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Did The Collapse Of The USSR Give The West A Free Hand?

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    Did The Collapse Of The USSR Give The West A Free Hand?

    EDIT: Removed
    Last edited by Johnny Velvet; 05-11-2021, 16:17.

    #2
    There's probably a bigger discussion to be had, but my first thought is that the USSR used to dump old nuclear reactors in the sea ,so I'm not sure they'd offer much hope on the environmental regulation score, and the rollback of the welfare state was already underway prior to 1991.

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      #3
      I certainly think that the End Of History mentality meant that there was no counterweight to the various strains of neoliberal economic bollocks, that there was little push for more social welfare and better workplace regulation and better workers right.

      I don't think that holds for environmental regulation, which was non-existent until the 70s, and only really just developing properly in the late 80s (with the arrival of largely Warsaw Pact driven acid rain in Europe, and the Montreal Protocols - which were put in place a handful of months before the Berlin Wall fell).

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        #4
        Originally posted by San Bernardhinault View Post
        I certainly think that the End Of History mentality meant that there was no counterweight to the various strains of neoliberal economic bollocks, that there was little push for more social welfare and better workplace regulation and better workers right.

        I don't think that holds for environmental regulation, which was non-existent until the 70s, and only really just developing properly in the late 80s (with the arrival of largely Warsaw Pact driven acid rain in Europe, and the Montreal Protocols - which were put in place a handful of months before the Berlin Wall fell).
        I thought acid rain (at least in Scandinavia) was a result of British Coal fired power stations and doesn't weather usually travel west to east?

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          #5
          There's an argument that the collapse of communism as a realistic alternative to capitalism has hurt the workers of Western Europe. But I don't think it works for global living standards which broadly risen dramatically over the last 30 years, in part because there are a lot fewer proxy wars fought in them between USA and the USSR.

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            #6
            We might not have got Bill Clinton or Barack Obama if the sabre rattling Cold War had kept givinn the GOP so many votes, so capitalism would have been even worse.

            Communism had a poor record in Africa and Asia, predictably so given that Marx said you need to go through a capitalist phase before you can jump to Communism.

            Ex-Communist states don't seem any worse off than the basket cases clinging to some bastardized form - Zimbabwe, North Korea.

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              #7
              Immiserated is a great word.

              It would describe the massive populations of Russia and Eastern Europe under communism, the population of Cambodia under Pol Pot, and the millions who were victims of tactical famine under Mao.

              What really improved the lot of workers and the poor in Western Europe was the redistributive and legislative impact of the EU, which many lefties hate because they saw it as "that capitalist thing".

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                #8
                Originally posted by Etienne View Post
                There's an argument that the collapse of communism as a realistic alternative to capitalism has hurt the workers of Western Europe. But I don't think it works for global living standards which broadly risen dramatically over the last 30 years, in part because there are a lot fewer proxy wars fought in them between USA and the USSR.
                That's a pretty western Eurocentric view.

                Living standards have not risen in many part of Africa and income inequality between the rich and poor has grown (like most parts of the world). What you see as progress is a result of the trickle down of technological advancements.

                in the last 30 years we have had:

                Yugoslavia
                Darfur
                Sierra Leone
                Liberia
                Rwanda
                Burundi
                DR Congo
                Libya
                Syria

                The list go on.

                Africa was never communist or indeed socialist. Many of the founding fathers of the liberation struggle would identify themselves as Marxist as this was the only ideology that was explicitly anti-colonial (socialism and Communism are not).

                Getting into bed with the USSR was always a practical rather than an ideological choice.

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                  #9
                  Has the west ever been interested in helping the third world when the west has been full-on capitalist or more social democratic? Things like the Common Agricultural Policy in the EU and corn subsidies in the USA are absolutely killing third world farmers. Those policies could hardly be described as neoliberal.

                  At the end of the day the west is going to look out for itself at the expense of the rest of the world, no matter which end of the political spectrum is in power.

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                    #10
                    I'm not sure there's that much that can be simplistically attributed to the collapse of the state capitalist bloc.

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                      #11
                      TG, obviously I'm a Western European, so my view is going to be coloured by that, but I'm specifically looking at a global context. The numbers of people living in poverty globally are massively lower than they used to be, though the bulk of this improvement is from Asia, and sub-Saharan Africa is the area which has seen the least improvement.

                      Of course there have been plenty of wars since the collapse of communism but the number of deaths in war is also lower than in the preceding years.

                      The gap between rich and poor is growing, of course and that is a major issue to be assessed.

                      I'm not arguing that we have attained a global nirvana, merely arguing that the collapse of the USSR hasn't made things demonstrably worse for much of the population of the world.

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                        #12
                        The SU under Gorby did look as though it could provide an alternative model, which is why so much energy went into destroying it.

                        In the late 80s, we also had the Eurocommunists in the ascendancy, and the Left was slightly energised; the EC project seemed like a strong alternative to Thatcherism and the possibility of a European military alliance a possible challenge to NATO.

                        As someone who read Marxism Today and visited Russia a lot in the days of Thatcherism, I loved the place.

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                          #13
                          I've got a bad cold so not up to making more of an argument.

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                            #14
                            Originally posted by antoine polus View Post
                            Has the west ever been interested in helping the third world when the west has been full-on capitalist or more social democratic? Things like the Common Agricultural Policy in the EU and corn subsidies in the USA are absolutely killing third world farmers. Those policies could hardly be described as neoliberal.

                            At the end of the day the west is going to look out for itself at the expense of the rest of the world, no matter which end of the political spectrum is in power.
                            Short answer no.
                            Speaking of Africa, all the west policies have been with the intention to destabilise and foster a reliance on the west.

                            Whether it is the actions of the World Bank/ IMF
                            The use of the most arable land for producing cash crops creating a food deficit
                            The propping up of leaders who follow a western agenda

                            etc etc

                            Etiernne

                            Of course there have been plenty of wars since the collapse of communism but the number of deaths in war is also lower than in the preceding years.
                            Have you got any data as a means of comparison?

                            I'm not arguing that we have attained a global nirvana, merely arguing that the collapse of the USSR hasn't made things demonstrably worse for much of the population of the world.
                            Speaking from an African perspective I am not sure I would necessarily agree with that.
                            In the old days you could play the east off against the west for a better deal, you could even play off the Ex-colonial powers off against each other.
                            With the fall of the USSR, the west could more easily strong-arm African states with a take it or leave it knowing they were the only offer on the table (until the Chinese came on the scene).

                            MSD, I know little of what you talk about but would be interested to learn more, can you provide some background reading?

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                              #15
                              Here you go TG: https://ourworldindata.org/war-and-p...ng-even-faster

                              Graphs 1.5, 1.6 and 1.7 are the key ones.

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