Indigenous (Ecuadorian) Groups Win Right to Seize Chevron's Canadian Assets

[The Intransigent Faction]

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So, this caught my eye and kinda caught me by surprise the other day.

1. I'm not naïve enough to expect the bourgeois judicial system to be a catalyst for economic revolution, but the implications of the ruling in this case make it seem worth some attention.

2. Texaco/Chevron may blame Petroecuador for not doing enough to clean up, but what they don't tell you is that they had decades to not cut corners by using cheap, heavily polluting extraction methods. Petroecuador is certainly trying to score political points and is not blameless because of the inherent problems with fossil fuels in themselves, but you can't restructure or update an entire energy infrastructure overnight, especially when revenues go to other areas that need them (i.e. social programs). Nor can you make the mess suddenly disappear. As for the attacks on the lawyers themselves, maybe someone more knowledgeable here knows more about them.

[Sea]

1. I'm not naïve enough to expect the bourgeois judicial system to be a catalyst for economic revolution, but the implications of the ruling in this case make it seem worth some attention.If anything this will have a pacifying effect. 1917 didn't happen because the Czar was such a nice person. Stuff like this doesn't whet the worker's appetite for revolution. In effect it only removes one thing from their list of "reasons I don't like the bourgeoisie".

[La Guaneña]

If anything this will have a pacifying effect. 1917 didn't happen because the Czar was such a nice person. Stuff like this doesn't whet the worker's appetite for revolution. In effect it only removes one thing from their list of "reasons I don't like the bourgeoisie".

Are you serious? So basically you think that the worse, the better? Do you really think that the will to struggle and the conciousness of the working classe in Ecuador, Venezuela and Bolivia have risen under the present situations? Do you think that the situation for revolutionaries is worse?

No way, you are arguing for us to:

1. Support worse governments to fuck the situation up more;

2. Just cross our arms and wait for the working class to suffer so much that it revolts on it's own?

[Sea]

Are you serious? So basically you think that the worse, the better? Do you really think that the will to struggle and the conciousness of the working classe in Ecuador, Venezuela and Bolivia have risen under the present situations? Do you think that the situation for revolutionaries is worse?

No way, you are arguing for us to:

1. Support worse governments to fuck the situation up more;

2. Just cross our arms and wait for the working class to suffer so much that it revolts on it's own?No, what I'm saying is that there isn't any reason to think that this signals some "rising revolutionary tide". Go read what I was replying to if you have trouble understanding the context. Do you really think I would say or think things 1 and 2 that you listed? Really? Of course not. It seems to me that you're deliberately misinterpreting what I said just to pick a fight.

Stop that.

[La Guaneña]

No, what I'm saying is that there isn't any reason to think that this signals some "rising revolutionary tide". Go read what I was replying to if you have trouble understanding the context. Do you really think I would say or think things 1 and 2 that you listed? Really? Of course not. It seems to me that you're deliberately misinterpreting what I said just to pick a fight.

Stop that.

You said that


If anything this will have a pacifying effect. 1917 didn't happen because the Czar was such a nice person. Stuff like this doesn't whet the worker's appetite for revolution. In effect it only removes one thing from their list of "reasons I don't like the bourgeoisie".

To me it is very clear that you understand that these progressive measures, won after harsh struggle by local indigenous people, are "pacifying" and remove revolutionary impetus on part of the working class.

So what do you think adds up to the "reasons I don't like the bourgeoisie" list and helps revolution? If concious struggle that led to pressuring a progressive government and delivered a big, rewarding victory for the working class isn't helping, what should we do?

[Sea]

So what do you think adds up to the "reasons I don't like the bourgeoisie" list and helps revolution? If concious struggle that led to pressuring a progressive government and delivered a big, rewarding victory for the working class isn't helping, what should we do?"Pressuring a progressive government" is the key point. When a movement arises that sets out to work within a government (which tells you right away that the movement in question has an economic, reform-oriented and not a political, revolutionist character, or that its political content is still immature) and sees success despite this, this is one less demand on the gripe-list. This most certainly has a pacifying effect just as bourgeois trade unions do. In the case of bourgeois trade unions, for instance, a rise from $1 to $6 per hour is a very practical victory, but it is not a revolutionary one. This too is one more complaint (temporarily, until inflation and a rising cost of living kicks in) off the gripe-list. However, it does not follow from this that "worse is better" or that the more deplorable conditions are the more revolutionary ones.

In such cases such as these the state is doing what it always does -- trying haphazardly to solve the contradictions of capital. When there is a contradiction between the drive to increase exploitation to increase profits, and limit of how oppressed workers can be reliably kept (a limit that changes with varying circumstances), the state will make concessions to the workers.

But guess what -- either way the workers are fucked over. Even this "rewarding victory" cannot improve the basic condition of the workers, who still must sell their labor-power to live, even if you think they should feel grateful to their "progressive government" and "rewarded" by the crumbs it tosses. Chevron has plenty of tricks up its sleeve so I highly doubt this is a serious blow for them, much less for world capitalism.