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Title: The Tragedy of Trump Author: Jeff Stein Date: January 31, 2017 Language: en Topics: Donald Trump, Elections, democracy, US, Anarcho-Syndicalist Review Source: Retrieved on 28th January 2021 from https://syndicalist.us/2017/01/31/trumpocolypse-2/ Notes: From Anarcho-Syndicalist Review #69, Winter 2017
Democracy is a commons. The election of Donald Trump is the logical
outcome of the modern enclosure movement. The 20^(th) century was a
struggle between capitalists and the labor movement and liberals to
recreate a commons: old-age pensions for workers, universal health care,
public education, national parks and wilderness areas, assistance for
the unemployed and children, environmental protection for air and water,
and public infrastructure.
Commons were nothing new. Before the industrial revolution local
communities set aside common areas for pasturing animals, collecting
water and firewood, hunting and fishing, and these provided a form of
assistance for low-income families to support themselves. As capitalism
developed these commons areas were seized and sold off (or given away)
by governments to the capitalists.
Then, as now, this enclosure was justified on the grounds that
capitalism would result in a more efficient use of the natural resources
and the benefits would magically trickle down to the poor as products
became cheaper. The fact that the rural poor were left with no income to
buy the cheap goods and were forced to the cities and “Satanic mills”
was never a concern. Yet from the ashes of the commons was born the
union and socialist movements (including anarcho-syndicalism) that
fought back. Threatened by social revolution and by their own excesses,
the capitalists relented and the modern commons were born.
But capitalism is still capitalism. Commons only benefit capitalists if
they can control them and make a profit. Privatization was advocated as
a solution to “the tragedy of the commons” – the tragedy was that
resources were being used for the common good instead of lining the
pockets of the 1% of greedy families at the top of the economic pyramid.
As an environmentalist and labor activist I paid attention when the term
“tragedy of the commons” was mentioned on a public radio program while
travelling to work. The phrase was coined by conservationist Garret
Hardin to refer to the tendency of an unregulated commons resource to be
over-exploited. As Hardin’s argument goes, the enclosure movement was
necessary to preserve the environment because the benefit derived from
overuse of a common resource goes to the individual but the cost is
shared by all, so individuals have no incentive to conserve common
resources. On the other hand if the resource was owned by the individual
or a family, that person had an incentive to take care of the resource
in order to continue to benefit him or herself and their descendants.
I decided to write an anarchist rebuttal of Hardin’s argument but the
more I delved into the literature the more I realized that Hardin’s
argument falls apart because he misunderstands the nature of capitalism.
Capitalists are not small farmers growing crops or raising cattle for
their own subsistence, but investors making a profit by extracting as
much value from their resources by putting them on the market. Markets
are commons. If markets are unregulated, there is the same “tragedy of
the commons” tendency for individual capitalists to over-exploit
resources – to invest in a resource, use it up and abandon it for the
next profit-making opportunity perhaps in another country. Growing one’s
capital is the goal, not saving communities, not saving a farm or
factory, not saving the environment, not even saving the market itself.
The individual capitalist is oblivious to the costs being suffered by
everyone else.
Hardin’s “Tragedy of the Commons” is the “Tragedy of the Markets.” The
only way to avoid the tragedy of the commons is to “stint,” to place
limits on what individuals can do in common resource areas. (E.P.
Thompson, the British historian wrote a number of articles about how
pre-industrial villages avoided the “tragedy of the commons” before the
18^(th) century enclosure movement by creating local rules favoring
conservation called “stinting.”)
Since the rise of Reaganism in the Republican Party and of Clintonism in
the Democrat Party, the capitalist establishment has pursued an effort
to once again enclose the commons and sell them to the highest bidders.
It is only natural that the enclosure effort would eventually engulf
both parties and the government itself.
Democracy has been slowly and steadily eroded. The parties are for sale,
the political candidates are for sale, elections are for sale, and
finally a billionaire has bought his way into power.
Since being “elected” in a rigged contest in which many voters were
denied the opportunity to vote or have their votes counted based upon
their race, neighborhood or age, President-“elect” Trump has made it
clear that his administration is open for business. Democracy has been
privatized. He has sold his administration to the right-wing elements of
the Republican Party, appointed billionaires and authoritarian generals
to his cabinet, and refused to sell off his business interests or even
disclose what they are. Where President Trump and Trump, Inc. begins and
ends, no one knows.
We can expect a level of corruption that is unprecedented even for
banana republics, for it will be backed by the most powerful military
and corporate empire the world has known. It is the “Tragedy of
Democracy” come home to roost.