International Socialists

Mike Tait looks at how big business is benefiting from the "war on terror"

 

 

A stone's throw from the Beehive in Wellington is one of the biggest monuments to social democracy in New Zealand - the huge, temple-like dome of the railway station foyer. Inside that dome is a plaque commemorating the partnership between the state and the Fletcher business empire, then just a fledgling construction firm.

 

It was the1930s Labour Government's state house building programme, not competition on the free market, that laid the foundations of the Fletcher family's wealth. James Fletcher served on a Cabinet appointed building committee and, hey presto, Fletcher Construction won half the government contracts to build state houses.

 

Rhetoric

The rabid free market rhetoric of Reagan, Thatcher and our own Roger Douglas, which blamed government meddling for recession, was always a lie. The free market can't survive without state support - to tide them over tough times, to carry the cost of building basic infrastructure, to smash open markets, or crush national rivals.

 

Just as interventionist governments from the US to Nazi Germany saved capitalism from the 1930s Depression by building dams, railways, and roads (and going to war), so businesses always come back to the state for a dip into workers' pockets to tide them over the next recession.

 

But there's no better time for corporations to rally round the flag (or feeding trough) than wartime. During wartime, the media muzzles itself, and substitutes emotion for information. Wages and conditions at work are shoved off the agenda - and military efficiency and unquestioning obedience become the highest civic virtues. But best of all, state spending increases massively.

 

 

Military IT

Aeronautics and armament firms are the traditional beneficiaries of wartime spending, and with US defence spending set to hit $396 billion next fiscal year, there should be plenty to go around. But the new kid on the block is the information technology sector.

 

Before the terrorist strikes, US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld was on a collision course with the Pentagon over the future direction of the US military. Rumsfeld favoured cutting back on Cold War weapons designed for use against a Soviet style enemy. He wanted a smaller, more flexible force that could blow away any opposition through vastly superior military technology.

 

The "war on terror" means that Rumsfeld can invest in high tech weapons without taking the big war toys away from the Pentagon generals.

 

 

Video game fantasy

These weapons include unpiloted aerial vehicles - which have been used in Afghanistan. In the ultimate video game fantasy, CIA operatives in the US can fly remote controlled planes in Afghanistan, and use "Hellfire" to kill the locals. Robot machines are also being made for the army and the navy. Along with space based radar and new global communications systems, the US defence budget will pump billions into the IT industry.

 

But the real windfall will be in surveillance technologies. Airlines are rushing to bring in a data mining program that will swiftly compile a personality profile on all fliers; massive surveillance camera programs and the sophisticated technology that make them effective are suddenly publicly acceptable; and the US Coast Guard has demanded "smart card" identification for all seafarers. The US defence department has already ordered cards for 4.3 million personnel, and may extend them to more of the 23 million names on the defence department's database, including family members, retired military personnel and contractors.

 

Technology firm ActivCard, which provides the software, has reported a flood of fresh interest from governments worldwide since the 11 September attacks, according to ZDnet. The US deal could herald a new source of demand for smart card makers, whose sales have been stifled by a year-long slowdown in mobile phone sales and the slow take-off of chip-based bank cards in the US.

 

"This is extremely important, not only to us, but to the whole smart card industry. It's the biggest Java-based smart card order yet," ActivCard Senior Vice President Tom Arthur said. "The level of interest has clearly accelerated since the attacks. Before, we had about a dozen interested parties. Now we have a dozen government projects in the pipeline from Europe, Asia and the Middle East, a dozen more from US federal agencies and state departments and a handful of projects from European and Asian militaries," Arthur said.

 

 

Capitalism means regimentation

Remember the heady days of the IT boom, when fun-loving whizkids were heralding in a new age of business? Not just business, in fact, but new society, philosophy etc etc. The old days of grumpy grey suited capitalists and grimy, disgruntled blue collar masses were over. The information boom that was supposed to be revolutionising the economy and society turned out to be a bubble, and the grumpy grey suited bosses cancelled credit until the whizkids learned who was boss.

 

The flexibility of the new technology, especially the varied and vibrant communication over the Internet, seemed to promise a new kind of technology, antithetical to the coal mines, steel works, and auto factories that many associate with capitalism. Even the name of computer multinational Microsoft seems to invert that particularly American value "bigger is better."

 

But there are limits to the amount of diversity the system can tolerate. Few firms would hesitate if they were given the choice between many diverse demands from a splintered market, and one massive deal with the world's most monolithic customer - the US military. Information technology can be tested to its limits developing weapons, communications, and control systems for the military, with little fear of a fickle market.

 

 

Technological advances

The technological advances of the last twenty or thirty years have been staggering, and they have immense potential. But on their own technological changes cannot overcome the hierarchy and exploitation that characterises work.

 

In the last analysis, the wealthy few who govern this world have no interest in getting rid of hierarchies. Whether in real time or cyberspace, this elite has the ability to control the way technology is used: either nice, by cutting off funds; or nasty, with cops and guns.

 

So long as a wealthy elite dominate the economy, new technology will always be perverted to keep the system the way that it is. This means labour-saving devices allow you to work longer; and communication devices that allow them to keep tabs on you.

 

We're not in the Matrix though, and technology - machines - are neither good nor evil. It takes human agency to change society, whether for better or worse. And the only human force that can get rid of hierarchy, exploitation and oppression is resistance by working people to the militarisation of society, against long hours of work, and against the roll back of hard won civil rights.

 

In resisting the system, the potential for a new society is born, where information technology can be used creatively, and its development isn't hampered by competition and crisis; or perverted by Pentagonic killing machines.