< < <
Date Index > > > |
civilizations? by Threehegemons 03 May 2002 03:00 UTC |
< < <
Thread Index > > > |
<At that time, the civilization, ( I reiterate we speak about human being not trees, animals, plants etc ), is a set of sciences, technologies, control of nature, and organization of social life that are incarnated in a series of networks. Civilization is a collection of divers social elements like economical, political, judicial, juridicial, cultural, moral and religious elements and they are less connection to material and mechanical elements.> The problem with such definitions of civilization--or culture--is that they assume a coherence that doesn't typically exist, historically. To put it another way, the networks of each 'civilization' crisscross each other, and actors pick and choose from options not consistently bounded by the concept. That said, I'm not sure I would completely jettison the term. Although world systems tends to be so materialistic that it is blinded to this, part of doing anything in the world is creating an identity that can act. The self-conception of 'western civilization' facilitated the project of colonialism and world domination. During the era of nationalism, opponents of Western domination typically accepted the cultural project, disposing of its most racist aspects only. Presently, to diverge from the dominant geo-culture, there are two options. One can try to frontally assault it, and try to overthrow its values, or one can delineate a boundary, in which it is claimed that some other values, 'Asian values', 'Islam', etc. predominate. Whether the latter is literally true is not exactly the point. It facilitates divergence to claim that some other civilizational gestalt is operating. It limits the capacity of the arbitrers of world culture to rule on the appropriateness of one's behavior. Eventually ideological differences become real differences in behavior and outlook. It may make the project of global liberation more difficult. But it is certainly one of the processes ongoing. The 'reality' of civilizations in fifty or one hundred years depends on the outcome of struggles in the present to produce a unified or fractured geoculture. But I am not sure this is so different than the situation that produced earlier versions of 'Islamic', 'Western' etc. civilization, although clearly the potential to produce and disseminate a unified global geoculture is much greater today. Steven Sherman
< < <
Date Index > > > |
World Systems Network List Archives at CSF | Subscribe to World Systems Network |
< < <
Thread Index > > > |