Reflections

Dear Network,

        The 25th Anniversary Conference of the Fernand Braudel Center is
now a fact on the ground of world history.  It brought together many of
the luminaries in the field, and offered many opportunities for us to
exchange thoughts and recollections.

        World-system theory and research, with or without the
hyphen, has powerfully illuminated our collective understanding of the
human past.  Whether it thrives for another quarter-century or fades into
the dusty files of intellectual history, it has already earned a secure
place in modern (or postmodern?) thought.

        Inevitably, many speakers looked over their shoulders at the
events of September 11 and ventured glimpses of what coming years and
decades may bring.  But although I missed several of the presentations, I
think it is fair to say that few if any remarks centered on the
environmental future.  World-system theory and research deals with human
systems, cycles, and long-term trends.  Economies and polities are the
chief actors, with an occasional glance at cultures.

        Yet it may be true that the material base of our world-systems,
obsessed as they have been with the production of goods and the
accumulation of capital, is approaching exhaustion.  Fossil fuels,
fresh water, strategic metals, topsoil--the limits are in sight.  Under
capitalism (and its "socialist" doppelganger before the 1990s), the
self-styled civilized nations of the world have devoured almost everything
in sight, and they are clearly bent on slurping up the rest in the next
few decades.  The major multinational corporations have begun to invest in
alternative energy sources and technologies, hedging their bets, but it is
doubtful if these half-hearted efforts will bear significant fruit before 
time runs out.

        Then we have the multiple internal contradictions of capitalism to
consider, as well as the onset of the next "B" phase of the current
K-wave, not to mention the immense costs of trying to sustain the
declining hegemony of the United States in the face of terrorism and
deepening systemic chaos.  I already regret being many times over a
grandfather.

        In any event, it seems clear to me that by the time of the 50th
Anniversary Conference of the Fernand Braudel Center, to which Immanuel
cordially invited all of us who attended the 25th, the modern world-system
is likely to stand on the verge of a system-wide collapse much more
serious than anything experienced since its emergence 500 years ago.  I do
not wish to underestimate its resilience.  Maybe it will stagger on for
another 25 years.  But sooner or later, the cards will all be on the
table, and a celestial voice will be heard proclaiming "Messieurs,
mesdames, les jeux sont faits."

        At this point, permit me to hope that what became almost a
running joke at the 25th Anniversary Conference, a World Party, will be on
hand to steer a stumbling humanity, or a wounded remnant of Armageddon, to
a collectively rational socialist global commonwealth.  Most commentators
at the Conference, including Immanuel, saw little likelihood of such an
outcome, and I would agree with them if we were talking only about the
next five or ten years.  The so-called antisystemic and counter-hegemonic
forces on the world scene today have about as much chance of supping at
the same table as Greenpeace and Osama bin Laden.  Very few of them oppose
the system as such, and even fewer have any sense of common cause with the
others.

        The World Party, as I imagine it, would be something entirely
different:  an umbrella and a shield for all the oppressed, and even
for all the oppressors who realize they are ultimately oppressed--and
doomed--by their own doings.  It would espouse a world-view that
transcends all the manufactured boundaries of faith, culture, race,
gender, and tribe, and it would not rest until the whole planet
acknowledged a common law and every corner of it was clean and whole and
safe.

        Warren


W. Warren Wagar
Department of History
Binghamton University, SUNY