 I want to say hello to everybody here and I'm very glad that you are joining us. This topic, as already Ethan said, it's planning for transformation, planning for social ecological, or green, or socialist, whatever, from the leftist perspective, transformation. My name is Michael Brie. I'm head of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Rosa Luxembourg Foundation in Berlin. This webinar is organized together by the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam. It's also organized together with the International Karl Polanyi Society. I will come back to Karl Polanyi very soon. And with our officers, the officers of the Rosa Luxembourg Foundation in Brussels and in New York, I want to thank all colleagues for helping us to organize this webinar. I will start with a very, very brief remark because this webinar, as I already said, is organized by the International Karl Polanyi Society, co-organized. Karl Polanyi in his famous book, The Great Transformation, he wrote it in 1942-43 in being in the United States during the Second World War. He wrote that the introduction or implementation of the capitalist market society was planned. It was done consciously. It was not by accident. It was done consciously by strong forces starting from the 18th century in England, step by step. And he also said that the counter-movement, safeguarding interests of broader parts of the society was in reaction, a more or less spontaneous reaction toward this planned transformation toward the market society. And as Ethan already said, we are back now in the age of planning. One may say we had this age of neoliberal market society, which was again a planned attempt. As Naomi Klein said, it was done consciously, destruction of a lot of societies around the world and shaping the societies in a market way. Now we see that we have to react. Also the ruling elites, the right wing elites are back to planning in a different sense, not in a market, totally market oriented. And we want to discuss this problem and especially how the left globally can bring back and in their own regions bring back planning with different aims, with different aims of social aims, with ecological aims, with aims of solidarity and peace. I'm very pleased that we have today three speakers from three continents. I will give everybody the chance to introduce her or himself. The first speaker and I'm very glad because she is coming from a partner of us, a long-term partner, Seatini, that's the Southern and Eastern Africa Trade Information and Negotiation Institute. And Jane Nalunga is the county director in Uganda. So welcome to you Jane and please introduce yourself and Seatini very briefly. You have the floor. We have some problems with the microphone. And thanks also to that. I'm Jane Nalunga, an organization Seatini works on issues of trade, investment and tax to make sure that these policies work for the people. We engage government who immobilize people. And we also participate in negotiations at national, regional and global level. Thanks Michael. Thank you. I think you were too moderate. You have, you are director there. You have worked in different fields of negotiations between African countries and the European Union and others. You have led the official member of the official delegation to the WTO and so on. But thank you very much for being with us and sharing your experiences on the topic. The second speaker is an old friend of mine and also a partner of us. It's Hillary Wainwright. Hillary, please introduce yourself. My name is Hillary Wainwright and it's a great pleasure to be here. I feel very pleased that the Institute I'm part of, the Transnational Institute, is part of the organization of this because the Transnational Institute, its slogan, its logo is ideas into movement and its image is the idea of a dandelion seed with the many different seeds that flower produces. And that's the idea that we work on ideas and research but very much with social movements, with, you know, the movements around climate change, the women's movement, the movements around food security via Campesina and so on, the radical trade union movement. Many different movements and we do research with them and for them. And so that's the kind of idea, so economic democracy. I mean, we have a whole sort of theme of work around alternatives in which economic democracy and democratizing public ownership and democratizing the state is very fundamental. So for me, this issue of planning, it's always been a puzzle. I'll say more later, but my experience has been more from the base, from grassroots planning, sort of workers planning, but that doesn't deny the importance of some kind of public state intervention ownership. So it's really for me that relationship between the participatory transformative movements coming from below, from within society and the idea of some kind of coordination. So how do we achieve that coordination in a truly democratic way? I mean, Polanni put it in terms of the problem of freedom and complexity. How do we plan, achieve a connection between purpose and outcome of a social kind, an environmental kind? Hilary, you are already starting your lecture. I know you too well. I just want to mention three books you have written. You have written. Others also reclaimed the state in 2003, service reform, but not as we know it in 2009 and the recent book in new politics from the left. It's published by Politi in 2018. And the last but not least speaker is also a long term partner of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in China and Beijing at the Beida is Professor Huang. Please introduce yourself, Professor Huang. Okay. Hello to everybody. My name is Qin Zihuan from Beijing University. So I'm my major is environment politics and left politics. My personal research started with the European Green Party as my dissertation 20 years ago. But in the past 10 years, I changed a little bit from general green politics towards to the red green politics. So this is the left politics. The reason why I changed my research focus is very much because our collaboration with the Luxemburg Foundation. So we started our collaboration in 2014, six years ago. So when we try to connect the tool to discuss and practice, what discuss is the emerging social ecological transformation. We call the SCT in Europe. But at the same time, there's the Chinese thinking and the practice we call socialist equal civilization construction. So we try to connect these two different issues. In what sense, the international discussion of the social ecological transformation can be helpful for the socialist equalization in China and the opposite case. Whether or not the Chinese experience can make some contribution to the European thinking. So that's our major idea. To do this, we co-founded our research group. We call the China Research Group on Socialist Equalization Construction in 2015. So in 2015, in the past year. I stop you now because you're also starting your lecture. I'm looking forward for your input. And now all of the speakers introduced just now have the chance to speak about 50 minutes. And I beg your pardon, I will be quite strict. After 50 minutes, I will try to stop you. You are the first. Please join the floor. Voice. Okay. Thank you so much, Maiko. And thank you so much, the listeners, participants. In my presentation, I'm going to look at just briefly the goals and aspirations of the new green deal. What is it talking about? And also the imperative, especially from Africa's point of view, to have our policies based on this new, this green new deal. I also provide some experiences, you know, regarding our policies and our strategies. And also look at the responses to the COVID pandemic and how that is either rhyming with a green new deal or whether it's still in the model of the neoliberal mode. I will conclude by giving some recommendations on the way forward. My presentation is based on our experiences at SEATINI. We are very critical about the neoliberal policies, the neoliberal agenda. And we always in our work search for alternatives to the neoliberal paradigm. When you look at the green new deal, it articulates a number of goals and principles, you know. This include, as has been pointed out in a number of publications, the transformation of production, infrastructure, lifestyle, supply chains. But also the reduction in social injustice and inequality at national and global level, but also ensuring that all citizens access social services. It talks also about the preservation of biodiversity and the environment. In other words, the green new deal is talking about putting the people at the center of development, the people and the environment. Yet today what we are seeing, we are seeing that it's the corporations and the money which are the center of development. However, fulfilling these goals as articulated in the green new deal will require drastic and fundamental changes in the policies, in the ideology, both at national and at global level. For us in Uganda, in particular, in eastern and southern Africa, but also in Africa generally, the policies we have in place today are enhancing market forces and corporate power. So when you look at Africa as a whole, there is very high economic and social disparities and environmental destruction. Most of the African countries have been implementing the neoliberal paradigm, neoliberal policies since the 1980s under the structured adjustment programs which were imposed on Africa by the IMF and World Bank. And since then, since the 1980s, very little has changed in our policies. We have privatized very, very drastically. You know, all most of the services that transport, the labor line, everything was privatized. In fact, even today in our discussions, government policies, we talk about private sector-led development, yet the private sector is really, really weak. We also liberalized extensively and since the 1980s, we have been liberalizing our economy very, very drastically. And this has led to a collapse of so many industries because of the import of competitively produced products. Government has also reduced its intervention in development, in the supply of social services and goods. And this has led to increasing inequality within the country. And when you look at also our budget, you find that the budget is also tilted not towards addressing the challenges facing the people but promoting the corporations and the private sector. I just want to give some idea around that. For example, when you take agriculture, in Africa almost 70% of the people are in agriculture because our agriculture is small-holder farmers. But when you look at, for example, the budget which we have today, this year for 2021, government only put 3% of the total budget to agriculture. Yet when you look at a number of meetings have taken place by government heads of state. And at one time they agreed that they will be giving 10% of the total budget to agriculture. This hasn't been done and you find that it's the small-scale farmers in Africa who are the poorest. And this includes the women because it's the women who are mostly engaged in the small-scale farming. When you look at the also in agriculture, you find their lack of policies, very key policies. For example, the lack of a minimum price for products. The fact that it's the private sector which is the marketing of the produce of the private sector. So you find because of that there's a lot of inequality, there's a lot of poverty. And the COVID pandemic has increased these vulnerabilities, increased these inequalities. I also want to talk about the very extensive liberalization I have talked about. It has led to deindustrialization. Most of our industries collapsed. For example, the textile industries collapsed. But what I want to emphasize is that when an industry collapses, the backward supply chains also collapse from the production of cotton. And also all those factories in between of the yarn and all that. And this has led to a lot of poverty, a lot of unemployment. In Africa, because this isn't just for Uganda alone, in Africa there is a lot of unemployment, especially the use. So all of these have been increased by the COVID pandemic. Today there are so many use who are really who are unemployed. And because of lack of industries, government has been exporting raw materials, exporting raw materials and importing finished products. Which has also led to an increase in a trade deficit, very, very high trade deficit. And in order to bridge that, there is a whole issue of indebtedness. I will talk about that later. I also want to talk about the whole issue of investment policies also in Africa. Investment policies in Africa are also about attracting FDI. And the whole thinking, and that's the whole new liberal thinking, is that when you attract FDI at all costs, you create jobs for the people. So we have seen our investment policies without any no rights for the environment, but rights for the investors. They can do what they want, bring in their money, take out what they want. And you find that because in our investment policies, we don't have social and human rights impact assessments. There is no clear outcome that what we are getting out of our investors. So you find that we have no minimum wage and also the investors don't pay any minimum wage. There is a lot of casualization of labor. You know, today somebody is working without a contract, you know, and all this has, you know, and they work under very appalling situations. But the whole issue is that we have FDI, they offer jobs, but we don't look at what kind of jobs they are offering. And you find again, because of that competition for investors, our investments to each other. So when you look at the pandemic and the resultant negative effects on the economy, you find that we need, there is an urgent need to review the current policies, you know, in order to stop the deepening of the inequalities and the vulnerabilities. There is a need for citizens to be able to engage, to understand, even for government, to understand that something has to change. However, there is a minimal, very minimal appreciation that things have to change. Maybe when you look at, for example, our current stimulus package, because a number of countries are giving stimulus to revive the economy to address the COVID pandemic and its effects. When you look at, and I'm going to talk about Uganda, our stimulus package, where it's directed mainly towards the companies. It's about tax exemptions, tax incentives. It's about provision of loans, you know, to be able to provide the private sector with refinancing. But because we liberalized our banking sector, there are no commercial banks in the villages, in the rural areas. So it will be very difficult for the small and medium enterprises, especially in the rural areas, to be able to access these finances. We gave some proposals on how to be able to address the issue of increasing, at least the purchasing power of the people, enabling them to have some money in their pockets. For example, we requested government that the pay as you earn taxes, the threshold, should be increased so that people who are getting maybe around $200 should be the ones to pay as you earn. But for today, people earning less than $100 are paying pay as you earn, you know, so this is also going to increase inequalities, increase more poverty. During the COVID pandemic, government distributed food, especially in the urban areas. But what's interesting, government doesn't have reserves, food reserves. So government had to purchase food from the private sector. The private sector had bought food from the small scale farmers at a very minimal price because we don't have, you know, we don't have any minimum prices for products. So at the end of that day, when you look at the COVID pandemic, it's the private sector which has benefited through such ventures as selling food to government. I don't know how many minutes I have, Michael. It's about one minute, left chain. So maybe in my one minute, I just want to say what needs to be done, you know, because nothing has changed at all. So we need to rethink all of us at national, at global level, the neoliberal ideology, we need to put the people at the center. But we also need to raise the consciousness of the people, you know, if they are to engage, they need to know that this neoliberal paradigm is not working, but also at the multilateral level, so countries, developing countries and poor countries like Uganda, we need the policy space, we need policy space to be able to put these policies in place. But my worry is that its business as usual, our governments are signing and negotiating agreements, for example, the CFTA, the continental free trade area, which is talking about more liberalization. The government is negotiating, for example, Kenya is negotiating that U.S. Kenya free trade area, more liberalization with very, very far-reaching implication on agriculture. So my worry really is that its business as usual. Thank you so much, Michael. Jane, we have to thank, there was already a question why we are speaking about transformation in the age of COVID-19 and of the pandemic. And I think you answered it quite well, because if the answer is to go on in a way of business as usual, this will be a catastrophe. This is already a catastrophe going on and it's enhanced by the pandemic. So the problem of a change of direction, of a real new great transformation is very arduous. So the next speaker is Zinje from the BEDA, from the Baking University in China. Please, you have 50 minutes. Once again, many thanks for the invitation of Misha and also Luxembourg Foundation. So I will continue my sharing of the issue with you. I mean, as I have said in the past years, we have a Chinese group focusing on the socialist equalization in China and try to explain this from a perspective of social ecological transformation. So I mean, we try to connect these two things. And then I have the topic for today. So it's titled socialist equalization construction in China. Is it an authoritatively planned or organized grand transformation? So can we think in this way? So that's the major question for today. So I will talk about this issue in the following three questions. Question number one is why socialist equalization construction in China can be interpreted as a process of SET? So why we can use this language, SET, to explain the Chinese case? Frankly speaking, in the Chinese context of today, reform rather than transformation, equalization construction rather than SET or renewal deal are more popular terms with the Chinese government and also the academic circle. Thus, a very common expression is that equalization system reform to build a beautiful China such as this. However, when talking about socialist equalization construction as a specific national strategy and the CPC Chinese Communist Party, political ideology, there are at least two reasons to support such application of SET discourse or politics. Firstly, both in terms of its main goals and policy approaches, equalization construction refers to our targets at a comprehensive change or re-shipping of the current reality. Namely, to implement the strategy deployment and the general task requirements adopted at the 18th National Congress of CPC in 2012. Secondly, given the official recognition of today's socialism with Chinese characteristics as a primalist date of socialism announced as the 13th National Congress of CPC in 1987. Socialist equalization construction can naturally remind us the transition of socialism from a relatively lower state to a relatively higher state, which has a rich documental basis from the classic Marxist. So therefore, we can reasonably understand the socialist equalization construction discourse and policy in China since 2012 as an experiment of a process of comprehensive transformation, which has a strong connotation of social-ecological reconstruction moving towards a society characterized with more sustainable ecology and more material socialist. So by the way, my article on this issue, socialist equalization in China as a transformative politics will soon be published in the Journal of Capitalist Nature Socialism. That's the first question. The second question is that socialist equalization construction in China as a highly planned or organized process of comprehensive reconstruction. So politically, this process appears as an authoritatively planned or organized process, which the CPC branches and the governments at different levels are the major leading force or promoter. For instance, at the national level, the three step plan for equalization construction over 2017 to 2049 was laid out and approved by the 19th National Congress of CPC in 2017. While the inspection tool mechanism of environmental supervision of Central Commission of CPC has been playing a crucial role in improving environmental governance throughout the country since 2012. Comparing with all these strong impetus from the upside, the common people are still not actively mobilized or incorporated in the process. Though we can also find with no difficulty the examples of participatory equalization construction, especially at the local levels. So that's the political field. Economically, the major feature of socialist equal civilization construction in China can be summarized as two main approaches or models equal mobilization and equal development. Of course, both terms themselves are not new at all, but what can be reasonably expected is that they will play their part in different ways under the discussing context of socialist equalization construction. As far as equal mobilization can be roughly regarded as the ecologicalization of modern or urban economy, while equal development as the wise economicalization of natural ecology are concerned. There are indeed some similarities between China and today's Europe or other advanced countries regarding the application of environmental public policy instruments. However, institutional framework of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the discourse of socialist equal civilization construction together with other social political factors can form a distinctive dynamics, which will facilitate a more ecologically sustainable economic utilization of natural resources in a social just manner. As we can see from the case studies in the national experiment of doings of equal civilization construction, such as Fujian province and Jiangxi province. In my world, the ideological opposition of equal capitalism or equal socialism in the context of social ecological civilization construction is not an inflexible one. From my own point of view, socialist equal civilization construction in China today can be generalized as a phenomena or process of comprehensive reconstruction or grand transformation, economic, social, political and cultural, which is quite highly or qualitatively planned or organized by a strong political leadership, at least for the moment. A major challenge for creating an economy of socialist equal civilization is still the logic of capital and its institutionalized influence at the domestic and global level. Arguably, with all the development and establishment of socialist equalization, there will be no way to succeed in consolidating socialism with Chinese characteristics. In these things, I argue, constructing socialist equalization in China can only be a long historical process, and it is indispensable to further make clear and stick to an equal socialist political ecology and political economy. Question number three, how to make the current process of socialist equalization construction in China more politically democratic or emissary and economically socialist? Undoubtedly, there is no guarantee that the ongoing process of socialist equalization construction in China will be definitely a success. All this process will certainly bring about a successful transformation of today's society into a real higher stage of socialism to be both more ecological and socialist. In the short term, although socialist equalization construction in China has to deal with numerous difficulties caused by the general, unfeasurable environment, especially the decoupling, sweating or attempt from the west in the years to come, it seems this possible that such institutionalized national strategy will make a drastic shift, which is formally supported by a widely recognized green political consensus among the people. In fact, one of the major lessons learned from the outbreak of COVID-19 in 2020 is that China has to stress its national efforts in equalization construction. And the all around the leadership of CPC and the governance are highly appreciated by the public, especially comparing with the performance of dealing with the spread of COVID-19 in the so-called advanced countries like U.S. In other words, socialist equalization construction in China has even received a stronger momentum from this catastrophic event. In the long run, however, there are indeed some serious challenges to deal with for constructing a socialist equalization in China or realizing a grand transformation from today's lower level socialist to a higher level. Of them, in my opinion, a very fundamental but far reaching work to be done is to make the current process more particularly democratic or emissary with a special attention to create an economy of socialist equalization. To achieve that, a crucial point is that while constructing or educating an even stronger political consensus among the public on the major goals for socialist, both economic, social, political, ecological, and cultural, and try to find and institutionalize all the opportunities making the entire process more democratic and emissary, all the people should become real participants rather than only beneficiary of this process. To make socialist equalization come true, both a capable CPC and a government and institutionalized participatory public are necessary. I would say that it is the constructive interaction between the two aspects, not only one factor or a real people's democracy could lead China to a red-green future of socialist equalization. So that's my main point. Thank you very much. You are really in time. Thank you very much and you made a very clear point. Maybe you can later also speak about your empirical research in Jiangzi province. The last input will be by Hillary. So join the floor, Hillary. Okay. Well, thank you, Mika. And also thank you, Jane and Kinza. I mean, I've been inspired by what you said and hopefully both said and hopefully what I want to say, I'll try and sort of connect. In a way, I thought it was better not to do a very prepared presentation but react a bit to what you're saying. And I think in a way I want to go back a bit before talking empirically about experiences in Britain and maybe other parts of Europe. Just to go back to, well, maybe beginning with Kinza's end point about democracy and planning. So that's been my kind of puzzle. I haven't got an answer to it but I've just tried to progress through both theory and learning from practice. How do we combine that requirement for an overall social purpose and environmental purpose, which is so necessary now with climate change and in a funny peculiar distorted way in Britain at any rate. We've had with COVID, you know, there has to be this overall social goal of health, you know, which in a way has to guide the economy in Britain that hasn't taken place because the economy has been so privatised that actually it's been impossible for the government to actually achieve an adequate health policy because there's so many inadequacies in the system, but we won't go into detail now. But how do we make that combination between an overall economic purpose and a truly participatory economy? And I think that the notion of transformation, why the idea of planning for transformation has got a particular meaning is because transformation implies change at every level. And for me, that includes the transformative capacity of every person, every citizen, every worker, including domestic workers, including, you know, young people and old people who may not be part of wage labour. But socialism for me is that idea of Marx, the fulfilment of each is a condition for the fulfilment of all. So democracy isn't simply about representative systems or congresses at a national level. It's about a deep transformative democracy that is building on and involving the capacity of all. And so I think we've got to go back to the markets and why we're against the market. I mean, that's for most of us how we became socialists because of the destructive unequal character of the market. And Misha's right that in a way the market was consciously constructed initially, but it was constructed in order to avoid democracy in order to separate economics, the sphere of the market, the private market, and democracy, the sphere of parliamentary, the parliamentary process. And so we've got to think how do we overcome that division? How do we create a purposeful economics? And I think that leads to thinking in a new way about knowledge and information, particularly knowledge, different kinds of knowledge. I mean, in a way that was the underpinning of Hayek's justification of the market. He was pointing against the model of planning, the state. He presumed, and to some degree it's been historically true, that the idea of state planning, the command economy, was premised on the idea that in order to devise a single purpose, social purpose for the economy, there needed to be, and there could be, the centralization of knowledge that could be then the basis of setting a conscious plan. And he, you know, as everybody knows, he pointed out the nature and importance of what he called tacit knowledge, things we know but cannot tell, you know, hunches, intuitions, capacities, skill, practical or experiential knowledge. And I, my answer to that is, yes, that kind of knowledge is really important. I've learned that through the women's movement, I've seen it in the ideas and thinking of the shop stewards, the workplace movement. But that knowledge can be shared, can be socialized. He thought this knowledge, or he argued this knowledge was completely individual. So it couldn't be coordinated. The only mechanism was the market, the haphazard, chaotic nature of the market would produce a kind of order. But we know that that order is in effect a very wasteful, very destructive, very unequal order. And so the problem for us is how do we value that practical knowledge and enable it to be coordinated in a way that in a sense is different from the centralized knowledge of the state. And I think we can see it in social movements. So in the women's movement, in the ecological movement, in the radical trade union movement, we've seen sharing of knowledge that's led to policies to alternatives. And it's always experimental. It's never has the certainty of state level codified knowledge. But it also needs that codified knowledge for certain purposes, statistical knowledge is very important to understanding, you know, the conditions under which we're working. So it seems that we've got to look at forms of coordination that are not purely through the state, but then think how a democratic state can empower and support those more grassroots levels of coordination. And I think that means we've got to think of the transition to a transformative kind of planning as being very important and involving a process of political parties supporting initiatives that are coming from below. I mean, one that inspired me, maybe many people know about it, it was this group of workers in the arms industry in the 70s that when they were faced with redundancies, they were very skilled designers and engineers. And they were told they were redundant, you know, because the company wanted to rationalize and cut jobs and cut costs and that meant cutting labor. And they said, no, no, we're not redundant, you know, our skills are useful, we could be creating, producing all kinds of health equipment, health, health instruments, public transport equipment, energy conservation equipment. And they drew up a plan, an alternative plan for socially what they call socially useful production, which has been very inspiring because it's shown a different way of planning a different way of making the connection between our intentions and the outcome, which is what the market tries to break the market is try to break that connection and imply it's impossible. And so there's been a lot of discussion about how do we spread that idea of planning from below implying a kind of network model of the economy. And we've seen an example of that in under COVID in the face of the pandemic. So in Britain, there was a shortage of ventilators. And so the government in a rather kind of, you know, sort of over optimistic, you know, unplanned way called on private companies to convert their capacity to making ventilators. And in the end, where it happened, in, for example, in a company called Airbus, which makes, you know, manufactures aeroplanes. It happened because, you know, the management could see that the market for planes was collapsing. And the trade unions could see this too. And the trade unions were incredibly well organized, particularly with health and safety reps and, you know, organization across the workforce, skill designer designers and general workers. And so they share their knowledge, their understanding of the production process, and they enable a very effective transfer to the production of ventilators. Now, obviously, you know, we ventilators can't be the basis, the simple basis of conversion from a high carbon economy to a low carbon economy. But it's illustrating the possibility of conversion. I mean, Jane talked about this importance of rethinking the economy, rethinking production. Well, it seems to me we got to start with the people who actually kind of at the forefront of production, who do the designs, who know how the machines work, who know the alternative products, that that production process or the production skills could be useful and could be key in developing a low carbon sort of strategy. And so, you know, we have in Britain, anyway, there's a need for a massive re-equipment of the NHS after it's been starved by the conservatives. And that massive need for an expansion of public transport. So that leads then to the question of what are the conditions, what are the economic conditions for realizing a participatory grassroots kind of planning. And that's where we need a strong macroeconomic policy of public ownership of public investment. And that's the kind of thing that Labour under Jeremy Corbyn was developing. And they also have this vision of when it came to public ownership, it wasn't going to be like the old kind of public ownership of 1945, which was very much geared to creating an infrastructure for private capital, really. I mean, cheaper electricity, a good infrastructure for the market. And so they're saying we want a different kind of public ownership that will serve social goals like maximum healthcare, particularly the whole dealing with the whole environmental crisis and the conversion to a low carbon economy. So they said that public ownership has got to be about drawing on the knowledge and capacity of those on the front line of production. So it was a very different vision of public ownership. And I think that's what we've now got to think about. I mean, Jane started talking about the importance of popular education and the building up capacity, and that's got to be key to any sort of transformation. But it's also got to be based on a recognition that there is a certain capacity, particularly in parts of the trade union movement, but it's been massively weakened. We can see the necessity of planning and of social purpose and environmental purpose more starkly now than ever before, but we're faced with very weak trade union movements, very weak forms of collectivity. But on the other hand, new forms emerging like we've seen this whole development of mutual aid, certainly in the UK and in other parts of Europe. And probably those kinds of mutual aid are also about sharing knowledge. We've seen new kinds of food production developing in response to the pandemic crisis. So we've got to build on what's been emerging and see how that can be empowered and strengthened. So I didn't have any blueprint, but I think I've got some tools for a different method. And that does require rethinking knowledge and seeing scientific knowledge, theoretical knowledge based on research as being more, in a way, accountable part of the tools of developing a vision and alternative. So probably I should end there and that's really a question and brainstorm kind of presentation, but I hope it's useful. Thank you, Hilary. Great. I think we are coming together on some most important points if I'm looking. We have already three questions at least to Jane. Jane, I sent them to you, Jane. I will look for it. The first, of course, was the question if the COVID-19 government intervention in the case of Africa is best for the big companies or what is the impact on small and medium enterprises and how the policy can rescue the poor at the grass root level. I think very important all over and of course especially in Africa, but not only of course. The second question was the need, I'm reading here the need for increased pedagogy surrounding the negative effects of neoliberalism prior to seek broader engagement. Please, maybe you can also answer to this question and the last question to you especially, but I think, again, to all of us somehow, the balance between environmental protection and economic development, which is also a strong problem in China as we know, and all over Europe. Maybe, Jane, you can start to answer with these questions and we can go on later with the other speakers. Jane, please. The problem maybe with Jane is that she can just use the microphone, not the video, but please, Jane, try your best. Okay. Thank you so much, Michael, and thank you so much to the previous speakers. Very, very good presentations. I will start with the issue of developing a popular base and also generating knowledge. And I think the last speaker has, Hilary has talked very well about this, about rethinking knowledge, how we do get, how knowledge is generated and how it can be passed on. And for me, I think building knowledge, building capacity for engagement is important for building a popular movement. For example, in Africa, most of our universities, for example, don't, they don't teach anymore about ideology, about neoliberalism, they don't, you know. So students, they use come out of universities, not knowing that we need even to search for alternatives. So we need to build the capacity, we need to do teaching, and we also need to link what we are talking about neoliberalism to the struggles of the trade unions, struggles of the farmers, struggles of the women. That linkage is really, really important. And we need to show why we are talking about alternative to neoliberalism and how that alternative will look like. So generating knowledge is important, but also passing on that knowledge is very, very important. The issue of SMEs, you know, is very, very important. Like I pointed out in Uganda, when you look at the stimulus package, it was supporting the the big private sector through tax incentives, through tax exemptions, through deferred VAT and other taxes. But what I want to emphasize here is the fact that it's not that those big private sectors who are, you know, who are going to revive the economy, because through government is just losing money through those tax incentives and exemptions. We have also signed a number of double taxation treaties with a number of countries and double taxation treaties help private sector or corporations to evade taxes, saying that they are paying that tax in a tax haven yet they are not paying anything. We have also liberalized our capital account. So corporations are free to take out, you know, all the money they want. Like I pointed out, we have no minimum wage. There is casualization of labor. So there is a lot of financial flows out of the country because of giving benefits to big corporations. So what we are saying is that the SMEs should access this fund and what we have proposed is that there are some associations for small scale producers, government should put money in those associations. And lastly, the issue of balancing environment and economic development. For me, I think if we are to plan very, very properly, the two are not mutually exclusive. We can be able to do both environmental protection and economic development. And for me, I think it's the way each country is going to do their planning, bearing in mind that we put the people and the environment at the center of that economic planning. Thank you, Michael. Thank you. Hillary, you got a question, direct question. Please look for it. It's the famous example of the, you spoke about this, of the workers in the arms industry. I think it's an important case often referred to in the, especially in the European context. And I just one remark when we in Germany speaking about transformation, of course, the German car industry is a strong case for transformation because all we know that Germany, the Germany, the German industry is too much dependent on car industry and car industry in the old sense is not the future at all, even also not in the form of car industry. So these experiences, how we can use and use the capacity, the knowledge of the hundreds and thousands of workers in the German car industry and millions of workers are depending in Germany on this industry, how we can use it and transform it into something useful for a green social transformation is a very urgent question. Maybe the central question of German industrial transformation ahead. Please, Hillary. Yes, I mean, I can't answer that, obviously, but I that would require, you know, the workers in that industry to be involved in a discussion. But I think also, you know, it's not, although this example I give is inspiring, it's not, it can't be replicated for two reasons. One is that a fundamental one is that I don't think that one can plan the economy, sort of company by company or sector by sector, I think there has to be some overall discussion about, you know, the importance of different sectors so some broad discussion about the, the, the significance and importance and value of the car industry and what alternatives are possible that isn't just a matter for those workers but obviously one of the goals in such a plan would be for those workers to have new forms of employment, which might be a regional discussion. I mean, it could have many levels, it could be about products, so it could be about, you know, the manufacturer of bicycles of different kinds of public vehicles, but it would also need to be about thinking about different industries as a regional level so that those workers could remain in the locality that they choose to live but have a different kind of employment, maybe a more one, a more fulfilling employment than working on a car production line. So that discussion has got to go beyond a sink, a simple company basis but it does need to involve the knowledge of workers and often sometimes that knowledge is not just a matter of the workplace I mean another impressive conversion of capacity during the pandemic in the UK was the ways in which people came together to produce protective equipment, you know, because of the government and because of the privatisation, you know, was completely hopeless. It was actually delivering that urgently required equipment and people felt a real, you know, concern and passion in terms of the urgency of that need and so you had families coming together to produce using 3D printers to produce the visors, you had people who knew how to sew men and women coming together to produce the scrubs for the doctors, so that knowledge could often exist within the household, you know, the household was part of the economy. So this view of the importance of practical knowledge is something that mustn't just be about the workplace but about I mean the community obviously is where knowledge about the environment is very important. So I can, I can give you my, put my email on the, on the chat and anybody interested in details about this particular case it was the workers were called from a company called Lucas Aerospace. And it's been well written about but it's, it's also that was a very, very strong self confident trade union movement being supported and encouraged by a radical part of the lame party. And that was what John McDonald and Jeremy Corbyn were going to do and spread they were also going to set up an arms conversion agency, you know, because that would require a national, a national plan for converting, you know, the the whole arm I mean Britain's very militarized economy and converting that capacity for social need. And a way I mean it's also very, arms production is usually very high carbon intensive so that was a key initiative, which, which generalized from the experience that Lucas Aerospace. But if I write my email I can send people the the the material about that example without sort of romanticizing it but it just proved that it's possible. There is another question to you. And what is your opinion about government partnerships with private sectors to deliver public services you know the famous PPP. Well, I'm against public private partnerships because I think that, you know, in a way the private sector the profit of the companies the private sector what is the private sector, it's actually about production for profit. And I think production for profit has no place within the public sector I think cooperatives do they can often share a social mission. So I'd say the public public public, which can also be public civic is very important and that's a place where the knowledge of citizens and workers is very important in democratizing the public sector so I think the public sector needs to expand but it needs to expand on a democratic basis that can draw on the knowledge of users and of producers to maximizing profit, maximize public efficiency and public benefit. And so I think it's a public public and a public civic partnership that's needed not a not a public private. Thank you very much. There were questions to you, Ginger, you have seen from Patrick Bond is also a long term partner of us from South Africa. I think you will answer these questions and maybe you also can very briefly add, you have done concrete research on the ground in the Yangtze province, maybe you can make clear what it means for the ordinary people these type of planning for eco socialist transformation in the provinces of China. Thank you. And so I just want to respond to questions from my very, very primary and you know, thinking. And so the first question is, of course, how to how to think about the general meaning of transformation and I mean, regarding the system production production economy, even knowledge, I mean, we have to rethink a lot of things, a lot of basic terms and so on. But back to the term I used socialist equal civilization construction is a very, very, you know, the Chinese style term or expression. So, but basically, we want to emphasize the two points. One point is just as the other two speakers also have mentioned the relation between environment protection and economic growth or economic development. It is, it was, it is, it will be, I mean, still be a very, very crucial issue for thinking about equal civilization or socialist civilization. I mean, it's very, very important and also very hard question, you know, even during the COVID-19 at the moment when we have to keep the balance between the two things. But there is another point is, I would like to see that in the Chinese case, what we are thinking about is how to, how to overcome the capitalist practice of thinking or model and a system of socialist, although the primary stage of socialist. So, the second question is also very, very important for us. I mean, anyway, the China is a socialist system. But the question is how to make such a socialist system to go further without, you know, back to back to a totally capitalism, capitalist one. So that's a key question, you know, why we talk about the socialist equal civilization. So how to connect the environment protection issue with the socialist justice issue. So that's the general thinking regarding how to integrate the socialist equalization. And then the very important question, I mean, the question which can be reduced from the, you know, the explanation about is that whether or not a strong government led by the socialist party, political party can be a leading force or promoting force for such kind of grand transformation. So whether or not the strong government, government is planning or organization can play a positive role in such a process of reconstruction or transformation. And then not only at the national government or at the national level, but we should also look at the local level. So that's why we do some of the field studies in the different we call the experimental zones of equal civilization. You know that there are thousands of such kind of demonstration zones in this time at different levels, at the province level and the county, even at the village level. So the Jiangxi is a province is in the middle of China, but not not the east or not the west in the middle part of China, but it is one of the four provinces named by the state council as the equal civilization construction demonstration zones. So when we go to there, so basically we focus on the two aspects. One aspect is that whether or not how the local government are planning or organizing their local practice or local implementation of the national strategy of equal civilization. So and then we can see that we have introduced lots of different kinds of public projects, such as the big, big data platforms, which can be used by all the cities. So to know how to see for wise the water quality and to know the general situation of the local environment and how to know how the local governments are working on in the environmental governance. So in this list. So all those projects are helpful for the local people to join the local governance of environment, of course, not the dust environment, but also economic activities, even the cultural activities. So that's the one side. And then another side is that we can also find a lot of examples that the local governments help the small, the family business or the private business. And to develop the green production of green economy at the local level. So I mean, so not only the departments of the governments, but also even the local government officials, they very, very actively to be involved in the process. So in this list, I will see that the local governments are helpful to create the green economy at the local level, and also have the local people to join the process of developing green economy. So that's a very, very short report to the cases. I mean, if I mean, I hope you have the chance to take a look at, you know, on spot. We are now a little bit running out of time. Hillary and Jane, Hillary, firstly, to you, you have seen, I think the questions. I think the main questions to you, especially where how to how to bring together how to organize this transformation from the industrial level, how to bring together workers and ecological organizations. We are discussing here in, I think, also in our Brussels office, but in Germany, the ideas of councils, councils for transformation, where ecological organizations, trade unions, the workers and councils in the larger industries, but of course also state state administrations at the regional or local level or the federal level, whatever are involved. So what have you some ideas, how to bring together these different stakeholders in a new and different way. Maybe in the current plan, you have already briefly spoken about some problems with regard to this. And the last speaker then will be Jane. Okay. Well, I mean, I, I could talk a bit from, I mean, I don't have a very specific tidy answer to that, but their experience is to draw on. I mean, I think the role of local government is very important. I mean, that's building on Kinza's point as well, because I think that's where the, the, often the knowledge about the environment is is. And I think, you know, maybe a fundamental question was got to just make is that in order to achieve any kind of harmony between development and and the environment. One's got to completely change the historical attitude towards the environment that that was characteristic of capitalist growth, the kind of Promethean, you know, harnessing the power of nature for the machine of the economy. And I think instead we've got to recognize the power of nature as something to develop and to be in a, in a harmonious relationship with them. It won't always be harmonious, you know, but it'll, but it's got to be somehow respectful. And so that, and that takes place best at a local level. But so local authorities are important. And there, one's got to kind of, I mean, local authorities in Britain have been really, you know, just almost destroyed by Mrs Thatcher and by the conservatives, who kind of paradoxically have been centralizing government and centralizing it in order to support the market. And local government was seen as like interfering with the market. And rightly, it did rightly under under labor control. So now people are thinking what powers do we have at a local level still that could be used to impose, negotiate environmental goals on the private sector. And obviously a clear power there is is procurement the power of procurement. So there's a good example in the northern city Preston, which is quite a well discussed example of how they've not only used their own procurement powers, but they brought together other public bodies, the health service, the police, the universities, in order to negotiate with local companies to provide the the resources they need, instead of going to big companies. So there's some kind of attempt to use procurement to enhance both economic democracy local, locally local control over the economy to improve workers wages and training and apprenticeships and so on, and to impose and negotiate environmental goals with those local companies. So, and it clearly local government can bring together green people who make green environmental issues their priority, whether in the Labour Party or the Green Party, and those involved in economic development, particularly the trade union movement. I think it also requires a bit of a shift in the trade union movement. I mean, this is difficult because the trade unions have been on the defensive. So not in a mood to take on new goals, but I think the impact of the COVID experience and now, you know, the drastic levels of unemployment are going to, well, they're going to reinforce that defensive attitude, but maybe also lead people to think in different ways about shorter working time, you know, reallocating work, the idea of a basic income. So in a way, a new kind of economic infrastructure that can ensure everybody has the chance to participate in the economy. I have to stop you now because we are running out of time and we all see I think there's a lot of to discuss and very close to the problems. I think all of us are now realizing the last now in this round is Jane, you were there were questions to you, especially how I think it's very important in all our countries how to get our leaders under control. Jane, please. Thank you so much, Michael. That's a million dollar question, especially now. But I think the beginning place is where Hillary has stopped mobilizing that people mobilizing constituencies, the trade unions, the workers, people working in environment that women, then we put pressure on government because, you know, what we are talking about is politics. It's about politics. And our leaders need votes. Anyway, in some countries, they do need votes. So we are talking about governance, making people participate in having their voices heard. So for me, I think we also need we should separate politics from what we are talking about from economic policies. Politics is protection of the environment. We need to link that to our vote and our ideology. Thank you very much, Jane. I want to conclude now I have to think really it's a pity of course that we are not can meet somewhere directly to see each other and all the participants on the other hand. It would be very difficult to bring so many participants from all over the world, almost to a seminar. So nevertheless, I think I personally learned a lot. I want to thank Jane. I want to thank Hillary. I want to thank Cingy. I want to thank the interpreters. I hope somebody from Spanish speaking countries was here. I also want to thank our colleagues from TNI and from the offices in New York and Brussels. And I think I do not know if I have somebody forgotten. Nevertheless, I want to end with phrases from the communist manifesto. Mark said proletariat of all countries unite. I think we what we should know to uniting all the different working forces and ecological activists, peace activists and so on. We really should unite to in organizing from the grassroots up, but also demanding that the state comes in helping us to organize this type of transformation we really need and we see in this special situation of the pandemic. How vulnerable our societies are and especially vulnerable are the most vulnerable parts of our societies, which are now unemployed can't get access to health service and so on. So there is a strong need especially in this situation to think how we can organize and plan for a new great transformation. I hope to meet you directly sometimes and all the best and bye bye in solidarity. Have a nice day. Hiji, you are going to have a night. The others have a morning now. We are in between. Thank you very much. Bye bye.