Politicians meet global warming at last, or again?

Well, good news for groenlinks, one might say. De Stern report get the attention of bloggers (not only from this planeet) elsewhere. Even my Venezuelan friends are hot on the issue, even if their incomes depend on selling the black gold (or devil's shit, as oil was known around hundred years ago). Even Blair is paying Gore to spin more attention to the dangers of global warming. Groenlinks might claim, again, to be in the avant garde of the political thinking for the future.

Now, one wonders. It is a bit surprising that so many people seems so excited about this report. Similar research is known since long time ago. Take, among many others, a paper published in Nature back in 2001. (De Leo et al, 413: 478-479) Then the authors already researched on the winnings of honouring the commitments of Kyoto. Maybe it was too much of a positive view. Back then everybody carped on the costs of Kyoto, and De Leo and colleagues, researchers associated to the university of Rome, showed that complying with Kyoto will be (or actually would have been) far cheaper than not complying with it. But hey, other issues came in the global agenda. Inflamed oil crashed on the twin towers, so we got more concerned with terrorists than with the means that gave them so much money in the first place.

Ok, five years later we might be back on track. The impact of Gore antics are not to be easily dismissed, at least up to the moment that he decides about his presidential aspirations in 2008. Blair might be on his way out of number 10, but he is another relevant actor in the international limelight, and who knows, he might come out in due time with his own filmpje.

The sarcastic tone is intended. Because, actually, what all this brouhaha shall bring? That is hard to predict. In principle, if one compares elections programs in NL today, it looks like Groenlinks has infiltrated thinkers in any other political party. Sustainability is a mainstream mantra,and even grisly right wingers talk about more money and more attention to the cause of clean air and better environment. But I keep on wondering, how much of this is to become real? Meanwhile my son takes swimming lessons in one of the two public swimming pools of Utrecht, both artificially heated, I look at the grey sky. Are we as collective willing to make the hard decisions that a reduction of pollution imply? I must say that I doubt it. Outside this bar there is a bunch of bicycles parked, from so many other parents waiting for their children. Few meters away, a busy road streams with cars, or diesel buses. Even here, in the small and flat Utrecht, cars are a main transport media. And let's not even begin with the mass consumption of energy, produced in fossil energy-guzzling factories. Our societies today consume far too much, and whether we like it or not, our lifestyle is not sustainable. Probably a election campaign is not the right moment to make headlines with it, but we should know better. The support of our life standards is costing the extinction of whole ecosystems and the poverty of a big part of the world, beyond our neat dams. To take the Stern report seriously would mean to rethink almost every step of our life. Are we able to do it? Are Gore and the Stern report enough to convince us? Or, to put a far more disgusting question: are we able to grooeimee at all, if we are to keep it sustainable?

posters

They say that an image is worth a thousand words. Let's try, for a change:



across the fence



the campaign is getting hot

Murder in amsterdam... is it really about the limits of tolerance?

For all allochtonen that care about politics, the last book of Ian Buruma is a must. And probably for dutchies too!

Buruma, as any other expat, follows the developments in his country. No surprise that he finds them shocking. How comes that the hypertolerant Netherlands has become a country that denies her glories as multicultural paradise, in such an extreme way to get politicians killed? Or ejected, in a political power play, from the country? That question, predating most of the book, is very relevant. Here in NL we might think that the integration and immigration debate is gone from the politics (as election programs have it), but in europe the issue is alive and kicking, so it will be alive, and kicking in NL for quite a while.

My concern is hat actually the book is not so much about “the limits of tolerance”, as its subtitle has it , but rather about the ways in which the world has a direct, and powerful, influence in NL politics. Two of the most poignant analysis of Buruma are about Mohammed B and about Irsi Ali. He spend great prose thinking about these two characters of our ongoing multicultural drama.

And if you think about it, both characters are telling us that the world matters right here and right now. Take Irsi Ali. The very bogus asilum seeker, (as she describes herself, and not for her faking a name) seems to have imported her political concerns into dutch politics. Her war does not seem to be the emancipation of (muslim) women. Buruma vividly describes a chat that keep Ali busy for a little while with muslim women, and her haughty dismissal of them. The war of Ali is rather bigger, about the way islam threatens her own view of the enlightenment. If you don't believe it, just take a look at her current job.

Or think about Mohammed B. Surely he -rather dramatically- illustrate the process of alienation that our underclass of economical and social outsiders can (or is) going through.. But the alienation of Bouyeri is well connected with the broader world. Buruma clearly illustrates the naivety of some thinkers that hope for the solution of the palestina, or iraqui questions, so that the islam question might disappear as well. That is not the case. But, perhaps more relevant for european politics... would Bouyeri has gone that far, without internet videos of beheading in the middle east? Would the anger of the young muslim, living excluded in europe today, drive him to a terrorist cell, if Al Qaida would not be the PR success that it is?

So in my view, Buruma's book belongs better to the row of books that today attack, or praise, globalization. Luckily the writer is smart enough not to have subtitled it “the world is indeed flat” as Friedman did with his. But Buruma is not talking about what we call tolerance... he is talking about the tolerance of our societies to the politics beyond the damns. Quite a exciting issue, and if not convinced, think about the PvdA and her turks. But ok, that might be the issue for another column.

invited article: GroenLinkscongres: forse correcties op de partijkoers

Paulus de Wilt wrote an article that, with his permission, i reproduce here. I think is worth the reading, by far and large...

GroenLinkscongres: forse correcties op de partijkoers

Het was een beetje een vreemde gewaarwording op het congres van GroenLinks in Zwolle. Wie het vaker meegemaakt heeft, herkent de patronen. Gewoonlijk worden er slechts één of twee amendementen aangenomen tegen het preadvies in. (Per slot van rekening wil het congres laten zien wie de baas is.) Daarover ontstaat dan wat gerommel, omdat partijbestuur of programmacommissie het punt toch wel erg belangrijk vond. Dit keer ging het anders. Op een fors aantal – vaak essentiële punten – werd het programma aangepast. Maar niet de programmacommissie was teleurgesteld, maar juist de criticasters van het programma.

Enkele tientallen leden liepen zelfs boos weg bij het congres. In hun ogen was GroenLinks opgehouden een sociale partij te zijn. De lijn van Vrijheid eerlijk delen – de ‘discussienota’ van Femke Halsema en Ineke van Gent over het sociale stelsel – was onvoldoende afgewezen door het congres. Nu bevatte die discussienota 18 voorstellen – de meeste daarvan onomstreden. De kritiek richtte zich op 3 hoofdpunten: de versoepeling van het ontslagrecht, de invoering van CAO-verkiezingen en het verkorten van de WW tot 12 maanden. (Ter verduidelijking van dat laatste: na die 12 maanden krijgen de mensen een participatiebaan aangeboden op minimumloonniveau – dat bovendien 10% stijgt.)
Vreemd genoeg zou een oplettende objectieve toeschouwer denken, dat op al deze punten het programma niet de lijn van Vrijheid volgt, maar veel meer aansluit bij de traditionele standpunten van GroenLinks.
Zo werd de versoepeling van het ontslagrecht al door de programmacommissie ingeslikt: in plaats daarvan nam men op dat ‘de ontslagbescherming van flexwerkers verbeterd moet worden’ en ‘De ontslagprocedures worden kort en eenduidig’. Een aantal congresdeelnemers las dat laatste echter als een verkapte vorm van versoepeling. Amendementen om de zin te schrappen werden door het congres verworpen. Misschien jammer, maar de tekst van de programmacommissie was al een overwinning van de criticasters van de liberale koers.
Wat betreft de CAO-verkiezingen kan men zeker tevreden zijn. Dit punt werd door het congres uit het programma geschrapt. Voor degenen die het debat niet gevolgd hebben: de discussie gaat hierbij om de vraag of niet-vakbondsleden invloed moeten hebben op de CAO-onderhandelingen. Femke en Ineke bestempelden hun voorstel als een CAO-referendum. Geheel ten onrechte, omdat ze juist voorstelden de onderhandelingsdelegatie door alle werknemers te laten kiezen, niet om na afloop het resultaat voor te leggen. Door vele mensen in de vakbeweging werd dit voorstel gezien als een frontale aanval op de bonden. Immers waarom zou iemand nog lid worden van een vakbond als de belangrijkste taak – een CAO afsluiten – niet meer door de bonden zou gebeuren? Het amendement om deze ‘verkiezingen’ te schrappen werd aangenomen. Het optreden van Jup van ‘t Veld bij dit punt heeft hem duidelijk geholpen om een plek op de kandidatenlijst te verwerven (Jup werd uiteindelijk elfde).
Blijft over het punt van de verkorting van de WW-duur. Daarover ontstond een heftige discussie op het congres. Velen wilden een amendement van Amsterdam aannemen dat simpelweg zei: ‘geen verdere verslechtering van de WW’. Net als bijna alle andere amendementen met een gelijksoortige inhoud werd dit echter verworpen met een stemverhouding van ca. 45-55%. Bijna alle andere amendementen? Ja, bijna, want één amendement slipte er door. Een amendement van Den Haag dat de woorden ‘een jaar’ verving door ‘zo lang als de duur van de WW-uitkering’. Een glashelder amendement dat bovendien als toelichting had: ‘De voorstellen kunnen ook prima zonder verkorting van de WW-duur.’ Waarom het congres nou precies de voorkeur aan dit amendement gaf boven andere die hetzelfde beoogden, is voer voor exegeten. Misschien vond men de andere amendementen te defensief geformuleerd of gunde men de eer niet aan Amsterdam (per slot van rekening was er weer veel gemor over de dominantie van ‘Amsterdam’).
Hiermee waren de drie meest omstreden voorstellen uit ‘Vrijheid’ verworpen. Ook op tal van andere punten werd het programma overigens aangescherpt. Zo werd het voorstel om tussen Leiden en Haarlem een nieuwe stad aan te leggen (de ‘Bollenstad’) verworpen. Ook amendementen over bijvoorbeeld milieu en internationale politiek/terrorismebestrijding werden ondanks het verzet van de programmacommissie aangenomen. Waarom dan toch die tevredenheid bij de programmacommissie? Ik kan het niet anders verklaren dan uit een poging de uitslag naar zich toe trekken. De dag na het congres meldden de meeste kranten dat er ‘weinig veranderd’ was door het congres. Zelfs expliciet werd genoemd dat de verkorting van de WW door het congres gesteund werd! Daaruit blijkt dat het partijbestuur/de Tweede Kamerfractie/de programmacommissie (samen te vatten als ‘de partijtop’) er duidelijk in geslaagd zijn een beeld neer te zetten dat niet geheel overeenkomt met de werkelijkheid. De redenering van de partijtop blijkt als volgt te lopen: het amendement van Den Haag verandert wel de tekst, maar niet de inhoud, immers elders in het programmapunt wordt óók de termijn van één jaar genoemd, dus er verandert niets. Er zijn vier argumenten waarom deze redenering niet kan kloppen:
1. Die andere vermelding van de termijn gaat over de participatiebanen, niet over de duur van de WW-uitkering.
2. De toelichting van Den Haag was glashelder en toelichtingen bij voorstellen moeten gebruikt worden als de interpretatie eventueel niet eenduidig zou zijn.
3. Amendement en toelichting van Den Haag waren zeer kort, iedereen heeft de tijd gehad om die te lezen tussen de eerste stemming en de tweede (met kastjes, dus extra lang de tijd om te lezen).
4. Als de interpretatie van de partijtop juist zou zijn, zou er feitelijk niets veranderd zijn. Dat betekent ook dat het amendement slechts een redactionele wijziging zou zijn en dus slechts een categorie 1 amendement. Het amendement was echter categorie 3 – een belangrijke verandering op een hoofdpunt!
De teleurstelling bij de linkse oppositie in GroenLinks heeft er helaas ook aan meegewerkt dat dit heeft kunnen gebeuren. Daardoor kon het beeld ontstaan dat de partijtop gelijk had in haar interpretatie. Men had kennelijk op meer gehoopt. Sterker nog, ik denk dat velen al zolang boos waren op de ontwikkelingen in GroenLinks, dat alleen een volledige overname van de oppositionele amendementen hen nog tevreden had kunnen stellen. Toen dat niet gebeurde haakte men alsnog af.
Het blijkt dus dat voor- en tegenstanders van de liberale koers iets van hun gading uit dit congres kunnen halen. Ook bij de kandidatenlijst bleek dat. Enerzijds waren er voornamelijk kandidaten te kiezen die weinig kritisch staan tegenover de huidige koers, anderzijds moet je vaststellen dat kritische kandidaten beter scoorden. GroenLinks blijkt een complete partij te zijn met linker- en rechtervleugels. De linkervleugel dient wat zelfverzekerder te opereren en vooruitgang in haar richting ook te verkopen als een overwinning. De rechtervleugel dient wat minder arrogant te zijn en de pretentie dat zij de partijlijn bepaalt een beetje te temperen. Anders lopen we het risico onze linkervleugel kwijt te raken. Voorlopige hebben ze elkaar nog nodig.

Paulus de Wilt
Bremen, 8 oktober 2006

Fear of the other

In two crystal clear paragraphs, Joost Lagendijk is quoted today in The New York Times:

“A lot of people, progressive ones — we are not talking about nationalists or the extreme right — are saying, ‘Now we have this religion, it plays a role and it challenges our assumptions about what we learned in the 60’s and 70’s,’ ” said Joost Lagendik, a Dutch member of the European Parliament for the Green Left Party, who is active on Muslim issues.
“So there is this fear,” he said, “that we are being transported back in a time machine where we have to explain to our immigrants that there is equality between men and women, and gays should be treated properly. Now there is the idea we have to do it again.”

So it is finally official. It is not only the right wing, the one that is scared. We too. If the right is scared because the invading muslims are transforming their sacrosanct dutch culture of the fifties, now the progressive left is also scared that the invading muslims are transforming their sacrosanct dutch culture of the sixties.

I reallly regret the quotation. One can always hope that is taken out of context, but probably the New York Times don't do that. It is a real sad message, surprisingly coming from one of our most successful politicians. Joost, rightly so, is respected inside and outside groenlinks by his delicate work at the commission of the European parliament that handle the integration of Turkey to the EU. It is shocking to hear this message from him.

Is it possible that the fear that Joost put out are the reasons that groenlinks has been so long so silent on the right wings attacks on the multicultural society? Is it possible that all this time the verdonks and the fortuins of this world have make us realize that there are, after all, reasons to be afraid?

Personally, I found the declarations of Joost very wrong. Precisely now, when a second and third generation of migrants is struggling to find their place in Europe, precisely now, when being an allochtoon in the netherlands means that you have it harder to get a job, that you are going to get a lower salary, and that is likely that your education is worse, precisely now should be the time in which groenlinks goes hard for integration, and not for assimilation. Today, the problems that the migrant face in europe are real hard core problems: education, labour and housing. To go on hammering about the culture, that sacred cow of the right, is not only discriminant, but useless.

I really hope that Joost was misquoted.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/europe/11muslims.html?ref=world

werkgroepen at groenlinks utrecht

Werkgroepen, bestuurvergadering GLU 4/10

What follow are loose thinking on werkgroepen binnen the afdeling utrecht. I am starting in the bestuur of the afdeling utrecht as werkgroep coordinator, so here some brainstorming.


Thinking on werkgroepen, ideas

Werkgroepen of groenlinks utrecht are entities that move information in channels: towards the party and towards the street. Both channels should have two-direction traffic. Further, there are two sub channels: inside the party they work or towards the members, or towards the fractie. That is what I see as connections of the werkgroepen with the rest of the world. Is any connection that I am forgetting?

Then, werkgroepen do two things. Or they discuss, or they act. By discussions I think of inhoudelijke agenda points in normal meetings, or heated discussions on bars. By acts I think in giving flyers in the street, or canvassing in a neighborhood. A third option is a mixed activity such as a politiek cafe. It is an action towards the street, because it is open and might get media attention, AND it is a discussion, because it helps to form opinion.

Tracking the werkgroepen, present, short and mid term future.

In my opinion, the bestuur in her role of supporting and organizational entity must be aware of what werkgroepen are meant to do, what they are doing right now, and what they intend to do. The first is pretty much clear, since each werkgroep has a reasonably updated definition at groenlinksutrecht.nl. The third is also more or less clear, since jaarplanen has been asked and compiled from quite some werkgroepen. The second is more vaguely known.

Accordingly, this is my short term priority. In order to track the present of werkgroepen I am busy attending meetings of them this month. At the end of the year/begin of the coming one, I'll ask for jaarplanen again, even if only for the record. This time I'll ask for a evaluation of their previous jaarplan.

My mid-term priority is to set the werkgroepen work, as far as they themselves desire, in digital format. For the end of october I intend to have compiled the wishes of the werkgroepen in this regard. In middle november the bestuur and the internet redaction will be presented with the wishes of the werkgroepen. In february we will be online, inside groenlinksutrecht.nl, or outside.

Future

The whole point of the issues above is to make werkgroepen known beyond their own group of people, and to be able to evaluate their work. A functioning groenlinks must be able not only to set up goals for its institutions, but also to evaluate the road to those goals. Important to notice, any evaluation should not be imposed from above (from the bestuur, for example). Evaluation is important for the werkgroepen in first place, and for the rest of the party in second.

In this sense I intend to organize a broad werkgroepen day, to be hold around february/march. The form of such event will be more clear with further discussion in the bestuur and with the werkgroepen. A forerunner to this werkgroepen-dag should be the second trekkers overleg of 2006, to be done before the end of this year. I would like to hear suggestions of the bestuur about an optimal datum for this.

On a suggestion of Lot (afdeling vz), I am in conversations with Marjan (former fractie vz) about another werkgroep-type possibility. The fractie might be interested in having a group of people organized around a one time event. It might be write a report or organize a day with vluchtelingen. These groups will be something like ad hoc werkgroepen. Needles to say, for this idea to prosper, an updated ledenbestand has to be accessible.

Bloggers of the planet, unite!

Actually, I should say planeet... even if only this post is aimed at groenlinksers that blog...

As you people probably know, this coming saturday there is a meeting “groenlinks in de versneling”, which is for us “kaderleden” and our participation in the campaign. Probably some of you people will be already there, and probably some others of you will not be able to make it (if only because many weekends for groenlinks looks like unhealthy)

But still... what about try to get together, and have a drink and see if we could collaborate in the campaign... as bloggers?

Surely there are things that bloggers can do in a campaign context... even if only compile a list of interesting blogs and write stukjes in them, engage them in debate with groenlinks ideas and so forth...

I am looking forward at your reactions... and if in private... intiATscicha.org works.

Have lidmaatschaap, go to the congres

Easy to write about the hot moments of the congress, and its results. Actually, lazy as i am, that is what I intend to do. But hey, for the record: That was a hell of a long congress. And unneeded.

GL can do better. There is no way that some 500 persons can reasonably evaluate several hundreds of amendments, and produce a well thought group of 25 candidates for the TK. In a weekend we decided what will be the line of the party in the next four years, and who are the persons that will carry this line to reality... or change it, if they think needed.

I'm not in favour for letting this work to a commission, but neither to four hours of amendment day and some twelve hours of congress. A party like ours needs, desperately, a level of internal discussion that we do not have, yet. Congress should confirm the results of what we have been discussing. And let's be honest: there is lot of disagreement over Vrijheid Eerlijk Delen. But there are no alternatives. In my opinion we are not a party of ideas. We are a party with a TK fractie that has (good) ideas. And with a not-organized internal opposition.

Anyway. Lets mention high and low moments of the congress.

Lame speeches
Kees Vendrik, the snake charmer
Bart Snels and the big blush
Nieuwkomers I: Tofik and Arno
Nieuwkomers II: Mariko and Fara
Not yet the time of the blogosphere for GL
Martijn, bitten by the snake
Henrieke, one blunder and that was it?
And last: a (very badly presented) motie from the Kleurrijk Platform

Lame speeches

Let's start disagreeing with the whole GL blogosphere: The speeches of Femke and Henk were predictable and lame. We clap and clap just because we know those ideas for long time, and they play to our own egos. Cookies from our own dough. No challenge (besides the: we need you for a good campaign) to the party, no (new) challenge to the country. If we admire Blair and Churchil (as speakers) is due to their ability to challenge and win people in a speech. Nothing like that from our leaders.

Kees Vendrik, the snake charmer

Well, without speech Kees did just what big leaders do. If there is something that has received huge amount of criticism inside GL, that is the whole set of ideas that he defended along the two days of congress. Kees against the hall. And still, we love him. His charm won over the congress again and again. There was no amendment that he did really argue against, that went through. That second place in the list is hugely deserved. For me, he could get it only due to his intellect. But in GL, he has it also due to his huge capacity of stay lovely under fire.

Bart Snels and the big blush

To my regret, Bart still has to learn from Kees. He tried to defend the idea of a new city in the Bollenstreek. But hey, wrong choice of words. Bart idea? Perfect. If we already vote for building 400000 houses... why not to build them together in a new and inspiring, ecological and innovative place? But when Bart used the words “let's build a big project” all alarms of groenlinksers rang, and he was booed. Red like a tomato, there was no more arguing left in Bart. Too bad. Too bad for groenlinks, I think. We need more ideas from Bart, but Bart needs more media training. Actually this issue goes further than good ideas and their defenders. In the congress it looked like the programma commissie did not look for the support of the people that lives in the area. Now... Ideas are good, but support from our own members is better...

Nieuwkomers I: Tofik and Arno

The first blunder. The promising kutmarokan choosed Arno Bonte to support him. True to form, Arno started saying that he was going to argue for a person that he meet a day before. Was that the reason that Tofik did not get a higher place? Probably.

Nieuwkomers II: Mariko and Fara

Contrastingly enough, the discomfort on Mariko was fully appeased when Fara Karimi argued for her. Fara is surely not the most popular kamerlid in GL, but she has done lots of work, and has a respectable and respected trajectory in the party. That was the approved seal that Mariko needed, and she got it.


Not yet the time of the blogosphere for GL

In other countries, and in other left wing parties, what bloggers say, goes. Think in Segolene Royal. Not so in Groenlinks. Is it that most groenlinksers do not read blogs... yet? Maybe. In any case, the lists that bloggers almost unanimously supported, failed to become true. Will that change in the future of groenlinks? That is something to be seen. We need more and better blogging. Or so I think.

Martijn, the snake bites back

Here, the uber candidate of the blogosphere. And what happened? Martijn has none of my preference, since he failed to support initiatives of party members that touched his area, in several crucial moments. Martijn is not the person to make GL grow. But never you mind my extreme and biased opinion. Few people had the respectable trajectory of Martijn inside GL, at his age. What happened? Well, a clumsy arguing of amendments surely did not help him. His prettiest blunder was to insult the congress of (cosmopolitan and internationally engaged) GL, asking if we -really- did know the Non Proliferation Treaty. That was far too arrogant, and the snake bite back. No Martijn for the TK.

Henrike, one blunder and that was it?

Henrike, Henrike, what happened? In the few times that I had contact with Henrike, she came across as nice, charming and engaged. Critical too. Perhaps the winning of Mariko put her out, moreover when the Europa werkgroep tried to sold Mariko, Martijn and Henrike as pieces of the same package. Groenlinksers might have thought that one internationalist in the list is enough (probably right thinking). But in my own (biased) opinion, Henrike did not help herself handling so clumsily the Kleuriijk Platform motie. If the congress agree to discuss a motie, and vote about it, the congress agrees that the result of the voting will have consequences. Henrike started arguing against the motie from the Kleurrijk Platform saying that it was out of order. Not for her to say, and quite arrogant too. Was that the moment that put her out of the race? Hard to say, but harder to dismiss.

And last: a (very badly presented) motie from the Kleurrijk Platform

Now, finally I came to the podium and defended a motie that intended to re-arrange the program to give more emphasize to our multicultural standpoints. In my opinion is just too bad that groenlinks does not dare to speak out her ideas on integration on a program. No wonder why allochtonen do not vote for us. But hey, I surely did not do any good to this cause with the way that I presented the motie to the congress. Mangled dutch (I should take seriously the poster that Femke flags in her car), loose oversight of the time and too long sentences. But lets be fair. The partijbestuur, or the congress presidium, were really, really incorrect . The motie, send in due time, and according to all rules of the game, was placed out of the program discussion. But it was about the program! It was the unique attempt of the party bases to change the visie part of the program. We, Kleurrijk Platform, could not do that with amendments (rightly so), because the rules of the game allowed only moties to do that. So we did. But the congress chairman declared the program discussion closed, and brought the program to vote before our motie was discussed. Very wrong. Even the NOS Journal camera caught me booing the presidium from the side (a thing that I would try not to repeat, but I was really piss off).

But hey. Shit happens. Motie or not, amendments or not... we do have a really nice program. And i am also enthusiastic with the candidates. So now... for something completely different!

Campaign!!