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Arundhati Roy’s blaze of light

The Checkbook and the Cruise-Missile: Conversations with Arundhati Roy
By David Barsamian
Harper Perennial, 2004

Review by Lachlan Malloch

Sydney, Australia, Nov. 3 — Arundhati Roy is usually introduced as “the Indian writer who won the 1997 Booker Prize,” before her activist achievements are listed. The four interviews that make up The Checkbook and the Cruise Missile — more a political pamphlet than a book — confirm, however, that Roy is an eloquent and insightful fighter in today’s global justice movement.

These interviews, conducted between February 2001 and May 2003 by US-based journalist David Barsamian, explore several themes about life for the mass of the world’s people under modern-day imperialism. Reading them together is a smooth ride: we’re guided by Barsamian’s probing, progressive spotlight and accompanied all the way by Roy’s insistent, persuasive prose.

The first theme is the profoundly undemocratic nature of the world economic system, especially as it impacts people in the Third World. The official development debate, as conducted by the World Bank, the IMF and company, is a “scam,” says Roy, amounting to nothing more than advancing the re-colonization of the Third World.

In 2001 she told Barsamian: “The distance between power and powerlessness, between those who make decisions and those who have to suffer those decisions, has increased enormously. It’s a perilous journey for the poor — it’s a pitfall filled to overflowing with lies, brutality and injustice. Sitting in Washington or Geneva in the offices of the World Bank or the World Trade Organization, bureaucrats have the power to decide the fate of millions. It’s not only their decisions we’re contesting. It’s the fact that they have the power to make those decisions. No one elected them. No one said they could control our lives.”

It’s clear that living and working in India, at globalization’s grinding coalface, places Roy at a vantage point. And there is so much to learn from her reflections on Indian politics. In the book, Roy explores the history of the Indian government’s project to build 3200 dams in the Narmada Valley and the mass protest opposition, which she has been a part of.

Roy’s commentary on the rise and ugliness of Hindu chauvinism in India also stands out as compelling reading.

Roy constantly reminds us that it’s women who, in many ways, bear the brunt of globalization, making feminism a touchstone of the global resistance. Hers is a fierce, uncompromising, independent, intellectual feminism. It’s a pleasure to read how she rallies her fellow women, especially in the deeply sexist Indian context, to retain what they want from tradition while gaining what they need from modernity.

While I read this book, I pondered why Arundhati Roy’s work should be so attractive to us.

It’s not just that she unleashes her prodigious weaponry of metaphors to unmask imperialism and inspire our resistance — although that’s a great asset for the left. The title of this collection is a fine example, referring to the two primary ways in which imperialism keeps the Third World subjugated.

It’s not just that she has chosen to continue to give a voice to the oppressed rather than “sell out” and pursue the purely financial rewards promised by the Booker Prize. That too is exemplary morality.

Among Roy’s greatest qualities is her activist-journalism, finding and telling the truth by taking sides in the struggles of the world’s oppressed.

Also, her sense of humor and alertness to the absurd rescue some of our sanity, by helping us laugh at an insane world.

In another way still she recalls a little of the old Italian man in Catch 22 during the Second World War. He pities the US empire because he’s calmly confident that humanity will endure, outlasting an empire whose internal contradictions and greedy overreach will eventually see its power drain away.

Roy’s unshakeable belief in the power of collective action — in the solidarity of the oppressed — is an example of what the anti-war movement needs in large doses. In Checkbook she articulates this in terms of breaking mass liberal illusions in the way the US war in Iraq might have been averted:

“Isn’t there a flaw in the logic of that phrase — ‘speak truth to power’? It assumes that power doesn’t know the truth. But power knows the truth just as well, if not better, than the powerless know the truth. Enron knows what it’s doing. We don’t have to tell it what it’s doing, we have to tell other people what it’s doing.”

How prescient that passage was for the recent theatrics of Australian politics! In one fell swoop it nails all the fake soul-searching and hand-wringing that’s been going on about “intelligence failures” supposedly leading the Australian government to lie to the people about the reasons for going to war against Iraq.

Our smooth ride with Roy and Barsamian further gathers pace towards the end of the book, as they begin to touch on the ways forward for our movement.

The global anti-war marches of February 2003 were magnificent, Roy says, but only ever symbolic. She implores us not only to grow, but more importantly to punch our way through into real civil disobedience. It’s the only way the powerful few will ever take notice of us. Roy chides the naivety in thinking that simply “giving up a Sunday” — even if it was millions of us doing it — was ever going to stop a juggernaut with such force as the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq.

This sort of perspective undoubtedly places her on the radical wing of the anti-war movement.

But a yet unanswered question for those of us following Roy’s work, especially as it relates to the World Social Forum process, is whether her proven capacity to change and to learn as she leads will eventually see her become aligned with a particular revolutionary party or socialist political current.

There are many of us who believe such a cross-over is not only possible, but truly urgent for all the leaders of today’s global resistance movement.

Source: Green Left Weekly

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Chomsky’s Smash Hits

Radical Priorities (Third Edition)
By Noam Chomsky
Edited by C.P. Otero
AK Press (2003)

Review by Nicholas Holt

Co. Clare, Ireland, Nov. 3(AGR) — Discovering an article about Noam Chomsky in a leftist periodical is akin to finding Jimi Hendrix on the cover of Guitar Player magazine: there’s no surprise and the subject selection, and writers would be hard pressed to find something new to say about such giants of their respective fields.

But, if I may be allowed to abuse an analogy a bit longer, for folks with even mild interest in social activism, or in simply understanding the daily news, Chomsky’s writings are as mandatory as The Experience’s Smash Hits are for a teenage guitar hobbyist.

Chomsky - who is recognized even by his rightist critics as a genius in his professional field of linguistics - can be an intimidating author to the unprepared, and as the author of more than 90 books, finding a suitable introductory volume can be a daunting task.

Radical Priorities is an excellent collection, both for such an introduction, as well as for the long-time reader of Chomsky.

The essays span the 1960’s to 2002 and a hit a solid range of topics: “The Hidden War in East Timor,” “Outside of Israeli ‘Official History’,” “The Danger of Nuclear War and What We Can Do About It,” and the (still) timely “Terror and Just Response.”

Those essays contain a number of powerful ideas foreign to liberals with a curiosity leaning leftwards, but who lack the intellectual fuel to sever themselves from the quasi-left represented by the liberal “mainstream.”

But the real mental jab will come with Chomsky’s smashing attack on liberal articles of faith: “The Carter Administration: Myth and Reality” explodes the humanitarian aura of one of liberaldom’s high saints, as well as challenging the limited range of “permissible” debate on the American war on Vietnam. “Watergate: Small Potatoes” dismisses the significance of the Nixon administration’s punished crimes as simply a case of a broken gentlemen’s agreement between the two factions of elite US power, nearly meaningless when compared to ongoing crimes of state, some of which are explored in “The Secret Terror Organizations of the United States.”

Further essays on anarcho-syndicalism, industrial self-management and capitalism are interesting as well, and if nothing the reader will come away with etymological clarity about oft abused and confused terms like “liberalism,” “conservatism,” “libertarianism,” “socialism,” and “anarchism.”

The only thing Radical Priorities lacks is a piece focusing on Chomsky and Edward S. Herman’s model of “manufacture of consent” through media management, an unfortunate decision on the part of the otherwise very fine editor, C. P. Otero.

Despite this shortcoming, Radical Priorities is recommended highly to anyone wishing to build a well founded critical understanding of US foreign policy and global capitalism or who is looking for succinct reviews of Chomsky’s major ideas.

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Abu Ghraib abuses tapped to theater

By Rana Husseini

Amman, Jordan, Nov. 8 — As the trials and courts martials of US military personnel involved in the Abu Ghraib prison abuses get under way, the Arab world is finding new ways to grapple with the issue.

Arab media pundits took to criticizing the US for what they saw as its double standards -- on the one hand espousing democratic principles and, on the other hand, allowing torture and sexual abuse of Iraqi prison inmates.

Live television talk shows were flooded with callers from the Arab world who expressed their outrage and shock at the Abu Ghraib abuses.

In Jordan, however, a theater director decided to take the issue one step further.

Director Muhammad Shawaqfa, 47, wanted to capture the anger and frustration of the “Arab street” directed at the “biased US policy in the Middle East” and its “unjust war in Iraq.”

His theater production, A New Middle East, has resonated with Arab audiences because of its strong anti-interventionist and pro-Arab undertones.

One recurrent theme that he follows through from one scene to the next is the premise that things happen in the Middle East only if the US wills it.

“I wanted through this play, and especially the Abu Ghraib scene, to tell everyone, look, this is the democracy that the US is talking about in the Middle East,” Shawaqfa told Aljazeera.net.

Writers also described it as a “sad and funny play at the same time because it reminded us of our miserable situation.”

The play spares none of the graphic pains associated with Abu Ghraib prison.

“I miss my dog back home,” says Lynndie England as she holds a cigarette in one hand and drags an Iraqi detainee with a dog leash in the other.

Then she lets out a wild and menacing laugh, which rings through the halls of Abu Ghraib prison.

Audience members watching were gripped by the intensity and the depravity of the scene.

“This scene was very tough on me — to depict her [England] character because I am against torture and the killing of anyone,” actress Suhair Fahd told Aljazeera.net, speaking about the role she is playing at the Amoun Theater in Amman, Jordan.

“I felt I needed to show the world the horrific abuses that were taking place at the prison and I studied England’s character carefully and discovered that she was enjoying the abuse against Iraqi prisoners,” Fahd added.

The play reveals the importance of the Abu Ghraib scandal to contemporary Arab society and may shed insight into growing anti-US feelings in the region.

Newspapers critics agree, saying the play, which started showing in July 2004 and is playing through the month of Ramadan, highlights the gap between the rich and the poor and blames “American democracy [for] causing this gap.”

For example, an actor in the role of a US soldier is seen escorting an Iraqi prisoner with a plastic bag wrapped around his head. He pulls the plastic bag off his head, asks the prisoner to drink water, then kills him, laughing out loud.

The issue of human rights is a particularly sensitive one in the region. Play critic for Jordan’s daily Al Rai newspaper Jamal Iyad believes the US passed laws and policies after Sept. 11, 2001 which restricted human rights and some freedoms.

Arab reaction to US influence in the region is personified in the character of Uncle Ghafil, played by Hussein Tubaishat, a popular veteran of Jordanian soap operas. In one of the scenes, he throws US dollar notes in the face of a US producer writing a screenplay which embraces “western objectives of destroying the Arab nation and its moral system.”

“Take your dollars because we will continue to fight and resist until the last drop of our blood,” Uncle Ghafil yells at the producer. In a scene, which ostensibly shows the fate of those who speak out against US politics in the Middle East, it is the character of Uncle Ghafil who is now tortured and abused.

But in a line which plays well with Arab audiences, he declares he “does not fear anything any more.”

Despite its controversial and somewhat macabre scenes, the play has become popular with Arab audiences.

Amir Statiya, 29, said he enjoyed the play because “it said a lot of the things that we were unable to say.”

A 25-year-old mother who took her five-year-old said the play reflected the views of the Jordanian street, but was saddened in some parts “because it reminded us of the US and Israeli oppression.”

“I wanted to tell the Jordanian audience that this is your future as the US wants it,” Shawaqfa said.

The play continues its run until next spring.

Source: Aljazeera.net

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Four-Course Compost Completes The Food Chain

By Elizabeth Davies and Michelle Locke

Nov. 5 — Some of the finest restaurants in California are turning award-winning food into compost. Haute cuisine is going green in a program that benefits the farms and vineyards who supply the state’s top eateries.

More than 2,200 restaurants and food businesses in San Francisco take part in the clean-plate, clean-environment project, which has become a model for food recycling.

Leftovers are deposited in green plastic cans and then converted into what is called Four Course Compost.

The result is less waste in landfills, lower rubbish pick-up costs, vibrant vines and vegetables — and a cheerful sense of completing a circle.

The food scraps come from some of the city’s swankiest restaurants, such as the highly regarded Jardiniere and Boulevard. “Now you have restaurateurs that are excited about sending nutrients back to the farms and vineyards. That’s exciting stuff. That’s role reversal,” said Robert Reed of Norcal Waste Systems, the San Francisco-based producers of Four Course Compost.

“We love the program,” said Jonathan Cook, superviser of operations at the Metreon , an entertainment complex in San Francisco that has eight restaurants supplying compost.

He said: “It’s increased the morale in the kitchens. People feel they’re not throwing things out, they’re doing something good for the environment while they’re working.”

Metreon restaurants are also saving about $1,600 in rubbish pickup fees every month, Cook says.

“That is what is so absolutely cool about it,” says Kate Krebs, executive director of the National Recycling Coalition. “Not only is a good, green environmental story, but it goes right to the bottom line.”

Growers like the program, too. “I think it’s been fabulous,” says Kathleen Inman, owner and winemaker at Inman Family Vineyards in Sonoma County. The organic compost makes for healthy green vines, and it is a kick to think of the soil’s candlelit past, she says.

Californians throw away more than five million tons of food scraps each year, according to the state. That amounts to 16 percent of all material going into landfills. While many cities are recycling bottles, cans and paper, food waste remains “the new frontier,” Krebs said. When the San Francisco program began, many people “kind of sat back and put their arms across their chest and said, ‘Sure. Let’s see how it will work in a city that has hills, that has little if any storage space. Let’s see how it works.’”

The program has since expanded to restaurants in Oakland, while Los Angeles officials recently asked Norcal Waste to begin a pilot with restaurants there. And the Seattle City Council recently voted to start a residential food-scrap program.

In Northern California, Norcal Waste subsidiaries collect the food scraps and other compostable material and turn it into nutrient-rich organic matter at a composting center outside Vacaville, about 50 miles east of San Francisco. There, the table scraps are ground with cardboard, soiled paper and garden trimmings — the compost is about 50 percent food — and pushed into bags, where it decomposes.

Sales of Four Course Compost have increased 23 percent by volume in each of the past two fiscal years.

At the Metreon, Cook is thinking about organizing a wine-tasting of vintages grown with Four Course Compost. “It’s closing the gap, throwing the food out and bringing it back with the grapes and drinking it again in the restaurant,” he says. “It’s pretty great.”

Source: Independent (UK)