Does the '3rd world' even want revolution?

[R_P_A_S]

If you keep up with current events, specially with the Austerity protest going on in Europe (Spain & Greece) The student movement and protest in Canada & Chile and the Occupy stuff here in the USA you'd think that a lot of people are angry and wanting some sort of change in their society or governments.

I was fortunate enough to have visited some countries in South East Asia this month. I went to small towns and some big cities in Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia and I didn't really get a feeling that people in the mid size and small cities even knew nor cared about "Austerity measures and High tuition rates". They seem to live simple and humble lives and for the most part they appeared to be content.

I'm not trying to say that these 3 countries are happy with their current situations. Nor that these people are better of with Capitalism. No! that's not what I'm trying to say. But my question is;

Are the people in these countries less likely to want revolution since they haven't truly experience the height and boom of Capitalism like Europe, Canada and we can even say Chile has experience some of the 'benefits' of Capitalism. I mean when I look at the situation in Spain, Canada and Greece.. These are consider develop countries in compared to Indonesia and the Philippines. Why are they "whining" so much? these people in South East Asia pull a water buffalo all day to cultivate crops, they have to haul water up the hill.. why aren't they revolting?

What happens to the "3rd World" if the "1st World".. middle class and more fortunate people reach a level of class consciousness to where their countries can strive for socialist change? Ultimately will this help the 3rd world?

[ind_com]

Seriously?

[Positivist]

Class conscioussness is low in the developing world because the people there are focused on immediate subsistence rather than complex social change.

[ind_com]

Wow.

[Sasha]

Content "noble savages" is as silly and condescending projection as true exploited proles ready to break their chains..
While Capital is a global system the form it takes differs locally, as so does the resistance it faces.

[Os Cangaceiros]

Are the people in these countries less likely to want revolution since they haven't truly experience the height and boom of Capitalism like Europe, Canada and we can even say Chile has experience some of the 'benefits' of Capitalism.

Asian countries have definitely experienced the full cyclical nature of the capitalist economy. Many people don't seem to remember this, but southeast Asia & Asia more generally experienced an economic crisis in the mid-to-late 1990's that was quite similar to the situation that hit American and European financial markets post-2008. There was widespread social unrest, such that even people like Suharto in Indonesia were unseated from rule.

[Raúl Duke]

In certain parts of the "third world" there are leftist guerilla movements(like in India I believe) still...

[ind_com]

I was fortunate enough to have visited some countries in South East Asia this month. I went to small towns and some big cities in Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia and I didn't really get a feeling that people in the mid size and small cities even knew nor cared about "Austerity measures and High tuition rates". They seem to live simple and humble lives and for the most part they appeared to be content.

You should have travelled around in the Philippines a bit more.

[Let's Get Free]

There are plenty of working class struggles in the 'third world' at the moment. It is instructive to note that the crisis of capitalism has been most the intensive and pronounced in the underdeveloped world, and the chain of capitalism is bound to break at its weakest link.

[jookyle]

The difference is that the people have the third world have very little and the see advanced capitalist countries having a lot of stuff so they aim for that. When it comes down to it, they will support which ever system keeps them fed and empowers them. It just makes it hard to organize when you have to boil every cup of water you drink so you don't get cholera. And, it's not like a third world nation would be able to have a socialist revolution with out the US coming in and ending that before it really gets to start.

[R_P_A_S]

Don't get me wrong. I SAW some really impoverish areas and also people who clearly ARE NOT benefiting from anything. I'm talking about the general vibe I got in some of these tows and the people I met. I also understand that I wasn't there long enough.. HOWEVER I've travel enough and have lived in a developing country my self to know that the differences are simply language.. more than anything.

[R_P_A_S]

I stayed with a family in Indonesia. A small little town called called Jabon.. and one of my host told me that he's favorite American president was "Ronald Reagan" :crying:

I didn't say anything.. Not going to get into a political discussion with him.. specially with a language barrier.

[ind_com]

Don't get me wrong. I SAW some really impoverish areas and also people who clearly ARE NOT benefiting from anything. I'm talking about the general vibe I got in some of these tows and the people I met. I also understand that I wasn't there long enough.. HOWEVER I've travel enough and have lived in a developing country my self to know that the differences are simply language.. more than anything.

Usually visitors from outside are taken to exactly those spots which are not witnessing any resistance from the masses. The most intense struggles of today are taking place in the third world. To know about the real situation in such a country, you have to interact directly or indirectly with the organizations involved in struggle there, and various other groups and individuals on every side of the resistance and layer of the society.

[R_P_A_S]

Usually visitors from outside are taken to exactly those spots which are not witnessing any resistance from the masses. The most intense struggles of today are taking place in the third world. To know about the real situation in such a country, you have to interact directly or indirectly with the organizations involved in struggle there, and various other groups and individuals on every side of the resistance and layer of the society.

When I travel I always stay with local people and politics come up but I never really want to get into any debates because the purpose of my trips are not for politics. I wish they were but I already get harassed enough at the airport on the way back to the states..:(

[the last donut of the night]

If you keep up with current events, specially with the Austerity protest going on in Europe (Spain & Greece) The student movement and protest in Canada & Chile and the Occupy stuff here in the USA you'd think that a lot of people are angry and wanting some sort of change in their society or governments.

I was fortunate enough to have visited some countries in South East Asia this month. I went to small towns and some big cities in Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia and I didn't really get a feeling that people in the mid size and small cities even knew nor cared about "Austerity measures and High tuition rates". They seem to live simple and humble lives and for the most part they appeared to be content.

I'm not trying to say that these 3 countries are happy with their current situations. Nor that these people are better of with Capitalism. No! that's not what I'm trying to say. But my question is;

Are the people in these countries less likely to want revolution since they haven't truly experience the height and boom of Capitalism like Europe, Canada and we can even say Chile has experience some of the 'benefits' of Capitalism. I mean when I look at the situation in Spain, Canada and Greece.. These are consider develop countries in compared to Indonesia and the Philippines. Why are they "whining" so much? these people in South East Asia pull a water buffalo all day to cultivate crops, they have to haul water up the hill.. why aren't they revolting?

What happens to the "3rd World" if the "1st World".. middle class and more fortunate people reach a level of class consciousness to where their countries can strive for socialist change? Ultimately will this help the 3rd world?

what lol? haven't you heard of the mass chinese, vietnamese and bangladeshi wildcat strikes? bosses in india are set on fire when it comes to labour disputes, this stuff isn't exactly new...

[DDR]

If the 3rd world doesn't want revolution how it is posible that since the 50s every single succesful or powerful leftist movement has come from the 3rd world? I mean, China, Vietnam, Laos, Cuba, Afghanistan, Angola, Ethiopia, Congo, etc. had a sucessful revolution within, in Philipines and India there are powerful revolutionary guerrillas, even in Bolivia, Venezuela and Ecuador the socialdemocrats (real ones) had rose to power by the ballot. Hell, even the most succesful north-american revolutionary organisation, the Black Panther Party, made their revolutionary work within a 3rd world frame (afro american slums could be in that time, and sometimes today, considered as 3rd world [poverty, illiteracy, shitty higenic conditions, etc.])

Ahe movements in the 1st world, at least in Spain (the one I know) are not that revolutionary, here they could been considered conservative since their main aims are to keep the Welfare State and to improve the institutions of the bourgeois democracy. Also in their economic field the go for something called social economy (it sound to me some kind of mutualism) with a "free" marked, progresive taxes and all that western socialdemocracy stuff. That's why I participate in some activities they make, to try to explain to them that the main contradiction is capitalism, that class strugle is real and they are winning, not the electoral law or the new bailout to the banks.

Also the only way for thing to improve in underdeveloped countries is Internationalism, solidarity between peoples, of us who live in the belly of the beast and of those who live under its boot.

[R_P_A_S]

what lol? haven't you heard of the mass chinese, vietnamese and bangladeshi wildcat strikes? bosses in india are set on fire when it comes to labour disputes, this stuff isn't exactly new...

Heard about all those.. Except Vietnamese. If you read my main question was.. in compared the the develop world. I was also asking if its best if "1st world countries" do it first than the "3rd world" countries. (Revolution)

[GiantMonkeyMan]

I also think you're overestimating the class conciousness of the '1st' world. The vast majority of people in countries of advanced stages of capitalism don't give a shit about "Austerity measures and High tuition rates" either.

[doesn't even make sense]

Well in part the level of discontent and dissent people express is related to the degree to which their conditions match with their expectations. I know this smacks of liberal sociology but there's some truth to it. By the same token quashed attempts at reform or rebellion can lead to people lowering their expectations and focusing on the day-to-day.

Then there are issues of perception. I mean whatever language barrier you have and your unfamiliarity with the culture, not to mention a stance of polite distance on the part of the locals might make certain details pass you by.

Another thing I'd note is that false consciousness applies just as much to any culture. It is perhaps easy to unknowingly essentialize the false consciousness of workers in a different cultural and social context.

[bcbm]

Are the people in these countries less likely to want revolution since they haven't truly experience the height and boom of Capitalism like Europe, Canada and we can even say Chile has experience some of the 'benefits' of Capitalism. I mean when I look at the situation in Spain, Canada and Greece.. These are consider develop countries in compared to Indonesia and the Philippines. Why are they "whining" so much? these people in South East Asia pull a water buffalo all day to cultivate crops, they have to haul water up the hill.. why aren't they revolting?revolts in the 'developing' world are actually much more intense than those in the first world. a number have already been named and that is really just scratching the surface. hell if you look at history, the revolts during the earlier stages of capitalism in the west were much stronger and more threatening to society than some kids camping in a park and throwing poop at the cops.

i dont know if they 'want revolution' but really these protests in the west aren't about that either, that is more the projection of leftist fanatics in reaction to their own impotence.

[the last donut of the night]

Heard about all those.. Except Vietnamese. If you read my main question was.. in compared the the develop world. I was also asking if its best if "1st world countries" do it first than the "3rd world" countries. (Revolution)

what's best is hard to answer imo. but generally capitalism does break at the peripheries, where the contradictions may be strongest