International

The Obama Administration : Transparent as a Brick

Details: Published: Friday, 06 November 2009 19:25; Written by Karl Belin

When Barack Obama was still a candidate in the Democratic primaries, he promised a new era if he were elected. Among his promises for “change,” he said his future administration would be one of the most transparent in history: “an unprecedented level of openness in government".

Green Shoots of Economic Recovery?

Details: Published: Friday, 06 November 2009 19:19; Written by Mick Brooks

Some economic commentators and financial journalists have divined the ‘green shoots’ of economic recovery’ growing out of the present crisis. Perhaps the wish is father to the thought. Are they right?

Manifesto of the International Marxist Tendency --The Crises: Make the bosses pay!

Details: Published: Saturday, 01 November 2008 15:47; Written by IMT & Socialist Appeal NZ Editorial Board

The "Manifesto of the International Marxist Tendency" explains the unfolding global crises of capitalism, as well as a socialist perspective and programme for workers to achieve socialism. This should be read in conjunction with recent economic and perspective articles on the Socialist Appeal NZ website.

Ideologies of Abstinence

Details: Published: Friday, 06 November 2009 18:52; Written by Mauro Vanetti

With the National Government debating the merits of the “Emission Trading Scheme”, we reproduce an extract by Mauro Vanetti's in which petit-bourgeois environmentalism is exposed as an non-viable response to global warming - green "ideologies of abstinence" simply play in to the hands of the ruling class. What is required is a genuine Marxist programme on this issue, which is outlined at the end of the article.

(This article can be read in full on http://www.marxist.com/global-warming-deniers-and-climate-change-ideologues-part-five.htm in reply to climate change denier Brian J Baker)

1929: Can it happen again?

Details: Published: Tuesday, 18 March 2008 01:16; Written by Mick Brooks

This article was originally written on the occasion of the seventieth anniversary of the 1929 Wall Street Crash. It was not intended purely as a commemorative or historical piece. It was written because, to Marxists, all the signs were then apparent that another stock price ‘correction’ was in preparation. In 1998 Long Term Capital Management had collapsed, losing $4.6 billion in four months. LTCM was a hedge fund. The details of their activities were arcane, but what they were engaged in was essentially the same practice as was called ‘buying on the margin’ in 1929. In other words they were betting with other people’s money. They had been much admired in high finance. Two of their operators, Myron Scholes and Robert C. Merton, had won the Nobel prize in economics in 1997. Their economic writings were mind-numbingly mathematical. However the fate of LTCM shows they made scant addition to the sum of human happiness. But after all that had never been their intention.

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