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Social Murder and Other Shortcomings of Conservative Economics [Jeff's review]

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I think Jeff says it all with his evaluation of Social Murder and Other Shortcomings of Conservative Economics:

It seemed oddly fitting to begin reading this book at a time when most major newspapers were either predicting, or confirming, the onset of global economic recession. The book’s main argument, as described tirelessly by University of Manitoba professors Robert Chernomas and Ian Hudson, is that conservative economics is inherently unstable, and prone to massive peaks and declines, leaving societies – and their encompassed workers – to weather the economic storm. Through a series of compelling case-studies, the authors demonstrate how conservative economics, praised for its rational, innovative, and growth-inducing characters has a number of significantly destabilizing side-effects.

The most compelling of these case-studies are analyses of macroeconomic behaviour, corporate misleading of the public, and the economic determinants of public health. For example, the authors provide numerous examples of how corporations – acting in their own self-interest, as conservative economics dictates – actively attempt to mislead the public when flaws in their goods are found. Citing examples as common as tobacco companies counter-arguing that cigarettes do not contribute to cancer, as well as the deliberate attempts to refute the fact that the Ford Pinto – a lovely automobile – was prone to exploding due to a manufacturing flaw involving the gasoline tank, the authors demonstrate how corporations have consistently attempted to mislead the public based on junk science and public relations ploys, rather than responding to public criticism. As the authors note, conservative economics suggests that if a firm makes a faulty product, they will be reasonably punished by consumers who demand something superior, and therefore each firm has an incentive to ensure that adequate safety and transparency exists in their product construction. However, the examples provided indicate that companies deliberately attempt to use information asymmetries to mislead the public, and therefore avoid painful economic losses.

Furthermore, the authors provide a number of compelling arguments demonstrating the economic determinants of public health, suggesting that those at the poorest end of the market system are also the most prone to disease and sickness, which can have a further destabilizing impact on social good. For example, the authors refute the fact that living standards have increased substantially over the course of the past century, suggesting that instead industrial development has merely shifted the disease burden from airborne diseases to more chronic disease, which is an exact reflection of work environments and associated stresses. As such, the authors suggest that advanced capitalism has created a substantial new set of public disease, which predominantly affects those with the least beneficial jobs – labourers, cleaners, miners, etc. – having adverse impacts on societies as a whole. Thus, far from promoting the public good through continued economic development, modern day capitalism is rife with a new set of disease – one which conservative economics fails to adequately address.

The authors provide a number of other case-studies such as discussions regarding income distribution, government as a tool of innovation, and foreign policy, all of which are less compelling than the aforementioned cases. For example, the discussion around government as a possible force of innovation does indeed provide a number of cases of profound technological improvements achieved by government scientists and thinkers, though the underlying motivation for such achievements seems to contradict some of the other arguments made in the book. For example, the internet is cited as a profound example of technological progress made by government employees, though the authors do note that the primary uses of the internet was to provide greater communications for military operations – a case-study discussed by the authors later on in the book. Therefore, government can indeed be a profound agent of change, but the authors would have been better suited to address how government can be an agent of change, and what is generally driving these motivations. In cases where bureaucracies are attempting to solve social ills the track-record might be less compelling.

Similarly, the case-study of US foreign policy is perhaps the weakest of the book, as it seems to lack a fundamental basis in the political motivations of US foreign policy over the last number of decades, rather than simply the economic motivations. While the authors arguments are by no means new – Trotsky long ago decried capitalism’s expansionary and imperialist tendencies – such arguments are strengthened when authors provide political context as well. While the authors have several examples of the United States overthrowing democratically-elected socialist governments in favour of capitalist despots, these moves were not always done merely to support capitalist growth, but also to stave off the considerable threat of communism, which helps explain the non-random approach of US intervention during the Cold War, and the focus on socialist leaders.

On the whole however, the books most substantial points, as well as greatest flaws, revolve around the so-called “TINA” (there is no alternative) thesis. While the book provides numerous examples of conservative economic failure, it rarely provides an alternative blueprint, contributing a narrative of cynicism, rather than optimism. On the other hand however, the book provides a number of concrete examples of conservative economic failure, and marries this with a straightforward analysis of how these failures manifest themselves, providing a list of counter-arguments for any first year political science student eager to challenge their conservative colleagues on campus. However, the failure to provide any sort of alternative vision of political economy leaves the reader in a somewhat ambivalent state, undecided about whether the authors might suggest full-fledged socialism as the alternative, or where one draws the line between a mixed-market state and an acceptance of capitalist economics.

Finally, a major drawback of the book is that even though it was written by two scholars at the University of Manitoba, there is a substantial lack of Canadian examples. As such, the fixation with statistics from the United States leads the reader to have a false-sense of security to think that such situations of economic dislocation are an American phenomenon, as friendly Canadians surely wouldn’t let similar outcomes happen here. A greater expansion of Canadian data and experiences might provide the reader with a greater sense of how even in Canada economic inequality is growing, and how the story of social murder is by no means restricted to the dogmatic capitalists in the US.

On the whole however, the book is a powerful tool for any critical thinker of political economy, eager for concrete examples and sharp comebacks. While the book only scratches the surface of the “shortcomings of conservative economics,” the authors certainly provide a positive contribution to the political economy literature, and should be mandatory reading for any first year undergraduate, regardless of position on the ideological scale.
* 4 stars *

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More information

• Extra Info:
  • Table of Contents 
  • Excerpt 
  • Index 
• Arbeiter Ring Publishing | Chapters.ca  | Amazon.com
• ISBN-10: 1894037316 
• ISBN-13: 978-1894037310

Lighting the Eighth Fire [Leanne Simpson]

The Liberation, Resurgence, and Protection of Indigenous Nations

Courtesy of Arbeiter Ring Publishing

This remarkable collection of essays by leading Indigenous scholars focuses on the themes of freedom, liberation and Indigenous resurgence as they relate to the land. They analyze treaties, political culture, governance, “environmental issues,” economy and radical social movements, from an anti-colonial Indigenous perspective.

Editor Leanne Simpson has solicited Indigenous writers that place Indigenous freedom as their highest political goal, while turning to the knowledge, traditions and culture of specific Indigenous nations to achieve that goal.

About the Author   

Leanne Simpson is a researcher, writer, and educator of Mississauga and Scottish ancestry. She is a member of the gidigaa bzhiw dodem and a citizen of the Nishnaabeg nation. Leanne holds a PhD from the University of Manitoba and is the past director of Indigenous Environmental Studies at Trent University. Her research interests include Indigenist theory and methodology, Indigenous political cultures and traditional governance, Nishnaabeg women, Indigenous Knowledge, and Indigenous philosophies on land and the environment. Leanne currently teaches at the Centre for World Indigenous Knowledge at Athabasca University and has previously taught at Trent University, the University of Victoria, the University of Manitoba, and Tampere University in Finland.

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• Extra Info: ToC
• Arbeiter Ring Publishing | Chapters.ca  | Amazon.com

Product Details

• No Longer Available
• Paperback: 232 pages
• Publisher: Arbeiter Ring Publishing; 1 edition (November 18, 2008)
• ISBN-10: 1894037332
• ISBN-13: 978-1894037334

Shipping within Canada sponsored by Arbeiter Ring Publishing

Social Murder and Other Shortcomings of Conservative Economics [Robert Chernomas, Ian Hudson]

Courtesy of Arbeiter Ring Publishing

Corporate power is one of the strongest forces shaping our world. More than half of the top 100 economic entities today are private corporations. With their immense size comes commensurate influence, to the point where corporations are able to wreak social and environmental destruction with few serious consequences. Yet, amazingly, this subject is essentially absent from the study of economics.

The conservative economic theory that dominates the profession is based on the core belief that as little as possible should interfere with businesses pursuit of profit. This approach to economics ignores history, politics, poverty, the natural environment, and social class, among other inconvenient realities. Conservative economics would almost be laughable were it not for the fact that this way of thinking helps prop up the worst excesses of capitalism.

Social Murder examines the connections between the destructiveness of global capitalism and the professional economists who help keep it that way. 

About the Author
Robert Chernomas is a Professor of Economics at the University of Manitoba with research and political interests in health economics, the social determinants of health and macroeconomics.
Ian Hudson is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Manitoba, currently researching in the areas of political economy and ethical consumption. 

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More information

• Extra Info:
• Table of Contents 
• Excerpt 
• Index 
• Arbeiter Ring Publishing | Chapters.ca  | Amazon.com

Product Details

• 2 copies available This book is CLAIMED
• Paperback: 224 pages 
• Publisher: Arbeiter Ring (November 1, 2007) 
• ISBN-10: 1894037316 
• ISBN-13: 978-1894037310

Shipping within Canada sponsored by Arbeiter Ring Publishing

Framing Identity: Social Practices of Photography in Canada (1880-1920) [Holly's Review]

It's disappointing when you have so much excitement for something and it doesn't deliver the joy or even the interest you expected. Sort of like my first date ever. Holly over on Reading for Beginners reviews her book with a note of sadness:

...their photographs are breathtaking, I found myself losing interest despite my love of both women in Canadian History and photography.

Keep reading Holly's review...

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• Arbeiter Ring Publishing  |  Amazon.com

Product Details 

• Publisher: Arbeiter Ring Publishing (April 1, 2008) 
• ISBN-10: 1894037294 
• ISBN-13: 978-1894037297

Sponsored by Arbeiter Ring Publishing

The Red Indians [Peter Kulchyski]

 

  An Episodic, Informal Collection of Tales from the History of Aboriginal People’s Struggles in Canada 

Courtesy of Arbeiter Ring Publishing

The Red Indians is a theoretically nuanced, frank, and accessible book about Aboriginal resistance in Canada, historical and contemporary. In the manner of Eduardo Galeano’s famous trilogy Memories of Fire, the book uncovers a critical, living history of conflict.

The Red Indians, with its polyvalent title that points to the many issues covered in the text, introduces readers to the history of colonial oppression in Canada, and looks at contemporary examples of resistance. Kulchyski clarifies the unique and specific politics of Aboriginal resistance in Canada.

About the Author   
Peter Kulchyski grew up in Bissett, northern Manitoba, and was one of the few non-Aboriginal students to attend a government-run residential high school. He obtained his undergraduate degree at the University of Winnipeg, and has a Master’s and PhD from York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He is considered one of the senior Canadian scholars in Native Studies. He has received numerous awards for his scholarship in Native Studies. He has published numerous books on aboriginal issues, including Like the Sound of a Drum: Aboriginal Cultural Politics in Denendeh and Nunavut, which won the 2005 Alexander Kennedy Isbister Award for Non-Fiction.

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More information   

• Arbeiter Ring Publishing | Chapters.ca  | Amazon.com

Product Details 

• 2 copies available  This book is CLAIMED
  
• Paperback: 112 pages
• Publisher: Arbeiter Ring Publishing (April 1, 2008)
• ISBN-10: 1894037251
• ISBN-13: 978-1894037259

Shipping within Canada sponsored by Arbeiter Ring Publishing

Gertrude Unmanageable [Deborah Schnitzer]

Courtesy of Arbeiter Ring Publishing

Gertrude Unmanageable, one hundred and three years old (or thereabouts), arrives at Serenity, a geriatric facility in a town called Promise. From there, the novel wonders about love and reproduction as two distinct forms of life intersect, and Gertrude finds poignant pleasure in the unmanageable she insists she carry.

On the one hand, there are the “born once” humans who follow the usual progression from birth to death. On the other hand, there are the “borneback” old ones, often presenting themselves in homes for the aged, who grow down toward their infancy. The crossing is made possible through Gertrude Unmanageable, one hundred and three years-old (or thereabouts), formidable (possibly gorgeous), who comes to life inside a geriatric facility called Serenity, which is housed in the born-once world. Her subsequent evolution in an Informary secretly maintained by her kin mystifies.

Framing Identity: Social Practices of Photography in Canada (1880-1920) [Susan Close]

Framing Identity: Social Practices of Photography in Canada (1880-1920) by Susan Close

Courtesy of Arbeiter Ring Publishing 

Framing Identity examines how Canadian women used photography as a social practice to establish identity. Specifically, Close studies the photographic practice of four, turn-of-the-twentieth-century women photographers: Mattie Gunterman (1872-1945), Geraldine Moodie (1854-1945), Ruby Gordon Peterkin (1887-1961), and Etta Sparks (1879-1917). From a revisionist point of view, it argues that photography is a social practice used by women professionals and amateurs as a vehicle to explore and establish identity