rick fantasia, cultures of solidarity (1988)

- - - -

[1] ambiguity: the importance of the instances of 'cultures of solidarity' being chronicled, in the book.

(A) on the one hand, Fantasia is right to refute the argument that all Americans are entirely self-interested, and have no stake in the labour movement/unions. there isn't a lack of 'traditions of solidarity', i think we can agree with him--'solidarity' is very clearly prevalent in d-to-day existence, as practice, even in a weak labour movement (pg. 14)

all this is fine. together with the argument against survey/one-dimensional measurement of class consciousness (pg. 5, 6), that is the book's principal aim, and he carries it off well enough.

but let's be clearer than he is, also, that there are serious problems with setting this low a bar. because there is something very rotten about the American labour movement, when--instead of comparing it to (a) totally self-interested workers, you compare it to (b) other labour movements; (c) itself in the 30s (pg. 4); (d) where we would like it to be

he's alive to this, in the conclusion, and he says some general things in this regard. but it's not central to his case studies. the narrative, there, is always developed against the silly position that american workers are always selfish--he finds moments of solidarity and we're supposed to rejoice/say eureka--rather than in light of the conviction that there's something seriously wrong.

[(B) he pooh-poohs 'trade-union consciounsess'/class consciousness distinction, but it's not clear why. there is a real reason to be very critical of simply trade-union consciousness. he himself notes the limits of that understanding, in the course of his book]

[2] what this leads to is the more important, central problem with the book--the narratives he's giving us have nothing to offer, really, in the way of analytical or explanatory insight. the question that he's trying to answer is just not clear, at all; there's no real argument.

his task, as he understands it, is to look at how collective solidarity emerges--as 'praxis', rather than as a attitude/belief-system, what have you. that's fine, but it doesn't go very far at all. and it becomes quite tedious/unenlightening to read.

we really want, I would suggest, is some account of why movements emerge when and how they do. to the extent that he gives us an answer to this in his case studies, it's a very weak one--we get a story about individual triggers/contingency (pp. 234-235--'collective action was 'complex set of interactions...'; pg. 99--'spatial positioning' of workers re: foreman.) (there's also the argument that collective action begets more solidarity--but it would be difficult to make this into a coherent argument about larger shifts in the strength of labour. you just push the question back)

it may be that, partly, the things he's trying to explain are so insignificant/'small' (tens of workers on a wildcat for a few hours!?) that 'contingent'/trigger explanations are in fact sufficient, for them.

but then of course in that case we can't extrapolate, scale up, which is fatal. (unless we somehow believe that more significant waves of labour unrest are also 'contingent',) we can't really say anything about what we're really interested in-- emergence of social movements, etc.

it's also, however, a function of the fact that he just doesn't ask the question.

for that, I think you'll have to take seriously things that he, to his credit, hints at in his book (pg. 119, plant leaving--. there's a structural context for many of the things that triggered what he's noting in the book, in the 70s, when firms across the country were faced with profitability pressures, etc, and so resorted to strategies for ramping up productivity that provoked the kind of backlash we see bits and pieces of, here (pg. 123-124--mechanization, de-skilling at hospital). there's a whole book making this argument, of course. this is the direction we ought to be heading.

[3] the other 'big' question that this book raises, which I already mentioned, is the question of the 'exceptional' weakness of the American labour movement. to the extent that he's committed to an explanation, it's institutional (pg. 227--'structures of industrial relations' vs. Italy)--'Taft-Hartley' is responsible for the exceptional weakness of the American labour movement.

there's certainly something to this, but I would have liked much more, here. he's stressing the institutional facts partly because of his larger argument that 'cultures of solidarity' develop in context, and the context is 'business unionism'.

but the larger argument, if we step back from his aims, is a bit too path-dependent. as he himself notes in his conclusion, there are reasons to doubt that labour only operates within the institutional constraints set by the time--the 30s were not like that. why is it that labour can't find the strength to ignore Taft-Hartley? surely other factors matter, as well. historical-structural factors; political-strategic factors. [balance of 'class forces' vs. his slight voluntarism pg. 167]

[4] attack on rationality is misplaced -- 'feelings' are important, but 'feelings' are constructed on real ground; i.e., you won't be able to sustain optimism if the grounds for it don't exist.

[5] is micro-level assessment just off-limits? no, I don't think so--it's more the way he goes about trying to understand it. there are structural ways to do this, that would shed insight on larger cases.

globalization, social conflict, and economic growth, dani rodrik (1997)

(3, 5-6): in short-- LA vs. E. Asia is not an issue of State interventionism, ISI, what have you--it's a feature of how they deal with turbulence they confront, which is an issue of trade strategy/industrial policy. it's a question of how well you can adjust fiscal/monetary policy

(8): imp--adjustment will be easier where you have institutions of conflict management and smaller social cleavages.

(11): not whether you globalize, but how you globalize

-----

1. fiscal/monetary policy? not underlying competitiveness? export performance? again, this seems to be marred by the same assumptions as Sachs. it's plausible that devaluation will help, i guess, but it can't substitute for success in becoming internationally competitive, surely.

reviving the developmental state? myth of national bourgeoisie, vivek chibber

(227): three Marxist expectations for national bourgeoisie, which have been called into question

1. expand capitalist relations
2. abolish pre-capitalist relations (anti-feudal, etc.)
3. natural interest in opposing imperialism

(228): assumption that national bourgeoisie is natural force for development needs to be challenged

(230): n. bourgeoisie has been an obstacle to State capacity, which is what was needed for successful development

(237): actual power of State in State-led development was weak

(238) twin problems

1. fiscal drain--slack taken up by public sector, subsidies to inefficient private sector, etc.
2. external account drain--import of capital goods, failure of export-promotion programs (due to resistance from firms)

(241): key point--late-late development was very different form late development, in the role that the State would have to play (more than subsidization/protection, due to comparative severity of backwardness). this is one reason Marxists had trouble understanding.

(242): second reason: Theory of the State issue, as well--instrumentalists understood State entirely in service of capitalist class. but if you allow some independence, it becomes easier to understand the conflict between capitalists and the State. [hmm]

(244): remember, ISI was a massive transfer of resources to capitalists.

(244): co-option and repression lf labour--too often labour was complicit (you mean labour bureaucracy)

-----

1. small number of producers not sufficient to generate competition [same question as last week, which was well-answered: (1) don't want to waste resources; (2) mkt not big enough]

2. th. of the State point. really?

sunkel and griffith-jones, debt and development crisis in latin america

(31): US vs. Keynes at Bretton Woods -- ultimately former won out, which significantly reduced the scope of the international institutions that emerged

(32): 'conditionality' was part of US proposal

(33): ended up too small--only made a marginal contribution to funding of deficit countries

(34): ideally, would aid country w/ deficits

(35): Prebisch agreed that a transfer of financial resources to a country could help it, provided certain conditions were met

(36): imp--other agents stepped into the space not taken up by the IFIs. in 50s, foreign investors. in 60s, aid agencies. and in 70s, multinational banks.

(37): these flows in the 70s were themselves financed by massive influx of dollars into the US, of course

(37-38, see also 65): key--these private financial flows were very fickle, and always pro-cyclical -- dependent entirely on whether they saw a profit, or not (interest rates were also floating, which exacerbated the problems). this is in contrast, of course, to the way in which and reasons for which resources could have flown in, had the international system been better regulated/planned.

(39): convertibility to gold should have kept the holder of the reserve currency (i.e., the US) honest, since not maintaining a satisfactory payments position would cause a 'run on the dollar' (as it did during the Vietnam War--but then US got rid of the g. standard, of course)

(41): weakness of SDR--didn't become a substitute for gold and foreign exchange, but more of an afterthought

(42-43): with end of convertibility in 1970s, reserves skyrocketed.

(43): liquidity in 70s boomed. and, importantly, became a function of the market.

(45): Bretton Woods institutions, at their birth, reflected the dissatisfaction with laissez-faire after the G. Depression

(48): over post-war period, US foreign investment going more and more to 'developed countries', after being 50-50 after WWII

(49): in 60s, net transfer of 5.7 billion dollars out of LA

(50): Alliance for Progress as clear response to Cuban Revolution

(53,55): net flows during Alliance for Progress are in direction away from LA (private outflows exceed official inflows). despite this--in sum--it partly compensated these countries, in sharp contrast to the impact of private inflows in the 70s.

(58): after laissez-faire, there was protectionism at the periphery and at the center, remember

(61-62): financing to LA in 70s became much more private, multinational bank-centered, oligopolized. key--loans were taken to cover deficits, which were the result of the 'exhaustion of the ISI model', plus the jump in import prices.

(62): the petrodollars were recycled, not through a responsible international agency, but through these multinational banks

(62): IMF didn't help with this very much, at all. about 3.1 percent of CA deficit covered by them.

(65): critical--these private inflows were a colossal waste of resources, since they came in and were spent without a plan. a great increase in luxury consumption, armaments, and flight of capital.

(66-67): interesting story about the transition to less State intervention, in which all major actors seem involved [but the story is underdeveloped]

(71, 73): growth of Euro-currency market, from which Mexico and Brazil borrowed especially (but this is more than petro-dollar recycling, we're being reminded--the mkt starts in the mid-1960s). 50% of loans made, in late 1970s, were made to developing countries.

(73-75): imp--growth in lending driven, principally, by competition between multinational banks; not as much by changes in countries themselves (notes a few: expanded public investment, stagnation in official development assistance, loans w/ few strings viz-a-viz official assistance). borrower bore more risk, though

(77): by late-70s, burden is enormous (table)

(78): variable interest rates hurt LDCs severely--eventually, most borrowing was going toward paying off old debt

----------

1. causal story re: increase in 70s liquidity. ending of covertibility?

2. supporting agriculture at the center, after WWII? why, whom? (p. 58)

3. better developing the story told on pp. 66-67, about the transition to neoliberalism. surely there were major actors opposed, as well? (this relates to the 'discrediting' point, in Vivek--this can be an excuse that facilitates transition, but there have to be concrete interests behind the transition, as well)

4. birth of Euro-Dollar mkt in response to loopholes in regulations? larger shifts in economy? what's the best story, here? (not petro-dollars, I think that's quite right)

jeffrey sachs, external debt and macroeconomic performance in LA (1985)

(525): difficulties in LA not a function of size of shocks, borrowting, extent of gov't involvement--but function of exchange rate management and trade regime (failure to devalue, turn to exports)

(532): not external shock

(534): rather, debt-export ratio is central -- debt accumulation in LA was over and above current account deficits. capital flight exacerbated this problem.

(534): not taxes, not budget deficit

(548): in sum--debt was burdensome in LA because of its structure (short maturities, variable interest rate), which had to do with it coming mostly from private commercial banks, as well as insufficient exports available to service it

(550, 555): bizarre argument that E. Asian economies were outward-oriented because of the strength of their rural sector

(554): using an overvalued exchange rate, rather than an export tax, b/c ignorant?

(559): urban-industrial exporters align behind an undervalued exchange rate

(561): key--assumption here is that devaluation will make you competitive, which is not insignificantly silly.

(567): Williamson raises problem of rural-->liberalization argument

-------

1. central problem in Sachs' argument is that devaluation will lead to export competitiveness. classic free trade garbage.

2. auxiliary problem is the idea that the power of the rural sector (very poorly measured, but that's beside the point) is the explanation for why export-led growth is pursued. this can't explain ISI in SK in 50s, and then rapid switch.

3. clarify causal story behind capital flight. function of what, exactly? (social structure, policy failures, both?

vivek chibber, locked in place (2003) chapter 1: introduction

(4): india's failure as a relative failure

(6-7): e. asian example teaches us that this is not so much about state intervention, but about the quality of state intervention. specifically, in two dimensions:

1. state's cohesiveness as a strategic actor
   
2. state's ability to extract performance from private firms

(9): critical--the question of the installation of this apparatus has been answered by referencing goings-on within the state. in contrast, bringing attentiont to the conflicts between the state and societal actors. two nested claims, here:

1. divergence in outcomes depended on the orientation of the business class -- state managers' agenda was frustrated by a well-organized offensive launched by domestic capitalists
2. the mechanism that caused a different reaction in India and Korea was the former's adoption of ISI, and the latter's adoption of ELI. they generated different political incentive structures.

chapter 2

(13) state intervention in the latter half of the twentieth century has been more extensive and invasive than earlier 'late development.' the hallmark is the appearance of 'development planning'.

(16-17): these demands on the state (state capacity) require institutional structures that can do two things:

1. coordinate amongst firms--guarantee inputs and coordinated investment projects
2. compel/discipline capital

(19-23): this, in turn, requires three things

1. rational bureaucracy
2. nodal agencies
3. embededness

(29-44): four theses

1. state building in India imperiled by capitalist offensive; not the case in Korea
   
2. ISI vs. ELI
3. Korea was able to switch to ELI because of unique historical conditions; this was not possible in India, ELI would not have helped appease capitalists
4. full explanation for failure in India would have to incorporate INC demobilization of the labour, which reduced State's autonomy from Capital

(52): coup of 1961, SK -- crucial

(53): not b/c of State power, but b/c of capitalist enthusiasm [this is why point about authoritarianism is misplaced]

(56): Rhee (1948-1961), pursued 'bad' ISI in 50s

(58): crux--critical factor allowing for policy change in SK was emerging alliance between K. and J. capital

(60): EPB as 'nodal agency'

(61): 1964-1965 -- the 'pact' around the export-led strategy

(62-65): control over finance/credit --> State autonomy? [no, Vivek is saying-- this doesn't render state managers indifferent to capitalists' reaction to their policies]

(66): summary page--development of dev. State in SK

(68): b. confidence went down with the coup

(69): 1961-1963 failure in SK

(71): difference between export-led and export-promotion (most countries did latter; SK was unique in pursuing former)

(72): in early 60s, Korean firms not so hot

(72): but firms will still be amenable, where a reasonable chance of success in markets, exists

(73-74): Japanese help was crucial, in SK--and it began before '64-'65

(77): FDI important or not? not a lot of the investment, but central to success in key sectors

(78): in short--the Japanese relationship [seems to suggest that Japanese supplied the credit; what does this mean in terms of importance of State monopoly of credit?]

(79-80): wrt Japanese capital, state support was critical (1) ensuring partnerships; (2) guaranteeing credit, etc. [but why not just allow State control over Japanese? why allow State control over themselves? isn't there a prisoner's dilemma, here? you might even want State to control others, but why your own firm? but maybe 'chaebols' obviate this]

(82): key--ELI causally prior to dev. state

(83): w/o this ELI analysis, you have a 'bootstraps' model

(86): three theses, re: India

1. release of Bombay Plan not motivated by desire to launch developmental State. instead, response to Quit India agitation of '42-'43, which industrialists perceived as threat. trying to preempt socialist planning, calling for capitalist planning
   
2. capitalists were quite opposed to idea of giving State any measure of power to control investment ('39 coordination fell apart', reception of BPlan, etc.). after 1945 very clear.
3. opposition to State power over private capital was generated by structural factors--partly due to flight of British capital, but mainly result of State ISI strategy

(92): Q. India went out of INC's hands

(110): by demobilizing labour, Congress was eroding its capacity to impose discipline

(113): Gandhi--singular capacity to mobilize the masses (especially rural) earned the respect of the Left; staunch defense of property earned the trust of the Right

(125): imp--question, here, of what allowed them to split the labour movement so easily. is it as simple as saying that they had political hegemony?

(128): argument re: business offensive in India

1. state managers needed to both (a) win support of capitalists; (b) impose discipline on capitalists.
   
2. but (b) was not tolerable to capitalists, and (a) made it very rational for them to resist (b) (they liked ISI largesse, which made it easy for them to make profits without ramping up productivity)
   
3. capitalist class was handicapped because self-regulation was discredited; and also 'planning' of the largesse kind was favored
4. as a result, industrial planning policy was passed--but severely compromised by State's concern to appease capitalists. PC basically became an advisory body
   

(142): political lobbying and investment strike, when things didn't seem to be going their way

(144): Nehru was concerned, but couldn't do anything: (1) departure of Left and (2) ascension of V.B. Patel left him powerless

(146): PC was neutered, as a result

(148): the State as 'doting nanny'

(163): importance of 'the nodal agency' -- need to discipline political elites, as well

(169, 172): structure of Korean business important in facilitating corporatist arrangements? made embeddedness/discipline easier? but then should have been easier in India, Vivek notes

(175): regulation in Korea vs. self-regulation in India

(182): in sum, planners weren't given institutional power

(195): why didn't reform occur?

1. not because of ideological biases--ideological argument can't explain why planners didn't pursue 'better' State intervention.
2. not because they were corrupt--in Japan and SK, corruption was compatible with effective State intervention

(196): Crisis of 1957 triggered re-think--onset of foreign-exchange crisis, exports would have to be increased.

(200-206): but trying to turn firms towards export markets, following Korea's example, in 1958-1959--floundered for three basic reasons.

1. preference for the domestic market--firms are comfortable making easy profits insulated from competition. why change? [so why change in SK, after 50s? because of historic opportunity given to them by Japanese]
2. but MNC's in India didn't play the Japanese role--corporations in India exported very little, unlike the Japanese, who had set up to export
3. b/c of this, only State export promotion schemes were left--and these didn't work, for reasons already detailed. structure of policy apparatus wasn't coherent, and firms remained committed to domestic market.
   

(207): imp--the fact that reform was understood as 'less State intervention' rather than 'better State intervention' was a function of the 'balance of forces' [Vivek adds that this was generated by the planning process itself, though I'm unclear what this means, exactly? why did the failure of the planning process produce a more powerful capitalist class? isn't it the case that we had this already--absent a labour upsurge or like increase in State autonomy, this was the destined trajectory]

(209): imp-- bureaucracy reaction to crisis is to ignore plan directives even more, allow foreign capital partnerships to aid import of machinery (this just favored luxury consumption, etc.)

(210): PC was incapacitated by its lack of clout--but it also was implicated in debacle, which made it a prime target for attack

(214): PC duly marginalized under Shastri and Gandhi--power shifted to the ministries

(212, 214): 1964 Nehru dies. 1964-1966 Lal Bahadur Shastri. 1966-1984, w/ exception of 1977-1979, Indira Gandhi. over this period, PC loses all its power.

(217): push towards 'ministerial autonomy' [how do you think of this, structurally? what is the place of the story of 'purely political' conflict?]

(218): US aid for liberalization

(227): planning possible when domestic capital resists, if you have the power, which you can have if (a) bourgeoisie is too weak; (b) labour is strong as counterweight; (c) exceptional circumstances [what would this look like? we're certainly not talking about benign State-capital cooperation anymore]

(228): Taiwan example of (a) [but Pakistan? something else has to be going on]

(228): Postwar France an example of (b)

(229): postwar Japan an example of (c)

(233-236): lots of countries tried ELI in 60s and 70s, but failed. this, largely, was b/c of pre-existing ISI and b/c lack of 'cohesive' State [but former the case in Korea, too, and it doesn't matter; and latter, if important, needs explanation--in acct explained by ELI, no? Vivek focusing, then, rightly, on the inability to reduce 'entry costs'--Korea had this b/c of Japan, but others didn't, obviously]. other possibility was their 'socialization by the State', but this is precluded because of the balance of class forces--of course, there you need a solid State structure.

(239): underdevelopment precluded ELI for most countries

(240): a postwar France, in India?






----

[1] is there an ISI that could anchor development, given suitable State discipline?

[2] authoritarianism important for overcoming resistance of political elites?

[3] question of m-term/l-term rationality, re: accepting discipline? not so much, I think -- they need coordination of investment, etc. so they accept it, on s-term grounds. but worth asking

[4] technological assistance vs. discipline?

[5] Indian capitalists' position as the 'default'

doug mcadam, political process and black insurgency

(1-3): four objectives

1. evaluate social movement theory--develop political process model
2. explore power in america--rebellion as politics by other means
3. analyze balck protest movement
4. show that 1930-1954 was critical to the civil rights movement--it didn't just erupt with Montgomery in 55-56, or 1954 Supreme Court decision

(6-9): classical model operates with pluralist premise. three versions

1. mass society--people who aren't integrated show extreme behavior
2. status inconsistency
3. collective behavior--disruption of normative order produces social movements (Smelser)

(10): s. movement as 'therapy'

(11-19): three weaknesses of classical model

1. no one-to-one correspondance between strain and social movement. protests are rare, strain is common. no political context.
2. individual discontent as driver--but often actors are better integrated. moreover, the theorists never empirically demonstrate this. also individualist, while movements are collective.
3. social movements as psychological problem. but movements are rational, not irratioanl--we need to take substantive demands seriously

(21): two key tenets of resource mobilization

1. strain is insufficient to produce s. movement
2. amount of social resources is what produces movement (resources always come from without, though)

(22-23): good things about r. mobilization (rationality, take movements seriously, imp. of resources)

(24, 29): central weaknesses are that, while this might explain well some movements (elite-led), but there are others (mass-based) that it can't explain, because it has no sense of 'structural power' ('negative inducements' -- pg. 30, indigenous organizational networks -- pg. 31)

(32): definition of resources is also weak

(33): no distinction between objective grievances, and their subjective recognition

(37): nice--political process depends on Marxist, rather than 'elite' view of power--where disparities are recognized, but it's also recognized that the disempowered have their own sources of power

(40): three factors to political process model

1. structure of political opportunities--as existing power relations change (gradually, rather than abruptly) [question, here, of whether this can be precise enough to have predictive powers--'finite list impossible to compile!']
2. indigenous organizational strength--resources of minority comunity allow exploitation of opportunity (members, leaders, communication networks, etc.)
3. cognitive liberation--people have to recognize themselves as capable of acting, empowered [this is the most hand-wavy--because even while it definitely gets at something, there's no way to (a) predict, for sure; (b) explain, even, because of the difficulty of operationalizing it. is the best we can say that this is facilitated by 'organization', as he admits (pg. 51)? but even then we only explain a little (e.g., Egypt)]

(46): int--solidarity incentives, vs. Olson [quite unsatisfying, though--very brief, hand-wavy]

(50): hmm--cognitive liberation doesn't depend on observation/empirical evidence [too strong? this implies something other than rationality, when i'm not sure we need to]

(53): study of movement development calls in a fourth variable--the response of other groups to insurgent challenge

(54): vs. Piven and Cloward, argue that sustaining an organizational structure can, absolutely, sustain a movement--the decline is not inevitable. there are these threats, of course, which they are right to note, wrong to finger as inevitable

1. oligarchization
2. co-optation
3. dissolution of indigenous support

(56): two factors shape response of others to insurgency

1. the strength of insurgent forces (heightens cost of repression)
2. the goals and tactics of the insurgent forces (more radical, more likely to trigger repressive response)

(65): political process suggests long historical time frame; other frameworks see social movements as a stimulus-response problem

(67): n. industrialists willing to abandon South because of threats to their profits; this explains end of Reconstruction

(69): disenfranchisement

(69): 90% of blacks in Sotuh in 1900

(69-70): Republican rapproachment w/ establishment--black political influence at very low ebb, 1896-1928

(71): correspondingly, Federal action against blacks

(73): in short--federal government transformed into force buttressing southern racial status quo, post-Reconstruction

(72): nadir after 1891

(72): Woodrow Wilson, anti-black legislation--the 'great progressive'!!

(73): the collapse of cotton, then, becomes the underlying structural factor

(74): labour shortage in North, after WWI, breaking the compact

(75): Depression, impact

(75): mechanization, impact

(77): four reasons black political prospects improved

1. n. demand for black labour, collapse of cotton, undermined economic basis of S-N alliance
2. oppressive social controls declined as cotton economy dissolved
3. massive rural-to urban migration, within South, gave blacks organizational context
4. massive migration, to North, gave blacks serious political leverage (deciding presidential elections, etc.)

(81): especially 1940-1960

(81): turn to Dems in early 30s

(82): creating shift in attitude of N. Elite, as a result

(83): the international context was a factor, as well

(84): by early 1930s, S. Court decisions turning

(84): executive, by 1941

(86): in short--1931-1954 period is very important, laying the foundation

(88): in rural South social control, via debt bondage, violence and physical force.

(90-91): S. Black Church was conservative, at this time

(92): B. Colleges basically non-existent

(93): NAACP ineffectual, in South

(98): in sum, the transitions were laying foundations for transformations of these institutions, as well

1. Church (98)
2. Black Colleges (100)
3. NAACP (103)

(106-112): collective perception, 1876-1930 vs. 1931-1954 [here problems surface, of course--alludes to the idea that modern survey techniques would help. but how? uncertain results. and then, moreover, don't we also want some idea of what explains the change in collective attribution--is it just a function of the first two, or something more?]

(118): three classical models, for black insurgency--none have empirical support (or, all do, which is precisely the problem!)

1. absolute gains
2. relative deprivation
3. J curve, rise and drop

(120-125): resource mobilization doesn't help, either--can't make sense of the centrality of indigenous resources to the movement

(134): 1956, D-Action Dampaigns

(134): 1960, Sit-ins

(135): activists of independent means were important

(138): SCLC founded 1957

(142): two responses

1. s. white supremacists
2. federal government (movement used them astutely, against the first, to further the insurgency in the early 60s) [anything to be said at a higher level of abstraction? b/c this is certainly made possible by the nature of the things being demanded--the State is not always going to "take pity" on you, even in the limited ways being detailed here--see p. 174]

(147): imp--need to 'develop' resources, for continued success-(1) formal organizations became more central to actions, 1960-1965

(148): but, vs. r. mobilization perspective, this external involvement was reactive

(154): competition amongst f. organizations aided movement

(158): b. vote even more precious, 1960 election

(159): gaining support in the white population

(160): in sum--(2) external political pressures were favorable, 1960-1965

(161-163): in sum--(3) pronounced sense of optimism, in this period [again, same issues here]

(164-166): 'genuis' of the movement was tactical. its tactics were more of a threat than its goals

(174): imp--triangulation of f. government and w. supremacists ('conscious provocation')

----

[1] question of typology of s. movements

[2] objective/subjective problem -- how to explain, much less predict, what moves people to recognize their grievances?

[3] imp. of this being the civil rights movement--the 'easy consensus' around r. integration. does it matter that other groups would look different?

power and powerlessness, john gaventa (1980)

(vii): power works to develop and maintain powerlessness.

(4): quiescence appears as a function of the power relationship itself (rebellion, then, presupposes some change in this power relationship--some 'crack') [can we falsify this? how do you assess power, independent of the fact of quiescence? it is certainly possible, but we need to be clear]

(5-8): within first dimension -- quiescence is a sign of consent; power irrelevant to explaining consent

(8- 11): within second dimension -- power affects grievances by narrowing/limiting the field of options (it doesn't shape grievances, like the third dimension, but organizes them out)

(11-13, 17): within third dimension -- power actually shapes grievances [as will be clarified later, this is still understood as a rational reaction to the field of power that shapes the terrain on which people formulate grievances/ideology ('history of defeat'--pp. 16-17). people do not hold these beliefs irrationally, in other words--though it might be true that they are not being 'superrational' (e.g. power may be weakening, but they don't know it)]

(19): 'split consciousness'

(22): different forms of power build on each other (accumulate)

(23): power maintained by inaction -- rebellion made possible by shifts in power [here he proposes either a loss in power of A or gain in power of B -- but surely this is a zero-sum game, they must mean the same thing]

(25): the power of a single victory

(29): against 'false consciousness', b/c it's analytically confusing [a bit unnecessary, I think]

(37-39): imp--noting high levels of labour militancy, relatively high levels of unionization. somewhat less in C. Appalachia, where we're concentrating, b/c of company unions. 'conflict consciousness,' not class consciousness. [this does raise the question of the explanandum--later chapter shows that what he wants to explain is real, but the whole idea of quiescence might still be a bit stylized. it's less of a puzzle than it needs to be--people are not always revolutionary/class-conscious because they've suffered defeat after defeat at the hands of the much more powerful]

(40): dominant explanation is a cultural one

(80-83): rough sum-- early encounters with absentee monopoly power shaped the field of power, producing powerlessness/legitimation, etc.

(86-87, 89, 94): v. imp--not the nature of work that explains quiescence--has to do more with company control of these communities (over homes, shops, workplace, etc.). no possibility of exit from the labour market, even if they wanted to escape. much more company control in Appalachia than in Illinois/Indiana [most lived in company housing vs. 1/10th, etc.]

(90-91): explaining that miners favoured short-term interests over long-term ones [but this is not at all irrational, let's be clear! we're not talking about delusion, at all]

(92): imp--q. of the appeal of fundamentalist religion--an 'adaptive response' to the exploitative situation [fair enough. using it to make sense of their misery. but the implication of his presentation, which he has to stick to, is that it's not a change in 'conceptions' that would matter, but a change in the field of power]

(99, 108, 120, 140, 141, 145, 164): again, v. important, rationality--quiescence/lack of enthusiasm for the union seems a perfectly sensible response to betrayal by the union. UMWA backed down in 1931; Lewis backed Turnblazer in 1933. other pages speak to quiescence as a rational reaction to a situation in which the costs of challenging the powerful are ominous [and then D-III is nothing more than a rationalization of this predicament]. politics take place in the field of power controlled by local elites.

(105): repression is critical, but not enough [perhaps, but the repression you've documented is quite awesome in scope]

(105): also the gate-keeping of information [yes--but D-II or D-III, this?]

(112, 223): here question of the evidence he uses to prove his claims re: quiescence/militancy

(115): re: Communists and ideology, arguing that their was an 'underlying ideological' effect of the differences over God, which was still a consequence of the 'prior role of power' in shaping consciousness [seems plausible; difficult to refine without better knowledge of the case]

(119): 1933, John Lewis and Turnblazer's local fiefdom -- Lewis sides with Turnblazer (whose son, his successor, was convicted for conspiracy to murder Yablonski)

(126, 128): structural context of mechanization and 60s trough -- by 70s more coal, less workers

(129-131 ): a mix of values--individualism of mountaineer, collective life of worker [if culture is 'mixed', it's quite clear that it can't really explain anything. all possibilities are open]

(139): statistics re: taxation

(141): exactly right--apathy as a result of the power processes of local politics.

(143): the Family

(145): costs of challenge are high for the powerless

(149-151, 154, 156-157, 159, 160-161): key--individuals' vulnerability to the company/powerful explains voting behaviour

(162, 252): also, emergence of challengers provokes counter-attack [this raises the Schwartz discussion--how do you deal with the challenges of escalation? can the powerless defeat the powerful? how and under what conditions?]

(165-166): Yablonski, and the puzzle of District 19 -- even in the 'open' election, only 19% voted for him (implication, he's suggesting, that D-II isn't enough) [but here the q. is how 'deep' does D-III go? as deep as influencing people to act in a certain way--but down to their deep convictions? who knows? how can we say? important?]

(168): v. good -- vs. Michels and the argument that oligarchy is a function of 'mass psychology'. Gaventa very correctly suggesting that 'mass psychology' is not timeless, but best understood as a function of 'powerlessness' and power

(170): pluralists are wrong -- by any measure, the union leadership had failed them. why quiescent?

(177): UMWA as business union in the 50s and 60s

(179-190): dimension II is the extraordinary apparatus of oligarchy -- mobilized its resources to defeat Yablonski. barriers put before insurgents.

(183): important--pensioners felt they had to cooperate [is this D-II or D-III? perfect place to raise the confusion.

(191-192): important--he wants to say that all 'barriers' were lifted by Dept of Labor intervention [really?], so we need D-III -- the participants and voters internalized their powerlessness, and collaborated. powerholders didn't need to actively 'exercise' power [is this rational on the part of the powerless, or not? seems definitely the case, see below]

(194-195): key--in short, internalized expectations seem to be the result of a rational weighing of accumulated evidence--so people were coming to this way of understanding the conflict on the basis of past experiences, and not just the present period of 'openness' [in this sense they're not superrational, because they're wrong--but they're still rational. this interpretation suggests that 'ideology' is an informational problem? like health care in 2009]

(200-201): important--he doesn't properly answer the principal question (why the MFD won in other places, but lost in District 19). his suggestion is that C. Appalachian environment is particularly responsible for this, developed in the last paragraph of the chapter [OK, but could have been made more central to the account]

(206): underlying fatalism is fear [a rational response to a terrifying situation]

(209): initial participation --> greater participation (builds confidence)

(217): in sum, study of CDC doesn't yield much. contradictory effects [he's reaching, here]

(218): dominant media misinforms

(223): one or two quotes don't prove that a people's attitude is changing!!!

(226): 'culture of silence' is broken [hmm. bad evidence, and b/c thin evidence, possibility of many other cases. doesn't speak well to the larger argument. he just hasn't found a positive case]

(235): the number of people mobilized to fight the AA ends up being quite small, actually

(246): imp--under conditions of weakness, the MNC becomes vulnerable [but again, the weakness of this speaks to his failure to find a positive case. when you've discussed the field of power in such depth, you can't say a hit to the MNC's reputation is sufficient to change the field of power. and that's, ultimately, what his conclusions demonstrate]

(252-254): main point--silence is never consensus, but a rational response to power.

(256): power and powerlessness are self-reinforcing [problem of radical structuralism. not a problem with the theory, but a problem of the world, in the main--but there is something more that needs accounting for. people do mobilize]

(257): alterations of power field need to be developed much more thoroughly

(258): no successful case in C. Appalachia, he admits [well then]

(261): odd implication--people can't challenge power, they need theorists and practitioners [hmm?]

----

[1] odd way of setting up power/powerless. the initial set-up makes them more powerful and powerless, respectively--well why not just start at time t1, instead of time t0?

[2] if their 'conceptions' are just an echo of the larger situtation, how much do they explain?

[3] evidence offered is better in the later chapters (voting patterns), but even there there's a tendency to use a quote or description to 'prove' (a) total quiescence, or (b) changes in attitude that are presumed to be widespread. very difficult to accept.

[4] for this to be social scientific, you should be able to anticipate a reaction, based on changes in field of power. but if your evidence for changes in field of power is thin (or worse, if it's circular--i.e., you observe changes in field of power when people start to mobilize), then you're in bad shape.

[5] how 'deep' does D-III go? voting behaviour not so deep. participation in a murder, maybe is evidence that something is up (but this is rare...)

[6] low standards for what constitutes change in the field of power

[7] the Schwartz problem. of course the powerless won't rise up and defeat the powerful. if you don't believe that, then you need to show how and under what conditions they might succeed. for that, you should probably have better successful cases than a BBC documentary!

[8] radical structuralism?

peter evans, predatory, developmental and other apparatuses (1989)

(561): main thesis--effiicacy of developmental state depends on meritocratic bureaucracy w/ strong identity AND a strong set of institutionalized links to private elites

(562): States are not homogeneous--thus, the effects of their intervention will not be homogenous

(564): neoutilitarian understanding of State actors is impoverished (that they are rent-seekers who will reward best bribers, not most efficient), even if it captures something real

(566): from within this perspective, it's very difficult to understand how any type of State business could happen.

(567, 573): Weber's picture is the mirror-image--State actors' path to personal advancement comes from good performance

(568): for Gersenkron, State has to be a surrogate entrepreneur; has to actively promote investment and offer 'disequalibriating' incentives (Hirschmann). all of this requries 'insulation', as well as intelligence, responsiveness, etc.

(570-571): Zaire as example of predatory State -- but not illustration of bureaucratization as problem. quite the opposite--lack of capacity to behave like a bureaucracy

(572): State acts as a surrogate for missing capital market, in Japan, and induced investments that transformed development path

(573): internal networks matter to coherence of bureaucracy in Japan

(573-574): external networks (links to business) matter tremendously in Japan (though they're not sufficient--State also needs 'autonomy')

(575): noting that these States emerged in a particular context: agrarian elites decimated, industrial groups disorganized, etc. [what's the importance of this, in the final analysis?]

(575): in sum, embedded autonomy

(576): there are problems generated by success, of course

(577): Brazil as intermediary case, where you see both Zaire and Japan [but can we specify what bureaucratic inefficiency is a result of? here the centrality of political appointments?]

(578-579): Brazilian state not embedded properly, b/c of landed oligarchy's resilience and active presence of transnational capital

(581): in sum, embedded autonomy seems to be a function of (1) internal organizational capacity [which is a function of what, exactly?] and (2) the surrounding social structure [how, exactly?]

weiss, transformative capacity in evolution: east asian developmental states

(42): active governments pursuing strategic intervention have been essential to E. Asian growth

(43): three questions

1. what about the State has made it effective?
2. how has this changed over time
3. is this capacity obsolete in current global context?

(45): main argument--it's not weak capital that explains State capacity, but almost opposite: strong, well-established capital complemented by a strong State (Government-industry linkages are critical). State capacity is best understood as effective co-operation

(46-47): summarizing Wade, E. Asian success was result of a strong State, which could:

1. heavy investment in high-growth competitive industry, which is different from what the mkt would have encouraged
2. deliberate outcome of strategic industrial policies
3. consistency in policy

(48): key--for Weiss, GI's key benefit is that it socializes risk, improving coordination: firms don't need to (1) raise capital; (2) develpo new products (3) find new markets; (4) train skilled engineers. this is better understood as 'coordination', rather than as an imposition.

(49): power through, not power over

(50-52): you need [to what extent to each of these have a post-hoc character? the first, especially?]

1. high-quality bureaucracy
2. intelligence gathering infrastructure
3. insulated pilot agencies which can sit back and coordinate policy

(57): consultation, not imposition

(58, 68): it almost becomes entirely a problem of 'information-sharing'/coordination. Weiss' point is that this also becomes increasingly the case, as you develop -- coordination becomes more importnat as technology becomes more complex [this threatens to underestimate the 'disciplining' aspect of what was stressed earlier--that investors actually want to invest elsewhere]

(58): chaebol is critical to facilitating cooperation

(62): imp--success is seen as a function of the form in which business and the State are organized [this, again, threatens to underestimate the importance of actually elucidating their interests in a specific context]

(64): GI requires a State that is both distant and close

(64-65): opposed to a 'negative sum' view of State strength

(67): States can't just be strong, they have to be 'catalytic'

(69): not submission, not domination

(73-79): four aspects of cooperation in E. Asian case

1. disciplined support--subsidies in exchange for performance
2. public risk absorption--require private sector, but they won't invest unless guarded against catastrophe
3. private sector governance -- getting them to self-govern (not a sign of State weakness, but of sagacity)
4. public-private innovation alliances -- coordinated approach to technological development

(79): this is a relationship that leads to win-win solutions [no clarity as to what the enabling conditions are, for this]

(82): as chaebols/business gets more powerful, this might become more difficult

alice amsden, third world industrialization: global fordism or a new model?

(6): amount of exports and dollar price were all 'highly politicized outcomes'

(7): they got prices 'deliberately wrong

(9): global Fordism cannot explain how or why mass production came to the Third World--and why it came to some places, and not others. so no explanation for divergence within the Third World

(9): there's also the fact that multinational investment has been a small part of total capital formation--which means the story of core capital driving Third World industrialization is dubious

(10): Amsden alludes to 'failure of dependency theory'--what does she mean? distinct from the failures of 'global fordism' nonsense?

(10): in short, three problems with g. Fordism

1. underconsumption is not the stumbling block, rather raising productivity and becoming internationally competitive: r. wage rate increase is greatest in history in SK (pg. 11)
2. far more political process than Fordism would suggest: it's not just State autonomy that matters, but also long-term commitments and specific State policies; support for business has to be greater than infant industry protection
3. Taylorist nuances don't really explain differences in 'management': they don't just export American Taylorism to factories in E. Asia

(14): you get intensive regimes (relative surplus value) and extensive regimes (absolute surplus value) being employed side-by-side, unlike regulation school predictions

(14): imp--lateness in E. Asia is qualitatively different, insofar as the competitive disadvantages are starker (absence of novel technology)

(15): invention (England) --> innovation (Germany, USA) --> learning (E. Asia)

(16): key--late industrialization is the era of the 'subsidy' -- but the subsidy which incentivizes exports, rewards performance. much stronger than IIP, again.

(17): the central coordination offered by chaebols might be very important

(18): good management is critical [OK -- but why would we ever expect anything else? it seems like good management can be assumed, insofar as the correct incentive structure is in place]

(18): imp--cheap labour is very important (as is the repression of that labour), but it is not itself sufficient to drive growth rates (all late developers have repressed labour)

(18): Korea much, much more educated than Germany or England at analogous times in development history

(20): foreign investment not significant

(20-21): labour-intensity was not sufficient to defeat Japan in the 60s--had to turn to productivity increases

(20): this is exactly how Japan beat Lancashire in the early 1900s--not with lower wages, but with greater efficiency

(21-22): imp--the 'subsidy' has to be the disciplining mechanism (not small firms--there are a couple of enormous chaebols, remember; nor technology, a la Schumpeter--since this is largely a question of learning, not innovation)

(22): there is pervasive corruption, but the key is that it doesn't come at the cost of competitiveness

(23): State's power over investment is critical (suggestion that this can be thought of as 'democratizing') [hmm...]

(24-25): imp-- nor is it the fact of performance standards that matters (this is true in all Third World states). it is the capacity to impose them on producers [here there is a just-so story about how Korea got this capacity; very unsatisfying]

(28): a compact management structure, leading to a relative decline in the number of white-collar workers (different from US)

(29): imp--very rapid wage growth, telescoping advance of the core countries into a couple of decades [question: if the domestic market wasn't the primary driver of growth, what did these workers buy?]

(30): serious gender divide

robert wade, east asia's economic success

(274): neoliberals think 'intervention' is responsible for E. Asian take-off only insofar as it was intervention to remedy the effects of previous intervention (so, 'less intervention')

(274): they assume technology away

(276): list of qualifications for S. Korean success -- pollution, repression, male-female wage gap, economic importance exaggerated vs. japan

(276-279): but four key indicators of success

1. gain in relative command over world resources (Korea and Taiwan reduced income gap with core in 80s)
2. trade perfomance
3. industrial transformation -- not as % of GDP, which can be misleading, but as ability to produce at world-competitive prices
4. removal of poverty--took about 100 hours to produce 100kg of wheat between 1400 and 1880, in Europe; in Korea/Taiwan this was about 150-200 hrs in 1950s, down to 40-60hrs in early 80s; in Indian village, 230 hours; in US at minimum wage about 15 hrs

(283): vs. notion that Third World was better off in the 'laissez-faire' world of 1900-1950

1. evidence that living standards fell in India; in Africa, no good evidence one way or the other
2. colonial governments were hardly laissez-faire
3. most economies grew successfully in dirigiste 50s and 60s
4. other factors explain poor performance in 2nd half, beyond gov't intervention

(285): four features of Korea, pace Amsden

1. State as entrepreneur, banker, shaper
2. distortion of price structures through subsidies, protection, price controls--different industrial structure than would otherwise have been generated
3. large, diversified business groups mean much economic activity is not on the market, but intrafirm
4. State disciplines firms with subsidies, rewards firms that do well on the export market

(286): late industrialization: handicaps experienced by market-based economies when there are technologically advanced firms on the market

(287): Amsden's central point is that investment needs to be directed to areas where there is low profitability and lots of work to be done. private firms will avoid this, unless the State can step in.

(288): the way in which firms borrow ('management' and 'learning') is as important, if not more important, than the actual act of innovating.

(289): subsidies have to be 'reciprocal', rather than unidirectional (as in, they need to reward and sanction, rather than be free handouts). State has to discipline firms (market is not sufficient, nor is pressure of technological competition [how different?])

(291-302): weaknesses in Amsden

1. getting prices 'wrong' -- not proven well, possibility that the State was just intervening to make the FM work b/c of market failures [confusing, though, since this seems her main, clearest point]
2. nothing about how the State was organized
3. could the success of industry be a scale effect, rather than a productivity effect (Korea's endowments already suited manufacture--no n. resources, basically skilled workforce, etc.)
4. didn't Korea just follow its comparative advantage? Amsden not disproving this well, either [also confusing]
5. learning is not adequately operationalized -- actually it is three concepts, and maybe even a 'frame of mind'

(303-304): Haggard's argument about why LA turned to ISI phase 2 (production of capital goods) and EA turned to export of consumer goods (and then export of capital goods?). has to do with:

1. external pressures: declining US aid in SK; balance of payments deficits
2. domestic coalitions: balance of class forces--landed elites imp in Brazil + agro-exporters
3. political institutions: authoritarian regime in SK; politicians in Brazil
4. ideas: technocrats' ideas [stupid] in SK; influence of Prebisch

(306): Haggard's argument explains 'irrational' policies in LA as a product of these factors.

(306-310): two weaknesses

1. is it true that this difference is the critical factor that explains divergence? maybe there are antecedent factors, like different endowments, that better explain this
2. description of politics is very thin, and argument is functionalist -- inferring the existence of coalitions from the fact of shared interests

(311): key--Wade wants to stress w-systemic opportunities: US buyers were looking for low-cost suppliers, but didn't turn to LA (because natural resources provision of export receipts disincentivized a turn to manufacture--'Dutch Disease'), and there was no 'basically skilled' population (either low skilled or highly skilled). LA was unlikely candidate for cheap labor manufactured exports, as a result. in EA case, they had all this, and the benefit of Japan close by ['flying geese'?]

(315): importance of authoritarianism -- not vote-seekers...

(316): imp--the importance of these w-systemic factors means that the chances for contemporary Third World states are 'slimmer' than is otherwise thought

(317): neoliberalism popularizes the myth of the 'harmony of interests' at precisely the time when the world is showing increasingly fierce competition

---

[1] significance of WTO sanctions becomes obvious from this description of E. Asian success

john foran, taking power

(7): definition--social revolution = political change + structural transformation + mass participation [q. of the kind of cases we've excluded w/ the last factor]

(8): but Grenada 1979-1983 is included, even though it was a coup, b/c of "enthusiasm" [this is problematic]

(9): the 'J-curve', James Davies--growing prosperity followed by sharp downturn

(11): critique of Skocpol [largely uncompelling, about 'structure,' ideology]

(14): definition--'political cultures of opposition' -- 'value systems'/ideologies through which people make sense of world around them

(15): the who of revolution is coalitions/multi-class alliances [a la Parsa et. al.]

(15): Third World needs its own theory

(18): the model: (1) dependent development ('growth within limits') --> (2) exclusionary personalist/colonial state/or open polity (vs. Goodwin, here -- it's the middling regimes, the polyarchies, that are most stable) --> (3) political cultures of opposition (ways of seeing the world) all meet the triggers that are (a) economic downturn + (b) world-systemic opening ---> revolutionary outbreak

(23): again, the problem of the multi-class claim, like Parsa [he agrees that they are likely to fracture, but this doesn't preclude 'social revolution'; we must ask, though, what it means that they fail in their aspirations]

(35): Mexcio largely agricultural, in 1910

(36): 'growth within limits,' Mexcio

(37): Porfirian state slogan: 'Pan y palo'

(37): political cultures of opposition, Mexico [clear problem, here, of how to evaluate this claim. it is far too hand-wavy; but can it be made more definite?]

(40-41): multi-class alliance, Mexico [question of the nature of elite participation--is it that they stand aside? not much by way of active participation, it seems, though Foran concludes the opposite]

(43): failure of Villa and Zapata [there's a clear failure, here, so it's unclear why it's helpful to consider this as 'social revolution'. and auxiliary question of why they failed is interesting, but unaddressed b/c of the nature of his argument]

(44-45): more than a reform? [how can your evidence for this be PRI nationalization under Cardenas?]

(45): Gilly--a bourgeois revolution that was pushed, by radial peasants, to being more than simply bourgeois outcome [hmm]

(47): China as 'not feudal, not yet capitalist' (b/c share-cropping and wage labour were common, he argues)

(50): debate on peasant conditions in the 1930s, with some suggesting that they didn't worsen, but most agreeing that they did, including Foran.

(50): GMD regime alienated elites, depending almost wholly on the army. no social base.

(52): vs. Skocpol, emphasizes the organizational role of the CCP (Skocpol thinks that peasants had no alternative but to respond favourably to CCP; Foran's argument is that, had they not been effectively organized/political cultures of opposition present, the peasantry would not have flocked. a 'battle for ideological hegemony')

(53): Communist movement as a 'nationalist' movement

(54): a diverse social base to the side of the revolution, China [OK, to a point. but this is directly consonant with the limited goals, as they themselves stressed. it is quite another to make this into the general condition of social revolution, since they abandoned the NDR soon after taking power]

(57): Cuba as a 'willed' revolution? no.

(58): more Cadillacs sold in 1954 Havana than in any other city in the world

(58): dependent development, Cuba ('a textbook case')

(59): US control of Cuban economy very pronounced

(60): 20,000 Cubans died at hands of police/army/intelligence, between 1952 and 1959 [!]

(61): oppositional culture, Cuba [here it becomes quite clear that this is too 'post hoc'; it seems easy to make similar summaries in clear negative cases]

(62-63): w-systemic opening, Cuba (US backing-off from Batista in late 50s)

(65): middle-class populist coalition, Cuba [first, seems extremely strange to talk about a 'mass' movement but then use composition of 600 guerrilla members as main piece of evidence for its being middle-class; second, the actual evidence of cooperation across classes gives absolutely no sense of its significance--it's just a quote. third, and perhaps most importantly, again it's shown that elite dissension is important to regime downfall; but a 'social revolution'? you can't show this by saying that, prior to post-revolutionary social upheavals, elites were partial toward the revolutionaries]

(67): American interest in Nicaragua; though lowest rates of investment, large American multinationals were present

(67): dependent development, Nicaragua (q. of whether it was developed enough to be considered)

(68): incredible land concentration figures--1.5% had 40% of land, 78% had 17% of land

(70): oppositional cultures, Nicaragua [again, not convincing--no way of assessing the significance, easy to make similar point in negative cases. and this is meant to be his clearest case--but if you had evaluated this in the mid-70s, or before the earthquake, would you have made a similar case?]

(73): 50,000 people died, ion total

(72-73): w-systemic opening, Nicaragua [OK, but Carter's posture is quite uncertain -- proposing a peace-keeping force, looking for internal changes. Sandinistas very clearly say no to this. how much this helps is entirely uncertain? maybe 'opening' is better understood as the absence of a 'w-systemic closing'?]

(73): FSLN was tiny! 200 members in 1977, 5,000 in July 1979 (though many fought who weren't expressly members of the FSLN)

(74): m-class populist coalition, Nicaragua [problem here is simple, and familiar -- you can't use the evidence of m-class involvement to make the claim that all classes contributed equally. this seems singularly unhelpful. in all of these it seems the case that the m-class have to withdraw support from the regime; but whether this is best understood as their being active members of the coalition, as a class, is extremely suspect]

(74-75): vs. Skocpol--Iran not exceptional, but prototypical

(75): dependent development, Iran [again, the narrative is not unhelpful, but the more I read the more I think that a better 'test' would be to see what isn't dependent development in the Third World. b/c everything short of that, which is most, seems eligible for a description like the one offered here: 'there was growth, but there was also poverty+inequality'. I don't know if unbelievers would be convinced by the analysis here, in other words]

(77): Shah's Army budget at $10 billion in late 70s!

(78): w-systemic opening, Iran (from Nixon doctrine to Carter's inaction) [but again, he is showing that Carter had 'strong personal rapport and called him an 'island of stability'; support Shah after massacre of protestors. we risk elevating rhetoric to reality, unless this is framed as 'absence of w-systemic closing'; inaction is read as paralysis, but better read as unwillingness to 'interevene' b/c of w-historic moment, I think]

(78): May '78 cable suggesting Shah was stable

(81): v. different from Parsa--where Parsa stressed the marginality of the religious forces to the making of revolution, Khumaini and the clergy dominate Foran's portrayal of the revolutionary movement

(83): political cultures of opposition, Iran [another example of how difficult this is to evaluate]

(84): largest crowd in w. history, three to four million people in February 1979

(87): m-class alliance, Iran [again, difficult to celebrate this as source of regime's radical nature when the consolidation of the regime demands the denial of so many of the participants' aspirations]

(89): in colonial cases, a 'distinct variant' of dependent development
(90): because foreign, collective dictatorship by outsiders is personalistic (in emotional terms) [emotional terms???]

(90): imp--conjunctural factors end up being very important, to the spate of revolutions that occur in the 1970s (both w-systemic opening, in US after Vietnam, and Portugese revolution; and economic downturn + the two oil shocks)

(91): though downturn can be 'partly' a subjective factor (in Cuba, guerrilla struggles helped create it, for example)

(92): literacy in Algeria comparable to Fr. at time of revolution

(93): exceptional violence of French conquest, extraordinary massacres

(94): Tocqueville--'we have been more barbaric than the Arabs'

(94-5): dependent development, Algeria (a 'split society'--key to which was 'agricultural exp. on mass scale'; urbanization w/o industrialization, as people pushed from coutnryside)

(95): in 1954, 85% of population illiterate

(95): Napoleon 1865-- to become French, one had to give up Islam; 98 of 106 mosques in Algiers made into churches

(98): in 1937, PCF was counseling that Algerians had to wait for the revolution in France [!]

(102): 1956, FLN strength was at 8,500, w/ 21,000 auxiliaries [quite small, in relation to French forces--450,000!]

(103-104): class basis, Algeria: led by urban middle-class, but fought by youth from rural proletariat; involved most of Muslim population in urban areas [a bit snide to call this a coalition, and Foran's comments are very hurried]

(104): imp--Angolan revolution (1960-1975) is excellent example of Third World Rev touching off First World Rev

(108): brutal Angolan State, no health or education budget 1953-1958, forced labour

(108-109): three anti-colonial movements

1. MPLA, Pan-African and socialist
   
2. FNLA, non-communist nationalist--evolved in pro-Western direction by 1960s
3. UNITA, counter-revolutionary, especially after 1975-1976 civil war
   

(110): political culture, Angola: length of struggle into 1970s radicalized the MPA [interesting--if it is an underlying condition, how can it be explained as a result of the mobilization?]

(111): mid-1970s US pushing for UNITA-led independence

(112): guerrillas didn't win on battlefield, v. few Portuguese troops died

(114): broad coalition, Angola: if the three movements [!] are included, cross-class [this is utterly absurd--three movements that were hardly allies in the liberation struggle, and then fell upon one another are the source of this claim!]

(115): not clear that condition of 'significant social claim' is met--instead, what qualifies this as a social revolution seems to be the 'ideas' of the revolutionaries. but of course that's not what we're trying to explain.

(116): dependent development vs. underdevelopment, in case of Mozambique

(120): multi-class, Mozambique [again, this just seems absurd. a fringe of elite leaders is not enough to make a peasant movement multi-class. the claim is simply confusing]

(121): the West supported Portugal consistently; South Africa and Rhodesia even more so, of course

(121): economic downturn, Mozambique: both in Portugal and in Mozambique (created by guerrillas?)

(123): creating an opening through disruption? (a la Cuba and Angola(

(125-126): dependent development, Rhodesia

(126): US circumventing sanctions it formally supported, to import minerals

(128): in 1971, Britain promising 'majority rule' in 100 years. Smith agreed.

(128): ZANU emerged successful over ZIPA and ZAPU b/c of appeal of its vision, more effective recruitment (winning support from the people) [this is less an 'ideology' issue, than an 'organizing' issue]

(129): radicals had been sidelined; this was the National Democratic Revolution

(130): conjunctural factors, Zimbabwe: impact of late 1970s--world-systemic opening (though ambiguous), and the independence of Mozambique and Angola

(131): 30k Africans died in Zimbabwe struggle

(132): Vietnam as best case--all factors come together, in 1945

(132, 139-141): imp, question re: Foran's use of political cultures, here [here it means something different than a 'historical endowment'; means something contingent, subject to organizing success. see also his explanation of later movement, which is a 'historical endowment' argument--'fusion' of indigenous and Marxism. entirely q-begging]

(135): dependent development, Vietnam: exporting raw materials, limited industrializatoin

(135): imp, some recognition, here, of importance of wider class base --> less radicalism (a non-communist alternative, had there been a middle-class][possible tension in larger argument]

(138): 1965-1973, USA dropped triple the bomb tonnage dropped on Europe, Asia, AFrica on an area the size of Texas

(139): at least 1.5 million dead Vietnamese; along with Mexico, biggest toll in all of the revolutions

(142): m-class, Vietnam: won the middle-class by not being too radical (a la Race) [but didn't this, simultaneously, have something to do with its failures post-revolution? and the vast majority of the rank and file were peasants; we need some way of deciding when the fact of overall, average composition ceases to be significant, if that's ever the case]

(144): Nixon's rearguard strategy for 'peace' w/ honor, a la Obama in Afghanistan today (Nixon Christmas bombing in 1972, for example, after breakdown in negotiations)

(151): imp, here looking at 'reversed revolutions' that weren't able to live up to their promise--but a central issue is that the claim of 'radical social transformation' in the 'successful' cases hasn't really been substantiated

(152): vs. Goodwin, the examples of Chile, Jamaica, and Iran as situations where revolutionary challenge launched through political process

(153): Bolivia in 1952--a revolution that was rolled back ever so slowly, after 18 months of radical reforms, thanks to US pressures (here discussion of 'coming to power'

(158): Army stands aside in 1952

(159): Chile is Foran's key argument against Goodwin -- a truly democratic polity undergoing dep. development is vulnerable to revolution (it's the in-betweens that aren't amenable to rev. challenge)

(159): strong existence of working-class parties explains the comparative strength of democratic institutions (four decades of democratic rule); though the electorate was considerably narrow, even in 1971[!] (only 28.3%???)

(161): strong labour movement --> strong political consciousness [again, q-begging]

(162): gradualists (CP, Allende's wing of SP) vs. radicals (MIR, etc.) -- UP as fragile center-point between these views

(163): key--more generally, ec. downturn matters only in context of ongoing dependent development

(167): 46 men in Granada! [again, raises question about the 'movement'--here, it's popular sympathy that's enough to make this into a case of revolution. but that's a bit of a stretch]

(170): in sum, revolutionary failure--the same factors that brought these movements to power worked to unseat them: dependency was restraint, democracy opened up space for the right, economic difficulties, intervention of empire

(170): in Bolivia, MNR leads social revolution

(171): LR, though, touched only 8 of 36 million hectares [for Foran this is enough, b/c it's 'popular']

(171-172): but, w-systemic closure brought MNR rev to knees [example, possibly, of the State being brought to heel by Capital]. 1956 as turning point.

(173): JFK's Alliance for Progress in Bolivia was culmination of US efforts to bring Bolivia back in line

(175): Chile LR touched 1/2 of all land

(175): Korry quote--'we will do all in our power to condemn Chileans to utmost poverty'

(176): CIA study: US has no vital interests in region--but Chile would represent a 'psychological set-back' to US, and 'psychological advantage' for Marxism

(177); State structure was never in Allende's hands: no majority in Congress, no support from judiciary, no loyalty of civil service or Army. no control of mass media.

(178): Allende in Aug 1972, amidst heightening class conflict, split w/ MIR: 'the fact that you have to get up at dawn to get to work, whlie I ride in a car...' [brilliantly tragic]

(180): imp--the middle-classes and the CD were the social base for the coup, hit hard by inflation/shortages. of course the landowners/industrialists/army were the prime movers. but their support was critical.

(181, 186): imp--failure of New Jewel Movement in Grenada shows causal importance of political culture. this was the explanation of breakdown. Coard vs. Bishop [seems question-begging, at some level--fragmented despite everything else being in place]

(182): FDI went up during NJM tenure

(185): Carter's FP was hardening, after 1979 revolutions--Grenada, Nicaragua, Jamaica were defined as threats

(185): Bishop on Reagan--'he's readying himself to drop into what he thinks is his bathtub!'

(189): US invasion of Grenada was not principal cause--it followed the break-up of the revolutionary coalition

(190): imp--after taking power, Sandinistas did their best to pursue a 'mixed economy', trying to keep national bourgeoisie and even foreign capital happy--big public sector, investing in basic needs, took over about 1/5 of arable land. as Foran puts it, basically took over Somoza's place in the economy. btw 1979 and 1983, this worked 'quite well'

(191): 1984 elections, they won 2/3

(191): coalition starting to fragment in mid-1980s [not well-explained--partly defection of industrial and agricultural elites]

(191): closure of w-systemic opening, with Reagan. US 'created' Contras out of Somoza's NG

(192): 30,000 Nicaraguans killed as result of Contra war

(192-193): in response to Reagan, Nicaragua kept civil liberties open--tried to push date of elections forward

(193): by 1987, were spending 60% of budget on military--US aid cut off, as was IMF/World Bank, active intervention in the banks

(194): Sandinista economic policy played a part? agrarian reform jeopardized agrarian exports, which put pressure on foreign exchange. this, plus falling commodity prices in the 80s, was big issue

(195): Sandinistas forced to implement austerity in 1988-1989, after economy brought to its knees in '85 to '87 period

(196): voting them out of office in 1990 was rational, given US posture

(197): ag. reform 'failed' in Guatemala, for reasons of complexity of existing tenure

(197): Manley government undermined, after nationalizing bauxite--again, US involved, according to Foran, in sanctioning gov't, which then turned to IMF/WB

(200): imp point against Goodwin--'open democratic polities' can be challenged [Iran, Chile, Jamaica, and Guatemala after Arevalo]

(202): post-Rev, becoming more democratic actually made these States more vulnerable

(200, 202-203): summary of argument re: reversals: dep development, open democracies, attenuation of political cultures, closing of w-systemic window. these four factors are found in all seven cases.

(205-206): studying the negative cases--attempted revolutions, political revolutions, non-revolutions, revolutions from above

(207): Salvadoran dictatorship favored by JFK, as bulwark against Communism

(208): El Salvador: it lacked the breadth of the movement in Nicaragua (also, stable nature of 'crisis'--things always very bad. regime well supported. w-systemic closure.

(208-216): other cases here [many of these are very underdeveloped

(218): final table

(222): here, in China 1911, w-systemic opening becoming a bit like 'political opportunity' [very underdeveloped and imprecise]

(222): imp--logic of book is that dependent development is expected to produce a cross-class coalition [hmm]

(223): Aristide is simply a political revolution. but surely as radical as some of the examples that have been considered social revolutions. [and, in any case, how do we measure whether dep development has gone 'far enough'?]

(223): odd--in Philippines, NPA is too narrow to produce a 'social revolution' [this encapsulates some of the problems with 'broad-based'. if it were to have reached out to m-class elements, it would have retained its social revolutionary commitments? come on]

(225): pol rev in SA--very forced, doesn't really make sense, to me

(231, see 257 for sum of PC): Iraq was non-attempt b/c no political culture [great place to show that this basically begs more questions than it answers. tautological]

(232): imp, w-systemic opening, Egypt [what, in general, are the mechanisms by which the w-systemic opening/closure makes itself felt?]

(234): Cuba and culture [pop consensus? but come on...]

(235): key--in SK, no revolution b/c they didn't enlist the middle-class [great place to expose this problem]

(235): advantages of real development

(242): m-class becomes part of the prescription for how to make revolution [ugh!]

(244): w-systemic opening and 'political culture' his two most important, for explaining failure [happily, they're also the two most poorly defined]

(253): key--what a good political culture should do, in short, is facilitate a broad-based cross-class coalition [ouch!]

(259): w/ Selbin, against Goodwin -- inequalities rising, and also possibility of democratic route to power