Category Archives: Wage Slavery

POLITICS Blitz farm inspections welcomed COSATU

Sizwe Pamla |

19 April 2017

Purpose is to ensure employers meet required conditions and standards set by labour laws, says federation

COSATU supports the Minister of Labour; Mildred Oliphants plan for blitz farm inspections in KwaZulu-Natal farms this coming Friday 21 April 2017

19 April 2017

The Congress of South African Trade Unions commends the Minister of Labour; Mildred Oliphant for leading a team of labour inspectors and other law enforcement agencies to conduct blitz farm inspections in KwaZulu-Natal this comingFriday ,21 April 2017.The purpose of these inspections according to the department is to ensure that employers are meeting the required conditions and standards set by our labour laws.

This is long overdue and we want to see more of these kinds of inspections taking place all across the country. COSATU has been urging the department of Labour to intensify farm inspections and make sure that farmers comply with Sectoral determination minimum wagesBasic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA)and all other prescripts ofLabour Relations Act (LRA).

We have been perturbed for a long time by reports that some farmers are deducting electricity, water and rent money to counter the minimum wage. Most farmers still behave like slave masters in this country.

COSATU wants to see moreintergovernmental coordinationto fight the modern day slavery that is still thriving on our farms. Not only do workers experience, extreme exploitation like these illegal deductions, they also suffer from physical and psychological abuse in the workplace.

During our ongoing Back to Basics and Workplace visits campaign that started last year directed mostly at vulnerable workers, COSATU discovered that on top of these illegal deductions, many workers are forced to exceed the maximum working hours permitted by law. They do not receive the required overtime pay or time off, including overtime provisions.

Most of them do not enjoy their rights to paid sick, family and annual leave. They are mostly not included under the UIF, due to the non-payment of UIF fees by the employers, and also do not enjoy full maternity leave benefits and rights.

The Human Rights Commission should also take on the blatant violation of farm workers rights by farmers. The department of Labour needs to also work to remove the rotten Labour inspectors, who sometimes collude with these exploitative farmers. We also call on the South African Police Service to root out corruption in their ranks and dismiss those officers, who also collude with farmers and are implicated in enforcing illegal evictions.

Issued by Sizwe Pamla, National Spokesperson, COSATU, 19 April 2017

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Blitz farm inspections welcomed COSATU - Politicsweb

Hidden files reveal plight of the boys 'made into slaves'

Independent.ie

A notorious industrial school in Limerick was paid to send boys under the age of 16 to work for traders, merchants and big farmers, according to hundreds of documents that have remained hidden for decades.

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/hidden-files-reveal-plight-of-the-boys-made-into-slaves-35626496.html

http://www.independent.ie/incoming/article35626193.ece/fd1f5/AUTOCROP/h342/Tom%20Wall%20Glin%20Co%20Limerick_11%20Read-Only.jpg

A notorious industrial school in Limerick was paid to send boys under the age of 16 to work for traders, merchants and big farmers, according to hundreds of documents that have remained hidden for decades.

Experts say the find demonstrates local communities were involved in the industrialisation and exploitation of marginalised children.

There is no record of the boys receiving money for their work among the files rescued from Glin Industrial School. An abuse survivor from the school called the contracts "slave deals, tying boys to a 'master' for up to three years".

Former Glin boy Tom Wall, who saved the documents from being destroyed, said he believes the commission of inquiry into the abuse of children should be reopened as the records show the practice of "licensing out" children was widespread. "I would never have thought slavery existed in Ireland until I went through these. All these documents need to be gone through now. Someone needs to look at it," said Tom.

"The congregations that were set up to help the poor children totally strayed from their foundation. They finished up exploiting the children and that is the saddest part of this. They ended up making money out of poverty."

These records were not included in the 2009 Ryan Report following the inquiry as they only came to light two years ago. They were seen publicly for the first time last week.

The Ryan Report previously found there had been provisions enabling schools to "license out" children to a "trustworthy and respectable person" to help assimilate the child into society. The report states licensing was a rare occurrence. However, it said "a severe, systemic regime of corporal punishment" was evident at Glin with deficiencies in care. Two Christian Brothers were previously transferred there, despite evidence or suspicion of sexually abusing boys in another institution.

Dublin City University deputy president Daire Keogh has studied and written about the Christian Brothers throughout his career. He said the practice of licensing children was a way for locals to avail of cheap labour.

He added the practice was a major bone of contention for many former industrial school residents, who often left the country for England shortly after the school's contract with local businesses was terminated.

"These farmers seldom kept boys on once they became men and wouldn't pay an adult wage. The whole thing reflects the level of societal collusion and institutionalisation and exploitation of marginalised kids."

The indentures, or contracts, between Glin and local businessmen or farmers tied the boys to new masters for three years. The monthly sums paid for the use of the boys increased for every year served, often from 3, to 5 and 8.

Under the terms of the indentures, the boys - referred to as apprentices - were prevented from getting married or working for a competitor. They could not drink, play cards or "absent himself from his said master's service day or night unlawfully".

The indentures seen by the Sunday Independent are dated between 1895 and 1914. However, Tom also has more recent documents and ledgers dated up to the 1950s.

Among them are hundreds of committal orders, discharge summaries and personal letters sent to, and by, the boys staying in the school. It appears the personal letters Tom rescued were never delivered.

Tom was born to a single mother in a mother and baby home in Newcastle West and was admitted to Glin Industrial School when he was three years old. His committal form was discovered among the rescued documents and shows he was deemed "illegitimate".

Letters from to and from his mother were among those that were never delivered.

"I asked about her on numerous occasions and I was told she was dead. I found out she was actually living in Newcastle West. I searched everywhere looking for her but nobody had heard of a Josephine Wall.

"By the time I found her she only had about six weeks to live. She was dying of cancer. I just made it but she was very sick in bed. I met with her a couple of times and asked why she never came to see me. She said: 'I called three or four times but I wasn't allowed in. The brothers told me you wanted no more to do with me.'

"I told her I wrote letters. She said she was writing letters as well but I never got a letter. There was no communication, no hope of getting anything through.

"I asked her about my father but she never let me know and I never found out."

Tom said growing up in Glin was horrific. He was sexually abused and faced regular beatings. He can recall most of them and still bears the scars from one of the beatings on his forehead. He fell while being thrashed and his head was "split open".

He was also accused of absconding from the school after going through some nearby fields in search of food before returning in time for dinner.

"We were down in the fields looking for a few blackberries on briars because we were starving. We never got much food and you were always hungry.

"Didn't one of the brothers come looking for us and it was said that we absconded but we hadn't gone anywhere.

"I got such a beating. That will always stay with me."

However, he was deemed to be a "very good child", according to the records, and a "good worker". He was kept on at the school after his discharge to help with maintenance and the running of the buildings.

In 1973, with the school about to close, he was told by a brother to take record books and ledgers from a pile of documents and place them in the boot of a car. The rest were to be destroyed.

Some were burned but he held on to many of the documents as he wanted to see if they contained information about his past and his mother. Tom kept the liberated files in an attic for more than 40 years.

"All I was interested in was finding something in the documents about myself. I was not into history or anything like that. I wanted to know about myself.

"I put them up in the attic and they remained there undisturbed until the roof tiles started slipping in 2015. Then I went to look for an archivist or someone who could do something with them."

He offered them to the University of Limerick (UL) but they remained untouched there for two years. He removed them from the university's Glucksman Library last week following a row over the ownership of the documents that prevented UL from putting them on display.

The Christian Brothers sent archivists and legal representatives to view the files in UL. They then claimed ownership and demanded the documents be returned for storage in their own archives in Dublin. They threatened legal action to obtain them.

After visiting their archives, Tom was not satisfied that the documents would be made publicly available and he was concerned that they would be difficult to access.

Tom's case was highlighted in the Dail last month by Fianna Fail TD Niall Collins and the European Province of Christian Brothers has since changed its stance, saying it would be happy to receive copies of the documents rather than the originals.

"We advised UL that were we to be provided with appropriate copies of the Glin documents for our archive we would have no objection to the original papers being donated to the university," said a spokesman.

He conceded there were gaps in the Christian Brothers' archives but described the suggestion Tom was told to burn records at the school as a "claim" and not in line with the congregation's policy. He refused to be drawn on the indentures or contracts when questioned by the Sunday Independent.

Tom has now called on the State to intervene and said all the documents must be put on display so people can see what happened.

"The archives are too sealed up and inaccessible. I think these papers can serve a purpose.

"The public and relatives of residents should be able to see them. They must be accessible."

Sunday Independent

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Hidden files reveal plight of the boys 'made into slaves' - Irish Independent

COTU has dismissed assertions by employers that increasing worker's minimum wage will push potential investors to relocate to other countries.

Secretary general Francis Atwoli said the statement by FKE is not only misleading but doesn't also make economic sense.

He castigated FKE boss Jacqueline Mugo for insinuating that wage increases have pushed companies' cost of doing business by 30 per cent.

"This is unacceptable when the very companies have been talking the same language over the years yet they are stuck here in Kenya."

"If at all doing business in Kenya is expensive, why not proceed as of yesterday to Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi, Ethiopia and anywhere else?"Atwoli asked.

He said in a press statement that Kenya houses the headquarters of most companies including those operating in Rwanda, Ethiopia, Uganda, Malawi among others.

Atwoli said the entities' monies are in Kenyan banks adding that such comparisons are a clear mockery to the Kenyan workers.

"We caution employers not to be proud of paying slavery wages to their employees."

He said COTU is happy with this weeks announcement by President Uhuru Kenyatta that he will consider their request.

Uhuru, when he toured the United Aryan Company, said he will impress upon employers to increase workers salaries during Labour Day.

"For the last two years, we have not increased salaries for private sector workers."

"On Labour Day, we will press upon your employers to increase your salaries," Uhuru said.

Read: Expect higher salaries after Labour Day, Uhuru tells workers

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Atwoli, employers' federation boss Mugo split over salary increase ... - The Star, Kenya

FOCUS Administration, Charlottesville community consider reparations by Hannah Hall | Apr 13 2017 | 22 hours ago

Colleges and universities across the country are wrestling with the question of how to tell a more inclusive story of their pasts.

In September, for example, Georgetown University announced they will offer preferential admission to the descendants of the 272 slaves sold to benefit the school in the 1800s. The school will also name two buildings to honor those enslaved as well as create a memorial.

The University of Virginia was founded by Thomas Jefferson, who over his lifetime owned over 600 slaves and relied on the labor of enslaved workers for almost five decades. There are some who believe the University has a responsibility to confront its past and make meaningful changes.

More and more attention has been drawn to this issue over the past decade, beginning with the creation of the University and Community Action for Racial Equity in 2007 and the development of the Presidents Commission on Slavery and the University founded in 2013.

These organizations, among others, are playing an important role in confronting the past of both the University and the City of Charlottesville. However, there continues to be a discussion between the University and the larger community on how broader changes and repairs can be or if they should be made.

Discussions of reparations

The term reparations has been used for decades to address the relationship between the U.S. government and the descendants of former slaves. Hearing the term often incites a variety of emotions and reactions, not all positive.

[Reparations are] emotionally charged, and it conjures up in peoples minds the government, whether at the local, state or federal level, handing out money to people, said John Mason, former vice chair of the Charlottesville Blue Ribbon Commission on Race, Memorials and Public Spaces and an associate history professor at the University.

For both Mason and Frank Dukes, one of the founders of UCARE and a member of the faculty with the Institute for Environmental Negotiations, the term repair rather than reparations is a more accurate representation of the work they are hoping to do. Using the term repair better describes the work that is done in the community, which is often more than simply offering money as an apology.

If you throw out the word reparations, but use the word repair, maybe thats more understandable for people, if you can say theres a harm thats been done, and things have been broken, and they havent been fixed yet, Dukes said.

The term repair extends much further than a simple payout to the descendants of those who were enslaved. For Georgetown, offering preferential admissions to the descendants of the enslaved was a form or reparations, or repair. However, PCSU Co-Chair and Assoc. History Prof. Kirt von Daacke said he doesnt believe preferential admissions is enough of a gesture of repair.

Its an incomplete sort of repair if it is only for students who want to come to U.Va. or Georgetown, von Daacke said. What are some ways that we can benefit the descendants of American slaves in a more wholesale fashion that isnt solely about having them come to U.Va. or whatever school it is?

Repair is a common feature in UCARE discussions, according to Dukes. Part of the work that UCARE does involves a student committee that is made up of members of both the University and Charlottesville communities. The group has worked towards encouraging repair by developing an understanding of the history.

We use the protocol of truth and understanding, so our history and the meaning of that history, and repair, and then relationship, Dukes said. And once youve done that, then you can have an authentic relationship with the community.

Changing the understanding of history as a way of developing repair was part of Masons task on the Blue Ribbon Commission. In addition to offering recommendations about Confederate statues, the Commission also offered recommendations on how to tell a more accurate public history of the city.

The commission unanimously voted to recommend that [City Council] provide financial and planning support for historic resource surveys of African American, Native American and local labor neighborhoods and sites, seeking National Register listing and zoning and design guideline protection, where appropriate, according to the Commissions December 2016 report to City Council.

The [City] Council understood in the telling of our story, African-Americans, working people, women and Native Americans are largely left out of the way we tell our story in public, Mason said.

The University and repair

The importance of changing the discourse surrounding public history has not gone unnoticed by organizations at the University. In 2015, the Board of Visitors passed a resolution to name the newest dorm after William and Isabella Gibbons, an enslaved couple that lived at the University. The BOV also passed a resolution in September 2016 to rename Jordan Hall, which was originally named after a pioneer of eugenics. The PCSU approved a design team in fall 2016 which will create a memorial to the enslaved laborers who shaped and built the University.

The naming of buildings and memorials is an important part of changing the public history of an institution, as noted by Mason.

[History is] of course told in books and scholarly articles, but its also told on historical markers and its told in our statuary, its told in the plaques on buildings and the names that we give to buildings, Mason said.

As a major part of the Charlottesville community both economically and physically the University has a responsibility to serve as a leader of repair in the broader community, according to Mason. The Cornerstone Summer Institute directed especially at local high school students is one way of developing an understanding that could lead to repair in the community.

The program was largely developed by Alison Jawetz, a then-Batten student taking a class taught by Dukes and History Prof. Emerita Phyllis Leffler. Von Daacke led the small camp, which examined the legacies of slavery at the University, as well as throughout the area. It also focused on the racial and economic divides that are still present in the city.

The program is still in its infancy, but von Daacke hopes the program can become something more significant.

The commissions work, and by extension, this camp, are informed by a restorative justice model, von Daacke said in an email to The Cavalier Daily.

Members of the community understand the significance of the University reaching out beyond its borders. Pastor Alvin Edwards of Mt. Zion First African Baptist Church is a member of the PCSUs Local Advisory Board. Edwards highlighted he was pleased with what the University has done so far.

Its opened the process to the community, and one of the things that historically the University has not done is be open to the community, Edwards said. President Sullivan has done wonders by opening the door and allowing more participation from citizens of the city of Charlottesville.

Looking forward

Even with the progress the University has made over the years, there are still some that believe the University needs to be doing more in the community which it impacts.

If youre looking at repair, our University was complicit in the the institution of slavery, Dukes said. We had some of the foremost thinkers endorsing slavery and then later on eugenics, segregation, white supremacy and so forth That impacted people in the community for a long time, and you see that impact today.

For Dukes, one way of evaluating and repairing that impact might be through paying a living wage to those who are working at the University an idea shared by Mason.

Because it is such a large employer, it sets the standard for wages and conditions of employment in Charlottesville and the region, Mason said. Right now many of the people who work on Grounds do not get a living wage, many of them are not working directly for the University but the University certainly can ensure decent wages and good conditions are offered to everybody on Grounds.

Regardless of what actions are taken, it is important that extensive discussions are part of the process. In order for repair to be successful, Duke stressed it cannot just be done through unilateral University actions.

I think this needs to happen by developing an understanding of the harm that was done, and whether or not that harm still needs repair, Dukes said. Maybe theres some elements that dont need repair.

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Confronting U.Va.'s history of slavery - University of Virginia The Cavalier Daily

Literal slavery is a horrible practice that still persists into the modern age. But, I want to talk about another form of human exploitationemployment slavery, which can also ruin a persons life. Generally, I consider this a self-inflicted slavery because its ultimately a persons choice to work under such conditionsbut I also understand that brainwashing can occur, creating the illusion that theres no way out.

Slavery (in general) exists because of the inclination among people to obtain the benefits of human resources, while providing little (or nothing) in return. Human work is the most intelligent, efficient way to create a system of wealth and power. For the morally bankrupt, such benefits are sought for free.

Employment, in the best case scenario, is a business deal of mutual benefit. But in other instances, the company is expending such minimal resources that they are taking advantage of you. In the worst case scenario, through a combination of slave-driving principles and psychological techniques to break you down, such a job can morph into something very similar to actual slavery.

If you dont know any better, its easy to fall into slavery conditions. Here are signs that your sense of freedom in life is totally gone:

Because of the way employers conveniently ignore yearly inflation, todays minimal wage is not enough to maintain any semblance of a normal lifestyle. Minimal wage makes some sense in small businesses just starting out. But, In America, $8.25 an hour, or less, from a large, billion-dollar corporation is inexcusable. In this case, your annual wages cost a second of the companys hourly profits. In other words, your hard work is a very bad deal for you, and a killer opportunity for the suits upstairs.

Youre lucky you even have a job! is a psychological taunt that bad employers use to try and keep their wage-slaves from believing they can do any better. Such statements are made to maintain a sense of control. Understand, voluntary slavery is not a rare phenomenon. It happens when a person is brainwashed into the belief that they have nowhere else they can go.

If your manager uses psychological put-downs like this to denigrate your professional abilitiesunderstand that its being done for a reason.

The idea of getting a raise and a promotion may be dangled in-front of you, but youve seen no evidence to suggest that it really happens. In fact, only a very small percentage of your co-workers ever obtain this goal, and they tend to be the cronies of upper-management. If this is the case, then what exactly is your reason for working at this company?

Inconvenient hours are inevitable in jobs, but some companies will abuse the system. This ranges from illegally denying overtime pay, to scheduling month-long bouts of cloping (working until closing hours late at night, then opening hours the next morning) that leaves the employee physically and emotionally drained.

An employee in this system may feel the intense pressure by the bosses to conform to abusive hours, under the threat of being denied promotions or even getting fired for seeking better treatment.

Americas two-week annual vacation time is one of the weakest in the Western world, and American workers tend to not even use it. This is because many employers will hint that vacationers are likely to end up on the shit-list of not getting promoted. They may even hint that unruly vacation-seekers will be the first to get laid-off or fired at the earliest opportunity.

A system of slavery does not allow free-time for individuals to maintain their own lives outside of their work. This could cause dissent and break the system of total control. An unspoken methodology among abusive managers is to destroy the lifestyles of employees so, instead of tending to family or hobbies, they work at full capacity.

Feeling motivated based on high-standards and being scared to go below those standards is one thing, but being genuinely scared of the people youre working for is another.

Slave-masters maintain systems of fear, to break down their subjects and perhapsin timebuild them back up. For the best example of thisplease see Theon Greyjoy in Game of Thrones.

Psychological and verbal abuse is usually what occurs. An abusive employer understands exactly what strings to pull to generate feelings of shame or guilt, and theyll use the professional context to destroy a subjects sense of self-worth, perhaps by implying worthlessness at the vocation theyve devoted their life to.

In other instances, the abuse is very overt and could include yelling, tantrums and even physical assaults. But the outcome is the same: the employee living in a constant state of paranoia, fear, and subservience.

Read carefully the ten warning-signs youre in a cult by the Cult Education Institute. Some of these that could be very applicable to a workplace include: absolute authoritarianism without meaningful accountability, no tolerance for questions or critical inquiry, the leader (boss) is always right, and former followers (employees) are vilified as evil for leaving.

If the job feels less about, you know, getting the job doneand is more about the influence, charisma and infallibility of the bossthen get the heck out of there. This means the person in charge is getting a side-benefit to running or managing the workplace: power and dominance.

The number one sign youre a slave and not an employee is that youre working an unpaid internship, and its not for college credit. You may be promised great benefits and valuable connections, at what amounts to harsh workplace conditions, long hours, and zero pay.

A huge mistake I see young professionals make, and it really irks me, is naivety about peoples intentions. I went to film school for my bachelors, and many students I knew lusted after top internships at film studios or with big names in the entertainment industry. Such internships are often offered regardless of college credit.

When a person is blindsided by their desire to make it and get in with big names, they are likely to make bad decisionsand unscrupulous employers will prey on this desire.

Internships are great IF its part of a students actual curriculum. It means hands-on work and real experience versus useless classrooms. But, the questionable non-credit internships I warn about also exist to lure young people into systems of slavery. Its gotten so bad these types of arrangements are quickly becoming illegal in California.

The reality of such internships is that the slave-drivers only desire one thing: unpaid work. There is NO promise that you will move up or land any type of a paid job. When your internship finishes, they will discard you and find the next victim.

The biggest reason to avoid internships is the mentality behind the deal. Imagine a law firm or a film studio that is a multi-billion dollar operation. How hard would it be to throw their new recruit at LEAST minimum wage? The fact such a company would, despite their huge profits, still desire unpaid labor is indicative of a slave-driving mentality that funnels wealth to the top at the expense of the people on the bottom making it possible.

As a professional, it would be best for you to avoid doing any type of business with any individual or company that possesses a philosophy like this.

Employment-slavery situations are common. Very common. But ultimately, the biggest factor in determining how bad it is, is a single question: are you happy?

If you are happy at $8.25 an hour with no benefits, because you like the people you work with, you like the nature of the work, and you feel its moving you somewhere you want to bethen its not slavery. Youre making an investment thatll either pay off, or it wontbut at least you enjoy what youre doing.

However, if you are miserable in your current conditions, its quite possible that the uneasy feeling in your gut is your intuition telling you that someone is taking advantage of you.

Employment is supposed to be a business contract, and an exchange of services. Never a system of control. Sometimes, just the willingness to walk away is your strongest defense against a terrible job situation.

For more about avoiding systems of employment-slavery, please see my short books: Freedom: How to Make Money From Your Dreams and Ambitions, and How to Quit Your Job: Escape Soul Crushing Work, Create the Life You Want, and Live Happy.

(For more books, also check out the Developed Life bookstore, http://www.developedlife.com/bookstore).

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8 Signs You're a Slave Instead of an Employee

Why is the reparations movement in the Anglophone Caribbean not putting capitalism on trial in its campaign to force British imperialism to provide financial compensation for its industrial and agricultural capitalists enslavement of Africans? To what extent is capitalism such a sacred spirit or god whose name should not be publicly called in order to avoid attracting its vindictive and punishing rebuke? Are the advocates of reparations truly convinced that British imperialisms payment of financial compensation for the enslavement of Africans would end the economic marginalization of the labouring classes who are toiling under capitalist regimes throughout the region? Why are we willing to place racism or white supremacy in the dock but not its creator capitalism?

On 17 December 2007, the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution that made March 25 the annual commemorative International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade. This day should be used as a rallying point by people of good conscience to press the former major slaving states such as Britain, Denmark, France, Germany, Holland, Portugal, Russia, Spain and Sweden to pay reparations for their participation in the economic exploitation and racist dehumanization of enslaved Africans. The General Assemblys initiative is an acknowledgement of the over fifteen million Africans who landed in the Americas and the over thirty million captives who died during the process of catching and delivering them into the Holocaust of Enslavement.

Capitalism and Slavery in the Caribbean

A key goal of all yearly progressive remembrance activities in the Caribbean and elsewhere should be to educate or remind people of the fact that capitalism was the primary force behind the extraction of the labour power of enslaved Africans. Of equal importance is the need to etch into the consciousness of the public that white supremacy or racism was simply an ideological tool used by the capitalist enslavers and various European states to morally justify the enslavement of Africans. Racism was deployed by these early capitalists and their respective national states to mask the purely economic motivation behind the development of an enslaved labour force.

In the seminal and classic book Capitalism and Slavery that was written by the late historian and statesman Dr. Eric Williams, he states that the brutal, exploitative and exacting labour condition of white indentured workers served as the template for the institution of African enslavement or slavery:

Here then is the origin of [African] slavery. The reason was economic, not racial; it had not to do with the color of the laborer but the cheapness of the laborer. The features of the man, his hair, color and dentifrice, his subhuman characteristics so widely pleaded, were only later rationalizations to justify a simple economic fact: that the colonies needed and resorted to [African] labour because it was the cheapest and the best. This was not a theory; it was a practical conclusion deduced from the personal experience of the planter.

Williams asserts that slavery, as basically an economic institution, gave birth to racism. He further states that Unfree labor in the New World was brown, white, black and yellow; Catholic, Protestant and pagan. Racism or white supremacy is now an autonomous system of oppression that intersects with patriarchy and capitalism to create differing degrees of labour exploitation within the ranks of the working-class.

The point that should be centred in the minds of revolutionaries and radicals in the Caribbean is that capitalism, the architect of racism, is still negatively impacting the lives of the working-class descendants of enslaved Africans as well as the societies that were built by their exploited labour. The late revolutionary, organic intellectual and historian Dr. Walter Rodney convincingly argues and documents in his ground-breaking text How Europe Underdeveloped Africa that capitalism was the main contributor to the stagnation of Africas economic development (see Chapter 4 Europe and the Roots of Africas Underdevelopment To 1885).

Rodneys indictment of capitalism and its retardation of the potentiality of the greater portion of humanity (the labouring classes) should be duly noted by the reparations activists or advocates who are playing footsie with capitalism:

the peasants and workers of Europe (and eventually the inhabitants of the whole world) paid a huge price so that the capitalists could make their profits from the human labour that always lies behind the machine. That contradicts other facets of development, especially viewed from the standpoint of those who suffered and still suffer to make capitalist achievements possible. This latter group are the majority of [humanity]. To advance, they must overthrow capitalism; and that is why at the moment capitalism stands in the path of further human development. To put it another way, the social (class) relations of capitalism are now outmoded, just as slave and feudal relations became outmoded in their time.

Dr. Hilary Beckles, Vice-Chancellor of the University of the West Indies, has written an excellent and easily comprehended book, Britains Black Debt: Reparations for Caribbean Slavery and Native Genocide. It is a must read for people who would like to understand the basis of the claim for reparations from Britain for its role in the enslavement of Africans and genocide against Indigenous peoples in the Caribbean.

Unfortunately, Britains Black Debt has placed the misbegotten child of capitalism racism- on trial, but not the inherently exploitative and soul destroying parent capitalism. If we are going to throw the book at capitalism for chattel slavery, we are morally and politically obligated to do the same for the wage slavery of capitalism under which the Caribbean working-class is currently being exploited.

Caribbean States and Reparations

Today, we are witnessing the unconscionable, but politically understandable behaviour of the neocolonial states in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) in divorcing their call for reparations from measures aimed at throwing capitalism into the cesspool of history. These member states of CARICOM are all committed to the implementation of social, economic and political policies that have enshrined capitalism in the region.

They are interested in reparations as a way to deal with their balance of payment, budgetary and development challenges as seen in the call for debt cancellation, technology transfer and a formal apology and not statements of regrets in this regional bodys Ten Point Action Plan for Reparatory Justice.

While these governments are acting like capitalism was not the real culprit behind the economic exploitation of enslaved Africans, progressive civil society groups and individuals who are advocating for reparations should not be silent or conveniently forgetful of this historical fact. We should expect the liberal petite bourgeois or middle-class reparations advocates to not indict capitalism. Their class interests and aspirations are totally immersed and dependent on the continued existence of capitalism. The petite bourgeois elements, unlike the labouring classes, display high levels of class consciousness and the former group tends to allow its class interests to guide its thoughts and actions.

However, radical and revolutionary reparations activists and supporters have no business not putting capitalism on the stand in their activism and general public education initiatives. As political activists who are committed to ending inequity and exploitation that are rooted in the social, economic, political and cultural structures of societys principal institutions, they should know that capitalist economic relations and practices are a major source of oppression.

As such, they ought to educate the public on the reality that the capitalism that exploited the labour of enslaved Africans is the same capitalism that exploited them as wage slaves after the end of slavery. Capitalism is still exploiting Caribbean workers and taking the lions share of the profit that comes from the labour power of the working-class.

CARICOMs ten-point reparations proposal is implicitly using the societies in the global North as the model of social and economic development. The mature capitalist societies in North America and Europe are characterized by widespread income inequality and concentration of wealth as well as the political marginalization of the working-class. How can such societies in good conscience serve as the standard of social, political and economic development for the Caribbean?

Reparatory Justice for Social Transformation and Dual Power

In the Caribbean, the revolutionaries and radicals must advance a reparations agenda that demands Britain/Europes financial compensation for the economic exploitation and racist dehumanization of enslaved Africans. It has been estimated that Britains reparations payment to Africans in the Caribbean would be in the region of 7.5 trillion. The 20 million paid to the enslavers of Africans after the 1838 abolition of slavery in the British Empire would be worth about 200 billion in todays currency.

The proposals below ought to be a part of the Caribbean reparations movements programme and be seen as a part of the general class struggle. The neocolonial Caribbean states do not need the immediate payment of reparations to undertake some of these demands. The social movements in the region must organize around these demands as a part of a dual power strategy or infrastructure of dissent or anarchist transfer cultures:

Promote labour self-management and economic democracy: The governments in the Caribbean must capitalize national and regional Worker Self-management and Entrepreneurship Funds from allotments out of the respective annual national budgets. These funds would be controlled by progressive civil society forces. These financial resources would be used to finance and support worker cooperatives and other labour self-managed companies as well as the work of the support organizations and structures that are necessary to ensure the viability of the workers ownership, control and management of their workplace.

It would be the duty of the revolutionary and radical organizers to ensure that a critical mass of the worker-cooperators embrace labour self-management as a part of the class struggle and the fight for socialism. The workers democratic control of the workplace combined with popular assemblies would be the laboratory or training ground for the self-management of the future stateless, classless and self-organized (communist) society.

Include labour self-management in school curriculum: The governments in the Caribbean should restructure the curriculum and place at its centre knowledge of the oppressive nature of chattel slavery and wage slavery as a system of labour extraction and exploitation. Of equal importance is the strategic need to adequately educate the students in primary, secondary and tertiary educational institutions about workers control, ownership and management of the workplace.

Further, the students would be equipped with the knowledge, skills and attitude to collectively self-manage worker cooperatives and other worker self-managed companies. We must challenge the public education curriculum that prepares learners, at public expense, to work in capitalist enterprises. The worker self-management ideas and practices should be integrated throughout the curriculum.

Develop comprehensive land reform programme: According to Tony Weis in the paper Restructuring and Redundancy: The Impacts and Illogic of Neoliberal Agricultural Reforms in Jamaica:

Jamaicas landscape still bears the scars of the most ferocious form of agricultural production ever devised, as plantations kept their vice-like grip on the best land after Emancipation in 1838, with all subsequent distribution programmes only ever acting on the margins of these inhumanly constructed yet sacrosanct institutions.

The preceding state of affairs is essentially the situation in the rest of the Anglophone Caribbean.

The governments in the Caribbean must undertake a comprehensive land reform programme that puts flat, arable land in the hands of the labouring classes. Enslaved Africans and indentured South Asians and the Indigenous peoples worked the land and their descendants must now exercise stewardship and control over it.

In order for them to take land out of the capitalist speculative market and to end the idea of the ownership of land by individuals, these governments must create the legislative framework for the establishment of community land trust (CLT). CLT are structures that are used to protect land from the rise or fall in the value of land based on speculation or the whims and fancies of capitalist demand and supply of land and housing. The access to land should be based on the right of collective use or usufructuary rights and not the right of private ownership. Each generation should be the steward of land and not its owners as under capitalism.

Create a cooperative housing programme: The condition of a large proportion of the housing stock in the Caribbean is an assault on human decency, especially for those who live in urban squatter settlements or overcrowded, ill-repaired housing in urban and rural communities. The state must create national funding programmes to support the development and maintenance of cooperative housing by the people through their organizations.

Cooperative housing is a way to engender popular, democratic and collective control and management over the housing by the people who live in these units and to undermine the idea of housing as a tradeable commodity. The members of cooperative housing would have security of tenure but would not be able to pass on the property to their heirs.

Establish working-class friendly labour laws: The system of chattel slavery in the Caribbean and the rest of the Americas was a very vile form of labour exploitation. The slave masters did not simply exercise power over the labour power and the fruit of the labour (profit) of the enslaved African workforce. These capitalists also owned the enslaved Africans.

The brutal legacy of exploitation of African workers continued after Emancipation in 1838. In the Anglophone Caribbean of today, progressive organizations ought to develop broad national and regional campaigns to force these neo-colonial governments to create worker-friendly labour laws that make it easier for workers to join or form trade unions. Severe or prohibitive fines must be levied against employers who violate the rights of workers to form or join trade unions. It is hypocritical of governments to demand reparations from British imperialism for slavery, while facilitating the exploitation of workers through laws that are titled against the power of workers in the workforce.

The rate of unionization is very low in the Caribbean and it must become a priority of progressive social movement organizations, socialist organizations, the revolutionary petite bourgeoisie and trade unions to push for legislation that will give workers a greater level of bargaining power in the workplace-based class struggle.

Establish popular, democratic and horizontal assemblies of the oppressed: The revolutionary and radical forces in the Caribbeans reparations movement must work with other progressive forces throughout society to establish a federated system of popular, democratic and horizontal assemblies of the oppressed. These assemblies would function as the direct democratic structures of political self-management that seeks to approximate the communist self-organizing concept of the administration of things and not the governance of people.

The assemblies would be the local, regional and national organs through which the labouring classes discuss, plan and determine their economic and social priorities. The masses would implement their main concerns through their alternative and oppositional institution as well as organize and impose them on existing and domination economic, social, cultural and political institution. In this contestation for power, the peoples organizations would use all available and ethical means to advance their liberation.

Perry Mars documents in his book Ideology and Change: The Transformation of the Caribbean Left that a section of the The Left in the Caribbean has a tradition of using or advocating the deployment of assemblies to connect with the people:

What these parties have in common is their strong advocacy of what are called variously peoples parliament or peoples assembly representing mass democratic participation in grass roots self organizations.

Further, The Left sees assemblies as political instruments that compensate for the fact that the liberal capitalist democracies in the region are not responsive or represent the needs of the people. Assemblies should not be used as consultative or information-sharing bodies by nationalist and socialist revolutionaries or radicals.

These political assemblies are supposed to be proactive and positive structures that familiarise the people with the idea and practice of shaping all decisions that impact their lives. Mars notes that in the Caribbean:

The problem with the peoples assembly is that the implementation does not necessarily eliminate the tendencies towards political centralization and elitism as far as leadership of the movement is concerned.

From the period of chattel slavery to the current period of neo-colonial flag independence, the Caribbean labouring classes have yet to exercise substantive power over the political institutions that govern their lives. A system of popular assemblies with the capacity to challenge the authoritarian liberal capitalist democracies for power would be one of the best expressions of reparatory justice in the Caribbean.

Conclusion

The struggle for reparations in the Caribbean should become a site of the class struggle and organizing the people for socialism or communism. Capitalism must be put on trial for aiding and abetting the enslavement of Africans and genocide against the Indigenous peoples.

The proposals that are outlined above for adoption by the Caribbean reparations will not become a reality in the absence of national campaigns that organize the people into their self-organized class-based and other popular organizations. We are seeking to build a counterhegemonic force or alternative power bloc to contest the existing forces of domination and to advance the long-term struggle of putting them out of business.

The neo-colonial governments have jumped in front of the reparations bandwagon and are trying to set the agenda. It is incumbent on the popular forces to organize the people in order to wrest the agenda setting initiative from the state and impose their programme of action on the state through the organizing of the labouring classes and other oppressed groups within its ranks.

It is critically necessary for the organizers who are organizing the people from below to do everything possible to utilize all available opportunity to build the capacity of the oppressed to challenge and undermine the existing white supremacist, patriarchal and capitalist political order. It is for this reason that a dual power strategy must build the embryonic economic, social and political structures of the future socialist society, while engaging and contesting the existing institutions of power.

It is in this light that the development of worker self-management over their workplaces and the establishment of a system of popular assemblies as the seat of working-class political power becomes necessary. The reparations movement can play an important catalytic role in helping to ideologically prepare the people for the completion of the Second Emancipation in the Caribbean and the rest of the Americas.

Ajamu Nangwaya, Ph.D., is an organizer, writer, and lecturer at the University of the West Indies. Read other articles by Ajamu.

This article was posted on Sunday, April 9th, 2017 at 10:30am and is filed under Activism, Africa, Anti-slavery, Capitalism, Caribbean, Culture, Economy/Economics, Labor, Resistance, Slavery, Socialism, Unions, United Kingdom, Wage Slavery.

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Caribbean Reparations Movement Must Put Capitalism on Trial ... - Dissident Voice

While most of New Orleans sits down to a dinner of red beans and rice, our seders will be beginning for us porch doors flung open to let in Elijah (and the seasons first mosquitoes), bottles of wine clustered like brass quintets on tables as the corner church bells strike six. Its Passover Louisiana style, with sweet potatoes alongside the brisket and hot sauce next to the butter, Hebrew prayers laced with Southern accents. From Uptown to the Bywater, Jews, some of whom have been part of this city for two hundred years, celebrate our Exodus from Egypt, when we broke free of an institution whose legacy is a bit more recent where we call home.

Yet, as we celebrate our freedom from slavery, its hard to forget that we have also been witnesses to slavery. In 2014 in The New York Times, Passover in the Confederacy, Sue Eisenfeld wrote of Jews who felt so at home in Dixie that they were proud to fight for it in the Civil War: To them, after all theyd suffered and fled throughout the ages, the South was their new motherland, the land of milk and honey (and cotton), and it was worth fighting for.

The online encyclopedia Virtual Jewish World states that more than 200 Louisiana Jews are known by name to have served in the Confederate forces, but the true number is probably three times that.

The Southern state with the highest Jewish population was Louisiana, where large numbers of Jews were concentrated in and around New Orleans. Many Jewish men worked in the shipping, sugar and cotton trades, or in related fields, like banking and maritime law, that financed or supported those commodities. The majority of Louisiana Jews were not slave owners, but their livelihoods, like those of their non-Jewish neighbors, were based on the slave economy. Without slaves picking the cotton and sugar, they would not have had jobs financing the sugar and cotton industries or shipping cotton north (one popular job for Southern Jewish businessmen), or owning the successful department stores on Canal Street that dressed New Orleanians for two centuries.

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Judah P. Benjamin

Judah P. Benjamin, the Confederate Secretary of War and the first Jewish U.S. senator, was an outspoken defender of slavery and the South. Benjamin was not a particularly religious man, but there were religious Jews who were able to reconcile their pro-slavery attitudes with their Judaism, such as Rabbi James Gutheim of the now-defunct Dispersed Of Judah synagogue in New Orleans, who, after the Union takeover of the city during the Civil War, refused to pledge his loyalty to the Union. According to the Encyclopedia of Southern Jewish Communities, he declared the Confederacys fight right and [just]. Rather than bow down, he moved to Montgomery, Alabama, and took over the rabbis job for that congregation, where he could be more outspoken. After the war, in 1868, he moved to New York, where Temple Emanuel-El hired him.

The first Jew to move to Louisiana was Isaac Monsanto, a Sephardic Jew who was later expelled when the Spanish began enforcing the Code Noir that the French had neglected. He worked in the shipping trade, and only one shipment over the course of his entire career involved slaves, according to Saul Friedman in his 1998 book Jews And The American Slave Trade. However, several of his descendants, who moved back to Louisiana when Jews were allowed back into the territory, did own slaves.

Friedman notes that the Monsantos were not great slaveowners: Benjamin owned 17; Angelica, 8; Eleanora, 4, and Manuel, 12. He argues that even calling these men and women Jewish slave owners is perhaps not accurate, as two of the women married Christians (a Catholic in one case, an Episcopalian in the other), and one converted. The Monsanto descendants, like Isaac, were not religious and did not even participate in cultural Jewish life. Because of this, Friedman argues, can you call them Jews?

Up north, Jews were split in their support of slavery. Tulane University professor Michael Cohen taught me of a dialogue between two East Coast rabbis that proves how divisive the issue was nationwide. In 1861, Rabbi Morris Raphall of the congregation Bnai Jeshurun, in New York, published The Biblical View of Slavery in the New York Herald, justifying slavery. His argument rests on the fact that the patriarchs, men considered the closest to God, owned slaves, and that the institution is simply a part of life: I am therefore justified when tracing slavery as far back as it can be traced; I arrive at the conclusion that, next to the domestic relations of husband and wife, parents and children, the oldest relation of society with which we are acquainted is that of master and slave. That is not the strongest of arguments, that because something has been around for thousands of years its fine, but Raphall drew a vehement group of supporters. He lashes out at those who dispute his ideas: When you remember that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Job were slave owners, does it not strike you that you are guilty of something very little short of blasphemy? If Gods favorite men owned slaves, why cant ordinary American Southerners?

Rabbi David Einhorn of Baltimore gave a sermon opposing Raphalls stance, arguing that Jewish law does not condone slavery: The Ten Commandments, the first of which is, I am the Lord, thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt out of the house of bondage, can by means want to place slavery of any human being under divine sanction. Einhorn received such backlash from his sermon that he was driven out of his congregation and Baltimore as well; he fled to Philadelphia. It was not just Southern Jews that justified slavery; Jews were like other American whites, a bloc that had both slavery supporters and those who did not support it, both in the North and in the South.

Of course, there were Southern Jews opposed to slavery, and Jews who chose not to own slaves. New Orleans department store owner Leon Godchaux is credited with transforming the sugar industry in Louisiana, but he waited until abolition, when the industry was a mess and plantations sat in ruins, cane growing tall and unpicked, to buy up bankrupt plantations and use wage labor to turn around the industry and become the largest sugar producer in the South. He remained a prominent member of New Orleans and Southern society, but not a slave-owning one. And there were many like him, whether or not they spoke out against slavery or quietly refused to support it.

When I moved to the South nine years ago, I was charmed by some Jewish-Southern adaptations the annual Jazz Fest Shabbat at Touro Synagogue during the first week of Jazz Fest, the fried chicken Friday Night special at Kosher Cajun Deli, Shabbat services shortened during parade season so that congregants wouldnt miss Morpheus and Krewe dEtat the Friday night before Mardi Gras. But I was less charmed by Jews embracing the darker legacy of the South, like a guy I met in college, a Jew from New Orleans who used the N-word in conversation, and when I called him out, he rolled his eyes and told me that I didnt understand because I wasnt from New Orleans. And the Jewish frat boy who hung the Stars And Bars alongside his Israeli flag in his dorm room window that faced out into an undergraduate residential quad. I am not equating these two boys actions with the support of slavery, but they prove that Jews can be as racist as any Southern goy.

Eisenfeld writes of families with husbands, fathers and sons away, fighting for the Confederacy, sitting down to a Seder to reflect on how we were once slaves in Egypt. While these Southern Jews were fighting to preserve the institution of slavery in their own land, they remembered how they themselves were once slaves. This paradox shows how much privilege Jews had in the South, even in the antebellum era. Sure, most Jews did not own slaves. But the huge difference here is that Jews in the South were never in danger of being made slaves again. Why werent those Confederate Jews looking back on our collective history, especially on Passover, and deciding that they could not morally be a part of this institution?

On my first Passover in New Orleans, I sat around a crowded table of undergrads at Tulane Hillel. We shvitzed in our seersucker and linen, knocking back plastic cup after plastic cup of wine and reading from paper Haggadot. The Hillel House sits right off campus, a campus built on what was once a long-lot sugar plantation that stretched from the Mississippi River to Lake Pontchartrain. The legacy of slavery literally surrounded us as we held our Seder. This proximity to a much more recent slavery was palpable. I cant imagine what those Confederate Jews were thinking as they broke matzo and worked their way around the Seder plate at their mansions in the Garden District and in Creole cottages downtown, how they could justify what they were fighting for when singing about freeing themselves from bondage.

It makes me think about what paradox I may be living in now, how we Jews need to always remain on the right side of history. Weve been through a lot as a people, and we must learn from all that suffering and use our knowledge to help others when we see them suffer. American Jews are Diaspora Jews. We need to remember that we were once in bondage, that we were once a targeted people, immigrants, and to help those in those positions now. As I sit down to my Southern Seder, thats what will be on my mind, making sure that I am not that that Confederate Jew, singing Dayenu and noshing on gefilte fish as slaves prep macaroons and matzo meal cake on the other side of the wall.

Sophia-Marie Unterman is a teacher and freelance journalist based in New Orleans.

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As We Celebrate Our Exodus, Let's Not Forget Our Role In Slavery - Forward

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Credit: International Labour Organization

Slavery in modern India the brick-kilns of Rajasthan

Slavery is a word that would seem to have no place in our modern world a world which is built on a language of rights and freedoms. Last week, Life of Labour linked to a series by the Guardian on instances of slavery across the modern world each one a brutal reminder of a feudal world we were supposed to have left behind. In one video, a Russian NGO called Alternativa rescues men and women who work as slaves in brick-kilns and sheep farms. This is not the slavery we expect slaves with t-shirts and passports sounds oxymoronic. But as withhuman rights abuses in the Middle East, Russian slavery is built on hidden debts, withheld wages, confiscated documents and, when that isnt enough, physical violence.

Brick-kilns are the sites of slavery and human rights abuse in India as well. Based on NSSO data, Anti-Slavery International calculatedthat there might be 100,000 kilns in India employing 23 million (or 2.3 crore) workers. In a letter dated 6th April 2017 to Rajasthans labour secretary, the Peoples Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) described the condition of brick-kiln workers and there were many similarities with the Russian situation.

The letter said, The vulnerable conditions of the these workers stem from the fact that:

(a) The state government has failed to enforce provisions oflabour legislations; (b) Most of these workers are interstate or intrastate migrants recruited from remote villages of UP, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and part of Rajasthan by illegal contractors onan advance wage during the off-season; (c) The workers are illiterate or have modicum of education, almost landless, poor with high indebtedness/deficit budgets and belong to backward communities like SC, ST or OBC. Representation of forward castes like Rajputs, Brahmins, Banias is not there; and (d) The establishments are located in the remote areas therefore the workers remain invisible and get exploited, deprived of social safety net benefits and legal labour rights.

In a reporton the issue, Equal Times described how a man from Uttar Pradesh borrowed money for a wedding and found himself travelling thousands of kilometres to repay his debt. His wife, three young children under the age of 10 and his ageing father all worked at the kiln, yet Brijesh was the only one officially employed and paid. The payment was a sustenance amount as he worked off his debt.

Just like Russia, the kilns tend to be situated in remote areas. So,geography becomes the first hurdle in trying to escape. These kilns are effectively gulags or debtors prisons but with the formal veneer of wage labour. In this instance, mechanisation cannot come fast enough. In an interviewwith IndiaSpend, Ken Bales, a professor of contemporary slavery at the University of Nottingham, said The interesting thing is that there are lot of things people do for business not just in India, but across the world with slaves that if they didnt have slaves for it, they wouldnt do itThere is a belt from Punjab to Uttar Pradesh, below Nepal, where they make bricks because of the kind of soil found there. You can buy Chinese brick-forming machines for not many rupees, and they dont need to pay for the machines because they have slaves children and mothers. As soon as you break it (slavery), either they have to shut down or they have to buy those machines.

But despite knowing about these kilns and the existence of strong central legislation against bonded labour, state governments like Rajasthan are notoriously impotent at dealing with the issue. PUCL hascriticised the state for notifying a minimum wage of Rs 227 for 1000 bricks. This wage was absurdly low compared to neighbouring states like Punjab (where it is Rs. 587), Haryana (Rs. 472) and Uttar Pradesh (Rs. 365). Within Rajasthan, areas like Ganganagar, Ajmer and Bhilwara pay more than double of this notified rate. But in places like Jaipur, the minimum wage is whats paid. And the prices of bricks are much higher in Jaipur than in Ganganagar or Ajmer, so there is no market reason for the wages to be so low.

Pioneering the use of behavioural science at work

In the United States of America, theyve moved way past slavery and now simply trickpeople into choosing to work hard by themselves. Employing hundreds of social scientists and data scientists, Uber has experimented with video game techniques, graphics and non-cash rewards of little value that can prod drivers into working longer and harder and sometimes at hours and locations that are less lucrative for themBy mastering their workers mental circuitry, Uber and the like may be taking the economy back toward a pre-New Deal era when businesses had enormous power over workers and few checks on their ability to exploit it. Read the fantastic investigation by NYT here.

Caste and Safai Karamcharis

A recent studypublished in EPW of 360 safai karamcharis employed by the Bombay Municipal Corporation argues that policies aimed at uplifting conservancy work may actually be institutionalising caste-based occupations, This study reveals that almost 90% of safai karamcharis in the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) belong to the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Other Backward Classes. Castes like the Mahar, Matang, Meghwal, Harijan, Valmiki and Chambhar dominate, whereas others like Kathewadi, Kunbi, Vadar and Devendrakulathan are found in smaller numbersIn our study, we found that more than three-fourths (77.2%) of safai karamcharis are second-or third-generation workers. Nine out of 10 have adopted this occupation after their fathers retirement or death and only 5% took their mothers place.

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The Life of Labour: Slavery in Modern India, How Uber Uses Psychological Tricks - The Wire

Henry Precht

By Henry Precht

BN Columnist

A historian friend of mine has listed the men he deems the ten worse American presidents. He didnt leave a vacant slot for the incumbent, but I wonder whether Mr. Trump might not soon fit in based on this countrys experience of the past two and a half months of his 48-month term of office.

Categorizing roughly, I would say that five of the historians ten baddies were listed because of their wrong-headed positions on slavery; two because of their toleration of corruption; two because of lying or criminal policy; and one because of ineptitude in dealing with a national crisis. Lets see how Mr. Trump makes it through this sieve. Chattel slavery is no longer on the agenda but we might easily substitute how the incumbent treats the middle and lower classes sometimes called wage slaves.

On that score, I would say Mr. Trump shows every sign of becoming a modern day Buchanan. After his campaign appeal for better treatment of educationally poorly prepared and economically threatened whites, he turned on them in proposing health care legislation which would leave them worse off than with Obamacare. Programs that benefit them Meals on Wheels, regional development funds, etc. are slated to be cut back. Its early to say, but I doubt that Trump tax proposals will treat them as generously as they will the traditional big money folks in the Republican ranks the kind that have been named to fill Cabinet slots. So much for favoring the little guy against the elites.

There is one bit of business where Mr. Trump gives equal treatment to wage slaves and elites: both will suffer from his destruction of Obamas measures to limit the pace of global warming. They and their descendants will suffer equally.

The next failing among past leaders for which two are held culpable is corruption: Grant and Harding are listed as the major malefactors. Neither, however, dipped his own hands into the till; they simply turned a blind eye when cronies ripped off the public purse. Something like that may be starting under the present regime: the assets of our billionaire president have been turned over to his kin to manage. We may see court cases challenging these and other arrangements on conflict of interest grounds. Another source of foul aroma may be found when a billionaire investor profits from his closeness to the bunch in Washington and successfully advises the elimination of regulations that harm his business interests.

Two scorned ex-presidents (Nixon and the second Bush) have been reasonably accused of lying and putting or keeping us in disastrous wars. The latter was also been accused of wrecking the economy. Its too soon to accuse our president of pushing us into deeper conflicts, but there are signs in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen that a drift in that direction is building momentum. The economy is doing well during his brief tenure thanks in good part to inherited momentum and high hopes among investors, which may prove to be ill-founded. When it comes to lack of respect for truth, however, Mr. Trump may establish a new national record. Roll over, Mr. Nixon.

Finally, how might Mr. Trump rank compared to Herbert Hoover and his bungled efforts to deal with the Great Depression? Happily, he hasnt had to face that kind of severe test. But can anyone vouch for his interest in the mechanisms of government, his knowledge of foreign relations, his skill in persuading recalcitrant members of Congress, or talents for generating sound ideas and reassuring the panicky public? Mr. Trump has faced severe difficulties in the past. Unfortunately there is no bankruptcy court to rescue him if the national economy tanks.

Roosevelt came to the nations rescue in the Depression in large part because he picked a staff rich in creative talents. Trumps staff is just plain rich.

To wrap up this evaluation, I would say that Mr. Trump is headed down the trail to low or lowest ranking. In all fairness we should allow him some more months to manifest his true fitness and qualities for the job if, in fact, he can scrape up a few.

Henry Precht is a retired Foreign Service Officer.

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Small World: Ranking the rank - The Bridgton News

Its time to face facts: Passover is broken. Busted. Split in two. Half of us are celebrating one part of the holiday while the other half celebrates the other part. Most of us dont even realize were celebrating only half the holiday.

This shouldnt surprise us. The Jewish community worldwide is broken into pieces. Theres no reason to expect our favorite Jewish holiday will be exempt. The festival mirrors the community that observes it. Right now were a community thats marching in two opposite directions at once.

One side of the community observes Passover to recount the suffering and persistence of Jews in a hostile world, from ancient Egypt up to modern times and, we assume, into the future. For the other side, Passover is about expressing solidarity with victims of modern-day oppression by linking our peoples historic suffering with injustices done to others today.

The first type of Passover, the Jews-in-a-hostile-world version, looks pretty much like the Passover that Jews have celebrated throughout our two millennia of wandering. Theyre not identical, of course. Through most of our history Jews saw the Egyptian bondage as a foreshadowing of their own suffering. Passover expressed our yearning to be liberated as our forebears were. Most of us today havent experienced anything similar. The holiday now serves to remind us of our humble roots. It also reaffirms our sense that were still historys victims, even if we dont look like it lately.

Then again, the Passover of the European exile wasnt the original model either. The original Passover, the one commanded in the Bible, centered on sacrificing livestock at the Holy Temple in Jerusalem. It was only after the Babylonians and then the Romans demolished the Temple that the family dinner took center stage.

One unifying element in all traditional Passovers, ancient and modern, is the recitation of the traditional lessons of Passover: In each generation, each of us is obliged to see ourselves as if we personally had come out of Egypt. Liberation happens by divine miracle. In each generation they rise up against us to destroy us. And, as we tell the skeptical son: This happened to me, not to you.

The other Passover, the solidarity-with-the-downtrodden version, is a more recent phenomenon. Its key feature is a revising of the Haggadah text to spotlight modern-day struggles for liberation from bondage. These can range from the agony of the Holocaust and redemptive birth of Israel to civil rights, gender equity and, more recently, Palestinian rights. Sometimes these new narratives are woven into the text of the traditional Haggadah. Sometimes they replace it altogether.

Alternative Haggadahs began appearing about 100 years ago, initially in the labor movement. Diasporist socialists sang of liberating workers from the wage-slavery of Boss Pharaoh. Labor Zionists sang of liberating the Jews from the bondage of diaspora by returning to the redeeming soil of the Land of Israel.

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Among Jews, the upheavals of late 1960s were a watershed, the beginning of our division into two factions. One of the earliest signs of the split was the appearance of two Haggadahs that embodied the two opposing worldviews. One was the Freedom Seder, published in 1970 by left-wing guru Arthur Waskow. It updated the Passover message by putting black Americas freedom struggle at the center of the holiday narrative, drawing parallels between the Exodus from Egypt and the civil rights movement. For the first time, Passovers main message was not the suffering of Jews but of others. It was the message of the Seders skeptical son turned on its head: These things happened to him, not to me.

Two years later, as if in reply to Waskow, came the Soviet Jewry-themed Haggadah Let My People Go. A traditional text with some new commentaries, its most memorable feature was the illustrations by physician Mark Podwal. Like Waskows Freedom Seder, it put modern events front and center. Unlike the Freedom Seder, it kept the holidays focus on Jews.

In the decades since, countless new Haggadahs have appeared, with and without the traditional text, focusing variously on gender equality, hunger, the environment and more. Each one tries explicitly to frame its contemporary cause as a modern version of the Exodus story.

The latest innovation, though, risks turning the Passover tradition on its head by connecting the Jews suffering in Egypt with the suffering of the Palestinians under Israeli occupation.

Some might see the analogy as a tad overdone. Certainly the Palestinians suffer under Israeli military rule. But its not the agony of Syria or Congo, and its not the suffering of the Hebrew slaves in Egypt.

In a way, though, the strength of the historical comparison is beside the point. Every analogy is imperfect. If juxtaposing our ancestors with modern-day victims helps draw our attention to injustices around us, thats for good.

Whats off-kilter about Palestinian-themed Passover texts is that they put the Jews back in the center of the story but as the oppressor, not the victim. If the Palestinians are todays Hebrew slaves, then the Jewish state is the modern Pharaoh. Where the Freedom Seder and its heirs asked us to see our neighbors as comrades in suffering, Palestinian-themed Passover texts ask us to go a step further and see ourselves and our family as the wicked enemy.

Its important to learn to see through Palestinian eyes. Learning to identify with the Palestinians helps us understand why they view Israel the way they do, and how Israel got into its current plight. It can help us to love Israel more, not less. Jews who love Israel should be trying to help Israel disentangle from its neighbors, not just for their sake but for Israels and ours.

If, however, we carry our solidarity to the point of viewing Israel as Pharaoh, as the enemy, then we undo whatever good we hope to achieve. When we make Israel our enemy, we make ourselves Israels enemy. When that happens, we lose any ability to contribute to peace. And we lose our family. Were left broken holidays, traditions and all.

J.J. Goldberg is the Forwards editor-at-large.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Forward.

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Is Passover Broken Beyond Repair? - Forward