Happy May Day, Workers

The weird thing about studying the French new left is the fact that "the red years" in France, especially the 60s, were at the height of the postwar economic boom. Never before or since has the working class improved its quality of life more than it did during those few decades, from the late 40s until the early 70s. Instead of deprivation and oppression (although there was a fair bit of that), the radicalized workers were experiencing unprecedented comfort and opportunity; their kids were going to universities for the first time, they had the creature comforts that used to be reserved for the rich, and even when they "lost" a political struggle (May of '68), they still won concessions from the government and management.

In historical hindsight, two things really stand out. First, the material prosperity of the western world was underwritten by cheap energy and a third world hamstrung by the legacies of colonialism. As we're seeing with China and India now in terms of oil prices, opportunity and development in the non-western world translates into hardship in the west as everyone squabbles over the limited supply of energy resources. Second, the left was at its strongest when everyone still remembered the depression and the second world war. People had experienced what untrammeled markets do and what right-wing ideology run rampant leads to, and they didn't want it to happen again during their lifetimes.

There was a period when I was growing up, from about the mid-90s to a few years ago, when history seemed to stand still for a lot of Americans. Prices stayed put and the reason a drooling moron like George W. Bush could think the Iraq War was a good idea was the belief that no one could possibly resist American military might. If anything good has come or is going to come out of the collapse of American hegemony, I hope it's that more people come to realize that history is now, happening in real time, and acting like it's all sewed up is a profoundly imprudent thing to do.

If still another left emerges that's able to get anything done, I think it's likely that (unfortunately for "us") it will be based on our own economic problems, not the desire for everyone in the world to have "our" standard of living (nor will it be based on the ongoing culture wars against the Christian Right, although those are important too.) My point is that it looks like "we" will have to be reminded of why "the free market" is a blood-drinking beast that makes the rich richer, not part of a shiny happy natural order in which everyone prospers.

The sooner some very serious, cranky, draconian bureaucrats are unleashed on the hedge fund managers, the better off everyone else will be.