What do you love?
If we use the common definition of patriotism -- love of, and loyalty to, one‟s country -- the first question that arises is, what is meant by country? Nation-states, after all, are not naturally occurring objects. What is the object of our affection and loyalty? In discussions with various community groups and classes since 9/11, I have asked people to explain which aspects of a nation-state -- specifically in the context of patriotism in the United States -- they believe should spark patriotic feelings. Toward whom or what should one feel love and loyalty? The answers offered include the land, the people of a nation, its culture, the leadership, national policies, the nation‟s institutions, and the democratic ideals of the nation. To varying degrees, all seem like plausible answers, yet all fail to provide a coherent answer to that basic question.

When we published our latest book – Reclaiming the State: A Progressive Vision of Sovereignty for a Post-Neoliberal World – last September, Thomas Fazi and I approached the UK Guardian to see if they would publish an Op Ed by us summarising the main arguments presented in the book. We received no response. Pluto tell us that the book is one of their better sellers since it was published. And it is not as if the topic is irrelevant in the Guardian’s assessment. That is clear from the fact that on April 5, 2018, they published one of their ‘long read’ articles by Rana Dasgupta – The demise of the nation state – which is a direct refutation of the ideas advanced in our book. This ‘long read’ also falls into the same traps and analytical errors that we point out has besotted the Left side of politics since the 1970s. The article is clearly part of the Guardian’s agenda to appear progressive but, in fact, be anything of the sort. As I have noted previously, the Guardian seems content to publish a torrent of anti-Brexit articles and criticisms of Jeremy Corbyn rather than provide any semblance of balance.

Here are a few simple questions to start with:

If the nation state is dead why does Wall Street spend billions of US dollars trying to influence who wins government and once government is decided on influencing the outcome of specific legislation.

Over the period that Rana Dasgupta claims the nation state has lost relevance, the total spending in the US on lobbying has gone from $US1.45 billion (1998) to $US3.36 billion (2017) and the number of unique, registered lobbyists who have actively lobbied has risen from 10,404 to 11,502 (Source).

Why does “Dark Money” exist? Billions are spent in an effort to influence elections for the ‘nation state’. Why, if the nation state is dead?

Look at the major US donors – National Rifle Association, US Chamber of Commerce, Americans for Prosperity, American Future Fund, and more.

Why?

Why do organisations such as the Dow Chemicals spend $US13.6 million lobbying government in 2016, if the state no longer has the capacity to limit their activities?

Why do “Many of the UK’s largest companies shroud their lobbying efforts in secrecy and do not disclose their political engagements to the public or shareholders” and spend billions of pounds lobby government? (Source)

Why did “six of the big energy companies” spend “tens of millions of dollars for a climate change denial campaign, despite knowing the claims were false”? (Source)

Even though the Greek government surrendered its currency sovereignty upon joining the Eurozone, why did the ECB essentially threaten to bankrupt its financial system in 2016 at the time of the referendum if they didn’t think the government had any legislative capacity to take independent decisions?

Why in small nations such as Australia is there a multi-million dollar lobbying industry? Why do gun lobby gropus spend hundreds of thousands of dollars “helping minor rightwing parties win seats” at elections in Australia? (Source)

Tobacco, gambling, medicines, energy, and the rest – why do they outlay billions to influence government legislation if the state has withered away?

Note, the neoliberal framing going on here.

Tax bases have shifted somewhat – governments have run out of money which the rich have take for themselves and so the social-democratic welfare state has to be dismantled and the ‘moral promise’ abandoned because the governments can no long buy stuff or transfer money.

That is as a pure neoliberal myth as you will ever find. It is typical of the fake analysis that the Guardian promotes these days.

In the period that Dasgupta is considering (post 1970s), the monetary system that most nations operate within fundamentally changed.

Governments adopted fiat monetary systems and floated their currencies in international markets. That freed them from financing constraints that were present during the Bretton Woods era of fixed exchange rates.

These constraints existed even though the governments issued their own currencies because the central banks were committed to defending agreed parities between currencies, which meant that they had to withdraw currency from the system when it was facing downward pressure and vice versa in times of currency pressures upward.

In the modern era, no such financial constraints exist and so the fact that tax bases have shifted is largely irrelevant to the capacity of a national government to maintain first-class hospitals, schools and income security (the ‘welfare state’).

The reason that public infrastructure and public services are under threat and being retrenched is nothing at all to do with ‘lost’ fiscal capacity.

It is all to do with the shift in the dominant ideology that has occurred since the 1970s or 1980s depending when you start counting.

In many countries successive governments began cutting expenditures on public sector employment and social programs; culled the public capacity to offer apprenticeships and training programs, and set about dismantling what they claimed to be supply impediments (such as labour regulations, minimum wages, social security payments and the like).

The neoliberal era was in full swing.

But, importantly, neoliberalism works through the state not apart from it. The state can set the conditions that private capital has to work within.

That is why capital spend billions lobbying governments.

There was no ‘fiscal crisis of the state’, just a relentless and strengthening campaign from capital to extract more national income for profits and it used the ‘fiscal crisis’ smokescreen as a vehicle to justify all sorts of policies – privatisation, cuts to income support, deregulation that would be in their interests.

Note the causality – capital lobbied governments to change policy positions through legislation and regulation – to advance its interests.

Nothing has been done independent of the state!