Discussion: No Borders and No Borders Camp in Calais 2009

[durruti02]

I'm not going to get into another "immigration" thing here because I've done it before and it never goes anywhere, but you can't say that neo-liberalism simultaneously supports "no borders" but then uses borders.

It needs borders to demarcate groups of people that can be treated differently. The "no borders" is a threat to neo-liberalism (though not a big threat politically because they've got their PR sewn up on that basis) because it denies them the opportunity to designate certain people as having fewer rights, which is passed down to enable attacks on and division of workers.

It's not "no borders", it's "the borders we want". "We" not being us.

yes i appreciate much of the above

Yes neo libs like having a state ( though not paying too much for it ) that will do as they say, and act to divide the w/c ( though i suspect total libertairians do support genuinely no borders) but i still think the neo libs want their cake and to eat it .. they want 'no borders' to their importation of cheap labour .. (in fact see the debate among the right in the USA ... while most are xenophobic many state how important the supply of cheap labour is to capital) .. while at the same time, as you say, they want political 'borders' to control us ..

so yes theortcially 'no borders' is a threat to neo libs but that is way too obscure for a campaign to attract mass support to a level where it can influence

as i say above it is one thing being theoretically correct, it is another constructing a campaign that can change things

 

[Fedayn]

My tuppence worth, as a 'glib' slogan 'No Borders' is meaningless at best arguably off-putting at worst. The point is that whilst supporting, defending and arguing for 'no borders' in the here and now it seems to have become some kind of bizarre 'litmus test' with some of the Left what does it mean to the wider public? At the present it means-whether those on the Left support it ot not, another arsenal in the bosses armoury to try and undercut wages. Yes the issue of TU rates for all, solidarity with those coming to work here is one anyone should support and no doubt all on here on the Left do. However the issue of 'No Borders' when we have absolutely no control over those borders is in who's interest? The bosses clearly support and demand free movement of capital and at times support the free movement of labour. The EU being a glaring example. So, in the here and now, when we can't even get socialists elected into a Europe wide parliament, what does 'No borders' actually mean when we have absolutely zero power in demanding it let alone ion actually organising it?

 

[JHE]

My tuppence worth, as a 'glib' slogan 'No Borders' is meaningless at best arguably off-putting at worst.

No borders is very much NOT what any putative socialist country has had. Try turning up in Cuba uninvited and announcing that you'd like to live there, please.

Trots, even if they love no other state, love the early Soviet Union. The Bolsheviks understood that they had to control their borders.

Anarchs, even if they love no other revolutionary wotsits, love the Spanish Anarchs and their revolutionary wotsits in response to the military rising in 36. The Anarchs understood that they had to guard their borders, too.

 

[free spirit]

My take on no borders fwiw

If there is to be absolute freedom of movement for transnational capital then there must also be absolute freedom of movement of people / labour.

IF there isn't, then it means that those unfortunate enough to live in countries where there is effecively an oversupply of cheap labour (in economiic terminology) will have no alternative but to effectively be economic slaves to the global capitalist system in a country that is in effect simply one huge open prison / slave labour camp. The vast majority of people in those countries mostly have the choice of work for global capitalism for 18 hours a day for less than subsistence pay or not work for it and beg in the streets / die because global capitalism has already (mostly) stolen their land from them, and stolen their countries natural resources in the guise of the IMF / World Bank's structural ajustment programmes or whatever they're latest names is for stripping countries of everything of value under the guise of 'development'.

Having 'no borders' would effectively mean that people could leave from those countries in search of better paid work elsewhere, which would have the effect of

1. Reducing the size of the labour pool in that country, eventually to the point where employers actually had to start increasing pay, reducing working hours and improving conditions in order to retain their workforce, rather than simply working people to death then brining in replacements.
2. Reduce international innequality levels by the additional levels of migrant workers sending additional money back to their home countries (worth fuckloads more globally than all global aid combined), which would in turn boost the home countries economy as there's more money to be spent in shops on local produce that works it's way all through the economy.
3. If done on an international basis, there'd be nowhere left for the international race to the bottom to race to - or more to the point the bottom would be rising fairly rapidly, and international capital wouldn't be able to play one slave labour camp off against another as easily because the workforce could just go and work somewhere else with better pay and conditions (or at least threaten too).
4. Mean that there would no longer be a huge pool of illegal migrant workers across the developed world willing / forced to undermine local minimum wages, not pay tax or national insurance etc etc because they are illegal workers. All workers would be legal, and on a relatively level playing field when it came to their living costs etc, and there's no reason why local / national agreements such as those in the lyndsey dispute can't be applied to both UK and migrant workers equally IMO. Therefore, I'd contend that a true no borders policy could well have the potential to actually lesson the impact of migration on the wage levels of the lowest paid jobs.
5. It'd stop thousands of people a year from dying in ever more desperate attempts to get into Europe / USA on make shift rafts / overcrowded boats / underneath trains etc etc. ffs if people are prepared to go to such lengths to get into the country just to have the chance to work their bollocks off, I really don't see how they're going to be anything other than a positive influence on the country... it'd also stop the whole forced prostitution racket in it's tracks as the people traffickers would have no hold over the women/girls.

Having said all of this, I don't believe for one second in the neoliberal experiment for one second, so all of the above is not actually my preferred option, more the making the best of a bad job option, to use the neoliberalist philosophies against them.

I don't think capital should have total impunity to move whereever it wants, do whatever it wants, fuck over whoever it wants not only without fear of meaningful prosecution, but actually with the full political and financial backing of governments and institutions like the WTO, WOrld Bank, IMF.

I believe that there should be strict limits placed on capital to ensure that it is subservient to the social and environmental impacts of it's activities. I believe that local communities should be given final say over any developments that affect their areas, that the wto, world bank and IMF should be abbolished as the failed and discredited institutions that they are, that all deals done over the last 60 years under their auspices should be investigated, and the multinationals be stripped of their assets where wrong doing is shown to have been done (pretty much every deal they've ever done IMO)...

basically I believe that the neoliberal global capitalist experiment should be declared morally, ideologically, ethically and financially bankrupt, be killed off, with it's leading ideologues having 95% of their assets given over to a new ethical global fund to be redistributed back to those at the bottom of the pile, and most of them should be imprisoned for significant periods of time for the crimes against humanity that they have been implicit in via the corporatoins they controlled (or should have done).

If this was done, then no borders would also not be an issue because international inequality would be so dramatically reduced (ok maybe after the initial chaos has died down) that there'd be no massive demand for it, and no real problem with a few people deciding they wanted to go and work in the UK just like so many brits have no problem emigrating to spain / australia / canada / new zealand etc and laws ensuring that all workers were paid the same rate for the same job in the same location could easily stop any lingering problems (laws currently virtually impossible under WTO rules).


The problem IMO is that there is precious little evidence that the working class in this country have any sort of a grasp of this situation, never mind any thoughts of doing anything about it other than looking on bemused at any talk of targetting the IMF / G8 / WTO / World Bank / Multinationals.

Maybe if we actually had no borders then there'd be enough people who'd migrate to the developed world who'd actually experienced the full horror of neoliberalism at it's worst that their stories might finally provoke the great mass of the working class of this country out of their slumber and onto the streets in solidarity with their brothers and sisters around the world, and there could finally be a real global movement capable of ridding the world of the scourge neoliberalism (and I'm not talking about a movement led by st bono or his bobness)


*note, I am not a member of no borders, but have in the past given this a fair degree of thought to sus out if I agreed with their position or not, and I know that this is the generaly background philosophy that no borders emerged from - ie the PGA inspired pre-globalise resistance, anti-neoliberal globalisation / anti-cap movement. I'm pretty sure that much of what I've posted would be pretty good potted summary of their position, or at least the position when no borders first kicked off, obviously with my own personal twist.

 

[free spirit]

My tuppence worth, as a 'glib' slogan 'No Borders' is meaningless at best arguably off-putting at worst. The point is that whilst supporting, defending and arguing for 'no borders' in the here and now it seems to have become some kind of bizarre 'litmus test' with some of the Left what does it mean to the wider public? At the present it means-whether those on the Left support it ot not, another arsenal in the bosses armoury to try and undercut wages. Yes the issue of TU rates for all, solidarity with those coming to work here is one anyone should support and no doubt all on here on the Left do. However the issue of 'No Borders' when we have absolutely no control over those borders is in who's interest? The bosses clearly support and demand free movement of capital and at times support the free movement of labour. The EU being a glaring example. So, in the here and now, when we can't even get socialists elected into a Europe wide parliament, what does 'No borders' actually mean when we have absolutely zero power in demanding it let alone ion actually organising it?

no borders would mean everyone could come here legally, so there's be no human trafficing, no half a million or so people in the UK illegally who're presumably working in some form or another and presumably mostly not paying tax or ni, and not subject to minimum wage levels... ie there's half a million people living and working in this country right now who have no choice but to undercut local wage levels in order to get work, and have no recourse to the authorities if employers mistreating them, forcing them to work excessive (dangerous) hours, making them live 15 people to a shed hotbunking etc etc.

The horse has bolted, in fact the entire fucking stables have bolted out the back door of the stables while billions of quid are being wasted reinforcing the front of the stable door. It is not legal migrants that you need to worry about undercutting wages (though properly enforcable wage agreements for both UK and foreign workers may well be needed in come industries), it's the half a million or so illegal migrants already here that you / we should be worried about, as it's them who unscrupulous employers will use to undercut those firms who're doing things by the book, resulting in properly paid workers beign made redundant in favour of cheap illegal foreign workers working in shit conditions.

IMO

 

[tbaldwin]

Having 'no borders' would effectively mean that people could leave from those countries in search of better paid work elsewhere, which would have the effect of

1. Reducing the size of the labour pool in that country, eventually to the point where employers actually had to start increasing pay, reducing working hours and improving conditions in order to retain their workforce, rather than simply working people to death then brining in replacements.
2. Reduce international innequality levels by the additional levels of migrant workers sending additional money back to their home countries (worth fuckloads more globally than all global aid combined), which would in turn boost the home countries economy as there's more money to be spent in shops on local produce that works it's way all through the economy.
3. If done on an international basis, there'd be nowhere left for the international race to the bottom to race to - or more to the point the bottom would be rising fairly rapidly, and international capital wouldn't be able to play one slave labour camp off against another as easily because the workforce could just go and work somewhere else with better pay and conditions (or at least threaten too).
4. Mean that there would no longer be a huge pool of illegal migrant workers across the developed world willing / forced to undermine local minimum wages, not pay tax or national insurance etc etc because they are illegal workers. All workers would be legal, and on a relatively level playing field when it came to their living costs etc, and there's no reason why local / national agreements such as those in the lyndsey dispute can't be applied to both UK and migrant workers equally IMO. Therefore, I'd contend that a true no borders policy could well have the potential to actually lesson the impact of migration on the wage levels of the lowest paid jobs.
5. It'd stop thousands of people a year from dying in ever more desperate attempts to get into Europe / USA on make shift rafts / overcrowded boats / underneath trains etc etc. ffs if people are prepared to go to such lengths to get into the country just to have the chance to work their bollocks off, I really don't see how they're going to be anything other than a positive influence on the country... it'd also stop the whole forced prostitution racket in it's tracks as the people traffickers would have no hold over the women/girls.

.

Crikey where can i start!!!!!!
The idea that migration makes the world a more equal place really is utter rubbish....you think remittances from migrant workers somehow is going to trickle down and make poorer countries richer......Utter free market bullshit....
You really believe that removing immigration controls wouldlead to less forced prostitution......Crikey.......HELP....

 

[durruti02]

interesting post freespirit .. hmm .. so are us saying NB came out of anti globalisation, but are taking an ultra neo liberal libertarian position as pure libertarianism destroys neo liberalism?? interesting .. but as i say utterly without a means to acheive this .. i agree with this bit "..I believe that local communities should be given final say over any developments that affect their areas.."

 

[durruti02]

Crikey where can i start!!!!!!
The idea that migration makes the world a more equal place really is utter rubbish....you think remittances from migrant workers somehow is going to trickle down and make poorer countries richer......Utter free market bullshit....
You really believe that removing immigration controls wouldlead to less forced prostitution......Crikey.......HELP....

he said " Having said all of this, I don't believe for one second in the neoliberal experiment for one second, so all of the above is not actually my preferred option, more the making the best of a bad job option, to use the neoliberalist philosophies against them."

but that bit is in theory correct .. but it is as you say totally bonkers free market bullshite that would involve the movement of billions of people .. and that it appears to be behind NB!!

 

[Shevek]

In principle I agree with No Borders I just don't know how it would work in practice. Durrutti I don't think there is anything wrong in being idealistic and having an internationalist approach I just think there are shades of grey. If you read the anarchist faq on the internet or much of Chomskys work (ie @narchism) I agree with it I just happen to be a member of the Lib Dems. I stood for election in an area with a large working class (if you want to use that term) population, according to my bf its one of the most deprived wards in the country (apart from the plush flats at either end of the neighbourhood). So in principle I agree with NB but I don't know how it works in practice and I don't know how you sell that idea on the streets. I have already mentioned this in a previous thread but when I was out campaigning for election in 2008 I encountered a lot of racism. I think there has to be a stepwise approach. I would like to see complete freedom of movement for all people but maybe suddenly removing all the borders (if in dreamland it could be done) would be counter productive.

 

[tbaldwin]

In principle I agree with No Borders I just don't know how it would work in practice. Durrutti I don't think there is anything wrong in being idealistic and having an internationalist approach.

I think there is plenty wrong with being idealistic if your ideas are really badly thought out..And i think that the term internationalist shouldnt be used by people who say they believe in this nonsense. Its survival of the fittest politics dressed up as something harmless. ITS NOT. Economic migration makes the world a far more unequal place.

 

[free spirit]

Crikey where can i start!!!!!!
The idea that migration makes the world a more equal place really is utter rubbish....you think remittances from migrant workers somehow is going to trickle down and make poorer countries richer......Utter free market bullshit....
You really believe that removing immigration controls wouldlead to less forced prostitution......Crikey.......HELP....

Having said all of this, I don't believe for one second in the neoliberal experiment for one second, so all of the above is not actually my preferred option,

as in, yes I am fully aware that there are better solutions, but I see fuck all movement towards them happening, or even any really signs that there is any sort of collective consiousness building up around the real nub of the problem that might indicate that there was likely to be anything other than business as usual for at least another generation.

That being the case, I'll back any campaign that aims to free half a million people in this country from the blight of being illegal immigrants with no rights other than the right to be exploited, and in so doing to undercut the pay and conditions of legal workers, that aims to end the deaths of the thousands who die each year trying to migrate to a better life, that aims to at least offer people some degree of freedom from the economic slavery of the current situation.

So yes, I'm using some free market thinking in this, because unless there's been a major change and no fuckers bothered to tell me about it, we actually currently live in pretty much a neoliberal free market capitalist global society, so any changes need to be played out within that framework upto the point where there's any realistic chance of the entire system being brought crashing down. That being the case, IMO we need to understand how the system is currently working, and target some bits of it that are the worst culprits in terms of biasing the system in favour of global capital and against labour / people (particularly those at the very bottom of the pile globally).

The restriction on movement of labour across borders, the economic prison camp countries / continents it creates, and the swathes of illegal migrant workers with no state protection, and no option other than to undercut local pay and conditions, is one of, if not the, biggest of those targets IMO.

as for the rest...

you think remittances from migrant workers somehow is going to trickle down and make poorer countries richer......Utter free market bullshit....

bollocks.

let's take bangladesh as a random example. the value of remittances sent back to bangladesh from overseas workers in 2005-6 was $4.8 billion, out of a total gdb in that year of $201.1 billion. OK, so that's only 2.5% of gdp, but it's 2.5% of gdp that goes direct to those that need it most, and is around 1/3 of the countries total value of exports.

This is no trickle, it's a fucking flood, and it's a flood that cuts out the corrupt middle men, has no admin heavy NGO's pushing wellmeaning, but wrong headed western ideas of what's good for the country, no IMF / World Bank structural ajustment programmes attached to it that mean they can only have the money if they privatise the entire country, cut their social programmes, and mortage their grandchildren to the hilt.

It's about empowering people to sort their own problems out, to not be forced to rely on foreign aid, or state interventions that have been shown to actually had a net negative impact in many cases, and to be able to do so in a way that doesn't involve having to risk their lives, break the law and undermine local minimum wage levels in the countries they're migrating to.

You really believe that removing immigration controls wouldlead to less forced prostitution......Crikey.......HELP....

If anyone from any country was free to simply get on a plane / train / bus / hitch across boarders legally, and arrive in this country (or any other country and work legally, then logic dictates that it'd remove most of the reasons that people use people traffickers to get into a country.
It'd also remove the fear factor, in that on arrival into the UK, if the girls found they were actually expected to work in a brothel rather than on a farm etc. they could actually go to the authorities without fear that the authorities would simply deport them. Now I'm not naive enough to think that it'd stop the trade completely immediately, but at least it would give people different legal options, and I reckon many people traffickers would give it up and move on to doing something else once the flow of willing victims slowed to a trickle.

 

[upsidedownwalrus]

I just can't see how anyone could advocate open borders when there's already so much of a shortage of housing, etc.

 

[tbaldwin]

free spirit im too sleepy to reply properly now.But i really think you need to give this some proper thought...Remittances increase inequality in poorer countries....It doesnt exactlytake a genius to figure out why.

 

[jonH]

what we need is more borders, more autonomy, more diversification

 

[free spirit]

interesting post freespirit .. hmm .. so are us saying NB came out of anti globalisation, but are taking an ultra neo liberal libertarian position as pure libertarianism destroys neo liberalism?? interesting .. but as i say utterly without a means to acheive this ..

no borders is a direct offshoot of the PGA inspired activists of the late 90's, built on the same networks, and same background ideological principles.
IIRC a lot of the activists involved were also involved in the international aspects of that movement - ie working with the Zapatistas, involvement in the caravan of activists that came over from India, as well as many who'd done serious levels of volunteer / paid work in africa etc. (from those that I know of who were involved at the ground level in setting it up).

Most also became or already were heavily involved in refugee and assylum seeker support groups in their local areas, leading into direct action to prevent deportation of assylum seekers they've been supporting, and a much deeper understanding of what's really going on in the world, and the level of suffering that is being caused firstly by the worst excesses of neoliberalist capitalist exploitation around the world, and secondly by the fortress europe style border policies that leave people trapped and unable to escape.

As for taking an ultra neoliberal position... I dont' see it that way. I see it as throwing their own logic back in their faces, at the same time as giving people back control over their own lives and destinies - lives and destinies that are currently controlled by the whims of multinational corporations, the wto / IMF, their governments, our government, and the people traffickers and unscrupulous bosses who seek to exploit their desperate situation. Which IMO is a pretty reasonable internationalist annarchist postion to have.

At the same time, I seriously believe that if done right, it could / should actually reduce the current situation in terms of illegal workers undermining local pay and conditions as all workers would be legal and at least subject to tax, ni and minimum wage. I don't really see why anyone from a Trade Union type background would have a problem with this.

i agree with this bit "..I believe that local communities should be given final say over any developments that affect their areas.."

aha, common ground - not quite sure about all that I wrote, it was a bit of a rant tbf, but the gist of my position should be in there somewhere.

 

[free spirit]

free spirit im too sleepy to reply properly now.But i really think you need to give this some proper thought...Remittances increase inequality in poorer countries....It doesnt exactlytake a genius to figure out why.

tell you what, I've explained my position, how about you explain yours, then I'll actually have some points to counter rather than just a series of glib statements.


please remember that I'm in no way arguing that the solutions I've proposed are anywhere even in the vicinity of being perfect, they are just less imperfect than the current situation, which has left a billion people at or under the poverty line, and another several billion not far off (while a billion or so sit in relative comfort in fortess first world, and a few tens of million swan about playing millionaire / billionaire bingo with the rest of our lives)

Also, as someone who's take on things is most closely aligned with a cross between annarchism and sustainable development (the real version, not the watered down corporate version), I believe in solutions that empower people to actually be able to at least have a vague chance of solving their own problems, and the problems of their community, or at the very least in removing as many of the barriers as possible that are preventing them from doing this.


btw how much proper thought do I need to give this before I'm qualified to pass comment on it?

 

[free spirit]

if there weren't any borders would the british police be able to arrest a frenchman on the streets of calais, could i claim jsa in la, would the nhs send an ambulance to nemhetrkovks?

Game set and match to this poster.

How could you organise anything without national states,health services,welfare, pensions etc......

while there will undoubtedly be some within no borders who actually do advocate the complete scrapping of all governments and state institutions, that is a seperate arguement to the arguement put forward by no borders, which they succinctly put as being

No Borders does not call for a reform of deportation centres or for 'fairer' immigration controls but for their complete abolition. It is an international network demanding freedom of movement for all and working for this through direct action.

It isn't calling for anything along the lines you suggest, with each country still being responsible for sorting out it's own affairs, policing it's streets, providing healthcare for it's citizens etc

I reckon the no borders lot should all go to Somalia to see what happens when the state falls apart...

I must have missed the no borders call out for ethiopia to invade

 

[free spirit]

But i really think you need to give this some proper thought...Remittances increase inequality in poorer countries....It doesnt exactlytake a genius to figure out why.

it's been a while since I researched this, so I thought I'd do a bit of a lit review to see if much had changed in the last 10-15 years or so.

From what I can tell from a quick skim, while there is some contradictory research, and the picture is therefore not clear cut for all situations, the weight of evidence has increased behind the viewpoint I've put forward namely that, in general remittances from migrant workers can be an incredibly powerful tool in terms of poverty reduction.

For the poorest countries the total value of inward investment of foreign capital from remittances is in the region of 213.5% [1] of the total velue of foreign inward investment from banks, international development agencies, donor governments etc. and none (ok, very little) of that money is being syphoned off in bribery, corruption, admin or backhanded deals which mean that most of the money actually goes back to the donor country in contracts awarded to the donor countries companies at exorbitant rates.

The income also allows families to invest their own money into buying new tools, machinery, doing up their houses or paying for eduction for the next generation, rather than the old discredited development model of the small farmers being encouraged to borrow money secured against their land that they are then unable to repay when the rains fail, resulting in them losing their land to the multinationals who are able to buy it at knock down bankrupt stock prices, leaving the farmers landless, destitute, forced to migrate anyway, and often still heavily indebted to the bank despite the sale of their land.

First, constant attention needs to be directed towards the protection of migrants, both male and female.

Second, migration is not a new phenomenon even if there are certain novel aspects about the current situation: it has characterized all societies at all times. Thus, migration
is not suddenly going to stop and cease being a characteristic. Governments need to learn to plan for it and attempts to control population movements within countries have invariably met with a
distinct lack of success over anything but the immediate short term.

Attempts to control movements across international borders have met with greater success but at huge cost both financially and often socially and politically. The issues of border control remain beyond the
limits of this paper but policy makers need to address whether the restriction of movement is in the best interests of their own population as well as the populations of origin areas.​

The weight of the evidence is that mobility enhances economic growth and improves the lot of most, but not all, of the population.
Generally, spatially static populations are likely to be economically stagnant populations.
<snip>

Migration may not be able to eradicate all types of poverty, and may even exacerbate some, but the alternative of attempting to limit or restrict migration is likely to be much less productive.
<snip>​

The challenge to policy makers is to facilitate the types of movement that are most likely to lead to an alleviation of poverty while protecting migrants from abuse and exploitation.
<snip>​

While accepting a variety of outcome, this writer stands by a generalization made earlier in the pages of this journal that "policies that accept the wider mobility of the population are likely to accord with policies that will enhance the well-being of greater numbers of people" (Skeldon 1997b: 3). More recent work of others appears to advocate similar approaches (see, for example, de Haan 2002; Kothari 2002), yet the immediate challenge remains the need to incorporate an appreciation of the potentially positive role of migration in poverty reduction programmes.​

​

​

[source=[FONT=TimesNewRoman,Bold]Migration And Poverty, R. Skeldon]

A paper presented by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to the Earth Summit 2002 argued that if the European Union, Canada, Japan and the United States allowed migrants to make up just 4 per cent of their 14 labour force, the returns to origin areas could be in the region of $US160-200 billion a year, a sum far greater than any potential debt relief (cited in [FONT=TimesNewRoman,Italic]The Guardian[/FONT], 26 August 2002).

[same source]

on the specific point of whether or not remittances increase inequality, tbf from the different studies I've just skimmed, it seems evidence is contradictory, with some studies suggesting remittances can decrease inequality, and others that they may increase inequality, and some that they do both at various stages in the cycle.

The best explanation for these contradictary results seeming to be that it's a dynamic process whereby the best educated, and most well off are the most able to migrate in the early stages, but as the costs of migration decrease, and the access to information and networks of contacts in the host country improve over time, it becomes more viable for the less well off to also migrate. The benefits their familes accrue from this migration are proportionally higher relative to the families existing income than for those who were already relatively well off, and therefore inequality decreases.

Obviously this will not necessarily apply in all situations, but at the very least, it looks pretty obvious that it's not as cut and dried as you make out. You may want to revise your theory to fit with the evidence, unless you want to post up data to back up your assertion?

*as a side note, I found it interesting to note that a lot (not all) of the studies that I could actually access via google were world bank funded. I can see how this could be viewed as evidence that my viewpoint tied in with that of a neoliberal instition, and therefore of neoliberalism itself. Problem with this arguement being that my viewpoint on this hasn't changed since I was studying this at uni in the mid 90's, being taught it by a died in the wool socialist with 30+ years field expereince in international development, a co-author of the brundtland report, and fierce critic of the world bank and neoliberalism. Looks like the world bank researchers at least have at to some extent been forced to come round to the reality of the situation as indicated by several decades of research, and the obvious failures of many of the banks policies... maybe there is some vague hope that the institution may actually be changing after all (more likely they'll just ignore their own research, but who knows).

I'm not that ideologically opposed to the world bank that I'll change my position just because they've changed theirs so that they're now much closer to the position I originally held.

links to some of the articles / research
1 - remittances, development impacts and future prospects - world bank

http://www.observatoriomigrantes.org/ocim/publicaciones/INFORME SOBRE REMESAS.pdf
​

Do International Migration and Remittances Reduce Poverty in Developing Countries?
​

​

RICHARD H. ADAMS JR. and JOHN PAGE * World Bank, Washington, DC, USA

http://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=...ts=c8oAUutpwX&sig=iDsSV40yVU7G5vyRYxun-B2K3zw
​

[/FONT]

 

[durruti02]

as in, yes I am fully aware that there are better solutions, but I see fuck all movement towards them happening, or even any really signs that there is any sort of collective consiousness building up around the real nub of the problem that might indicate that there was likely to be anything other than business as usual for at least another generation.

That being the case, I'll back any campaign that aims to free half a million people in this country from the blight of being illegal immigrants with no rights other than the right to be exploited, and in so doing to undercut the pay and conditions of legal workers, that aims to end the deaths of the thousands who die each year trying to migrate to a better life, that aims to at least offer people some degree of freedom from the economic slavery of the current situation.

So yes, I'm using some free market thinking in this, because unless there's been a major change and no fuckers bothered to tell me about it, we actually currently live in pretty much a neoliberal free market capitalist global society, so any changes need to be played out within that framework upto the point where there's any realistic chance of the entire system being brought crashing down. That being the case, IMO we need to understand how the system is currently working, and target some bits of it that are the worst culprits in terms of biasing the system in favour of global capital and against labour / people (particularly those at the very bottom of the pile globally).

The restriction on movement of labour across borders, the economic prison camp countries / continents it creates, and the swathes of illegal migrant workers with no state protection, and no option other than to undercut local pay and conditions, is one of, if not the, biggest of those targets IMO.

but what is happenning now, open borders for cheap labour but disciplined by political border controls, is utterly fundamental to neo liberalism .. so why on earth would they change this!?

NB has a fundamentalist anti state perspective that has no hope nor path to being acehieved

.. however you are wrong to say there is fuck all else happenning

we DO see good examples where change comes thru w/c struggle .. only this year victories at visteon linamar construction etc etc

and the SOAS issue gives us a window of opportunity ( as did the Atherstone Fire) for a broad based attack on the use of cheap unregulated labour ..

i started a thread recently on CAIC and hwo they have tool a prpgressive stand on the Lindsey disputes .. and i handed out their leaflets at their demo in Watford .. that is the way forward not obscure events like this in Calias

btw you state "I'll back any campaign that aims to free half a million people in this country from the blight of being illegal immigrants with no rights other than the right to be exploited" .. but NB can not and does not have the ability or any potential to do this

 

[durruti02]

no borders is a direct offshoot of the PGA inspired activists of the late 90's, built on the same networks, and same background ideological principles.

IIRC a lot of the activists involved were also involved in the international aspects of that movement - ie working with the Zapatistas, involvement in the caravan of activists that came over from India, as well as many who'd done serious levels of volunteer / paid work in africa etc. (from those that I know of who were involved at the ground level in setting it up).

Most also became or already were heavily involved in refugee and assylum seeker support groups in their local areas, leading into direct action to prevent deportation of assylum seekers they've been supporting, and a much deeper understanding of what's really going on in the world, and the level of suffering that is being caused firstly by the worst excesses of neoliberalist capitalist exploitation around the world, and secondly by the fortress europe style border policies that leave people trapped and unable to escape.

As for taking an ultra neoliberal position... I dont' see it that way. I see it as throwing their own logic back in their faces, at the same time as giving people back control over their own lives and destinies - lives and destinies that are currently controlled by the whims of multinational corporations, the wto / IMF, their governments, our government, and the people traffickers and unscrupulous bosses who seek to exploit their desperate situation. Which IMO is a pretty reasonable internationalist annarchist postion to have.

At the same time, I seriously believe that if done right, it could / should actually reduce the current situation in terms of illegal workers undermining local pay and conditions as all workers would be legal and at least subject to tax, ni and minimum wage. I don't really see why anyone from a Trade Union type background would have a problem with this.

aha, common ground - not quite sure about all that I wrote, it was a bit of a rant tbf, but the gist of my position should be in there somewhere.

1) "..at the same time as giving people back control over their own lives and destinies.." .. but it does not and has no means to do so unlike e.g trade unionism or local e.g. tenants associations. migrants by the nature of who and what tehy are are almost impossible to organise and tbh tend also to be niether interested in commitment to a long term project and tend to be looking at short term gains which they can send back to family

2) "..a pretty reasonable internationalist annarchist postion to have..." disagree .. a reasonable internationalist @ position would be one that can actually DO something .. this is a mistake the left as well as @ have made over and over .. saying you support migrants or palestinians or the iranian uprising is utterly meaningless unless you can actually concretely practically do something

actually we see this best at local level with defence of asylum seeker camapigns but most importnatly in struggles for wages and terms and conditions e.g the RMT and the Cleaners issues

fundamentally we can only influence the way the world works IDF we have some sort of power .. people have swapped the hundreds of years old attempt to acheive this with 'campaigns' that shout loud, appear radical but have not 'roadmap' or actual strategy to acheive their aims

3) "..I seriously believe that if done right,.." in what way could it be done right or acheive anything?

 

[durruti02]

freespirt .. i have still yet to find a link for this but in a book on Italian fascism i was fascinated to read that the Italian communists at the start of the 20thC apparently oppossed mass migration from Italy to the USA, They argued, apparently, that it drained areas of the best skilled and motivated workers, that it allowed capital a safety valve and that remmitances did nothing to develop self orgnaisation and the power needed to change society from what they had then, to one in which people did not HAVE to migrate

.. i find the current so called autonomist communist position coming out of Italy which appears much like NB, totally uncomprehensible in comparison ..

 

[LLETSA]

what we need is more borders, more autonomy, more diversification

Which is what genuine anti-globalisation would look like.

 

[In Bloom]

arguing for 'no borders' in the here and now

No Borders does not simply argue for "'no borders' in the here and now"

Christ, how many fucking times does it have to be said?

 

[In Bloom]

The fact of the matters is that borders do not stop mass migration, it's a physical impossibility, the resources do not exist to police every inch of a nations border.

It's no more possible to prevent migration from poorer contries to rich countries under capitalism than it is to completely abolish borders under capitalism, so while migration might be used by bosses to undermine "native" labour (aided by the fact that migrants are in a more precarious position due to their lesser legal status, not by an absence of borders), the question has to be, how do we respond to migration? Is it better for the working class to be divided against itself or for us to unite against those who would seek to divide us?

 

[In Bloom]

one of the thngs that infuriate me about NB is i do not see any process for change .. it appears to be just another m/c shouty campaign. who are they trying to influence? the UK state? LOL!! UKINC is both allowing the neo libs all the cheap labour they want AND use immigration politically .. why should they listen to a bunch of @s??

Oh come on durruti, you're better than this fatuous bullshit.

No Borders are not a pressure group, they do not aim to abolish borders under capitalism, but to provide practical solidarity with migrants (whether asylum seekers, refugees or migrant workers) while putting forward the political argument that borders create problems for the working class, rather than solving them. They do not always do this in the best way (and I do think the camp is somewhat misguided), but they do a lot of good, practical work and I think they deserve some acknowledgement for this.

 

[LLETSA]

The fact of the matters is that borders do not stop mass migration, it's a physical impossibility, the resources do not exist to police every inch of a nations border.

You can't honestly say that borders have no effect on mass migration though, can you?

 

[moon23]

I'd just like to throw something else into the mix, with the development of techonology won't most borders in the future be elecronic? Take for instance India's announcement that it is going to spend billions to introduce ID cards.

Part of the reason given it to stop illegal immigration:

http://business.rediff.com/report/2009/jun/26/what-nilekani-and-the-new-id-system-will-do.htm

In this country with have the e-borders program and under the transformational government agenda ministers talk about rights and entitlements to service. E.g. if you are a citizen with an ID card you get access to services.

Allready ID cards are issued to overseas nationals and foreign students. We have a network of offices opening up under the control of the IPS to enforce these new electronic borders.

I know NB South Wales have protested about this issue, but should they be focusing more on the digital borders being created?

 

[tbaldwin]

1 tell you what, I've explained my position, how about you explain yours, then I'll actually have some points to counter rather than just a series of glib statements.


2 please remember that I'm in no way arguing that the solutions I've proposed are anywhere even in the vicinity of being perfect, they are just less imperfect than the current situation, which has left a billion people at or under the poverty line, and another several billion not far off (while a billion or so sit in relative comfort in fortess first world, and a few tens of million swan about playing millionaire / billionaire bingo with the rest of our lives)

3 Also, as someone who's take on things is most closely aligned with a cross between annarchism and sustainable development (the real version, not the watered down corporate version), I believe in solutions that empower people to actually be able to at least have a vague chance of solving their own problems, and the problems of their community, or at the very least in removing as many of the barriers as possible that are preventing them from doing this.


4 btw how much proper thought do I need to give this before I'm qualified to pass comment on it?

1 My position is this.

Economic migration makes the world a far more unequal place.
It means poorer countries losing the young and skilled workers they most need.
It creates huge problems already and to argue against all immigration controls is to argue for the catastrophic consequences that would result.

I am against the free market in capital and labour as a socialist i believe both need to be tightly regulated.

2 Not perfect.....yes somewhere between not perfect and genocidal.
Mass economic migration is disastrous. How do you expect people in poorer nations to get on when richer nations poach their skilled workers?

3 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT!!!!!!!! What kind of sustainable development is that thinks the answer to worldwide inequality is for people to move to where the money is rather than for welath to be shared around the world......
Kind of David cameron world view you seem to have....

4 I am not sure to be honest....I think the answer is right in front of your nose so to speak....maybe you just cant see it as its too obvious and are looking for some more complex answer to the bleedin obvious?

 

[free spirit]

but what is happenning now, open borders for cheap labour but disciplined by political border controls, is utterly fundamental to neo liberalism .. so why on earth would they change this!?

NB has a fundamentalist anti state perspective that has no hope nor path to being acehieved

.. however you are wrong to say there is fuck all else happenning

we DO see good examples where change comes thru w/c struggle .. only this year victories at visteon linamar construction etc etc

and the SOAS issue gives us a window of opportunity ( as did the Atherstone Fire) for a broad based attack on the use of cheap unregulated labour ..

i started a thread recently on CAIC and hwo they have tool a prpgressive stand on the Lindsey disputes .. and i handed out their leaflets at their demo in Watford ..

as I said - fuck all. These are mere pinpricks of resistance, and they exist in the intellectual vacuum that is the UK trade union movement. Actually let's take a second to look at exactly how morally, intellectually and ethically bankrupt the UK trade union movement is shall we...

it's a movement that has consistently for the last 15 years funded one of the most neo-liberal parties in the world to power, kept it there with it's fuinding and failed utterly to hold it to any sort of account (with a few honourable exceptions).

It's a movement who's response to a multinational company closing or threatening to close a factory is to call for state aid for that multinational company in the mistaken belief that this would be anything other than a temporary reprieve, and when the multinational does finally pack up and leave, instead of doing something proactive like supporting the workers to take over the factory and run it as a workers co-op, the unions standard reaction is to lobby the government / rda for more state aid to encourage more multinationals to set up shop in the area... fucking genius idea.

It's a movement that (in this country at least) has basically got no clue whatsoever how to deal with extreme neoliberalist globalisation of the last 20-30 years, or even in most cases what the term actually means.

It's a movement who's leaders have allowed themselves to be cowed by even the slightest possibility that they might get baged up... how many trade unionists have gone to prison for even an overnight stay in the last 20 years compared to those from the DA / No Borders / Dissent side of the fight? cowards IMO.

The TU response effectively has been to keep on paying the piper while whispering in his ear to see if he might have a quiet word with the global corporate bosses to ask them if they wouldn't mind awfully fucking over their members marginally less.

On a shop floor level the TU response has been to bury their heads in the sand, then adopt a scared rabbit trapped in the headlights when the sand dissappears and they suddenly realise there's been a juggernaught heading for them all the time. Shortly before they get splatted they look around to see millions of other shop floor stewards all around them mostly still with their heads buried in the sand, and some already splatted, and a thought crosses their minds that maybe if everyone had taken their heads from the sand they could collectively have stopped the juggernaught, but they'd believed their leaders bullshit about burying your heads in the sand being the best policy, and meekly gone along with it and now they too have been splatted, but yet the policy doesn't change.


so when you say NB has "no hope nor path to being acehieved", I'd merely point you at the crumbling ruins of your house and suggest that you put it in order before issuing lectures to others.

that is the way forward not obscure events like this in Calias

this obscure event in calais as you call it has brought together in the region of a thousand activists from all over europe to firstly raise the profile of the campaign and the plight of those left trapped outside the system, desperate and destitute on the streets of calais, secondly to give these people some hope and restore some faith in humanity, and thirdly to give no borders international activists the chance to meet up, exchange ideas, and strengthen the bonds needed to build a truely international movement that has the potential to achieve their aims.

btw you state "I'll back any campaign that aims to free half a million people in this country from the blight of being illegal immigrants with no rights other than the right to be exploited" .. but NB can not and does not have the ability or any potential to do this

well, here we have it in a nutshell - the difference between the trad left, and our mob.

Our mob see the juggernaught coming and immediately crack on with building a barricade to stop it, sure in the knowledge that they can't build the barrier by themselve, but confident that if they start building the barricade then others will see the logic in what they're doing and join them until the barricade get's built so easily that nobody can even remember it seeming like a stupid idea in the beginning.

The trad left hold a meeting, decide it's pointless, go to the pub and take the piss out of the loonies building a barricade until the barricade get's built, at which point you declare that you knew all along that building a barricade was a good idea, and supported it in principle, and that the barricade builders should now join your movement and let you lead them because they've obviously got no real intellectual grounding or working class roots.

 

[free spirit]

1 My position is this.

Economic migration makes the world a far more unequal place.
It means poorer countries losing the young and skilled workers they most need.
It creates huge problems already and to argue against all immigration controls is to argue for the catastrophic consequences that would result.

and do you have any research findings to back up that position, or is that just a hunch you're working on based purely on a logical extension of your personaly political ideological position?

if it's the latter, have you considered the possiiblity that your personal political position is in fact wrong?

I am against the free market in capital and labour as a socialist i believe both need to be tightly regulated.

2 Not perfect.....yes somewhere between not perfect and genocidal.
Mass economic migration is disastrous. How do you expect people in poorer nations to get on when richer nations poach their skilled workers?

sorry, but the genocide is already happening, and you position traps people in those economically failed countries and robs them of the route that has been used throughout history by people struggling for their very survival - migration.
To put this into a historical context, your position would have trapped millions of Irish people in Ireland in the midst of the potato famines and left them to starve to death - ie genocide.
Your position is currently trapping hundreds of millions of people around the world in abject poverty with no means of escaping it.

It's a position essentially of 'That's your lot, like it or lump it', a position that would be morally bankrupt in any case, but is especially so when you consider the fact that it is in most cases our corporations backed by our governments who've robbed their countries blind, robbed the people blind, and forced those countries to cut their social welfare and education programmes in order to pay back their debts (or to do so in exchange for us dropping the debt).

We caused these problems, or at the very least we as a people didn't stand up and fight for these people when our governments and corporations were inflicting the worst of this damage on them, so we should take some fucking responsibility for that situation.

As for poaching the best workers... that is what is happening now. We now only allow workers with certain key skills that we want into our country, which of course means that it creates a skills shortage in those other countries (particularly when we've forced them to cut spending on education so they have less of a pool of educated people to draw on than they should have done). In case you missed it, this is not the position of no borders, and it is not my position.

3 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT!!!!!!!! What kind of sustainable development is that thinks the answer to worldwide inequality is for people to move to where the money is rather than for welath to be shared around the world......

erm, not surprisingly you've missed the point because you're facing in the wrong direction with your fingers in your ears going lalalalala I can't hear you.

The entire point is that this is just another way of redistributing wealth more fairly around the world.

It is a method of doing so that has been used successfully throughout history by civilisation after civilisation, yet you seem to think that somehow you're able to just discredit it entirely based on your word alone - no proof needed, no evidence to back up your ideas, the intellect that is TBaldwin has spoken and all must be as you say.

It is also a method that avoids all the problems associated with pretty much any of the well meaning or otherwise attempts at state / international governmental / NGO assistance. All the money sent back goes directly to families on the ground level who get full freedom to decide for themselves what to do with the money, how best to spend it to improve the lives of themselves and that of their communities, which all the evidence demonstrates to be the most succesfull, most cost effective, and most sustainable method of encouraging development in those areas where it is most needed.

I'm not surprised you've come up with the position you've come up with as a socialist. The standard socialist line being that government knows best and must decide for the people what's best, and therefore all development money should be funded through government programmes etc. etc. Well, would it surprise you to know that this has been fully discredited in full field scale trials over decades affecting the lives of billions of people, and costing both us and them hundreds of billions of dollars? It's not a bad theory, it's just wrong.

Kind of David cameron world view you seem to have....

sorry, but you can fuck right off with that sort of shit, particularly when you're arguing the same line as that pushed by the daily mail - think about it eh.

4 I am not sure to be honest....I think the answer is right in front of your nose so to speak....maybe you just cant see it as its too obvious and are looking for some more complex answer to the bleedin obvious?

or maybe the onus is on you to provide any sort of evidence that backs up your assertions seeing as you're going against the weight of historical evidence, as well as the weight of current research.