Policywonk, in a smart coat, LIVE FROM WESTMINSTER

[policywonk]

Hello and welcome

I've got my dongle working! Woohoo!

Today is a briefing day organised by the G20 Voice peeps.

Am networking like a wild thing. Oh look, there's Michelle O. 'Scuse me.

Does anyone know why they chose the ExCel centre as the venue?

I ask for two reasons: 1. Central London!? are these people crazy. They KNEW there would be protests, so why don't they have it somewhere in the middle of nowhere

1. ExCel is possibly one of the most depressing places on earth (had a bunch of exams there). It's big, drafty, and you have planes taking off every ten minutes right next door. How are they going to solve all the world's problems with that racket going on?

Are Mumsnet against any form of capitalist system?

I am sympathetic to some of the reasons for wanting capitalism replaced with something else (nobody seems to have much of a clue what precisely it would be replaced with though). It seems hopelessly naive to be campaigning for an end to capitalism when those campaigning can't come up with a workable replacement system.

(Note to protesters: Put down your anti-globalization banner before you unwrap your Big Mac, it looks silly).

I don't think MN is against any form Swedes - does it sound as though we are?
I think many of us would like the capitalism we have to be tempered, perhaps..

You see I had been mulling over Swedes' question for some considerable time and every answer I came up with sounded so, well, facile. And then OneBat says it perfectly - no, I'm not against capitalism per se, because what's the alternative? But it has to be a gentler, more forgiving form of capitalism. Tempered is just the right word.

As PW says in her blog: "You don't have to look far to find evidence that the governments of the West are motivated by nothing but self-interest, and that the obscenity of global inequality is only ever addressed as an afterthought."

Have really enjoyed this thread - but failed miserably to spot the divine PW in my brief foray into the live streaming. She is doing a fantastic job.

Has anyone on this thread called for an end to capitalism swedes? I missed it. I'm sure most anti-globalization proterters worth their (excessive levels of cheaply flavour-enhancing )salt stay away from the MacDonalds.

Do anti-globalists generally campaign against cap? I would have thought they were social enterprise kinds of chaps.

An end to capitalism would be a disaster IMtotallyuneducatedO. Instead of half the world living in poverty and pain, we would all be doing so.

I can imagine that there are situations where communities are worse off than they were pre-capitalism, but I don't think that it's possible to argue that capitalism created unfairness. It has not done nearly as much as it could have done to correct inequality, but I imagine that the bottom line (am not economist or even well-read person or even mediumly-read person) is that there are fewer people living in p and p now than there were before.

The question is (realistically) whether we can reduce (even eradicate?) both the numbers suffering, and the extent of said p and p.

We could do this by redirecting some of the energy generated by capitalism, or by adjusting the circumstances in which it's practiced.

What upsets us all, I imagine, is the fact that there are still people living in such dire p and p, despite the fact that such extremes of inequality are not actually necessary for capitalism to function.

The point at which we might disagree is the extent to which a completely free market is necessary to generate the shallow but broad gains that capitalism has offered to the West; and the best means of broadening that shallow pool of amelioration to the DW.

I'm talking, you'll notice, in very big brushstrokes. That's a trick I've learnt for when I'm profoundly ill informedspeaking from the heart

I'll take the horrible bit off my already horrible name if you talk to me about John's Passion just a teeny bit a sentence to tempt me.

Terrifyingly shamefully ignorant qu: Does John's Passion refer to the gospel of John?

Ah, ok. Yes, that seems remiss of him. Good to sort out the aftercare for mum, though. Thanks.

I am now an eggless worm.

Just for the religious bods on the thread:-

Do you feel the established world religions bear any responsibility for the inequalities of the world?

It always strikes me that a good way to preserve the riches of the (very)few is to convince the (very)many that they will get their just desserts in the next world.

Well, it's not a case of 'ditch capitalism, embrace socialism/one world government/rule by Noddy/etc. We don't have to lurch from one flawed system to another flawed system wholesale.

What you need is a workable amalgam of capitalism and socialism, which is what the better bits of our society are already. It's about translating that coherently into a bigger picture.

But given the indolence of human nature that we mentioned earlier in the thread, I'm not sure that's really possible.

To throw another of my worthless opinions on the thread, you need a free market with room to grow, but with a robust regulatory system for keeping it tidy at the wilder edges (you know, like stamping on corruption because it's wickedness ).

And you need a welfare safety net with a bit of bounce so that people don't get trapped there, a welfare system that we all take responsibility for it so that we don't see it as 'taking our taxes' but as a contribution to social cohesion, which is good for everyone.

You need the capitalism to make sure we're prosperous and productive, and you need socialism to make sure we're not all selfish gits who overlook the ones who aren't in such a good position.

Onebatmother - Agree. The reason I've raised this point is that Policywonk said "capitalism can't prioritise the needs of developing countries". I disagree. Capitalism can and does address the needs of developing countries. Although I think it is insufficient.

So what is the slogan 'capitalism isn't working' all about? Capitalism is working - recessions are part of the capitalist cycle, they are capitalist self-corrections.

yes, 'religions' disembodied entities as they are, are tools that arses have used to control, no doubt about that. But, like capitalism/socialism/a fondness for Vicks vaporub, there's a bad side and a good side too.

I am quite happy to take responsibility personally for the wicked things I've done in my life - but I do so because I acknowledge a shared flawed humanity, not because I'm a religious person specifically.

"Capitalism isn't working" -- it isn't satisfying human needs well enough. It never could do without some degree of appropriate regulation, and the currect regulation regime is not working.

The self-correction system within capitalism might be regarded as working if you regard capitalism as a self-sufficient, self- legitimising system with no ourtside imperatives, but that is not what it is. There are outside imperatives, hence a need for external regulation. And the manner of the regulation needs to change. The 'Washington consensus' of minimal regulation is dismissed now by all and sundry, not just the protesters.

And regarding developing countries, in some instances global capitalism promotes development Korea, China, etc but in others it does not -- many African countries. When it promotes development it is kind of accidental. There is no guarantee it will favour growing prosperity in undedev countries. So, again, regulation and other forces external to capital.

And what is all this anger at bankers all about? Why not anger at advertising agencies, television companies, the BBC or each and every one of us? We were all complicit in manufacturing the boom that preceded the bust.

Instead of blame I'd like to see a collective sense of responsibility.

It's a shame that today was not a protest but a march for collective responsibility. That would lead to change very very quickly.

Well, I think she's right in that it can't prioritize those needs. It can - if forced to - take account of them though.

and the fact that recessions are part of the cycle isn't necessarily a rebuttal, I don't think. They may be looking at the bigger picture: ie if it needs to self-correct to this degree it's fundamentally flawed. Lurching, and unpredictable- other than in the broadest sense of its cyclical-ness.

One of the most powerful things I heard today was the StChildren (I think) guy talking about the disproportionately gigantic impact of the recession on the developing world.

Threadworm, I'm not sure though - wasn't the mess in America caused in part by the banks being asked by government to lend to people who were high risk? So it wasn't so much lack of regulation as the wrong kind of regulation, inappropriately applied without thought for the consequences.

I might not have my facts straight on that, and I'm a bit fuzzy with medication this evening.

But shouldn't religious leaders be taking more of a role in all this - to right past wrongs maybe? I know its very simplistic to talk about the wealth of say the Catholic Church and why they preserve that wealth and priviledge at the expense of others but-how do they justify it against the teachings of Jesus?