David Harvey's 2008 essay outlines the inter dynamics of urbanism & capitalism and the recurrent practices that have contributed to the global economic crisis. What is fascinating & key is that Occupy Wall Street as one movement now challenging this system is galvanizing real demands, most recently Adbusters' proposal for The Robin Hood Tax, a 1% tax on all global financial transactions. This concrete demand answers a question Harvey poses below "If they somehow did come together, what should they demand?":
http://www.adbusters.org/blogs/adbusters-blog/robinhood.html
Excerpt from David Harvey's essay:
Unlike the fiscal system, however, the urban and peri-urban social movements of opposition, of which there are many around the world, are not tightly coupled; indeed most have no connection to each other. If they somehow did come together, what should they demand?
The answer to the last question is simple enough in principle: greater democratic control over the production and utilization of the surplus. Since the urban process is a major channel of surplus use, establishing democratic management over its urban deployment constitutes the right to the city. Throughout capitalist history, some of the surplus value has been taxed, and in social-democratic phases the proportion at the state’s disposal rose significantly. The neoliberal project over the last thirty years has been oriented towards privatizing that control. The data for all oecd countries show, however, that the state’s portion of gross output has been roughly constant since the 1970s. [17] The main achievement of the neoliberal assault, then, has been to prevent the public share from expanding as it did in the 1960s. Neoliberalism has also created new systems of governance that integrate state and corporate interests, and through the application of money power, it has ensured that the disbursement of the surplus through the state apparatus favours corporate capital and the upper classes in shaping the urban process. Raising the proportion of the surplus held by the state will only have a positive impact if the state itself is brought back under democratic control.
Increasingly, we see the right to the city falling into the hands of private or quasi-private interests. In New York City, for example, the billionaire mayor, Michael Bloomberg, is reshaping the city along lines favourable to developers, Wall Street and transnational capitalist-class elements, and promoting the city as an optimal location for high-value businesses and a fantastic destination for tourists. He is, in effect, turning Manhattan into one vast gated community for the rich. In Mexico City, Carlos Slim had the downtown streets re-cobbled to suit the tourist gaze. Not only affluent individuals exercise direct power. In the town of New Haven, strapped for resources for urban reinvestment, it is Yale, one of the wealthiest universities in the world, that is redesigning much of the urban fabric to suit its needs. Johns Hopkins is doing the same for East Baltimore, and Columbia University plans to do so for areas of New York, sparking neighbourhood resistance movements in both cases. The right to the city, as it is now constituted, is too narrowly confined, restricted in most cases to a small political and economic elite who are in a position to shape cities more and more after their own desires.
Every January, the Office of the New York State Comptroller publishes an estimate of the total Wall Street bonuses for the previous twelve months. In 2007, a disastrous year for financial markets by any measure, these added up to $33.2 billion, only 2 per cent less than the year before. In mid-summer of 2007, the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank poured billions of dollars’ worth of short-term credit into the financial system to ensure its stability, and thereafter the Fed dramatically lowered interest rates or pumped in vast amounts of liquidity every time the Dow threatened to fall precipitously. Meanwhile, some two million people have been or are about to be made homeless by foreclosures. Many city neighbourhoods and even whole peri-urban communities in the us have been boarded up and vandalized, wrecked by the predatory lending practices of the financial institutions. This population is due no bonuses. Indeed, since foreclosure means debt forgiveness, which is regarded as income in the United States, many of those evicted face a hefty income-tax bill for money they never had in their possession. This asymmetry cannot be construed as anything less than a massive form of class confrontation. A ‘Financial Katrina’ is unfolding, which conveniently (for the developers) threatens to wipe out low-income neighbourhoods on potentially high-value land in many inner-city areas far more effectively and speedily than could be achieved through eminent domain.
We have yet, however, to see a coherent opposition to these developments in the twenty-first century. There are, of course, already a great many diverse social movements focusing on the urban question—from India and Brazil to China, Spain, Argentina and the United States. In 2001, a City Statute was inserted into the Brazilian Constitution, after pressure from social movements, to recognize the collective right to the city. [18] In the us, there have been calls for much of the $700 billion bail-out for financial institutions to be diverted into a Reconstruction Bank, which would help prevent foreclosures and fund efforts at neighbourhood revitalization and infrastructural renewal at municipal level. The urban crisis that is affecting millions would then be prioritized over the needs of big investors and financiers. Unfortunately the social movements are not strong enough or sufficiently mobilized to force through this solution. Nor have these movements yet converged on the singular aim of gaining greater control over the uses of the surplus—let alone over the conditions of its production.
Excerpt:
"In the future we may be able to wear electronic circuits on our skin, which can record signals from our nervous system during sex and allow us to replay the sensory experience at a later date, according to futurologist Ian Pearson.
Pearson describes a future (by 2030) where sensors will sophisticated enough to detect and map the collection of stimuli that create certain sensory experiences -- be it someone shaking your hand, hugging you, or having sex with you. The idea is that by stimulating your nervous system in exactly the same way -- with the appropriate pressure, warmth and motion -- you can recreate the experience. People might use this sort of technology when they are separated from their partners or, more likely, when they don't have one (which, really, would make this story more about the future of masturbation than sex).
Pearson told Wired.co.uk: "We could record vast libraries of the sensory experiences of celebrity porn stars and be able to experience how they actually feel..."
Original Post by Francesca Rheannon
Oct 25 2011
"...In that spirit, the Alternative Currencies Working Group at OWS is putting out for consideration by the General Assembly a software-enabled gift currency called PermaBank, that’s premise is “to develop and deploy a set of technologies that align 'financial services' with the principles of permaculture.” PermaBank would enable individuals and groups “to post their wish/requests and gifts/offers and indicate whether they've been completed.” It would also use paper money and credit cards (on a local credit union).
It seems the currency will formalize and organize an economy that has already spontaneously sprouted, enhancing “the efficiency of the gifting culture that currently exists within Liberty Plaza.”
The protestors have already deposited their money into a small credit union on the Lower East Side serving poor people who have been denied loans or accounts by other banks. In an extraordinarily mean-spirited move, Goldman Sachs retaliated against the bank by withdrawing a $5,000 pledge when the Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union planned a fundraising event honoring the Occupy movement.
Alternative local currencies are not new – they have been promoted for decades by the Shumacher Society (now the New Economics Institute), among others, and are thriving in the Berkshires of Massachusetts (Berkshares) and elsewhere and in the explosion of time banks around the country.
The Metacurrency Project (whose proponent Arthur Brock was invited to speak to the 99%-ers at Zucotti Park) promotes the idea that “people should be able to decide what they value and how that will be measured and acknowledged. This means they have to be able to create their own currencies.” It aims to create the technology “tools, protocols and platforms” that will enable people to “transact directly with each other with no segment of that interaction relying on a centrally controlled system,” where “all levels are sovereign” (horizontally, not vertically determined).
The horizontal, democratic participation that Web-based technology makes possible is being used by another ad hoc group formed in the wake of OWS. Initially put out into the digisphere by Ralph Meima of Marlboro College’s MBA in Managing for Sustainability, “The American People’s New Economic Charter” is hoping to crowd-source an open, national conversation that develops a plan for redress for 18 of the 23 grievances in the Declaration of the Occupation—the ones dealing with economic issues...."
Excerpt:
"As winter approaches, many occupiers will dig in for the long haul. Others will decamp until spring and channel their energy into myriad projects. Many of the big ideas for rejuvenating and reenchanting the world that have been swirling around the left for the last 20 years will pick up steam. From revoking corporate personhood to de-commercializing the cultural commons, to separating money from politics, to the birth of a True Cost Party of America … we are entering a sustained period of boots-on-the-ground transformation.
And every now and again we will have a worldwide blast reminiscent of the global march against the Iraq war eight years ago. The next of these blasts could happen as early as this Saturday when #ROBINHOOD strikes the G20. Imagine a few million people rising up and sending a message to the G20 leaders meeting November 3/4 in France: "This austerity vs. stimulus debate you've foisted on us doesn't mean a damn thing… It's obvious you have no idea how to get us out of this economic mess you put us in. So now we are telling you what we want: a radical transformation of casino capitalism… we want you to slow down fast money with a 1% #ROBINHOOD tax on all financial transactions and currency trades."
#ROBINHOOD marches have already been announced in over a dozen cities. Bring it up at your general assembly … then create some edgy Robin Hood graphics for the world to digest and let's march out there millions strong this Saturday … Let's leverage the G20!..."
Excerpt via Montreal Gazette:
"Graffiti equipment for paralyzed artists and bacteria that diagnose human illnesses are just two pieces in a museum exhibit about devices that help people interact with one another and the world.
"Talk to Me: Design and the Communication between People and Objects" at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) includes pieces designed to appeal to both casual museum goers and design aficionados.
"There are people who are wandering through on their way to see another exhibit, and don't realize what the show is about, and often get really excited," said Kate Carmody, a co-curator of the exhibit with Paola Antonelli.
"We've also had a lot of app designers, theme designers, people who usually aren't represented in museum shows who come here ready to participate on that level."...
Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/life/fashion-beauty/exhibit+showcases+devices+...
Gary Shapiro, Contributor
President and CEO of Consumer Electronics Association
Oct 26, 2011
"Using forceful arguments about the ongoing threat of Internet piracy, Hollywood and its allies are pushing legislation through Congress that would ensnare and criminalize legitimate Internet sites on unproven allegations of content theft. The “Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act” [PROTECT IP Act, S. 968] was rushed out of the Judiciary Committee by voice vote last May and may soon be voted on in the Senate. A House bill may be dropped any day.
Supporters of the bill, including the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), led by former Senator Chris Dodd, argue that film studios are losing money on rogue, mainly offshore, websites that steal and sell their movies. According to one umbrella group, Creative America, which represents proponents of the bill, more than 500,000 movies are stolen every year worldwide. This is a compelling argument.
It’s the cure that is the problem. The PROTECT IP Act would allow copyright owners – movie studios and other content providers – simply to accuse a website of infringement, which could lead to that site being shut down by court order and entire links to the site being wiped clean from the Internet. Any website with a hyperlink, such as Twitter, Facebook or a blog, would be subject to liability. More, non-infringing sites could be inadvertently shut down under the proposal. Indeed, the law is so far-reaching that it would force Internet providers like Comcast to block all access to the allegedly illegal site.
The potential for abuse by the notoriously litigious content industry is clear. Last year, when the government sought to shut down one child pornography site, it ended up affecting some 70,000 legitimate sites for several days, even notifying visitors that the sites – many of which were business sites – were purveyors of child pornography.
For instance, the bill is so broadly written that, in theory, it would allow any copyright owner to shut down a legitimate retail website, such as Amazon or Best Buy, by alleging that one product being sold on the site could “enable or facilitate” an infringement. It could even allow any content owner to block access to the Patent Office website if it receives and posts a patent application for a product that is believed to use content without permission...."