Madrid y Barcelona estudian con el comité que analizó la deuda griega hacer una “auditoría ciudadana”

por Pablo Garcia

2016-03-10 01 pablo-garcia- El encuentro del Plan B en Madrid sirvió para reforzar el contacto entre los ayuntamientos de Manuela Carmena y Ada Colau y el Comité para la Anulación de laDeuda del Tercer Mundo (CADTM)

- Ambos consistorios reconocen conversaciones. «El trabajo que hicimos en Grecia puede ser una fuente de inspiración incluso para el Gobierno actual de Tsipras», señala el belga Eric Toussaint

Iceland refuses its accused bankers ’Out of Court’ settlements

Eva Joly interviewed by Renaud Vivien

2016-03-04 02 imageOn 8 December 2015, at the end of his visit to Greece, the UN Independent Expert on Debt, |1| Juan Pablo Bohoslavsky, advised the Hellenic Government “to establish better judicial and administrative accountability for Government officials and decision makers in the private sector” citing the example of Iceland. |2| That small country of 320 000 inhabitants has indeed shown that it is perfectly possible for those responsible for the financial crisis to be prosecuted and condemned to prison sentences. The CADTM interviewed Eva Joly who played a key role as advisor to Iceland’s Special Prosecutor in the criminal investigation and is now MEP for the “Europe Ecologie-The Greens” party. Eva Joly, whom we presented with Éric Toussaint’s latest book, Bancocracy, also discusses how the crisis was managed in Iceland and the pressures brought to bear by its creditors to try to obtain repayment of illegitimate debts.

Donald Trump reminds Holocaust survivors of Adolf Hitler

Niall O'Dowd @niallodowd

2016-02-28 01 donald-trump-asDonald Trump as Adolf Hitler -- absurd, over the top right?
​ ​That is unless you are a Holocaust survivor, those brave souls who are still alive having somehow survived the most dreadful genocide on earth. ​I​nternational Holocaust Day was remembered this week and many survivor’s revealed they were scared stiff of Trump.

Eva Schloss, 86-year-old stepsister of Anne Frank, stated "I think [Trump] is acting like another Hitler by inciting racism." Schloss, an Auschwitz survivor was writing in Newsweek.

Franck Gaudichaud:

“Reality can’t be radically transformed

only through institutions”

Franck Gaudichaud

2016-02-26 01 LatinoamericanoSource Resumen Latinoamericano / The Dawn / February 7, 2016.- Interview with Franck Gaudichaud, researcher and teacher, editor of the book “Latin America. Liberation in progress”.

By the end of 2015, researcher and teacher Franck Gaudichaud published in Chile the book “Latin America: Liberation in progress”, which compiles texts from different authors on several political processes of emancipation in the sub-continent. Venezuela, Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Ecuador, Uruguay, Mexico, Brazil and Bolivia are present in the book, preceded by a general study by the compiler. The daily Resumen Latinoamericano talked with Gaudichaud about the book.

Déclaration commune des collectifs solidaires avec le peuple grec

2016-02-23 01 Solidarite France Grece  Répondant à l’appel du collectif Solidarité France Grèce pour la Santé et de l’association Bretagne Grèce Solidarité Santé, plus de 80 personnes de 23 collectifs locaux venant de plus de 20 villes et départements (*) se sont retrouvés le 20 février 2016 pour faire le point sur la solidarité avec les dispensaires sociaux grecs et le combat du peuple grec contre les politiques d’austérité imposées par l’union européenne et mises en œuvre par les autorités grecques.

[Documentaire] Grèce Années Chaos

La crise grecque, de la colère à l’espoir

par CHRISTIAN LORRE

2016-02-20 03 Grèce Années ChaosDepuis 7 ans, la Grèce est un pays ruiné, avec un peuple épuisé et une démocratie bafouée...

De janvier à juillet 2015, le réalisateur a regardé la Grèce se débattre dans une guerre où le peuple grec paye les errements de sa vieille classe politique et le dogmatisme de l’Europe néo libérale.
La Grèce est devenue un pays du tiers monde mais elle n’est pas un épiphénomène car ici l’Europe teste la résistance des peuples.

Poul Thomsen, Greece and the cynicism of the IMF

by DANIEL MUNEVAR

2016-02-20 01 Poul ThomsenFor the casual reader, Poul Thomsen’s recent piece |1| on the role of the IMF in the bailout review negotiations currently taking place between Greece and the Troika would seem balanced and reasonable. At the end of the day, as he has argued elsewhere, |2| the numbers simply need to add up. For that there is a tradeoff between the “ambition of the reforms” Greece needs to impose and the amount of debt relief that can be granted by its European partners. In blunt terms, more austerity implies less debt relief and vice versa. Thomsen argues that given the contentious character of the negotiations the IMF is simply there as a friendly companion that supports both its Greek and European partners to help them make the tough decisions required to develop a program that adds up. However, for someone who is more familiar with the role that the IMF in general, and Thomsen in particular, has played in placing Greece in the precarious situation that it finds itself today, his piece can only be defined as brazen and cynical.

Bernie Sanders y la oportunidad para el cambio político en EE UU

DAN LA BOTZ

2016-02-13 02 DAN LA BOTZEn EE UU Estamos asistiendo a un movimiento importante y muy significativo.Por primera vez desde los años 1930, asistimos a debates sobre el socialismo y el fascismo en los medios de comunicación de masas. Bernie Sanders se define, de forma franca, como un socialista democrático, al mismo tiempo que la candidatura de Donald Trump alimenta el debate sobre el fascismo.

Por primera vez desde los años 1980, es decir, de la campaña de Jesse Jackson, tenemos un candidato progresista en las filas del Partido Demócrata y empezamos a oír una nueva (o quizás deberíamos decir muy vieja) retórica que habla de la "clase de los multimillonarios" y de la necesidad de una "revolución política".

Más sobre títeres y miedo

YAYO HERRERO

2016-02-13 01 YAYO HERREROAtónita asisto al último esperpento madrileño centrado en la obra de títeres que ha terminado con el encarcelamiento de los titiriteros.

En la polémica y debate abiertos se discute si la obra enaltecía el terrorismo y si era adecuada para público infantil. Con respecto al primer tema, antes de opinar, es interesante leer el resumen del guion de la obra publicada en eldiario.es[1] para saber por qué aparecía esa pancarta en la obra. Podrá gustar más o menos el hilo argumental, pero es obvio que no se enaltecía la violencia terrorista, sino que los muñecos que mostraban la pancarta representaban a policías que trataban de incriminar a otro de los muñecos como terrorista.

62 billionaires now control half of world’s wealth

by Farooque Chowdhury*

2016-02-05 01 62 billionairesThe richest 62 persons now control more than half of the world’s money, according to a new Oxfam report. Total wealth of these individuals is the same as that of the world’s poorest 3.6 billion people. The rich-poor gap is growing wider. The ultra-wealthy group of persons is getting wealthier.

The 44-page report, ‘An Economy for the 1%’, published by Oxfam GB for Oxfam International (ISBN 978-1-78077-993-5, January 2016, Oxford, UK) says:

“The gap between rich and poor is reaching new extremes. Credit Suisse recently revealed that the richest 1% have now accumulated more wealth than the rest of the world put together. …Meanwhile, the wealth owned by the bottom half of humanity has fallen by a trillion dollars in the past five years. This is just the latest evidence that today we live in a world with levels of inequality we may not have seen for over a century.”

62 people own the same as half the world, reveals Oxfam Davos report

by Oxfam

2016-02-05 02 Oxfam Davos reportThe Oxfam report An Economy for the 1%, shows that the wealth of the poorest half of the world’s population has fallen by a trillion dollars since 2010, a drop of 41 percent. This has occurred despite the global population increasing by around 400 million people during that period. Meanwhile, the wealth of the richest 62 has increased by more than half a trillion dollars to $1.76tr. The report also shows how women are disproportionately affected by inequality – of the current ‘62’, 53 are men and just nine are women.

IMF’s Prescription for Europe:

Exploit Refugees with Low Wages

Economist calls IMF ’the sancta sanctorum of neoclassical/neoliberal thinking.

by Nadia Prupis

2016-01-30 01 refugees

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Wednesday released a report urging the European countries accepting a majority of refugees to “temporarily” pay them less than minimum wage.

In its report, the IMF recommended implementing a short-term differentiation between asylum seekers and EU citizens, by way of “temporary and limited derogations of the minimum wage for refugees.”

That would entail giving wage subsidies to companies to employ individuals migrating to Europe to escape war, poverty, and state violence from the Middle East and North Africa, or adopting “temporary exceptions to minimum or entry level wages” for those already hired.

Lénine et Trotsky face à la bureaucratie – Révolution russe et société de transition

1989, par TOUSSAINT Eric

2016-01-24 01 TOUSSAINT EricCe texte, « Lénine et Trotsky face à la bureaucratie », inédit sur la toile, n’a été publié qu’une fois [1]. Cette étude a été réalisée pour un cours de formation présenté à l’été 1989 – elle se veut donc d’une écriture simple, mais aussi rigoureuse et bien documentée. Elle est sur notre site ce 21 janvier 2016 à l’occasion du 92e anniversaire de la mort de Lénine.

1. Remarques préliminaires

Premièrement, les marxistes et le problème de la société de transition entre le capitalisme et le socialisme : Quand les bolchéviks ont été confrontés à la construction d’un Etat ouvrier à partir de l’insurrection d’Octobre 1917, ils avaient très peu de bases théoriques sur lesquelles s’appuyer en cette matière. C’était effectivement la première expérience historique, pratique, sur grande échelle, de tentative de construction d’une société socialiste.

Left Experience in the Spanish State: Two Years of Podemos

by RODRIGUEZ Teresa, URBAN CRESPO Miguel

2016-01-23 01 RODRIGUEZ-Teresa URBAN-CRESPO-Miguel This Sunday (17 January 2016) we celebrate the anniversary of our first public act: the press conference at the Lavapiés Theater District in Madrid in which we were lucky to participate. We have built a great organization which has managed in two years of history to produce a storm of enthusiasm for change and has become a reliable electoral tool. We have helped to open a new cycle in which public life is no longer split in two and, above all, we have repoliticized society in a moment in which possible responses to the suffering of the people might have been resignation, apathy, or even hatred. And we have done it fundamentally by articulating a new and terrible sense of reality in material terms (the crisis and its effects) and in subjective ones (outrage at the socioeconomic reality and the corruption in government).

Ettore Scola morto, addio al maestro della risata amara e popolare che negli anni 70 raccontava l’Italia di oggi

di Davide Turrini

2016-01-20 01 Ettore ScolaSe ne va l’autore che della commedia all'italiana di Monicelli, Comencini, Risi e Germi aveva forgiato una versione più raffinata e potente, coraggiosa e militante, dal grande respiro storico. La sua cinematografia tocca l’apice di successo e di pubblico con C’eravamo tanto amati (1974) e Una giornata particolare (1977), ma La più bella serata della mia vita (1972) e Brutti, sporchi e cattivi scolpiscono nell'immaginario collettivo il ritratto impietoso e sublime di un Paese perennemente uguale a se stesso

Ora il capitolo è chiuso. La lunga vita della commedia all’italiana è definitivamente finita la scorsa notte, quando anche Ettore Scola, 84 anni, ci ha lasciati. Il cuore ‘stanco’ di uno dei registi che con Mario Monicelli, Dino Risi, Nanni Loy, Luigi Comencini,Pietro Germi, Luigi Zampa, ha scolpito su pellicola il linguaggio della risata più amara e più bella, più popolare e più coscienziosa, ha cessato di battere. Se ne va l’autore che di quella commedia ne aveva come forgiata una sua versione più raffinata e potente, coraggiosa e militante, dal respiro storico e autoironico. Signorile e mai sopra le righe Scola lo è stato sempre.

Espagne : près d’un demi-million d’expulsions, le produit d’une loi franquiste

par Fátima Martín , Jérôme Duval

2016-01-19 01 stop-desahuciosEntre 2008 et le second trimestre 2015, l’Espagne a connu 416.332 ordres d’expulsion de logements. |1| Les expulsions sont une des conséquences de la crise, mais la loi qui les autorise est bien antérieure. Il s’agit de la « loi hypothécaire » imposée par décret sous la dictature de Franco en 1946, et qui demeure en vigueur.

La « métaphysique » des expulsions

L’Association hypothécaire espagnole (AHE) elle-même, qui rassemble les groupes financiers les plus actifs sur le marché espagnol des prêts hypothécaires, rappelle sur son site Internet que cette loi est la refonte d’un décret du 8 février 1946. Dans son guide « en caso de impago » (en cas de non-paiement) qui vise à rassurer les créanciers, il est fait état que : « si un emprunteur ne paie pas un crédit - qu’il soit personnel ou hypothécaire - il devra répondre avec tous ses biens, non seulement ceux qu’il possède présentement mais également ceux qu’il pourrait acquérir dans le futur, jusqu’à l’apurement complet de la dette ».

PACTO JUNTS PEL SÍ-CUP

Cambia el President, se mantiene la estrategia

MARTÍ CAUSSA

2016-01-19 01 MARTÍ CAUSSAEn un sorprendente pacto en el último minuto el dilema “Mas o marzo” que ha dominado el debate político catalán de los últimos meses ha sido evitado. No habrá nuevas elecciones autonómicas en marzo y el presidente de la Generalitat no será Artur Mas, sino Carles Puigdemont. En Catalunya se inicia un rumbo teóricamente claro en su objetivo principal, pero en la práctica lleno de contradicciones y un nuevo pulso entre el movimiento soberanista catalán y el Estado español; este último, después de las elecciones del 20D, no tiene gobierno ni una orientación política clara, pero sus fuerzas mayoritarias son firmemente contrarias a reconocer el derecho a decidir de Catalunya.

In Portugal, an unlikely deal for the Left begets victories and exposes all contradictions

by CAMARGO João

2016-01-14 02 CAMARGO JoãoAfter the Portuguese general election last October it seemed unlikely that the actual outcome could have made such a long run. The Socialist Party, led by Antonio Costa, had to choose between its utter surrender to the center-right or a shift to the left, pressured by the relative majority of the right-wing coalition that governed in Portugal during the troika years on the one side, and a rising left on the other.

Left Bloc’s pressure to drop the right-wing government and sustain a Socialist Party’s government with the help of the Communist Party and the Greens paid off when the Socialists, with 28% of the vote, and the left, representing close to 20% of the vote, joined in Parliament and failed the right-wing’s coalition government program, forcing the right-wing president to call on Costa to constitute a government against his expressed will.

Après la COP21. Retirer du CO2 de l’atmosphère ? – Les « technologies à émissions négatives » : nouveau mirage, nouvelles menaces

par TANURO Daniel

2016-01-14 01 TANURO DanielAuteur notamment de L’impossible capitalisme vert et de plusieurs articles pour Contretemps-web, Daniel Tanuro revient ici sur l’après-COP21, notamment sur l’illusion des « technologies à émissions négatives », et défend l’urgence de solutions écosocialistes à la crise climatique.

Dans un article écrit à chaud sur le résultat de la COP21, je m’interrogeais sur le paradoxe suivant : alors que la dangerosité du changement climatique se concrétise plus vite que projeté dans les modèles, l’année où les spécialistes estiment que les émissions mondiales de gaz à effet de serre devraient commencer à diminuer pour rester au-dessous de 2°C de réchauffement semble reculer, donnant l’impression que le risque a été surestimé, que toutes les solutions pour éviter une catastrophe restent ouvertes et qu’elles le resteront encore un certain temps.

A new political situation in Latin America: What lies ahead?

"Venezuela defines the future of the progressive cycle"

An interview with Claudio Katz

2016-01-08 01 Claudio-KatzTwo recent events — the second-round victory on November 22 of right-wing candidate Mauricio Macri in Argentina’s presidential election, and the December 6 victory of the right-wing Democratic Unity Roundtable, |1| winning two thirds of the seats in Venezuela’s National Assembly elections — have radically altered the political map in South America. In the following interview, Argentine Marxist Claudio Katz discusses what these setbacks for the left mean for the progressive “process of change” that has unfolded on the continent over the last 10-15 years. My translation from the Spanish.