David Harvey on R4's Thinking Allowed

[purves grundy]

Downloadable from here until Thursday.

 

[FridgeMagnet]

Is that the one from last week which also had the South Korean development economist bloke?

 

[purves grundy]

Is that the one from last week which also had the South Korean development economist bloke?

That's the one... haven't heard it yet, but I know there's a few fans of DH on here, so FYI and all that.

 

[butchersapron]

Thank you purves.

 

[JimW]

Downloaded it too just, cheers.

 

[ska invita]

he was on hardtalk a couple of days back (is that on iplayer?) - was a bit embarrassing i thought. didn't really hold up to some fairly soft questions - certainly wouldnt convert anyone not already in the choir

 

[butchersapron]

Why, what did he stumble on? Are you quite sure you understood the answers?

 

[JimW]

Have we had this one yet, his talk at the RSA on April 26? Just seen a link and am watching:
http://www.thersa.org/events/audio-and-past-events/2010/the-crises-of-capitalism
Also

 

[ska invita]

Why, what did he stumble on? Are you quite sure you understood the answers?

no need to patronise

no, it was the oppossite - he over simplified everything
still, not often you see someone attempting to make the case for communism on the bbc

 

[revol68]

no need to patronise

no, it was the oppossite - he over simplified everything
still, not often you see someone attempting to make the case for communism on the bbc

Well going on my experiences of Harvey's output in comparison to your posting history, I think I'm going to have to assume the problem lay with the reader not the text.

 

[FridgeMagnet]

The programme originally referred to in this thread is actually still available - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00s3fzq - it looks like Thinking Allowed preserve their content longer than standard iPlayer.

I was actually interested more in the other guy's position (not that Harvey was bad or anything, but I'm more familiar with him). Dr Ha-Joon Chang, Reader in the Political Economy of Development, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge. He had a pretty aggressive critique of modern development politics, the IMF and the concept of free/fair trade.

 

[FridgeMagnet]

Just to add one thing that I remember struck me as odd when I first listened to it, and listening again has reminded me: Harvey says that he's not heard "greedy unions" and "labour" being blamed for the crisis this time. Well they're not being blamed for *causing* the crisis, but they're still being blamed, as immediate and specific targets rather than just vaguely saying "oh greedy bankers aren't they awful".

There's abstract blame attached to unnamed capitalists but in practice, everything that happens that anyone complains about is blamed on workers and unions who just aren't "being realistic". If you're unhappy about your pension vanishing you should shut up, and if you do something about it you're the one who gets the knife in the press. Any idea that there's a cause seems to have vanished from the public discourse in favour of the Global Economic Crisis being some sort of natural occurrence like sunspots.

edit: actually I sort of answered my own question there

 

[butchersapron]

I don't see what he dumbed down in that interview at all. It's pitched at the same level as his popular (as opposed to specialist) books, which is still a few hundred levels about your Kleins and that. If it was dumbed down, it was because he was obviously aware it was on R4.

 

[revol68]

I don't see what he dumbed down in that interview at all. It's pitched at the same level as his popular (as opposed to specialist) books, which is still a few hundred levels about your Kleins and that. If it was dumbed down, it was because he was obviously aware it was on R4.

ska invite was talking about the Hardtalk interview.

 

[revol68]

Found the Hardtalk interview on iPlayer

Watching it now.

 

[butchersapron]

Ah, i had the wrong interview then. Right. Downloading the other one to watch later.

 

[revol68]

oh fuck that interviewer is a simple minded cunt!

 

[revol68]

the fact that Ska Invite thinks he didn't hold up to the interviewers retarded questions should be of no relevance to anyone other than himself. In truth I thought he did well not to slap the fuck out of the silly cunt.

 

[butchersapron]

I did try with that but the intro itself warned me wahat was going to happen. An that's the hardtalk? Newsround has more rigour and understanding of its subject. The little bit i watched reminded me of the infamous Negri/Harari interview.

 

[articul8]

jesus wept - just read that Hari thing I agree with Wittgenstein: "whereof one cannot speak..."

 

[butchersapron]

Uploaded a load of essays and books by the man:
1
2

 

[revol68]

Cheers butchers, grabbed a few of them yesterday to read on the train.

Any particular recommendations?

 

[butchersapron]

Only just got cracking on them myself - hoping to get a few finished later today.

 

[JimW]

Uploaded a load of essays and books by the man:
1
2

Is that two links to different places to download same collection, or is the content different? Got the first .rar yesterday.

 

[butchersapron]

Second lot's diff - may be a few duplicates as well though.

 

[JimW]

Cheers - best get that as well then

 

[revol68]

yeah there's a few duplicates in the second rar.

 

[butchersapron]

10 minute animated thing on Crises of Capitalism (ignore the blurb about him being a sociologist) - not yet seen the whole thing, but it looks like it may be worth a go, something different:

 

[purves grundy]

Uploaded a load of essays and books by the man:
1
2

top stuff BA - cheers!

 

[JimW]

Some web journal called Interface has a section called Debating David Harvey in a recent edition: http://www.interfacejournal.net/2010/05/interface-21-crises-social-movements.html Not actually read the articles yet - one from Harvey called 'Organizing for the anti-capitalist transition' and six responses