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Re: US compromise by CAS 22 October 2002 19:38 UTC |
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I couldn't agree more with Elson's confident assessment of world
affairs . . . Really? Unless, of course, the whole thing of Mr. Bush plotting
war against Iraq with the whole world and "the people" watching . . . was a
charade.
How about Mr. Bush, in fact, undermining the warmongers? You
know what they say about politics - it is a lot more complicated.
Claudiu
A. Secara
-----Original Message-----
From: wsn-owner@csf.colorado.edu
[mailto:wsn-owner@csf.colorado.edu]On
Behalf
Of Elson Boles
Sent: Tuesday, October 22, 2002 9:42 AM
To: WORLD SYSTEMS
NETWORK
Subject: US compromise
There seems to be compromise, not
unilateralism, on the horizon both now
(see the article below) and in the
middle run future. And since I
started this message, Bush now claims
that "regime change" also means a
changed regime ("..if he were to meet all
the conditions of the United
Nations, the conditions that I've described very
clearly ... that in
itself would signal the regime has
changed.'')
This comes in part because of Russian and French resistance
in the UN.
Why? To reiterate my view, I think Russia and France are
opposed
primarily on grounds of economic gain or loss, not because of
potential
US unilateralism by hawks regarding Iraq and other states (and/or
the
missile defense program for first-strike capability). As for
Russia's
reasons for resistance, add to the potential loss of oil access the
huge
debt that Iraq owes to Russia. There is the possibility that it
would
be ignored by a new regime, and so it is among the negotiating
chips.
Conversely, Saddam is being pressured by Russia to make sure he pays
it
back and gives special attention to French and Russian
oil-field
development enterprises (who made contracts with Iraq for
the
post-sanctions era) in exchange for France and Russia's resistance
to
the US and for his staying in power.
Regarding Steve's last message
about a historic trend of unilateralism:
It is relevant to keep in mind that
the hawks may not be in power in a
few years if we see the a return of a
Clinton-style government. The
opposition to US hawks in power today can
easily be overblown as
symptomatic of a long-run trend as opposed to the
coming and going of an
administration. Of course, it is true that we're
in the politics of a
"B" phase or down turn, and thus, for most of the past
30 years,
conservative Republicans have been in power: Nixon, Ford, Reagan,
Bush
Sr., Bush Jr. (But then, Bush Jr., got less than 50% of votes,
in
contrast to Saddam, who got nearly 100% -- hence neither are
fully
legitimate even by the standards of bourgeois democracy). Over
the
middle run there has been a "Reagan Revolution" which includes
a
chauvinistic foreign policy. However, not until Bush Jr. came
into
office on a fluke election, did the hawks gain unfettered power in
a
post-cold world who are allegedly willing to "scuttle the US version
of
the "enlightenment." No doubt there is a real possibility
that
successive Bush or Bush-like administrations could lead to a real
rift
with Europe and other states, but the point is precisely that
this
remains to be seen.
The question is, how far has this scuttling
really gone? Certainly it
has not been a scuttling of Neoliberalism or
"free trade" as Steve
claims. So far, it has merely meant tougher
negotiations on behalf of
respective corporate interests. That
is, Europe's policy regarding
free trade has been just as contradictory as
the US's. As a supporter
of the Agricultural Industrial Complex
-- ADM, Monsanto, Cargill, etc.
-- Clinton's team engaged in contradictory
"free trade" policies, such
as continuing subsidies for big agribusiness
operating in the US while
also calling for reduced tariffs abroad for
companies that didn't even
produce goods in the US, like Chiquita, DelMonte,
and Dole bananas, and
to achieve increasing their access to markets abroad,
working through
the WTO and IMF. Europe has done the same for it's
farmers.
The Clinton Administration -- as bad as it was -- was closer to
Europe
than Bush Jr.'s regime on "green enlightenment," which gained steam
over
the 1990s. If a Clinton-style government comes back into power
with
pseudo greens the likes of Gore, wouldn't the US position be
largely
similar, or at least not radically different from, that of
Europe's
Green leaders who are in power? I think it
would.
Above all, are the differences between the US and Europe
greater than
their commonalities in governing over the world (with the
general
support of their constituent majority middle classes)? I don't
think
so.
In fact, Steve's comment, "There is no shared mission,
and no single set
of institutions with increasing legitimacy" borders on the
absurd. The
UN's legitimacy is growing significantly in this crisis,
and the US
can't stop that. Unilateral action on Iraq would only
increase the UN's
legitimacy in the eyes of the world which opposes any
invasion. The
shared mission is the continuation of capitalism.
We are not headed
towards the kind of rifts, indeed world wars, that
characterized core
relations in the three past periods of chaos. This
is manifest not only
in the political incorporation of the periphery creating
a world free
for MNC investment everywhere (what Arrighi calls a "free
enterprise
system"), but also in the rise of not a similar, but larger
and
militarily more powerful, hegemon, but a number of smaller
wealthy
cities and half-states (S. Korea, Taiwan) and occupied states --
Japan.
Further, the idea that the guiding values of [US hegemony
["human rights
(narrowly conceived), democracy (again, narrow version) and
free
markets"] has suddenly been abandoned just because Bush came to power
is
similarly absurd. It is hard to not notice the increase
of
quasi-democratic states and the demise of dictatorships over the past
20
years.
Of course US power is on the wane, and many people are sick
or bored of
US cultural domination, or at least to some extent. (Yet on that
latter
issue, the debate regarding the "homogenization" thesis put forth
by
Schiller and the like, vs. hybridization or local interpretation
put
forth in response to Schiller, etc. by people like Beynon and
Dunkerley,
David Howes, John Thompson, etc., show that the US cultural
imperialism
thesis is significantly inflated as it is not fully supported by
the
evidence.)
But let us not forget another commonality between the
US, Europe, and
powers in East Asia: racism. With the fall of the
Iron Curtain arose
the wall around Europe and the US to keep immigrants out
and to repress
those already within, and Japan isn't about to start
become
multicultural with significant immigrant inflows.
In all, it
just doesn't add up to a real rift between US and Europe. To
suggest
so, under the excitement of recent headlines centering on a
hawkish
administration in power just two years, is to abide by
Wallerstein's
prognoses despite middle run realities (which is just the
opposite of what he
suggests we ought to do in "The Itinerary of
World-Systems Analysis, or How
to Resist Becoming a Theory.")
One should not exaggerate a few of the
short run differences between US
and Europe to the exclusion of how these
federal states increasingly
work out deals in the WTO, IMF, WB, etc. in
pushing forth Neoliberalism,
a mild human rights agenda, and pro-corporate
democratic governments,
even though they may dispute some details and
frequently are deeply
contradictory in their actions. European states
often talk the talk,
but are really quite far from really pushing
sustainable
economic-political changes that would create a socialist
world-system.
At most radical, Europe seems a bit oriented toward
Swedish-like reforms
for the core, which would put but a small dent in global
inequality.
Elson
Elson Boles
Assistant Professor
Dept.
of Sociology
Saginaw Valley State University
University Center
Saginaw
MI, 48710
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