Too many immigration threads on UK P&P?

[phildwyer]

I'm more familiar with the "Philippine model"

Shouldn't that be "Philippine models," dickbreath?

Woof. Twat.

 

[phildwyer]

And I know for a fact that there are many, many millions who benefit directly, and many tens of millions indirectly, from this "model", despite its deficiences.

How many "models" benefit directly from *your* deficiencies, wankstain?

Woof. Twat.

 

[Knotted]

I don-t think you can really argue with those quotes...but how on earth do they back up tbaldwin?

Well the first quote is pretty much tbaldwin territory isn't it? The fact that he igores other factors doesn't mean he is basically incorrect about the 'brain drain' and all. (Yes I know that the brain drain is more complex than he presents it, but it is still a problem and just because others are more knowledgable than he is on this doesn't make him wrong for pointing it out.)

 

[Knotted]

It's an interesting piece you link to, Knotted, but I'm not sure your presentation of these two quotes as offering a neat balance of opinion, actually reflects the balance of the article, if read in its entirety.

I was just picking out two points of interest, not trying to reflect the entire article.

Firstly, the article sets out to refute the - probably generally accepted - notion that the "Mexican model" has, on balance, done not too badly for Mexico. Even so, the authors are forced to admit the strongly beneficial effects of remittances.

I think you are quite wrong here. I think the article just underscores what is generally accepted with respect to remittances. They aleviate poverty but make the country dependent on the export of labour without developing the economy.

Indeed, it seems to me that the meat of the refutation centres on the lack of locally generated, long-term, secure, unionised, high-paying jobs being created, rather than foriegn invested, less secure, minimum wage, jobs. This is a global trend, of course.

I don't read it that way. Most of the negatives are to do with structural development, and I don't think its trying to refute anything.

But (I suppose for the purpose of trying to strengthen their case), the authors actually count these jobs - worked by Mexicans in Mexico - as "exported jobs" as if the workers were overseas.

Huh? No they don't. They merely point out the fact that the jobs in the maquilas are 'ever more marginal and precarious'. Surely this is relevant to the Mexican economic model with respect to exporting to cheap labour - you have to have people desperate enough to work as cheap foreign labourers in the first place.

They note that foriegn invested enterprises have created over half a million jobs between 1994 and 2004 and then argue that they should count as exported workers since the only main benefit to Mexico is the wages paid to those workers.

Hmmmmmm.

Again, no they don't. You read this into the article.

I guess I can see the point, but I think it's stretching things a bit.


There's also some interesting statistics thrown in:

Now, this says that in the ten years betwen 1994 and 2004, the US has done a little bit better than Mexico in terms of the growth of the overall size of it's economy. The US' economy has expanded a wee bit faster than Mexico's during that decade.

If you call an 11.5% increase in the ratio between the US GDP and the Mexican GDP 'wee', then yes.

It also says that average manufacturing wages during the decade have grown a wee bit faster in the US than in Mexico.

If you call a 19.3% increase in the ratio between average manufacturing wages in the US and Mexico 'wee', then yes.

What we also know is that this is no surprise. The US is the worlds largest, most competitive economy.

Is it? I didn't know that. Out of interest, not argument, do you have a source for that?

What we don't have is any other raw or comparative data. How about a table of ALL countries vis-a-vis the US over that decade? Maybe that would show that Mexico did comaratively well compared to most other countries - even developed ones - during that period?

Neither do we know HOW much Mexico grew during that period - was is a stunning decade for economic growth and an even better one for growth in employment AND in average wages (just not quite as stellar as US growth)?

Selective? Hmmmmmmm.

Fair points. I don't think that even if they provided what you site above that they would prove very much. I think the quoted statistics are just there to provide a rough picture of what's going on rather than to say such and such a cause had such and such an effect. The article has no pretence of statistical analysis.

That said, the majority of the article basically seems to be admitting the strongly beneficial effects of remittances, while also pointing out some of the pitfalls of globalisation.

It's a very weak refutation that largely seems to support remittances, with a couple of reservations.

And that's also the position I take. I'm more familiar with the "Philippine model", which IMO actually has a more detrimental effect on the country than occurs in Mexico but, on balance, still has a strongly beneficial effect.

So, Knotted, I don't believe your presentation of those two quotes represents either a true reflection of the balance of benefit-to-detriment brought to "remittance economies".

You seem to see globalisation and the increasing use of migrant labour as somehow seperate. I think you have missed the point about structural development as opposed to cash being pumped into the economy.

Nor do I think it even acurately represents the balance of the article, which despite perhaps attempting to refute the generally strongly positive effects of remittances, actually merely reinforces the view that, on balance, despite some possible negative influences (that themselves seem more related to globalisation in general), remittances remain a powerfully beneficial force on the Mexican economy.

I don't understand why you think I was either trying to accurately represent the balance of the article or why you think that I didn't accurately represent the balance of the article. You have just criticised the article. You keep reading things into it. They say nothing to refute the positive effects of remittances. They don't even attempt to minimise them. They just describe them as part of the overall picture.

Certainly in the Philippines, th export of labour has some profoundly negative effects - particularly upon the sociological infrastructure - and yet until a viable alternative is created through sensible government policy and administration (rather than corruption, nepotism and greed,), the "model" remains the only thing keeping the country from mass starvation.

Sure, but is anybody saying that the model should be scrapped tommorrow? Does the model as it exists help provide a viable alternative or has it made it harder for the Philippines to realise an alternative?

And I know for a fact that there are many, many millions who benefit directly, and many tens of millions indirectly, from this "model", despite its deficiences.

Most overseas workers I know are absolutely torn; on the one hand they'd rather be at home with their family and kids and on the other, they recognise the profound benefit that not just their families derive from their labours and sacrifice, but also the wider community in their home provinces and their country in general. It's a tough, tough choice.


Woof

And on that I'm sure we can all agree.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Hmmm, I note the phildwyer, soi-disant purveyor of facts, has evaded such hard detail here, and instead made his more usual recourse to cheap abuse.

 

[Lock&Light]

instead made his more usual recourse to cheap abuse.

Unlike you and nino, do you mean?

 

[ViolentPanda]

This message is hidden because Lock&Light is on your ignore list.

 

[Knotted]

Jessiedog (and others) might like to read this more detailed analysis on NAFTA, maquiladors and the export of (Mexican) labour in this working paper by Raul Degado Wise and James M. Cypher:

The Strategic Role of Labour in Mexico's Subordinated Integration into the US

Quote from 'conclusions' section:
"First, the actual model deployed by Mexico is not a triumphant example of outward-oriented industrialisation, instead it is typified by a very basic form of "primarization": While many Latin American nations have taken a step backward into specializing in low value-added exports of commodities or undifferentiated resource-based industrial products (most notably Argentina) Mexico has taken "two-steps backward" reverting even further, offering-up as its absolute advantabe cheap, usually modestly-trained labor in an institutional setting wherein this labor can be deployed with few constraints either in terms of unions, benefits, labor rights, legal rocouse to adverse health effects, or severance protections."

 

[Jessiedog]

Get back to the bar girls, you stupid old queen.

Eh?

Know many "bar girls", phil?



Woof

 

[Pigeon]

How many "models" benefit directly from *your* deficiencies, wankstain?

Woof. Twat.

I hope all these delightful little witticisms are being collated somewhere.

It would be an insult to the memories of Dorothy Parker and Oscar Wilde if not.

 

[brasicritique]

The fact of the matter is that socialists should be building communities but instead the likes of nino back neo-con policies that fragment them and divide them.The only thing most of you lot are in touch with is your private parts on a regular basis by the looks of thinks.You are white middleclass elitest kids who do not really gie a fuck or do anything for local communities except bully them into your way of thinking.If immegration is so cool and you are going to fight for the rights of big buissness then why not start national campaigns for more council housing as housing seems to be one of the reasons people are anti-immegration.But no the whole point of the violet and ninos of this world is to sit around between moral wankerthons and pat themselves on the back for being good socialists in that the belief is more important than the action.

Becky you are right i do pity them.


Am i the only one to see the irony in the title of this thread

 

[ViolentPanda]

Oh dear, sad class-war boy brasic, the white middle-class twat strikes again.

hey, if he can make out that everyone except him is white and middle class, I can say the same about him, the Hampstead-occupying little fartsniffer.

 

[mikeinworthing]

Oh dear, dwyer banned again – twice in a week.

What has the psychiatric professor been up to this time?

Apart from general troling, drink & coke?

*heads off to check*

 

[Jessiedog]

I hope all these delightful little witticisms are being collated somewhere.

It speaks volumes, methinks.

I doubt that phil actually knows many "bar girls" - her/his stereotypes are too cliched.

Nevertheless, I started it with the "fuck off".

So I'll leave it.



I really don't want to get sidetracked away from the good bits of this thread, phil, so apologies for saying the "fuck off" bit.

I've tried not to get into it before and I'll try again.

Fair?

In exchange, please just stop trolling so hard all the time - at least on this thread.

Why not leave it here and get into something fun with me on the "lesbian" thread instead?

I'd be more than happy to explore your experiences of "bar girls" there.

Please?



I'd rather learn more about "Remittance Economies" on this thread, thanks.



Woof

 

[urbanrevolt]

Arguing for working class unity is not the same as opposing immigration controls. Raising a maximal programmatic demand does not solve trade union issues.

True but what I have actually consistently been arguing is that we do undertake basic work around reforms such as demonstrations and protests against cuts/ privatisations as well as more specific immigration struggles such against deportations/ against detentions/ against discrimination (such as th epartly successful campaign against Section 9 that the Sukula Family Must Stay campaign waged) and link up all the different campaigns and struggles in the working class.

As a socialist I would point out the links between different issues and the need for the working class to run our own affairs. However, I agree with you that maximal demands if unrelated to day to day struggles are mere sloganeering.

However, it is quite possible to do active campaigning around specific issues and have a vision of a different society where working class people run things for ourselves on the basis of human need not private profits for the rich.

Here is an article on the Trade Unions Against Immigration Controls conference of yesterday (March 31st 2007)
http://www.permanentrevolution.net//?view=entry&entry=1263

 

[Knotted]

However, it is quite possible to do active campaigning around specific issues and have a vision of a different society where working class people run things for ourselves on the basis of human need not private profits for the rich.

I think this is where I disagree with you. Though I could agree with a vision of a different society, I would see that society as abolishing class distinctions rather than working class control which is surely a transition to socialism.

As far as a transitional government is concerned, I think immigration controls maybe a transitional necessity. That's speculation of course. However, I would hope that the question is resolved democratically rather than by ideological scripture.

 

[Lock&Light]

Oh dear, dwyer banned again – twice in a week.

What has the psychiatric professor been up to this time?

Apart from general troling, drink & coke?

*heads off to check*

Whatever happened to WHSpliff? Your reincarnation on Urban has not been blessed. When did you first take to gloating?

 

[tbaldwin]

Economic ones from what you write.



Woof

I have never said anything about not liking economic migrants. I am against economic migration that doesn't mean that i dont accept that people will do what they can to improve their own lives and that of family and friends.

Your arguement is like saying somebody hates the class system then they must hate people born into a class.

 

[tbaldwin]

And you keep trotting this bollocks out again and again and again.

No data, no evidence, nada.

I've refuted these specific arguments three times on three different threads, baldwin, and yet each time, you ignore it and then trot the same bollocks out on the next thread.

And that's just bollocks!



Woof

Like VP etc you just tend to ignore stats that don't suit your prejudices and then whenever somebody puts a point of view you disagree with you demand evidence stats.Look at the NHS thread i satrted or the one on Higher Education.
To see what impact stats have on closed minds like Vp's and Nino's etc.

But look at the impact economic migration has on rich people in rich countries and then on poor ones in poor countries.
For any socialist to support that is indefensible.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Like VP etc you just tend to ignore stats that don't suit your prejudices and then whenever somebody puts a point of view you disagree with you demand evidence stats.Look at the NHS thread i satrted or the one on Higher Education.
To see what impact stats have on closed minds like Vp's and Nino's etc..

You live in a total dreamworld, don't you balders?

A dreamworld where it's other people who don't like stats, data or evidence, not you, and where it's others that pull your dirty little stunt of only believeing stats that support your case, rather than you.

A dreamworld where you actually talk sense, rather than the shit you spew here.

You're becoming as big a joke as brasicattack is, and as deluded.

 

[Fruitloop]

I believe it's called a 'confirmational bias'.

 

[ViolentPanda]

I believe it's called a 'confirmational bias'.

.

Yep, but when you use phrases like that at balders, he calls you a "LIBERAL SUPREMACIST".

One way (out of many he uses) of getting out of engaging with any substantive criticism of his fuckwittery, I suppose.

 

[tbaldwin]

VP so have you got anything of substance to say? It would make a nice change.
This thread has not managed to come up with any evidence to back up insinuations that people who disagree with nino are racist has it?

I really know you like rules. And 2 of the most important rules for you.

Are 1 Never use 5 words when 295 will do.

and 2 Demand as much evidence from your opponet whilst producing as little as possible as yourself.

But i really struggle to remember a time when you have succesfully used stats to back up your views.

 

[ViolentPanda]

VP so have you got anything of substance to say? It would make a nice change.

I see you're projecting again, balders.

This thread has not managed to come up with any evidence to back up insinuations that people who disagree with nino are racist has it?

I wasn't aware that was the aim of the thread (looks at thread title)oh look, it isn't!

I really know you like rules. And 2 of the most important rules for you.

Are 1 Never use 5 words when 295 will do.

and 2 Demand as much evidence from your opponet whilst producing as little as possible as yourself.

Actually, dickwad, you know precisely DICK about me, except what I've told you myself that you've then twisted to suit your own "arguments", as many people who've read your pathetic attempts at smearing well know.
You labour under the delusion that just because you claim something is so, that it actually is so.

But i really struggle to remember a time when you have succesfully used stats to back up your views.

I don't, but unlike you I don't have a very selective memory or the psychological need to convince people that I'm "right".

Me, I prefer the facts to speak for themselves.

You, you prefer to edit them to present yourself in the best possible light.

That's why so many posters tell you you're a joke, but don't say the same to me, and that's not because we're all members of a liberal cabal, it's because anyone with half a brain can smell the shit you talk a mile off.

 

[Pigeon]

You, you prefer to edit them to present yourself in the best possible light.

Shit, do you think that's what he does? Really?

What the fuck would the unedited baldwin look like?

 

[ViolentPanda]

Shit, do you think that's what he does? Really?

What the fuck would the unedited baldwin look like?

brasicattack?

 

[durruti02]

excellent posts from Knotted ..

 

[nino_savatte]

That pretty much somes it up. You think that nationalism is a simple idea that you either know or you don't know. However, there is no particular consensus on what nationalism even means. Hence you have a simplistic notion of nationalism. Therefore your anti-nationalism is simplistic.

Could we please get back to issues of substance.

Nowt like a circular conversation. Tell you what, you can continue to insist that i have a "simplistic notion of nationalism" as much as you like but it will not alter the reality that the nation-state is a construct.

Could you please remember that this thread does not exist to give praisesong to nationalism.

 

[nino_savatte]

You specifically stated in post 324 that neither nations nor nation states are real. I don't mind backtracking and refining what you say or clarifying what you think, but please don't try to use it as a debating trick in order to accuse your opponents of dishonesty.

So what? A nation-state is an imagined space; it exists in the imagination. You seem unable to grasp that for whatever reasons that you have. I don't actually recall you dealing with any of the points I have made. In fact, you seem to have completely misread my OP in order to pursue your somewhat tedious point about "simplistic anti-nationalism".

 

[Knotted]

So what? A nation-state is an imagined space; it exists in the imagination.

With respect to Benedict Anderson, my reading of him is that his notion of imagined community is not an imaginery entity. Urban75 is an imagined community. We do not all know each other, yet there are still social rules that are collectively enforced. So as a community, Urban75 is an imagined community but that's not to say that it is imaginery. Anderson even views nationalism positively in this sort of 'banal' respect. You should read the interview I linked to.

You seem unable to grasp that for whatever reasons that you have. I don't actually recall you dealing with any of the points I have made. In fact, you seem to have completely misread my OP in order to pursue your somewhat tedious point about "simplistic anti-nationalism".

That's easy for you to remedy then. Just explain your arguements so that I don't misread them as I'm really at a loss to understand what you are saying now. Nation states aren't real but they are physically real? You have to appreciate that that's difficult to interpret and I'll get clobbered with the accusation of misrepresentation whatever I take you as saying.