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NDERCURRENTS SSN 0306 2392 'tzdercurrents is published bi-monthly by Indercurrents Limited, a democratic non- rofit-making company without &are capital id limited by guarantee. rinted in England by Prestagate Ltd., 3 Underwood Road, Reading, Berkshire. elephone 0734 583958. 'ndercurrents has two addresses: arth Exchange Building, 213 Archway Road, ondon N6 5BN (registered office), id 1 Shadwell, Uley, Dursley , Gloucestershire, L l I 5BW, Telephone 045 386-636. lease send subscriptions, single copy orders !c. to Uley and letters and editorial matter to ie London office. UBSCRIPTIONS. etails of the subscription rates and the ipropriate labour-saving form may be fiiiind n page 48. ur airfreight agents are Expediters o f the pinfed Word Inc., 527 Madison Avenue, New ork N.Y. 10022. Second class postage paid at ew York City. OVER. This issue's front cover was designed

Tony Durham, whilst thanks for the back )ver are due to the Danish anti-nuclear group, OA (see page 8). 'e would like to thank Ellena Rushbrooke for anslations from the Danish, and Peter Bonnici )r his medical cartoonery. ISTRIBUTION. We have two UK distributors: he Publications Distribution Co-opera five, 35 Caledonian Road, London N7, el. 01-609 3969, supply radical bookshops, id other alternative stores. zperchain Ltd., 4 3 Silver Street, Whitwick, eicestershire and 5 Monmouth Place, London '2 supply other outlets and all UK wholesalers. elephone 0530-37413 and 01-229 9000. iquiries about UK distribution and North merican airfreight should go to Chris Hutton- wire at the London office. He can also be mtacted by telephone, on 01-891 0989 ome) or 01-261 6774 during normal office lurs. Other enquiries about overseas dis- ibution should be directed to Uley. ERSONNEL. Undercurrents has three nployees, Sally Boyle, Joyce Evans and 'artyn Partridge, and a large number of unpaid ut-timers, of wliom the following played ajor roles in the production of this issue: zrbara Kern, Chris Hutton-Squire, Dave 'liott, Dave Kanner, Dave Smitlu Duncan impbell, Godfrey Boyle, Martin Znce, Pat ->yne, Pete Glass, Peter Cockerton, Peter Immer, Richard Elen, Tony Durham, and, ost important of all, the Collective-at-large. special thanks are also due to Nigel and ermione Gowland and all at Earth Exchange. nyone interested in any aspect of the maga- ne is invited to attend our weekly meetings at rchway Road. These occur on Wednesdays id start at about 8pm. TUTTEN CONTRIBUTIONS to the magazine e most welcome, preferable but not icessarily double-space typed on one side of e paper to facilitate the minimal amount of liting we like to perform. Scripts should be a t t o Archway Road. RGANISATION. Undercurrents is not pro- uced by a publishing elite: it is open to any- ie who feels committed to the magazine and s aims. Key decisions are made by the Alective a t major meetings held every two onths, immediately after publication day. At Lese meetings we discuss the latest issue, 'view what we are doing for the next edition, id appoint posts for the one after that. rincipal functions - News Editor, Features liters, Reviews Editor, and so on are located at these meetings depending on who available. All decisions on important issues of litorial policy, production, etc. erne e durin ie weekly and bi-monthly meetings,2etails of hich may be obtained from either of our rfices. OPYRIGHT. Unless otherwise stated, every- ling in this magazine is joint copyright @I976 ndercurrents Limited, and the respective ithors. We will quite ha pily let people we ke reproduce anything from the magazine, i t you must ask our permission firs

Number 19

December 1976 j apuary 1977

2 EDDIES: News, gossip and wild speculation about the anti-nuclear struggle, pyramid power. Diggers, atomic ships, satellites, motorways,

- nature reserves and similar things. .

7 WHAT'S ON/WHATSS WHAT: Useful (hopefully) information about events and entities.

8 UP AND ANTI-ATOM: Lisbeth Rink describes the successful anti-nuclear campaign in Denmark :. . . .

9 LETTER FROM AMERIKA: . . . . ..Dave Efiiott reports on the growing opposition in the United States.

11 CAT'S CRADLE: Mgrtyn Partridge and Godfrey Boylf, describe their ~ impressions of the Centre for Alternative Technology, in Machynlleth, North Wales.

14 - PUTTING UP A MAST IN A GALE: Jfm McCullough tel ls how.

15 ELEMENTAL ECOLOGY: Findhorn, a cortimunity on the North East coast of Scotland, reputedly grow food with the co-operation of plant .

spirits or Devas. Richard Elen in conversation with Dick Barton, consider what might lie behind th is phenomenon.

17 ' LETTERS: Your chance to get a slice of the action.

19 THE SECRET PEOPLE: John Fletcher's alternative history of England from Saxon times, via the Norman yoke, to Ynstanley.

22 LIMITS TO MEDICINE: Twentieth century diseases vs twentieth century *

medicine. jenny Rmliffe asks, which i s winning? . ,

24 HOLISTIC MEDICINE: I t 's no use just treating people's individual ~ symptoms, argues Tom Graves; you have to look at the whole of their lives to find out what's really wrong.

25 THE POLITICS OF SELF-HELP*, Margaret Versluysen says that the se'lf- . help movement i s all very well for the young, healthy people who advocate it, but what about the poor, the agediand the chronically sick?

28 PEOPLE'S PRESCRIPTION: Geoff Watts reports from Venezuela, where "

an important experiment in deprofessionalised, popular medicine is taking place.

29 COMMUNITY HEALTH: The NHS is a beehive of professionals and - . bureaucrats, observes Tom Heifer. How can attitudes and organisation be

changed to make it serve the community?

31 BABES'IN THE WARD: The debate between Naturalism and Technology is part of the current controversy about childbirth.jahn Bradsbaw analyses the issues at stake; both for and against.

34 DRUGS AND WOMEN: The London Hospital Women's Group present some horrifying data about the use of drugs to manipulate the minds and. bodies of women for the convenience of . . . . . who?

36 -GUIDE TO ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE: A travelogue around the fringe ideas which the BMA don't like, compiled by Richard men. ,

39 ROADERS RETURN: Victor Anderson replies on behalf of Alternative Socialism to criticisms raised in Undercurrents 18.

40 , IN THE MAKING: ~he'latest additions t o this useful l is t of alternative projects and what not.

41 REVIEWS: Magic, ancient mysteries, herbs, vegetables, education, Buddhism, natural childbirth; hunting, NATO, poultry, Vietnigm, com- puters, self-help housing, Loch Ness Monster etc. etc. -6. ."

;LOCAL RESIDENTS who blocked the busy Archway Road in North . London in pretest igainst plans by the Dep3itment of the Environment t o demolish building*atong the whole length of the road ill Oldei to build Mf a mite of motormy. "ThkI iiohted dab ofdiotcowy ii tto-aw1', sap "STAMP (Stop The ~rchway Motorway Plan), "It's just a short cut horn

tnffie tern to another." In older to provide this dririOu6 convenience ihops, open spaces and woods will be destroyed, at a cost of

million. - - public enquiry was originally convened on September 15th and

struggled on for four weeks suffering constant adjournments because of bid behaviour. The DOE inspector. Mi. James Vernon, embarked on a policy of grindjng down the more outspoken objectors by stopping pro- ceedim until the following day, presumably in the hope that they would crentually give up and.go away. As a result only two seaions out of more thanthirty actually ran tfceilfull course. Unfortunately Mi. Vemon was the prtoctoal victim of this strategy and the enquiry was adjourned sine die when k was taken seriously in in mid-October.

The enquiry is not expected to be resumed until the new year. The Objectorrare determined& maintain their policy of outspoken protest became they regard the enquiry as a piece of window dressing which is almost duty-bound to find for the DOE (and the history of public enquiries bears this out). There Ism point in t o the p&te rules of open debate if the inspector ii impervious= toss, to how they see it. Their champion in this attitude hqs been John Tyme, vet- of Aire Valleyand Winchester, who attended every session of the enquiry before being called bade tohis post of lecturer Environmental Studies at Sheffield Poly- technic. He submitted a ten% e document to the enquiry dwelling parti- cutely on flu infiltration of flu 'Road Lobby' into government and administration (distinct intimations of chicanery), and the absence of a national integrated transport policy. '

The question of a transport policy is overwhelmingly relevant because the absence of one it is imoo~ible to iudee the 'need* of a scheme like

.&way Motorway. In the context of ;much more energetic campaign use, for example, the scheme would be less desirable, even on.

economic grounds. It is senseless to consider each of these potential schemes in isolation; they can only properly be evaluated as part of a whole. Tyme quotes Richard Marsh,former chainnan of British Rail, who was asked onBBC TV last March what he expected to come out of the government's review of BR. "Well, I am like the public. I read my news- papers. It would be nice to know," was the astonishing reply.

TIÈconsequence of urban motorways are a ripe field for specpbtion.. They are noisy, ugly and depressing, of course, and people who Bve near them suffer from excessive lead in their bloodstreams, which tends to make children in particular listless and violent. Anyone who cares to visit the site of Carnival in Netting Hill could hardly fail to be depressed by the overhead Motorway which cuts a swathe through this community. Its moronic concrete facade is a form of institutional brutality which detracts in evtfry way from the quality of life in the lieighbourhood. Just one of many reasons, perhaps, why people freak out - will Hiehgate be next?. Some people have the temerity to argue that we shouldn't be talking about how much urban motorway we need in older to achieve some putative national objective, but rather, that we should make the protection of

"cornmunit& from this sort of ugliness one of the majbc-objectives in itself. ~ndercurr/lttghas strcntg interest in the enqufry because our office, in

the buildine of Earth Exchaftre. will be demolished If the road scheme goesaheadan the other hand, we have to admit that we can only afford

use planning blight associated with the motorway scheme has y values crashing down. It's an ill wind . . . . The photo-

l i l y Chris Chinuby, courtesy of Islington Gutter Press,

<- '

The threats to civil hberties from security in the nuclear industry and likely opposition to nuclear developments is the substance of a report recently published by Friends of the Earth together with NCCL and the Council for the Protection of Rural England. *

Their aim is to address the social and political issues alone and leave aside the technical matters which arc already well covered.

The theme of the first oart arises from the vroblem of sabotage and the - . -. theft of plutonium, a which worsens kith the development of the Fast Breeder Reactor. The threat to civil liberties is a product of the total security measuresrequired for keeping the stuff safe. M.I.5 would be at th< base of this as advisers to what wasnecessary and the new armed p r iva t zpm force would do the actual guudlng. Prospective employees am 'positively vetted, in the A.E.A. and B.N.F.L. which BOW must *&cessarityextend içWtheC.E.G.3 mid more widely. This includes five- yeatly z b of pofitical associations. A blanket of secrecy already , < ¥teoad any movements of phitonium between plants. 3

At the Press conference Tom Burke, of FOE, said that although Tony Benn claims to want a full and open public debate, it cannot be ultimately achieved &cause of the security position

Also Pat Hewtt, of NCCL, admitted that positive vetting could produce rather tametrade,tinioos and measures could betaken against 'militants' thus encroaching on normal T.U. activity. Outside the industry, the gm& who oppose nudear power are likely to

and the usual array of surveillance techniques it available to them.

Forces could be applied to the Press bv extension of the 'D'notice tyteci; gometimes overzea~~usiy used by Min'iere, ssSS included too HÃ discussion of theConstitutiona1 -ions of the n of an armed pow far*-with so fit* a&untabl~ty. After die theft of ' plutonium or terrorist threat, the general search ensuing would need to be of unprecedented proportions

The second part of the report con cerns the selection of nuclear sites and the planning procedure for consent. It is corisidered that opposition to these wffl be voci- ferous and could lead to civil dis- obedience on a higescale with dis- ruption of inquiries using tactics learnt from the mot?iway ones. Opposing pressure groups are more likely then to come under sur- veilfance. . Tom Burke thought the CEGB should be forced to oublish the full Bst of coastal sites that it has its &yes ort, this would allow time for national opposition to Scum and really raise oublic conscio mess. pinahy he &mmcnted't hat the American eouivalcnt ti1 the Nuclear hupe<irate had actively promoted debate in the socio-political issues, compared with the bland platitudes over here.

Of interest too is t h e response of the press, this report was given extensive coverage by the main dailiesand it is notable that since . the publication of the .Royal Com-

Power (~hich,~urprisingly, is * a good read) and this FOE one, t he national coverage has increased. It ; is about time, too, since the silence of this NationalDebate ivas . . becoming oppressive. <

Nuclear Prospects, A ~ ~ m e ~ t a the individual, the State and Nuclear Power by Michael Flood and Robin Grove- White. (Friends ' of the Earth, E l ) .

Sabotage details

Michael Flood has also bad 3 published in Bulletin of the &id Scientists, October, aearticle with' a set of tables detailing: theAffa4

3 on Nuclear InstallatioWor A

Facilities, e.g. two bombs by + Breton separatists at BrenneUs, - ' Fiance in 1975; Vandalismind Sabotage to Nuclear FaciBties; Hoaxesamj Threats to Nuclear Installations, e.g. 23 it. the U.K. and 99 in the U.S.A., all in the period 1966-75;Breaches o f . . Security, e.g. G e r m MP eatera- plant Unnoticed with a bazooka gives it t o the Director; and U.S. firms fined for breaking security z regulations. Flo.od's point is th& tà show not that nuclear sabotage, G

leading to credible terrorist acts," a possibility but rather tha inevitable and is already

Californian plan

He's not the only on the State of California tingency plans for a nu mail incident, of which a Phase 1; the Threat is in t of Undercurrents. (Phase the eventuality). It is mundane document mainly with setting out t command of the relevant Those with the* fingasin are the E.R.D.A:, the F. University of California, ment of the Army as Radiological people EmergencyServicei. a fairly quaint set of questions h u l d ask vans.&&

mission on Envirocrnenta! Pollution's report on Nucksar. . ,

ther we can assume that similar as exist in the U.K,, but that our %&I Secrets Acts ensure that' h titbits neyer surface.

&an demos I

&the point about expected on tq nuchaf sites, the

ins propose to build a nuclear r in Biokdorf, neat Hamburg,

lhe Efee. he development site was

surround& by coils of military ?tytebarbed wife and a moat dug outsidethis. Powerful searchlights jÑr erected and the perimeter was p~troUe4 with dogs. All this was in -me to the formation of a local q w r h n group.

hSaturday, October 30th lemonstratin was held to occupy

the atepeacefully. ~ f t e r marching , round the fence composing and ,- staging songs, the demoratntors, iBctudint many 'respectable' people 1 crossed the 10 foot moat using t h e stout placards and threw carpets owr fbe barbed coils. Some bcal farmers also helped out with straw bales-Despite police opposi- tte t h e y ' f i gained access by cutting throughat a aurpiià point..

The Kit of the day was spent inside, and the priest heading the , , demo negotiated with the police t o remain there as long asthey were quiet. Meanwhile more fencing was erected around them, though lo* vflbgers kept cutting the wire. In the evening tents sprang up and boafires were lit, but after the TV and press people had finally departed, the poHce.tumed off the searchlights and attacked the demonstrators, despite the agree- meat with thepriest, beating them hxd@abbtely an4 using- tear gas. Tents and deeping bags were set alight and no ambulances were to 'hand. so the iniured were taken to 1 hospital in cars.

The following day, the moat was deepened and new barbed wire arrived; inside notice were camped in lar&army tents. T& dernoAra- tion reformed and they marched in silence but met with a wlice road Node. SQ they were forced to I circuit the Èrea Some people flew

foil kites to interfere with the wlice VHF field radios. Their effectiveness is uncertain but

-the police threatened to disperse I the k c h unlessthey were wound in. Some protestersevp took to the air in sentaircraft but (hey

re intercepted by anny he& ?ten which forced themout of

the zone. - . - 30.000 twnedout0~ November 13th fora repeat per- . f o , ~ , SCOTB of riot police a d

protesterswerewiwedandmore still were arrested. ,- 1

Acrowdvariouslyestimatedtobe between 1 5 0 4 2,000 turned up inTrafalgarSworeon-ember 20th toheara l@ofTxmourpeople (including Diana RigfandHugo Montefiore)inveighagainstthe Windscale planning application.' The event was organised by CANTO . (Concern Against Nude& Ttchno- logy Organisations), which is a dynamic, unilateral anti-nuclear . initiative ran by John Hanson from

suffered an init* setback the . previous day when FOE Energy Co-oidinatoi Czech Conroy publidy diuocfited FOE from CANTO in The Guardian, but Tom Bmt* tioaed up on the day not- witlutendtaf. John Huuon point8 out tint the ofganiMtioBi repicà ented on tIy have* a total combined-mcmbenhip of over two million, which must give Peter Shore some sictpleà after-

19 Cheyne walk, London SW3 noons. (01-352 3771). CANTO had

AT to Sell Out ALTERNATIVE TECHNOLOGY if 'Genera, the "new' figures presented about to become big businean. Or by Gerald Leach of the Inter- so company representatives speak national Institute for Environment ing at a ~ecent conferbm on Wind, and Development showed the Sun and Waved'wouM taw m crunch for Britain occurring in believe. about 1990. Drawn from oil wm-

Having mule hit pile, Walter panics confidential figures and Lmch of the E&a group of com- ' a two year Amaican study, only; panics retired. In a moment of the erowine acceptance of& guilt, or altruism, he founded the Larch Foundation Butthe wn- ference recently held there, and attended by about 200 people, was oiganiied by Conservation Tools , and Technology and Elga with MI eye to business.

And, though it rained all day, representatives from companies as diverse as Laing, the Express Dairy Co., Slack a d Decker, the Ministry o f Defence, andMerrychef were not going to mils an alternative techno- -chance to savea buck. %

The day began with two slightly different views on the depletion of fossil fuels. Prof Alan Williamsfrom

University suggested that: evenwith a growth economy fossil fuel supply will owet demand for thirty to sixty year*. Just bade from a World EnergyConference in

latter view% surprising. Certainly this would not have been missed by the silent delegate from the DEn. Asalways the desirability of niain- taining a growth economy was not under question.

The rest of the day was spent s e w wind, wave andsolar power; depending on your company's pro- duct. Theyare exp+dveproducts, and it will be a rich A.T. freak that insW a ready-made wind or tolas power wit; costing anything from fifty to fiye thousand pound;. . Tfo confer.mw showed that A.T, is becoming agrowthinduttw,A may lake t h e to overcome market resistance, but for all ow own mis- givings, ¥i will prove lucrative for some.

~twas&quiteayawn,\be -

THIS MONTH'S Queen's Award tv Environmental Concern goes to Amey Roadstonis Co. Ltd., ., a member of the Gold Tfekb Group, and England's largest fro-' ducer of gravel and quairied s with over 140 operational pit; Concerned to improve on th+ somewhat tarnishedimage&, amajor despoilsof tyçnglu -try*, ARC lime, -1972, 9 r i a cpiner^neypto- yVt(t*tUnfold,a700çc ateof workedpitsownedbythe company. The d m of theproject ue:

l.ageaei*!studyofthee& of the newly exuntçlgravelpita iltudyoftheMtunlcolonition <rfthepits,~dof whichlyBdtowt #pe&iJdaptbefttothinenviron-

alUMdfriHu- 3.a~tudyoftliefactoncon-

troBag.the survival of ducUiafl, andinputiculuoftheiifood fupplytothefirstweekiafta tatduuf.

Or soitaoems.3utfremtheutart .theecotogxal.Ç< hasbeen mostly window-dressing.Local enviroa- Bientalistsbecarnewncernedwhen

they discovered that the company &tended the restored pits to Bq med as a shooting area; fears hardly alleviated-when Game Con- ssrrancy became the chief recipients of ARCS conscience money. The major "threatened apecies' under inwstigation were the Mallard and Tufted Duck - the commonest waterfowlaround. The investigation of feeding~equire- molts has:after two years, dome us with the Nobel p w w i n n k result that, for rapid growth, ducklings require a high protein diet. In fact, of course, the research project's a h has been to increase the dud; population at as fast a rate as

wile, so that cropping becomes fr-tee m y and profitable shooting lights can be leased out.

Man's harmony with the duckling is also somewhat restricted; as sailing and fishing are equally exclusive. A sailing club hasrights to sailon one of the pits, while the Binnbgham Anglers' Association and the Leighton Buzzard Working Men; Club (!) monopolise the right' of fishing.

A representative Of ARC was asked: 1. what access the general .public had to me site; 2. whether the project would be repeated on other sites if it were financially successful; 3. why did ARC start th project in the first place? The answers were: 1. too much! - they had troubles with vandals taking 'eggs from the nesting site; 2. of course! 3. because ARC is a fesaan ibbbody with a conscience.

rami id Power: -

1 The Chips are own INNER TECHNOLOGY freaks wiU be aware of the mysterious 'pyramid. poWer' e m that is cokcted by carefully mnstructed miniatus=replia of the Great Pyramid when they are orientated North-South. This en- (which may be related to Orgone and ley-energy) is known to be capabk of doing a whole mUectbn of odd things, t3om sharpening razorblades (Sw Radical Techmlogy p. 237) and preserving food, t o intensifying psychic healing and meditation. Recent w r k by the Undercurrents Alternative Sc i ice Reaearch Unit seems to indicate that it can a h affect m e of modern techmbgy's most compkx and intricate creations: integrated circuits.

~ b v e g i g a t i n g some of the subjective effects of a particular ramid recently, in thii a 2-ft.quare base hardboard m d 4

a peculiat ti@% and numbness was noticed by one of the experimenters as he p d his hand o m the min t of the pyramid. The other workers tried this and compared notes, but not before one of the group hnd been advised fo remove his Iiquid€rystal-Displ (LCD) -type digital watch, "% case of damage''. He declined, and mntinued with obseming the effects.

few minute8 later, the watch stopped dmd.

Modern digital watches consist of bur basic blocks: a power source,

often a mercury battery; a digital display, either LCDVor Light- Emitting Diode (LED) type; a com- plex CMOS-typ Integrated Circuit 'I@', and a quartz crystal In this

,articular model, the crystal is in an oscillator running at about lKHz., which is divided down to IHZ. for seconds, and subdivided further for hour, day, and month. The oscillator 'strobes' the display at its basic frequency, and the ekTect of the ~vramid was n o t i d by the way t k s high-speed flicker- ing - normally only just visible -

d down and stopped. ~erally it is very hard to 'slow

down' crystal oscillators: their frequency is exactly determined by the mechanical remnance of the aystaL They either go or not. BY frenzied pushiig of the reset buttons the watch was restarted: again, the display began to flash slowly, then faster and faster, until something like normal frequency was rFached. But on trying to reset the time by the Speaking Clock it wasfound that the watch was lo& one second every ten. Then it

)pped again and would not r e ut : the numbers faded, leaving )lank face. Hypotheses were advanced as to ,e niture of the failure, beginning

battery had run down, and pro- ceeding to more esoteric theories as the simple ones proved lacking. The watch was retuned to the Swiss manufacturers, who commented that in the 1% years they had been producing the watch, not one had failed - except thii one!

UASRU have a couple of theories as to what may have occurred (per- haps readers have had related experiences and would like to comment?) They think that either the chip was destroyed by pyramid energy (it is well known in technical circles that a CMOS chip can be 'blown' just by thiikihg at it, let alone by blasting it with enough energy to bend steel!), or that t h ~ ,quartz aystal was destoyed by the energy field (they point out that many descriptions of the Great Pyramid include an account of a Cimond or quartz crystalat the apex: over 80% of megalithic stones contain quartz, and this particuh small pyramid had a rockquartz aystal in the apex which had been proved to increase the power level of tbe system). Alternatively, p a - haps the imphnting of the sugges- tion that the watch 'might b e damaged' was sufficient to focus enough mental energy on the IC or the crystal to damage it.

1isPired by these results, UASRU . are currently examining the possi-

bility of collecting pyramid power with the ancient Egyptian healing instrument, the Ankh, which resembles a high-frequency tuned circuit with dipole transceiving antenna, and directing the energy in su& a way as to disrupt military communications. Their first project is to erect a 10-ft cardboard pyramid in the middle of High Hol%om between the two mysterious 'Christmas Tree' arrays of fibreglass aerials in the central' reservation, and just wait and see . *Details on how to build your own pyramid may be found in 'Psychic Discoveries behind the Iron Cwtain'

- by Oestmder and~Schroeder (Abacus Paperbacks).

Surveillame AN AMERICAN WRITER, now living in povmy m East London, beli that his radical opinimns have led him to become the victim of a a u e l experiment by the US military machine. His thoughts and actions, he are being c o n h u e d by a computer, and his sanity has been affected by a s e r k of s a t e l l i t e h p o d mental drams.

However, the fact that these apparent mentaldikturbances wn- tinw, even when inside a room totally screened against electro- magnetic radiation, indicates to the Undercurrents fringe science cones. pondent that telepathic control would be a better explanation of the phenomena. This analysis coincides with the opinion of a Dane who has had s imbr ex- periences. He backs his claim by qu~t ing the apparently huge figures spent annually by US and Soviet military parapsychologists, for developing 'ESP for behaviour modification'. Both selfdesignated 'victims' are quite open about the fact that they would be described psychiitrically as 'paranold'. This, they maintain, is just the skiiul use of a vicious tool to undermine theu aedibility. The double-bind here is evident. Although one's rust thought is that they really are suffering delusions, far more corroboration is neededbefore any f m conclusions are drawn. Beaus several other people have reported it too. . . .

OF THE SUMMER FIRES that claimed 11 %of Dorset's heathhds, one burnt out a sqm kilometre of heath immediately to the west of the Atomic Energy Authority's experimental nuclear reactors at Wimth . Is this anotha unanticipated hazard in the Nudear Saga? Only a muntry hut separated the burnt area from the sprawling reactor compkx and although the metation was charred right to the edge of the lane along a front of - semal hundred metres, there was no trace of any bur* on the A.E.. d e . This, together with a brand new water installation on a knoU om looking the amling towers, its fue hoses stiU layed out in early N o w suggests that the A.E.A. were extremely womed, and had ensured the didn't ma the mad.

Intesestingly, the local Dorset paper of August 16th records the h a fue sweeping o m Tadmll Fann' destroying buiuings, but doesn't mention the nearbv nuclear reactors.

>uri#n'e January.

ith the obvious suggestion that the

'IRE !K?CI,EAR SHIP W Otro Hahn droppd aneIm af the Pact d m p t o n on October 20. Sfhe did w aft= long and ambiguow em&atbn by British authbritk& a d is one $the m y few n n c h * ~ t o ~ ~ t h e ~ r n k h ~ ~ y a g e ~ % b r n ~ k e d by the same Wty as Mutm's W e n voyage from Japan (in which #e 1- reaWr was plu&sd with w c h afdfed Mth rice) it r w d s enough about Pozt Authodty attitad= to make any &as& nudeaf p a - mid move to Dubyshh

The Otto is dedgned as a freigh- a nuckau accident, you may say. H o r n , she is ow& not by Well, they don't. ' a shipping line bat by tI+e Nuclear What is M s t &king about Ship Wi tu t e Propulsion Research Southampton's bkd attitde to Csntm, om. of Germany's less w d nu- ships is that it defieg the known centm of technological Department of Industry's own line excclbnca, and spends most af bet<: on ihe matt-, detailed in thek time t m the hi@ seas showhq~,.? - sew Nwkq Sb&+$tdy of off the wonders of nuckau shippit&. . 1975.1C~ysiliit Tar nuck.ships She,'s by no means unique; therese *it is d y p b w e some mu- a umber of Soviet civilian nuclear sttaint o a the deasity of papubtion ships, maw iwb&h-and a few k~ the W g ofthe berth, and Westem ones Mke the Amedcap an emergency PWI deailing how .%warm& ' thb population csn be emmated

There is a bng4ing v m e n t and Whted." Southampton is fordamagesheueofnuclearship m a p b c e o f W a n - a e c i d e too; it dates back to and SO IRE, although thmu@ T 1962, when it was fixedby a wn- bY the stand&% knot a p b f m h in Bmsek And this is for its evacuation. The~Nuchr Ship wheze the fun began when the S M y ad& that, in 1975, criteria 1 Otto's trip to the-u~ was planned, fox heaths dbze n@& ships It was intended to @me to Tilbury might be a w M wffe stil l being

wasuaqillin$toaemptthe~aon +meOt@qw the 1962 mtnpensation terms as- , % 3 . R d b r ~tqi from btting tbe the mmpnsation in case of 6 - e* &fa drop &or at Southampton accident ($10061) + bc+n erode@ Hke. a tramp #ewer loaded with badly by idatipn. The fact that it &-&' e@s, you I&& think; and was aiwaya h&xoualy small com- mred with the m d b l e hobmust is - k t the PLA'S mncem; they are kppy enoigh for navy hunter- W b r s to mme up their channel ta chatham, after alL .

So the Otto went to Southamp ton, which had p r 6 v i o ~ y viaited by the h n n a h . as weqaa by a rawe of n u b submarines. &uthaipton arc very pleamd with

. n u c h ships, regardii them as mbstantiail~ d e r than the nasty' f o a fuel Grt. They point out that &me of the 10,006 people who toured the Sovannuh in 1964 are still alive, and that t h y now have a perfect two out of two record for d a y with nuclear shiw Mkntion of the Mutsu caused some mn- stemation, and the reply "she was experimental, though", even tb.ugh

,the om is too. Yes, SoutWpton regard them-

selves as a natural port fez n u c k shim. FaItIy because they haw

dealing with every possibk marine q rgency . This plan, celled WLFRE. k tested every muple of

you'd be %kt.

300 Y: -1r Drag THE BASIS foraaadng the wrth- with a fawe of tlO.000 only some wbilemm of ~ E W mad.building was five years ago, which Mms &mibed by ~~ Sea& of the absurdly inflationary. Do inaeases

e~ of the &-t in have to be referred to the Price =ng r-w. why commissiin? us hope so. he ia m t with the Deoartment of Down m the small print, where Txanspotl n t h & E n v i ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ e n t , , tlk detaib of the n&ber; used MU d h p r d i n g the poiat that the hi?%, the-re are more goodies. Most wual 'own amunt* diihbex importantly, the mst of any scheme attached t~ p k by civil is dkounted by the COBA schepe, was absent, there ware still mints of the c thmt DOE algorithm, over i n t d in h b piece. a perhi of no less chan 300 years.

One of these is that the mst per Yes, there ia an assumed emn6mic head of human life is now set at life of 300 years for eve.^ mad a pdnely L39,300. This is the p h , and tlkrefore they k e all &we wed for alculatizlg the mvlng plwned on the assttmption @a" to be made by a given road altem- there are gokg to be no &ant tion and includes one's contribu- c b e s in o w mode of transmrt tioia t o w h the pmduct, ~ 6 F e the Year ~?f 0,"r ~&pt ion

The meeting was organhi by the Viikm Natfonal Shop Stewards Combine Committee, who are a& mnsiderbg diwai£yiu away from armaments to amongst other things, f~ farmii systems and pre- - %ricated heusing units and it indicated that w-rkers are ha* to challenge mtny of the tedum- bgid assumptions underpinnim capitalism.

The North East is t ic& the Whest unemplojment levels since the thirties - a d the 6,000 Parso'm workers will clearly have to put up a major fiiht If they are to succeed h adapting the Lucas approach to what is a very diiferent iudustdal context, large-scale, u ~ t produetion oriented heavy emineerine. The Newcastle me&& was th; f i i step in building up the vital links

.

between the Parsons workers and other+ fghting for the adoption of socially useful technology. T b naxt stage will be to build links with the w o r k e ~ in fhe othei energy industries, the rival flfh G E ~ the CFGB and the minas,50 avoit.the d . q e r of divisive . . .a?d$t~,-d lay t4c. foki* j, @$&.**. mmgY p+y . - , .

,.-, . . .- . . . *,, .' . G- ,..

.proda@e-@mk ~ ~ ~ & T n ? z O

*nrm, w ~ ~ & ~ l d

e of thjs d n p h m t -

&ts sins the 196Os, and in 1974 stbod unsuccessfuUy fw &k

mess, in uppo$&tion

kY on Two1& profiible tomkt @ieMhi, One of the items in his --e was t2conbezt publie 6 vehicles %I burn metkae, to bepi+& in the Iocalswa@ We%&& D M the tenswn o m

Farm Dave received two itom to hia home who threatening way. Aft=

we he notipd that .

ih at the moment. The t of the incident is that o m

of the visitom, who is now in gaol over an entkely unconnected matter, received allegedly wme m j d s , and Dave Fowkes has been clmrgal with causiug grievous bodily

-&-*:-d&,* 8 1 t d o f ~ ' o f w n l d ~ . - . % even if 'appropriate tedkdwks'

$03 W@ODSTOVE SHOW is. a oneday.emnt BBLWA by Counffy college in the viUage hall Digswell in Hertfordahire on 15 J a R u u ~ ?% Demonstrations of leading makes of

'

sweghn and B r i m stove% of wood-, K& food, Mure6 on ~~ woodbd m & m n d W wood m c e s . Axeman- @ md use of power saws. Dl -Y v i i t tin m p o r fuzther debllsphone 043871 6367 SAE to Country College, 11 Harmer Gren

ahernate Wednesday emkga. On JanuG 26 there will be a f i l ~ ~ on Buckminster F&er18 ideas, and discwbzi, and.- F&uary 9 there w d l b e a Z e n ~ ~ h t k t s ~ ~ W e k Le M ~ @ e a Ail nwtisgs st@ at 7 p.m. at the T e W d Centre, 81 Cromw& Road, London.

ExOslMs m e of a planning patticipa- .tion game held on February 4-5, and

by the Lmcs C d k g ~ f a A&& WUGIhfl. It should form a good introduction

THE WREKIN TRUST runs a p~opa&e of short reaidentid and day conferences con- centraiing on vaxious 8spxSs of spiritual know- ledge,,de&rmd to stimulate exploration a&l awareaess af the wonder and joy of life. Examples of c o w are: Developing Sensitiv~ty and Perception, on lammy 28-30.-and B h

- feedback and Meditation, February 1&20. If you are interested in their programme write to, The.Secrekuy, Wrekin Trust, Bower3 How, Bridst~w, Row on WyeJ Hereford%hir+=-:cZ

l h r s What Smce the pubtication of our CITIZEN'S EhfERGENCY CHILDBIRTH is a iw a regula monthly local paper, and Boo?nf0%qr '

JiiD article in Undercutrents 16, there has print of a book written by a doctor to e t Books, which d,k a soci&t/altemative -. s a great deal of interest in ihe Press in the women in cldklbirth' Useful self-help advice, bookshop. Avyone tempted to cough up a &t, and w y the possibiities of a CB and plenty of itrawin@. Available from or an intern-fm loan, or would likefur* +

Britain E x W v e articles have been Compendium (femi&t secthn), 234 G m d w details, should write to AWn McNaughton, bfi&&in the Daily Tdegruph, the magazines High Stre@, &I, or IWng F r w - , Boomtown R- Ltd.;163167 !GI% . ~ctronfcs Toaky Intermtionat and Wireless 155 ~ u m m o n d Streqt, NWl. At 4llp plus 15p S t r W AWdea~. As- - . - - .

and h r e has evm been a piece in the post & packing, it's'good - 21 ~

:k pnper, New hfw-ml Express Since our * o RADICAL. ST~ISTICS, which ant% - w, two groups have h n aet up to camp& NEW SANCTUARY k the title of into being about eqte8.n m n h ago, goes ,CB in the UK. Further enquiries should be a amall w i q e whiih aims to create a greater from strength to strength. The name of thk , , . &ed to sither of the%? groups. The f l l is awareness of animal (both wild and tame) organisation is self-explanatow; it is dM&d e. : Cit&ea's E d AmcMoa, run by James welfare among the public, and a h to bring L~to a number of s u ~ o u p s with the iafmb rant, W F . 16 Church R-oad, St Marks, a greater sense of unity and purpose to the of investigating and reporting on specis&& e l t e ~ G l o u c s . 'They are primarily people anh o r g a n i ~ ~ s in the Animal W e M areas where statkti'cs is used, such as health, - . e m e d in VHFIUHF fw a CB, setting Movemen$. Factual articles, pix, and humour edueatu, economics and teaching. Ra&ta$ * sible sights on TV Band I which too, all f a 2Q@ pa copy. Write to New . a whole pubkishei a newsletter every three - L m e t i d y becomes vacant in 1980. There is 8pUu iy rqadw, 47 €%@& bad,' ' month& defaila of which can Lie obtaim?d f& ; xgh room Tor Lhth.a 6m. AinaJeur Ba@d ' 3m&ey, imibn~&JF&. ' . +- ' Nk Wig&, Tp1'-;65 ?kiw&-Stseet, , %

3aCBinthiiregion: prbbabIyabuttmW- a W ~ , ~ 4 W ~ l . ~ H ~ * - the 27MHz. scheme. 27MHz. is, ItowVer, ,# &Om& k &k $ % & h O , G m u @ h a a j u 8 t m k t &ox ,, the band chosen by the second group, the wants to we a radical local papef need sear& entitled ~ e ~ m ~ ? , a critique of the -

U & e d ~ m ~ B u k i C m p a i g n , no further. The Aylesbuty U@y Lkicklhg. , DHSS consultative i.lucument for H d t h .

'245 Stabridge Ro& Halemen B63 3QU. recenUy hatched out and You can get one fme SocialSe.rvices. Tliis can be had for 6Op, iack The UKCW isa membex of the European CB - tage, from Radical Statis€ H d t b

'

:.. Congres May% these two organisations will be , c/o BSSRS, 9 Poland Street, b n d ?able to.work closeky together and make British - ; CBsr@ity-ammingofcoursethatwcan bs bothered to support them. t

THE OTHER CINEMA, f i i d by -- for "a sustainable state ernphehg new modes Howes S t h e abovt address. p&lk &mription, has just opeued. It aims to of human prwm." %dosing date is 15th ahow d ~ c a l and alternative films and they January 1977> and fur the^ d d s can be Two impoztant dmmerits have- m. off with Wimtanley' the f h of the obtaihed from W3ilem.P.S. Boichel or Anne A. been publhed on the sgbject of land and -.ggas (see UC13), and a new Danish ant& Bolduan, ATG 77. c/o SID, Room-1131, hpusing. me Greet &Ies Rob&ev e x p a the

f l h , w h i d ~ is in very low key and 1346 C e c t h t Avenue NW, Washingtou hypocrisy and misreprwentation whkh has o w the visual effect of this mega-technology Dâ‚ 200z LIRA. been advanced in support d t h e pXcy dW- - speak f a i W v iq council h ~ u w to my lucky temmts %Vhy RSs Deamber is a & spfxiak 'HOW 0 %me friends of o m m A b e m Wtf Imppen ta h v e the &, an$ is r q d d re&&$ i#@ m g d t b Mountaid, by Jo& lvenes gMten t e uader em roof and am bwy for any One who would like to $inow mom aWut.

t?yjng to raise ~ l m e y to fim up the premises. $ h e ~ u t s t % o r ~ f h a d j & d i a . L i e ~ W :

rHE DANISH anti-nuclear campaign is an excellent example of the way I small group of sane individuals can, with very little resources,*hange the inergy plans of a nation by skilful presentation of the facts to the widest ~ossible audience. Although it could be argued that, the Danish Government s more easily swayed by reason, as against vested interests as our own ppears to be, surely the British anti-nudear campaigners could learn from he operations of the Danish OOA, described here by Lisbeth Rink. Though there are no nuclear power

~lants in Denmark, several have been tuilt just across the border in West iermany and Sweden, prompting the ~uclear lobby to argue that Denmark may IS well join in. Three years ago the electricity com-

panies, the research centre at Ris@ and he industries that stand to gain, started o press the government to put a bill )efore PaFliament to permit nuclear ~lants, even though there was no energy )Ian for Denmark.

Denmark is exceptionally badly off for mergy - it has neither coal, oil nor ~ydropower - so when the nuclear cientists at Rise painted rosy pictures of heap, clean, problem-free energy they vere readily believed - to begin with. iowever, a few people had doubts a b u t technology without snags. Some of

hem came from the peace movement, ome were ecologists and some were just ~atural sceptics. Together they started he Organisation?or Information about duclear Power (OOA). To begin with OOA had no money and

or the first two and a half years no-one vas paid. However, they were able to tart a magazine called Atornkraft and ontribute to the mass medh Great care vas taken that articles were factually orrect and well documented. They had o contend with a well heeled PR effort by the nuclear lobby end the ignorance ~nd indifference of the public and toliticians. Little by little interest grew, ~olunteers came forward and money was ;iven, making it possible to reach people LII over the country. OOA began a series )f special information bulletins and per- uaded local libraries to take them. Today there are 120 autonomous

;roups all over the country and a secre ariat in Copenhagen. There i s no formal nembership but activists get an internal ~ewsletter. Four times a year there i s ,General Meeting of representatives from 111 the groups to plan strategy, discuss troblems and get inspiration. OOA has no hairman; i t s only officers are a Treasurer ~nd a Secretary. The Copenhagen office leals with the State bureaucracy, Parlia- nent, and the mass media. Public meet- ngs have been arranged with foreign cientists like Amory Lovins of Friends )f the Earth; however, to their shamel the toliticians have mostly stayed away. They

trade union movement; every fortnight they send out a bulletin about the labour situation in the atom power industry to all the union periodicals. A special brochure, written in collaboration with unionists, has been issued to shop stewards. The book published by OOA on nuclear power has a chapter on the problems of the workers in the industry,

* which have otherwise been shamefully neglected in the public debate.

All over the country local groups have put on exhibitions, demonstrations, street theatre, bookstalls, concerts, etc. A 170,000 signature petition was-pre- sented to the Prime Minister this summer. A Jutland group has made some excellent material for use in schools. It i s con- sidered most important that the anti- nuclear message should not be too sinister and negative. So at the suggestion of the Arhus group OOA has adopted as a badge a smiling red sun on a yellow background surrounded by the motto Atornkraft? Nej Tak (Nuclear Power? No Thanks). It has been sold as a button by the hundred thousand dl over Scandi- navia; you see it on T-shirts, grocery bagsl wall posters, bumper stickers, post boxes everywhere you go. You can even get a yellow balloon with the sun on it for your kids, a cheerful symbol of renewable energy that i s more effective than any

DANSK '# NENSK '*, .*+

amount of words. At the start of 1975 the State granted

a quarter of a million pounds to inform the people about nuclear power. Experts in adult education were chosen to use t h ~ grant in the best wav and thev did

beautiful job yith'the smalisum (aboul 6p per head). g x books were published, each written by an expert in a different field. Together they covered all aspects of the problem with due respect to all point of view. OOA wrote the second book: Anyone who wanted to start a study circle or hold meetings with visiting 3peakers (always one from each camp) could get money by sending in a form.

The long overdue Energy Plan was finally published in June of this year; it contained proposals for the exploitatic of Denmark's North Sea Gas and for a programme of house insulation which would eventually halve our oil imports. also proposed five or six nuclear power stations!

OOA reacted quickly and forcefully. There were demonstrations all wer the cou~try. We were well backed up by the press and sympathetic M.Ps who criticise<

lave good relations with parts of the

NUCLEAR POWER looks like becoming a major political issue in the US and, as in Sweden, may have a significant effect on the presidential election. Following the energy crisis the Nixon-Ford administration embarked on 'project independence', aimed at making the US self-sufficient in energy. As part of this there would be "an accelerated use of nuclear energy through processes that have been proven safe" - a policy which was central to the Republican election platform. However, throughout America, citizen groups have been asking whether existing, much less planned, reactors were safe.

,---7 * Dave Elliott reports. K *,"'

Opposition to the nukes has mani- halt the construction of new plants by hundreds of thousands 'ated itself in various ways: through raising points about safety and insurance arrested in'the necessary struggle against eferenda, for example, including the ill- liability. However, despite the fact that nuclearpower." ated Californian moratorium attempt in the US there are many regulatory Another rally was organised for where the anti-nuke activists were out- controls open to the citizen, many groups October 23 and further demonstrations ~ n t by the nuclear lobbf. Hopes are do not feel that the law i s sufficiently -

are planned for the Spring. A film isbeing hat the result o f the next wave of reliable. Rulings get reversed under made o f the campaign by Green Mountair 'eferenda (in Oregon, Washington and Pressure from the powerful energy mono- post films, who made Lovejoy's Nuclear Colorado) will be very different polies. Legal intervention is expensive, War.

Lobbyist groups focussing their despite the large number o f voluntary ittention on Capitol Hill have also been citizens' interest law firms willing to

A key development in the struggle has been the creation of a large number o f

ixtremely active - and it i s not insig- n e r v e on b e o f c o m m u n i r p local 'Alternative Energy Coalitions~ iiticant that Carter's Democratic c O n u e n ~ O m P P citizens' groups based on local )!atform includes the statement that for direct action, modelJing themselves on and up essentially of local 'US dependence on nuclear power should the very successful German, Swiss and residents keen not only to stop nukes but ie kept to the minimum necessary to French groups, who by Inass to explore alternatives. so the A E C ~ ~ beet our needs. We should supply of intended nuclear sites have been able trongersafety standards as we regulate to halt the active construction. The hold workshops on solar power as well as

ts use. And we must be honest with our celebrated struggles at Wyhl,-where at one tOmi-nuclear teople concerning its problems and time 28,000 demonstrators faced 1,000 The anti-nucyear cause seems to have langers. " police, have inspired US activists in New become the campus issue of today,

In the first o f thegreat debates, broad- England to adopt the m e nonviolent perhaps filling the vacuumleft by the ast coast-to-coast in September, Jimmy citizen occupatipn technique. The first of Vietnam war. Anti-nuclear teach-ins, '

carter, himself an ex-nuclear engineer, - these actions, on August 1st 1976, co- demonstrations, street theatre, rock irgued that ". . . we need to concentrate ordinated by the Clamshell Alliance, groups with anti-nuke lyrics, and altthe wrresearch and development effort ori took place at the proposed nuke site at rest abound. A vast number of anti- '.Mi-burning and extraction with safer Seabrook in New Hampshire. 18 people nuclear groups have emerged, and the nines but also on clean burning. We need were arrested after having adopted a CND issue has been taken up by the o shift very strongly towards solar style 'we shall not be moved' approach. Naderesque 'public interest resear1

mergy and have strict conservation The Clamshellers sat down next t o groups' that function o n many a univer- neasures. And then, as a last resort only, saplings that they had planted on the sity campus, funded by a levy on the . fpntinue to use atomic power." nuclear site, and were promptly dragged Student Union grant. +Right across the country there is off by police. So far these various campaigns have

t ground swell of citizen action, lobbying On August 22nd, 1,500 people rallied been mainly concerned to point out the at the site and 180 were arrested and held environmentaj and safety hazards of

undercurrents IY

MdH f$Zaenergy technology development would

only create.more jobs of varying sorts & I various parts of the country,-but would also make nuclear power unnecessary.

energy produced, solar technologies . a

.>require about 2.5 times more labour than I' nuclear power.

l\_ Another Washington lobby group,.. . , 3 Ewfmentatists for Full Employment, ., ftave argued likewise. They quote Senator Btreh Bayh as follows: 'f.. . energy conservarioq can create , E

than developmentof flew - ; energy supply systems,

- such os d-wells, coatgasification plants am/ &ear power plants are h-Ighly automated. They employ skilled workers ,

whose talents are already in short supply, &' ; such as petroleum engineers, or involve

+npleasant and dangerous tasks like coal- f e - mining. New jobsare usually loatqdin - 9: mining areas far from the &,$as of -,

unemployment. Conservation, bn the Cither hand, requires skills possessedby 5' (tease who are now out of work, Imutat- ' Hag buildings, constructing new mass

$-g/xonomy where it is most & (Congressional Record & - - jan,21,1976). - - tn an excellent article on' Nuclear f 'Rower, a recent iswe of SÃ 'Scteflce for the people i. - ". . . @me of the alternatives to nuclear

pawar open up manymore new job .' - bpportunities. . , The one million dollars ¥- spmt m w to build one. nudear power - ~

f.' :plant could create many more jobs If ; 'spent in construction work aimedat - making (wildings, both residential and 9- commercial, more effciem In their use E-. $

k - ing; for example it takes $23,OW ofcon- i sumer spending t o create one job in &*

** lejtergy production, as cornpared to only ft0,OOO required to create one job to .

- clothiqmanufacture. " . . . &an a-pt to get this sort of argu- ment heard by workers, the Environ- -

m e n t a l i for Full Employment group recently (>rganised a conference for -, =-: - envirofanentalists and kdm@ Unionis*' which attracted'300people pncluding Leonard woodcock of ihett<Hetf.~yto Workers.) Labour unions in the US we

. traditionally vet$ hostiletQenvir~n- ~

mentalists, whom they see as seeking to impose pollution controls which destroy a jobs. Consequently this meeting was both

0

. 'Dave Ellktl -- Clamahell Alliance, Box 162, Seabrook N.1 . - -

K" For example, & Critical Mass group in ^ Washington have published detailed 1s' calculations showing that, wen on the fc- most conservative estimates per unit-of

- .

Coast's principal tourist attractions. The Centre for Alternative Technology is designed to impress, to turn people on to the sort of ideas which Undercurre* ,

readers may well ,take for granted, possibly terescue AT from the hairy fringe and put it fairly and squarely in the middle of things.

People live and w q k at the Centre, and the result of their efforts is on view for visitors to admire. This means the whole gamut of ecologicalIy acceptable energy sources, 'from familiar wind and solar power devices, t h r o e such ambitious

WALKING UP'TME ROAD from bynlleth the first thing you see is

_ M i s windmill perched, on a hillside, steel blades shiningin theearly'rnorning sun. A little further onward and more windmills come into view, a few odds and ends too remote to identify, signs of inhabitation, a former slate quarry starkly grey among hills and valleys green in all direct-ions, wen in this year of drought. On every road for miles around AA route markers indicate a 'sun and windpower exhibition': a modest enough description ofwhat has become one of the Qmbrian .

possibilities as water wheels and methane - digesters, culminating in relatively high . technology options like solar-electric cells and heat pumps. They also have ideas about food production, a thriving organic * garden and plans for a fish farm. A sense of what John Seymour calls 'tender loving care' is everywhere to be found, a feeling of quiet exactitude, of crystallised hard

ion. Nothing is shod

ate retired couples, raucous . i

families, Lancastrian accents pre-

dominating. A father eulogises about die oildrum savonius to his teenage daughter: "That's what I call ingenious," he says.. "Don't you think it'sa bit ugly?" she replieswith tentative scepticism; a classic contradiction, methinks. What would the neighbourssay, back in Rochdate? A windmill in the garden? For most of the visitors a universe of possibilities is opening up, a fantasy of clean and healthy independent lives, had work and intrinsic satisfaction, fresh food and country a&. How can it all be turned into reality?

* . * ~ a ~ l & Woodrow, over 130 names in all. This testifies to the prodigious fund-

John Eyles trirna the sails of his lovely big 12ft Cretin-type windmill. Geared up b about 50-1 it drives a CAV altematoi and produce! a genuine 700Watts. Sow is beautiful .... ..and

i n the exhibition hall a multicoloured display draws a few ideological con- clusions. "The principal defect of the Industrial way of life with Its ethos of expansion is that it is not sustainable. It's termination within the lifetime of some- one born today is inevitable - unless it continues to be sustained for a while longer by an entrenched minority nt the cost of imposing great suffering on the rest of mariklnd." You may want to take issue with this, possibly other defects of industrial life have occurred to you, quite apart from its unsustainability, but at least it'spartially true, and it makes a pleasant change to see such sentiments

ten an airing in a world in which bland vocations of pavlovian consumption urnally hold sway. The exhibition

The oiganic garden. Different s t e m s a r e M t o s e e w h i = F CAT addf a dadi of pest control philosophy:

Â¥lear about your pests as they have leaned about vow vesefbles". And D N compost bins. they ay , are fetter and cheaper than die corn- '

mercial Variety (surprised?).

indludes a display of wasteful packaging with the caption 'A Product of Rampant Capitalism Co.', which leaves one in some doubt what the preferred alternative is to h"; capitalism couchant, maybe?

There are siens of political ambivalence; early the at the Centre are adept riding two horses at once. The list o f

raising efforts of the society for Environ- mental Improvement, whose chairman, Gerard Morgan-Grenvitle, said in Under- currents 8 that "people towards the top of the pyramid are vastly more effective in terms o f what is to be done than people at the bottom o f the pyramid -this is absolutely, obvious." I mention t h i s not in condemnation, since without financial backing very little could have been . achieved, but in order to try t o identify the political and economic pressures which operate on the Centre. When rich and powerful people invest money in AT they do so in the hope o f staying rich and powerful, even after Armageddon, and that is not entirety compatible with many o f the other expressed aims of the Centre. I've no doubt that the people there appreciate this as much as anyone, and, in fairness to them, they clearly prefer . the role of humble advisers to that of gurus: "We do not know all the answer!. Many issues have yet to be fully resolved and we welcome your constructive comments," says one of the displays, and no-one in their right mind would quarrel with that

The other thing that has to be said about the Centre's ideology is that it fe consciously trying to appeal to a much

~ c o n v a t a l & t e ~ c o Centre cottage has ?tar heated by b n g e i m o f p %ace heating n by I d !&we, dectddty by

e Winchnger OK the hill above. Cot- on rkht if heated bv 5kw dectro. c o t t i e on left is-rtfll being converted. -

broader spectrum of society than, shall ,we say, a fairly sectarian event like Comtek or, dare it be said, a slightly sectarian magazine like Undercurrents. When visitors arrive they bring their con- sciousnesses with them, false perhaps, often whimsical, but resolutely inde- pendent and not necessarily eager to imbibe the conventional wisdom o f the alternative society. As one character said in the final episode o f Bi l l Brandthat renowned vehicle of true insigh@, "You've got to start where people are." Appreciating th i s the Centre lays strong emphasis on what people can d o t o make their lives that little bi t more sustainable: support IocaMndustry and save transport costs, grow your own food, use local resources and materials, support local action groups such as FOE, ConSoc and anti-nuclear movements, and encourage labour-intensive rather than capital- intensive methods of production.

And there is a s t r m Do-It-Yourself

displays a wide range of off-the-peg bard- ware there's no doubt that their greatest sympathy lies with people who are keen to build their own. Almost invariably examples of self-build devices are shown adjacent to their up-market counterpal and I was particularly impressed by t h ~ independence o f spirit which located a DIY haybox (for cooking without fuel

Show House, vast m me e x i u m new w aced line of low energy homes for conservatively- minded executives. Wates say the house uses only '/ of the energy of a convention*! home, yet oniy costs an extra £2,000 hat figure dnem't indude the wst of the e y s u p p l y system. The bank of batteries and e Australian Quirk8 3kw windmill which charges them cost another £4,500

made for nothing out o f straw and acardboard box) right next to the highly dubious CTT polystyrene version costing a not-so-cool £ 2.15. The Centre also publishes a prolific series of cheap DIY plans and information sheets which cover the whole range of its activities.

There is a plethora of options and you /can pick and choose what suits you best. I won't go on at length about what I liked and what I didn't like since that would tell you more about me than about the Centre, which i s not my intention. But I must say that I found the energy- conserving house designed by Wates the

, builders quite odd, and I hope I neve.r have to live in one. In many ways it's rather clever, being massively insulated (triple glazed, super-thick walls) and

The 30ft water wheel. Free. non-pollutine energy just rolls off the mokntiuiside - when it rains. Eventually, my CAT thewheel wffl shred compost for the methane dig.-.

eircommercial and industrial sponsors a remarkable cross-section of the British

à capitalist establishment, from El to emphasis, too. ~lthou-gh the Centre

Undercurrents 19

heated entirely from heat pumps powered example, who knows what else? - and by a 3KW windmill. Thisflecessitates they're not actually extracted or mapu- ' a vast array of batteries in places where factured in situations of rustic sptenBwr., .

normal households tarn their overcoats . - either Itfl-eople were to becogigcpm, - ng example of' @&entabout using AT hardware tn - -

pursuit of-&logical harpwy.-v&hm considering, imp1 ication^ef &&ittiorrand ,

pollution at the point of production, the0 it woutdamount toexportingjhehard work foesame other namelh individual to take csfe of- and issue's nothing very . . progressiveabout that. ft would smack of privilege, in fact.

~h i s~s ' ho t intended as a specific criticism ofthecentre s h e the $6 contradiction pervades $he whole of AT. We're full of fancy ideas about how to

buildan autonomous house up to North American standards of comfort and would much prefer to respond (and see - other people respond) to the onset of cold weather by putting on a thick woolly sweater and enjoying the elements

t. far what they are. The converted quarry- workers' cottages e e d much nicer and much cheaper, which is to say, much .

-. more caring of scarce resoUtees., There's an idea that won't tie down;

and it's somethingto do with materials. B e Centre has gone to great lengths to we local, natural 'vernacular' materials ' wherever possible and, mundane though it maybe, I would single out the recently aWnpleted toilets as a neat example of

ascetic simplicity in both design and construction. But a lot of the other materials used there are anything but tocat -steel, aluminium apd glass for

build gadgets cheaply using just a few nuts and bolts and bits and pieces of wire and glass and plastic and whatnot, but some- - 6ne somewhere has to make these things. - 3 -. . s- . Where did the watef go? John Eyleslooks

wistfully at one of the CATS d m t-stnckca . Peltonwhedt.Noniullyit should livCTllc~ at 120 gaRoiu8 minute.

outlets for peopiepsskills, and institutions through which they can make their views- ; effective. The JY approach, although -: a definite adv & ce on consumerism, isnot, in itself enough because many materials and products require a complex level of cooperation and it's at this point that notions of crude autonomy break down. If we're to have any chance of estabtirt- =

ing a natural energy economy then we'll need more than the occasional news- ,

&-orthy solarpanel here and there, we'll 4 : need Iitera)<y~ions of them. If we're 2

cm. coarsenoone - ,(ohbid the h&&the mass- production assembly line & la Henry F6rd

and it's not just our smartness and hard then we'll have to advance on two front* a

work that goes into the final effect, but One is the technical problem of develop their smartness and hard work, too. I'm ing ways in which solar panels and wind not advocating acampaign of total auto- mills and whatever else can be built nomy from extraction to finished product efficiently without turning people into but I do feel that if air movement Is to zombies, and the-other is the political continue being useful then some serious thought à if W e t o be given to the actual mechanics of production, am) not just to slick ways of trapping natural energy. That means the clothes we wear, the . furniture we use, the vehicles we ride in, the consumer goodies and household utensils we alreadyhave but mightwell want to replace one of days. -

Probably the most significant event to occur to AT since its inception has bee13

~

the Lucas initiative and the subsequent campaigns by workers elsewhere to work on socially useful products. (See Under- . currents. 18). For the foreseeable future the crucial economic life of the coufltrv will continue to take piace in factories,. and any. search for retevance must inevitably start there too. I hope thatthe Centre for Alternative Technology, with

. I 41 their merwhelming enthusiasm* problem of ensuring that the controlof :- proven expertise, will come to-regard this capital and resources passes into the ha&&, sort of research as a suitable ccmtributiofr of those that use and need them. hat's : to make. Having sketched out a rough you and me; in case you think I mean the 1 idea of what constitutes an ecolmicallv Politburo.) The Centre's 130-odd entre- ,

I sustainable way of life& next impor&t preneurial supporters wiil happily con- ,-

stage is to devise ways in d i c h its para. wive energy all t h e w t o the bank Yt- unless the right sort of pressure is phernalia can be produced in circum-

stances which acknowledge the needs Of - maintained, and it's up to the ~wt-of us those who oroduce it. This means devising ¥ make sure they don't.

1 manufacturing methods with suitable - * Martyn Partridge

,-? ,z . they are in good Condition. A com-

@@a:% munal spanner or a split hammer helve bound with string is not on.

MASTERFUL ,. IECHANICC 4 I f your mast i s of wood do notpaint - . A- use clear varnish so that you can -

;jsee i f it has sprung.

cCullough gives a few hints about windmill building and ways to Raising * younelf, your friends andyour neighbourhood from mortal irijiS- 1. No matter what rncchanical aaVantage

5 6. Check ifyour masthead needs ni youhave, raise the mast handsomely ,>

illumination for aircraft safety. (slowty with style), now with a run -

t when school is in session -kids Stress

this avoids whip. are a hazard. Pay attention to risk of butt travel/ Go it on a day of low wind. 1< Think "yield point' att.the time. C, breakaway in early stages o f the raise. Don't do it in thundery Weamer. 2. Take your stress analysis and rew 3 . Raise the mast slightly bowed away . . for a 25% safety factor. from the direction of raise.

: 3. Treat mast couplings as if they were 4. Themast should be stable at all angles :level ground to simplify across- universal joints - stay them. of raise - side guys taken up and back-

raise geometry. Make sure site centre isdear of alt ' 5. Make sure that you can go into dwellings, etc., by at leastmast length,.* ering mode at any time Increase if possible to include safe ediatety without loss ofcontfi distance for broken guy whip. outchanges to tackle. Try for a drained ground with a heavy

at least span distance plus '/*away . ... Ã werbead powercabte routes. - -

Undercurrents 19

 tLErnEh TdL ECOLOGY John Seymour, in his Undercurrents17 article, Strongly criticised a number of attitudes to organic husbandry, especially thepractice employed at the Findhorn Community, Scotland, of communicating directly with the nature for& (or 'fairies' as John Seymour calls them).On a recent visit to Findhorn Richard Elen askedDick Barton, a mehber of the community 'core group' or governing collective, how he felt about the methods usedat Findhorn, and criticisms of them. I talked to Dick one sunny August ,%

morning, in the living room o f his --: .bungalow among the sand-dunes that-' &round the Findhorn Bay Caravan P near Forres, home of the Findhorn C muni t . since 1962. 1 asked him if he'd input signal, and the human brain Is no seen a nature spirit himself. Yes, hehad exception." This is a useful, if inaccurate, seen what, in his terms, he understood to analogy. If we tried t o deal with even 10% be the body o f an elemental. A t the time of the data which assails our senses every he was the controller o f an RAF co ould go triad. We individually puter training centre, and he saw th , tune the circuit to accept entity through the window. He inter- dreject others. John preted it in terms o f his science - he mour i s "A man ofgreat focus, who an electronics engineer - as asystem of 't need to be drawn away from that electromagnetic waveforms. He regarded at this time. He is doing it his way it as physical energy, with a structure he doesn't need to see fairies. Humanity normally encountered, but still within - if we add together what normal physical laws for such radia instead of trying to divide "If I'd seen this thing without my start getting a synthesis; scientific background'' he commented, john Seymour's view Is his way of seeing "I might have thought I'd seen a classical it - his reaiity, and the reality of many, fairy. It had incredible shimmering many people. There Is another reality. colours, and as it changed its shape it Now the exciting thing Is when we bring could easily have been imagined to be these two realities together, not in con- fluttering multicoloured wings. It was Wct, but in synthesis - they are corn- a living control mechanism, controlling piementary. You have the bedrock, the energy in and out of a growing plant, bricks and the mortar with which to varying its shape with this control. build the foundations of something new."

"Talking to other people who've had So how do these two worldviews live gether? "It's not new, it's been going on a great deal of time; it's almost the

allenge of the two opposites - between

problem arises when

the place were people can . ..- experience. There must be a balance,

The interface modifies the thought patterns and you see partially what you1 want to see - you interpret the reality in terms of your own preconceptions. But there was something there in the first place to interact with your imagination. In the same way two reliable witnesses can give totally different accounts of an accident "And because of the great 'thought form' of fairies set up in the West over thousands of years, when pwple get this type of experience, they say 'I have seen a fairy! " But it may 'only' be an energy field, seen with imagination. It is not a 'spiritual' or 'mystical' thing - "just a straightforward mount of aphysical observation" says .

a synthesis between .mer and outer. Neither is sufficient on its own. "The people who are totally hung up about elementals, nature spirits, elves, falrles, and so on can do nothing. Every time th put a spade in the ground to plant some thing they disturb the worlds of mll//on! of tiny lives. If you become sensitlsed & that, you can't move, walk, or anything. . You can't breathe for fear of killing insects. You can become sensitive. sensitised, and then allergic. ~ha~hoppe here sometimes. It's freaky: people become so sensitive. In a 'New Age' type community I suppose the problem Is om of sensitivity to personal aggression - y< can become allergic to aggression and finally not be able to communicate with anyone at all. A t the other end of the scale people can become so Insensitive that they blunder around bumping into things, though that would be very unlikely here." In the outer world, mar11 people are unaware o f the consequences of their actions. "You can see the two. extremes as full stops at the ends of experience, andfyou move along the line between.

"I can live happily with both sides, I like to see someone looking very deep . into the metaphysical, having contoct 1 with the things people know as devas, as 1 have, but I find there has to be a sort o telephone exchange between the two extremes. You can call 'ft many things: the Higher Self, the 'Soul; the 'Christ Consciousness', It has many names. It's like a translator. between the Incredibly . broad seectrum of the level of existence of the devas, and the evolving mind of Man. Again, the 'Soul' is a balance point The devas can attune to that, and so can Man. Then the link happens, and there's work to do. Both are needed to hold the world together so to speak.

"One of these contacts happened within the last three weeks. I usually feet a tension building up over a period o f days: when I realise what it Is It's a matter of finding a quiet place and atturUng to the contact. This is what I did on this occasion, and-a being came through to

Dck. Someone like lohn Seymour may be

screening these experiences off because he does not accept the traditional idea of 'fairies'. Or his mind may be working in-, , 1

Undercurrents T9

e, from a higher plane. My scientific thing! whether contact will be made, not your lind said 'how can I on this level corn- 3 "It's interesting that the people who lower self: though it can produce fine tunicate with this being on such a higher get the most balanced view out of this ilInsions! This is perhaps what John vel?'and the answer came back fhst f he ' sp i r i t ua l understanding' are thosewfio -Seymour is talking about. There is so intact 'trickles' down through the approach.Vie subject sceptically, sayif$ much rubbish around this thing. Som lanes, and you campick It up 'whemtw. '1 Sott't beliewall this rubbish', It's very times It's safer to throw the whole lot out, ou like, like harmonics of aradto tmus- glamorous, florhg energies flowing ' , because it can cloud what you do, and fission. This was at the mental level. It tbmugh you and thissort of thfng, and can be so complicated that for some wely d that- the dew was the sub- too easy for people fust twimagine pewle it's just not worth dabbling with. 'ance of a given level, and that Its sub- it But Use sceptfc doesn't believe When a p e m is ready to contact this 'ance was now +able for use on the thing will happen, d e n it does, - is type of thing it,will happen. l fyou feel b w e r planes, including the plant scepticism helps him know that It's real that's the way you want to go, you begin /ngdm Plants are ImportQnt, It said, at and not just a product of his Imagfnotion. to take your own quiet time, learning ie moment, sad this VMS where Man's That's how I started, I 'was just sitting your Identity, finding out who you ore, w k was to be done. Man Is inmlved quietly &e day, trying to find Out what what you're abaut, then cqntact is ecause there is acertaln wfll-aspect t h a t t h i s 'meditation' was, when I became possible. You start physleally.. You start- involved, and Man is the vehkle for aware o f sitting, on the bed, and bekg looking at your plants, asft see that they rat. Thedemsarcnot: ttimstobe somewhere else, flying highup, and that ore living things, and part of the crention. irough co-operation between us. There I was being watched by someone & The so# ~s alive. Everything right down to ad to be agroup of human beings who swnething I didn't Wwe W. Communi- the smaflest atom is Wive' in asense. nderstiml this relathxiship, who could cation MS established, and that opened That's where It starts. Not reachingout

to yvb some extraterrestrial contact - I---- . the horrifying thing you realhe when

POST CARD ! pww i contacting the dews is that you've been in one all the time! Everything you touch - is an expression of a d m They are so close you can't see them. 1've even 'talked to' the 'Dew of Oxygen'!

"Not everyone con cope with this sort of i n f o n i ~ t t m That% where people like w.oWa j+v B O/+TWs, I. k b fGflwA 4, -JvIuiS~w~wmivSyhe(~f8i l .By

r,,, m e f c v ~ l I- WE . putting this sort of thing down, theyturn off the people who aren't sure. Thosa that we deadsure - they'll'support him, because having John say the th/fffi aren't

. there, that they don't happen, and so on, is no threat to what they know to be true. It>fust where he comes from. A different reality. We all create our own realities.

,,, Hfr is- He- "" Better we live in them than try and Jive la

we. &e. i.i6~6 uMf. Ç<. .stir~6a.-rnf^ forget that this is an

Wry f£opt WHoSI- 4JBD Itdoesn't replace ,

f l r ~ f l lfi i s f 8 T ~ Ã ˆ i M/ a dew contact they become gardener

we in to their higher selvei and reall& 'the floml-gatfs, tfl/n$s kept pouring in But they've got wmther.20 years of learn-

hat there wasifnew formofenemy for about three weeks. Gradify ing to do yet! You don't come by twp decades o f experience by sitting in a dark *lubl% &wugh wfUCh afetw and diff<wtf. @fIngs came together, I fbi/nIf. meditating. You've got to go ¥lant could work together. This would books mdescribedand Wainedsorne out into the world and ham it. hen end to staMlIse the plants 'genetkafly, in of the things I'd been told. . . you've become an ekpert in the field, then mns of keeping breeV&g true, and "I fhid no problem the s p i r i t u a l do it with that plus . . . then ~ u l d stabilise growth by helping the \ world and the normal physical Me. In

'&its i% grow in harmony rather than tmtft, there is no barrier there. One , you've got something. "You can'rtalk someone who take: anpet@ with each.oW. It wwfd also enhances the other. And people who get a materialistic line into spiritual wide lake them mqe resistant to peS& New deeply into the spiri@a/ Me and find

llants and #ew types would appear as thefnselves inhibited 1n.their physical ' standing. And even If you could, you

hey were needed. - activity must be deluding themselves, shouldn't. That's a good definition o! black magi- manipulating the form to "That doesn't *Y @husbawhy-'I think. They get totally abstract the out it's breaking f l of this is beyond that ~t tiwe &ift off with totally utirealistk schemes; down a beliefs ~f they still

ood husbandry. You must U* compost, that's not the realityof it at,all -it's on accept your alternottves - that leaves ou -keep the S d r i g h C YOU must be YMensely practical life " &, and have knowfeobpo f dl the them with d i n g . The sceptic, besides I asked Dick if there were any guide-' is so & *t ist is wide open vstems/nvolyeifinplantgrowth. AH of lines that could be written down to <iatistakenfor@ntedi ThkIsalittle to everything that comes along - though

enable people to experiment in the GO- must be wefu/ to the =- ab to be m & d on on the higher levels operation between the kingdoms. M e you're doing the rest. They're "It all stems from being centred with& and hock the his technology own boundaries. - always rhat pushi . ~s , unless omplefnentaty. ' yourself. It must come from being he allows his own thought forms, h h

K balanced human being. In my unda-

h e r betieves in his

.

Undercurrents 19 . SECOND CLASS CAPITAL I would like to correct the title given to my article in Under- currents 19 find to comment On the letter from Ms E. van Qudtshoarn. The title should have been:

Intermediate Technology and the Prohlenf of Second Claw Capital, not Second Claw Capitalism Capital exists in ill societies, whatever the level of development and political complexion It e as roads, railways, water sup= etc. as machinery and Plant, a

your articleon the Downton p w a station, f d b9 the

EGB. with i t s HOKw. water- ¥aerate knma~ of en-

<Undercumnt~-17), was, & ubiishfd lo after the Board had

k t % uniaue piece of

studtnts. It's now wçspu on%?%^^ t o

tat thb fine ptece of mill arc& ?q in good order, even if they hwe removed th* molt essential

of the buildinf - an hydro-

Salisbury a z*' ..~ b

Wiltshire SP4"TOA

Â¥ Excursion it seems there has been --. -. .- very little discussion on a national anti-nuclear camp n The F.O.E. energy workshop ofWhitsun

y mentioned the subject. Though the 'energy team' is no\ no longer confined to Poland Street what is still lacking is sufficient consultation between anti-nuclear grouris.

I propose a meeting between active participants in F.O.E.,, ConservationSociety, Half-Life, . Socialist Environment and Resources Association* Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and other interested groups. Anti- nuelear groups from abroad might also he invited. The aim would be to form a co-ordinated national campaign to actively prevent the nuc ear industry s proposals going ahead.

1 11 Fitzhamon Embankment ~iverside

Undercurrents 19 ' - country preaching the primitive com- munism of the early Christians on village greens, at fairs and markets. The one we

The Secret Pe~plt know most about was the highly organ- ised 'Great Society' in eastern England, gathered by the fiery preacher John Ball, which rose in 1381 under Ball and Tyler in the Peasant's Revolt The peasantry from the South East gathered on Black- heath where John Ball preached his

We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and sweet, Yet is there no man speaketh as we speak in the street. It may be we shall rise the last as Frenchmen rose the fint, Our wrath come after Russia's wrath and our wrath be the worst. I t may be w a r e meant to mark with our riot and our rest God's scorn for all men governing. I t may be &er is best. But we are the people of England; and we have not spoken yet. Smile at us, pay us, pass us. But do not quite foiyet.

G. K. Chesterton The Secret People

"History", said Voltaire, "is no more than a fable generally agreed upon." Far from being 'agreed upon'; English history has been imposed on us by a, tightly knit group of financially motivated men who seized power in the seventeenth century and have clung on to it ever since. John Fletcher thinks that it is time to change all that.

LIKE, A SHIP'S RUDDER, history ' peasant lived of f what he produced, both individually and co-operatively. bartering letermines where we are going even

though it is behind us. Until we have a firm understanding o f our past, it is difficult to understand where we are, and almost impossible to discern where we're going.

The British version of the Bolsheviks (tailed capitalists - a tiny minority of power-maniacs who bloodily seized con- trol during their country's revolution, and then proceeded to impose a far worse terror then anything the old regime had ever dared), long ago recognised the necessity of rewriting history. Today their technique has become so refined ' that it is rewritten daily in-best 1984 fashion, and few even notice it taking place. Our betters have conned us into seeing the whole of history as aminexor- able progress to I t s present dazzling culmination under their natural and omniscient leadership. y e are taught the history of the top five percent, and the other 95% of the Anglo-Saxon people can go hang - which, in the British Archi- peago, they frequently did!

Since many o f us profess to be. interested in a post- or supra-industrial society, we can learn a great deal from the customs and struggles o f a pre- industrial one. Those of us who live in places remote from the great suppuration o f London should gain encouragement from the fact that the fields and woods that surround us were the scene o f battles as fierce as any waged by the industrial proletariat, that our ideal decentralised, communitarian form o f society is a vision that many generations of our ancestors held.

The disease that England has bequeathed the world, that o f an elite leadership suffering from profound insecurity and a rabid sense of persecu- tion, can be traced directly to the Norman conquest. There is an unbroken line stretching from the classically paranoid walls of a Norman keep to the Official Secrets Act.

Tribal Anglo-Saxon England granted any person's basic requirement - that he

any surplus for the products of the -

craftsmen in the local market town. The tribal hierarchy, which seems so despotic to us, is a surprisingly democratic organism. One has direct access to one's leader; each night in the rambling Saxon halls the chief sat in the circle as an equal, and anyone was free to tell him exactly what he thought of him without fear of punishment. The peasant gave a per-

. centage o f his crop to the lord in exchange for protection. If the peasant didn't like the service, he was perfectly free to go somewhere else, and since the , lord measured his wealth by the number of peasants in his area, it paid him to behave himself.

Every Anglo-Saxon was entitled to trial by a jury of his peers; a man starving to death was entitled to steal a week's food to survive; and each parish was a self- governing unit which elected i t s own council, which in turn elected officials to higher tribal bodies, which in turn were represented in the national parliament

The Norman conquest imposed a.military dictatorship upon a self- governing and self-reliant tribal society. So bitterly was the loss of all our Anglo- Saxon liberties felt that 800 years later one o f the main demands of the Chartists, in their petition o f 1839, was for a return to the Anglo-Saxon constitution. With the execution o f Charles I, the Civil war radicals claimed that "wee have 'by this victory recovered ourselves from under his Norman Yoke, and the land is now to refurn into the joynt hands of those who haw conquered - that is, the corn' moners" Such opinions remained the birthright of generations o f usually illiterate common people.'

The Norman Yoke Under the Norman tyranny, in a p re

capitalist service/barter economy, the Anglo-Saxon serf retained economic, but lost his political and social freedom. Larg underground organisationsstarted

-

. - famous sermon -

"And if we are all descended from one father and one mother, Adam and Eve, how can the lords say or prove that they are more lords than we are - save that they make us dig and till the ground so that they can squander what we produce . . . G o d folks, things cannot go wellin England nor ever shall until all things are in common and there is neither villein nor noble, bunl l of us are of one condition."

Demanding an end to privilege and corruption, a defence of common rights and areturn tothe Anglci-Saxon con-

stitution, they marched on London and took it Contrary to assiduously fostered elitist myths, they behaved with superb discipline. They hanged looters amongst- themselves, they executed, after trial, a handful of particularly hated enemies like the Archbishop of Canterbury, but allowed the family of the arch villain, John of Gaunt, to pass through them .. without hurt, and to show they were no common thieves, as they burnt his house they carried out all liis valuables and ,

dumped them in the Thames. Fences enclosing common land \

thrown down throughout England. the rising was eventually betrayed, and mass indiscriminate executions followed.

Religious and political radicalism cot tinued underground in groups like the Lollards. Their leader, Sir John Oldcastle, who held that "Algoodes commun oughte to be", attempted an uprising in 1430, in which the king was to be replaced by an elected council. The Lollards had an extensive underground organisation, linked once more by wandering preachers. For example, in the late 1430s a William Wakeham of Devizes was captured, admitting to owning English versions o f religious and secular amo&t the craftsmen and peasantry,

keeping in touch by popular, unofficial '

books, and to travelling widely amongst preacters, who wandered around the Ã

debating circled of craftsmen and weavers, own what he produced. A peasant equates liberty with land, and the Anglo-Saxon - . - ¥^"- ^' . . ' ,

7 , ^ . . - , .

- - wÑ.ys Ñsm .=, as that earth is

more imwtant&an teaven and that the soul of rTf^n k tfie true souJ-~f ~od . ' What i s so amazing is i te t i t ' f e tnpre- cisely the-same parishesin die Home CouSBttes, East Anglia and She West where the Loterds thrived, that nearly 500 years later Captain Swing rtoaof 1831 broke out, incited by She %me triiveliing. 'ranting' preachers and craftsmen.

- un t i l the late middle ages, the great part &England's cultivated land was owned . 6y the commons and farmed by them for tfw common wealth on a c e a t i v e faas. The dissolution ofthfr%onasteries @ 1539 is the-turning point ifl Endish Pery, marking out the lines o f battle between the commons and their betters per the.next three centuries. The great (fifninon lands and open fields were stolen from their rightful owners over this

rod, t o he farmed for individual profit. % peasant, if there was any ptace for Jfiffi in the new system, was to become *mere wage-slave on land that had once .#n his. The land-snatch was carried out "by an unscrupulous minor;@ using the

of violence, i n t W a ion and succeeded by an efgy of

Werested misgovernment on the part of Wnterested beneficiaries, it aggravated wery problem andgave a new turn of the wew which was squeezingpeasant and mftsman. " Not surprisingly, this attempt p t u r n the people o f England off their incestral land led to fierce opposition, md, again unsurprisingly, "the men who 'lad invested in the reformation when it MB still'a gambling stock naturally nursed 'he security, and denounced the revolting msaotry as communists, with that mystic reverence for the rights of voperty which Is characteristic in all ages if the nouveau-fiche. The old common land had been farmed

ntensively by the whole community, vhile enclosed land that was farmed for q-ofit (which usually meant sheep) equired only a few shepherds, and

usually resulted in the wholesale clearance "efvillages and communities. -2

unaercurrenis 1,

_.7 after sleep, and shaking her Si'&cks. Methinks I see her as

2 he\v~pg.hef mighty.ywn~and kindlhfherurtdazried eyes uf* 'full

t* overWraw fte OKI w - ~ i e w m y e r , t& . @ -4

new ha's always had t~'atoerf^to A e Fora feq q&s be* w r ~ t i q n an( masses with the cry of 'Freedom', and terror set in - before the CtWCn and always for a inonwif& a have put Charch recognised tWaizeraiflty of the., that 'Freedom' into practical effect Whig aristocrats and merchants, and before being stamped by revo- aristocrats and merchants rngn isea-9 lutionarv betters. <Burford 1647. necessity of Crown and Chufch in Kronstadt 1921). i<*[s+is &om&nfwhich maintaining their suzerainty (as the '

makes revolutions such a profitable and Bolsheviks recognised the need for the inspiring study, for one glimpses, just old managers and middle classes in fleetingly the whole genius and potential buttressing their dictatorship), t he~om- of the usually submerged 95%,emerging moll people r e a l i d their o m potential in aN its glory and humanity, as in the . . for"humane, self-ordered, and visionary. 'revolution', the revolving, the whole self-government. . nation rolls on its backand reveals that .- The Bolsheviks of the English Revolu- which is usually most carefiilfy '

' tion, the Whig Aristrocracy, held no suppressed. The protozoic soup from doubts about the imperfection o f the whicfr English revolution~ryzftal came a

masses when they returned to absolute welling up was a particularly rteh and + power with the Restoration of 1660. On potent one. For centuries ihe expeifed wnSte in.1706, the common people "we peasants and craftsmen had been gather- , very rough and savage in the/r.Disposi- . ing and squatting and building small- ' tions, being of levelling Principles, and holdings within forests 2nd mows and . refractory to Government, insolent and marshes, on waste and bmmop ground, tumu/tuous . . ." Using the weapons of where they organised their own societies. Poverty and legal mass terror, the newly With their own independent communal dominant classes proceeded to bring the ernnnmiec and a i ~ t n n n r r i o m lerai recalcitrant commons to heel - - - . - . . . . - - -. - - - - - . . - . . . - - - . - cultural, religious and educational What i s so fascinating about the systems and inter-communitv under- eighteenth century i s that in this battle - ground communiqations systems they virtually constit+ted a &a& within a state, and were renowned and feared amongst the well-to-do for their lawless- ness (i.e. independent spirit) and total '

lack 6f deference. The ranks of the New Model Army, and later the Levellers, Diggers, Ranters, Muggletonians, Fifth Monarchists, Quakers, Shakers, Seekers, etc. consisted almost entirely o f such craftsmen, artisans,,and smallholders.

The Civil War is too huge asubject for this article, and I can only recommend Christopher Hill's glorious World Turned Upside Down4 as an inspiring intro-

for power, so-many o f ttie-customs and -- habits which common people had deviw to live a h,umane and social life are , revealed. In forests, for example, there was no such thing as absolute property, one trade or occupation by ancient right" exploiting the game, another the timber, and a third the grazing - their lives inter- locking in complex and ecologically . sound cyclical economy. To govern them- selves, all forest dwellers elected courts annually which had the power to punish all forest dwellers. I n those Fades which relied upon the bounty o f Nature - as in mining, taking game, beachcombing, and even smuggling - it is interesting that when 6rganised the trades for themselves, they did it on an ecologically sound basis, always making sure that they did not over-exploit their resources.

When the sledgehammer of,capitalism smashed into this form of life, and the nation was subjected to the abstract - dictatorship o f absolute property these older $ystems responded with great vigour. Kent in the 1750s became a battlefield between gangs of smugglers, often numbering over a thousand, and the army. The army was similarly heavily involved in the pastoral quiet o f Windsor in the 1740s suppressing the natives in favour of the better bred red deer, which royalty liked to huntwithout the inter- ference of poachers, foresters, and . independent-minded small-holders taking pot shots at foreign princes as they careered at full gallop through the farmers' rioe corrt fields.' Similarly. those

duction. If anyone ever doubts one's who had &ken game by right from' fellow peoole,"or lapses into looking upon Common grounds, as Soon as the land was one's fello v English people as political enclosed, became poachers, liable to be

executed, and i n many areas like zombies, then these words ot John Milton, actively involved in-the English Staffordshire the army had to be intror -*- Revolution, should give one the lie-: duced to suppress mass uprisings and , ; r6&&-&s /-see ifi a no& and po^ch-ins. Today 1t sounds .funny, bur

quarrel between different fg$&s in . puissant nation roushg herself like the mew - - e

s always the

-I

[allows groaning with their obscene fruit, Union's Fatal ~ r e e . ~ Such barbaric behaviour by the

ountry's rulers cannot be dismissed-by aying it was the product ofbarbafiic ,

imes. Not only, as in Russia, would oty present economic 'system' awl 'fruits for ill' have been impossible without this pre- iminary terror, but the Whig aristocracy ind capitalists had a theoretical ideology hey proclaimed every bi t as idealistically ts their twentieth century counterparts in Russia arid China.

On riding through the 'exceedingly ~opulous area' around Dudley in Worc- istershire, infested with independent- ninded craftsmen and small-holders, the luritan divine Richard Baxter was horror- itruck at the slothful behaviour o f the nbabitantswho, having only their own nouths to feed, spent inordinately long jeriods o f time staring out o f windows licking their noses or else hatching levelling' plots. I n a high-minded fashion, 3axter argued with himself that. since Bey had an entirely self-contained %onorny, they in no way added to the national wealth', and therefore it would >e to everyone's good, including their

would disappear into their smallholdings or hire themselves out to farmers for harvesting - whereas cloth merchants needed continuous and assured supply. likewise, craftsmen and-artisans-worked t o natural' r hy thm which woutd not dovetail with thedemands of machinery.

Right up until the 18m, the vast majority of English workmen religiously

'

observed-their Saint Mondays and even their Spint Tuesdays. Work would finish Sattitday tea time, Sunday would be spent going to church and visiting relatives, Monday would be spent in drinf&ng with one's mates, and Tuesday would be spent recovering from Monday, doing odd jobs around the house, and making a tentative start to work. The momentum o f work would increase through the week, until it would be common to work all through Friday night and reach a peak at Saturday lunch- time.Thus sloth alternated with extreme activity, a much more natural rhythm than the frenetic 40-hour-week brutality o f the stop-go assembly line. Indeed, in Burton-on-Trent to this day, a group of

- bloodyminde$coopers s t i l l cling to their Saint Monday.

has penned a stirring account of one ot the few smallhold/squatter communi run on the antique, pre-capitalist economy which survivedup until 1914,-- that of Headaigton Quarry in Oxford. Thrill to the heartstirring exploits of Mac Massw, Spot Wright, Snuffy, Flirnpy Buster, Mucky and Scabs Gurl as they hold out against varsity toffs, the factories, starvation and the workhouse; their hands unsullied by the transfer of ,

money! Gasp as they poach, makebricks, graze and raise crops on wasteland in '

a totally self-managed self-su~portin~aati perpetually drunk economy!

The point o f t h i s article is to awaken eveiyone to the immense inspirational and instructive history o f our island, to the resilience and glory of common human nature and aspirations. True history shows us that our hunches and ideals are built on firm and deep found* tions within human nature and the natural order. I t is our opponents - 'THEM' - whose lousy, wheedling, self- justifications and pox-ridden, rickety abortion of 'history' scarce props up the- rotten ground on which they strut and posture. It is THEY who are the true

vssf-Hi.ars.ET.~ZVB G X T S ,...., if they were driven off their land tn&forced t o werk for wages, thus help- ng to create 'national (or someone's) wealth'. Ahem. A p o w pause before we :ontinue.

Lone Live Saint Monday I was always taught that technological

md industrial progress has always Followed i t s own, totally non-ideological momentum. In fact a very good case can bemade out toshow that on many

asions technical innovations have been eloped and introduced specifically as

the most effective way of disposing of troilblesorne artisans and craftsmen.'

Until the Industrial Revolution, the West of England and the Home Counties were the main manufacturing areas in

and, and it was because of the highly nised opposition ofthe craftsmen to entrepreneurial merchants and

echanisation that the area waseclipsed it was much easier to impose industrial-

sation in the more backward North.

upstarts, the-true revolutionaries who *

have set e world on its head and would convince % s that a world so topsy-turvy i s the most natural thing since Julie Andrews. Spare a moment of thought fnr our poor lunatic leaders,* ~erard- Winstanlev did: "~ las ! poor, blind earth-mole4 /or& of manors, and Norman gentry. . . you strive to take away my livelihood, and the liberty of this poor weak frame my. body of flesh. . . but I strive to cast down your kingdom of darkness, and tc open hell's gates, and to break the

I ~ ~ J E W O C . ~ devil's bonds asunder where you are M BJE.OO.DAESS SLtO,,T* tied, that you my enemies might live in

As a doctor,Andrew Ure, noted in peace; and that is all the harm I would 1835, "The main difficulty is in training have you human beinas to renounce their desultory ~ ~ f ~ ~ ~ _ . ~ John-Fletcher

of work, and to identify them- s.v*w~wmxww

1. The English Uprising of 7387. R.H. Hilton selves with the unvarying reg~/af/ty of and H. Fagan, London 1950. the com~lex automaton. " Women and The-Pursuit of the Millennium. Norman children were introduced to work in the- factories, not because they were 'barbarous times', but because they were the only people who could be effectively broken into the discipline of factory work, men over the age of puberty tend- ing to wander of f after a week or two or to smash the place up. One Yorkshire mill-owner lamented that he could only get boys to work for him, and that he found institutionalised, automated orphans from the workhouse the most amenable t o work."On such stirring foundations is not just our, but any, , industrial society based.'

In the countryside, and especially in the South, the antique economy was on its . last legs, (read cobbettl' for a detailed description). The last, pathetic uprising . o f the uoverty-stricken and utterly broken

. Cohn, Paladin 1970. 2. The Later Lollards, 14 14-1520.

J.A.F. Thompson, O.U.P. 1965. 3. Religion and the Rise of Capitalism. .

R.H. Tawnev. Pelican. . , . 4. The World Turned Upside Down. C. Hill,

Pelican. 5. Whigs and Hungers - T:s Origins of thq

Black Act, E.P. Thompson, Allen Lane 1975.

6,Albion's Fatal Tree. Douglas Hay et al., Alien Lane 1975.

7. Altertmtive Technology and the Politics o f TechnicaiChange. David Dickson, Fontana 1974.

8. Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial . CatYitatism. E.P. Thomoson. Past and -., - -- Present, ~ 0 . 3 8 , Dec 1967.' The Decline of Saint Monday, 1 765- 18 76. D.A. Reid, Past and Present, No. 71, May 1976.

9. The Making ot the English Working Class. E.P. Thompson, Pelican.

A famous and b t d y riot in Shepton Mallet in 1766 kept thespinnihg fenny

- out of the west, (and it% been slump and craftsmen of the South 10. Rural Rides. W. Cobbett, Penguin Classics.

'town U.K. ever since, bless it), while the came with the Captain Swing riots of The Cottage Economy. W. Cobbett,

gig mill was only introduced-into Frome 1830", after which any resistance to the ed- G-K.ChestertOn.

in 1822 with the help of troops. usurpers collapsed. A few of the 11.Captain Lawrence Swhg. and Wishart E.1. Hobsbawn 1969. - and G. Rude2

Independent weaws wye highly religious fanatics suwived, more eccentric v,l,age od e,,. Rw,,aei 'inefficient', since their production varied than dangerous.

. . be major advances in the general health of the community can be i#ributed to improved nutrition and a purified water supply, and to improvements in standards of housing and education. What, in the mean- time, has the medical profession been doing. Are they just a part of the industrial system, waging an expensive but losing battle against the very ipecific, new ailments which it causes? \

WHEN THE NHS was inaugurated it /as assumed that the nation's bill for the ealth service would decrease as morbi

re about 2.4 billion prescriptions a ye 1 the US, representing $5 billion in sal letween 50% and 80% of adults in the . replace local surgeries.

against modern diseases. In ~anada: the rate o f fnasectomies and hysterectomies - is 2-3 times that o f England and WaW, but the percentage of deaths is approx- imately the same. The five-year surviw rate for breast cancer is about 50% irrespective of check-ups or typeof treat- ment e.g. surgery? We have entered the phase o f diminishingreturns and yet the advancement o f technological medicine continues unabated,its inefficacymasked by our need to believe that it works.

Medicine has also'a more serious effect; the medical establishment has itself . become a major threat to health, not c in the clinical sense o f maltreatment,siae- effects, and the use o f inappropriate

'

therapies, but also in the social arid structural sense, whereby medicine *r to obscure the social conditions which

. make people unhealthy and also, more

tK swallow a prescribed drug every 24-96 oiift.' Ftes~ite these alreadv massive ? Drains; not d w

expenditures, many people would be i The eradication o f infectl&s iseas& favour o f even more; a middle-aged such as T.B., diphtheria, typhoid, small- executive would undoubtedly be plea pox, etc. in England and Wales was-largel to know that his local hospital i s getting the result of improved nutrition, sanitary%$ 1 acardiac arrest unit with a team o f specialists. More importa that, sooner or later, given research and development

eart disease will be overc icpects to be cured of pai y the medical, profession, p y know almost nothing odv. What he does notask is whv do we

reforms, purification o f water supplies and education,.Medical intervention sue

By contrast, present day life ex~ectanct

I

>end so much on medical &re? should in males is decreasing andonly remaining ot expenditure be decreasing as the same for females. The main causes of

rises in a capitalist state expend excludes industrial nave to be justified for cost effec these issues are only beginning to seriously raised. "--'oB rule, OK

1 vulnerability by means of an engineering disease: "In the UK the cost of the approach to health. Yet our emotional hospital treatment of ischaemic heart responses to illness and death are disease has been estimated at £21. undoubtedly as strong; although we have £21.9millio for 1969. Some of this apparently rejected religion and magic we expenditure would almost certainly have tend not to question technological secured much greater reductions in medicine as rigorously as we would other mortality: . . if it had &en deployed on activities. This approach is reinforced by preyention rather than cure - for example the elitism and autonomy of the medical on health propaganda directed at over-. profession which forms a largely self- weight, smoking, mIddk+ged males. " regulating body, qffwtiwty excluding t& Paradoxically, curati~e medical inter- "uhfic from access to'fcfcdi tians am,iwed&iy. taefiaetiw . * ' ,..

SRH rn

~ndamentallv. "expro~riates the power social changes; however, even with the f the individual toheal himself & shape is o r her own environment."' John McKnight puts it thus: "medicine m r e s the reality of iqequity,exploit- ion and control over people's lives and self contributes to that control under ie guise o f a therapeutic ideology o f sip."

loneliness of the distance hospital

Further, the health care system is itself ecoming progressively dehumanised ecause of increasing size, institution- lisation and specialist technological .eatment at a time when more people ian ever are turning to medicine to cope '4th their problems of 'alienation' in ther spheres. Dr. Roslyn Lindheim7 y e s that the centralisation o f medical icilities in huge complexes tends to drain ie surrounding community o f resources i d medical personnel, and has helped zcelerate the trend towards specialisms low 67 recognised areas in the US) here the facilities, status and financial wards lie (hence the lack of GPs). The itient is not seen as an individual in the >ntext o f his or her home environment id with little reference to his personal story and whole body. It is not together surprising that an investigation8 f home vs. hospital treatment following heart attack shows no convincing snefit o f being in hospital from surviwl point o f view. The chances are iat home treatment wins out psycho- gically. Often the patient i s not /

eluded in his own treatment in a posi- ve way but rather is an ignorant, passive

er o f therapy, conditioned into . ting to get good health by external 'encies.

present system the medical establishment can either contribute to the control manipulation o f individuals or can counteract it by encouraging the de- mystification of medical technology ana the ability to cope with pain and death.

This is not primarily a medical task, but if 80%'of doctor/hospi6l based care is concentrated on 20% of the population, has a low efficacy or produces iatrogenic effects, and also diverts the appropriate therapies from those that need them, it may be possible t o argue for a more equitable distribution o f resources into low-level, low technology medical care on cost-effectiveness if not on humanitarian grounds.

Hopwood" suggests that funds should be distributed equally between food, environment, preventative and curative services, which at least takes note o f the -primary influence o f these forces on health.

Beckett also argues for the 'nurse- . ~ractitioner' to be encouraged and - - ultimately for self-care, on cost-effective- ness grounds. The danger i s that this

?%>.~~.*.

1 is beautiful , :gig In small ways, the present medical itablishment could start to redirect i t s Torts on a more humanitarian level. Quentin Young of Cock County ospital, Chicago, has instigated a cut- ack in the use of pharmaceuticals from 25 prescriptions a day t o 1 2 a day: I xtors soending more time talking to

could become the sole justification for a shift in health care emphasis obscuring the more fundamental issue o f our attitude to technology, health and welfare.

It is possible that more notice may be taken o f small-scale centres such as John Bradshaw's AMIGOS life centres (see UC12). The essential concept embraces the philosophy o f friendship, sympathy and oractical self-helo rather than the passive consumer-style health delivery we have become used to. After all, it is the lack of these which may explain much of our 'illness' in the West. One critical feature is that o f disseminating know- ledge; if we are to understand our bodies, and take an active part in our cure; know how to stay well rather than get well, we need basic information. So far this has been almost the opposite o f the policies adopted by the medical profession, whose tendency is to avoid discussing treatment

itients with the result that patients get 1 ore appropriate and human treatment. One GP' has described what he con- dered to be the cheapest and most Tective health centre encountered during 12-year practice as a cross between cottage hospital and a conventional :neat# practice, run by 24 nurses and . defies, one dentist and one doctor, tth 12 beds. The centre served a popula- onof 10,000 and only l%had to be &erred to a distant general hospital for eatment. Nurses were able to carry out

with thepatient, or explaining how he can help himself. Bredsttaw's idea is to have lay people as community health educators as well as auxiliaries to give

mple investigations and treat most cases basic care. This corresponds closely to the ith simple remedies without the doctor. barefoot doctor o f China - whether such - - ~ ~ ~ . . - ~ - . ~~~ ~ . . ~ - he costper person per year was a role couldbe developed outside of the ¥cb at i10:The benefitin qualita- social structure in which it originated m terms c a w be priced. remains'to be seen - Wecan (earnmuch from the 'barefoot However, are the s s o f change really wtofl approach ofChina,or the sueet encouraging? ~ n g ~ l % l ~ ~ n u ^ a prlv U, @@y&jatrift"of m a . Since medical 'lay' individuat, produced thousands of- stitutions are part of Aesociety &@ leaflets with the help o f gynaecologists

thrush, two common complaints which account for about 3% million drug treat- ments a year at an estimated cost of £ million. The Department of Health refused to fund the printing and distribu- tion of the leaflets on the grounds that they did not encourage selt-medication a& an alternative to clinical treatment by a doctor.

A t a symposium on medicine in the 21st century held in Manchester in 1973 virtually all the panel (all males incident- ally) were optimistic, and emphasised even greater technological body engineer- ing. Professor Ulf van Euler predicted the development of drugs which will give precise control o f will, attitudes and emotional states. Sir Richard Doll recommended central data banks (corn puterised, of course) to record people's reaction to drugs along with all other case 'behavio~r'.~~ It seems that medicine may be progressing further towards social iatrogenesis, as our society becomes pro- gressively more intolerable. What are natural reactions to our maladaptation to modern life (e.g. depression, anxiety states and associated physical changes) are labelled as illnesses which must be 'fixed' by our medi I engineers, and only gradually are 2 e looking back to our life- styles for the solution. It is paradoxical that the cost of medical care i s rising at twice the rate o f inflation in the U.S. and yet this effort s t i l l cannot keep up with research into and treatment for the effects o f the pollutants we eat, drink and breathe; the artificial and unbalanced diet we consume, and the urban lifestyle many live. Meanwhile, Bradshaw's AM IGOS Life Centres languish for lack of sponsor- ship, and many genuinely concerned doctors are frustrated and bitter at criticisms they regard as social dilemmas, and at their inability to affect the issues. As Bradshaw himself pointed out, "the only alternative that will work in the health field (and other fields) is a radical change in society". The medical system, as with other systems, should have a low ecological demand and a high humani- tarian potentialand hopefully be sustain- able and available to all.

- Jenny Ratcliffe

References 1. Ivan Illich Medical Nemesis Calder &

Boyars, 1975. 2. John Powles The Medicine of Indu!

Man Ecologist, 1974. 3. H. Mahler Hmith-a Demystiflcatlon of

M e d i d Technology Lancet, 829,1975 4. D.P. Burkitt Some diseases characteristic of

modern Western civilisation Brit. Med J 1, 274, 1973.

5. D. Wrighl Conference on 'The limits to medicine' held at Davos, Switzerland, 10""

6. Breast Journal 56,782 1969. 7. Dr. R. Lindheim The hospltalisation of

Space Calder & Boyars, 1975. 8. H.G. Mather Acute myocardial infarctk

home and hospital treatment Brit. Med 334, 1971.

9. J.C. Dunbar The ideal health centre? Brit. Med. J 4,480, 1975.

10. E. Beckett How barefoot? Next steps fc - the medical auxiliary Lancet Il 1 1 37, 1975.

11. B.E.C. Hopwood Organisation for healt Lancet I I 915, 1975.

12. D-Gould Medicine 2001 New Scientist 59. in only be changed @@@&by tafger tetfing . - - WP how to avoid cystitis and J 758. 1973.

23

underlying causes are not tackled, the health of the patient remains unchanged, and will probably find some other disease to die of. Emotions affect health, beliefs too; the effectiveness of any tratment i s tiofistic -Medicine ~at ient partly dependent trusts the drug. on how the mu* doctor. the or his

naintena& of h&. The major concern of science is to find ut, or rather to explain, how things ~ork, and to codify those 'explanatiohs' it0 a logically coherent, consistent and xciusive system - with the result that ny system of treatment which is not lgically consistent with the main view i s ssumed a priori to be useless H e m the onfusion within the medical establish- tent on finding that acupupcture, among ther systems, works as a highly reliable fstem of health care - even though it an't be fully explained in conventional :ientific terms. The confusion arises from-taking 'scientific' rather than twhnological iew of medicine. Science is concerned ~ i t h the l o g i d consistency of explana- Ions, not the usefulness of those exptzna-

Lwn ability to keep t r t he treatment; while 'cancer' patients have been known

EALTH, literally, is 4wholeness0: k d t h care shouid b centred round the to die o f an imaginw cancer - the h o l m of the patient, the integration of all parts of body and mind with doctor mis-diagnosed, and the pa t i v t he 'outside' social wortd. Ek~t this convention& rnedka fags &I do, died of his trusting thb authority of the ram Graves: in p'& it is 'curet-centred, centred on the prestige of doctor. (This was discussed extensively in

artah drum, techniques or doctors, rather than on the quiet preventive letters in 'Lancet' ab*t three years ae0.1 ., ,

So a complete medicinemust be able to a technological approxh to medicine all treat the whole being, not just the body - of the factors and conditions in the and this scientific medicine does not do. health of the patient (physicaL, sociai, It treats parts, not wholes; agents, not emotional, mental or whatever) haw to causes In a complete medicine, the key be taken into accwnt - and lo&al con- problem is not whether a particular drug sistency be damned! . ,can treat a particular 'disem', but

A scientific approach to medicine whether the treatment can bring about depends on a precisely definable and con- an overall improvement, an improvement sistent system of 'sole cwses': "for every not only in *e.physical existence of that illness there is a single cause". But this body but of the overall qu$lity of life for view, reflected in scientific medicine as that being. The questiorr is not 'Does this 'immunolo~',~collapses on the question system of treatment make sense?' but "Why do people fall ill?" The answer i s SO 'Does it produce the required results?', tangled that we can only say "We don't 'Under what conditions - mental, know". For example, cholera, we are physical, emotional and otherwise - does told is caused by an organism carried in it work?' and ' ~ i c e h those condition3 impure water. But the cholera organism is how can we work it? - in other words only the agent of the disease: 'causes' a techdogical approach to medicine. r a m from voor sanitation to fear of Given that. a comolete medicine would

? doing, to + , w . w ~ - f w e s # a ~ art lying withi- - 'f -, 4&ue 'H&& ServW, woaM be ,

If& to u s & y system o f weatment-a? @, according to *e needs of tfle @nt fin othet word3 it wouid-select

system kpproprfate to the patieit her than fqcingthe patient to fit any e svstem. ('Alternative' medicine is b s t @hty of 'iailroading* i& patients in- is way & conventional medicine - they d d only create a true Health Service wwking togher, instead o f each

i i i n g to be 'the onJy.scimtific system ~reatment'.) Within the &isting ucture a f the Wth Service, this cmld

be done by adapting the general- m idohw and heatth-centre network, rphaising the role o f the GP as. tgnostician directly in contact with the tienq aware o f the socia! and other ;tors involved tn the health o f ttte . t kn t &ause of the hugecapital tmrmbnt in property and fxtlitiesl nave away from central* hospitals to

ones based on a health centre would &My have to be delayed for many as; but the existing bureaucracy (and a m a n t costs) can;and should, be t, as at least two of the four levels opitai, p p , region and national) are ~ u m 5 . rhe GP $ ~ d d be able to diagnose the i t e o f health of the parent, relying &inky on conventional diagnosis tech- wes bqked up where necesq by mplmentary or altertqftve tech~iques . ch as &e -'of a 'dewit& phdubm I in p'si& medicine) W the t%W Mple-pulse diagnosis. A practising,W w i d d d only short courses in the inciples and praetice af these

s,~rn0t&e wm3ptef- m e n m y di inost ic techniques has

been grasped. Selection of a treatment are to have anything resembling a sane system would follow diagnosis, the Health Sewice. d o c t ~ r either treating the patimLdimtly To suwise,,thenl a technolo&ical or else rf&dng thepa@?nf to a specialjst (ra@er than 'scientifii' OF $seudu in whawer s y a w is c h m

' scientific) viewpoint on health an&'

t f e r e ~ a m e Zajm @ere&&@ me&% W t h e r e woul&suggest, among tegal prebfw: #w-Wppxratk 6f.h * * - . points, the fotloping; ' states that it 1s pfchks~M Mkconduct ' i. we need to curisi i r the hedth of th to refer a patient to 'an unqtatified patient as a whole, taking into amm ~raiti~&mer'. This means drat anv as many factors as possibfe. practitioner o f a@ u&tthd& h r m o f

' ii. we w d to considef the patient as

medicine (with the exw$tim @ a faw an individual, not as a statistic; a% homepaths in the Royal H m e w a t h i i a whole, not as a c o l l ~ t i o n ef Hospifals) are ~ q & ~ e d ' ; so if a GP at u n c o n w p d ergans and-iflnesses present efers a patknt to an u p r t h o d ~ x iii. a khmb~$ ia l vkw o f medicine practitionerl he (the G?) may bkfiued suggests that a// systems of m4 ic1 heavily or have his name m k off the UJn~etUid and unconventmnd, medical register - vety -5 pendties shoold be u d , based on f i e patiehl indeed. Eat surely the p r d m is n ~ t needs, not on the 'bureaucratic con- whether tke practjtimer is 'qeNRed' i$ * venience of the existing system. the sense o f havhg p& a be6r.etical . iv. following from the above, far more exam, but whether he or she i s a 9 good emphasis nee& to be placed on the ' at practisihg wharner system he w she patient's re%ponsibility for his Or purports to prac€ Even - c%part@fa~> state of health - for % only pa ly, because of thefrW@-fd.- 6rthod0~ who can actually 'cure' an iitnea practitioners make W m s clinicai mrs. patient; medtch is tmjy maid, ..--

Apd the work-load of the ex&fwgGF. n c ~ m i n M also points out anotherproblem, which v. the existingsystem could quite easib lllich aired in 'Medicat Nemesis': the be ada~ted lo w i t these reauiremml existing system is doctor-centred rathex by pl&iw the main emph& a n than patient-centred, with the result that - a general practitioner/health centre patients are neither encouraged, nor, in network able to call on any sp%iatis- many cases, afiowd, to take responp and paratpeckat services (convmGW ibility for their own state of health. and unconventional) as requ'w; a%-* Natural laziness, coupled wi$ blinding- point within this w w t d be the with-sim*, the cult of the expert and ; 'necessity for practitioners being the 'mtracte hive made thbm of *asses& on their practical abaty' thekeyf~tars iat4te emmn&risaIn r a h tbw rntkrk- qudifica- the y w y c- af*.fkat* s+ - . ti- + . - from less than El00 mWon in W I b e k i i tMt changes almg these lines Beveridge Plan to 4 1 GW?# S 3 3 W m i U i i would help the k t 1 goday. People need , what it is wptathfy %&a TeqmSiSl* - **ip %he) includes their social surroundings) if we words. . .

The Pditics of -Self Help. --. G

mmtbmdthe'crWintheN~,d basis but aiise from the canplex inter- action of man with his social environm 1

- UNTiL THE MiD-StXTkES the power- my&qws that modem medbine had

, mated abwt i tw l f stood virtually : bnchallmged in the popular imagination. i t was widely believed that scientifu @kine m l d cure anything if given

' time, that only scient i f~ medicine could pavide r u l y effective therapy, that ipcrcasingly complex and sophistkated

of h:& di t~&m havebeen h e distortions and defxiqncies of 1 .- .- . k a & d for gobbling upGarce re-ces,' modern medicine and the unhealthy mode 1 and for dehumatlising a d depersonalking of lik in developed industrial societies tnedicalty managed, but m r d M a n experiences such as chitdbirth.' The' medical professjon itself has besn ~ u s e d of ignoring cur einotip)al and psycho- logical d, Treating US as machines and d h m t W i not people, . dealing with us in a pcrunpkq and authoritar*m m& in the therapeutic er~cwnter,~often reinforcing sexkt and racist stereotypes,. and ereating a @en& ence en itself d i c h keeps the pr6fession in businc~5.~ Research has revealed the special disease patterns o f developed induqtrial societies. where cancer. heart

self-reliance and self-help a$ a solution production which pollutes the environ- . reco~nise that ~overW i s a serious cause of the d m&bm of iiiness is hv m b L ~roduces unhealthy but ~rofitable

cmrhodities, and involves production processes which may be dirty and

%timthrougbout the nineteenth dangerous for @te workers employed ktury in Britaih. tn itscontempuWy - tipat, and Ikzt ewn the highest . muiation, the sfpment for self- assembly th wMers experience &fen* hnce has been put forward by less hstmtibnand a sense of fbtility in wkms and less trendy social critics . their daily worka.The rnajww of the an lllictt. I menan Ill'& s-ly wmkfme are employed in idustrial cause his v&on of the theme has had production h e littte real choke

mkir appeal and is doy ing wide about the MWre of he producfin pro- mncy- Wihls specifii arg~meng about cmes whkh make tJwm mpecjalfi . 16help are in many ways less important sfsceptible to injury, 2nd mental m d an the uderiy ing assumptions which phy-3cal illness The concentration of fhe Forin t b ~ j p m e n ~ T h e s e assumptions ownership md 9trd of industrid pro- e rardy 6fought out in th&open, when hcti6n m&t the &t wltinhiional ey are given an aifig, they will be seen corporatiom shoukd at least QXI& us *be of#miml usefulness either as scepticata&~~t the p&bil i ty of ow du tbn 20 our cuseot health probiems, e%rc*he o# any meaningful & o b over as a v a e strategy for pr&cing real , tki s o c ~ n o m i c ~ i e s are the

in our present MEW@ system real threat to Wth. i&strial pro- Mlich .seems to assume that Wth is duction mncer~trates the wqk force and mly a matter of persqnal choice, one t k s the majority o f the pqwlation in at could be freely exercised if only one . urban industrial eentrw where homeless- nild destray the power of the m i d i i mm, wercrowding, mi=, ldi- ofession over that choke. The &lief ness, mi other social p r & l m qe at at health and illness, like poverty and WK most acute and where the emotional hence, are primarily matters of . and psychological if not@hysical health ssonal M i e is a v e ~ ve~asive one. of the ~wulation is at its most fragile. . . - - - - - - deed.= w o r a of acGemic studies is wotd d i s o w i w hew individuals uld be so irrationall ill-educated, or

&informed as to somehow dfoose to be w, sick, homeless or u n w a ~ w The h i n a n t liberal democratic tradition in &@o-Awican culture has induced us to believe &at ow per-sod social situation. $pr*marily the outcome of free choice. A useful theory for the rich, powehl, .& hdthy in our soclew. The belief &at we can exercise free choice is also F l y amactive to p&le who may not "&Q materially or physidly deprived but kbo teel disgusted WMI their society, mitical of its dominant m& ef fife, .ad &WW!W in the faw of its monoliil& b t iw t km such as the m e d i i ~ s t e m . m y of us erne into the si?cmd category a d want ta assume that we dn exercise pdtive c h o i i over our own health. We must then ask whether we ire totally. frw to make positive choices about health in WAF existent society] or only partially free &doso.

hf i t s v6 Health Ar@ments about assuming personal

~ ~ b i l i t y for healffi lay weat stress I preventwe measures, urging more - brcise, a & i t of natural unprocesq d unidulterated f w d and avoidanceof b s o md alcohol. Good sounQad?ie, g whilst favourable to zood health,

The m&rity of us, even if we are i o t forced to work in industrial ~roduction have to live in cities and y e k p d to their particular hazard3 to Wthv Fwthemwe we live in a c@ s i & y W h e ~ p i t f o n k an -m@mt vaiable affecting h W and illness dis- t r h t i on in she -m@lation.

Contrary to the arguments of liberal indfvidual'bm people db not choose their mid situation or class position, they are born into it Our society does maintain . limit63 routes of upward social mobility for the very few, enough to maintain the myth that class position can be matter of iMwidud merit and choice, though it rarely is. The work@ class cornprim the ~

majority of the population, and it &OU& be no surprise to anyone, including I* lllichl to learn that a breakdown of morbidity and mortality rates by &al class, shows she mrking class, parti- w l d y &-h unskilled and manual level to have the highest incidence of chronic disease, infant mortality, still-birth, mental ilIne$s.and.w on. 1s this yet

. another example of personal irmponw ibility and irrational choice, like homeless- ness and poverty or could it have some- thing to do with swards of living?

lllich's argument that s i e t y as a whole ' ha$ become dependent on doctors and

medicare does .& rbgnise the fact ot differential access to medicat faciiities bv

ill hgalth, even'under'advanced industrial capitalism. In short, even if the majority O f the population, with the best will in the world, adopted healthier living habits we m i d stilia have enormws diff~culty in counterbalancing~~ eff'ki of the present soci&economic wses of ill- health*

Unreal and ~o&atttic ' So what i s to be done? ~ccording to

lllich we should somehowarest industrialism by persuading the giant c m glomerates wtto own and control w industrial system, i.e. monopoly cap to revem industrialisation and ~e p u r m of grpvth, to break down industrial bureaucracies, especially the medical one, and cwince h controllers of our system that health, norindusttMism (01 don't we man profit?), should be the dominant virtue of our society. Heady Stuff!! l1lk.h has a touching faith that the progressive destruction of the e n v i e meah and the decreasing returns from industrialism coupled with our increased self-reliance (once we have the medical profession metaphorically behind bars), will ultimately convince thepowers-tha& be of their errors, and that a utopian, new healthy ndndustrial d e t y will emwge. An opthnhtk if u n f d and romantic view of h w social change couldccune about. &&we the day of reckoning, we are a d v i i to set UD self-care. both as an

. alternative for the preseni and as a polKial strategy for @angIng the system for the future. lllich advma a to* drop-out as the ideal fratnew for self-care, a d ropa t not just fro institutionaiised medicare but from whole industrial way of life?' A d~ which at present is not possible for mw of us, inconveniently forced to earh our Vwing witkin industrial urban ceptres.

- dropout now, for health reasons is a~ a m e idea, if one is ywn& fit, healthy and relatively affluent, whic ma jaw of the population is not Pi -doxkally thase whose heaith is m a threatened in our society? who rm-ve worst deat from institutionalid mdicine, and whose mental and physical well-being would be most enhanced by a natural, rural way of life, are those I&te likely tebe able to be self-reliant and dF wffi-mt, namely the old, poor, ha capped, and chronically.sick. So mi .for dropping outl war$ from the privil- few who clearly could tak~ -- o f th&nselves anyway, unless of coufs$ they had inconvenient emergency illne6 which would inevitably force them

*.%w mti& and natufdconsumption . social class Even in Britain with nation-. into the industrkdised &stem. O f c o t ~ f ~ ~ - a 4 leisure habits would by no means A i d medicine, the sick chiid of a h i i alternative techndogy p r o d u d by tap &stare iL tn industrialbl capitalist income family is four times mere l i b y peopte mightdevelop new whniyes ft wietks ilt health is not simply caused in to be ts& by a physician than a similar dealing with a burst appendix or a pre- the area of consumption, although frwn a low income famity! TI$ mature M y . But it wwld take time, a a massive medie idustry d t i y mmi- posit'wbrtelation between pweffyand I suspect wen longer than 1Il.h bagim pulates out wtifi~iaffy created needs for i l t -Wth seems tm obvious to mewion. to &po&&nalise wdalkts w&h tta unhealthy ~ o m m d i t k Ill-he&h is Yet even in OM c ~ ~ n t ' society'the mesary expertise to be r a y usefat b fundamentatty cmt+ in the areon of percentitge d thspoputation Vihg at, or a c h mencies. production. The meam of praluction are near, the sbsistmce pmerty lev@ has ority of us, n&&ie or owned and contr6lled by a rich and since the 196% been at feast 15% ef the to

and those in positions of power cc- operate with us, learn from our exampb,. or simply~ ignore us? The difficulties ef organisitag@able and really CW- prebeqsive A€ medicine wfwi the ex img s~cjo-economic and political . structure would be enorrnwQ

r . me Pfaf&~* -Let us briefly examine just a few of h e .

?&npedimenfs like professidismand b y . access to-nw@cal information. It i$ not ,without reason that the medical pro-

. W i m h a s been called t$e most powerful ratxi effident trade union in the country.

T h p profession has a long history of , ef'fe2tively protecting i& interests and .would be loath to ceoperate in any enter- .@isayhkh would ultimatety erode those ipterests.

Tbe present professional autonomy and &talus of the profession was won through

" f i e statutory restfiction of competition qqm o+er health workers, and through tke monopolisation of technical know- ,j&e about health and ilkness Medical kn~Medge has virtually become the ,

pciva& property of the profession. Private property is jealously guarded in w r swiegy, and there i s no reason W suppose That tbe profession as a whole would be

-

willing t~ r d l y share its knowledge and =&iw with wen the most welt-meaning . k y pmn, unless the dass and power b e of the medicid profession itself were dtered. Cmsiier the momk paem

, of r m r q s for Af-care, and the typeof wvi& that c 6 r n e d Iay-pmpk &dd provide. Idustrkdised miit@ p& d f m which require4e%tremely costl diagmsti= and therapeutic. toots. Medare has becme a capital and technology- btqsive industry, partly because the ,

vmatment o f conditions wch as cancer and heart diseases is enormwsly ecpensimk. The costly therapy required ,

fefthg diseases of i&strM society is one af the reawns that the >@te cannot leave nxdiiare to private entqrise, but is fttrwxi to intewery lf a rdat~ely fit and &kelabwf fa IS to & available for h e q~womy upon *ich society rests b w could @fa re provide the~om- pmhawive se~ice~which has been shown *to tie fiwe~sary? It could not, and would &ef~ he thrown back on the existent @te~% Self-care would not only be

A i.tmited !o the type of sewice it could , provide8 but would never reach more

a tiny proportion of the population. -4Zxarn~he the class and geographical dis- , ~tribution of any self-help consumer

gwes if yw do not agree. Finally,x4f- 3 ~ e w m l d deflect criticism, concern and ,conflict from the existent m e d i d

z~h-ibW tf we &r all our etwgks ifito . dum$dterw&e%-e gr&s h the b m a r # t y d 4 b w m , -@lfii q tmpmant Mitt& r d e . ? w mgii WE+& people more aware of the m A b @ e causes of illness, and a m pewle with

j knowledge whtch would encobrage them not to avoid institutional*d medicirie, but to challenge it. A challenge which would naturally be extended other baaions of class power and privilege in our miety. Community health gfoups cwld unie heath consumers with that n~@ecx.ed but considerable stion of the work force, health workers, in a s a g @ f w a just, humane a d t i d i e r mie&.

A healthy wcidty can only be achkwd* if the sm@e for health &OWES a cbllective w i a l responshild~, not &I indivbKtaliStk W. liealth w81 only become a c & W i w i d right if medi- care consum~s, that isall of us, uniFe with health w&km to radically change the economic and classfoundation of the unhealthy inlhMat capmist %bty ih . which we live.

Margaret vmiuysul New

&#day ?he W e e Review atticlw & G&QG~of l3#&2Oth&toberl974 see arm slaw, W.S. F& hk-- .w@mk& mein rbe united *w. w o n &&b t5itid Soci&gy, f9

3 . ~ p ~ h t s h = v e a i f b e & m e d e b y He&Ii c- ~ O ~ S , f*ta and o h s . A weli-known. *tudy.vf m?+& values and amh-ds p&mts IS found in Becker, H:S. Hughes, E.C., Geq& . Strauss, A.L. Bo s In mite . University 6f chicago Press. l h l .

£0 ,example:- p l y , D., & Bath P. 'A Funny l%@g

Happed On the Way to the Ww: Women inQ9ueb@y Textbool$

, Arneixn Jixtnwl of ~~- V d 78. Na 4. Jan 1973.

Big&?+ Journal ofh&i&e f e&. 8, 19: On r a m by doctors see for exmple: -

Fanon, F. PL I The North Africm Syndrome' in Towrds the A f M Rev01 tion, hucan. 1970.

6. See F%wle.+, John de Hoss, J.H. 'Geo aphicat patholegy of

&e major kiUing.fiirders. Canem a<nd Cafdiovasuh d m ' in Wolstenhdme and O'Connor, M. (Ms.) Heatth of Mkn- kind, Cjba Foundation 100th S y m p o s ~ Churchii, Londun. 1968

Dtietzel, H.@. (Ed.) l?m h i u l man&& ofHdth Recent Sociology No. 3. M i i c k i i . 1971.

7. IUi&,pp. 11,167.

Witutions, thereby dehsif~g cmfconta- ion *-He:- "*with that and other social institu- k w l ~ kdm ' 0 ~ the ~-hi&ons of Mdern

.4ons. A confrontation which would be bidi%m% && MedVme, hfi?n, '

People, Prescri be! Hospital hetors in the West h&e a vast range of gadgetryavailable to them; some valuable, some useful and some just plain daft, but nearly all costly.

Last year in Venezuela Geoff Watts mw one wav of brin~ina demand for - - medical-care into baJance with suppiy -by ingenious improvimion of rudimentary medicat aaui~ment and bv aivina medical auxiliaries emuah " training to deal with tk buik of medi&freqirements. Pffhaps in the, developed countries we mn balance the equation from the other direction; by reducing demand instead of increasing supply.

W CONTRAST TO most Latin munity. Only those zpproved by the American governments - Cuba aside - people they'll eventually serve are chosen the Venezuelan administration, for what- as trainees 7 and it's this attempt to seek ever reason, has backed a scheme specially ' .the approval o f the wmmunity that designed to bring medicine to people characterises simplrfied medicine. The Wing in rural areas. The backbone of $e -=heme - cheap, effective and, above all, project i s a nationwide chain of dis- appropriate to local needs - is just one pensaries, each run by an auxilkry health among many such primary health care worker with four months training in projects dotted around the Third World. simple diagnosis, therapy and preventive Last year WHO compiled accounts of ten medicine. The outstanding feature o f this such schemes (including the Venezuelan scheme of 'simplified medicine , as it is OM?) in wuntries as far-apart as Cuba and known, is the commitment of those who Indonesia. They published these accounts work for it. For them, i t 's almost as a book, Health by the People - "by" a crusade. Their grasp; their understanding because while most o f the projects were of the health of the community, both as catalysed by outside influence, all now a group and as individuals, is extensive . depend on the active interest and parti- and profound. Their knowledge of the cipation of the com+unity. basic medicine they practise i s faultless. T k y are intensely pround o f their dis- pensaries and the simple, frequently imp~ovised equipment - a stecilising oven made out o f old tin cans, for example. (They time each sterilisation by putting a raw carrot or potato in with the instru- - mnts; when i t 's cooked, the oven has been hot enough for long enough.) But most important is the relationship between each dispensary and the village it serves, for the people, too, are proud of their dispensaries - proud enough to maintain the buildings by themselves, to buy new chairs for the waiting room or whatever. They visit the dispensary in . search o f treatment mu& as we visit the GP. But they go also to learn basic facts about child care or fobd hygiene or sanitation. They learn to understand the origins o f good health - knowledge that might be commonplace to a Western European, but which has hitherto played little part in the life o f a Venezuelan . peasant. Health for the people, by the people

There are two reasons for this relation- hip between dispensary and community. First, the simplified medicine project was started only after i t s protagonists - i handful of enthusiasts in the Venezuelan ninistry o f health - had taken pains to End out what it was the people needed in the way of health care. And that included isking the people how they themselves t iewd those nee& Second, all -candidates taken on at the auxiliary training centres nust be natives or at least long-term .esidents of the villages in which they ~ntend to WOR. Though some basic zu&ificat!ons are mandatory - literacy ind iifnple arithmetic, for example - the elect~on of cand~dates depends primarily jpon their acceptability to the tocaf com-

Lessons for the First World What has'all this t o do with us, with the

people of a rich industrial nation? What can we with our cities and our state ,

welfare system learn from nations whose standard of living is just a fraction o f our own, whose people's lives and experiences

' are so incomparably different? Of medical technology, little. The

techniques o f diagnosis and treatment .used in most o f these programmes of basic medicine are recognisably our own, albeit shorn of an frills and adornments. The lesson we have to learn lies not in tech- niques but in attitude; in a word, involve- ment.

True we made a faltering step towards partikipatioh when the 1974 NHS re- organisation introduced the community health council (CHC), but it is clear from schemes like the one now running in Venezuela that many people in the Third World - not just in China - have an involvement with their health and the means o f improving it that makes our community health councils look little better than rampant tokenism. Is your doctor really necessary?

On, then, to the second theme - also a kind o f involvement, but individual rather than group centred. If demand for health care i s potentially unlimited, - resources a n never be adequate until that demand is somehow limited. There are two ways o f limiting demand; by imposed rationing or self-rationing. Rewrces can never be adequate until that demand is somehow limited.

At present it's imposed rationing that .holds sway - has always done so. Medical administrators juggle priorities and balance the cost o f places for the chronic sick and mentally subnormal against beds in the glossy and e~pensive intensive care unit. With l~tt le even in the wav of wide-

Undercurrents 19

lines, they're forever seeking some kind of compromise between soc~al need and the resource-gobbl~ng pressures of a scientific medicine that's perpetually devising new and specialised (and more expensive, o f course) treatments. Again, there's the cruder - albeit simpler - approach to imposed rationing: the market force, the ability to pay. The urban poor o f America can tell you about

- that. But imposed rationing, whether . arranged by priority or by cash in the bank, does nothing to deal with un* meetable demand: at best it may conu it. Sooner or later the stresses and stmi..= it produces will erupt; once again, chronic pressure will boil over into acute 'crisis'.

The alternative is self-rationing As never before we understand our

bodies, their functions and malfunction^ Yet, paradoxically, we have also as riel- before surrendered all responsibility f( our health to another person, the doc1

Increasingly wfiimbue our medicine with omnipotence; a body o f knowleage with a packaged solution to every defect. But medicine is9not all-powerful, all curing. Our day to day well-being still 1 depends more on evolution-conferred' immunity and self-repair than on the minishations o f the doctor. Medicine, as often as not, can do little more than speed these processes on their way. Most disease i s anyway self-limiting. There's an old saying about flu: ':Do nothing and it'll go away in seven days; call the doctor and it'll be gone in a week". For flu yc can read a stack of other ailments:

The failure of understanding is, I thi less medical than biological. The per-

/ formance level o f all living systems te to fluctuate, to oscillate around a meL at one moment a little above average, another a little below. And so it is wit.. the sum of the life processes we toosely refer to as our health. Sometimes it swing5 along in overdrive, others it barely gets out of first. Perversely, we have come +-

believe that continual perfect health i s some sort o f right - the kind that can u guaranteed by the state and dbled out:

Health education of the tradition4 stamp doesn't help much; most of i t s force is deployed in pleading for the earlier detection of disease. That's fine far as itgoes. But the crying need now for a biologically-oriented health eduw tion that emphasises not simply what t a look for, but what to ignore; what has to be tolerated as another vicissitude o f living. Hence the need for what I am calling self-rationing.

Does all this sound like the fascist 'strength through joy'? Like the refrain of the stand-on-your-own-two-feet and cradle-to-the-grave-welfarism-is-sapping- the-stren~th-of-this-nation end o f the political spec!rum? I hope not. Nor am . I trying to line up with the anti-doctor cranks. I am simpfy suggesting that a realistic inQolvement with your own body - in other words, an interest in its smooth running and, where appropriate,.' an enlightened d isrwrd of i t s hiccups - is a direct corollary of involvement with, the administration and planning o f hea4&1- -re delivery. There i s no other way of bringing demand into reasonable balance with rewwces. Geoff Watts

this would mean that the caring functio

Community Health of the statutory services would have to I re-orientated to provide support*^ the informal systems of caring for people in the community, while the curative

and the N.H.S. , functions would be restricted largely to. . interventions of proven effectiveness, ar

both would be distributed according to n~ftii ..---.

The National Health Service is now the largestemployer in the UK with over 900,000 employees. Dr. Tom Heller looks at the changes which the The power of the medical NHS has undergone in recent years, particularly thegrowth of a powerful profession bureaucracy and more militant action by medbal practitioners in support The medical profession wields enormw of their own economic interests. Isn't it time to reconsider what genuine - Power and resists any attempts to erode

its autonomv. However. in ~ursuine its service to the community involves? THE SHAPE OF the National Health

Service has been determined by the conflict between the two major decision- making groups within the service, the medical profession-and the management/ administration. The interests of these two groups are really quite different, the medical profession wants to keep in con- trol and resents and resists attempts to introduce the rational management of i t s affairstfiat would be required by the managers to create an 'efficient' system. This dynamic has created enormous dis- - tortions in the service which we will describe later, and also prevents these dis- tortions from being overcome. More . importantly this basic power dynamic within the service has meant that the p& tagonists have lost sight of the people for whom the service is intended. Individuals as patients and communities of potential patients have little effective voice to determine the sort of health service thatL they need. Similarly the bulk of the ordinary workers within the service (now the largest single employer in the country employing over 900,000 people) are without any meaningful power when it comes to decision-making to determine the structure and functioning of the service. f

The power of the administration The power of the administration can be

shown by observing the manner in which it 'consults' the people, both-at national and local level. At national level the Department of Health and Social Security has recently published a consultative document called 'Priorities for Health and Personal Social Services'. Although this document described itself as 'a new departure', detailed analysis of its con- tents shows that no new priorities are actually projected and that both the contents of the document and the prc- cedure used for consultation are being used as a facade instead of real consult- ation.' Similarly at local levels the admin- istration often treats individuals, local interest groups and the new Community Health Councils in the offhand manner that emphasises the lack of influence these groups have over the affairs of the service.

The power of administrators as a group can also be shown by the recent growth in the numbers of administrators employed in the NHS. In the ten years before the reorganisation of the NHS in 1974 the numbers employed increased by

65%, while the number of doctors increased by 21% and domestics etc. by only 2%?~uring the process of re- organisation the power of this group was once again demonstrated by their ability to increase their numbers and the control they have over the organisation of the servi~e.~

The management and administration of the health service seem to suffer from a very limited concept of health, and rely . on exclusively administrative approach to the nation's health. The 'problems' of the nation's health are perceived as being largely amenable to the ministrations of the statutory services if only they can be 'delivered' efficiently enough. This approach presumes that there will be a satisfactory outcome for the nation's health if, and when, the various norms and guidelines are met The Department of Health is constrained-by this very limited model and their concerns appear , to be with producing some sort of equity between regions geographically, bringing services up to some arbitrary guidelines and a general striving for cost-effective- ness and efficiency. None of these aims is to be decried as such, but all o f them put together can only contribute marginally to the 'health' of the nation, however defined. In addition all these aims rely on a dominant management for the service , that i s able to achieve these aims and which must outweigh the immediate interests of the employees of the service, including members of the caring prc- fessions and also which relegates indi- .iidUal and community based decisions to a position of comparatively minor importance. This limited concept of health in fact ignores the evidence con- cerning the relationship between health services and the measurable levels o f health within the community. .Various historical and international studies have shown that the organisation of, and expenditure on, health services bears little or no relation to the levels of health found in that ~ommunity.~ Furthermore, the caring functions of the statutory services have been shown to be of com- paratively minor importance compared with the volume of caring that is done in the community by families, friends and various informal and voluntary networks.' All this is not to suggest that there should be no statutory health services, but that the current ideology of the administration appears to avoid putting these services into their correct perspective. In practice

own ends the profession i s not necessaril acting in the best interests of the health service or of the community as a whole. Insistence on total autonomy has given rise to the current situation where the treatment for similar conditions is wjdel different and apparently depends only o the whims of the doctor in charge. The variation in days spent in hospital for thl treatment of similar conditions is the simplest example where savings'could be madeby the useof 'medical audit' or some guidelinesfor doptors on patients' management.

There are nk really effective sanctions against the members of the medical pro- fession and the complaints procedure foi both hospitals and the general practition services are heavily weighted in favour ol the doctors.'The doctors themselves sit in judgement over their own colleagues and even in cases of gross negligence which are dealt with by the General Medical Council the cases are dealt with by a panel consisting largely of other doctors.

The medical profession remains largely orientated towards the technological cor ponents of medical practice. Medical education focusses on the advanced technological special ties and medical students therefore aspire to join these specialties which naturally attract the greatest kudos and the bulk of the resources of the health service.

In addition the profession is very aggressive over protecting its own financi interests. This can be seen in the fight to retain private facilities in the.National Health Service, although the maintenanc of these pay beds costs the NHS more money than it receives in revenue from them, and this practice is to the detrimei of the majority of the population who cannot afford private treatment. The increasingly aggressive wage bargaining stance and frequent threats of strike action detracts from the amount of money that i s available for actually pro- viding the services for patients. An example of this can be taken from withii the East Anglian region which has alway: been very poorly provided with resource This year the region has been awarded additional 'development funds' to bring the services up to the standards of the other regions. However, a large portion a these funds (over 50% of the funds avail- able for the Cambridgeshire areafor instance) has gone to pay the increased salaries of the junior hospital doctors.

In no sense are the decisions of the pro

f e s s ~ o n W i d e u i p ~ s & ~ v f ~ w A ( l ^ e . fiwgrne merit in* dlfeeuOn. Tins Wjitwq&ve adm iWfra+im, w &@re &arti~a2&ty~&Y .Aose i development of cornvttinityhe@ say tjkferon-making apparatus withm'%e councift with the ability to ensure tfaAt

munity. This doe5 not mean that the -W them? , the'real needs of their c ~ ~ n j t y art ions taken by the profession are 4. That it can be shown that thos? most - actually met. In addition the services -

+er in the interest of the community, inneed of services are the leasttikety to themselves should become orientated to - bttt that they are always taken on a uni- have them easily available, ffa pS~ticu1ar ' serve the cons-&, for example there lateral basis. a class analysis of the services shows that should bepatients' committees with both

We are not suggesting that the medical the members of social class iv and v have power and responsibility as part of each *s"Ã

#

.,

implemented in such a way as tobring out a real change in the service unfit ere is a shift inthe relati~nships of

â b. lomHella 1976 .-

Whose Priorities? Radical Statistics Health Group, 18 Porden Road, SW2.

2 House of Commons written answer 29th October 1975. New Bottles, Old Wine? Institute of Heal* ' Service Studies, Hull University 1975.

teaching the community how to stay 4. Abel-Smith, 6. 1976. Value for Money ill Health Services Heinemann. London.

healthy, and how tocope with simple ailments as they arise.

that we have described has become the

7. Stacey, M. 1974. Consumer CarnpWts hi the British NHS Social Science and Medicine,Vol. 8, p429.

8. Townsend, F. 1974. Inequality and the '

2. Heller, T.U; 1976. The fW

group practice of general practitioners etc. In addition pilot projects should be developed in which there are explorations of different relationships between 'pro- fessionals' and the community, and new, - methods-of communication betweenthe various branches of the caring services.

There are in addition amyriad of more detailed reforms that could be suggested for the improvement of the h+th service. These would include an improved system of redistribution of resources betweeh geographical regions, types of disease,' social class etc., also there are many improvements that could be made to the training,programmes of the professional groups such that the sort of concerhi detailed in this short study would receive attention during the student period etc. Much needs to be done with regard t o the development of methods of controls over professional 'power,. spending power and complaints piocedures etc. as welt as the development of an administrative mathinery that is more democratic, more accountable and more open. Howevix, it is unlikely that anv of these will actually

BABE CX THE

"Experience has shown that labour is far from safe if left to the capricious whims of Nature. " (Two consultant obstetricians, Lancet, April 1976')

"One wonders, have some obstetricians become intoxicated by their new technology, or have they lost faith in the normal physiology of parturition? For that matter, do students and young obstetricians still have the omor- tunity nowadays of observing truly normal deliveries in the home? i f not, how can they possibly appreciate the importance of the family and home - . . environment in this supremely exciting and emotional event?" (A consultant perinatal paediatrician, Lancet, April 1976')

Doctor John Bradshaw has been observing the Battle of the Bulge and sends us this report. Could common sensfbe winning?

- . ..",: ?--

*t-..=?-.-..= - - <. ,<? . - ~. . . .- '....s"? :

AT vresent 90% of D ' enriching emotional experience for the

have their babies in hospital. For years the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists have aimed for 100%' hospital deliveries, and the British royal medical colleges are in matters corporeal the nearest thing there is to the Vatican in matters spiritual. None the less the 100% advocates, while beratingthe whims of Nature, perhaps forgot about the nature of women because some of them have been demanding more home deliveries (the demand understandably synchronising with the rise o f the Women's Movement), and an increasing number of doctors, and obstetricians have now joined the chorus.

I t must be said at the start that not even the most ardent feminist thinksall deliveries should take place at home. What proportion might do in an ideal world, no-one knows: 50% perhaps, more likely 30-40%. And in any case any transition from the present gW would admittedly have to be gradual. Certainly hospital delivery i s desirable or , essential in many cases where a difficult labour can be forecast for physiological or clinical reasons.

However. the advocates of home delivery argue that hospital delivery for 'normal' women, carrying the possibility of interference with the labour, is at best expensive and of unproven value, and at worst positively harmful. It indicates that the obstetricians are so delighted with . their power to interfere (and their gadgetry) that they have forgotten that birth is a natural process that was con- ducted, commonly with success, long before the first obstetrician was ever heard of; and that many deliveries can take place quite safely and properly at home. A home delivery, unlike most

mother, the father, and any other children there may be. 100% active hospital management of labour is, they say, simply high-technology medicine ramnanL Labour involves vain: and though it i s not for a man t o say to any woman that such pain, if properly pre-

I t is illegal (!) to give birth without a midwife present. So i f you want to have your baby at home in your own way you must find an enlightened midwife. This is much harder in some areas of the country than others. For help and advice write (with sae) to: the National Childbirth Trust (9 Queensborough Terrace, London W2), or to B I T(146 Great Western Road, London W1 I), or to the Society to Support Home Confinements (c/o M. Wright, 7 7 Laburnham Avenue, Durham. Anyone with time and energy to spare should contact the Association for Improvements in the Maternity Services (c/o Anne Taylor, West Hill Cottage, Exmouth Place, Hustings, Sussex; 0424 420591, This is also the contact address for the struggle against induction.

Worth reading is an article in Spare Rib No. 49 by Christine Beels. She is writing a book on childbirth and would like people to contact her with their experiences at 19 Broomfield, Lee& 3.

pared for and properly and companion- ably coped with, can be enriching, it may be permissible to suggest an analogy. Ask the climber who wants to get to the top of Everest whether being dropped on the top by helicopter wouldn't be preferable to the pain and weariness of trying to climb there:- what would be the answer?

The Case for Hospitals This type of argument is anathema to

the advocatesof 100% hospital deliveries.

there won't be some trouble during the confinement (true); and then, if there should be trouble, by the time the mother i s got to hospital it may be too late (also true); lastly, any baby may develop some trouble soon after birth which only a hospital can deal with (trui again). It is a ldt rue that life involves risk; and after a certain point efforts to eliminate risks become counter- productive - more is lost than is gained. Ivan Illich's Law of Negative Returns.

What is involved in a hospital delivery? And what are the purported advantages for the apparently.normal young womar

FIRST, the labour is often artificially started at what is said to be the best timt for the mother or baby. Sometimes that is the reason for induction, though quite often it i s the best time for the doctors c nurses (A separate argument is in pro- gress as to whether labour should be induced if a pregnancy i s very late or atoxaemia of'pregnancy develops. Some obstetricians say "yes", others, equally experienced, say "No; equally good results can be obtained without it, and there are fewer Caesarian deliveries").

Anyway, as well as the likelihood that labour will he induced, hospital delivery often involves monitoring of the con- tractions of the uterus, perhaps with the help of a computer, and the automatic giving of injections to improve the con- tractions; routine monitoring of the . baby's heart during the labour; the takin of blood samples from the baby's scalp during the labour and the givingof pain- relieving drugs to the mother.

Sometimes too a forceps delivery or a Caesarian section delivery becomes necessary; and there is a special-care unit for babies who are born in poor con- dition. The whole thing is doctor-and- nurse-managed, the mother often plays little part, and sometimes she simply wakes from a daze to be told "It's all over, dear - a boy". Some perverse mum don't like this.

However, with some justification various advantages are claimed: less pain, a shorter labour, greater convenience, am most important, a lower perinatal mortality - that is, fewer babies either born dead or dying in the first week (often due to a difficult labour).

Flesh and Blood So how can anyone argue against it?

Well, first, birth is very much a flesh-and- blocxtprocess - most people would say that it constitutes one of the crucial flesh-and-blood processes of our lives; ant there is a strong, possibly atavistic desire for such processes to occur in a truly human matrix. Hospitals are not truly human, and the more efficient the hospital the less human it is. One British obstetrician has said3 that some women "are terrified of hospitals and modern obstetrical technology" and that "they may suffer as a result". If I were a woman, I think-1 don't know-that I wouldn't be terrified, but then, being a doctor, I would have a jolly good idea 1 what was going on. (No lay person woult dare even to auerv the wisdom o f nurse

hospital deliveries, is often a deeply You can't always tell, they say, that \ or doctor - more's the pity. I think they

a

' , undercurrents \l

iould, and that they should go ort que* fact that the deficiencies inperinatal care for more home deliveries.) The figures igJkr@iI they're stisfed.) Semeelectors" . rwealedia the rqaw&pp& ta a given are all very striking; to some people Wat,ifawomanisterrffiedbythe extent to the haspMserv/ce." one - wen horrifying. ospital environment, @e her a tranquil- -1% it mentioned that about 1 in 4 FIFTH, it hash suggested that the ser. But k f the cause of terror is the of the hospital babies were not examined improvement in the maternal and infant capital, and the woman doesn't need it, on the #@st day; but of dfthe babies who mortality rates in western countriestas hy not get at the root - remove the w e going to die in the first week, three- been due mainly to education, proper wi ta t and deliver the woman at home? quarters died in thefirst 24 hours. Only preparation,'improvements in nu t f l tw ' SECOND, what do women themselves 1 in 3 of the infants was examined within and health generally and the better *:

link about'home versus hospital' ' 24 hours of discharge f- hwt&. H, spacing of families 6.f. public health a*- efiieries? One survey of 336 women does look as though a high perknatal - , - a whole), and less to the increased pro- iho had had a baby a home and a baby mortality for the babies delivered in portion of hospital deliveries. The obvious' r hospital showed that 80% preferred hospital was in some part due to the corollary isthat such factors would do ome confinement; another, of 65 women absence of the very factors alleged to more than 100% hospital confinements A

winga home confinement, 37 having make hospital delivery superior. The to improve the outlook for mothersahd ad previous experience of hospital con- ground i s disappearing fw under the babie*.'~ff the report with which that inement, showed that 80% agaimsaid feet of the pro-hospital ddcturt; and it is , Lancet article4 dealt, the perinatal fter the home confinement that they €h who are making it vanish. mortality for women in social class I was rpatdprefer to have the next baby at --' .The report also-showed that home con- only 7.5 per thousand; for social &$ U' owe too. Those two 80 cents can finernents fell from about 36% in .I958 to women i f was 15.8; and for women in ~ardly be coincidental. . about 12% in 1970; $at i M u c t h of classes IV and V it was 26.8. t t certtfiWy Thepro-hospital advocates answer that labour rose in that period from 13% to does look, therefore, as.fliough better '

f s @ very fine when alt goes dl, but 30%; forceps deliveries increased (ram &cation, nutrition and family planning oppose it doesn't; women can hardly be 4.7% to 7-9%. and Caesar'un detiverks make a very big difference. x&ted to know better thana doctor in , from 2.7% 4.5%; and that in 1970 by .SIXTH - and th is is alas! a typical hese matters. Actually this i s just what the tenth day after birth 70% of the argument of some modern scientist- Btne~woawt W e the temerity to suggest babies were being bottlefed, compared doctors - that even a single baby dead tttiycatfy- that they (iip know better; with a mere 15% in 1946. (Recognition disabled i s an argument against hoffie *that, in any case, thfeir bodies are among doctors &the superiority of confinements. Remember that thew i: =own concern. In fact, of course, the breast feeding and a corresponding shift- Probabiy at present an irreducible mini- " ast nu@ity would unhesitatingly accept 'among the more intelligent, middle-class mum of one perinatat death per 10& I d&etor's word i f fee said there was a risk women back to breast feedinghave been births in twcountry: in the present State ~-lhemotfier'% or baby's lifdheatth. ~nninsroughly parallel with the demand of the obstetric art the very best medical

THIRD, what relevant evidence is there . . - b

km this and other countries? Inthk . ,oUntry between 1956 and 1968 the6 we more perinatal deaths in areas Ksfms a high home delivery rate, but The *â G.P.," witli~~~~vabk'xtcrilizablelining. rfter 1968 they had fewer sucfrdeaths. 4 Contailling &-' malleable m p l stem, nether words, perhaps by #tat time all - k worn& who needed to go to hospital but without Skull Coronet peripheral nozzle*;

tohave their babies were doing so, and hfrlaw of negative returns had begun to hypo. with 6 yards cord and operate. In Cardiff between 1965 and 1973 an increase in the proportion of ;onfinements that took p W in h-itil nadelittle or no difference twperinata) (Sartality.

966 and 1973 the increased

Tom 27.5% to 49% and hospital peri- vatit mortality fe l l from 25 to 16.3 per housarx); but for home deliveries peri- . wtaf mortality fell-even more drama- 5catty - from 14 to 4.5 per thousand. '

Lastly, Sweden has about the lowest natfrnai death rate in the world: and rithough it certainly has a higbate of lospital deliveries, the main .factor thought to be responsible is that& mother has amidwife who looks after her -ight through the pregnancy and labour. '-

FOURTH, perinatal mortality rates wted in the m e t 4 for home births, births supervised by the family Asctof, and by hospital consultants were 4.3.6.1, and 27.8 respectively. The Lancet said "In part, the hfgh P.M. R [~erinapl mrtafity rate] -associated with these, 'losoffo/ deliveries way be ekptahted by selection of at-rW cases" - the difficult &is that is. T@-article* how?w,,went an. " Unfortumtely, it 4 .Impossibie net . ~ -+

PIeaae state voltage of current wtten orar-r b*dw-m'*m '- -*!FO~'C<~AV, !L';f!t ~ ~ ; 1 1 i 1 ) . ~ ( 1 ~ ~ 7 8 h1&le8 producedfcydoctors~ fete?&~off-* - I ) < ~ t i l l f & & ' ~ Pi rfoi'(6tur. Slant tributed. Nor is it possible to ignore the , a

The present perinatal death rate i s about '- two per 100 births; so that what is at issue is the life of one baby per 100 births, and, much could be done to prevent that death by means of improved antenatal care, etc. Those who argue along the lines just mentioned are therefore pfoposing that, in order to prevent the death of one baby, not per 100 births, but per two, three or even four hundred births, one is justified in subjecting .

pregnant women to the loneliness and' inhumanity of a big hospital when a big proportion of these women could have their babies at home with perfect safety. By having a hospital confinement they - might lose something irreplaceable; T

perhaps something more important in toto than the lives of a few babies.

what the results would be, here i s scientific evidence for something that hundreds of thousands of mothers and babies in this country are losing every year - by being subjected to unnecessary hospital confinements, for the sake of perhaps one baby in three or four hundred. If anyone objects that the price isstiff worth paying, leathern reflect on- what the authorsof the paper stated: "Early and extended contact for the human mother mayhave a powerful effect on her interaction with her infant and consequently Its later development. " -

Midwifery Bags and Pouches to be Bled in coimeoBon mth direct

"*^* Ripply - main, improved fmm I C O - ~ ~ U lump)

however deplorable tha't might seim.

Human Contact It is probably the perfectionism of the

puritan and the scientist in me (or should 1 just say the scientist?) that makes me reluctant'to deploy this argument without scientific support (I keep thinking of that one baby.) I s there any such support? - Yes, in particular a paper5 on the effect of

3 s =

In other words, the later 11 ifp&;eT hundreds of thousands of babies @my-6 adversely affected by hospital confine- - ment Is prevention of th i s not, by any criterion, worth the price of that handfu of babies' lives possibly saved by 100% hospital confinements?

Costs of Living , Lastly, 'the Department of Health and

Social Security has to some extent made thewhole argument academic. The Department stated6 that despite the sh$ fall in births of recent years the cost of hospital maternity services has greatly increased - up by about 4% a year between 1970 and 1973, when the total number of births fell by 5% a year; the average cost per hospital case rising by about 6% in real terms. The document suggests that "In general the hospital maternity services have attracted too large a share of resources; and that the minimum aim should be to have lowered their cost by about 7% by 1979180." Tfc is a substantial cut-back,even in a time ( great financial .stringency; but this is whi the Department intends to achieve.

There have been protests about this; quite prob y attempts will be made again to re 3' me the long march towards 100% hospital deliveries; Let me then, a< a mere man (and 1 do not have my t o m in my cheek), try to explain the argurnei by yet another analogy: (direct persong argument comes uneasily from a rtale):+ If I want to get to see a d to know a country, I can do it i h" three ways. I ca fly over it in a plane, I can use a Land Rover or I can don my boots and trudge across the country. Now, if there is great danger one goes by plane. If there is sm danger one might go in the Land Rover, armed. If there is very little, one walks. To walk in that way is to see and to know - to live in other words; and similarly to have a baby among one's ON family, is to live. Thpre is always alittle risk to any worthwhile living. To take bi risks is stupid: to take l i t t le ones is the price O f being alive, of having an experi- ence obtainable in no otherway. For . healthy women without any complica- tions I am in favour of home confine- ments every time - and so i s an increasi, number of doctors, and of informed lay people. I hate to have to trot out an old chestnut in conclustion, but somehow the stupid old human species managed.t go on propagating itself long before the first obstetrician was invented. It did so at a terrible price to many women and their babies. I'm not so sure we aren't today paying a terrible price by having gone com~letelv to the other end of the spectrum. John Bradsha* t

Referen- 1. Beard, R.W., and Chamberlain, G., Lancet;- 24 April 1976. v. 904. 2. Dunn, P.M., Lancet, 10 April 1976, p. 799. 3. Arthure, H., Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology o f the British Commonweal !, January 1973. n. 1.

.: , , , . .: . . -. ., '

talking to or some form o f practical help, they are likely to see neither a doctor nor a nurse.

The drug companies have successfully increased their sales every year. Sales pro- motion is massive - to quote from Dr. Peter A. Parrish3 "In the UK the pharmaceutical industry spends huge sums of money on sales promotion; maintains an active and continuous pro-' gramme of public relations; is active in the fields of government, industry, pro- fessions and-news media; sponsors clinical trials and other research; finances non- subscribed literature to doctors; supports professional journals by advertising; pro- vides educational services, lunches, dinners. buffets, film-shows, hand*f~+c "...>

rug company advertising is successful in its primary aim of persuadi and gifts; and deploys an enormous sales actors to prescribe, and patients to consume, large quantities bf the force which succeeds in a high proportion (pensive products, even though they may be dangerous or useless. of face-to-face interviews b owever, the aspect of the sales drive that disturbs the London Hospita reps and prescribing docto

'omen's Group is the presentation of the stereotype of women as second- ass citizens; drudges to be fobbed off with pillsif they venture to -&in. . =-L+. Pilfr fn* peace?

THE ADVERTISEMENT?~~; 2% they saw received a repeat prescriptit doctors: an overwhelmingly male and and very little else? In the very situa iddfe class group whose social attitudes where patients are most likely to nee we played a large part in forming the

It ssible that women today feel themselves to be living under more st1 than men, since they report twice as many symptoms of such things as ner

laract& o f the NHS. Advertising helps form or reinforce the doctor's attitudes

h i s patients and their treatment. GPs consider drug company advertising, mature and representatives to be their ain source o f information about new lies. 45% of the doctors in a study'said ley had seen five or more drug firm presentatives in the four weeks prior to te study. Only 6% had not seen any presentatives! .

very picture telba story Gerry Stimson2 compares the image o f

.omen in contracepttv advertisements - 9 "the demure partner fo the male, a wife who Is a girl-friend but not a mother" - with-those shown in tranquilliser and anti-depressant advertisements - T e y are usually older, with ch/ldren. They are -it dressed or groomed for pleasure. They

e tired of the drudgery, boredom and . loneliness of the woman's world."

Tranquillisets and antidepressants are one o f the fastest-growing and most profitable areas of the market. Given tht increasing scale on which we are being . prescribed these drugs can we really say that the advertising and other sales pro- motion o f the drug companies i s not

ceding?

GPs give repeat prescriptions for drugs acting on the central nervous system more frequently than other types o f drug. "The doctors in the studies seemed to under- estimate the frequency of repeat pre- scriptions." This isconsistent with the

and m&musWHent" of doctors taking part in another study when they &overed that a Quarter of the patferns

redness, depression, irritability, and eeplessness as do men and take twice as any medicines, both prescribed and 3n-prescribed. There are many reasons for stress. ngle parents (84% of them women) ruggle to bring up children on their un; married women may have to do two lbs because their husbands weren't .ought up to do housework or look after tildren when they come home from ork; the breakdown o f old communities hen people are moved to new estates, id the difficulties o f forming new ones high-rise flats; homelessness and poor

wising. These are all likely to affect omen more than men since women are ewed as housekeepers and child-minders. The advertisements for tranquillisers id antidepressives rely heavily on these 'cia1 causes o f stress. They also depict omen fifteen times as often as men.2 It ould be surprising, therefore, if doctors d not prescribe tranquillisers more adily for women than men -and for hat are, in many cases, for 'social' - asons - t o help them go on living with hatever is causing them distress. In fact omen do take twice as many tranquil- ers and anti-depressants as men. The tio is the same in almost all the luntries where the multi-national drug mpanies operate (see table). This is not say that women are necessarily suffer-

g from more stress than men. Men may ve other ways o f dealing with stress. wever, doctors are being encouraged to e women's 'nerves', etc., as a medical oblem and so women, too, see 'nerves',, a medical problem with pills as the swer. Social pressures can be the cause o f any different symptoms from ulcers to' adaches. Should doctors treat stress mptorns with tranquillisers and forget out the causes? Should social workers allowed to prescribe tranquillisers? It

s been suggested4 that it was time the iblic were allowed to buy 'yinor inquillisers' (e.g. Valium and Librium) er the counter. Women have been conditioned into .ole that is no longer acceptable, and t o juce the amount o f stress in women's es social conditions must be improved. 1'he provision o f nurseries at work and tter contraceptive and abortion facilities e only the first steps towards a more uitable society. If we accept that we cannot treat people th pills while denying their right to equate living conditions, then we must pport any action to raise or maintain e standards of those conditions.

- T.ERNATIONAL USE OF ANTI-ANXIETY DATIVE MEDICINES I N 1971 fl each sex-gpup using medicines: .

Men Women Belgium 12.0 20.9 Denmark 10.2 19.9 France 11.9 21.4 Germany 8.4 19.2 Italy 9.8 12.6 Netherlands &.5 16.3 Spain 7.0 125 Sweden - 9,9 , '21.5 UK 19.1 USA

References 1. Karen Dunnel and Ann Cartwright

Medicine Takers, Prescribers and Hoarders.

I . 2. G. Stimson Women in a Doctored World

New Society, 1 May 1975. 3. P.A. Parrish The Family Doctor's Role in

Psychotropic Drug Use. M I N D Occasional Paper 4.

4. Office of Health Economics Medicines Which Affect the Mind. Paper 54, 1975.

I

An exhibition giving the full facts ls available for hire to Interestedgroups Contact: The London Hospital Women's Group, c/o Clubs Union, Stepney Way, London E. 1.

he suffers from dysmenorrhoea

.Xuph tf*n Kwauw lJuiihast6n ws notmhibtt ovuiaiion, pregnant?, the besttreatment, an& irrwntHi Each Duyhaft '~~~ tahlpt ro~fcama K3mg dydmeaterone Furtjier inforinationon requeat.

Undercurrents 19

IDE .. . . ., .~ -. -

LTERNATIVE MED T H E R E M A R K A B L E T H I N G about most alternative medicine in this. country is that y o u have t o go and find it yourself, as N H S doctors can on ly refer your case t o 'recognised practitioners', and yes, y o u on ly get recognised and accredited if y o u are suitably allopathic. So it's u p t o y o u t o decide whether your doctor is doing the best f o r you o r f o r the drug com- panies w h o bombard him w i t h tons o f full-colour books, magazines, adverts in magazines, and even pop-up four-colour pictures o f the brain and h o w the drugs work o n it. Roche qui te recently employed every last one o f these hard-sell techniques to advertise Nobrium, a supposed successor t o Librium.

o t surprising tha t so many people are o n the s tu f f . . . B u t there are number o f alternative therapies available f o r body and mind: usually f o r 0th simultaneously. Richard Elen gives a br ief description and l ist o f centres or some o f them in the UK, culled f r o m a number o f sources including

.. . < . ~ .~ -,,*.=- ick Saunders' Alternative England & Wales (AE& W). . * .- b.? ,ã-z~- : , l .E

. f . ?" -^. r- . . . . . . -. . ,...- f., . -. $ ..-..+.'A. .-

. .- A c ~ ~ i i c t u r e

Acupuncture i s an originally oriental technique requiring the insertion o f special needles (usually gold or silver) into the skin along the route of some o f the 24 'meridians' or energy lines that

traverse the body. The id& is that the yin and yang influences can be brought into balance, so creating and maintaining a healthy body. The technique is com- plex, however, so be sure thatwhoever you go to is really good, as there are a number o f ripoff merchants. Good acupuncturists may be found on a list put out by the Acupuncture Association, 34 Alderney St., London SW. Nick Saunders quotes the price at 15% pence, but better check for inflation.

m-5- c

Bach Flower Remedies Dr. Bach was an allopathic doctor who

decided that illnesses were due t o pefpn- ality defect$, which had to be cleared up

t o cure ailments. These defects, he found, cduld be counteracted by suitablecorn- binations o f the essences of up td--32 flowers. These essences are usually dissolved in brandy and taken in very small doses. The idea may sound:strange, but I have seen the effect o f the 'Bach Emergen& Remedy' on a severe problem (at Comtek) and was most impressed. It is

:reputed to be able to bring people back :k from the point of death, and I can well

believe it, so don't flisroiss this strange- sounding technique lightly. The/emedtes can be supplied by Nora Weekes, Mount Vernon. Sotwell, Wallingford, Berkshire.

Biochemic Remedies These are often associated with Homeo-

pathy, but they seem to be worth a mention separately. These remedies con- s i s t of 12 'tissue salts' that supposedly have the same sort of purpose as proteins or vitamins, except that they correct shortages or deficiencies o f mineral sub stances. Cells require nourishment cleansing of poisonous waste; and 1

mineral salts ensure this. In case 01 disease, Bjpchemic Remedies corrfw. ..ie existing deficiencies. One manufacturer of these salts is New Era Laboratories, 87 Saffron Hill, London EC1. They also producea book on how t o use the system.

Colour ~ealing' Many o f the mystical andmagical

traditions recognise the importance of colours: for centuries the colours o f the spectrum have been associated with different parts o f the body, different planets, different lev& o f consciousness,

h n d as in many other fringe areas, modern science i s beginning to find proof of such traditions, though-admi ttedly this i s an easy one for the scientist to dismiss. But before you join him, think about the

Undercurrents T9 -

fact that two specific bands of fre- - pathy is based on prescribing a substance the advantage that you are in control. quencies, at either encj of the visible - g.W in qwW&wifities w M d pro- And you can do it * often & you need spectrum, infra-red and ultra-violet, Aave duce the &my symptomsas the d i m * th- the tr&ing is often expensive a profound effect on file physical body. but it is supplied in absolutely minute - (Sibcosts £60) But you do (earn 'otb Is it inconceivable that some of theother doses which have thereverse effect: 6.e useful things' too. frequencies might also do something i f dear.it up. JB fact, the smaller the dose, accurately tuned in? Hygeia Studios, the more powerful Has remedy: A reailF a - Brooke House, Avening, Tetbury, Glouc- powerful homeopathic remedy can beso estershire specialise in colour and sound dilute that a vial ofthe liquid would not therapies, based on the teachings of con* a WIe ma/ecule of tte sub- Rudolf Steiner. The place is fun by Theo stance! Some t h e m as to why they Gimbel, and those who met him at work indicate that whilst no physical, Comtek 1974 and remember his lectures chemical is finally p&wnt, tile 'etheric will no doubt agree that he knawswhat maax' of the substance affects the water he's doing. in which it is diluted, and this 'treated

Ñg2. =-.qT@ water' is what reallydoes the job. Pertiaps -&=.- 3 ~ ~ 2 a this is why a homeopathic remedy is

'potentised'by banging it in solution: to shake that matrix.

Homeopathy, like many alternative systems, is not just concerned with special

.

tittte bits of you, like 'Ear, Nose & Throat', but is concerned with treating Natural Childbirth Aft whote person, physically, and often Write to the National Childbirth TI mentally and spiritually as well. So be .9 Queensborough Terrace, London <. prepared to give the doctor as much (01 -229 93?9), enclosing an sae forth< information about yourself aspossible. address of the local group'(100 plus) 01 A really good one will probably. ask for - . teacher @*his) nearest to A fh quite a lot. Also, in the case of hpmeo-

example c mutual aid, as well as runni pathy, be prepared to give UP certain . prenatal c asses they help each 0-a things during the course of treatment. a personal mother-mother basis. The These will#rob&Jy be things like coffee ye good at overcomingh and peppermints. And camphor, if you ever do anything with that.

obstacles that the 'health industry' put in the way of mothers who want to fee their babies themselves. .If you wani

Herbalism have your baby at home they may t Herbal medicines are derivedfrom * to put you in touch with a sympathetic

traditional plant remedies developed @ver . rnldwife. thousands of years. They are gentle,&d The NCT also have a film available -.of course, natural, many of the herbs 1 hire, entitled Birth$ A Film about appearing ail overttie place (e.g. as weeds: Feelings and Experiences. 11 consists of as Findhorn say, "A weed is a plant in the film of two births intercut with

wrongptace at the wrong tkp"), ' comments by Sheila Kitzinger, autho

atthou# you can pick them up in trendy Maturebirth, and Dr. Uboyer, a&~a - shopsathigh prices as welt. A large variety Birth Wlthout Violence, and a number of fnatments are descrjbed in Potters mothers talking about their own expert'

New Encyctopaedia o f Botanical Drugs ences. It is in cotour, lasts 45 minutes, andPrepantttoqs (Health Science Press), and costs £ 5 for up to a week's'hi- and an even larger variety of herbs are in the well-known Culdpers Herbal. The . National Institute of Medical Herbalists, 6 8 London Road, Leicester, and the m y ef Herbalists, 65 Emanuel House, -18 Rochester Row, London SW1 can :su&ply information;AE& W also mentions

Lm- - - the Friends of Herbalism at 6 Ronald +%& A:*$*Â 'Qose. Eden Park, Beckenham, Kent, who Hypnotherapy sound like a good bunch of activists. % Hypnosis is a very useful method of

dealing with things like habits and , e>-v-

allergies, and a number of psychological Hornpathy problems. Sometimes thsugh, when treat- Osteopathy --Mzw'2'--

. Homeopathy is one of the few alter- ingpsychological matters, it has a tend- I don't know much about thi native therapies that you can actually get ency to treat the symptoms rather than - Nick Saunders in AE& W says ''

'on the NHS. Rumour has it that thisis the root cause, so the problem changes involving manipulation of the bones, -just because the Queen uses it and for no into something else. But it seems to be muscles, tendons, ligaments and {oints. ether reason. I have been told also that about the best method of getting rid of " Besides treating symptoms directly MHS-trained homeopaths are just ordinary nasties like hayfever, or giving up smoking related to the joints, osteopaths can cup

:*tors who have taken a few months and other drugs. It can'be expensive, indirect troubles like pains in the legs Raining at the end of their normal medical though. Contact the Psychotherapy caused by a slipped disc pressing on the

'ittstquction. They and the Royal London Centre, 67 Upper Berkeley Street, spinal cord of nerves." Qualified ate' ;Meopathic Hospital seem to have London W1 for details. Another useful paths are listed by the Register, of Os@o .reputation for being allopathic in almost' system for allergies, habits, and things like . paths, 16 Buckiiam_Gate, tendon St!

ity because it losing weight is the use of a mental train- to get the real ing technique like Silva MI$ Control - ,

Homeopath& {details$ UC11. adfliwfo UC12), *

~ssociation f<w- iaHà fiwnà tÇà ,M Abft snb, m-Biefdbacfc. Devonsh&$$yegt, t-awtoftw1. w- at%&%effective as hypnosis and have: met a practitioner of these arts at ->-,A - - "r..-¥z&-¥¥E./A &--J?

Undercurrents 19

incftiorn, one Gall Rabom, and warmostt npressed. She is from California, but expect letters to her at PO Box 827, lendicino, Calif. 95460, will be irwarded to her as sheis currently living etween the UK and Holland.

Psychotherapy The world o f Alternative Psychiatry is

incredibly tangled, it seems to me, and yould require far more than the space available to cover adequately. But AE& W has a good section, beginning p. 174.

*one Therapy Wilhelm Reich, a European scientist

who moved to the States in the 30s, ieveloped a number o f remarkable heories, political (he was a highly indi- ridual radical Socialist), psychological 'he developed Bio-Energetic Therapy and wrote The Function o f the Orgasm) and cientific. Ip the latter field, the majority if his theories were so far ahead o f his %me that he drew storms o f derision from i

i f fc iai circles for some years. He leveloped the idea that there was a basic ill-permeating 'life-energy' he called Jrgone. He spent many years researching his energy, and devised 'orgone accumu- ators' to store it He found this stored inergy very effective in treating disease, wen terminal cancer. U fortunately the -A decided to take anard line and took iim to court to try to prove that orgone. lid not exist Reich did not think it was possible for a court to rule on natural aws, but he was finally convicted in I series o f cases that make horrifying eading and make Velikwsky's persecu- jon look like a holiday: in fact it seems ikely that the FDA were put up to i t by :IA or FBI: Reich died in prison in the niddle o f the cold war and was no doubt een as a dangerous revolutionary. A l l his looks and accumulators were burned in 1 medieval orgy of repression. Only ecently has his work become available gain in the States and have scientists >egun to realise the value of his hypo- heses. Orgone energy i s collected by lyramids, and is also the energy that . lows along ley-lines, possibly being the ause o f the traditional healing effect of nany megaliths. Good starting material rould include a copy o f Reich's Selected Vorks; it could also be useful to contact he Reichian journal Energy and ;haracter, c/o David Boadella, Abbot* ury, Dorset We were sent a copy o f this ecently, and whilst it is heavy reading, hey no doubt have a targe amount o f ifonnation.

Radionics - "Radionics is a method o f healing at

a distance through the medium o f an instrument or other means using the ESP faculty", begins An Introduction to Radionics by the Radionic Association (Field House, Peaslake, Guildford, ,

Surrey). Radionics can treat any living system, human, plant, animal or even the soil. It is particularly useful in organic ,

farming as it enables pests to be con- trolled, and weeds, without the use o f chemicals. The methods were originally researched by Dr. Albert Abrams; the. 'Electronic Reaction o f Abrams' was developed in the late 19th Century from work on the electrical measurement of disease reactions. An English committee under the chairmanship o f Sir Thomas Horder investigated Abrams claims in the year o f his death, 1924. They decided that Radionics was ". . . established to a very high degree of probability". Sir James Barr took up the techniques and wrote a book on the subject Dr. Drown in the States made further developments, and the Delawarr Laboratories began investigating Radionics in the Farti? and

'are still going (They manufacture equip- ment and are at Raleigh Park Road, Oxford). The only thing about Radionics , is that. . . well, an American SF magazine editor was researching it once and found that a circuit diagram worked as well as the machine itself! Whilst the thought of instant electronics ("Just draw the schematics and plug 'em in!") is appealing it sounds a bit odd. More likely than not the machine just acts as a device for focusing mental energy, which does all the work (and work it does). In which case Radionics is probably closer to 'spiritual' healing than it would like to admit. The machine is used to send a 'rate' appropriate to the disease, being linked to the patient by a suitable 'sample' - hair, a spot o f blood or even a photograph - in a way that is almost identical to what one could call 'reverse mapdowsing' (see UC17). Anyone can build a machine (in a simple form, a stable wide-range oscillator driving a 'witness' coil - for the link with the patient -.and a 'treatment' coil which may be used to send a homeopathic remedy or something, linked by a control circuit and a 'stick- pad' - a metal plate covered with rubber or plastic that becomes 'sticky' to the touch when the 'rate', in t h i s case the oscillator frequency, is correct A pendu- lum -see also UC17 - can be used instead o f a stickpad however. The con- trol circuit may be no more than a number of variable resistors in series in a particular pattern, e.g. 16 pots in two concentric circles.) and I'm currently working on one myself. I'll give'the circuit diagram to anyone who wants to try (you inight even like t o build the machine as well!) and I intend to wrjte it up when

. I 'vedowa few experiments. Unti l then, practitioners, and general information on Radionics including details o f tuition is available from the Radionic Association, address above. And if you build a machine: it'll definitely work: if you believe it will!

Spiritual Healing Actually this'is a large field, covering

a number o f different methods, channel- ing of healing energy through a medii from the higher realms, from God, J( just from within the healer. They probably all amount to the same thing: a focussing o f mental energy, but that's just a personal thought. It has been demonstrated, I think pretty convincing- ly, that healers have a definite tangible objective effect (See Psychic Discoveries Behlnd the Iron Curtain and works on Kirlian Photography:- why not check yourself - see UC17). There's a lot of groups around (see A E W again-thar Nick!) but you could try the Spiritual Association, 33 Belgrave Square, for starters.

Unfortunately it is impossible to cover t alternatives in medicine hopefully these few will

be o f some use to members o f the Move-

BIBLIOGRAPHY This reading list i s taken from Try Being

Healthy, a new survey of Alternative Therapies by Dr. Alec Forbes (Langdon Books, The Old Laundry, Langdon Wembury, Plymouth; 188 pp., £2.25) We will review this book I Undercurrents 20. Bailey, A.A. Esoteric Healing (Lucis Press> Bhattacharyya, B. Gem Therapy Calcutta 1971 Burr, H.S. Blueprint for Immortality: The

Electric Patterns of Life (Neville Spearm Carlson, R.J. The Frontiers of Science am

Medicine (Wildwood House) Gallert, M.L New Light on Therapeutic

Energies (James Clarke) Gurdjieff, G.I. All and Everything (Routledge

& Kegan Paul) Hahnemann, S. The Organon of Medicine

Calcutta 1961 Hauschka, R. The Nature of Substance (Stuart Isaacs, J.M.A. Healing in the Context of .

Psychic Phenomena (Journal of the British Society of Dowsers, voi. xxv, no. 5, p. 2, 1975)

~eadbeiter, C.W. Man Vklbie & Invisible (first published 1902; Quest Book edition Theo- sophical Publishing House, Wheaton, Il l . , U.S.A. 1969)

L6 Shan, L. The Medium, the Mystic & the Physicist (Turnstone)

Lilly, J.C. In The Centre of the Cyclone (Paladin)

Ostrander, S. & Sc'hroeder, L. PSI: Psychic Discoveries Behind the iron Curtain (Abacus)

Reich, W. Selected Writings (Farrat, Strauss & Girouxl

Steiner, R. he Anthroposophical Approach t i Medicine Anthroposophical Publishing Co. ( 1 9281.

~ o m ~ k i n s , P. & Bird, C. The Secret i

Plants (Penguin) Tromos. S.W. Psvchical Phvsics (Etsevier. . ,

U S:A. 1949) Wachsmuth, G. The Etheric Formative Ft

in Cosmos Earth & Man Anthrooosooh . . Publishing Co. ( 1 932)

Watson L. Supernature (Hodder & Stout Westlake, A.T. The Pattern of Health (St> All these books w e e published in London except where otherwise indicated.

--- played down by the Labour and Com-

3 munist Party varieties of socialism, which became the dominant ones in this country.

But i?s vital to avoid just simple nostalgii for the 19th Century - or the 1960s. We need to relate to what are live issues today and what arise from them as

ICTOR ANDERSON was not at all pleased to find Mike George mis- practical tactics and strategies. For

presenting - as he sees it - Alternative kiat ism in Undercurrents 18. instance, going beyond "the right to work" to challenge the millions of useless

~ybe he was reading it upside down. More likely, AS is in the mind of the or harmfuL jobs that at present aist and holder. The article in UC18, says Victor, just missed the point. -.--. av-ediscuss the need for new jobs to be

reformism, or trade union sectional %??< - created in their place. Going beyond economism. We can read this in the - a"cam~aigning against the cuts" to

common ploy amongst reviewers use what's supposed to be a criticism a book, film, or whatever, as a way o f iting something of their own on ~gh ly the same subject, without really ling much specifically about what sy're 'reviewing'. I think that's whqt ke George has done in his review in idercurrents 18 of the pamphlet Alter- rive Socialism. There were ideas he ~nted to attack, and a review seemed

enient way of'doing iL But I don't the ideas he attacks are the ideas the

mphlet puts forward. As he presents it, ind Alternative Socialism almost recognisable. --- example, he says "socialism is. . .

understanding the economic infia- ucrure (which our friends conveniently tore)." If by this he means issues like 2 sorts o f technology there are, who ss and controls it, what work people do,

hat they should be paid, roughly ter of the pamphlet is on it.

a1 ks about "well-meaning anarchists &hor any form o f organisation

lich is oppositional. " But the pamphlet vocates "encroaching struggles about tat is to be made and how and for tom", "a forward-looking offensive ategy based on the potential uses of .hnolcgy", and so on. He says "It's just not g o ~ d enough to uate 'socialism' with so-called revolu- wary Trots, par/iamentarist Labour

Telema~h anbAday. " What vou won't find in t& re1egraph jbut will find on page one of the pamphlet) is the intention of developing an alternative form o f social ism "to crysta//ise socialist dip satisfaction with the existing ~pt ions" by I in king "the alternative society with various varieties o f socialism-"

But I don't want to defend the whole of Keith Paton's pamphlet (or attack the whole of Mike George's review, some of which I agree with). Instead I'll briefly say what my version o f Alternative Socialism is. I t 's about a synthesis of alternatives and socialism - about constructive and oppositional action together; self- expression and social justice; changing both the means of production and large scale politics; about race, sex, age, and other divisions, as well as the inequalities 'class' refers to.

A t present, that appears as a task o f integrating socialism with the 'alternative' themes which arose in the sixties. But hking a longer-term view, it's about reviving a whole tradition of socialism that was almost buried for f ifty years (191 7-67). Many o f the themes which sixties radicalism presented z 'new' - ecology, community, decentralisation, ,

imagination, etc. - were central concerns for many early socialists (e.g William Morris, Shelley, Proudhon, the syndicalists) but were fought against or .

. - - - challenge the present organisation and purposes of the "welfare state". Going beyond Scottish and Welsh devolution to ensureThe Government doesn't go back on i t s commitment to devolution in England as well, and that devolution in political structures i s accompanied by devolution in economic structure firms, unions, etc.

Though basically anarchists, we don expect a sudden revolution, but more a gradual process of change brought about by people both outside and inside Westablished institutions - Parliament, the Labour Paw, trade unions, the Churches, ek. - and on their fringes.

These are the sort of things we've dis- cussed (and disagreed about) in the Birmingham Alternative Socialism group. There are now also groups in Manchester, North and South London, and plans fc- a local conference in Leeds (Novembe~ 27th). As well as Keith Paton's initial pamphlet (I Op plus 9p postage), there' a pamphlet o f discussion on Alternative Smialism, reprinted from Peace News (5p plus 6 % ~ postage), and we've produced a number of leaflets, some o f which we've st i l l got copies of. There are also plans for an occasional national newsletter. If you're interested, please write to us: a1 64 Harbury Road, Birmingham 12 (021-440 1379).

Victor Anderson

first full Daragra~h of column 3. DaEe 36. the figuri 0, ~ G ~ U S should havi i e i d

.

0,s Gauss, the point being that anomalies were noted in excess of the Earth's magnetic field, which is about 0.47 Gauss

seph Needham Ve apologise to Joseph Needham and

our readers for the mess we made of the article Put Politics In Command which appeared in Undercurrents 18. Part of the lact section, 'Yin and Yang', was accident.

/ pasted down in the first section, 'Put . -1itics In Command'. The sentence and it was history, not theology and not hvsics. which had been the , , , (Column . . 2, line 8, page 12) should be followed by . . .regina scientarum. (Column 3, line 18). The intervening passage, from been so strong, but it was reinforced. . . to Science is one and indivisible. The. . . should be inserted after line 4 of 'Yin and Yang'.

Ley Detectors

in ~r i tain, although the instrume~nt had initially been adjusted tp remove the effect of the Earth's field. Such anomalies are, of course, somewhat significant in this context. Land For The People

We forgot to say in Undercurrents 16 that the article Garden Villages o f Tomorrow was taken from Land for the People (Crescent Books, 8a Leighton Crescent. London NW5. 1 4 4 ~ ~ . £1.201 a book Af essays compiled by '~erbie '. Girardet on the 'Land Question' and radical answers to it. Other contributors include Michael Allaby (food supplies), Martyn Partridge (the enclosure move- ment and the Diggers) and Dave Elliott (past attempts to get back to the land).

Kirlian Photography

the low-voltage power supply is shorted out when S3 is set to 'long' exposure time and R4 is at the top end of i t s travel, if S2 is 'on'. This fault (asfault it is: I left out the component when re- drawing the circuit for publication) is easily rectified by the insertion of a lO@ohm, 0,s W. resistor between the third ('long') position of S3, and ground, replacing the direct link given. Alan also notes that the last-but-one line on p. 30 should read "with a pulse repetition rate of 25-250 pulses per second ." and not 25@2500, which is impossible with the time constant of R3/C4. He says: . "Attempting to increase it (the repetition rate) beyond thiscauses the output voltage to decrease rapidly as R l prevents C2 from charging fully between pulses at higher frequencies. You can tell when this point has been reached wi*out an oscilloscope by the distinct change in note as the frequency is increased and there i s no point in going above this frc quency." Many thanks to Alan for poi1 ing these out, and apologies to readers who blew up their bridge rectifiers..l d and should have remembered! I

The article in UClB, 'How to Make Alan Talbot of North Harrow has I Ley Detector' also contained a small, written to point out that in the Kirlian but significant error. A t the end o f the Photography Unit described in UC17, *

I

w . WERESTED IN d o i i came thing in an old village s h e in Elampshim? It's just beco @ee and will won be put n o r - d e . It's 5 from &a, & we're told it would make a 8004 workshop as well as having a 8malJ hmae &tach&. IIW*'S nome sum for the idea dmdy, so if you're interesied Write e n !

The penon who suggested th& dm wants to et in touch with *<any d e m e for +/exc~ta e of

1 gc+s/smica w i ~ m the ~n%e &h~-type framework, Le. - between seW-management @ups.'' *&Is, 'We're woodwork/

, rjo@ery/f~iiure makers, and would tc mtae3ted. to work witkin such a acheme, for mutual

wakingw*â‚ :, S W Exchange (IWQSE)

PEOPLE IhTE+STED in 6~ opmtive work prowts can ge and work on them for a short whileinaachemetbtiajust startiiThustheycankarnthe problems and s u c m Of Work- 4 woperatively before wm nutthg themdves to WOI 9 full-time on a pmject. Not o y will visitom learn from the e operatives, bet hope+lly dek , s k i u s w i l l b e ~ ~ t h ~ .

building or prh W o S E ia an%n .extension

of the WOOF (Workmg Week- ends on Organic F m s ) deme, which has been successful in the *'

~ u l t ~ d sphere.

Milton Keyms.abop PLANS ARE NOW b e i i nude

for a timber pmdwta cwperative entexprise in W o n Key- It seems asthou@ mqe fkance wi8 be available h m the Milton Keynes pelopment Cozporatbn

lica!ion w% soon be J O ~ creation ho-

m m e . The f i i product line wil l probably be recycled pallets Dne problem could be too many willing helpas/advisera but a lack ~f people want- to make a zuing out of starting a co-op. If vou're interested in helping set up the co-op, especially if y?u haye any woodworking or dmgn skdls, contact

Box DH, In 77ze &king, 84 Quucli street, W ~ e x t o n , Milton Keyled, BudKs.

- -. =?* . QWrB * m h @

S ~ ~ ~ O M M U N I T Y is an -tion w h a a@s wt w much to do tW&a f f f d W & people, but to help them to k& ~ x d v e s . &iln~Ita@rW0f this is theirneedto. do s o r n z f d and become involved in a community. A recent new Stwe prqect is a ' S d Repairs Workshop' whieh e@&a disMed people to undextake mall repairs of qMpment for .%re hembers and to repair sob MAKIM ~~~~o~ - whether fit or dmblcd. h~ puticuh they y d *ce help, one or two enthusmstlc gmdene4S

YES, IT'S Jn the Making back again! We're now to help set up a new Gardening a regula feature in U~ercu~ents as well a an annual {well, koject and artktkvohwtem to hopefully) 'Directory of Proposed Projects in Self- rovidk &onal ~ a ~ s

for sa~eab~d pints, etc. hwgemnt a d Radial T&nologyl. We're minty an- . she commm*, c e d with production - and specifically with finding ton Road, Mertfn Fpk solutions to the problem inv0Iv.d in manufactuiing c:d%Wl9 3NX. $2 *- socialfy-useful products in a mexploi€iv moperatbe

*Y The JTM page is in U n d ~ m ~ f s to help put co-

operative projects in touch with r f a k s interested in joining or helping them, and v i c e - v d Far more details, subscribe! Ttie $rectory and supphmts, sent to all subscribers, con- prhtsm and the printing depart- tain articles, news, projec2 details, personal profiles and an ment of an educatkd &arity.

AT research section. (See below for subscription rates etc.) Thb three C 0 m p O ~ &s - TQ Fublicatidns which pub@ha

who h 1m 'Thm-be Quarterly' and '¶%W W, I. Belks Resa and IRAT

In i%e &king was origiadty start&! in 1973 {see U a ) ~ d L W g n - t o ~ k ~

by R&?in Fielder, Mavis Kirkham, h e &wand the mst a year to negotiate the merger. All were "co-opexatbe

of tfie Rad- coHeetive in %effW. They h e now -=x7dentated groups" and say IRAT will be "working town&

w h a t i s m ITM is w b t w l e acttdiy Wdwd in self-managed

productive projects and AT W e of it. We're planning the next full directory (nudw 4, W 7 ) now, hoping to get it out bv kember or a. I t wit1 have aflkJesd &f enfrks tike the ones on this page. If you want to write R e v d u t i ~ village? an arfide for iTM, please &. We!re especially interested in lW3RJ3 ARE PLANS to build articles onprojects that have sucxeeded (or failed); on what

, ~ , ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ - O u t self-management might mean in practice and how to get -=?hireNottingb&&ke border, there; and on practical points for people setting up projwts ncas bughbmo The wheme themselves. is behg m@% keaer3

koject entries will probably cover the folfowing cate former city planner Konmd

pries: Urban; Rural; Industrial; Food c ~ s ; A% and SndgM& and the &st Midlands Housing As&&tion..The plam

other projects. Also covered is industrial action which n * w-ere revedul to delegates from linked in some way to demands for self-management and the United Nations 'Habitat' con-

shop-floor conwol over the mnning of businem We rely ferenm on human d e m e n t . The villa with its own industries

on you for information, so please send anything you think d d $ , e up about 80 acres of may interest us to ITM arthe address below. the 3DO acm of prkhnd

s m u n K Stanford Hall, which is mw u s as a Cc-operat~e College. Under the scheme it is

SUBSCfUBE TO ITM! The# (*ch may pmpod to b a abokt 1000 %~bm'ibef~ meive the . . in- wbsribe now!) h0u.w on these 80 acre& Park- wmnk issue of the ITM - d i ~ w k & wpPie. m d d Prae~ed .

C ~ I P f a m y on an existing dimtow, PIM Supplemmb mnts t d t YOW m ~ r t e ~ runs hm wq a -*e factow (2 or 3 t ima a year), whbh out. Single copies of the last anda & m h g X a c t o v are will parallel and expand on d j q (a114 17343+) are the p r ~ ~ industries the Undercurrents feature. avaltable at Xip. The would be a m$e! c* Currcm rates are: operatwe, sap Komad Smg~elski

All mail to: The l d planning authorities are . Minimum subscr$ptbw£O,8 ITM, C/O ACORN, stitl agafnet the scheme, but he is

Donation subscription £1. 84 Church Strwt, f d y convinced that in 10 years

(if you can afford it1 Wolverton, Milton Keynes, Ft2Fe wiU be su* a*ge! "" "- ...

Institution rate £1.5 Bucks. 0 Box RV,'In the Wkbg*.

Pretty Mind Capitalim, Socialism and the Environ- ment, Hugh Stretton. 31 0 pages. Cambridge University Press. pb £2.50

This is one o f those books - I'm glad somebody's written it, though I'm not so sure that it's a very good book. lt's a very ambitious attempt to cope with, not only environmental issues, but inflation and inequality as well, and to pick out m e of the critical reiationships between them. In his introductory chapter: 'Environ- mental Politics' he raises a host of questions and problems that anyone seriously working for radical social change just has to confront - it's pretty mind boggling, though luckily he doesn't offer quick and simple answers so it's safe to feel confused. But nevertheless it's a sobering prospect to review the range'

~d c6mplexity of relationships between .~ysical and sociai environments, national nd international economic policies,

ateria rial a.4 social inequaltties and so on in present day 'developed' countti&.

Stretton assumes the continuation of an almost endemic inflation, no great changes in technologies, resource depb tion and pollption - a fairly simple (simplistic?) baseline from which he out- lines three alternatae scenarios which lead us to beyond the year 2000. These

bggling cony!ncing, others are a bi t dubious, not Ieast-because, in trying to write about the U.S., most European countries and Japan, Stretton has to talk in very broad general- ities and misses some quite important specific developments in particular countries. It's maybe better to see these scenarios as abstract ideal-type thinking around the relationships between con- servation, production, di$tribution, the costs o f clearing up ~ollutiom, and political choice. He rightly points up the social nature of environmental questions - and for this reason alone these scenarios have value.

In the next section Stretton explores moregeneral issues, starting with ideas and ideologies relating to models of economic development, sociaJ and material environments, equalities and inequalities in income, wealth, property and other personally-owned resources, plus a very unsatisfactory bit on aliena- tion. From this exploration he constrbcts his 'manifesto' which can best be described as a type o f 'soft' corporation based on egalitarianism, humanism and environmental care - it smacks o f a very 1959s English paternalism.

, Whilst Stretton leans consciously to the Left and supports a radical Left-based initiative to severely l imit incomes, con-

scenarios are viewed through the need to ope with inflation and the problems of istribution and consetvation of scarce sources. The first xgnario entails Thatcher-like government which

develops into an almost South African style autocracy - the problem o f ramDant inflation, scarcity of oil and raw

- trol prices, regulate land use and price, and tackle environmental problems ofall description$ I'm at a loss to see how t h i s would actually happen. Basically the se called 'mixed' economy stays, though with more publicownership, capitalism stays, though WIM a pore Human face. The ' ~ e o ~ l e ' decide to suoDort a more

Stretton's no Marxist, he wants change without breaking any eggs especially in the futures field. The markets should be partially socialised (controlled to inc~ease equality), public ownership should take on some financial an sewice functions, but that's about all. Nothing of any note about Labour organ- isations, rwl political parties, real politics Yes, maybe Marx didn't say puch about what a socialist society would look like (he was busy writing books about how to get there), but that's no reason to throw his analyses out o f the window withou first Considering them. Stretton makes weak and veiled criticisms about ~e anarchy o f the capitalist markets (especially the property markets), but ultimately he shies away from anythin more than a continuation o f postwar Labour reformism.

There's a lot to consider here, and m be what N& need now i s a similar book Britain, so we can really get into the politics properly. I'm sorfy Hugh, I car go along with an intellectual vanguard, matter how well-meaning and rational. Part of our environment. and a maior psychological part is the'politics o f POI..-. and control. A real Left programme which embraces the issues o f equality o f material wealth, sociat amenity, a sustainable and environmentally sound economy, and democratic social relations just couldn work in a society which still relies on capitalist economic criteria, capitalixt social relations, production for profit imtead o f need. l t 's nevertheless a thought-provoking book and well worth a read. But I think he should have stuck to his earlier work in urban studies.

Mike George

makrials, and widespread pollution lead to a permived need to submit to strong .

leadership and a rigidly hierarchical society. The second alternative is a con- tinuatim of 'muddling through', really a straight extrapolation of the 1970s The third scenario is a sort of radical social democratic government which, in dealing with inflation and environmental issues,

radical Gcial-democratic governmen through their increased feelings of deprivation as inflatton increases inequalities. Political choices multiply in the face of eveflgreater challenges to

hickens! - economic and social stability. lt's all eminently believable, except for a total lack o f mediation - HOW do *se Dt'essures in the State and civil - w i e t y

PI- emphasis on Seater material and - iome to be translated into a political =id w A ~ , greaer ' ~ X t i c i ~ a t o ~ , party's policy and action? Really demmrac~', and a ProSamme for a new Stretton's talking about an intellectual society based on a reestablish^ cjf the vanguard who perceive and carry brough ddjghts o f home life. a rational political programme which the

" 5 ~ of these scenarios are w v *pmple' eagerly agree with.

The Backyard Poultry Bmk, Andrew Singer. 120 pages. Prism. hb £3.50 pb £1.50

Wheeer it was the chicken or thee& which came first, Andrew Singer's com- prehensivemanual deals with all the aspects o f poultry keeping and is a must for all potential p6ultry keepers to read before making a start. Indeed, there is plenty o f information to be obtained for those who have been keeping hens for some time.

Whereas the 'Backyard Dairy Book' set out t o give an introduction to cow and goat keeping merely to whet the apwite, the poultry book provides instruction and reference for the backyarder.

Andrew Singer most persuasibely sets out the reawns fy keeping hens, and if . &ere are no ~ t i - p o ~ I I t r y reg YS i~ the ma: and tmobieetin~ nt ww

I,, wax a a.

ied a1 as being a con- ictor cowards heartdisease. - :ory, however, that overweight, <in& and sedentary occupations h more detrimental effect &an

?ggs eaten a week, makes good

:having decided to go ahead with ~g hens, prospective poultry keepers i d chapters in the book giving I advice as to the breeds of hen to

rhey 41, we are told, originated wild red jungle fowl.) Advice, feeding, housing, chick-rearing .

. .- .d management. Each chapter ns s y n d advice, although it might said that it is perfectly possible to

sound and easily moveable hen- at a farm sale, f ~ r just a pound or hus saving considerably on the cost sing a new one, or eve0 on the cost %rials for making a new one. Ther5 atso, have been more information chingchickens for future laying rather than buying-in day old ; the former i s a most interesting warding exercise. Sometimes, in our haphazard set-up,a hen will

appear from a clump of nettles llowed by a proces3ion of &w

s, having incubated her owneggs st&- a very sayisfiing sight!

W you know that a recent survey arried out in the Midlands *owed that 5% of all eggs eaten were fried, and that 7% afa e s consumed &ere eaten at teqkfast? #is shows a.sad lack of nagination, but Andrew Singer's book k s numerous more adventurous and ?&&-watering ways of cooking with BS* Until I had read 'The Backyard Poultry oak', I had assumed that if a hen were I ill health it would undoubtedly die and could do nothing about it. Howeve5 'ter working down the comprehensive b t of the symptoms of each disease and s possible treatment, I have taken fresh :art. Ducks, geese, turkeys and peafowl are I included in this ihfomative IittIe book, id zhe illustrations throughout, mainly ~ k e ~ from old b w k s on the subjech give fd@ interest. There is a fuJl list of ~rther references at the back o f the mk, but it is, itself, so packed with zful a d v k ~ as t a Make this sarcely *saw: . .- To end with a word of warning, like

'Backyard Dairying', we h3ve fmad that . backyard poultry keeping can get out of hand. Six years ago we started out with five hens and now there are about 120 beaks to feed - a beak-breaking exercise, or is that an eggzameration?!

A a Blackburn

Mach for living in Housing by People -.Towards Autono a high i n m e will no In Building Environments, John F.C.\ .t a lot easier to be autc- Turner..162 pages. Marion Boyars. £2 using at a reasonable The A u t o n m w House, Brenda and a poor family.Given Robert Yale. 224 pages. Thames and oes the argument, people Hudson. £2.50 ly improve their housing

Amnomy, it-werns, can mean quite diierent things to different people. This becomes apparent after reading these ing conditions, but a b u t books; whereas Turwr is mainly con-. redistribution o f decisiopmaking pro- cerned with the right o f people to build cesses. It is about change3 in housing their own houses and plan their own policy and not about redistribution o f e4vi~omnents, rather than being depend- economic power. Turner has formulat~ ant on distant bureaucracies, the Vales' three principles for practice: "First, \t,.,.- are investigating ways in which houses is the necessity o f self-government in local and their inhabitants can become inde- affairs for which the principle o f local and pendent o f external sources of energy, personal f r eedp to build must be main- food, etc. The first book i s written as tatned. Second i s the necessity for using a result o f the author's growiw dis- the least necessary power, weight, and illusionment with the housing authorities size of for &e j& ( h e t k r af the big cities ufthk &bbm WM!~, in' managerial technological). In principle whi& the aspirations 4 abilities of this i s to say m a l l is beautiful, but wi

. people to help thmseIves are still ail buL the proviso that m e jobs - especialt ignored. The A~tommous on the the less beautiful ones - do need large other hand, is mainly about the possibi- mrganiations and powerfd machines. lities o f alternative tghnology in tk con- Thirdly, there i s the principle that plan- versmn of. existing houses as well as in ning is an essentially legislative, limit- *

new house designs. Both books are about setting f u ~ t i ~ n , a d must t o new options, architectural and techno- confused with design, which has to do logical options on the one hand and3ocio- with laying down lines of action." pobtical ones on the other. I am sure that the authors o f The A h

Housing by Pewk is the result of Years nomousHouse would agree with these of @search by theauthor in- housing principles although their main pre- conditions in big dti% and ~ar~cu1arIy occupation i s a quite different one. cities i n Latin America: It is a theoretical, Akmrding rn Brenda and Robert vale

,#vL-* *

and often rather abstract b k ; the ". . . The idea of autonomy probably ta i& understanding i s &I be f o q d in arose from two quests. The first was KO . . a comparison o f living conditio-& in gain free power for house heating, e t ~ . ~ 1 squatter settlements on the one- hand and so that conventional fuels need mt be in officially sponsored hou$ing&emes~ bught, and the scond was to free the on the other. Tbe author a w t h a t given planning o f communities. A t present any an adequate infrastructure of w a m and building m a t link to an e.&ting or electricity suppty, roads, dginagmtc., purpose-built sewice network. Cifies, peopte should be left t o get un with their t k e f w e , expand w o w d thetr edges in own housing. No doubt *is is a dmpl& order to keep houses on the mains . . . fmt4on, but anyway, this isthe gemral Removal of thkrestraint would enable trend of the argument. Autonomy is houses to be built virtually anywhere, people deciding for themselves what is a& communities would be formed for best for them. The book i s not greatly a more logical reason than the need to be concerned with the. economic base on fed and watered at a central point. . . . which such housing aut@nomy is possible. h c h new" or communitv WOUM be

--- trdmmenw19

'. . . * - control of his own heating, I i g b i ? ~ fad - produce; rather than in processed foods production, etc. A real decentralisttion of or meat. It explains why a reduction in control would be achieved and every meat consumptim is dtsfrabfe, how fuod person would become self-governimt" co-ops save pwkaging &encourage Let's hope so. The book deals mainky with recycling, a f d lead people to adopt the techjmbgy &kh could make w h a sirnpleranifheatthkr way oreating As a form of a u t o m y possble. f ie V Z ~ ~ O U ~ Food C q Hines Friends of the a n d w L w * m b e r s w.ill-meet new '

chaptkrs &a1 with solar adwind energy, E d . 6%. , people tfil'bgh thek ceop with whom to heat pumps, wask recycling, water, and share o t h e r ' t h i ~ It w d d be nice to see

p:.the stwage of electricity and hat. The *is wt c.mty a~ in #=ail dl notices ostke boards of laat community k2 wry mnsiderable range of technalogicak kt sea@ up a c+op -for h centres, of c6-0ps'which have r m h r ;, &tiow and the unfortunate sbrtcomi%s bdk-hy im its mhk it new members.

of all uf them areexplained in great The book i s printed on 1190% red~aed demil. What makes th is be& partkukrly ng

paper, and is an excellent first @rcbse k f n t is that it shows themwmus for a.f& cwop.

*' - - kcyn the larger wholesalers (whq Cw&- -4

\ 7e

+rH@uire a minimum amount to t#; " , 2@ dwms in book ** ifh~5*te . h g h t ) to the small focal store;& MI , . tdmwml option% F O ~ ~ ~ Y M Y usually providea worthwhile discount for

&-Who wants W venture i gttOLwM*eW

. <

would like). The wthm we modem man <

-- #,

6 Nelson has written a triumphantly clear, t*

thorough, deep and -yes- exciting one which beats anything his more straight competitors have managed.

Of course, the basics are presented from . the angle of useful computing for people; the languages described in detail, like the :g amazing TRAC, are all simple enough to %g * 3 be taught quickly to anyone, and the machines described tend to be small and cheap micros or PDP11 types rather than great megabyte beasts.

And the applications! Netson avoids :- with dexterity the more ludicrous or clumsy computer uses, in favour of elegant networks, nei hbwrhood com- puters, RESISTORS (a kids' computer club) and the like. Many readers will be convinced that Cybercmd can be con- quered before they even get to the exciting stuff at the other end.

And exciting it is too; graphics, artificial intelligence, information retrieval, control systems, and the like, as well as newer, smaller and cheaper machines and bits of machines. A lot of this is stuff almost anyone could try now if they had the confidence, when the main part of the cost of a microcomputer these days is an IBM typewriter to let you converse with it. Graphics are still in the dizzy cost range, of course, but they too are getting cheaper like most things to do withcom- outing.

This opens many avenues for fun, education, and even political control, of course, but what else? Specifically, is it of any possible use to people interested in small-scale, community based, and all the rest, political structures? Well, this reviewer's view is emphatically yes; com- puters now cost less than cars and will soon cost less than bicycles, and have it in them to be the greatest force ever thought of for liberating us from drudgery, ignorance, domination, alienation, and other things we can do without. But the battle against cybercmd aqd its more

Calling the .. ;.z.is2&k, . . '5.1 'Odds#. -,- a?---

. . . . . , <- . .

Of Acceptable Risk: Science and the 5 :.guarantee objectivity? Are scientists not determination o f Safety, William W. ,;..Y

Lowrance. 180 pages. William Kaufman Inc:. California. In the UK from Omnibus ~ o o k Se~iceLtd.

.' ~.>.-->, - . .- ,. ~. . e

"A thing is-'sife if its be acceptable." On thi Lowrance divides his study of the deter- mination of safety into two distinct operations: first, how risks are measured, and secondly how these risks are judged to be acceptable or otherwise. The 'risks' he considers are mainly those of

serious colleague, central control, is pollutants, drugs, pesticides and radiation, hardly going to be a walk-over. rather than industrial injuries, car

Compliments - the book is a priz accidents andso on, and a substantial part of self-publishing. It was made, like of the book is concerned with a rather Undercurrents, by glueing the copy pedantic account of the ways in which 'boards' and surrounding it with g scientists measure risks (epidemiological headlines, and the rest. It would have surveys, animal experiments, clinical

trials etc.) and the criteria and processes letraset rather than handwriting h by which safety is assessed (Is the product

essential? Are less risky alternatives easily available? I s exposure essential? and so

cartoons, diagrams, and the like by the on). author. There are also lots of splendid Although Lowrance raises possibly some computer graphics which have a very of the most crucial questions o f science immediate effect on the impact of the and public safety, he, curiously, does not book. And lots of the non-computing examine them. I reached the end of the content, like 'How to Learn Anything', i s book.feeling distinctly dissatisfied with also a delight. i t s ultimate impact. This was, finally,

Insults- unfortunately, Nelson is a descriptive account of the mechanics of

making valu; judgements in the design and execution of their research on risk

/ Are decision-makers capable o f uoder- standing the 'evidence' that the scientists put before them? Do scientists therefore step out o f their allotted so-called 'objective' roles and attempt t o opinionate about say, what the public should be drinking? Who decides and who pays? Lowrance describes benefit-risk analysis as part of the factual, as opposed to value judgement, operation. Yet is this really so? When, for example, an economic scientist asks a man how

. more money he would require to, sufferaircraft noise, or live in a filth town, he is not asking an objective question but a value-loaded one which a function of the distribution of wealtl and therefore o f the relativity of a person's concept of wealth, and of state of knowledge of the person who being placed at risk. Further, he descri the risks, assessments and benefits e.g. a drug or making a polluting pr--.- in terms of a total balance sheet; this begs the question- "Who benefits and who takes the risks, and why?" since ii is quite usual for these not to be the sa individuals. Yet Lowrance assumes the to be objective, and indeed neglects to analvse the economicbackeround of ri

a liberal. Behind the modish clenched fist on the front cover lurk 'intelligent men o f goodwill' and similar unanalytical balder- dash, which many Undercurrents readers will find unacceptable. Likewise, he has swallowed the Club of Rome doom scenarios wholesale, and some of his views of intelligence are-fairly repulsive. But pleas persevere, because he's doing all he can. - -

Martin Ince

safety appraisal, which need to be eneration and acceptability, which analysed critically. nnot be ignored if one is to discuss

For example, there i s a tacit assu ncepts of risk assessment. He would that the way scientists assess risks is oubt argue that this principal theme i objective, if probabilistic. Nowhere does he book i s the role o f the scientist in 1 he question the fact that much of the safety issue and that he is not attempt! scientific assessment of risk is carried out to analyse the wider issues; and to som by the very organisatiom that create the extent there is some useful discussion risk, as in clinical trials by pharmaceutical about how much scientists should step companies or pollution research by major into the 'judgement' arena from the 'd manufacturing industries. Do& this providing' arena, and indeed whether t

3IY Diagnosis fedicines: A Guide for Everybody, Peter it did no harm to the doctors' prestige to irish. Penguin. £1.50 ¥continu keeping their arts swathed in

Until recently, most doctors tooki t for .anted that the less the patient kne Y )out his illness the better. And uoti the iddle of the last century t h i s maybe asn't such a bad idea; had patients ifore that been privy to the medical nowledge of their physicians, they might ive been distressed to find out just how ttle more did the healers understand Len the would-be healed. Even a modest velation o f trade secrets would have ade it plain that the potions and the .obings were based on little fact and less sight Happily, medicine did eventually icwed in basing itself on something ore than pure fiction or guesswork; but / then secrecy had become a habit. "Not I be handled by the patient" was now rit large on the case notes - and in truth.

dense auras o f mystery. Fashions change. Medicine has become

more introspective, more eager to present the correct, socially conscious image. So medical officers o f health have trans- formedthemselves into community physicians, GPs into family practitioners, and all and sundry have joined an amorphous creation known as the health care team. Many o f these metamorphoses have proved changes o f clothes rather than of substance, but one valuable idea did go abroad: that patients should have the right to understand just a little more o f what was wrong with their own bodies - and perhaps even take an ever-so-small part in Sealing with it

The notion that patients should under- ' stand - let alone do - has yet to penetrate the furthest backwoods of medical practice; elsewhere it has

read; the rest o f the book is then reference as and when you need i

Part one.of the book explains eAcu-Jy what's m w by the term drug, and how the tablet you get from the doctor differs- from the l iquidin the Johnny Walker bottle differs from the muck you're --- inhaling out o f the exhaust from next "$ door's Lamborghini, And having pl*& medicinal drugs in context, it whips -2 through their metabolism in the body, the placebo effect, the inevitability of side :z effects ("a drug's effects are like s h o m w - pellets - some land on target, others do 2 not"), the dangers of taking several . different preparations at once, and much, much more. A11 logically, lucidly explained. And having absorbed that lot you close the book, put it on the shell and forget about the other 4@ pages until you need them; need them because- you want to know what - if anything - you should be taking for this or that aid- ment, or what might be the effect of whatever it is the doctor has already prescribed.

The rest o f the book, then, comprises two more sections. Part two is divided by

attracted more lip service than practical ording to different drug - action. But the trend is clear and the types (tranq 3 Users, antibiotics, anti- movement has become, one hopes, . inexorable. . , . - - (asthma, angina, migraine and what have

histamines etc.) or different ailments . -

Peter Parish's book is a symptom 3Svou). Each section carries a broad outline (a health symptom of course, rather thar'. of why that particular group o f drugs is a disease symptom) of the trend. If YOU used for that particular disease, and how happen to open it at the back or the . they work. No sloppy stuff, either. Where middle or anywhere ind d but the first there exists a tolerably straightforward ¤ 50 Pages, You may feel e word 'every- scientific explanation for the actions of body' in the title is a shade unrealistic. a drug, you'll find i t "Everybody?" you cry in distress. "The Part three is the pharmacoipia: all the man i s mad. This is a textbook." Indeed - commoner hospital, Gp and across-the it is. But then Peter Parish is setting Wt counter drugs listed by generic name and. a great deal of hard fact; and a great deal < manufacturer's brand name. Look up of hard fact is a textbook. The difference a oarticular drug and You'll learn what It between Medicines andmost o f the academic tomes on pharmacology used by doctor and medical student i s that Medicines (a) is better written and (b) comes with 50 pages o f simple and con- cise background information and instructions for we. It's only these 50 pages you're supposed to sit down and '

- . . - - - - - - , . - . - . . - - - does, how it's taken, and which section o f part two will tell you more about it.

If you want to try a little judicious.self- help or find out just what it i s the i pharmaceutical industry is striving so enthusiastically to fill you up with- what the pills can do, can't do and may do if you're unlucky - th i s is the book.

P--- ,.,-LA-

@-& technological innovations they fiefienerated. But even here he falls &.&f a genuinely penetrating look at

Eats the . x )~ 1 of the Education: The Practice of Freedom, much further than that - the opening

Paulo Freire. 162 pages. Writers and paragraph - through the dense thicke.. Readers Publishing Co-operative, o f Freire's verbosity, the tortuous paths pb £ -00. of his syntax, the arid deserts o f his

. endlessly qualifying clauses,Jhe mud- . "To be human is to engage infet banks of his reasoning, the-total humour-

e ships with others and with the world. It is lessness o f the man, the sheer bloody >cia1 acceptability o f risk. to experience that world as an objective unreadability o f it all, with not a single Any book which bypasses these issues reality, independent o f oneself, capable o f ounce of metaphysical meat to chew ill ultimately fail to do a badly needed being known. Animals, submerged within upon . . . And who i s supposed to read ib; tout kt usremain hopeful that reality, cannot relate to it; they are these books? Surely not the illiterate owmce's second book will really creatures of mme contacts. But Man's peasants in North East Brazil who are said <mine thepoints he raises in the first. separatenessfrom and Wenness to the to have benefited so much from the . dentists have @a1 responsibilities but world dis$inguishÈhima a being o f . teaching techniques developed by Freire, rey cannot, alone, assume these which presumably lie buried somewhete--

producers, polluters beneath these iwligestible mountains of- Wish. ahen by&- stse?' who will never go near the cursed North

L Ã ˆ but who take a donnish pleasure in '* so without considerable exasperation? the abstract contemplation of it all? Or And whatis after all so astounding who? I've been told not to lay i n p this about Freire's insights as claimed by the. book too heavily because the Co-op is blurb, that education is a political process

body sympathetic with us and (in -

or has political and cultural implications?. inciple at any rate) we support them as Of course it does, and always has done. . .

tell . . . But I wonder how many of the . But what we should be really on about iembers of the Co-op have actually -read (and more and more people are) i s i t s

'

the book, or even tried to,or have done metaphysical ones. Nigel Gowland

I High Magic

IL)

Round-Up Pluto's Big Red Diary 1977 has Law and

Disorder as i ts theme. It costs £ for 160 A6 pages and i s much the best leftie diary. around. A week per two pages offers enough space for anyone except Lord Goodmanto keep track of where they ought to be, and also find out a lot of things about repression and resistance if

Ñ u I ~haiques of High Magic - A Manual of boob is about-' practical wysof

.If-Initiat/on, Francis King and Stephen use of-these 'littleknown natural Skinner. CW. Daniel Co. Distributed by Magi% say the authors, is based Omnibus Books. £5.76(!) assumptions: ful a political tool as you could hope for.

"1. That the universe of the physical The research, by the way, is by Christine Readers who found my review of -tist i s a Par% and by no means Jackson. The design, by Kate Hepburn, is SSOTBME in UC13 interesting will the most important part, of to? ' excellent except that some dates are over- recall that I recommended it as "an intro- reality.. printed in not very pale blue. The other duction to A n Introduction TO hbgk". 2. That human wi l l -p~ef is a real problem is that you'll have read all aboi the latter being the hypothetical book f b e Law and Disorder long before reaching that would take you from the end of I Wt Twelfth Night. Yours for £ from leftie SSOTBME, to the start of an ordered path is capable of changing its environment bookshops or Pluto Press, Unit 10, in the direction of one's chosen magical and producing 'supernormal' effects. Spencer Court, Chalcot Road, London goal, or system. Techniques of High 3. That this will-power must be directed N W ~ ~ L H . Magic is flu's book if your interests include by the imagination. C w n Readon is the m i n e of the so-called Western Tradition' (It's 4. That the universe is not a mixture of ~uswalian FOE. a taster, one recent really mainly MiddleEastern: the only- chance factorsand influences but an &sue contains pieces on toxic metals, 'Western' connection is AtJanteafl and &&&d system of correspondences, ax) chNa, wm, -fearpow with . legendary). fltt the tthderstanding of the pattern of W ~ ~ ~ J U W r m to uranium mining

This is esxntiatly a practical book, and c a r r e p o n d c n c e s - d a * d @ bicyctes, and lots more. 1 thought the b only half a dozen pages are spent explain- to use them far own purposes, good bit w d the w e d history o f the Envire ing the 'meaning' of Magic: it is described Or ment Minister, whose previous record by the authors as "The an and science of This 'disciplined will-power' i s not / '

using littleknown natural forces in order a gift given only to a few (an even if it to achieve changes in consciousness and was, why criticise it? jealous?) - it can harder to describe than to demonstrate. the physical environment." This defini- be learned, like riding a bicycle. This But do these things have any objectivi tion aptly points out the potential of ability has for too tong been the property reality? This is for the practitioner to magical systems in the field of radical of a few privileged individuals - now is decide for himself. In the section 'Awa social change. They are immediately ihe time to make it generally available. Projection In Theory and Practice' Kin capable of bringing forces and energies to and Skinner quote J.F.C. Fuller: bear on current problems in ways which . Techniques of High Mask ('Hi&? To "The-truth is, it does notmatter one ra the poorest imaginative Wlty can distinguish 4% from Magic, i,e. - b what name you christen the illusio immediately devise. Magic is radical - parlour tricks like manifesting £ note, o this life, call them substance, or radical means 'from the roots' and the

1 etc. - see J.H. Brennan,fiwerhnta/ . ideas, or hallucinations, it makes not

roots of the human mind go far deeper Magic) provides all the basif techniqu the slightest difference for you are in than almost anything else. And how can used by the Order of the Golden Da them and they in you whatever you li we 'change the world' without first - or the en&of last century: Divination, to calt them and you must get out o f at least simultaneously - changing our- them and they out of you, and the les selves? It is also interesting to note that you consider their names the better; the abwe definition, with the 'little- for name-changing only creates known* remwed, can be seen to apply essary confusion and i s a waste 1

admirably to the Alternative Movement, tion-(of whatever that is, as a whole. Our duty is, &wy efore call the world a sen perhaps, to ensure that the practicalities, and have done with it, fi techniques, and applications of magic are made available to all people, and do not and examination systems, rts become the preserve of a bunch of reinarkable rituals, and ifs distinguished 'experts' who wield this power o ~ e r us. l is t of members left an imprintm ic, and so are cows and angels, am This applies whatever the magical system: Western occultism which gets'deeper as e landscapes and so are visions; ai it i s no more magical to use a ritual to time goes on. It is no surprise, then, to the difference which lies between the! create wind than it is to use that wind to find here simplified versions of the existences is the difference which lies light a house. Certainly there are things standard G.D. manuscripts, adapted for - -between a cheesemonger and a poet, we don't really know about the operation use by beginners. They have been Wiii between a blind man and one who cat of a ritual on the enviroment: there &@ adjusted in a very workable fashion: s e e . The clearer the view, the more pe theories, like synchronicity, that attempt' =tittle d'

^ ing if you're used to the à 2 -fat the view; the clearer the vision thi

'3 explain it; but then we don't really originals(thhbook h s incorporated more perfect the vision. The eyes of now how the light bulb on the end of some post-GD ~itual structures) but a hawk are keener than those of an w e wind-generator lights up. But we have eminently sua(table for the purpose of and so are the poet's keener than thos Fair grasp of how to use the energies in introducing beginners to the Art. More for he can see ,

each case. (In fact one can argue that we information on correct 'vibration' of the ton while the latte know far more about magic: it has over various Names required would have been d-sixpence 12,000 years head start!) That's what this useful, but the right 'tone of voice' i s far Richard Elen

note that two silk bookmarks have been :

Sun to Am ose's Heat Pumps and It -the book, not the monster- goes reviewed by Shipwrite in Undercurrents f/edr/c H&. Unless you want 10

. '

through the history o f Nessie from eariiest 15. acquire a library rather expensively, times (her encounter with St Columba and ' Our colleagues at The Economist perhaps a betteridea would be to write -

sr position in early water deity lore) to ("A Radical Journal of Opinion with and ask him if hehas what you need. if . ,be present era o f scientific investigation. a reverence for facts" ^ tor, why didn't itas Abbotfand Von Ooenhoff's T+ Most of thebook is about the present, we think o f that?) have just published the of W/ndSections, the answer's y@;just with an emphasis the social role o f - latest in their range of fat, dear, works of the thing for highly numerate molino-

ie entrepreneurs who investigate the reference. It's The World in Figures, 294 lwists. - lonster by $zchnological means - sub- pages for an economical £16.75 If you - *

% :- Mathematical I - -

To where, in science, is 'atomic structure' leadine?

g to a neglected branch o f . ,' .. math Could the, -- yu. of a ,irehensi& scheine of correlation whicl, braces the real solar . . system as in: - - L

- r LOST ART * OF

. MATHEMATICAL EXPLOR By F. Crook, M.Sc., Grange Place, Gue~

British Isles £2.5

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'For people w h o st i l l think of the future in terms o f mega-machines and all-powerful bureaucracies, Radical Technology wi l l be an eye-opener. It proves what many futurists, ecologists and philosophers have been saying There is an alternative. Radical Technology offers a fresh way t o think about tomorrow. No th ing could be more useful."

A l v i n Toffter

Wical Technology: Food and shelter, reflected in the wide variety o f contribu- 001s and materials, energy and communi- tions to the book. They cover both the ations, autonomy and community. 'hardware' - the machines and technical Edited by Godfrey Boyle and Peter methods themselves - and the 'software' laver and the editors of Undercurrents. - the social and political structures, the (Wildwood House, London, £3.25 way people relate to each other and to Pantheon Books, New York, $5.99, their environment, and how they feel 104pp. A4 illustrated, index. Available about it all. lirect from Undercurrents Books, The articles in the book range from 1 Shadwell, Uley, Dursley, Gloucester- detailed through general hire, GL11 5BW, England, for £3.5 accounts of alternative technical methods &{"ding postage by surface mail. Order to critiques of current practices, and 'our copy now! general proposals for reorganisations.

~ / i ~ ~ l Technology is a large-format, Each author has been encouraged to .nsivelv illustrated collection of follow her or his own personal approach, wiginal articles concerning the reorganisa- sometimes descriptive, sometimes ion of technology alone more humane, , analytic, sometimes technical, sometimes ational and ecologicall~ sound lines. The political. The contributors are all nany facets of such a reorganisation are authorities in their fields.

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The Practical Building o f Methane Power Plants is available from Undercurrents Books at the special price o f £3.3 including postage by surface mail. Cheques and postal orders to Under- currents Books, 11 Shadwell, Uley, Dursley, Gloucestershire, GL11 5BW, England.

=NTS BACK ISSUES UNDERCL. .. .-

I CUT PRICE BACK LUMBERS! For a limited period only, we are offering back issues o f Undercurrents at a reduced price: 50p for one copy, 75p for two, £ for three and so on, adding 25p for each extra copy. Don't miss this the gaps in your set at bargain basement prices! Please use the order form on page 48.

Jndercunents 7 Communications Issue 'elephone Tapping & Mail Opening/Phone Phreaks/TV Spy Cameras/ topic's Radio Primer/Other London Underground/Ham RadioICable

currents 8 FEK/National AT Centre/Organic GardeningIFree Radio/Rammed

iarth/Windmii Theory/Hemeticism Jndetcunents 9 Soecial Nudeal Power Issue

A-Bomb ~esign/~iddies Guide to Nuclear PowerIEnergy Analysis/ limn Supply/Solar Collectors/Nature et Rogres/Grow Your Own

Vegetables Jndercunents 10 Joint Issue with Resurgence MY Solar Collector DesignISward Gardening/Anarchist Cities/Future if AT/Land for the PeopleIGeneral Systems Theory/Alternative Mture: Part 1 Jndereuaeati 11 MY Windcharger Design/Beekeeping/Ley Hunting/Rammed Earth1 lutonomousHouse/Mind Expansion/Alternative Culture: Part 2

Â¥uoa Aerospace/Biofeedback/Community Technology/Comtek/ Uternative MedicieWid Power Part 2lAltemative Culture: Part 3 Jndercurrents 13 Mggers/Energy & F w d Production/Industry, the Community & AT/ Utemative Eneland & Wales Suo~lementlPlannine/John Fry on ~ethane/~lte&tive Culture: PG 4

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Jndercurrents 14 lack MundeyIAT Round the World/BuiIding With Natural Energy/ nsulation DIY Insulatmn/AT in India/Brachi on BRADIAT & Industry Conference Report

Undercurrents 15 'Who Needs Nukes?' Issue Insulation vs. Nuclear Power/Towards a Non-nuclear Future/AT & Job Creation/Production for Need/Biodynamic GardeningIRadical Techno- logy/Invertor Design Undercurrents 16 Special Habitat Issue Garden Vilages/Wood Food GuideIDlY New Towns/Self-sufficient Solar Terraces/Lifespan/By-passing the Planners/Citizens' Band Undercuuents 17 Inner Technology Issue Computer Ley HuntIDowse-It-Yourself/Kirlian Photography/Chris- topher Wren's BeehiveISaving Your Own Seed/Women & AT/ Terrestrial Zodiacs Undercurrents 18 Intermediate Technology l i n e IT & the Third World/Chinese ScienceIIT & Second Class Capitall Supennacker Cartoon/Leyhunting: the Linear Dream/How to Make a Ley Detector

UNDERCURRENTS 4 : The fabled mag in a bag A limited number of these collector's items are available on a first come, first served basis at the rip- off price of 50p each. Apart from the naked lady.on the cover, Undercurrents 4 contained articles on: the Street Farm; Concorde; Alternative Scotland; DIY Chemical Manufacture; the Chile Community; and 'Hidden' Switzerland. There's also an interview with Murray Bookchin and thoughts on Velikovsky Note that Undercurrents 4 is not part of our half price back number special offer.