The long arm of the Bilderberg Group

Manlio Dinucci
Voltairenet.org

For the last few years, many ridiculous stories have been written about the Bilderberg Group. However, working from the documents, it is possible to piece together a reliable vision. Numerous researchers have been working on this. It is absolutely not a world government, but a network of influence, composed by the CIA and MI6, intended to support NATO.

hree Italians were invited to this year’s meeting of the Bilderberg Group, which was held at Montreux in Switzerland, between 30 May and 2 June. Another journalist was invited with Lili Gruber, the host of the TV channel La7, and now the permanent host of the Bilderberg Group – this was Stefano Feltri, assistant director of Fatto Quotidiano, directed by Marco Travaglio. The « third man » chosen by the Bilderberg is Matteo Renzi, senator for the Partito Democratico, and ex-President of the Council.

The Bilderberg Group, constituted formally in 1954 on the initiative of certain US and European « eminent citizens », was in reality created by the CIA and the British secret service MI6, in order to support NATO against the USSR [1]. After the Cold War, it continued to play the same role in support of the strategy of the USA and NATO.

The guests of these annual meetings are almost exclusively citizens of Western Europe and North America. They number approximately 130 representatives from the world of politics, economy, the military, the major media and the secret services, who, formally speaking, participate in a personal capacity. They gather behind closed doors in luxurious hotels, each year in a different country, and are protected by draconian military security systems. No journalists or observers are allowed access, and no communiqué is ever published. The participants are sworn to silence – they are not even allowed to reveal the identity of the speakers who may have given them information (in total disregard of their proclaimed « transparency »). We only know that this year, they talked mostly about Russia and China, spatial installations, a stable strategic order, and of the future of capitalism.

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Why a hipster, vegan, green tech economy is not sustainable

Vijay Kolinjivadi

Al-Jazeera

Improving eco-efficiency within a capitalist growth-oriented system will not save the environment. 

On the western borderlands of Montreal's well-to-do Outremont district and the ultra-hipsterised and gentrified Mile End lies an expanse of land where the University of Montreal is currently building a new science campus. Just across is Parc-Extension, one of Canada's poorest and most densely populated neighbourhoods and a port of call for many newly arrived immigrants.

The new campus has been touted as a model of "sustainable development". It boasts LEED-certified buildings to reduce environmental impact, rainwater collection structures, energy-efficient lighting and heat recycling, infrastructure for electric vehicles and bikes, lots of greenery, and overall, a minimal carbon footprint. A number of tech companies, including Microsoft's new AI Hub, are moving in and are expected to further enhance the "eco-efficiency" of the area.

The unspoken expectation is that once the green new campus is completed, capital and economic growth will naturally flow into the area. This means nearby neighbourhoods will get "revitalised", especially the poorer ones, like Parc-Extension.

Thus, immigrant-owned grocery stores, halal butcheries and community centres will soon be replaced by vegan chain restaurants, hip vintage clothing joints, organic food stores and coffee-shops galore, as landlords push out poor tenants to make space for more well-to-do ones. 

In the process, the implicit socio-economic violence behind gentrification will be invariably "greenwashed" and presented as development that would make the area more "sustainable", "beautiful" and "modern". 

Unfortunately, creation by destruction is what capitalism does best, and its damaging practices are anything but green. This market-driven "sustainable" vision of economic activity, ecological-conscious diets and "hipness" within modern capitalism reinforce inequality and still hurt the environment. 

Before I proceed further with my argument, I should mention that I am an academic, living in a "hip" part of Montreal and engage in activities that follow a particular aesthetic ethos, all of which make me very much a part of the reality I critique below. My aim is not to moralise, but rather to highlight the dangers of a political and economic system that profits from deceiving perhaps well-meaning self-proclaimed progressive folks into believing that a greener, more efficient capitalism is possible.

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At The Frontiers Of Surveillance Capitalism

Katie Fitzpatrick
The Nation

Before they started their successful wildcat strike last year, West Virginia teachers railed against the introduction of a workplace wellness program called Go365. The program coerced employees into downloading an app that would monitor their health, rewarding points for exercise and good behavior. Employees who failed to accrue 3,000 points by the end of the year would be penalized with a $25 monthly fee and increased deductibles. 

Although the program was made voluntary before the strike began (and has since been eliminated), the outrage over Go365 helped ignite the strike. As one teacher told The New York Times, “People felt that was very invasive, to have to download that app and to be forced into turning over sensitive information.”

By resisting Go365, the West Virginia teachers waged two battles at once: They fought in the trenches of state austerity and on the front lines of private digital surveillance. The app presaged many of the worrying trends that Shoshana Zuboff describes in her new book, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism. She explains that Silicon Valley firms are looking to wearable technologies and other smart devices to gain an increasingly detailed view of our physical and emotional health. Go365 measured teachers’ daily steps with the help of a Fitbit; Sleep Number beds measure the hours we keep and the quality of our rest; a new company called Realeyes plans to surveil our facial expressions as we watch advertisements, interpreting our emotions in real time. 

Silicon Valley firms don’t want to simply monitor our behavior, however; they plan to shape it, too. Their influence over our actions might be indirect for now, effected through the prizes and penalties that Go365 weaponized against teachers. But by integrating these devices into our daily lives, these companies also set the stage for a future of more direct intervention. Zuboff quotes one software developer fantasizing aloud about the tech industry’s ability to push and prod us remotely: “We can know if you shouldn’t be driving, and we can just shut your car down…we tell the TV to shut off and make you get some sleep, or the chair to start shaking because you shouldn’t be sitting so long.”
Drawing on thorough research as well as alarming interviews like that one, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism offers an urgent warning about our possible future. Zuboff discusses the technological innovations and market mechanisms that make ubiquitous surveillance increasingly likely. Although her diagnosis is chilling, her solutions are few. 

Throughout the book, she decries the abuses perpetrated by Silicon Valley companies and argues that they represent a radical break from an earlier, kinder form of capitalism. But by refusing to acknowledge the continuities between past modes of exploitation and the latest horrors of surveillance capitalism, she ultimately leads readers away from the most promising paths of resistance.

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