A
less optimistic view is that problems such as
those in the Tengiz affair symptomize a complexity
that never will yield to the allurements of a theory
of globalization. From this point of view, the
laissez-faire foundation of globalization is
inadequate, and so far there is no complementary
thought to make up for its shortcomings. The
opposition of grass-roots and labor movements against
free trade and against the power of transnational
corporations to alter national priorities represents
a common-sense reaction to globalization's logical
fault.
John R.
MacArthur, writing in the Providence
Journal (12 May 2001),
articulated this logical fault when he reported on
the free trade summit at Quebec City:
No
respectable economist would call NAFTA or FTAA a
free-trade agreement because free trade assumes
not only duty-free movement of goods and capital,
but free movement of labor across borders, which
neither the United States nor Canada can
tolerate. Pure free
trade is a utopian madhouse, even crazier in
concept than communism.
Just imagine the damage to the social
structure--not to mention wage rates--if
unlimited Mexican immigration were permitted in
either country. (My
underline)
A reasonable
working opinion at this date is that world leaders
and thinking citizens have to address the conceptual
limitation of the globalization system. If
globalization rests on the assumption that world
markets can operate freely and if complex reality
cannot support this assumption, then globalization as
a system will operate inefficiently and, in the
process, damage precious human values around the
world.
Where does that
leave us? A start may be to acknowledge the
following.
(1) Since 1990,
with the end of the Cold War, the world indeed
entered a new period of history. Its keynote is
global electronic connectedness. From this
connectedness radiates a whole range of changes in
the way persons and societies think and behave within
themselves and one to another. Short of a Luddite
reaction that destroys the World Wide Web (some
activists doubtless think about it), this worldwide
convergence is inescapable and is setting the agenda
of globalization. We will have globalization, however
we define it and however much we approve or
disapprove of it.
(2) The idea of
globalization to some extent rationalizes what has
happened to the world since 1990; but so far it has
done so inadequately. Globalization is a target of
opposition for the world's underdogs as much as it is
a rallying cry for free and open economic development
of the globe's human and natural resources. Opponents
see globalization as an enemy of workers, of social
values, and of the physical environment. No one has
yet expressed the ends of globalization in such a way
as to satisfy these opposing voices.
(3) Therefore,
it is imperative that we find a better way to define
and practice globalization. We are ripe for a fresh
perspective that goes beyond the old Enlightenment
ideas on which globalization, as presently
understood, rests. This better way needs to be as
expansive and inclusive as the globe itself. One
starting point could be the comprehensive notion of
ecology found in the late work of the late Felix
Guattari. Here are two quotes from his The
Three Ecologies, first
published in France in 1989. Such insights might
provoke the kind of re-framing and re-visioning that
globalization begs for:
The Earth
is undergoing a period of intense
techno-scientific transformations. If no remedy
is found, the ecological disequilibrium this has
generated will ultimately threaten the
continuation of life on the planet's surface. (27)
The only
true response to the ecological crisis is on a
global scale, provided that it brings about an
authentic political, social and cultural
revolution, reshaping the objectives of the
production of both material and immaterial
assets. (28)
More current is
the popular discourse occurring around Empire,
by Michael Hardt and Antonio
Negri. Fredric Jameson, the master of
postmodernism, quoted in the New
York Times (7 July 2001), called
it "the first great new theoretical synthesis of
the new millennium." (This almost sounds like a
baton-passing ritual from one academic star to
another.) Hardt and Negri reportedly see in
globalization the beginnings of a new distribution of
political power that will overcome the boundaries
traditionally set up by nation states and regional
economies. Their "empire" is apparently a
self-organizing, all-encompassing system beyond a
single point of authority or control (similar,
perhaps, to the autopoiesis
defined by Maturana). This sounds like a
logical extension of the kind of decoding through
lines of flight and reterritorialization that we find
in the postmodern writings of Guattari in partnership
with Gilles Deleuze. (The buzz around Empire
is such at this writing that I've been unable to buy
it and have to wait for my bookseller's order to come
in.)
I am thinking
that out of discussion at the degree of inclusiveness
found in Guattari and in Hardt and Negri, a
formulation of globalization might emerge that would
provide an operative new myth. It would link
rhizomatically to key ideas from the postmodern
project. It would aim to influence the course of
global development in creative and so-far unimagined
ways.
And it might
provide the foundation for above-board deals in
Kazakhstan oil that would benefit the many rather
than a few unscrupulous thieves in positions of
power.
End
of 3. Correcting globalization's logical fault
End
of essay
