Shock Doctrine

West Prepares To Plunder Post-War Ukraine

July 29, 2022 Jake Kallio and Ben Norton, Multipolarista. Educate! Neoliberalism, Shock Doctrine, Ukraine

While the United States and Europe flood Ukraine with tens of billions of dollars of weapons, using it as an anti-Russian proxy and pouring fuel on the fire of a brutal war that is devastating the country, they are also making plans to essentially plunder its post-war economy. Representatives of Western governments and corporations met in Switzerland this July to plan a series of harsh neoliberal policies to impose on post-war Ukraine, calling to cut labor laws, “open markets,” drop tariffs, deregulate industries, and “sell state-owned enterprises to private investors.” Ukraine has been destabilized by violence since 2014, when a US-sponsored coup d’etat overthrew its democratically elected government, setting off a civil war.

Ukraine Uses Russian Invasion To Wreck Workers’ Rights

July 21, 2022 Thomas Rowley and Serhiy Guz, Consortium News. Educate! Russia, Shock Doctrine, Ukraine, Worker Rights and Jobs

The Ukrainian parliament has passed two new radical measures on labour liberalisation, prompting fears of Ukrainians losing workplace rights permanently as Russia’s war puts huge pressure on the country’s economy. In two laws passed on Monday and Tuesday, MPs voted to legalise “zero-hours contracts” and made moves towards removing up to 70 percent of the country’s workforce from protections guaranteed by national labour law. The latter measure means the national labour code no longer applies to employees of small- and medium-sized enterprises; instead, it is proposed that each worker strikes an individual labour agreement with their employer. It also removes the legal authority of trade unions to veto workplace dismissals. Draft law 5371 had previously been criticised by the International Labor Organization, as well as Ukrainian and European trade unions, on the basis that it could “infringe international labour standards.”

Starving Cities And States

April 23, 2020 Eve Ottenberg, Counterpunch. Educate! Austerity, Capitalism, COVID-19, Shock Doctrine

Disaster capitalism is in high gear. The stock market plunged, so Trump, hysterical, whipped out the federal checkbook. The result? Unlimited bailouts of shoddily-run corporations, criminally managed banks and other assorted oligarchs with their hands out. But hey, it got the stock market soaring, because now investors know Washington will rescue them, whatever idiocies they commit. Everybody else is on their own. After they cash that one-time stimulus check, they get to join the rest of the unemployed in the line at the food bank. Meanwhile the lifeline for the 22 million people who have lost their jobs is their unemployment check. For that they turn to their state. And guess what? The Covid-19-caused economic shutdown is bankrupting the states.

Four Reasons The Ruling Elite Love This Crisis

April 11, 2020 Lee Camp, Consortium News. Educate! Civil Rights, COVID-19, Privatization, Shock Doctrine

Leviathan monumental shocks currently pound citizens around the world. Shocks to our lives. Shocks to the economy. Shocks to our reality. Shocks to our families, our careers, what we used to view as our “normal.” The pain of these shocks hits us in many ways, not the least of which is being forced to have sex while 6 feet apart. Welcome to the Shock Doctrine. Many of you may know Naomi Klein’s best-selling book “The Shock Doctrine.” It was also turned into a hit movie I believe called “Fight Club,” but don’t quote me on that. The Shock Doctrine basically says that the rich and powerful — our rulers bereft of empathy or moral cores — exploit any crisis such as disasters, natural and otherwise, to force through controversial, draconian, profit-based, or flat-out, offensive policies and laws, while the majority of the populace is too distracted, stressed, and drowning in anxiety to fight back adequately.

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