I have to say that in my criticism of the Left I haven't been nearly critical enough of Capitalism. But then, it seemed to go without saying. I mean, I was criticising the Left for its failure to adequately address the problems of Capitalism, and for its insistence on a binary Left/Right divide, this divide being inadequate to the complexity wrought by the collapse of the worldwide economy.

Obama's calls for curbs on US banks, today, draw attention to this issue again, and talk on the European side of the Atlantic centres around amazement at a Right wing administration doing what a Left wing administration in Europe daren't. Of course, as we have seen in blog discussions recently, Obama is often taken as a Leftist in the U.S - or at the least, a Left-leaning Democrat - which chalks up even more clearly the daftness of political binarism.

In any case I'd have to say that Capitalism is by definition bad as it implies a system that seeks capital above all else (and that has seriously negative ethical implications). On this note, there are few sensible politicians that characterise themselves as out and out Capitalists, preferring at least to add the prefix 'Global' or 'Free Market', but often just characterising themselves as 'Liberals' (forward thinking and adverse to State Control) or 'Conservatives' (cautious, and adverse to State control on the whole). But then we have other factors which come into play, which can have any political party employing policies traditionally associated with another.

This is partly why it seems so odd to cleave to the politics of the Left. Though I appreciate that the term 'Left' might be employed to signify certain values and a history traced to any one of a number of significant Leftist events of the past, which may hold positive value for the self proclaimed 'Leftist'. In this it is pretty clear that the new 'Brit-Pack' of thinkers, Mark Fisher, Owen Hatherley, Nina Power, et al. are variously committed to certain Leftist principles without being beholden 'lock, stock' to the Leftist cause. At the moment I'm finding Mark Fisher the most convincing (see here for my review-article of his 'Capitalist Realism...')  - and the most questioning of traditional Leftist forms - of this crop, though I think Owen does an important service, placing architecture at the centre of social-political considerations.

In any case Capitalism = bad, provided there are no provisos on it, clearly. What I question however is whether the Left = good, when that Left will not work with advocates of the 'Right', who are rarely 'Capitalists' per se, but rather by default, often counting as the principle motive for not affiliating themselves with the 'Left' either an urge to preserve what is 'good' about existing institutions (though one wonders if there is anything good left of them following Thatcherism and Blairism) or an urge to reform where necessary (and this often entails reforms of a Leftist nature), both coupled with a disdain for State control. They do not count among their motives an urge to rinse the masses for every last drop of Capital they can gain from them, though this is an end result of the autonomous Capitalist machine which many Conservatives and Liberals agree would agree needs addressing.

New Labour seem to have coupled State control with undiluted Capitalism, and now they're about to take lessons from U.S. Democrats on Leftist policy making. Given that extraordinary situation, my disdain for Leftist rhetoric simply aims itself at its appearing completely out of touch with the times (nothing tallies with the old Left/Right boundaries anymore), rather than at calls for equality, community, etc, which really just sit in the political minds of most reasonable people as aspirations anyhow, without necessarily becoming a rallying cry.*

With that I think I might make the unfashionable move back to art critique next post.

*Though I co concede that these aspirations are far from being realised, and seem in some senses ever more distant. I just question to what extent 'assent' or 'dissent' towards the growing distance of these aims can be drawn along traditional 'party' lines. It may be that fair minded people need find allies everywhere if there is to be any hope of slowing the autonomus machine that Capital clearly has become, before it spawns too many of its own 'machines', its own allies, and makes, for as long as we have it, the subjective freedom of the mind the only freedom we have (that being my principle motive for defending the notion of the 'subject' against object-oriented philosophy). We really are approaching a politics of the subject vs. the object if we cannot quickly salvage a democratic politics whereby subjects interact together for the good of the community.