Potential Danger of Globalization

The world is constantly changing with some changes much more dramatic than others, leading to catastrophic events. The industrial revolution brought about technologies causing drastic changes to western societies and shifted manufacturing predominance from east to west. At the turn of the nineteenth century power shifted from England to Germany precipitating the First World War. In the early part of the twentieth century the Russian Bolshevik Revolution gave birth to communism. Fascism came into being in part to counter the threat of communism to the establishment. German fascism not only instigated the Second World War decimating Eastern Europe, but its ethnic cleansing brutally destroyed millions of innocent Jewish lives. We are currently in the midst of another revolution. The information age is greatly accelerating advances in technologies. The most dramatic, of these, social media, allows massive, inexpensive trans-global communication facilitating international commerce. One of the consequences of the globalization is the diminution of the significance of international borders and a potential shift in the balance of power. At the turn of the twentieth century, the threat to humanity came from the left fermented by communist revolutionaries. The risk, as I see it today, is that as power; military, financial and intellectual is more evenly distributed throughout the world and as environmental, security and economic threats require more collaborative responses, fear, xenophobia and the desire for time to stand still could drive us into another world conflict. In this era, the threat is from the right. Conservatives, by their very nature are more susceptible. They may even have a biological predisposition to fear, particularly of the unknown. They want exiting institutions and relationships to continue unchanged and tend to wave the flag with greater gusto. My worry about the future stems from the Republican Party’s need to pull into their tent people whose economic wellbeing is inconsistent with fiscal policies favored by the Party. Theirs is a dangerous strategy playing into these tendencies and using a mix of fear, prejudice and patriotism to expand their electorate. The threats posed by global terrorism and, in response our war on it, unfortunately supports this strategy. My other concern is that since the turn of the twenty first century I started seeing inklings of a dangerous similarity with the past coming from the right. Some of the rhetoric is starting to sound a little bit like that of the German fascists in the early nineteen hundreds. They promoted fear and the resulting hatred of Jews to rally their ill-informed lower middle class. In the west, the political right propagandizes the fear and hatred of Muslims and Islam and in our country the “southern Strategy is still alive and well. The Nazis stressed the superiority of the Arian race while our right constantly chastises its opponents for insufficient acknowledgement of our exceptionalism. In Germany the “fatherland” was part of their battle cry. Here the word “homeland” and the need for its protection is more and more often heard. Collaboration in the control of the political process by the government, church and the industrial complex is a hallmark of fascism. In the last few decades we have had a strong shift to political engagement on the part of the religious right and the rise in economic inequality gives the wealthiest a disproportional influence on government. With the pronouncement of a never ending war on terror, more and more power is placed in the hands of the president and fear has lead us to cede a number of our civil rights. More military operations are undertaken by paramilitary rather than conventional forces. These forces are not subject to the code of military conduct and are responsible to an ever shrinking portion of the government. Fear and the Neo Con’s quest for ever greater military superiority and interventionism could push us in the direction of the German quest for world dominance. Then there is the charismatic leader lacking “intellectual curiosity” with the ability to rouse fear and anger that also scares me. A number of irrational, charismatic contenders were put forth by the right who momentarily lead the pack in Republican primaries (Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachman, Donald Trump, Rick Santorum, the Pizza guy). Happily they were voted down for now. Fortunately the above are just inklings and thus far not a firm indication of a dangerous direction. Globalization, if we figure out how to navigate effectively through all the technological, environmental, social and economic challenges can make, not only our country but the world as a whole a better place for everyone to live. To this end we need leaders who are intellectually capable of understanding and dealing with complexities which we will invariably encounter with a vision looking well into the future and with the skills to counter the fear and hatred sown by extremes on both the left and right. The electorate will need to be well informed and select senators and congressman to implement policies for not only today but that anticipate impending changes. I think that in time, the information technologies will make people better informed and thus see through the talking points, though I recognize the potential for the same technologies to more efficiently spread propaganda. We will see. Whatever happens, it will be an interesting but hopefully not a lethal time.