David Cameron's Big Society

[Hen]

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100047738/why-socialists-and-egalitarians-hate-the-big-society/

Read this and spewed my tea out at sentences like:

One of the reasons socialists love “diversity” so much is because it has to be policed and regulated by the state.

and bs like this:

Quite the opposite – the egalitarians hate “faith schools” not primarily because of the religious content but because, as elite state schools, they attract more middle-class pupils than others. Good church schools educate thousands of desperately poor children, and make a considerable effort to give them help and provide a social mix, but any organisation that provides a good product will become disproportionately middle class to a certain extent, just because there are always inequalities in life.

[People's War]

The Telegraph is a joke paper.

Not as bad as the Daily Hate Mail though.

[Hen]

I mention this because I have a friend who is an NHS commissioner and who is allowed budget control and significant responsibilities in the local area in one of the most social institutions in the UK. He frequently meets the local MP, a tory, and returns to tell me of his great ideas; big society, greater autonomy for local people and communities, localized administration rather than monolithic state bureaucracy.

I think we are on the same page in some respects, e.g empowering the people and making services community based etc. This is a positive approach insofar as the NHS remains a public sector service even under the Conservatives and is not subject to the profit-maximising, exploitative forces of the market. However, this "big society" unshackles the private sector too, and it is here that the Conservatives erroneously claim to empower the people. Deregulating the private sector is not comparable to the NHS and will just lead to outsourcing of labour, unemployment and even greater inequalities.

[PoliticalNightmare]

As an anarchist I almost agree to an extent that there should be a "big society" however I feel that Cameron is merely using these ideas to subtlely suggest that the state should not be responsible for charity.

The way I visualise communes is that taxation would be voluntary: you would provide your labour to organisations in return for your fair share of the goods and services of society. However this is not practical nor even possible under capitalism where private accumulation of property is possible, let alone Britain under a Tory government.

So some of his ideas are not so bad (indeed civilians should be encouraged to organise together to help construct localised roundabouts, tackle local issues, etc.) but they miss the mark in other respects namely the flaw that there is no well-established system on a national basis to democratically reward labour and provide charity to the most vulnerable in society and that such a system cannot possibly exist under capitalism.

[Oswy]

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100047738/why-socialists-and-egalitarians-hate-the-big-society/

Read this and spewed my tea out at sentences like:

One of the reasons socialists love “diversity” so much is because it has to be policed and regulated by the state.

and bs like this:

Quite the opposite – the egalitarians hate “faith schools” not primarily because of the religious content but because, as elite state schools, they attract more middle-class pupils than others. Good church schools educate thousands of desperately poor children, and make a considerable effort to give them help and provide a social mix, but any organisation that provides a good product will become disproportionately middle class to a certain extent, just because there are always inequalities in life.

What a bunch of reactionary fuckers.

The 'Big Society' phrase is an attempt to recast the actual aim which is to have as small a state as possible, especially in those capacities where the state helps the most vulnerable, i.e. it's just neoliberalist bullshit.

The good news is that the tories have only been in power six months and they are deeply hated already; many of the effects of their policies haven't even been felt yet. It's a kind of Thatcherism round-two but this time there aren't any big industries to privatise or big unions to smash, so all they've got left is to try and erode whatever state provision exists that is not easily privatised (because it's not very profitable) and try to make it the responsibility of the recipients, which invariably means the poor.