Voices from the heartroots
Posted:
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Mr. Walter I. Balane is a journalist from Mindanao. He is one of the invited resource speaker of the 2nd Mindanao Bloggers Summit held recently in October 25, 2008 at General Santos City. Here below is the contents of Mr. Balane privilege discourse presented during the summit.
Good morning!
I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to speak today on the topic: Voices from the Heartroots: Notes on Life and Living in communities.
My sharing is largely about my personal experience and reflections as a “journalist who blogs”.
Yes, a journalist who blogs, that’s how I call my self now. It sounds remarkable. But there’s an anomaly in the phrase because journalists are supposed to be busy with reportage. How come they have time to blog?
Actually, when I opened an account with blogspot in mid-2004, I only meant to “go with the uso”.
Parang hi-tech kasi pakinggan. May blog ako! (kahit hindi naman alam ng mga kaibigan ko dati ano yang blog.) I bragged about it!
Sa tingin ko since my email address naman ako at natuto ng magchat, mag google, baka its time to go “next level”.
So the blogger in me was born.
This was also the time when I was already serious about crossing over from print to online media. I joined MindaNews in 2002 and moved to its Davao office in 2004.
Then, the reason why I blogged was because I wanted to see my articles online.
I thought of putting up an archive of my stories from MindaNews.com and from the local newspaper in Bukidnon that I was editing.
Since most of my stories were about my coverage of Bukidnon and Mindanao as a whole, I thought of calling it ISTAMBAY SA MINDANAO (Standing by in Mindanao).
Like any beginner, my early experience in blogging was about experimentation and adventurism. Sa time na yon, hindi ko pa kilala sina Blogie Robillo, Avel, at iba pang bloggers.
Ang alam ko blogger ako at reporter ako. Ako si Istambay sa Mindanao. Nasisiyahan akong mabasa ang mga naisulat ko. Feeling ko meron ding mga tao na nagbabasa ng mga post ko. Feeling lang.
Kasama sa naging experiment ko ang pagmigrate galing blogspot papuntang wordpress noong 2006.
Slowly, I got hits and there were those who were kind enough to post comments.
Mukhang masaya.
Ngunit magulo din.
Ilang beses din akong na reprimand ng editor ko dahil na nauna kong napost sa blog ko and isang istorya bago ko na ifile sa desk.
At sa isa pang araw, merong nag post ng comment na violent reaction doon sa sinulat ko sa blog.
At sumunod pa ang isang comment na “paki ko sa opinion mo” “ano ba ang alam mo sa sitwasyon” .
Hindi ko rin pweding kalimutan ang mga spam message na kong pumasok akalo mo na marami nang nagreact sa post mo.
Napag-isipan ko na parang hindi ko pa na harmonize ang pagiging blogger at reporter ko at saka naging self-publisher na ako na parang “the world revolves around me” as if the world cares about my news, my aspirations, dreams, reactions, pains, and victories.
These and other factors made me reflect on why I blog and why I should continue blogging.
The responsibility is doubled with me as a journalist who should keep his credibility, focus, and relevance intact.
It is trippled with the fact that my setting is Mindanao where there are a lot of stories, good or bad, which are left untold.
I decided to be a journalist first as it should be.
But I also decided to continue blogging. I can’t imagine myself “not blogging”. In fact I learned to tweak on my header, sidebar and other stuff on my dashboard.
With the focus on my job as a journalist, I became more conscious about reporting (and blogging) accurately, about using more point of views, about ground-truthing, and about fairness, balance, and timeliness.
I learned that if my voice should count it will only count so much.
I have to use my platform as a journalist to cover the different and diverse voices around me.
I cannot just rely on the opinion or statements of the usual and official sources.
I have to be on the ground to get the facts right and fast.
I learned most of these things when I joined a team formed by MindaNews to do grassroots reporting and documentation training engagements in communities around Mindanao.
In Caraga, Davao Oriental; Tandag, Surigao del Sur; in Upi, Maguindanao; in Bagra, Cotabato City; In Midsayap, North Cotabato; In Iligan City, In Kumalarang, Zamboanga del Sur and in other commuities I learned that the people there have stories to tell and yet we don’t hear them at all.
Most of these peoples and communities battle hunger, fear, ignorance, and isolation everyday.
They seek peace, justice, hope, life, victories,even the most basic --- food.
The mainstream media cannot cover everything. Sometimes they choose not to cover it at all or cover it smacked with generalizations, misrepresentations, and angles taken out of context, among other concerns.
This is a challenge for journalists and an opportunity for bloggers.
Already, Mindanao bloggers are known as organized and ahead of other blogging communities in the country.
Blogging has already occupied a level of command in the information highway.
That is why I believe this could be handy.
Blogging the Mindanawon consciousness could be blogging more about these peoples, issues, events, concerns, dreams.
We are ought to give them the chance because opportunities for them to express themselves and be heard are scarce.
This is especially true in a time when Mindanao continues to experience unpeace and is misunderstood in many ways.
Mindanawons blogging about Mindanao is a natural course and is the perfect energy needed.
It might not be enough, however, that there are Mindanao bloggers who discuss on Mindanao from their online platforms.
We, Mindanawon bloggers can only do so much. We can speak only for ourselves, our work, our views on Mindanao, our feelings, reactions, victories, pains, excitements, plans, dreams, and aspirations.
We have to gather more voices and flood the information superhighway with solutions, too, not just problems.
But a bigger part of Mindanao’s people is still “offline”. They are not yet connected to many things linked in Mindanao, enjoyed in Mindanao.
Ang kadaghanan wala pa makasakay sa sakyanan nga gigamit sa uban.
Apparently, there is a big gap between the volume of the voices of Mindanao’s bloggers and those of the “offline Mindanawons” in expressing their humanity.
“Blogging the Mindanawon Consciousness” might mean bridging this gap.
Mindanao bloggers might consider helping enable other key sectors and peoples in their communities to blog about themselves.
Blogging might not only be limited to blogging about Mindanao and its peoples but also helping the “voiceless” learn to blog so they, too, can blog about themselves.
Of course it would be extremely difficult for existing Mindanao bloggers to acess many of the areas safely and for the people in communities to appraoch which local bloggers can help them.
But bloggers must continue to try linking them and engaging them for mutual respect and understanding in an effort to connect more and more people.
Many of us who are already blogging about the voiceless must continue doing it and infect others to do the same.
We can focus on a Mindanao consciousness that is more inclusive, not exclusive.
Let us blog about how we can build the “we” among Mindanawons and not on “us” and “them”.
On the other hand, many of us might be turned-off by this kind of appeal.
Sometimes we have the impression that blogging about the conflict is flooding the information highway with bad news about Mindanao, when bloggers wanted to change the image to “good”.
But how can we have good news if we continue to blur and ignore the not-good news.
Mind you, there are also good stories that come out from the evacuation sites: there are stories of resilience, stories of hope, stories of dreams, stories of humanity.
There are many opportunities to give voice and attention to people in the communities, like helping explain (of course to understand it first) the peace process in general and the MOA-AD in particular.
My editor Carol Arguillas told me earlier that she commends our fellow blogger Sarah Matalam for what she is doing and blogging about: connecting people who have something to share to the bakwits in Pikit and neighboring areas.
It is not as easy as I say it here.
But we are not only bloggers. We are Mindanawon bloggers.
Altogether in our own communities cities and circles of influence we can collectively promote the Mindanawon consciousness.
Indeed it will not be easy.
I liken it to our trip yesterday from Iligan-CDO-Bukidnon in Bobby Timonera’s Mitsubishi Adventure.
Along the way, there were good and picture perfect sights, an early lunch, fresh air and fruits, lively chats, and good music.
But there were also spoilers like a heavy rain in Malaybalay, more expensive unleaded gas in Maramag, a busted tire in Damulog, Bukidnon, chargers left at home, and endless detours over long and winding routes.
But we made it here. We all made it here.
Yes, Mindanao bloggers can make it.
Thank you and once again good morning!
Good morning!
I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to speak today on the topic: Voices from the Heartroots: Notes on Life and Living in communities.
My sharing is largely about my personal experience and reflections as a “journalist who blogs”.
Yes, a journalist who blogs, that’s how I call my self now. It sounds remarkable. But there’s an anomaly in the phrase because journalists are supposed to be busy with reportage. How come they have time to blog?
Actually, when I opened an account with blogspot in mid-2004, I only meant to “go with the uso”.
Parang hi-tech kasi pakinggan. May blog ako! (kahit hindi naman alam ng mga kaibigan ko dati ano yang blog.) I bragged about it!
Sa tingin ko since my email address naman ako at natuto ng magchat, mag google, baka its time to go “next level”.
So the blogger in me was born.
This was also the time when I was already serious about crossing over from print to online media. I joined MindaNews in 2002 and moved to its Davao office in 2004.
Then, the reason why I blogged was because I wanted to see my articles online.
I thought of putting up an archive of my stories from MindaNews.com and from the local newspaper in Bukidnon that I was editing.
Since most of my stories were about my coverage of Bukidnon and Mindanao as a whole, I thought of calling it ISTAMBAY SA MINDANAO (Standing by in Mindanao).
Like any beginner, my early experience in blogging was about experimentation and adventurism. Sa time na yon, hindi ko pa kilala sina Blogie Robillo, Avel, at iba pang bloggers.
Ang alam ko blogger ako at reporter ako. Ako si Istambay sa Mindanao. Nasisiyahan akong mabasa ang mga naisulat ko. Feeling ko meron ding mga tao na nagbabasa ng mga post ko. Feeling lang.
Kasama sa naging experiment ko ang pagmigrate galing blogspot papuntang wordpress noong 2006.
Slowly, I got hits and there were those who were kind enough to post comments.
Mukhang masaya.
Ngunit magulo din.
Ilang beses din akong na reprimand ng editor ko dahil na nauna kong napost sa blog ko and isang istorya bago ko na ifile sa desk.
At sa isa pang araw, merong nag post ng comment na violent reaction doon sa sinulat ko sa blog.
At sumunod pa ang isang comment na “paki ko sa opinion mo” “ano ba ang alam mo sa sitwasyon” .
Hindi ko rin pweding kalimutan ang mga spam message na kong pumasok akalo mo na marami nang nagreact sa post mo.
Napag-isipan ko na parang hindi ko pa na harmonize ang pagiging blogger at reporter ko at saka naging self-publisher na ako na parang “the world revolves around me” as if the world cares about my news, my aspirations, dreams, reactions, pains, and victories.
These and other factors made me reflect on why I blog and why I should continue blogging.
The responsibility is doubled with me as a journalist who should keep his credibility, focus, and relevance intact.
It is trippled with the fact that my setting is Mindanao where there are a lot of stories, good or bad, which are left untold.
I decided to be a journalist first as it should be.
But I also decided to continue blogging. I can’t imagine myself “not blogging”. In fact I learned to tweak on my header, sidebar and other stuff on my dashboard.
With the focus on my job as a journalist, I became more conscious about reporting (and blogging) accurately, about using more point of views, about ground-truthing, and about fairness, balance, and timeliness.
I learned that if my voice should count it will only count so much.
I have to use my platform as a journalist to cover the different and diverse voices around me.
I cannot just rely on the opinion or statements of the usual and official sources.
I have to be on the ground to get the facts right and fast.
I learned most of these things when I joined a team formed by MindaNews to do grassroots reporting and documentation training engagements in communities around Mindanao.
In Caraga, Davao Oriental; Tandag, Surigao del Sur; in Upi, Maguindanao; in Bagra, Cotabato City; In Midsayap, North Cotabato; In Iligan City, In Kumalarang, Zamboanga del Sur and in other commuities I learned that the people there have stories to tell and yet we don’t hear them at all.
Most of these peoples and communities battle hunger, fear, ignorance, and isolation everyday.
They seek peace, justice, hope, life, victories,even the most basic --- food.
The mainstream media cannot cover everything. Sometimes they choose not to cover it at all or cover it smacked with generalizations, misrepresentations, and angles taken out of context, among other concerns.
This is a challenge for journalists and an opportunity for bloggers.
Already, Mindanao bloggers are known as organized and ahead of other blogging communities in the country.
Blogging has already occupied a level of command in the information highway.
That is why I believe this could be handy.
Blogging the Mindanawon consciousness could be blogging more about these peoples, issues, events, concerns, dreams.
We are ought to give them the chance because opportunities for them to express themselves and be heard are scarce.
This is especially true in a time when Mindanao continues to experience unpeace and is misunderstood in many ways.
Mindanawons blogging about Mindanao is a natural course and is the perfect energy needed.
It might not be enough, however, that there are Mindanao bloggers who discuss on Mindanao from their online platforms.
We, Mindanawon bloggers can only do so much. We can speak only for ourselves, our work, our views on Mindanao, our feelings, reactions, victories, pains, excitements, plans, dreams, and aspirations.
We have to gather more voices and flood the information superhighway with solutions, too, not just problems.
But a bigger part of Mindanao’s people is still “offline”. They are not yet connected to many things linked in Mindanao, enjoyed in Mindanao.
Ang kadaghanan wala pa makasakay sa sakyanan nga gigamit sa uban.
Apparently, there is a big gap between the volume of the voices of Mindanao’s bloggers and those of the “offline Mindanawons” in expressing their humanity.
“Blogging the Mindanawon Consciousness” might mean bridging this gap.
Mindanao bloggers might consider helping enable other key sectors and peoples in their communities to blog about themselves.
Blogging might not only be limited to blogging about Mindanao and its peoples but also helping the “voiceless” learn to blog so they, too, can blog about themselves.
Of course it would be extremely difficult for existing Mindanao bloggers to acess many of the areas safely and for the people in communities to appraoch which local bloggers can help them.
But bloggers must continue to try linking them and engaging them for mutual respect and understanding in an effort to connect more and more people.
Many of us who are already blogging about the voiceless must continue doing it and infect others to do the same.
We can focus on a Mindanao consciousness that is more inclusive, not exclusive.
Let us blog about how we can build the “we” among Mindanawons and not on “us” and “them”.
On the other hand, many of us might be turned-off by this kind of appeal.
Sometimes we have the impression that blogging about the conflict is flooding the information highway with bad news about Mindanao, when bloggers wanted to change the image to “good”.
But how can we have good news if we continue to blur and ignore the not-good news.
Mind you, there are also good stories that come out from the evacuation sites: there are stories of resilience, stories of hope, stories of dreams, stories of humanity.
There are many opportunities to give voice and attention to people in the communities, like helping explain (of course to understand it first) the peace process in general and the MOA-AD in particular.
My editor Carol Arguillas told me earlier that she commends our fellow blogger Sarah Matalam for what she is doing and blogging about: connecting people who have something to share to the bakwits in Pikit and neighboring areas.
It is not as easy as I say it here.
But we are not only bloggers. We are Mindanawon bloggers.
Altogether in our own communities cities and circles of influence we can collectively promote the Mindanawon consciousness.
Indeed it will not be easy.
I liken it to our trip yesterday from Iligan-CDO-Bukidnon in Bobby Timonera’s Mitsubishi Adventure.
Along the way, there were good and picture perfect sights, an early lunch, fresh air and fruits, lively chats, and good music.
But there were also spoilers like a heavy rain in Malaybalay, more expensive unleaded gas in Maramag, a busted tire in Damulog, Bukidnon, chargers left at home, and endless detours over long and winding routes.
But we made it here. We all made it here.
Yes, Mindanao bloggers can make it.
Thank you and once again good morning!
The Human Cost of Economic Meltdown and Its Alternatives
Posted:
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
by Dada Maheshvarananda
The New York Times editorial calls this "the scariest economic free fall the world has seen since 1929," referring to the Great Depression that caused great suffering to millions. The sentiment is echoed by hundreds of leading economists, bankers and traders whose opinions are quoted daily, as they struggle to explain the economic fallout to the general public. Yet no one is able to confidently predict our economic future.
The US government first bailed out and then, following the lead set by Britain, France, Italy and Spain, began taking over some of the largest financial institutions. How many billions and trillions do they have? Of course the answer is that they already have more than 10 trillion dollars in national debt!
The Human Costs
The human costs of this economic meltdown are only beginning to be felt. More than a million citizens have lost their homes in the past two years, and a million more are expected to lose their homes in the coming12 months. Yet the United States government continues to pay more of the mortgage costs of rich homeowners, through larger tax deductions, than of poorer homeowners.
United States citizens have lost two trillion dollars in retirement funds, representing about 20 percent of their value since last year, reducing the income of everyone and forcing many older working citizens to continue working even into their late sixties. Countless small investors are losing their savings.
The frozen credit market, which is much more serious than the severe stock market declines, will cause companies around the world, unable to borrow, to layoff workers and unemployment will rise.
The Russian stock market fell by about two-thirds since May. Thus, the global financial crisis has wiped out roughly a trillion dollars in wealth across the country.
The country of Iceland itself is failing. Prime Minister Geir Haarde warned of the threat of "national bankruptcy." The government seized its three largest banks to prevent their failure, and the currency had already lost half its value before its trade was halted. The country is desperately seeking an emergency loan from Russia or from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). However accepting the IMF harsh structural adjustment policies to restore fiscal and monetary stability will hurt everyone, an extraordinary reversal for the island's economy, which has been quite affluent for the last decade.
Consumerism and Greed
Greed is the excessive and selfish pursuit of wealth or other material things, without concern whether one's actions deprive others of necessities. Rather than controlling this instinct, unregulated capitalism encourages it. Some proponents of free market capitalism even go so far as to argue that greed should be considered a positive trait because the race to maximize profits propels the global economy. As the character Gordon Gekko in the film Wall Street said, "Greed... is good!"
The meltdown has been caused in large part by corporations that spend hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising campaigns to make debt sound desirable and risk-free. Their sophisticated ad campaigns and direct mail programs are aimed at every age group, from young teenagers to the elderly. The largest credit card company launched a campaign "Life Takes Visa," MasterCard did "Priceless" and Citibank taught "Live Richly." The insidious goal of each of these campaigns was to eliminate negative feelings about going into debt. The creative director of MasterCard's campaign, Jonathan B. Cranin, explained, "One of the tricks in the credit card business is that people have an inherent guilt with spending. What you want is to have people feel good about their purchases."
It gets nastier, because lenders prey on people who urgently need loans to pay for health care and other necessities. To squeeze more profit from borrowers, US credit card companies have increased interest rates from 17.7 percent in 2005 to 19.1 percent last year, a difference that gives them billions of dollars in extra profits. Average late fees rose from less than $13 in 1994 to $35 in 2007, and fees charged when customers exceed their credit limits more than doubled to from $11 to $26 a month.
The lucrative lending practices of these merchants of debt have led millions of North Americans — young and old, rich and poor — to the brink. However in 2005 the bankruptcy laws were changed. This legislation, proposed by President Bush and driven through Congress by financial services firms, makes it much harder for consumers with modest incomes to escape from under their debt by filing for bankruptcy. The new laws encouraged more reckless lending on the part of lenders, because they could more easily force poor borrowers to repay.
Practices such as these that produced record profits for many banks have shaken the world's financial system to its foundation. As a growing number of people default on payments, banks are recording hundreds of billions in losses, devastating their shareholders. As each bank is realizing that it is holding many bad debts, an increasing distrust is taking place between the institutions, afraid of how many bad debts the other banks are holding.
Global economy vs. Local economy
The solution to the global economic meltdown should be the formation of local economies. The first crucial step of any humane economy is to provide the basic necessities of life to all: food and pure water, clothing, housing, education and medical care. Human beings require these in order to realize their individual potentialities, to develop culturally, to achieve inner fulfillment and self-realization, which many now consider as higher goals of life. What a wonderful world it will be when no one on the planet will have to worry about getting enough money to buy the food, clothes, housing, education and medical care needed for his or her family!
Second, the current centralized economies should be decentralized into economically self-reliant regions. The regions would be defined by geographic conditions, and by the inhabitants' cultural legacy, language, economic problems and interests. These bioregions would decide their economic future from below, with planning emerging from the communities and supported by central government policies.
Third, each economic region should also be divided into smaller "blocks" or counties, which would provide the basic level of grassroots economic planning. The area of a county is small enough for the planners to understand all the problems of the area; local leaders would be able to solve the problems according to local priorities; planning would be more practical and effective and give quick, positive results.
Fourth, breaking the dependence on petroleum by rejuvenating local agriculture and achieving self-reliance in food, medicines and energy. The importance of rural employment and an adequate standard of living to reduce internal and external migrations is also important.
Each of these solutions is part of the Progressive Utilization Theory or PROUT, which proposes a dynamic economy of the people, by the people and for the people. Rejecting profit making as the goal of the economy, PROUT bases its economic policy on consumption; that is, on meeting the actual needs of people. PROUT proposes a three-tiered economic system to realize this.
To preserve the creative, innovative spirit of capitalism, but to avoid the destructive, exploiting impact of capital which disregards social costs and environmental degradation, private enterprises should be of small-scale.
The second tier of the PROUT economy is formed by cooperatives. This guarantees economic democracy, a decrease in alienation and a more just distribution of wealth. The goal of cooperatives is not profit at any cost, but satisfying the real needs of the community and achieving everyone's well-being. Members participate in decision-making and determine their community's economic future.
The final tier is industries which have strategic importance and which are too big or too complex to be efficiently managed by a cooperative. For example energy, steel, telecommunications, airlines, etc., should be state-owned and managed by elected boards in the public interest at the national or state levels. These key industries should be run on a no profit, no loss basis, serving all the people of the country.
The Central Bank of each country is such a key industry. However all the other banks should be cooperative credit unions, loaning savings to local businesses, cooperatives and homeowners.
A local economy organized in this way would be human-based, resilient to global market fluctuations and inflation, and able to achieve full employment. Isn't this the type of economy we want?
**********
Dada Maheshvarananda is a yoga monk, activist and writer. He is author of After Capitalism: Prout's Vision for a New World with preface by Noam Chomsky, translated into 10 languages. He is director of the Prout Research Institute of Venezuela. See www.priven.org or write him at maheshvarananda@prout.org
The New York Times editorial calls this "the scariest economic free fall the world has seen since 1929," referring to the Great Depression that caused great suffering to millions. The sentiment is echoed by hundreds of leading economists, bankers and traders whose opinions are quoted daily, as they struggle to explain the economic fallout to the general public. Yet no one is able to confidently predict our economic future. The US government first bailed out and then, following the lead set by Britain, France, Italy and Spain, began taking over some of the largest financial institutions. How many billions and trillions do they have? Of course the answer is that they already have more than 10 trillion dollars in national debt!
The Human Costs
The human costs of this economic meltdown are only beginning to be felt. More than a million citizens have lost their homes in the past two years, and a million more are expected to lose their homes in the coming12 months. Yet the United States government continues to pay more of the mortgage costs of rich homeowners, through larger tax deductions, than of poorer homeowners.
United States citizens have lost two trillion dollars in retirement funds, representing about 20 percent of their value since last year, reducing the income of everyone and forcing many older working citizens to continue working even into their late sixties. Countless small investors are losing their savings.
The frozen credit market, which is much more serious than the severe stock market declines, will cause companies around the world, unable to borrow, to layoff workers and unemployment will rise.
The Russian stock market fell by about two-thirds since May. Thus, the global financial crisis has wiped out roughly a trillion dollars in wealth across the country.
The country of Iceland itself is failing. Prime Minister Geir Haarde warned of the threat of "national bankruptcy." The government seized its three largest banks to prevent their failure, and the currency had already lost half its value before its trade was halted. The country is desperately seeking an emergency loan from Russia or from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). However accepting the IMF harsh structural adjustment policies to restore fiscal and monetary stability will hurt everyone, an extraordinary reversal for the island's economy, which has been quite affluent for the last decade.
Consumerism and Greed
Greed is the excessive and selfish pursuit of wealth or other material things, without concern whether one's actions deprive others of necessities. Rather than controlling this instinct, unregulated capitalism encourages it. Some proponents of free market capitalism even go so far as to argue that greed should be considered a positive trait because the race to maximize profits propels the global economy. As the character Gordon Gekko in the film Wall Street said, "Greed... is good!"
The meltdown has been caused in large part by corporations that spend hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising campaigns to make debt sound desirable and risk-free. Their sophisticated ad campaigns and direct mail programs are aimed at every age group, from young teenagers to the elderly. The largest credit card company launched a campaign "Life Takes Visa," MasterCard did "Priceless" and Citibank taught "Live Richly." The insidious goal of each of these campaigns was to eliminate negative feelings about going into debt. The creative director of MasterCard's campaign, Jonathan B. Cranin, explained, "One of the tricks in the credit card business is that people have an inherent guilt with spending. What you want is to have people feel good about their purchases."
It gets nastier, because lenders prey on people who urgently need loans to pay for health care and other necessities. To squeeze more profit from borrowers, US credit card companies have increased interest rates from 17.7 percent in 2005 to 19.1 percent last year, a difference that gives them billions of dollars in extra profits. Average late fees rose from less than $13 in 1994 to $35 in 2007, and fees charged when customers exceed their credit limits more than doubled to from $11 to $26 a month.
The lucrative lending practices of these merchants of debt have led millions of North Americans — young and old, rich and poor — to the brink. However in 2005 the bankruptcy laws were changed. This legislation, proposed by President Bush and driven through Congress by financial services firms, makes it much harder for consumers with modest incomes to escape from under their debt by filing for bankruptcy. The new laws encouraged more reckless lending on the part of lenders, because they could more easily force poor borrowers to repay.
Practices such as these that produced record profits for many banks have shaken the world's financial system to its foundation. As a growing number of people default on payments, banks are recording hundreds of billions in losses, devastating their shareholders. As each bank is realizing that it is holding many bad debts, an increasing distrust is taking place between the institutions, afraid of how many bad debts the other banks are holding.
Global economy vs. Local economy
The solution to the global economic meltdown should be the formation of local economies. The first crucial step of any humane economy is to provide the basic necessities of life to all: food and pure water, clothing, housing, education and medical care. Human beings require these in order to realize their individual potentialities, to develop culturally, to achieve inner fulfillment and self-realization, which many now consider as higher goals of life. What a wonderful world it will be when no one on the planet will have to worry about getting enough money to buy the food, clothes, housing, education and medical care needed for his or her family!
Second, the current centralized economies should be decentralized into economically self-reliant regions. The regions would be defined by geographic conditions, and by the inhabitants' cultural legacy, language, economic problems and interests. These bioregions would decide their economic future from below, with planning emerging from the communities and supported by central government policies.
Third, each economic region should also be divided into smaller "blocks" or counties, which would provide the basic level of grassroots economic planning. The area of a county is small enough for the planners to understand all the problems of the area; local leaders would be able to solve the problems according to local priorities; planning would be more practical and effective and give quick, positive results.
Fourth, breaking the dependence on petroleum by rejuvenating local agriculture and achieving self-reliance in food, medicines and energy. The importance of rural employment and an adequate standard of living to reduce internal and external migrations is also important.
Each of these solutions is part of the Progressive Utilization Theory or PROUT, which proposes a dynamic economy of the people, by the people and for the people. Rejecting profit making as the goal of the economy, PROUT bases its economic policy on consumption; that is, on meeting the actual needs of people. PROUT proposes a three-tiered economic system to realize this.
To preserve the creative, innovative spirit of capitalism, but to avoid the destructive, exploiting impact of capital which disregards social costs and environmental degradation, private enterprises should be of small-scale.
The second tier of the PROUT economy is formed by cooperatives. This guarantees economic democracy, a decrease in alienation and a more just distribution of wealth. The goal of cooperatives is not profit at any cost, but satisfying the real needs of the community and achieving everyone's well-being. Members participate in decision-making and determine their community's economic future.
The final tier is industries which have strategic importance and which are too big or too complex to be efficiently managed by a cooperative. For example energy, steel, telecommunications, airlines, etc., should be state-owned and managed by elected boards in the public interest at the national or state levels. These key industries should be run on a no profit, no loss basis, serving all the people of the country.
The Central Bank of each country is such a key industry. However all the other banks should be cooperative credit unions, loaning savings to local businesses, cooperatives and homeowners.
A local economy organized in this way would be human-based, resilient to global market fluctuations and inflation, and able to achieve full employment. Isn't this the type of economy we want?
**********
Dada Maheshvarananda is a yoga monk, activist and writer. He is author of After Capitalism: Prout's Vision for a New World with preface by Noam Chomsky, translated into 10 languages. He is director of the Prout Research Institute of Venezuela. See www.priven.org or write him at maheshvarananda@prout.org
2nd MBS: Initiatives for Social Media Cultural Dialogue
Posted:
Wednesday, October 01, 2008
Who are we to define this Mindanawon Consciousness?
In this process, we could be haunted by doubt. Who are we to define Mindanawon consciousness? Isn't this an exercise of power and domination? In reality, that is not what we want to do. We want to look forward a way of speaking about Mindanao, a set of social images that can give us some control on how Mindanao can nurture multicultural understanding, peace, development, and a sense of meaning and identity. We want to generate new collective energies.
Objectives of the Summit
- To strengthen the unity among bloggers in their drive to accentuate the untapped potentialities of Mindanao,
- To encourage bloggers to become more enthusiastic about the Mindanao consciousness,
- To utilize maximum potential of new social media, and
- To foster the entrepreneurial spirit of Mindanawans through blogging.
The Panel Discussion Resource Speakers
| Looking South: An Outsider Pundits about Mindanao Politics, History and Commentary |  http://www.quezon.ph |
| Voices from Mindanao Heartroots: Notes on Life & Living in the Communitiests: |  http://istambay.wordpress.com |
| “Mindanawon Consciousness” |  http://www.writingedge.co.cc |
| Tips and New Media for Mindanao Bloggers |  http://www.aileenapolo.com |
| Blogging the Entrepreneurial Way of Life |  http://www.riajose.com |
| Images of Mindanao from the perspective of a Mindanaoan |  |