>Date: Tue, 06 Aug 1996 02:14:40 -0400
>From: Peter Grimes <p34d3611@jhu.edu>
>[CONTEXT: Terry wanted input on good areas for future W-S research for
>PEWS. Below is my contribution--P]
>
> I would like to endorse the suggestions made by Terry,
>Gunder, and Al about interesting topics for world[-]system(s)
>research.
> I propose as well that WST, because of its unique global
>level of analysis, is better situated than almost any other
>orientation to contemplate the accelerating inter-relations
>between environmental pressures, multiplying state fiscal crises,
>and consequent state de-legitimation and fragmentation. These as
>well spin off into the issues of patterns of energy use,
>automation, unemployment, and crime. One simple example: the
>same automation & industrial re-location that is throwing people
>out of work globally (thereby engendering a proto-fascist and
>xenophobic class consciousness among the working classes) also
>costs enormous amounts of energy, which in turn is powering
>global warming, in its turn creating rising sea levels and more
>violent storms along with desertification. These "natural" (sic)
>phenomena combine with unemployment & crime to impose
>accelerating costs on beleaguered state budgets, strangling their
>capacity to continue (already marginal) subsidies to the
>burgeoning underclasses. The consequent de-legitimation of the
>affected states feeds all manner of "revolutionary" movements and
>regional separatisms. Case in Point: The failure of this year's
>winter wheat crop in the US southwest has already compelled
>Jordan to cut its food subsidies, leading to protest marches in
>Amman last week and growing support for the Islamic opposition.
> Bottom line--we're living in a time of multipli-nested
>crises that are *GLOBAL* in scale, hence can only be properly
>analyzed at *GLOBAL* level. What better place to start than with
>the tools of long-term global analysis provided by WST?
>--Peter Grimes
>
>
>
>