Beautiful game, pity about the nationalism

[Devrim]

From this month's World Revolution, publication of the ICC in Britain:

In the future, in a real human community, there will surely be football. The elimination of economic and military competition from the basis of society does not imply that people won't still want to play team games, and football has proved itself to be the most compelling team game of all.

But there won't be any nation states, so the World Cup in its present form will have been consigned to the Museum of Football History (possibly the one in Preston).
That's if we reach such a society - which we absolutely need to do if humanity has any chance of surviving and flourishing. And if we don't, the continuing grip of nationalism will certainly be one of the factors that will have doomed us to sink into an inferno of endless wars and ethnic conflicts.

International sporting events like the World Cup are the perfect vehicle for stirring up nationalism. As in the current Carlsberg TV ad, the ghosts of Agincourt and Bobby Moore are conjured up from the dead to lead ‘11 English men' to victory over the foreign foe....Meanwhile (at least until England get knocked out) the country will be awash with flags of St George and the likes of the English Defence League will seize the day to step up their marches against the imminent danger of our country being taken away from us by Islamic terrorists (or just Muslims, or blacks, or foreigners in general).

Some will reply: lighten up. It's all good harmless fun. After all, not everyone who waves the Crusader's flag is a xenophobe or a fascist. There will be plenty of black people and Asian people supporting England.

And indeed, it's not likely that the World Cup itself will have a very deep or lasting impact in Britain, or that the nationalist hysteria it generates will end up in much worse than a few sordid examples of racist bullying and violence against those perceived as the non-English. But there are plenty of examples to show that football, or rather its manipulation by the media and political factions, has been a key factor in whipping up real and very bloody conflicts. Last year's qualifying match between Egypt and Algeria for this World Cup is a good example. Six Algerian fans were killed in the chaos that followed the match in Cairo and 21 Algerians injured. 23 Egyptians were injured in Khartoum, and on top of this 14 Algerians died and hundreds were wounded in Algeria in post-match celebrations. In addition to the violence around the actual match many of the 15,000 Egyptian workers living in Algeria were attacked and felt forced to flee. Thousands of Egyptian supporters also fought running battles with the police in central Cairo, resulting in 11 police and 24 protesters being injured, 20 people arrested and 15 vehicles damaged. Some fans, unable to reach the Algerians, pelted the nearby Indian Embassy with stones. In addition to this there were widespread clashes between North Africans living in France.
Although the bourgeois media condemns events like this the very tone that they take shows a completely different reaction to the one they had at the time of the massive strikes in Algeria two years ago. Then the full fury of the state, and all its repressive apparatus, were turned against the working class, showing the fear within the ruling class. After the football match there were a few gentle words of condemnation and appeals for calm.

This is far from the worst events that we have seen at a football match though. Back in 1990, one of the events that was part of the build up to the wars in ex-Yugoslavia was the match between Dynamo Zagreb and Red Star Belgrade. Of course wars are not started by football matches. Nevertheless such public demonstrations of nationalist hatred are used as a way to mobilise the working class for war. The match ended up in a pitched battle between rival Croatian and Serbian nationalist gangs, the Serb one led by Arkan, a Serb nationalist later indicted by the UN for crimes against humanity. The police were quickly overwhelmed by the large numbers, but later returned with reinforcements, armoured vans and water cannons to join in the violence. After an hour with hundreds of injured, some shot, some stabbed and some poisoned by tear gas, the fighting subsided. The wars, in which over 60,000 people died were about to start, and Arkan's Tigers, a militia based on Red Star supporters, played a role in some of the worst cases of ethnic cleansing. Zvonimir Boban, later to achieve massive fame with AC Milan, caught the limelight that day by attacking a policeman during the rioting. He later said he loved Croatia more than anything, and that he would die for his country. He didn't, but unfortunately tens of thousands of workers did.

Going back to 1969, to the 1970 World Cup qualifiers in fact, El Salvador and Honduras fought a war commonly know as the ‘Soccer War'. The match was the spark that turned an already tense situation into war. Following the second-leg match the media in both countries reported, exaggerated, and incited attacks of workers from the other country, and within a month the countries were involved in war, which although it only lasted for four days left over 3,000 dead, the vast majority of them civilians, and 300,000 refugees.

In the future, if we have a future, there will surely be football. But it won't be used to sell us back our own dreams, to turn respect for skill into the worship of stars and idols, to bind us to a false community where the exploited and the oppressed have the same interests as those that exploit us and oppress us, just because they were born inside the same national borders.



http://en.internationalism.org/wr/335/beautifulgame

[ComradeOm]

A revolution without the World Cup is not a revolution worth having

[RadioRaheem84]

Amen

[it_ain't_me]

i have to say it's stuff like this which makes me unable to take the ICC very seriously.

[Lyev]

I see your ICC article, and I raise you a CWI ;)

Soccer World Cup 2010: South Africa, the ugly backdrop to the beautiful game

NOTHING SYMBOLISES more graphically the ugliness that forms the backdrop to the beautiful game than all the scandals, corruption and greed surrounding the 2010 World Cup.

Sheri and Weizmann Hamilton, Democratic Socialist Movement, South Africa

The mega event, on which the entire world's media is focused, is the first to be held on the African continent. It is being presented as an opportunity to contribute to the development of sport and the economy through stunts such as 'football Fridays' (when the national anthem should be sung by all and the national football jersey worn), and the special 'diski' World Cup dance.

It will brighten up the fading colours of the "Rainbow Nation", boost "nation building", provide redress for historical injustices, a panacea for all social and economic ills, create jobs and help South Africa (SA) escape the effects of the global recession and kick start economic recovery!

However, even before a ball is kicked, SA has already beaten Brazil, winning the World Cup of inequality - the only cup it will win!

The World Cup has sharpened the already acute contradictions, pro-duced by the increasingly desperate efforts of the political elite around the African National Congress (ANC) leadership to rapidly become a rich black capitalist class and to impress Western and white capital, which still overwhelmingly dominates the economy.

Investment in vanity projects like the World Cup, during the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, depression adds insult to the injuries the working class is suffering.

In fact, the expenditure will worsen prospects of economic recovery because of increased state debt and the displacement of expenditure on more socially and economically useful projects. Back in April, the ruling ANC had to ask the World Bank for a $3.75 billion loan to secure the country's faltering electricity supply.

Even the promises made during the bid for the World Cup, to use a sport historically supported by the black working class to leave a development legacy, lie as empty as the stadiums will be once the event is over.

Serving the elite
Only a handful of clubs, Orlando Pirates, Kaizer Chiefs and Bloemfontein Celtic attract decent sized crowds. As with every other of the government's allegedly economic and social development programmes, the main motivation for the 2010 World Cup is to provide the elite with opportunities for self enrichment. Everything to do with soccer has attached to it a 'for sale' sign.

The Mbombela stadium in Mpumalanga, widely seen as the most corrupt province in the country, was built on land acquired by a BEE (Black Economic Empowerment) consortium from a community for a couple of rands and unfulfilled promises of investment.

Consumed by the insatiable ambitions of "tenderpreneurs", conflicts over tenders have brought ANC factions into bloody conflict with each other. Several leading politicians named on hit lists have been assassinated. The Mpumalanga ANC is split; its premier a target for removal but supported by powerful allies including the presidents of the ANC and ANC Youth League, Jacob Zuma and Julius Malema, respectively.

Massive profit
The almost R800 billion (£710 million) that was set aside for infrastructure development in roads, airports, highways and stadiums, is many times the amount spent on the World Cups by Korea and Japan (2002) or Germany (2006). Despite the then economic boom, return on investment for those countries has been, at best, negligible. The climate is much less favourable for SA currently.

The total cost of SA's hosting the World Cup is unclear. Present estimates are 757% above the original guesstimates! Apart from the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) systems being introduced, World Cup expenditure displaces investment in projects with more meaningful and long-term benefits such as health and education.

For example, World Cup-related infrastructure expenditure equals ten years of housing investment. Only 7% of SA's schools have functioning libraries. Yet for every seven seats in the new stadia a fully equipped school library could have been built.

Much of the World Cup revenue generated in South Africa is siphoned off in returns on investment by FIFA (International Federation of Association Football) and other overseas investors.

The main beneficiaries of local investment in infrastructure and stadiums have been the construction industry bosses. Between 2005 and 2006 their pre-tax profits sky-rocketed 56%. Company executive pay rose on average by 39%, the highest in all economic sectors.

Profits of a top earner such as Group 5 rose by 73% and those of their Black Economic Empowerment partners by 21.6%. Murray and Roberts' CEO's remuneration rose 40% to R7.4 million a year.

Construction workers, on the other hand, officially earn between R1,144 and R4,576 per month. In reality many workers are paid far less - down to R5.50 per hour (half the minimum rate).

The majority of workers in the industry are not unionised and are employed on so-called limited duration contracts. There have been 26 strikes on World Cup sites of which 20 were 'wildcat' strikes. The strikes were complicated by the fact that the companies involved have BEE partners with prominent political profiles. These individuals could use their influence with union bosses to settle disputes without undue pressure on their lucrative profit margins.

The short term nature of the jobs has done little for the training and skills development promised. At most 50,000 temporary jobs are likely to have been created. The government had claimed the World Cup would bring 415,000.

FIFA will be laughing all the way to the bank with an expected €1.2 billion in media rights alone. Earnings for 2010 have already exceeded €1 billion - a first, despite growing concerns that ticket sales will fall well below target. Having been stubbornly indifferent to pleas to open ticket centres for over-the-counter sales, to make them accessible to the majority of SA supporters, FIFA and SAFA (South African Football Association) were forced do so from 15 April.

The irony is not lost on those protesting on the streets and the more than 2.8 million youth aged between 18 and 24 years who are neither working nor in any kind of education and training.

Class divide
Working class people are asking why the government has succeeded in completing the building of brand new stadiums in record time when they still don't have decent houses; why they have embarked on a massive highway improvement scheme when there is such rampant poverty. 900,000 workers in 2009 alone lost their jobs as a result of the recession taking the total to between six million and eight million jobless (35%).

The government pleads financial constraints when it comes to delivery of basic services, houses, access to health and education. Yet it has found R30 billion to build stadiums and a further R787 billion for all infrastructure development. Failing to address the crisis of homelessness, local government has instead embarked on quick "fixes" to hide street kids and other 'unwanted' people.

The country is being drowned in a deluge of patriotism in an attempt to numb working people's sensibilities towards the harsh class realities at work in the most popular working class sport in the world.

Whilst the tiny elite of BEE tycoons and white capital make fabulous profits from World Cup contracts, the working class is being asked to accept its lot - poor wages, mass unemployment, poor service delivery and deepening poverty - for the good of the country as patriotic South Africans.

Patriotism, as Samuel Johnson said, is the last refuge of scoundrels! That president Zuma has fathered a child with the daughter of soccer boss, Irvin Khoza, not only shines a light on Zuma's moral and cultural hypocrisy, but it reveals the connection between the ANC political elite and the soccer mafia to promote their mutual interests.

The greed, corruption and naked self interest that lie at the root of the divisions threatening to tear the ANC apart are mirrored in SAFA without the fig leaf of political pretensions.

Rivalry between the warring factions - led respectively by the Local Organising Committee's Danny Jordaan and the Professional Soccer League's Irvin Khoza - deteriorated to such an extent that it threatened preparation for the World Cup itself as both parties insisted on holding elections to the SAFA presidency before the event.

The truce negotiated by Sepp Blatter and Zuma will hold until after the World Cup. Then it's all-out war for the presidency of SAFA and the billions that will fill the pockets of the winner.

So consumed by the opportunities for self-enrichment is the SAFA bureaucracy - widely regarded as incompetent and corrupt - that they disregarded all advice to pour the billions that make SA football the richest on the African continent, into sport development.

What could have been an opportunity to develop young soccer talent and more generally to let the World Cup leave a legacy of health, fitness and a sporting culture, has been subordinated to greed, the pursuit of power and prestige.

Protests
The ruling elite are using the World Cup like the emperors of the Roman Empire, who tried to distract the attention of the masses from their miserable lives with 'bread and circuses'.

But there could be protests during the event by township residents demanding basic services and by taxi associations whose livelihoods are threatened by the new bus transport system in the major cities and by other workers too, as the World Cup coincides with the annual wage negotiations season.

Whatever the outlook of union leaders, workers will not be blackmailed by accusations that they are 'unpatriotic' by demanding decent wage increases.

Street traders have already organised several protests against their forced removal from stadium precincts and even roads leading to them for the duration of the games.

Even the Congress of SA Trade Unions, (Cosatu) hitherto loyal choristers in the desperate attempt to whip up a phony SA patriotism (going so far as to call upon workers to fill the stadiums during the Federations Cup "dress rehearsal" to "avoid embarrassing the country") have had to protest against the draconian actions of local government against small traders.

Cosatu was also forced to protest against the production of the World Cup mascot in Chinese sweatshops and the virtual colonisation of the country during the World Cup by FIFA and Sepp Blatter, whose salary is protected from scrutiny by Swiss banking secrecy laws. After the distraction of the World Cup, the intensity of the class struggle will go into a higher gear.

Service delivery protests reached the highest level since 1994 in the first three months of this year and have spread to almost every part of the country, most intensely across Gauteng and Mpumalanga townships.

Youth are leading residents in burning tyres, blockading roads and destroying government facilities in scenes reminiscent of the anti-apartheid struggle; expressing massive frustration and resentment over the continued lack of services.

Ongoing protests include the townships near Balfour in Mpumalanga province where protests first broke out in May last year shortly after Jacob Zuma's presidential inauguration, and which led to the dismissal of the entire local council mayoral team after a visit by Zuma.

When the president returned there two weeks ago he was booed by the crowd who pointed out that nothing had come of his promises to improve services.

The ANC government is aping the insolence and contempt for the masses displayed by French queen Marie Antoinette whose infamous response to their demands for bread was to say "Let them eat cake"! In response to the demand for houses and basic services, the government appears to be saying 'let them have stadiums!'

It is time for a real alternative that will prioritise the interests of workers and youth and not those of the bosses.

Bafana Bafana - little to inspire
The national team, Bafana Bafana, is now 83 in FIFA's world rankings having dropped like a stone from the heady days of the 1996 African Cup of Nations (Afcon) victory. The indignity of Bafana Bafana failing to qualify for the January 2010 African Cup of Nations in neighbouring Angola, meant the national team was deprived of playing against the type of tough opposition they can expect in the World Cup.

Bafana are not expected to progress beyond the preliminary rounds. The team's preparations have been an absolute shambles. Emergency training camps in Brazil and Germany saw them playing against lower league and reserve teams. China cancelled its friendly match in Germany with Bafana, citing travel difficulties because of volcanic ash.

In the end SA had to settle for matches against North Korea and Jamaica. After all these failed efforts to give Bafana Bafana at least the semblance of a football team worthy of the name, the team is left to rely on home support for inspiration to progress.

Protests and demos ban
In late May, police issued directives to municipalities to ban all protests and demonstrations by trade unions and other campaigns until after the World Cup was over on 15 July 2010. Police minister Nathi Mthethwa said in a statement to parliament that air sweeps by fighter jets, joint border patrols with neighbouring countries, police escorts for cruise ships and team security guards with 'diplomat' training were aimed at preventing "domestic extremism, strike action and service delivery protests". This ban has been openly defied by workers and working class communities.

The government has now been forced to retreat in the face of threatened legal action over the ban during the World Cup. An Education for All demonstration will continue as will the Anti-Privatisation Forum march on 13 June, preceded by pickets at FIFA and SAFA offices from 7 to 10 June.

Stadiums and toilets
Probably the most grotesque example of the government's attitude to the World Cup is the fact that Cape Town could afford to build the country's most expensive stadium, at a cost of R24.5 billion, (which mayor Helen Zille boasts is 'the most beautiful stadium in the world'), and yet could only afford to build open air toilets for residents of the black township of Gugulethu!

The city council pleaded poverty - saying that providing enclosures would have meant building only one toilet for every five families. But with open air toilets, every family could have one!

Residents have been protesting despite the police minister's extravagant threats. 23 residents were arrested last week and those released have vowed to continue protesting until they are provided with decent toilets.

[Devrim]

I see your ICC article, and I raise you a CWI ;)

Yes, we also ran a piece about the background situation in South Africa:


Behind the euphoria, the real class divisions

In the World Cup opening ceremony at Soccer City, Johannesburg, five fighter jets flew over, suitable symbols of South Africa's military and economic strength in relation to the rest of the continent. Because of traffic snarl-ups many missed the beginning of the opening match - demonstrating that, despite extensive pre-tournament investment, getting from A to B can still be a serious headache. And if you were to look at the spectators in the seats (and the 184 suites) you would have seen only fans from abroad or those South Africans rich enough to be able to afford tickets. For the majority of people in South Africa the World Cup will be just something seen on TV, if at all, in a country where there are fewer than 120 TVs per 1000 people, where literally millions don't even have electricity, while the rich have generators in case of power cuts.



Read more (http://en.internationalism.org/wr/335/world-cup-sa)




A revolution without the World Cup is not a revolution worth having


Amen

I think it is important to realise that communism is not just capitalism without the bosses, but a complete change in society. How can you have a World Cup without nations, and obviously professional football?


i have to say it's stuff like this which makes me unable to take the ICC very seriously.

Why?

Devrim

[ComradeOm]

I think it is important to realise that communism is not just capitalism without the bosses, but a complete change in society. How can you have a World Cup without nations, and obviously professional football?Easy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-Ireland_Senior_Football_Championship)

More importantly, stripping out everything that is enjoyable or fun from society on the basis that it offends your sensibilities is just another form of puritanism. Of course people will continue to play football after a revolution and of course there will be global tournaments. Why? Because the World Cup is hugely enjoyable for countless millions of people

[Devrim]

More importantly, stripping out everything that is enjoyable or fun from society on the basis that it offends your sensibilities is just another form of puritanism. Of course people will continue to play football after a revolution and of course there will be global tournaments. Why? Because the World Cup is hugely enjoyable for countless millions of people

I don't think it is about 'stripping out everything that is enjoyable or fun from society'. It is about the fact that you can't have international football without nations.

Also I don't think the nationalism is just something that 'offends my sensibilities'. Certainly, football inspired nationalism is used to mobilise workers to fight each other. The references to genocide in Serbia in the article are a good example of that.

Personally, I actually enjoy the World Cup. To be honest though I am enjoying it a lot more without a Turkish presence as nobody is shooting a gun outside my house, and no babies have been killed after matches. It is nicer without having to suffer the nationalism directly.

Devrim

[manic expression]

I don't think it is about 'stripping out everything that is enjoyable or fun from society'. It is about the fact that you can't have international football without nations.
So after the revolution we're all going to speak the exact same language, grow up in the exact same culture and geographic area and share the exact same ancestry and collective history? Nothing, and absolutely nothing, will differentiate one corner of the globe from another? When people ask "hey, where are you from?", the only possible answer will be "everywhere and nowhere...just like you!"?

No, nations will not end after the revolution.

[FreeFocus]

So after the revolution we're all going to speak the exact same language, grow up in the exact same culture and geographic area and share the exact same ancestry and collective history? Nothing, and absolutely nothing, will differentiate one corner of the globe from another? When people ask "hey, where are you from?", the only possible answer will be "everywhere and nowhere...just like you!"?

No, nations will not end after the revolution.

This, this, this. I have zero interest in fighting for the creation of some monolithic society - it necessarily entails cultural genocide or the slow death of culture.

[Devrim]

So after the revolution we're all going to speak the exact same language, grow up in the exact same culture and geographic area and share the exact same ancestry and collective history? Nothing, and absolutely nothing, will differentiate one corner of the globe from another? When people ask "hey, where are you from?", the only possible answer will be "everywhere and nowhere...just like you!"?

No, nations will not end after the revolution.

The modern nation state is a product of capitalism, and a relatively recent phenomenon, which has only been in existence for a few hundred years. In the Middle East it is a much more recent phenomenon basically since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the after WWI.

I can personally remember meeting an old man in the boarder region who when asked what nationality he was replied that he spoke Kermanji, Zaza, Turkish, Farsi and Arabic.

Of course in a communist society people wouldn't all speak the same language or other things that you suggest, but I don't think that their could be nation states.


This, this, this. I have zero interest in fighting for the creation of some monolithic society - it necessarily entails cultural genocide or the slow death of culture.

I don't know where you get this idea of a 'monolithic society' from, but personally I have zero interest in fighting for a world of nation states.

Devrim

[Vanguard1917]

International sporting events like the World Cup are the perfect vehicle for stirring up nationalism.


I don't think that that's the case, at least not as far as England is concerned, even though it may seem that way superficially. Underneath all the St George flags and the trite jokes about the French, the Germans or the 'Argies', you will struggle to find any real, proper football-driven nationalism in England today. It's fake, seasonal nationalism, which is clearly demonstrated by the fact that, as soon as the competition is over, the flags are taken down to gather dust somewhere until the next tournament. A bit like Christmas and decorations.

But the British media, especially that of the liberal variety, seems obsessed by the idea of football-driven nationalism. This obsession is caused by deep anti-working class prejudices -- the notion that working class people, particularly white ones, are so impressionable and simple-minded that they're able to be led astray to chauvinist frenzy by a sport that they're apparently crazed with. But, in reality, football-driven English nationalism is pretty much a myth. Nationalism has concrete social and political causes, not sporting ones.

[Devrim]

I don't think that that's the case, at least not as far as England is concerned, even though it may seem that way superficially. Underneath all the St George flags and the trite jokes about the French, the Germans or the 'Argies', you will struggle to find any real, proper football-driven nationalism in England today.

Which is pretty much what we said:


And indeed, it's not likely that the World Cup itself will have a very deep or lasting impact in Britain, or that the nationalist hysteria it generates will end up in much worse than a few sordid examples of racist bullying and violence against those perceived as the non-English. But there are plenty of examples to show that football, or rather its manipulation by the media and political factions, has been a key factor in whipping up real and very bloody conflicts.

The Two main examples that we brought up were not from England, but from North Africa and the Balkans.


Nationalism has concrete social and political causes, not sporting ones.

I think that this was implicit in the text too:


But there are plenty of examples to show that football, or rather its manipulation by the media and political factions, has been a key factor in whipping up real and very bloody conflicts.

Football is used to whip up nationalism. It is not the underlying cause.

Devrim

[Devrim]

And promptly goes on to list occasions of violence associated with nationalism in football. Which is fair enough. For me however, with a schooling in English football, "the worst events... seen at a football match" include violence between rival fans at local derbies. Drill down far enough and you will always arrive at some local competition. Are meetings between Millwall and West Ham fans really less vicious that those of international rivals?

Yes, I think so. Millwall Vs. West Ham is a storm in a tea cup compared to what goes on in some places. I went to English football in the 1970s, Manchester United at the height of football hooliganism, and the worst I ever saw was a few people being punched a little. To compare to what we are talking about, the article mentions the Egypt Vs Algeria World Cup qualifiers:


Last year's qualifying match between Egypt and Algeria for this World Cup is a good example. Six Algerian fans were killed in the chaos that followed the match in Cairo and 21 Algerians injured. 23 Egyptians were injured in Khartoum, and on top of this 14 Algerians died and hundreds were wounded in Algeria in post-match celebrations. In addition to the violence around the actual match many of the 15,000 Egyptian workers living in Algeria were attacked and felt forced to flee. Thousands of Egyptian supporters also fought running battles with the police in central Cairo, resulting in 11 police and 24 protesters being injured, 20 people arrested and 15 vehicles damaged. Some fans, unable to reach the Algerians, pelted the nearby Indian Embassy with stones. In addition to this there were widespread clashes between North Africans living in France.

I can't remember, apart from Hysel, which I think was more of an accident due to bad planning and an old stadium, six people being killed after a match in England in football violence.

Equally disturbing, I got remember 15,000 foreign workers being forced to flee the country after an England match. I think that one of the differences is also the fact that in England hooliganism is combined to relatively small groups. There isn't quite the same mobilising factor that there is with nationalism.

In the article that we had in our Turkish press, we also talked about the events after the Leeds Vs Galatasary match a few years ago where a couple of Leeds boys got stabbed to death, which again was motivated by nationalism. As well as this we also talked about the habit of shooting your gun in the air after winning a big match(i.e. against foreign opposition). At one point a couple of years ago, there was on average a death a week resulting from 'celebrations'.


False? How so?

I think I demonstrate in post 15 above how these identities were creations of capital.


Not that it really matters. In Europe at least, the nations that were forged in the late 19th C now exist and have a life of their own. 'German' and 'French' now means something fundamentally different, and not necessarily worse, than it did two hundred years ago. I have no problem with this and I see no reason for these bonds to snap or fray post-revolution

I think though that the form of the national state is intrinsically linked to capitalism, and certainly do see a reason for these bonds to fray.

Devrim

[ComradeOm]

The nation is an artificiality created community.
OK, let's say they're artificial, just like technology, industry, class, production, song and dance and every city on the face of the earth...just about everything in human civilization is artificial. Doesn't mean we should do away with it.


The definition that you give of a 'nation' is absolutely full of holes. It would completely rule out nations such as Belgium, and Switzerland, that are based on more than one 'language group', but even the idea of a language group is not something that has always existed as a standard definition. The major languages today are the direct results of the formation of the modern state. Prior to that what existed were a host of different local dialects, and minor languages.First, Switzerland and Belgium are not nations, they are multi-national countries. Second, yes, languages have been affected by the rise of the capitalist nation-state, but does that change the facts at hand? Finally, the death of languages is simply part of the march of history. I don't like it, but that's how history has played out. Marxists don't argue with the facts of history, they observe them and adhere to them.


The whole idea of some sort of 'pure' divided ethnic groups is a fabricationI never said that was the case. The Marxist approach to the national question overturns this capitalist assumption that you seem to have embraced as the only possible conception of the nation.


Generally people are a pretty mixed lot, and the dividing lines of nation are something that the modern sate has forced upon people. If we look to the British Isles again, the 'nation of Ireland' is essentially a modern creation, which certainly didn't exist before the rise of modern nationalism.So what if it's a modern development? It exists.


One final example of what national identities actually mean in practice from Turkey, In 1923 after the Turkish War of 'Liberation', there was an act of massive ethnic cleansing which is generally referred to as the 'population exchange', in which 2,000,000 (500,000 from Greece the rest from Turkey) people were forced out of their homes made refugees and 'exchanged'.So the suppression of the right of nations to self-determination means that we shouldn't support the right of nations to self-determination?


States exist yes, but the nation is a false recently constructed community.
This is the most insane part of your argument. Ankara is a "false recently constructed community". I suppose we should blow it up block by block after the revolution.

[EDIT: Below originally posted by me in response to Devrim. No idea where the rest came from]

The article started like this:

....And promptly goes on to list occasions of violence associated with nationalism in football. Which is fair enough. For me however, with a schooling in English football, "the worst events... seen at a football match" include violence between rival fans at local derbies. Drill down far enough and you will always arrive at some local competition. Are meetings between Millwall and West Ham fans really less vicious that those of international rivals?


The idea of professional football though will be outdated in a world without moneyNaturally, but then I've always been a big fan of amateurism in sports


States exist yes, but the nation is a false recently constructed communityFalse? How so?

Not that it really matters. In Europe at least, the nations that were forged in the late 19th C now exist and have a life of their own. 'German' and 'French' now means something fundamentally different, and not necessarily worse, than it did two hundred years ago. I have no problem with this and I see no reason for these bonds to snap or fray post-revolution

[EDIT: End of my original post]



States exist yes, but the nation is a false recently constructed community. This is the most insane part of your argument. Ankara is a "false recently constructed community". I suppose we should blow it up block by block after the revolution.

I don't think that it is 'insane' at all. It is a direct response to this statement of yours:


Not nation states, of course. But the nation and the nation state are not the same: the nation goes beyond the nation state, and the capitalist nation state suppresses genuine national self-determination. A nation, to be brief, is made up of people who share a common language, a common geographic region, a common history and a common cultural identity (border regions are what happen when multiple nations meet...surely the man you mention was not Persian and Arab and Turkish and more equally at the same time). These entities predate capitalism by a very, very long time.

I don't think this is at all true, and I think I successfully argued that it wasn't. You at least seem to have changed your tack from first saying that 'nations' were pre-capitalist to then saying it doesn't matter if they aren't, which is a completely different question.

My point was to dismiss the fallacy, which is constantly put forward in society that the nation is a 'natural' way of organising things. On the contrary, I think it is a relatively recent phenomenon, just as capitalism is itself.


OK, let's say they're artificial, just like technology, industry, class, production, song and dance and every city on the face of the earth...just about everything in human civilization is artificial. Doesn't mean we should do away with it.

As I said, this is a completely different argument. Your original argument was that they shouldn't be done away with because they were "entities [that] predate capitalism by a very, very long time. They will not and cannot disappear through the abolition of class". Now you seem to be saying they are relatively modern things and that is not bad in itself.

No, it is not, but neither does it make them good. As I pointed out above, I think they are intrinsically capitalist forms.

Devrim



One final example of what national identities actually mean in practice from Turkey, In 1923 after the Turkish War of 'Liberation', there was an act of massive ethnic cleansing which is generally referred to as the 'population exchange', in which 2,000,000 (500,000 from Greece the rest from Turkey) people were forced out of their homes made refugees and 'exchanged'. So the suppression of the right of nations to self-determination means that we shouldn't support the right of nations to self-determination?

The ethnic cleansing in Turkey after the 'Liberation War' was carried out by the national liberation movement, incidentally many of them exactly the same people who only a few years earlier had murdered 1,500,000 Armenians. They were supported by the Comintern and opposed by the left-wing of the Turkish party, the majority at the time of the war.

The ethnic cleansing was committed in the name of national liberation as it often tends to be.

There is an intrinsic problem with supporting all of these national liberation movements. I remember once being accused by an American of being a Turkish nationalist, quite ironic really, for not supporting both Kurdish, and Armenian national liberation movements. To me it seems an absurd idea, as they were both claiming exactly the same bit of land. How can you support both?

Devrim


I don't think this is at all true, and I think I successfully argued that it wasn't. You at least seem to have changed your tack from first saying that 'nations' were pre-capitalist to then saying it doesn't matter if they aren't, which is a completely different question.
OK, let's say they're artificial

"Let's say", as in: for the sake of argument let's accept your premise. Everything after that line you didn't really contend with.

But anyway, I said that nationality isn't beholden to capitalism, that it predates it. You haven't debunked this, at all. You brought up examples of nations that developed most sharply, as identities, in the modern age. But that is not to say that the concept of "Irish" only started in the 19th Century. You should tell Wolf Tone that, he'd be quite surprised. Or perhaps you should tell an Irish farmer in the 16th Century that s/he's no different than a farmer in the Loire Valley.


As I said, this is a completely different argument. Your original argument was that they shouldn't be done away with because they were "entities [that] predate capitalism by a very, very long time. They will not and cannot disappear through the abolition of class". Now you seem to be saying they are relatively modern things and that is not bad in itself.See above. But since you're claiming that nationality only existed after the beginning of the modern age, here's an assignment for you: tell me how nationality played no role in the 100 Years' War. Or, if you prefer, how the English national identity, being forged in no small part by the Anglo-Saxon period and the 1066 Conquest...only started coming into existence with capitalism. I'd like to see this.


No, it is not, but neither does it make them good. As I pointed out above, I think they are intrinsically capitalist forms.Again, first, they aren't, as shown by the fact that the English didn't suddenly invent their language, culture, history and geographic region in 1688. Second, even if they did, your position would lead us to oppose industry and the scientific method. I await your response on both of these issues.


The ethnic cleansing was committed in the name of national liberation as it often tends to be.You obviously didn't answer my question, so I'll ask you again:

So according to you, the suppression of the right of nations to self-determination means we should not support the right of nations to self-determination? As far as the dilemma of supporting two nations in the same general region, it's quite simple: support the liberation of both, which means the members of each nation living in the same area have all the rights of an enfranchised nation. It's not like Switzerland doesn't have overlap.


OK, let's say they're artificial

"Let's say", as in: for the sake of argument let's accept your premise.

Possibly because its true?


But anyway, I said that nationality isn't beholden to capitalism, that it predates it. You haven't debunked this, at all.

I said that the modern idea of nationalism is intrinsically linked to capitalism. I think I gave a lot more evidence to demonstrate this than your base assertion that it wasn't.


But that is not to say that the concept of "Irish" only started in the 19th Century. You should tell Wolf Tone that, he'd be quite surprised.

I would check when Wolf Tone became politically active if I were you. I think you will find that it is actually after the French revolution of 1789, which we could say is the birth of modern nationalism, and nation states. In fact he was directly inspired by it.


Or perhaps you should tell an Irish farmer in the 16th Century that s/he's no different than a farmer in the Loire Valley.

But I haven't even suggested that. My whole point is that they were different, not only from people who live in what are now different states, but also from people who lived a hundred kilometres down the road in what is now the same state.


See above. But since you're claiming that nationality only existed after the beginning of the modern age, here's an assignment for you: tell me how nationality played no role in the 100 Years' War.

The 100 years war was not at all a national war in any sense. It was a feudal conflict between two essentially 'French families'. Check the first paragraph on wiki:


The Hundred Years' War (French (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_language): Guerre de Cent Ans) was a series of separate wars lasting from 1337 to 1453 between two royal houses for the French throne, which was vacant with the extinction of the senior Capetian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Capet) line of French kings. The two primary contenders were the House of Valois (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Valois) and the House of Plantagenet (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Plantagenet), also known as the House of Anjou (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Ch%C3%A2teaudun). The House of Valois claimed the title of King of France, while the Plantagenets from England claimed to be Kings of France and England. Plantagenet Kings were the 12th century rulers of the Kingdom of England, and had their roots in the French regions of Anjou (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anjou) and Normandy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normandy). French soldiers fought on both sides, with Burgundy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duchy_of_Burgundy) and Aquitaine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquitaine) providing notable support for the Plantagenet side.Of course there was some proto-nationalist rhetoric, but it doesn't change the fundamental nature of the conflict.


Again, first, they aren't, as shown by the fact that the English didn't suddenly invent their language, culture, history and geographic region in 1688.

Actually modern English as a unified language is a direct result of the invention of the printing press, and the development of the modern capitalist state.


Second, even if they did, your position would lead us to oppose industry and the scientific method. I await your response on both of these issues.

No it wouldn't this is a straw man you have made up in your head. At no point have I said that 'new is bad. Old is good'. I merely pointed out the fallacy in your argument that nations are some sort of timeless things existing outside of economic development. As you put it "These entities predate capitalism by a very, very long time". They don't.


As far as the dilemma of supporting two nations in the same general region, it's quite simple: support the liberation of both, which means the members of each nation living in the same area have all the rights of an enfranchised nation. It's not like Switzerland doesn't have overlap.

This might seem reasonable in your leftist cloud cuckoo land. Unfortunately that is not how it at all works in the real world. In real life, national liberation movements have quite a torrid history of victimising, and attacking members of other national minorities, including the Kurdish nationalists in Turkey.

Devrim

[manic expression]

I have no idea what happened here...


Possibly because its true?
My point was that even if it is true, it wouldn't mean anything.


I said that the modern idea of nationalism is intrinsically linked to capitalism. I think I gave a lot more evidence to demonstrate this than your base assertion that it wasn't.No, you didn't, you gave your interpretation of a few select national identities.


I would check when Wolf Tone became politically active if I were you. I think you will find that it is actually after the French revolution of 1789, which we could say is the birth of modern nationalism, and nation states. In fact he was directly inspired by it.Wolf Tone, though, did not invent the Irish nation. That is the issue here. He recognized something that existed when he found it. Did Wolf Tone make Irish not English? Did he invent all forms of Irish culture? Did he make the history of Ireland himself? Did he make Ireland a distinct geographic area?


But I haven't even suggested that. My whole point is that they were different, not only from people who live in what are now different states, but also from people who lived a hundred kilometres down the road in what is now the same state.But not in the same way. Irish farmers were different from French farmers because of their language, history, geographic region and culture. The guys down the road were different for other reasons, but it's no surprise that as history marched on, the guys down the road were recognized by all as also being Irish while the guys in the Loire Valley weren't. This is quite simple, it is not merely a subjective decision but a pinpointing of what history has carved into the face of human society.


The 100 years war was not at all a national war in any sense. It was a feudal conflict between two essentially 'French families'. Check the first paragraph on wiki:And here is where you stumble. The initial reason for the conflict was a run-of-the-mill feudal feud, with two rival branches claiming the French throne based on two interpretations of the Salic Law (Carolus Mangus' thing, IIRC). However, it gradually became far, far more than that. The distinction between English and French became sharper as the war grew on, to the point that the use of French in the English nobility (what was once the mark of noble standing, essentially) dropped like a rock due to its connotation of being foreign. Further, if it was just about control over the throne, why did the French (read: French) care so much about taking back Gascony and other English holdings on the continent? They already had control over Paris and Rheims...why did Gascony or Normandy even matter if it was traditionally held by the English crown anyway...and especially since Normandy was where the English crown drew its legitimacy from in the first place?

The 100 Years' War redefined the relationship between England and France. The English ruling class once viewed itself as a French-speaking Norman ruler (and de facto subject of the French crown) over a basically alien population. By war's end, it viewed itself as English, in contrast to the French over there.

All this points to the naked fact: nationality is an objective, concrete entity. Calling it artificial would be like calling capitalism, the bourgeoisie and proletariat and modern industry artificial. They exist. Marxists do not argue with what exists.


Of course there was some proto-nationalist rhetoric, but it doesn't change the fundamental nature of the conflict.Not just rhetoric, but significance. The 100 Years' War has a unique place in history because it formed the basis of what we know as England and France. All long before the Glorious Revolution or Bastille Day. The "proto-nationalist rhetoric" you want to dismiss is precisely the point: the development of the nation in that conflict is plainly undeniable.


Actually modern English as a unified language is a direct result of the invention of the printing press, and the development of the modern capitalist state.But middle English as a spoken language is not, and that formed the basis of modern English. Without that, there was nothing to standardize when the printing press and political centralization came along. Even back when Chaucer was doing his thing, English wasn't Welsh or Irish or French, it was English.


No it wouldn't this is a straw man you have made up in your head. At no point have I said that 'new is bad. Old is good'. I merely pointed out the fallacy in your argument that nations are some sort of timeless things existing outside of economic development. As you put it "These entities predate capitalism by a very, very long time". They don't.However, as we can see in the dynamics of the 100 Years' War, nationality as we know it was strongly developing long before capitalism as we know it came into its own. We can also look to the Reconquista, the end of the Kalmar Union (Sweden firmly separating from Denmark), the consolidation of Muscovy under Ivan the Terrible (and the defeat of the Polish invasion during the Time of Troubles period that soon followed), even the Hideyoshi unification of Japan (and subsequent invasion of Korea) as other examples of this.


This might seem reasonable in your leftist cloud cuckoo land. Unfortunately that is not how it at all works in the real world. In real life, national liberation movements have quite a torrid history of victimising, and attacking members of other national minorities, including the Kurdish nationalists in Turkey.That is why we cannot let the suppression of the rights of nations to self-determination (the attacking of members of other national minorities) stop us from supporting the rights of nations to self-determination.

Your argument is akin to saying that since representative governments have suppressed the democratic rights of countless peoples, we should reject all forms of democratic representation.

[ComradeOm]

Something seems to have gone wrong with the split to this thread (http://www.revleft.com/vb/nations-capitalist-formsi-t137327/index.html). I'll edit my post above to note the merge/mess