Economics Explained has a massive neoliberal, pro-western bias which makes his analysis very questionable to say the least.
Their latest video about my country France for example is 18 minutes of him yapping about why akshually it’s a good thing that Macron is taking away our retirement pension, during which he says such absurdities as unironically arguing that France is kinda socialist.
Your reading of the situation is correct. There is a few reasons why this is the case:
Imperialism allows western countries’ capitalists to exploit the cheaper resources and labor of some economically less developed nations and acquire super-profits on top through unequal exchange, since doing this is much more profitable than producing industrial goods in the west directly, western industrial capitalists have a huge incentive to move their factories to the third world. This has the effect of de-industrializing the west itself, and has gotten so bad that some European countries like the UK can barely even produce their own steel anymore, which is very bad given how important steel is to a lot of industries.
This makes the west more and more dependent on supply lines they don’t necessarily control in order to get the resources and goods they need, in this situation the smart thing to do would be to diversify your supplier countries do reduce any ones’ leverage over your country. But…
The US has been hard at work making sure Europe was dependent on them above anyone else for supplies.
They have also have been offering generous advantages to businesses who would de-localize to the US, aggravating the problem for their own profits.
This is part of the reasons why the US has been doing somewhat better than the rest of the west despite de-industrialization and financialization affecting them too, they’ve been sucking on Europe like a parasite to offset the problem ever so slightly.
As you’ve noted, most of the technological progress lately has been happening in the third world who has been catching up while the west seems to have lost it’s drive and is being overtaken. There are a lot of factors at play here but the main issue is the profit motive. A lot of research and a lot of things that are useful for a society aren’t profitable.
Take China’s high speed train network for example, it’s a very good thing for the peoples that there is such a good method of public transportation available, but it’s not profitable, the Chinese state is running it at a loss (offset by other income sources, but still). Because of that, such a good railway network would never be built in the west because the western companies and even governments are only interested in infrastructures if they bring in a profit.
An other example is renewable energy. For many years a lot of peoples have had and propagated this narrative that, since green tech is becoming cheaper, profit driven organizations would have an incentive to switch away from fossil energy, yet this hasn’t happened. Why? Because profit isn’t that simple.
Why can a business buy a pile of woof for 1$ and sell a chair made from the wood for 2$? Where do the added 1$ come from? It comes from work, they can take this chair made from 1$ worth of wood for 2$ because it’s not just a pile of wood anymore, something happened to it, someone used their time and energy to turn the wood into a chair. If it was possible to use some kind of spell to turn wood into chairs without effort, competition would drive the price down to the value of the dead materials that makes it: 1$, and the profit rate in the industry would be 0$ or very close to 0.
This, in a nutshell, is why cheaper green tech hasn’t pushed corporation to transition to clean energy. Sure, it’s cheaper, but it’s also vastly less profitable because green tech like solar panels and wind turbines are much more automatized than fossil fuel which mean less peoples who’s work add value to each unit of energy produced which mean proportionally less profit. This is why the green transition hasn’t happened and won’t anytime soon as long as the west is driven by the profit motive above all else.
The problem is the profit motive and private property. The capitalists shouldn’t be allowed to do whatever they want with the industries and infrastructures society needs, taking them to a different country whenever they feel like it, taking jobs away from us to exploit less developed nations, etc…
What needs to be done is to kick out the neoliberals, nationalize a bunch of important industries, restrict what capitalists are allowed to do with their private properties and moving toward abolishing private property altogether.
And the way to move toward this goal is to learn political theory and start organizing. Go to marginalized communities, poor peoples, even to the petty bourgeois not wealthy enough to move their business to the US and get left to die by the wealthier international bourgeoisie who are robbing their country, help them, listen to their problems and their complaints, help them understand where these problems come from and why the right’s analysis of the situation isn’t correct, and build a democratic popular movement able and willing to take power, by force if necessary.
maybe I’m too naive
Yes you are. Who is gonna do this “diplomatic lobbying”? The US? Some EU country? Most of the mightiest economic and military powers on earth materially support Israel’s genocide, whether it’s economically or militarily, because they have important geopolitical interests in keeping Israel going to maintain influence on the west Asia region through it. Don’t expect them to stop anytime soon, especially not because you asked them to.
No genocide has ever stopped because other countries asked it, that’s literally not a thing. Whether it is the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, the civil right movement in the US, the independence movements in Vietnam, Algeria, Haiti, etc or even the genocide of Jews and Slavs by Nazi Germany, every oppressive system, from “simple” economic discrimination to outright genocide of entire populations, that were successfully stopped were stopped by resistance movement who didn’t hesitate to use violence and warfare when necessary.
Hamas and the other organisations operating in Gaza have a lot of problems and religious extremism and bigotry is certainly a problem, but the thing is, they are the ONLY peoples doing something on the ground about the genocide and stopping Israel from putting their bloody boots on Gazan soil and create settlements there. Calling for dismantling is the materially equivalent to calling for the end of all Palestinian resistance, because regardless of what you think of them they are the resistance. The Palestinians have literally no one else to defend them.
Your call for disbanding them is nothing more than rambling of a spoiled, probably white (sorry for assuming), westerner who who has never experienced them mildest form of discrimination, and want to oppose the Palestinian genocide but who, instead of working with what is available and trying to make it better, has decided to whine that the idea of supporting hooded AK-47 wilding openly Muslim Arab don’t make them feel comfy enough. Sorry, but the Palestinians have other more important things to give a fuck about than making you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
And you are rationalizing this position together with you circle jerk by repeating ad nauseum the insane, unsubstantiated smearing of the resistance peddled by peoples who want to keep the genocide going.
You are also naïve to think that the solution you are proposing would solve anything at all of even change your position on this issue.
Let’s assume this happen, Hamas and the other resistance groups are disbanded and a group with whatever aesthetic makes you comfortable is created. What do you think would happen then? That they would win the heart of you spoiled lot and everything will be good? No. Let me tell you what would happen. As soon as this new group start to take actions, the Israeli and western propaganda machine are gonna start getting to work slandering and smearing this new group, accusing it of every sin just like they did with Hamas, and you peoples are gonna swallow it all like you always do and start asking to dissolve this new group too.
You are one of the “white moderates” that Martin Lutter King Jr denounced: Just like you are today against Hamas and the Houthis for “being terrorists”, if you were alive and/or following the events back then, you would have been against Nelson Mandela for “killing innocent whites peoples”, you would have been against MLK and Malcolm X for “disturbing the peace and organising illegal and violent protests”, you may not like it but this is the position you are defending right now regarding the genocide of Palestinians.
I see your point.
This is correct, these mesures would indeed be tremendously effectives, the problem is that it’s easyer said than done, and it’s already happening even without ICJ rulling anyway.
The BRICS block is working to move away from using US dollar as we speak, they have started to progressively replace the US dollar by local currencies in trades between themselves and are trying to create an international currency for international trade.
But compleating those projects will take a few years at least, you don’t move half the world’s economy in one day.
Until then, a lot of countries will have no choice but to continue using the dollar for international trade, at least partially, not to mention Europe, Japan, South Korea and the others former British colonies who will undoubtedly continue to use US dollar to support the US.
But even once the dollar stop being the international unit of acount, I doubt the US will stop supporting Israel (if Israel is still there by then, let’s hope it’s not), as I said Israel perfoms the US’s budding in the Middle East, this is why they support Israel so much, the US has demonstrated during it’s recent history that its typical reaction to a competitor appearing was to push it lower than they have sunk rather than pull themself higher and Israel is a tool to do this to Arab countries, ensuring that the huge oil reserves of the region keep flowing to US company and don’t feed potential Arab competitors, among other things.
In fact, I wonder if that wouldn’t make their support of Israel more direct and agressive, it would be very US-like to, as the empire start unraveling, keep clawing on every bit of international influence and every way they extract wealth from the 3rd world to slow down ever so slightly they collapse.
My point is, wait for the US egemony to unravel some more and trust Hammas, Hesbolla and Ansar Allah to deal with Israel, the end of the genocide will come from that, not from the ICJ rulling.
South Yemen’s blockade is certainly hurting Israel and making it way harder for the US to supply Israel while Hesbolla’s strikes are successfuly spliting Israel on 2 fronts, all of that is very good, and yes it is effective, but they’re not gods, they can only do so much, Ansar Allah can only blockade the red sea, they can’t do anything about the supplies comming from the Mediteraneean, and Hesbolla, while very competent, must keep in mind that the IDF despite all the paper-tiger behavior they showed are still a well equiped modern military supplied by the world’s first military power, they can’t act recklessly and they know that, which is why they are not going all out against Israel (yet).
However, you are correct in saying that they are reliable support that Hammas can count on.
Give them some time, and with the current unraveling on US influence, they will win against Israel eventually.
As soon an the US can’t support them anymore, Israel will be done for, they will fall like Saigon when the US finally left Vietnam.
I mean, it’s good to have hope. It would be awsome if the ICJ will stopped the genocide.
But I’m telling you, you’ll be disapointed in the end.
Either way, well see what happen when it does.
And there are many ways for member states to enforce the ICJ’s decision on ISRAEL (IDK why I have to keep repeating myself on this single point) and the US if they get mentioned as well, economic sanctions are just one of them.
What ways then?
Unless Israel forces itself to become a recognized colony of the US, you don’t have a case here.
How so? Israel doesn’t have to be a “recognized colony” or whatever for this to be about US interest in the region. There is a reason why the US is Israel’s largest foreign arms supplier and Israel is one of the coutries who buy the most american weapons in the world.
Israel is the only coutry in the middle east who is willing to do the US’s bidding there without questions, if it disapear, all the US will have left will be a shaky alliance with Saudi Arabia and a fragile ocupation in Iraq, and with Iran just next door, without Israel those too will be gone sooner rather than later as the middle eastern country realize that now that the US can’t do shit to them anymore they can freely make an allience that makes much more sense for their geopolitical interests with Iran.
And without any influance there the US has no way of stealing middle eastern oil or to at least presure middle eastern countries to sell their oil in dollar and severe concurence to american oil company will soon apear which the US doesn’t want.
IDK why you guys insist on arguing with me about some of the most basic shit. It’s almost like you support genocide but are too afraid to come out and say it.
Saying that an ICJ rulling wont stop the US from doing whatever they want isn’t supporting genocide, it’s being realistic and realizing that the US wont stop pursuing their interests just because an organization with “international” in it’s name scolded them.
OF COURSE it would be good if that made the US stop, but we are analysing a real life geopolitical situation, not power-of-friendship shonen where the good guy convince the bad guy that it’s not very nice to not be nice with a speach.
How would the ICJ rulling stop the US?
The ICJ DO NOT have the power to enforce it’s rullings, especialy not on the US.
Not to mention, like everyone here keep showing you, all of the instences where did not respect an ICJ rulling in the past.
They already did it and nothing happened, there is no reasons to think it would be any different this time.
If today the ICJ rules that Palestinians have been victims of genocide, that war is ending in the next few days/weeks.
This is naive. Like we keep teling you, the US has made it a habit to go against decisions from intrenational institutions like the UN, the ICJ etc. Nothing has ever happened to them as a consequance of that behavior. If they decide to keep backing Israel’s genicide anyway, which they without a doubt will, there will be very little consequances for them at best.
That wont change anything even if they are. Their geopolitical iterest in the middle east are at bay, they just won’t care and will continue to support Izrael anyway. That’s what they always do.
Anyway, here’s to hoping other nations will do the right thing when the ICJ ruling is passed and hold all the financial supporters of genocide against Palestinians to account.
They wont.
The fundamental rule of economic sanctions is: never assume you wont be sanctioned back. Nations who attempt to sanctions Israel’s economic backers will be sanctioned back by those very economic backers, among which is the US, a country who hold a massive deals of control over the global economy through the US dollar, the curency which is used for the majority of international trade and which every countries hold assets and reserves in. Not to mention the fact that despite the massive ongoing deindustrialization the US is still the world’s second major exporter and importer. Almost any economy cut from them would imediatly enter a massive economic ressetion. You can’t just sanction coutries and expect everythong to be hunky-dory ICJ rulling or not.
A lot of these countries are at least ally of the US if not pupets, don’t count on those to do anyting about it if the US decide that they don’t care what the ICJ says.
As for the coutries that aren’t, what they can do is very limited, they can place embargos and apply sanctions but that’s about it, they certainly won’t perform any military actions against the US even if they are in theory able to because they aren’t stupid and understand that a war with the US won’t end well for them even if they win.
Even without going that far, the actions that can be taken against the US are limited because since in the real world coutries aren’t closed off pocket universes and are rather part of the same world and all connected by economy, politics, history and geography in some ways, any actions taken by one country against an other will have consequances for the PERPETRATOR of those actions as well.
How do they keep not respecting ICJ rullings against them and their allies then? Like, bruh. This shit is not magic. Without a structure that would be able to physicaly force the US if and all of it’s intricate global military alliance to respect the rulling if nessessary, which there are none of currently, the rullings are just empty words which they can and will ignore. It’s like expecting that convicted criminals will walk from the courtroom to the prison on their own without any escort being needed to make sure they respect their sentence.
I’m split between not wanting the US to cause more wars and kill more inocent civilians and the hope of what could come from them being more overstreched than ever on all the fronts they are fighting and getting rekt on all of them.
Just send more weapons guys! What could possibly go wrong? 
Because Israel is the only government firmly committed to doing the US’s bidding in the Middle East, they need to make sure it has all it needs because if it falls all the US will have left to exert influence in the region would be an unstable occupation in Iraq and a shaky alliance with Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
As someone who live in France and is familiar with our local discount genocide Joe and his predesessor’s shinanigans, I can guaranty you that everything you just said is bullshit.
It is trying to navigate this mess in order to keep civil peace in a very very tense context.
No it’s not, it’s trying to cover up it’s fellow US vassals. Anyone who followed the unrest in France in the past few years knows full well that when French official says they want “civil peace” what they really mean is “the proletariat and minorities are crushed back in their place and the white bourgeoisie get what they want”.
France is backing Israel because it is in dept with Jewish people over its collaboration during WW2 and the help it provided to the Nazis in the hunt of Jewish people.
I don’t know what ghoul you heard this from but those are just excuses to whitewash the actions of the French state, I can promise you that none of the illegitimate American bootlicker freemarketeer in our government gives a shit about any of that. Also, sorry to break your “good guy bad guy” worldview but Izrael and the Zionists collaborated with the Nazis, evidences of that fact are easily found online. So that would be bullshit anyway.
Hamas is more or less aligned on IS when it comes to Western countries, that is why it is considered a terrorist organization.
I wonder why the peoples who say that there is a link between Hamas and ISIS never bring any evidence to support that claim🤔 . Could it be… That there isn’t any!? No, that can’t be…
But France is also in dept with Arabs and Muslims. It colonized North Africa for 130 years, led a bloody war in Algeria with lots of war crimes against civilians. It hosts millions of citizen of Arabic and Muslim ancestry and the government cannot pretend their opinionidoesn’t matter
Ha! So that’s why they arbitrarily arrested an arab with no charge for speaking against Izrael’s genocide of arabs, gottsha.
It has been funding schools and hospitals in Gaza, is dropping food and medicine by air for Gaza’s population. It does not provide any military assistance toI Israel which is not a member of NATO.
[citation needed] + 
So yes, France needs to regulate public speech to avoid civil unrest and violence at home
No, they that’s not why they are doing that. Again, anyone who know what has been going on in France in the last few years knows that the government don’t care if there is civil unrest and violence, they do shit that cause civil unrest and violence all the time and respond to it with even more violence.
while working toward a lasting peace between Palestine and Israel.
[citation needed] +
Why say I could and not do it? If you have sources, give them. You haven’t linked any source whatsoever in this entire thread to back up your wild claims.