uh. uh. uh. uh. there. are. a lot and very very big welcome to worlds apart as you can probably gas some joining us now from our usual studio guys from the campari dock my old almost going to conference reach over the last couple of weeks of self isolation has become and being overbearing and while most of us can't wait to go back to our normal lives

it's hard to tell what normal even means at this point how will the college 19 ordeal changed the way we run our politics economy and social relations well it just doesn't amount joined by william robinson professor of sociology at the university of california at santa barbara professor romans and it's good to talk to you thank you for your time thank you for having me on i can see that you're also connecting with us from your whole no no the only one you have in a whole order war almost a month. what it's been like for you. well we're on yeah we're on lockdown the university closed over a month ago in the 1st week of march and we moved to online education i mean this is a completely different light we know won't last forever but i also think that we're never going to go back to normalcy it will be by normalcy is great pandemic now

you've been writing about the perils of capitalism globalization for many years and i think it's fair to say that you've been pretty sure radical about it by the standards of the wall street journal i wonder if these last weeks and months have changed your analysis in any way not at all i think it confirms my analysis i've been arguing for the last decade or so that what we're capitalism crisis is both a structural crisis and it is also a crisis of state when you're going to see in a capitalist edge of money and this pandemic did not cause the crisis you know only major they asked me yesterday and may and revealed to the whole world and it's going to aggravate all of that the dimensions of the crisis the health emergency relents but we're still going to be left with this dual crisis of structural the structural crisis of the economy and the political crisis of state legitimacy and have generally been mainway how base that structural crisis manager after it's off

is very interested and accelerating inequality you know they told her sound a warning more than buy it we. undermined capitalism a. nation difficult to function it's a bit like a snake eating its own tail i wonder how do you think because 19 condemning is going to just bag these. struggling system do you think it's going to x. and it's like time by a little bit or do you think it will be ultimately to final blow to. don't know if this is going to be the final blow to the global capitalism no not at all i wish that were the case now but to be honest with you i'm a democratic socialist but let's look at what's happened a global inequalities are simply unprecedented we've never seen these levels you mentioned one percent controls over 50 percent of the world's well but the more

relevant data is that 20 percent of the world's people those that could supply them the system control 95 percent of the world's wealth so 80 percent of the world's population and that's somebody they cannot consume and so that one will economy has been pouring out over recent years and decades more and more well but the global market cannot appeal well so that has let's a. stagnation this has been a crisis waiting to happen this year actual dimension of a crisis and i just say you know it would have happened without the fibrous that myself but many others have been talking about us being on the verge of a major recession even deeper than a rigid a moratorium on its debt that would have triggered this giant structural crisis and the measures that are being taken now to address merchants see them temporary measures but they're going to aggravate the long term structural dimensions but i think what bastes. ahmed 19 or deal dreams. been assassin

or structural agree justin and what i mean by that is that global production change will have to reconfigure if i may you wanted an operating governments including the american government i now actively thinking about bringing to production oh. supply home and data hardly a positive development when the transnational capital classes. yes but that's temporary on the contrary what i refer to as transnational elites have been some have been actually well 1st of all the measures taken by governments especially the u.s. government is 0 is good is very similar to 2006 and those. only going to aggravate you until morning structural contradictions of global capitalism i think the problem is with the thinking it's our in the thinking and if planning because one thing that the creatures of capitalism have now been taking into account is a risk that the global economy can come to

a halt their weight happened over the last couple of weeks and months and once you factor that enter your notion of profitability changes dramatically all of a sudden the world stops being your only star and it's easy to see how localizing production and consumption in a wide specific area may see like if they are auction and i prefer a guy x. actually it's going to give bill a big governments and local communities more bargaining power in dealing with this huge company well this chamber that doesn't mean they're going to get their way i mean the only way out of this crisis is a major restructuring of the system it cannot continue with this nail liberal capitalist it was a should model of the last several decades but so far what states are doing in a suggestion made to the principle state in the world the strongest in the world the united states is repeating what we did in 2008 which is to send mr amounts of resources to the banks so you are right that we can't continue the way we were and

you're also right that a lot of transnational beats and state officials are recognizing that but that doesn't translate into the banks and the global corporations that drive the global economy to actually force them to undertake major restructuring and there is a robinson to be a fairy fairy i think what we see around the world is the government's giving assistance not only to use and large industries but also to the most vulnerable citizens there is a lot of talk about the introduction of basic income many governments are sending checks that isn't maybe that's not an odd. i think that. that's a bit of a difference from how it was handled in 2008 let's look at this the figure and this is the economist magazine economist just gave us a speaker that already 7 trillion dollars have been approved at least stimulus packages just in to european union and the united states 1st of all the best

majority of that is going to corporate bailouts and secondly it's going into injection of money into the banks to do it they want the banks are not obliged to help poor yes yes they're released true grounds but they're not going to resolve the structural crisis they're basically crimes that are better in some countries like germany and denmark right here in united states $2400.00 for a family of you know 2 grand winners is absolutely nothing it's irrelevant perms and well when you multiply it by millions that have actual lot of money you've taken out of a state coffers you know it's a few billions of dollars it's absolutely not and but but look at something else also there's also billions of dollars here in the united states going to small business they are getting long in 3 months they have to pay back that. so there's no real fundamental restructuring here the same thing for instance the i.m.f. just announced a trillion dollar package for poor countries and us and it's an

a moratorium on current more tournament patients but once they have to resume payments we're going to be back in the same situation. as are on the internet isn't it also a chair that initially one shadows sat. stimulus measures right now as they were in one line with what has been done before but i think the governments are and asking it as they go away and there is no act or there are already a discussion in the united states that some of those loans can be written off even to companies keen to die and lawyers or the majority of the employees employed so. i think we can be certain how did this how wrong the state is going to ultimately manifest itself that well let's put it like this the battle for what will happen after the health emergency itself as this is now underway and there are certainly many horses here among the states among transnational waste that are saying we need a major restructuring and this is the starting point for these kind of can as in

stimulus measures and the really programs and if these voices win them then that would be that would certainly be a way forward but currently we don't have any indication that they're going to or not and the real economic and financial i was in the main with the banks and we name with those sectors of the global or corporate class that are simply course in some more profit making and more sturdy now you mentioned a moment ago that they see this crisis as a crisis of state legitimacy and i think many political strategists would disagree with you because. they would suggest that this crisis if anything has reasserted the importance of a nation state you mean just like you don't shrug i know you do but it is don't know chopra's telling g.m. what to do not the other way around hasn't called it 19 actually reasserted the importance of nations maybe as a way to reorganize our social lives absolutely i'm not arguing anything

differently and on the contrary the crisis demonstrates that we need a state we need sentence aventura in the market in the economy we need state regulation when i speak about a crisis of state richard a receiver generally i'm not referring to that own research into how billions of people around the low. world don't consider their own governments in their own states legitimate don't trust in those governments and in a capitalist system to resell their survival needs. to mention trunk you know one of the articles here accusing him of quote criminal inaction and as a spy i took it upon himself to close borders before it became standard practice he took a lot of criticism for that as well i'm sure one can find many people's records actions but isn't it inevitable that any government would be elaborate in dealing with so many and ylem's. and then in the case of look up trump this is very clear the timeline is very clear on january 30th the world health organization declared

local and out of the global emergency and trump all he did after that announcement was to suspend flights from china and we lost all of that during the 1st quarter part question of march it wasn't until march 14th the jump just layered a national emergency so we lost 6 weeks and during those 6 weeks trump was saying that this is a democratic hopes that the whole economy is going to reopen in april 1st that more people die of the flu than of this pandemic so absolutely you can't defend trump is criminal inept it's a no that's not the case for other governments around the world i mean look at the fantastic job that the south korean government did much i just reopened again but as far as is trump i would defend that criminal ineptitude and i know that you have an issue with lawyers add. that at a moral and ethical category act previous a couple of years ago that in the beautiful fair world of in the future we'll have to i downed a national citizenship and when it comes to and gag orders really very

line of the pants i may not well yes for a health emergency but that's very different than what i've been arguing we have several hundreds of millions of trans national migrants we have an increasingly globally it's a great reduction service and financial system and capital and corporations have been moving around the world in finance with many more accelerated fashion for the last few decades and yet people and people have been to an increasingly economy such as the u.s. economy is dependent on transnational my gran's are but puzzles my hands migrants when they go from one person to another of the world economy and play a critical role in that economy they don't have civil rights they don't have medical rights they don't have the rights of citizenship so that's an extremely unjust arrangements. have been there also any chance of borders would tell you that they are also driving the wages down as make labor protections while the local.

population is far more precarious do you think they're wrong on that. absolutely they're wrong because 1st of all here in the united states we have our right here in california which is one of the best of all worlds now we have an incredible labor source shortage the if this health crisis continues california will collapse and the majority of those articles will workers are immigrants and i don't know any u.s. citizens that can get any job that has for political rights that want to go in extraordinary in the field but that's not the larger issue i think wait. a minute and after g a week so much of isolation i'm sure there will be a lot of people we should use it become stronger is i mean i want to pull out your mike now i'm so sick and tired of you know we have to take a short break right now and perhaps if you're if you are. one of the. working from home but maybe we'll be back in a few moments thank you. toby

19 pandemic not only sees much of the world in lockdown but it is also devastated economies the pandemic has been painful recovery from it maybe even more painful is it all asians fault. welcome back to rules of the park with william robinson professor of sociology abby

university of california santa barbara should i said speaking of balbi response to this and demi. i think it's a big county and even ironic that the countries with the most laissez faire economies like let's say the united states had to impose such cabaye restrictions on businesses while a country like sweden and this became the old one and a socialist chose not to do that which approach you're more sympathetic to. absolutely the traumatic a lockdown is crucial and necessary in the united states and european countries with that and then the kit but my biggest concern of me has wrestle with the whole world and the lockdown which is imposed for instance in india in the central american countries and south africa where 6070 percent of the population is in the informal sector and besides that a lot of it if you're homeless if you don't spam always living in one single rooms

also project money left on the measures that we do need in italy you know in france in the united states and russia is actually a death sentence for a $100.00 you know hundreds of millions or billions of people in other parts of the world yeah that's actually a very crucial point that south isolation of the strategy if you are sending this pandemic is a privilege that not everybody can afford now and we are yet to see how different approaches that how outcomes in different countries i think it's fair to say that for the time being more tense when then and in the united states the dow toll continues to climb but i think it's also cheery that these kind of belong down is absolutely unprecedented i mean it's a shame really invented the history of capital is nothing of the sort has ever been that something on cheers shoggoth by there is this scale of bread and be out of egypt reach it was instituted almost everywhere in the world i mean the lid reaches

countries of the well that means right you know what but what that shows is if the major states in the world can almost overnight lock down the population and close down the economy for the health emergency then the same can be done through the economic and social emergency that we've been facing long before the content i mean that moves the points and that and that also through the claim that perhaps they said transnational capital is i'm not as. strong and carter planted in the actual as in your theory them to be. no i don't think that proves the point at all because again if again you know this lockdown and the paralysis of the company is very temporary but there are measures taken and that's why i stress this points earlier the measures taken to take trillions of dollars and give merits of the banks to do as they will suggests that the transnational capitalist class is going to come out

of this winning unless you know there's there's both state give there's more i'm like members of the elites and states and unless there's also some mystery government you know mass strikes and pressures from vermont to do something different. i mean because europeans are talking about bad before and that if the banks in deep can keep me and read that old ways that would be true that will reduction and because as you very adequately argue you know capitalism can all go on for the like bad be destruction or limb balance that exists where you know they don't reach having all the money and the rest of us having no money to spend ultimately makes capitalism incapable of functioning why should they come up with some their alternative for that state yes absolutely but the thing is that individual corporations individual a capitalist have only one thing that they're interested in is maximizing profit so we need state and mess up your control and regulation will return pittel and i hate

to be the point but let's remember what happened in 2008 it was clear that we needed major restructuring and from 2000 a to 2020 not only did we not get a major restructuring of the system but all of the programs were deep bench so the lessons of 2008 say that after we get these you know the health emergency things are going to continue to deepen to get worse unless states and lightens elites and masses for below have the ability to impose a restructuring and general. an accent on who you know character it on the trans national cut will split us. i know that you believe that randomness and damage is all more at many of our societies will look more like police they said or rob there and cruel will police say isn't that a bit too just ok and because even if some governments that prompts you to temptation of making this emergency powers more permanent their resources for maintaining this sort of regime indefinitely actually and we deplete it it's not in

that interest you know right before this in december 2019 u.s. congress approved over $800000000000.00 write the biggest military budget in in in history right now the central lloyd's coordination of this crisis to deal with it and we need but truly decentralized coordination isn't sense of occasion of control of surveillance of the movements of people and so what lose no reason to assume that they counter with states especially the u.s. they began which is a center of the world you know the global system and the military industrial complex there's no reason to believe that they're going to pull back and what i call the increasing move towards of local police states right now we have a wave of strikes and mass discontent the united states to the extent that there is more rebellion from below against global inequality right and against and against everything going on to the extent that it escalates after the emergency is lifted

we're going to have more pressure from above to impose social control on track connie and we'll look at the state take measures that any police face that matters that require centralization and i think over in this crisis we haven't seen because of centralization yard talking about the many of the traditionally more essential eyes space like russia and china that has been. you know we've seen from delegation of decision making to regional authorities and i think even in the united states the federal government has been acting more like. sort of you know has been lying charges logistics than anything else what is there to support this theory is over global police state i mean if. there is a known global community anymore everybody is scary for them south of time what i mean by global police state is that 1st of all as we started this interview with these incredible mobility quality and unless those inequalities are a mirror related the really roots need to clamp down on the best discontent

rebellion which is generated by that inequality whether or not the clampdown is centralized and giants states and certainly remember it will be a police state is that increasingly the whole local economy has been calling itself out of stagnation by wars and by conflicts and system of social control and repression and unless there is an alternative willing out of stagnation the global can as you newsom's on social spending from raising will demand there's no reason to expect we're not going to see more intensified conflict around the world which becomes very difficult for corporations and banks that finance themselves or. you know i have a child in the soviet union and i think the major difference between the old style author of clarity of public mind a century and be there to use that allegory terry neal is exactly how digital those social controls are when the state openly that crisis it's the place clear which is why they got splendid when it's done a great clique when people believe that they are actually really when dad being

controlled it's much harder to resist or is or they hold wanting to craigslist who knew the ability of people being in charge on their own lives and if you are too harsh read police matters it will become apparent that they are not. right well i think this you know to let the global police state beats down on 2 different populations that 20 percent you and i 1 then have the listeners who can get a bite maybe even florissant of this this system sure there's more surveillance on us our own store now going to be you know monitor every movement and so forth but but we're not the principal you know targets of the global police say the principle targets are again you know that the 700000000 transnational refugees and people in war zones the targets of global police they don't where for instance war so at least by the united states in iran or in iraq just in order to generate costs in those places of them they have just left displacement you know destruction of their

lives that are victims of global police state i mean it's not so much human rights here well i think there are many 20 percent are also struggling quite a lot i tend to approach these issues from a public health risk that there and i think that the current consumerist system at least the way to exist in the united states and the way of being spread around the world is outlawing ultimately decide who are. an addict a neurotic middle volatile a disordered individual who consumes more than he or she needs who waste just as much and well out of it now becomes a cash cow one medical and all are all sorts of services i mean to some extent you know karkare ations are a just and i was living longer but having miserable life so that me do you know source of income and i wonder do you think college 19 would be big enough and riskier who are people to pay more attention to how they choose to consume yeah

but i mean you're making a really good point and i have to add that you know full blown critique of consumerism but you know one of the good things i see coming out of this emergency is the nail role model which again i mean i don't like global capitalism. but particularly its nail liberal variant has been in place for several decades and what isn't generated at the cultural in the social level is consumerism narcissism individual ism and alienation as you pointed out but what we're seeing now is that this health emergency is sparking a new sense of solidarity of mutual aid of connectedness to other people so again the this emergency is a turning point and what's going to come after it not just in terms of the economy that we've been speaking about acquittal systems but in terms of you know consciousness and cultural systems as one open now to struggle what comes next and while i was speaking about this nearly your own model there are some actually especially here in russia who believe that the crisis of capitalism that created

this guy right now was in many ways sort of ad dream determined by the collapse of the sony of uni and and the discrediting all the leftist ideas based on being an ideological balance to your liberal ideas which ultimately produce this runaway globalization and inequality what norm would dare say if going to take some hybrid of richard gere have any idea. what mission be expiring is here i think the type of restructuring we need to struggle horn's clients or at this point involves extending like what we have right now is definitely spending and knesset in stimulus we most need to restore tour towards a global can as it is and that raises global demand among that 80 percent we need to move towards systems where states once again regulate the market regulate what corporations and financial institutions can do we need to rebuild public sectors especially public and also educational sectors and social welfare systems we need

to tax the rich and have progressive taxation rather than repressive taxation we need to have capital controls on financial speculation across borders we need kroger policies we need in the united states and we've been calling the green new jails all of that is what we need and it's even within global capitalism that's not moving beyond. well and professor robinson we also have to leave it there because our time is up but i'm really grateful to you for sharing your insights with us today thank you thank you so much for having me on. thank you for watching and hope to syria and next week on the world apart as they say and stay at home. mom.

but. you. certainly did not.