A reader thinks that Naomi Klein should revisit the Louisiana story and see how the “shock doctrine” has progressed:
| Diane, I too have a passion for Louisiana, and a couple of friends there who also keep me in the loop.Your tireless efforts to tell the truth about what has happened in Louisiana since Milton Friedman decided to use “Shock Doctrine” to his advantage is very important to stopping Jindal from his merciless destruction of public education and democracy itself!
For those who are not familiar with Naomi’s introduction to “The Shock Doctrine – The Rise of Disaster Capitalism”- here is a brief excerpt from her intro: “Over at the shelter, Jamar could think of nothing else. “I really don’t see it as cleaning up the city. What I see is that a lot of people got killed uptown. People who shouldn’t have died.” He was speaking quietly, but an older man in line in front of us overheard and whipped around. “What is wrong with these people in Baton Rouge? This isn’t an opportunity. It’s a goddamned tragedy. Are they blind?” A mother with two kids chimed in. “No, they’re not blind, they’re evil. They see just fine.” One of those who saw opportunity in the floodwaters of New Orleans was the late Milton Friedman, grand guru of unfettered capitalism and credited with writing the rulebook for the contemporary, hyper-mobile global economy. Ninety-three years old and in failing health, “Uncle Miltie”, as he was known to his followers, found the strength to write an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal three months after the levees broke. “Most New Orleans schools are in ruins,” Friedman observed, “as are the homes of the children who have attended them. The children are now scattered all over the country. This is a tragedy. It is also an opportunity.” Friedman’s radical idea was that instead of spending a portion of the billions of dollars in reconstruction money on rebuilding and improving New Orleans’ existing public school system, the government should provide families with vouchers, which they could spend at private institutions. In sharp contrast to the glacial pace with which the levees were repaired and the electricity grid brought back online, the auctioning-off of New Orleans’ school system took place with military speed and precision. Within 19 months, with most of the city’s poor residents still in exile, New Orleans’ public school system had been almost completely replaced by privately run charter schools. The Friedmanite American Enterprise Institute enthused that “Katrina accomplished in a day … what Louisiana school reformers couldn’t do after years of trying”. Public school teachers, meanwhile, were calling Friedman’s plan “an educational land grab”. I call these orchestrated raids on the public sphere in the wake of catastrophic events, combined with the treatment of disasters as exciting market opportunities, “disaster capitalism”. ~Naomi Klein, “The Shock Doctrine – The Rise of Disaster Capitalism” [2007] ~ read the excerpt as taken from here: http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine/excerpt I would like to see three media sources come to do a follow-up on Naomi Klein’s introduction to her world renowned book: “The Shock Doctrine – The Rise of Disaster Capitalism”. Can we get Naomi Klein to do a follow up? How about teaming up with Joanne Barkan who wrote, “Got Dough” [see link to this article here: http://muse.jhu.edu/login?auth=0&type=summary&url=/journals/dissent/v058/58.1.barkan.pdf ] in Dissent Magazine? And of course, how about teaming up with Ed Shultz? Cant he three of them get together with you to increase the public’s awareness of the unconscionable crimes being committed against Louisiana’s children, against their own state constitution? Gotta love, Ed! I’m so glad he had you on his show. I want him to invite you as a REGULAR guest! Still wish Maddow would wake up and bring you on too, but I digress. I think the 4 of you could do some real good together as partners to help Louisiana get out of “disaster capitalism” and spread that healing to the nation, ridding us of the marriage between Neoliberalism and Neoconservativism through corporate education reform that is destroying public education and democracy! Thank you again for helping the children, families, teachers, and communities of Louisiana by shining a light on the horrors of corporate education reform in this state.
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Diane Ravitch's blog 
Didn’t Klein just have a baby?
Yes! She did. I follow her on Twitter, and will send her a link to this blog post.
Creative destruction = disaster capitalism.
The right’s play book is limited, but chillingly effective. By the time they are done there will be nothing left of our schools, or economy.
I can reach out to Naomi Klein via Twitter and see if she’s interested.
Thank you, Peter!
Reblogged this on tressiemc and commented:
The Shock Doctrine treatment of the private take-over of New Orleans public education post-Katrina is the subject of this blog post from Diane Ravitch. My former professor Kristen Buras has been working in this vein for quite some time.
Getting Naomi Klein and Joanne Barkan to collaborate would be fantastic–and to get it on Ed Schultz! And keep following it up. Where’s Rachel Maddow in all of this?
Playing courtier, as Chris Hedges aptly described MSNBC as. To keep the illusion of “choice” in our 2 party pseudo-democracy going.
An excellent idea. I read The Shock Doctrine several years ago, and it opened my eyes to the Friedman agenda currently being crammed into every facet of our society. As a Los Angeles high school English teacher who was laid off because of the school district’s unsubstantiated budget crisis, I think I can recognize disaster capitalism when I see it. How many of America’s workers have been laid off in the last three years because their employers were in a “budget crisis”?
While many businesses are definitely experiencing economic trouble, big oil and Wall Street seem to be doing just fine, achieving record profits. Financial fear-mongering has never been at such a fever pitch. It’s reminiscent of the decibel level reached before we invaded Iraq.
When our public schools are privatized, we not only lose good teachers but their unions as well. Reducing and ultimately eliminating unions is a major goal of “educational reform” because it weakens the power of traditionally democratic funding sources. This isn’t about making schools better. It’s about a step by step process designed to transform teaching into a non-professional job and to give the plutocracy a distinct financial advantage in the spirit of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision. And if corporate America does acquire clear control of public information, how long will it be before we lose our two party system altogether?
Thank you again, Diane, for posting my question in response to your earlier blog about Louisiana!
One of my friends at the Save Our Schools March last summer told me their story about being a first responder after Katrina hit while we were riding from the hotel to the workshops on the Metro in D.C.
Someone had made an off-handed comment about Louisiana that struck this person, like a kick in the gut, creating a visceral response. He was brought to tears, winded for a moment, recalling the horrors of the events in real people’s lives as they struggled for survival, all while President Bush and FEMA made their excuses, for what can only be viewed as sheer racism. I hadn’t really known him before, but I hugged him and I joined him in crying on Metro, for the lives of the people who suffered and continue to suffer after Katrina.
It was little comfort, for the people of Louisiana are still suffering through Jindal, I know. The story he told gives me shivers every time I think of his narrative.
To think that “Uncle Miltie” and now “Uncle Jindal” have taken such horrible advantage of the disaster, disgusts me and makes me feel the same sickened shame I feel when I read primary source documents from slaves or our indigenous peoples during the “westward-ho expansion movement”.
Disaster capitalism has been around for a VERY long time. It’s an old story. Much older than Naomi Klein.
But then, the renewed interest in capitalizing on it by BOTH neoliberals and neoconservatives seems to double the threat, doesn’t it?
Do you think this “disaster capitalism” is bringing on an era of Neoslavery?
I hope Naomi Klein responds to your blog. I hope readers are able to reach her. Someone out there has to be able to, as she is so obviously motivated to help solve this problem too.
By working together and creating media attention, we can stop this corporate take-over.
Yes, we can try to contact Naomi Klein via Twitter! Let’s ALL send her your blog!
Dissent Magazine responded to me recently. I will send your blog to the email address they provided. Maybe, if we are lucky, Joanne Barkan will contact you.
I think I will post this on Twitter to them and to Ed Shultz!
I hope your readers will do the same!
I know Joanne Barkan and I will forward your comment. I think she reads this blog.
I know there is hope. Wonderful! I just sent a request with your blog as well.
I am not surprised to hear that she reads your blog. We need ALL media journalists to read your work.
Thank you, Diane!
And, of course, let’s not forget what Arne had to say about Katrina….
Do we have that quote? Oh, snap!
“ABC News’ Mary Bruce Reports: Education Secretary Arne Duncan said today that Hurricane Katrina was “the best thing that happened to the education system in New Orleans” because it gave the city a chance to rebuild and improve its failing public schools.
In an interview to air this weekend on “Washington Watch with Roland Martin” Duncan said “that education system was a disaster. And it took Hurricane Katrina to wake up the community to say that we have to do better. And the progress that it made in four years since the hurricane, is unbelievable.” ~ Mary Bruce on Arne Duncan —read the “whole exchange” here.
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2010/01/duncan-katrina-was-the-best-thing-for-new-orleans-schools/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
A trip down memory lane that adds more to the gut-wrenching DOE SHAME we live with daily.
Once upon a time, in America, we were proud of the US Department of Education…
uh… When was that again, Diane? Ms. Tracey?
While Duncan was explicit and got caught, check out this fro President Obama who uses coded words to mean the same thing :
http://www.nola.com/katrina/index.ssf/2010/08/transcript_of_president_barack.html
“In education, we’ve made strides as well. As you know, schools in New Orleans were falling behind long before Katrina. But in the years since the storm, a lot of public schools opened themselves up to innovation and to reform. And as a result, we’re actually seeing rising achievement, and New Orleans is becoming a model of innovation for the nation.”
DR’s posts on the Boston Consulting Group and New Orleans’ schools makes me think of the recent University of Virginia conflict, which had many similar elements. Too often, reformers seeking to remake our k-12 schools and colleges/universities use the idea of technology to make other, unrelated, reforms seem inevitable, but many of those reformers date back to the 1970s, well before the world wide web supposedly changed everything. In short, BCG and others use technology as a “shock doctrine” to hide their real goals, which have nothing to do with technology. See, for example, this piece on UVa and the idea of “disruptive innovation”: http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2012/06/26/disruption-excuse-politically-motivated-changes-essay
Perhaps this is something worth another post?
How do you propose to get it out to the regular people who should know about such things? I got Naomi’s book and read just enough to get the gist, but how many hard working moms and dads will even try a scholarly book like that?
Plus, do not think the media is going to help broadcast!
Many more people need to wake up to the fact that this country, this world is in the grasp of “greed”, in hands of the few global elite families who own banks and corporations.
Here some good clips to watch!
A great introduction to banking and how the Federal Reserve by loaning money to the government, causing inflation, moves wealth to those at the top:
Excellent insight into The Corporation as it functions; it cares not about the devastation it creates!
Those in control meet every year to help move their agenda forward to benefit them, not the people! This video should reach millions!
Each U.S. president (it matters not if he is a Republican or a Democrat) is complicit in keeping disaster capitalism alive by protecting the interests of the corporations, domestically and abroad!
And this Architects of control ( a long but very insightful documentary)
Oh, and very insightful too. See where president Obama stands politically! You think he’s a social democrat? Think again. It proves the point Michael Parenti makes in The President!
Here’s the right link. My apologies. http://www.politicalcompass.org/uselection2012
Diane,
I blogged about the “shock Doctrine” last year in describing PA governor Tom Corbett’s defunding of public schools. The “shock doctrine” describes what is happening all over the country to a lot of public schools. See here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/timothy-d-slekar/the-shock-doctrine-case-s_b_856053.html
Tim
Ed Schultz is out to lunch and needs to be deporgrammed before anyone can have him out in public speaking about education. The other day he invited Randi Weingarten on his show and allowed her to perpetuate the myth that she stands up for teachers when in fact she can’t sell us out fast enough to the deform movement. Curious he didn’t allow any callers to interact with her either because he was pressed for time or maybe he knows what she really is and didn’t want her exposed on his show. He is not up to speed and as far as I can tell he has no good reason to be in the dark about someone as anti labor and anti teacher as Weingarten.
I don’t think that the Shock Doctrine applies that well to what initially happened in New Orleans. The state takeover of the public schools was motivated more by race and the quest for power–and overthrow of local black-controlled democracy would have happened if Milton Friedman had never been born. It was not the first time that black political power fell to minority rule in New Orleans. A biracial government developed in New Orleans after the Civil War and schools were integrated beginning as early as 1870. That biracial government–born a century before the Shock Doctrine phenomenon–was also overthrown by the white minority.
I agree that once local democracy was crushed (in a city that was 70% black at the time) and all the black teachers fired, that the drive to shift public assets to the private sector took over. But it is important to recognize the role of race as a motive force in the takeover and mass firings because the racist arguments were used to justify and rationalize the violation of the rights of displaced blacks. The takeover and firings were overwhelmingly supported by local whites–80% of whom send their children to private schools–though most never heard of a charter school and had no idea of what the “reforms” would look like. Their open support or silent bystander behavior legitimated the wrongful actions.
I raise this only as caveat that the same dynamics are likely to occur in other cities. White who break the silence by speaking out against the injustices and allying themselves with the victims can be powerful allies and help stop the abuse of rights.
Diane, I’d like to follow up on this idea with two things:
Another important person to collaborate with is Ben Jealous, NAACP President. They have come out with a strong statement against Charter Schools due to their segregation impacts. It can be found here for your readers:
http://naacp.3cdn.net/ec6459eda5247ea257_d1m6bxsf6.pdf?mid=56
A friend, Adam Bessie and co-author, Dan Archer wrote this 2nd part in a two part series about Disaster Capitalism in “Truthout.” He just sent it to me this morning:
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/10061-the-disaster-capitalism-curriculum-the-high-price-of-education-reform-episode-2
Your readers need to see this great use of comics to tell the story of education reform in Louisiana.
Thank you again for your work to help Louisiana and all of us — children, teachers, and communities! You are much appreciated!