http://www.truth-out.org/buzzflash/commentary/will-the-shock-doctrine-manifest-itself-in-the-wake-of-hurricane-harvey
[links in on-line article]
Tuesday, 05 September 2017 08:20
Will the Shock Doctrine Manifest Itself in the Wake of Hurricane Harvey?
BILL BERKOWITZ FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT
"Only a crisis -- actual or perceived -- produces real change. When
that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that
are lying around." – Milton Friedman
How will the federal and state and local governments deal with
post-Hurricane Harvey recovery? How and who will they deal with the
toxic discharge from oil refineries, superfund sites and the raw sewage
that is flooding the streets and highways of Houston and other
communities? Will climate-change deniers finally take the impact of
climate change – a term that Team Trump shies away from – seriously?
Will Trump be able to stay focused on recovery issues? Will corporations
see this as their golden ticket to vast financial gain? Will homeowners
be shoved into toxic mobile homes like many were post-Katrina? Will the
homeless be housed? Will a chunk of the public school system be
privatized and/or voucherized? Will minorities be forced out of Houston,
which, according to recent study by the Pew Research Center, is the most
economically segregated city in the United States? What will be done to
make the victims whole?
While rain has finally stopped pelting Houston and other parts of the
Texas Gulf Coast, thousands of people rescued/evacuated, shelters
holding tens of thousands of internal refugees, many thousands will be
homeless for the foreseeable future. And, while it is probably too early
to think about how the federal and state governments will approach the
massive task of recovery – which will undoubtedly take billions of
dollars and years to complete -- it might be worthwhile to pull Naomi
Klein's The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, off the
shelf – or going out and getting a copy -- dusting it off, and
reconsidering its thesis. While tragedies and difficult times quite
often bring out the best in the character of Americans that help their
friends, neighbors and total strangers, however, when there is a crisis
of this magnitude -- natural or man-made -- you can almost certainly
count on "rapid-fire corporate re-engineering of societies that are
reeling from shock."
From the book jacket of The Shock Doctrine: "At the most chaotic
juncture in Iraq's civil war, a new law is unveiled that will allow
Shell and BP to claim the country's vast oil reserves. Immediately
following September 11, the Bush administration quietly outsources the
running of the 'War on Terror' to Halliburton and Blackwater. After a
powerful tsunami devastates the coasts of Southeast Asia, the pristine
beaches are auctioned off to tourist resorts. New Orleans's residents,
still scattered from Hurricane Katrina, discover that their public
housing, hospitals and schools will never be reopened. These events are
examples of ...'the shock doctrine': the use of public disorientation
following massive collective shocks - wars, terrorist attacks, natural
disasters - to push through highly unpopular economic shock therapy."
President Donald Trump’s trip to Texas comes less then two weeks after
he rolled back the Federal Flood Risk Mitigation Standard, an Obama-era
regulation from 2015. According to Vox’s Ella Nilsen, "The 2015
directive, which never fully went into effect, required public
infrastructure projects that received taxpayer dollars to do more
planning for floods, including elevating their structures to avoid
future water damage and alleviate the burden on taxpayers."
Nilsen pointed out that Trump "characterized his move as repealing an
onerous government regulation and streamlining the infrastructure
approval process. But he was criticized by both environmental groups and
conservatives, who said it made sense to try to protect federal
investments."
A recent missive from the Washington, D.C.-based Heritage Foundation,
the nation’s foremost conservative think tank, and a major contributor
to Team Trump’s policy agenda, highlighted its 2007 post-Hurricane
Katrina report titled "Grassroots Disaster Response: Harnessing the
Capacities of Communities."
The report clearly laid out the conservative think tank’s preferred
approach: "Throwing money at states through homeland security grants or
turning the responsibility over to the federal government entirely will
not make Americans much safer. Instead, Washington should play a limited
role, enabling and encouraging states and communities to take the lead
by empowering individuals to care for themselves and others during
disasters."
On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina made landfall near New Orleans,
ultimately devastating large parts of the city. More than 1,800 people
were killed, and there was at least $100 billion in damage.
Neighborhoods that were destroyed by the raging floodwaters, still
haven’t recovered. No one who saw the events in New Orleans unfold will
ever forget the tragedy of the Superdome, where thousands suffered under
oppressive heat, with little food, water, or medical attention.
As of 2013, there were 100,000 fewer black residents then there were in
2000. Whole neighborhoods remain depopulated.
While many have praised New Orleans for coming back after the massive
devastation, nowhere is evidence of The Shock Doctrine more readily
visible then in post-Hurricane Katrina.
In 2015, The New York Times’ Campbell Robertson and Richard Fausset
reported that the city "has been altered, by both a decade of
institutional re-engineering and the artless rearrangement that occurs
when people are left to fend for themselves.
"Empowered by billions of federal dollars and the big ideas of eager
policy planners, the school system underwent an extensive overhaul; the
old Art Deco Charity Hospital was supplanted by a state-of-the-art
medical complex; and big public housing projects, at once beloved and
notorious, were razed and replaced by mixed-income communities with
housing vouchers."
The floodwaters have yet to recede. There are so many questions yet to
be answered.
