19.10.2005

Fair trade or Marxism?

Alec Long reviews Derek Wall's book Babylon and beyond: the economics of anti-capitalist, anti-globalist and radical green movements Pluto Press, pp220, £14.99

Derek Wall states that the purpose of this book is "to explain the economics of [the] anti-capitalist movement and, in doing so, to examine how a fairer and more ecologically sustainable world can be created" (p2). That gives him a problem in terms of the book's sweep. In truth - even if one actually accepts that there is such a thing as the "anti-capitalist movement" in the first place - I know the author would agree that a characteristic of the 'movement' as it is presently constituted is an enormous range of programmes, panaceas and schemes for refashioning the world. Attempting to cover such a wide range of theories in a relatively short work is extremely difficult and I found the book frustrating in many places, as it jumped from author to author, from one brand of theory to another. Most were given a very superficial 'once over' and left me wanting more in most cases, less in others. I suspect comrade Wall would actually regard this type of ideological 'diversity' as a positive strength - which is debatable in itself, of course. After all, there are lots of ideas out there - and most of them are pretty crap, unfortunately. The comrade's book is thus quite useful as a extended directory of political trends in what we can all probably agree is a new period, even if we disagree over whether those trends form any sort of cohered movement. It is clear that something has changed. Thousands of young people have entered radical protest politics, but this has hardly been reflected in recruitment to the existing left. Nevertheless, the shadow that fell across the workers' and progressive movement in the aftermath of the ignominious collapse of the USSR has partially lifted. Yet, far from all that was discredited and bankrupt being left behind, 'anti-capitalism' initially presents itself as a rearticulation of the old, both organisationally and politically. Thus, on the fringes, anarchism has been given a boost by the new mood. In Italy and France, anti-capitalism has moved into the orbit of 'official communist' and Trotskyist groups. Indeed, there is a direct parallel here with the situation within the organised Marxist left itself. That left is characterised by flux, as the old dies and the new struggles to be born. However, the politics of this period are dominated by doomed attempts to replicate (on much lower levels) the defeated and discredited politics of the past: popular frontism, left social democracy, et al. If comrade Wall was set on seriously pursuing the stated second task of his book - "to examine how a fairer and more ecologically sustainable world can be created" - he should, therefore, have adopted a more critical attitude to some of the ideas that prevail within 'anti-capitalism'. Take the question of fair trade, for example. The author recognises that this topic - a hotly contested and frequently discussed one, of course - reveals the confusion of ideas and programmes that characterise the 'movement' as it presently stands. He calls it an "excellent example" of the "intellectual confusion and "¦ chaotic mismatch of contradictory assumptions" that is its chief characteristic (p17). It is in this sense "an excellent illustration of the contradictions that the movement must address if it is to succeed" (p18). Quite right. It is precisely in this sort of context that we should go "back to Marx", as the comrade puts it in his interview with Mark Fischer. As we have pointed out before, one of the theoretical progenitors of modern notions of 'fair trade' was the French anarchist, Pierre Proudhon (1809-1865). Thus, demands for 'fair trade' in the contemporary world are a repackaging of ideas that were deeply flawed when first elaborated over 180 years ago. They were demolished by Marx in his brilliant The poverty of philosophy, of course. Yet, some 160 years later, we find Derek Ward effectively giving a degree of credence to such backward-looking schemas. True, after writing in glowing terms of a few "embedded markets" where petty commodity producers "exchanged and produced under conditions determined" by them, he adds the warning that, while such initiatives are "significant, they still work within a capitalist system that threatens them": the need to survive can lead to self-exploitation, with pay being cut to remain competitive" (p182). However, the comrade still gives credibility to the notion that such approaches are at least an attempt to "adapt markets as a way of beginning to move beyond markets" (p180). Clearly, comrade Wall did not intend this book as some turbo-charged polemic. However, the job of those who stand in the tradition of Marx is precisely to attempt to bring clarity to a diffuse movement, not invest illusions - even qualified ones - in historically redundant panaceas. It is not so much the idea that fair trade initiatives could temporarily "ease present ills" that is objectionable in itself. It is more that such ultimately utopian schemas have a widespread programmatic currency amongst many who class themselves as 'anti-capitalist'. People need a programme that really does take them beyond capitalism - Marxism, not warmed over Proudhonism. Of course, such a short review will necessarily have a one-sided take on a book that is so ambitious in the amount of ground it attempts to cover. Its publication is certainly to be welcomed. Despite its many flaws, the fact that it originates with a serious politician in the ranks of the Green Party underlines the point we have tried to make to the organised Marxist left. We should engage with radical petty bourgeois parties as reds. Thus, comrade Wall - like so many others on the left - is fundamentally wrong to suggest that "attempts to 'green' Marxism are clearly necessary" (p122). This is not a squabble about colour schemes - as comrade Wall himself states in our interview, we need to set ourselves the task of discovering afresh the real Marx. * Back to Marx Mark Fischer interviews Derek Wall