America is undergoing shock therapy.
It has been a year since Naomi Klein’s book “The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism” made its debut, but it seems even timelier and more relevant today. Through on-the-ground reporting and years of historical research, the journalist and documentary filmmaker rejects the claim that Milton Friedman’s free-market economic policies are as peaceful of a force as he presents them. Using examples such as General Pinochet’s coup in Chile in the 1970s, the Iraq War and post-Katrina New Orleans, Klein argues that the Friedman followers implemented a radical policy of privatization and deregulation to profit in times of violence, shock and vulnerability. What she calls the “Disaster Capitalist Complex” allows for corporations to benefit heavily from destruction, upheaval and economic instability.
In a recent article on the Huffington Post, Klein asserted that the next big series of shocks has begun.
The necessary symptoms are in order. Economic crisis, shock, panic and a subsequent blind-sided opportunistic approach that ultimately ceases to benefit those most in need.
The threatening and panicked rhetoric of our leaders forced lawmakers to rush into legislation deemed deeply flawed and ineffective by bipartisan voices. On the Senate floor, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said, “under this bill, the CEOs and the Wall Street insiders will still, with a little bit of imagination, continue to make out like bandits.”
Sanders vehemently opposed the bill, arguing that it does not effectively address the very serious problems that caused this crisis and lacks the necessary oversight to remedy the deregulation fervor, not to mention that it does not address foreclosures and executive compensation nor does it address the growing unemployment rate and low wages.
The speed of the bill’s passage and gaping holes in logic eerily mimics the post-9-11 Bush administration sweep to pass both the Patriot Act and a vote to fund the “war on terror”. Perhaps shock and legislate is the administration’s mantra. When the public is disorientated, as they are amid a disaster or economic crisis, the shock doctrine comes into play. We regress to a state of vulnerability akin to that experienced after electroshock therapy used on subjects in covert CIA experiments, clinging to the first means of comfort available (in this case the ‘bailout’ bill and our leaders). The first shock has emanated, robbing us financially; time will soon reveal if new leadership will choose to profit from the shock, using it as an excuse to push partisan policy or call for stringent regulation.
To examine the current crisis in the Shock Doctrine lens is both revealing and frightening. Whatever approach of reform we adopt, given the state of our economic and political system, it must come loudly, boldly and from the grassroots. Unfortunately, Tresury Secretary Henry Paulson, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs who earned $38 million in bonuses in 2005, will not be our white knight, nor will we see E. Stanley O’Neill, the executive officer of Merrill Lynch, shovel some of his $161 million severance package our way. And I doubt the Richard Fuld of Lehman Brothers is going to help bail us out with the $354 million he made in total compensation over five years.
It has been painfully clear the Bush administration has not held up the public interest; it is now time for us to be the opportunists. Klein reminds us that if our government is able to ask for an inordinate amount from us without question, we should surely be allowed to ask for some things back, starting with caps on executive pay and help on foreclosures.
It is easy to get lost amid the shock waves of panic and feel compelled to act now, and act fast. But if we don’t stop and question the crisis in terms of serious reform and long-term solutions, in terms of who this legislation is really benefiting most, in terms of how we can push for equality and resist the shock treatment, we will be left financially and politically bankrupt for years to come.
And, thanks to Klein, this outcome won’t come as a shock.
Naomi Klein will be speaking in Austin on Oct. 12 at 6 p.m. at St. Andrews Presbyterian Church. Tickets can be purchased in person or by phone from MonkeyWrench Books, 110 E. North Loop, 512-407-6925.
Tuma is a journalism senior.
