------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1998 From: Jeff Jewell <•••@••.•••> To: •••@••.••• Subject: Re: GRI/I.1: "Evolution of geopolitics: from Pax Romana to Pax Americana, via nationalism" Dear Richard, Congratulations on your absolutely brilliant analysis, masterfully presented! Several points -- Firstly, while America is an offspring of Europe, and the collective imperialism under Pax Americana [which a good friend refers to as Pox Americana] is clearly a transmogrification of Euro colonial imperialism, your terminology of 'Euro' power and 'Euro' interests etc to define the former fails to give credit [i.e. blame] where due -- specifically to America, as the primary inventor and implementor of this diabolical new world order. As a question, I wonder what assistance American elite planners of the 1940s may have had from their Anglo counterparts -- who were of course the leading practitioners of Euro imperialism, and obviously about to lose their empire -- unless they might be able to enter into a junior partnership arrangement with their prodigal sons. [The English vision of the political economy was also influenced at the time by Hayek, who shortly thereafter transplanted his message to the Chicago school.] Secondly, have you read the Iron Mountain Report [i.e. the strategic analysis, purported to be a hoax, of the implications of a general and permanent state of peace, arising from the elimination of national armies -- replaced by global peace-keeping forces]? Any comments? Thirdly, while I'm in complete agreement with your assertion that "It is inconceivable that China would be allowed to reverse the direction of the collective system", this argument applied to Canada [and our recent discussion of Orchard] would seem to be quite consistent with my projection that no leader would be permitted to extricate this or any other country from the collective imperialist system -- without facing whatever force as might be deemed necessary by the collective mafia dons to compel its submission and dissuade any other such acts of independence. Cheers to you, -------------- Dear Jeff, Thanks for your encouragement! re/"Euro" - I think I'll switch to the term "West". There is certainly a special relationship between the US and the UK. It was Churchill and FDR who signed the "United Nations Declaration"; it was Reagan & Thatcher that simultaneously launced the neoliberal revolution; the UK was the primary ally in the Gulf War; etc. The US is, after all, a UK spin-off. re/Iron Mountain - The observations in this book seem uncannily perceptive, quite extrodinary really. It makes me wonder if in fact it _is based on the results of some kind of high-level study, or series of studies, even if the scenario presented in the book isn't what really happened. If so, then the book deserves serious attention as "government thinking". If on the other hand, as the purported author claims, he just "made it up", then it deserves more recognition for its vision -- the guy's on a par with Orwell or Huxley in his ability to project forward from current circumstances. It seems that the uncertain origin of the book detracts from the recognition it deserves. re/Canada - every nation, not just Canada, is being pushed by the global regime, and will not be allowed to hold back its rulings. What's special about China is that military force may be required. It seems that perhaps Canada and New Zealand have been singled out as "precedent hosts", places where sovereignty is to be defeated first, setting the precedents that will apply later to everyone else. The US government pretends to ignore what's happening, even though it knows the precedents set elsewhere will apply to it as well. The campaign to dismantle national sovereignty is global and systematic. re/Orchard - David Orchard is a conservative Canadian politician who seems to be sincerely running on the platform of "taking back sovereignty". You and I have been discussing whether those of us opposed to globalization should support him. You suggest that his effort must fail, given the power and determination of the globalist forces, and we shouldn't support him because that would be fighting a battle we cannot win. I disagree. If we can believe he's sincere, then I think he should have our support. But it is important that the issue be framed at the most fundamental level: the importance of Canadian independence. If Orchard gets elected, we would want Canada, as a whole nation, to pereive itself as taking a couragous stand for independence, and we would want that to be known to the rest of the world. Then if Canada is beaten down by the global regime, it could serve as a visceral "wake up call" to everyone else, it might make the sovereignty issue real to people. If we want to defeat globalization there must be engagements of various kinds -- whether they succeed or fail they will help build the movement. rkm ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1998 From: Nikolai S. Rozov <•••@••.•••> Organization: Novosibirsk State University Subject: Re: Evolution of geopolitics (for review) To: •••@••.••• Thank you Richard for sending to philofhi your comparison of pax romana and pax americana and a brief criticism of the Huntington's model ---<snip>--- the future fate and shape of Western global dominance for a long time is (since Hegel and later Spengler) and with no doubt will be in the focus of scholars' discussions unfortunately i had no opportunity to get and read Huntington's book and i know about his ideas only from reviews. strange but Richard's description gave more positive impression than i had had previously no absolute peace in future... but it is not (only?) a vicious apologia for future interventions but just a very plausible geopolitical prediction (shifts of wealth, population and armoury inevitably lead to shifts in territorial power, mainly by wars and/or military aliances; but the first shifts are evidently eternal!) main load of control as a responsibility of regional powers seems much more efficient and economical than any other alternatives (global government or pure anarchy between atomic nation states) a geopolitical predominance of the West and NATO is really argueble but as for me i strongly prefer this hegemony than the probable alternative ones (say, the planetry Islamic, Chinese or restored Russian-Communist) just because of existance of old and real democratic and liberal traditions that necessarily will provide limits for aggression and coercion, and even now provide such brave antisystemic activists as Richard Moore (I've heard nothing from or about Islamic or Chinese activists who appeal to defend the world from too dangerous Islamic or Chinese future hegemony) Richard properly compares the planned future world order with a mafia structure but it is possible with no less success to make a comparison with a nation-state: the same 'biggest gun' in hands of a state which obtains 'monopoly for legitimate violence on its territory'(Weber) in fact these comparisons give us a hint of a significant difference: in mafia one is a hegemon because managed to grasp the biggest gun (i.e. support of most powerful coercive coalitions) and in democratic state there are elections, laws and legal order no we can see TWO real positive alternatives to the Huntington's model: the (elected) World Government and World Legal Order. a discussion on these matters took place in WSN just 2 years ago, W.Wagar, I.Wallerstein, T.Boswell, Al Bergesen, C.Chase-Dunn, R.Moore, me, and some others took part in it. i strongly recommend everybody who are interested in this issue to get and read it (the whole discussion is collected as a gopher file in WS-archive by Chris Chase-Dunn). By any WWW browther you can reach: gopher://csf.colorado.edu:70/00/wsystems/praxis/globprax or: http://csf.colorado.edu/wsystems the go to World-Systems Archive then to praxis i'll give two my pieces from this discussion in the next msg, but the discussion contains much more valuable material (including harsh criticisms of my ideas) my interest and questions for possible further discussion in philofhi is as following: 1) if the Huntingon's (or like) model of future world order are implausible, what real alternatives can be suggested? 2) what criteria (humanistic, moral, multicultural, democratic, or other) should be put in the basis of building such alternatives? 3) for what extent these alternatives are realistic and sustainable from the viewpoint of expierence of world history? best from Siberia Nikolai --------- Dear Nikolai, Thanks indeed for your thoughtful responses. I find it difficult to understand how people can question the geopolitical hegemony of the US. One might claim that the US is _politically restrained from deploying its power, and I would challenge that claim with considerable evidence, but the raw power is clearly there. Nuclear subs, satellites, carrier task forces, cruise missiles, electronic counter-measures -- all of these are undergoing continual refinement and development in the US military program. Not only that, but the US trains and arms many of the world's militaries, and its intelligence services keep close tabs on what everyone's doing, what weapons they're buying, and what their state of readiness is. Not only does the US have the _potential to get its way by force if necessary, but it is actively engaged on an ongoing basis meddling here and there, switching governments around, etc. The fact is that the US _manages the global geopolitics. You might take a look at "Killing Hope" by William Blum. The effect of US policies is to create tension, to create instabilities. The US isn't the only arms seller, but it's a very big one, and its policy seems to be to arm everone to the teeth, even potential enemies like Iraq. The US is creating Huntington's scenario. By allowing Turkey to invade Iraqi territory we are seeing the US experiment with the "core power" concept, seeing how it goes over in public opinion, and debugging for future episodes. As Turkey is kept out of the EU, we see the "civilizational boundaries" being defined and enforced. Think how different the world would be if the US used its power and influence to build a peaceful world, instead of world of tension. What if it embargoed arms to unstable nations instead of embargoing poor little Cuba? What if it led the fight for general disarmament, both nuclear and conventional? What if it used its vast intelligence information to mediate disuptes and prevent conflict, instead of stirring up conflicts? One way to measure the geopolitical power of the US is to consider the magnitude of the effect if the US were to change policies. I like your discussion of alternatives. I see serious inherent problems with world government, and so I was glad to see your "World Legal Order". And your desire to investigate "realistic and sustainable" for proposed alternatives is welcome, and history holds good lessons for just about any organizational scheme you can think of. But I find it even more fruitful to investigate the following question: By what means can "we" cause any change at all to be made in the direction things are going? How, in fact, could we implement a "better alternative" if we had one in mind? I think it is clear that only by overcoming capitalist political hegemony can the course of events be changed in any significant way. If we don't overcome it, then our course is more or less clear, and it is a dismal one. Even in the collapse scenario, and assuming enlightenment arises from the ashes, the number of deaths would be staggering, a cost far too high to pay if there is any conceivable alternative approach. For capitalist hegemony to be overcome, there would need to be a popular political uprising of unprecedented proportions, at least unprecedented outside of full-scale armed revolutions. In other words, the scenario in which we would be considering what "world organization" to adopt is a scenario in which radical anti-systemic governments have been elected in the West (at least), governments which are backed by a fully mobilized populace. Presumably this massive uprising would be motivated by the danger of corporate globalization, and its agenda would be one of national sovereignty, anti-imperialism, democracy, and people-serving economics, more or less. It seems to me that if Western nations were to reach this stage, then the prospects for a peaceful and orderly world would be very promising. I don't believe formal international structures would be necessary. The world is a community of nations, and nations can simply collaborate for their common good, just as people in a community do. The massive mobilization necessary to overcome capitalist hegemony is in fact the creation of the backbone of a strong, vibrant civil society. The world too can be a strong, vibrant, civil society of nations. That is simply congruence between the micro and the macro levels. A problem arises; concerned nations gather, discuss, and reach agreement; they sign a treaty; they live up to the treaty. Why do we need more than that? That is, _if we can expect democratically mobilized societies to be responsible societies. I've got that much faith in human nature. And if that much faith isn't justified, I don't think any system is going to work. rkm http://cyberjournal.org ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To join the discussion on bringing about a movement for a democratic renaissance, send any message to: •••@••.••• --- To subscribe to the the cj list, which is a larger list and a more general political discussion, send any message to: •••@••.•••
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