba 17 estava prop del recinte, a la cara est. No se sap qui hi ha enterrat però se suposa que va ser algun fill de Snefru, com a la mastaba 16, al nord-est de l'anterior, més allunyada de la piràmide on fou enterrat Nefermaat, amb la seva dona Atet; un altre fill és enterrat a una mastaba propera identificada com a número 6, amb la seva dona Nefret.

Referències

Bibliografia

 Meidum: Site of the Broken Pyramid & Remnants of the First True Pyramid- Virtual-Egypt
 John Legon article on the Architectural Proportions of the Pyramid of Meidum

Per a més informació
 Arnold, Dieter (1991). Building in Egypt: Pharaonic Stone Masonry. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 Jackson, K. & Stamp, J. (2002). Pyramid: Beyond Imagination. Inside the Great Pyramid of Giza. London: BBC Worldwide.

Meidum

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Column 1: Election time
admin | November 17, 2019	| 0 Comments
By BILL SHARKEY III
Martinez News-Gazette Columnist
ELECTION TIME has begun. And, some interesting entries have already made their intentions know to the electorate. Actually, one very interesting candidate, and veteran of past elections and skirmishes, will be facing a lot of 'baggage'. Serious legal issues will be included.
Supervisor Federal Glover, the District 5 incumbent, has announced his intention to file for re-election to his County Supervisor seat in District 5, a district which includes Martinez and a stretch of the Carquinez Strait east to Pittsburg, Antioch and beyond. He has held the seat since 2000, been Chair of the Board three times, and served during a period of successful serious health issues.
Gus Kramer, longtime County Assessor, who is undergoing legal battles with Contra Costa County over alleged serious personal conflicts within his office, and facing legal action as a result, has been an elected official in positions over the past, including Martinez City Clerk for 10 years, has been County Assessor since being elected in 1994. His tenure in that position has been plagued with allegations of business irregularities aside from his departmental activities. He has been a frequent critic of the Board of Supervisors over the years. He is facing a court trial in January over the charges by female employees in his office after formal charges filed by the county Civil Grand Jur. He has sued the Board of Supervisors after he was censured, claiming that certain documents pertaining to the legal action were not turned over to him, and claims open meeting violations. That suit is still open.
Sean Trambley, a Martinez City Planning Commissioner, and a newcomer to the election process, has announced his intention to become a candidate for the District 5 position, also. He, too, resides in Martinez, and claims he fights for more housing, opposed the downtown proposed gun range, and hopes for 'common sense cannabis policies.'. He is a member of the Contra Costa Young Democrats, and CEO of his communications firm, SMT Strategies.
A SURPRISE to almost everyone was the sudden and unexpected resignation of County Clerk-Recorder Joe Canciamilla, a veteran county politician who was first elected to a public office at age 17, as a member of the Pittsburg Board of Education. "I decided now is a good time to leave," he stated in an email announcing his immediate resignation on October 30.
Allegations of serious violations of the state Fair Political Practices Commission regulations were announced recently and are being reviewed by the Contra Costa District Attorney's office. The claims filed against him include spending more than $130,000 of his campaign funds for personal use on property in Hawaii, and an expensive vacation in Asia.
Canciamilla, 64, was raised in Pittsburg and has spent some five decades in politics and his family's funeral business. Elected offices included eight years on the Pittsburg City Council, four years on the Contra Costa Board of Supervisors, 1996 to 2006, at which time he was elected to the California State Assembly for two terms. He returned to Pittsburg to the family business, and to his law firm before being appointed to the county position.
We recall one of his campaigns for elected office which described him as "Hard Working Joe', and featured a pair of work gloves on his campaign material. As we look back on his career in public and private life, the moniker certainly describes his life. He was energetic.
Regretfully, the well-known phrase, from another context, "lead us not into temptation", has not been learned or followed by politicos or elected office holders who have not been able to resist tapping their sometimes flush campaign coffers for personal use. Tsk, tsk!!! Bad and a costly one, as well. For this, Hard Working Joe is paying a $150,000 fine, plus repaying the amount he used., we hear. Ouch!!
ALMOND RANCH (no Almond trees here) is getting closer to becoming part of the John Muir Land Trust, and 281 acres of lovely property right on Martinez' doorstep south of Highway 4 and west of Alhambra Avenue, abutting Mount Wanda with views of miles of countryside.
All that is needed now, as the JMLT makes a final push for a successful transaction, is $225,000 to meet the deadline of $4,000,000 by December 31, 2019. We do not say ALL as an EASY dollar amount to raise. We say it as an encouragement to all of YOU who could kick in some $$$ to help the fund-raiser make that last If you need more $225,000. If you need more information, call Melanie Hogan, Director of Major Gifts, at 925-228-5028. She will be delighted to hear from you.
WITH SUCH wonderful efforts attempted by people who care about our communities and their environment, there are still the slobs among us who don't care about nature, our environment or other people. Driven along Franklin Canyon Road lately? Makes one want to upchuck, or worse at the things which are dumped along side the highway….for someone else to pick up. How thoughtless and noncaring can people be? Go figure.
MEALS ON WHEELS latest newsletter has great news for the in-home citizens who have needed more than the one meal at noon they have been receiving, thanks to the generosity of hundred (thousands) of those of us who can contribute, according to Paul Kraintz, the 'honcho' and co-founder of the Meals on Wheels of Contra Costa. Such a wonderful service extension to the program which deals with people unable to get out and about, but who can have a meal provided by their fellow citizens who can get out and about and take care of themselves.
Want to help? Call Paul and help with money, or as a drive delivering meal on wheels. You will learn to enjoy the volunteer effort and feel part of a truly gratifying effort as you share the 'giving' with so many others in the community. Call them ate 925-313-6310. You will be glad you did. We have done it!
SOME CHANGES coming to Martinez. Stay tuned!!
CHEERS for the efforts of the Martinez Veterans Commission, City Staff and all of the participating veterans, youth groups, elected officials, and individuals who made this Veterans Day very special on a lovely day at the Ygnacio Plaza at City Hall. Truly a special event feting the men and women who have served in our armed forces over the history of our nation. May God continue to bless America!
Tags: Bill Sharkey III, Column 1
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