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Date: Sun, 18 Sep 94 02:21 AST
O.K. Stephen, for the next lines I will adopt a thinking man posture,
forgetting everything about my flesh epistemology and, of course, trying
to leave behind what many of us, victims of colonialism can not forget,
ANGER...
Besides my anger, why I oppose the invasion of Haiti by the United
States of America? This relative simple question, demands on my part an
elaborate answer. I should go back to my original post and develop
further what was said (in a rather simplistic manner, for your taste).
There is no doubt in my mind that one of the main interest involved,
from the standpoint of the Clinton administration is purely economic.
Sure there is a political agenda (within the United Stater mediascape
and definition of the political). After all, Clinton's public image is
very deteriorated and, probably, his p.a. people may be aware of the
effect a sounding triumph on foreign policy may have. The way that both
Quayle and Bush has addressed the issue, simply without any kind of
substantive argument, seems a good indication that this may end up like
any other adventure "at high sea".
However, and in the context of the Caribbean basin, the possible opening
of Haiti as a cheap labor paradise is conditioned upon the progressive
deterioration of cheap labor conditions that other countries on the
basin has experienced in the last 25 years. Puerto Rico in this respect
is paradigmatic. Since the start of its process or rapid modernization,
the island showed an incredible capacity to develop cheap labor within a
context of low and medium skilled workers. For the first part of the
century, Puerto Rico remained one of the first stronghold of the
clothing industry in the States, because of its abundance of cheap
unskilled labor. The tobacco industry changed dramatically for the same
reason, leaving the production of tobaccos for that of cigarettes.
But modernity brought other developments in the island. College
education began to expand for the general population, producing other
type of labor, as medium skilled as well as skilled. The first
engineering school was established in Mayaguez, on the west part of
P.R., opening the opportunity for other types of companies to establish.
After the years, this progress showed its bad face; the salaries of
skilled labor prompted better salaries for medium and unskilled labor.
In other words, labor turned expensive.
At the beginning of the eighties, the Reagan administration induced the
economical exploitation of the Caribbean Basin under the banner of
progress. The real reason, while Puerto Rico was no longer cheap, there
was an incredible opportunity to have a combination of skilled and
unskilled labor within the same geographical area. All of this went hand
in hand with the disintegration of fordism as an strategy of production,
and the introduction of flexible production. The flexible agenda
established as its paradigm, the constant seek for the best cost. So in
Puerto Rico you may had the best cheap skilled labor, while in the
Dominican Republic you had the cheapest unskilled labor.
The problem with many Caribbean republics has been their political
problems and unstableness. The Dominican Republic has been, for the last
ten years, very unstable. The same could be said of Cuba and Haiti.
However, for the moment, the possible future of Haitian politics lies on
the hand of the U.S.
The Reagan Initiative for the Caribbean Basin went bankrupt in the
middle of the eighties because it established a sort of free market
environment under certain United States tax rules. For transnational
capitalism, no rules was better than little rules. After the initiative
went kaput, the companies started to move in. Their final goal, for the
moment, lies in Cuba and Haiti. No matter how good, compared to Haiti,
the education of the Cuban workers may be, the bottom line is that the
greatest bulk of their population will be treated, once the blockade is
finished, as cheap labor.
Believe Stephen, Haitian cheap labor is much better to handle than Cuban
or Mexican. Why? Because there is no strong union support for them. As a
matter of fact, one of the greatest triumphs in Haitian dictatorship
history is the no existence of labor politics.
What can be done then? I am not looking for answers here, since there is
too much to grieve in this situation. More than 67% of the arms that the
Haitian Army uses are of United States origin. The other third comes
from France. The constant interventionist politics of the U.S. has
created the current situation; with no help from the outside, there is
no possible solution for the crisis. But the paradox here lies in this
fact: for many Haitians, the current situation is better than the
possible return of Aristide. Why? Less bloodshed. What the intervention
will create for certain, is a new civil war. It will be virtually
impossible to identify the militia, once the invasion ends. There is no
security that they will be completely eradicated during the
intervention. So there is no reason to think that there will be no witch
hunt. Do I have to believe in Aristide when he says that there will be
no prosecution for the militia? Will the U.S. allow the military to
remained free, pending a possible civil war? Then, who was part of the
militia and who was not? How can they tell? How many innocent people
will die in the process?
But probably, the main question should go in this direction: Why do we
have to recur to interventionist politics to resolve this mess? The
violation of frontiers, for whatever reason, still is a violation. Why
do we have to believe that this is a humanitarian intervention? Is war
the only way out in this kind of situation?
The bottom line can be this: Sometimes intervention is fair others not.
Why? In my opinion, what we should be discussing is the nature of
intervention, because if its politics didn't existed in the first place,
right know we could have been figuring out ways out of the crisis that
did not relied on the use of force of an essentially imperialistic
foreign policy.
Ah, but I forgot, in Stephen's sense, I am not a thinking man. Still...
The problem in your argument, Stephen, is that your disqualification of
anger relies on the entitlement you conceive to the intellectual part of
our existence. It is very clever to disarm this subject position through
deconstructive type of discourse. Why should I reclaim textual authority
because of my closeness in regards of certain phenomena? In that regard,
you can claim back that same textual authority. Certainly. But most of
that theorization comes from core-nation-thinkers (or at least, that's
their context). Spivak, in this regard, does not comes from a core
nation, but from a subaltern one. Her work is focus on one thing (at
least that's my reading of her work): what is the context of those
subaltern positions. What is the importance of those positions?
Post-colonial discourse has stressed the end or breaking of the subject
from the contradiction that emerges between the identity of the
colonizer and that of the colonized. The case in the post- modern
discourse of the subject, comes from the idea of those other identities
that were crushed in the process of achieving modernity. In that
context, the reasons for the suppression of those marginal identities
are different (in essence, although similar in practice).
What I am trying to get at is that, the pain of the gay community,
although similar, is not the same of the colonized people. It is
different because of its context. Still, as Foucault taught to many of
us, behind those forms of pain lies a certain way of understanding.
Dissimilar, again because of context, but again similar in structural
terms (because its genesis is the pain itself).
The understanding of the context, then is vital, for the understanding
of the pain. Probably, that is the reason why Jonathan read my anger
(and pain) in a certain way, while you disqualified it completely. That
is probably why I reclaimed the right to use the word "fuck" or
"fucking".
Do I have textual authority to claim the respect of those of you who
have never experienced an invasion in their lifetimes? Why should I
claim that its my right, while not violating yours of free speech? Well,
again, free of speech or multiculturalism (as a gay person you feel free
to reclaim) is much better when is based on the concept of tolerance and
respect. Was I insulting all of you who felt United Staters? No. I was
just reclaiming the respect that its due to us, the victims of
colonization.
Its a shame you do not feel responsible for the actions of your
government, because I do. You see, I may live in a colony, but the
ruling party here believes in Statehood as a resolution of our pending
political status. I did not vote for them, never have. But I feel
responsible for them being in power, because their presence reminds me
that I have not done enough to stop that nonsense. The governor is in
favor of the invasion,which makes me feel very ashamed, again for the
same reasons.
Do I have to conceive anything to him. No. I still stand on the same
line of thought as I did before he went to office. I do identify with
the Haitian people. But I don't think I should approve the invasion,
just because its the easy way out, just because I could gain some power
through the media, concurring with the ruling party. Nor do I feel I
should classify his action in terms of whether he is "politically
correct" or not.
I think I've said enough for the moment. If you have any doubt, well you
can continue writing. I hope I have reach your level of intellectual
competition that you reclaimed for the debate. For me, I feel myself
much comfortable in my epistemology of the flesh, of pain.
Javier, plainly (this time)
Date: Tue, 20 Sep 94 00:43 AST
From: Javier Santiago Lucerna
Stephen and all of those who have been following the thread:
I will try to make a final comment on all this load of senseless
accusations, for some based on "emotion" (as you cleverly
suggest) while for others based on the technical superiority that
some sort of knowledge seems to assess to certain interlocutors.
Being said that, lets state this simply: Both of us are not
definetly on the same page. You have your idea about why the U.S.
should invade Haiti, while for myself that is not even a
question! Why should I think the Staters have to resolve any
single problem in the area with their Arm Forces?
My anger was not based upon the premise of "why or why not invade
Haiti." Rather, my preocupation was, why should you ask or narrow
the options upon whether to invade or not. But lets face it, for
the moment that seems to be the only event that will actually
occur. The reason being the impersialistic way on which the
United States has handle Caribbean Politics this century (16
invasions in total). Clear and simple.
You still have not answered that fundamental question that I
posed: which is better, the present misery and degradation of
the Haitian people or a genuinely capitalist regime that will
actually represent soime progress in living standard? Another
question: You said, "Sometimes intervention is fair others not."
Please delineate the rules by which we determine when an
interventin is fair, and when one is not. Frankly, this
statement undermines your entire argument.
Your description of living standards in Puerto Rico actually
makes a strong case FOR intervention in Haiti. In fact, your
argument about Puerto Rico pretty much exactly parallels the
arguments of the development people. They argue that cheap labor
allows the development of an industrial infrastructure that will
eventually provide the basis for a level of prosperity
previously unthinkable. I repeat: the fact is that cheap labor
in Haiti is an insignificant factor in the present invasion.
Cheap labor still needs to be good labor, and it is unlikely
that Haiti will be a major earning station for international
capital for some time. But if, as you point out in Puert Rico, a
few generations of cheap labor lead to economic development such
that there are too many college graduates and not enough cheap
laborers, then shouldn't Haiti get on that bandwagon? How does
your argument differ from development economics.
The reason I delineated the current state of labor politics in
the area was not part of my argument against the invasion. Check
back on the original message you send: you reproached the
analysis I made of the reasons the U.S. had to invade Haiti. I
was just putting into context the brief reason I gave that time.
But, what if I oppose the constant penetration, monopolization
and privatization of everyday life under capitalism in the
Caribbean? Why should I believe in the modern notion of progress,
thinking that they may be better under a capitalist regime of
exploitation. The development that Puerto Rico experienced in the
fifties and sixties was based on a particular configuration of
capitalistic penetration on the island. The tax structure that
allowed this changes established a certain amount of funds that
had to be deposited in Puerto Rican banks. I doubt Haiti workers
will enjoy such bonanza, particularly because that model of
economic development went bankrupt more than 25 years ago.
Present felxible production strategies stress more the importance
of lower cost without the mediation of any kind of State. (Ask
the people in Peru in that regard).
One of the problems Caribbean left have had in its agenda
in the last quarter of century has been the ideological value of
the capitalistic notion of progress. That is the same notion
Stalin and the old communist block bought from the West. But
history bakfired at them, showing the impossibility of reaching
the "living standards" of Western societies without reaping off
the natural resources, enslaving the working clases and creating
a big breach between the rich (or those who hold power) and the
poor.
It is important the role the Cuban revolution played in the de-
mystification of progress in this area. For their objective was
never to acheive a consumerist "living standard" close to the one
in U.S., but rather focused in those areas where the general
public was going to benefit the most. Did you know that for years
Cuba had the best Health Care system in the world? This same
model of economic development was adopted by the Nicaraguan
revolution (the Sandinistas) as well as other guerilla movements
in Central America (the FMLN in El Salvador, and also in
Guatemala). In other words, the notion of middle class type of
progress, very much alive in Puerto Rico but with a crisis
pending in the next corner, has been rejected by progressive
parties in the Caribbean as well as Central America. The reason
is simple: they know the high price the have to pay to
transnational capitalism and problems it ultimately will bring.
As for the out-of-context citation of "Sometimes intervention is
fair others not", hey that's your point man, not mine. If you
didn't understand the phrase or the paragraph where it was, you
should re-read it. That was implied in Nathan's original post:
"Gosh, I think this time invasion is good." Which I think made
the Invasion of The Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Panama,
Chile, Jamaica, Cuba, Granada, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala,
were no goood. Gosh!
Its much better for me, again, to focus in the reasons why you
should wind up in that kind of position in 1994 in front of this
current crisis, which is nothing new! I mean, remember Rafael
Trujillo in Dominican Republic? Batista in Cuba? I guess you can
include Noriega in Panama? Somoza in Nicaragua? And what about
the living legend, General Augusto Pinochet, responsible for the
killing of more than 200,000 people in two years?
This is a big difference between your argument and mine (although
you say that mine does not exist, something I REALLY APPRECIATE
from my heart). For me there is no military solution to this,
because at heart it will create even more problems.
Understand this my friend: if there are reprisals against the
MOST BLOODTHIRSTY MILITARY IN THE AMERICAS OVER THE LAST
CENTURY, it will not be the US Army who commits them!!! The
righteous anger of people liberated from hell will be quite
sufficient. You tread dangerously close to defending the Haitian
military here. Moreover, the issue is not to decide whether
Aristide will make appropriate decisions. The issue is whether
the Haitian people deserve to have the leader they elected in a
free vote. Suddenly, you argue that "sub-alternists" should
support the Haitian military!!! Get a grip, pal. If that is the
result of anger in thought, then my argument gets a considerable
boost.
You are putting words in my mouth, something that I do not
appreciate after so many years of english in public school here
in Puerto Rico. The problem with the invasion is that, in the
face of Big brother (U.S.), and for big brother, how can you tell
who is pro-Cedras and Who is-pro Aristide? Look at Panama! In the
case you don't know, the current elected government of Panama is
formed by former associates of Manuel Noriega. In the end, the
intervention couldn't guaranteed that those who were in power
before it does not return!
Well probably you were right, I was not clear enough. If there is
a Civil war, let it be without the intervention of the U.S.!
There is no doubt on my mind that a civil war will be the only
way out of this mess. But why the U.S. never contemplated that
posibility? I guess it does not guaranteed their dominance (both
political and economical) in the region, so the hell with it. Ah,
and when I say support I'm not talking about sending some troops,
but sending arms, training soldiers, etc.
I do not know if you are that aware, but the support for Aristide
has diminshed incredibly since the coup de etat. So an efective
manner to measure the posibility of his return, or the emergence
of a new leader could depend on the effectiveness of the civil
war. Sure tribal politics could emerge in such a war, just like
South Africa of Somalia. But again, isn't the will of the people.
Invasion, on the other hand remains a very problematic notion
here. For you, as for many others, may bring finally peace and
justice to Haitian people. But that is a short term thing. Think
about it, after all another invasion will kept fine tunning the
war machine of the United States. Money will keep pumping into
it, as well as a general consensus about its effectiveness. And,
boy, as long as we live in a war machine where do we expect to
go? Nuclear thread may be over, but does that eliminates the
possibility of anihilation when war is the main thing the U.S.
still exports. Whoa, dude!
A couple of notes: I reject the notion of "core" nations. (I
would appreciate a citation on how this term is used.) When the
left swallows the notions of the right and then pretends that
those notions are its own, the left has thereby abandonned its
unique position. That is precisely the basis of my critique of
the left as I have tried over the last year to elucidate it on
this list.
Moreover, the use of the notion of a core "nation" pointedly
abandons the notion of class, both in the capitalist nations and
in the Third World. When you say that I out to "feel
responsible" for the actions of "my" government, you betray a
fatal inability to understand what class rules in society. I
pointedly decline to take responsibility for a government which
I do not control. It is not my government. You betray the
moralistic underpinning of much left-wing discourse on the Third
World ... especially left wing discourse by Third World
intellectuals whose class background is, frankly, considerably
more privileged than mine!!
Quite Frankly, is a shame you do not believe in the concept of
"Core nations." I mean I do not feel the phenomena exists right
now (it depended too much in the idea of Nations in the
geographical sense). However, it is a very important notion that
helps understand part of the phenomenom of colonialism and
imperialism. It does not denies the structure of class (didn't
you said yo weren't a Marxist, buddy?); rather it exposes the
ways on which that concept fall short in terms of imperialism.
Remember, Marx knew very little of colonialism and imperialism,
because he never studies closely.
On the other hand, you make quite a case again for a class
structure in society when you pin-pointed earlier that you were
no marxist. What I find amazing is that by the logic you call
when you explained your shamelessness towards the political elite
of your country, you seem to cut your own wings, your own
arguments. If you cannot control or intervene in the way the
power is handled in the States, then why your are a leftist? So
you can cry with someone else in the blues? I should not get a
grip, its you who need a grip dude!
Surely class determines a lot of the power structure of a certain
soceity; but in no way that determines the impossibility of
affecting any kind of decision! After all, Clinton new the
advantages of declaring himself pro-choice following the show of
force pro choicer did during Reagan's and Bush' years. If you
don't feel proud about it, then you should be feeling the blues
for shure. Oh, don't tell me taht was political oprtunism, it was
more than that. Pro-choicers were heard, and that counts for me!
I could, were I of a different bent, prance and posture with
great anger over your ignorance of the gay community ... your
rather mechanical desire to rank and quantify forms of
oppression. Instead, I will simply point out that I too have
anger ... trmemndous crippling anger, at times ... which I
pointedly control in order to keep my mind clear.
As for the repeated questions and disqualifications you have made
towards my anger, I will not make any further comments since you
made me believe (and probably I firmly believe it right know)
that my intellectual competence is not up to the standards of you
and other (which I have not heard through out of this sort of
saldy controversy) in the list possess.
From the rest of your argument, this particular line expresses a
lot of my arguments, so I just felt I should quote it:
Which renders in a funny way the next segment:
So in a sarchastic sort of way (and also in response to my low
intellectual quotient), I can honestly say nice work Stephen.
[BTW, I would like to know exactly where your knowledge of
American Military history showed in this accidental and very
wicked thread.]
I think I lost a lot of energy in this, sincerily. So the best
way to finish this is reasserting what I laready said in the bulk
of the message. Yeap, in the light and sight of Stephen, my
intellectual level is not quite up to his: so be it! If this will
finish this sorry incident: So be it!
Javier, who has slept very well and continue to do so, even when
another person in the States thinks he is intellectually
incompetent (Guess that's part of living in a colony...)
[P.S. I will not read any other message Stephen Arod Sherrif
writes to the list concerning this issue. I rather focused myself
in other things. So I guess this is the end of the road for me...
HEARD THAT, STEPHEN YOU WIN... SO NOW YOU CAN CASH YOUR CHECK FOR
ANGER-BASHING... (Sounds familiar!)]
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