{"id":1513,"date":"2005-11-13T23:34:00","date_gmt":"2005-11-13T23:34:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=1513"},"modified":"2005-11-13T23:34:00","modified_gmt":"2005-11-13T23:34:00","slug":"1513","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=1513","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

GLOBALIZATION AND WAR: REBUTTALS AND COMMENTARY: DAVE SCHULER<\/strong>
<\/strong>
Part of an occasional series, the rebuttal and commentary posts will address the roundtable on Globalization and War. This format is open to both the symposium’s participants and other interested bloggers or scholars who would like their views published here.
<\/strong>
Link Preface:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Globalization and War by Dave Schuler<\/a> <\/strong>
<\/strong>
<\/span><\/strong>
“Globalization and War<\/span><\/strong>
<\/span><\/strong>
by Dave Schuler of<\/span> The Glittering Eye<\/a><\/strong>
<\/strong>
I thought I might put in my own two cents (uninvited) on ZenPundit\u2019s roundtable topic, Globalization and War. First, a definition might be in order. Globalization is the idea that, as a result of increasing linkages in modern communications, trade, and social contact that the world is becoming consolidated on a global scale. This may be reflected in the development of a single world market, a single world society, a single world government or all three.<\/p>\n

Opponents of globalization tend to portray the final outcome as a mean, homogenous mess in which economic welfare is spread out, as one critic put it, so that the average person would have a lifestyle that would \u201clook good to a Pakistani bricklayer\u201d and world culture would become a simulacrum of popular American commercial culture whose epitome is Ronald McDonald. That\u2019s certainly a possibility but I think others are possible and, indeed, more likely than the \u201cMcDonald\u2019s model\u201d in which most people receive a subsistence wage and culture is a uniform commercial nightmare.<\/p>\n

Another such model is the \u201cDisney model\u201d. In the Disney model there\u2019s at least the illusion of prosperity but nearly all institutions worldwide are highly uniform. Everyone acts, believes, and thinks the same differing only in menu, language, and national costume. Think of the \u201cIt\u2019s A Small World\u201d ride at Disneyland.<\/p>\n

A third model of globalization and one that I think is much more likely actually to come about might be characterized as the \u201clinguistic model\u201d in which there are many different styles of institutions and culture in \u201cfree variation\u201d. In linguistics two sounds are in free variation when either sound may appear in the same environment without a difference in meaning and without a native speaker considering that either is wrong. For example, the word \u201ceconomics\u201d may be pronounced with the first sound as \u201ceh\u201d as in \u201cget\u201d or as \u201cee\u201d as in \u201cgeese\u201d, possibly by the same person. The sounds are in free variation.<\/p>\n

This won\u2019t mean that anything goes. There will be social pressure for a limitation on the number of acceptable options particularly on the outliers\u2014whereever practice differs most dramatically from world norms.<\/p>\n

Some people think that globalization is just another word for American dominance. I think that this is completely the opposite of the truth particularly if the \u201clinguistic model\u201d obtains. In many, many things including ideas of the nature of law, the role of government, and the position of the individual within society, the United States is the outlier and I suspect there will be mounting pressure on people in the United Status to adopt attitudes that are closer to those that are prevalent in the rest of the world.<\/p>\n

Does globalization lead to war or discourage war? I think that the answer is \u201cBoth\u201d. As countries become more interdependent economically war will become quite difficult and unpalatable. The commodity that Americans usually think of when they think of economic dependence on other countries is oil but I\u2019d like to consider another: computer memories. Computer memories are not just used in computers. They\u2019re used in a huge number of everyday objects including automobiles, electronic goods of all kinds, gas pumps, ATM\u2019s, and stop lights. Computer memories are necessary for our military, government, and daily life to function as we\u2019ve become accustomed.<\/p>\n

We used to produce nearly all of our computer memories domestically. We produce nearly none now. Most are produced in South-East Asia: China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, etc. That\u2019s globalization for you.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re simultaneously reluctant to go to war with the countries that produce the things we need (like oil or computer memories) and willing to go to war to protect our access to supplies of these things.<\/p>\n

Still, as Clausewitz put it, \u201cWar is a continuation of politics by other means\u201d and that doesn\u2019t just mean external politics it pertains to internal politics as well. It\u2019s possible to go to war with another country for reasons that have very little to do with country but everything to do with domestic politics. As countries come under the pressure to change due to globalization that pressure is all but certain to manifest from time to time as war. I suspect that this will be particularly true for the outliers especially when their cultural, political, or social variants depend on ignorance or force to maintain.”<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/span>
(Editorial Note<\/strong>: Dave Schuler’s views are always welcome here at Zenpundit – an open invite to you Dave )<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

GLOBALIZATION AND WAR: REBUTTALS AND COMMENTARY: DAVE SCHULERPart of an occasional series, the rebuttal and commentary posts will address the roundtable on Globalization and War. This format is open to both the symposium’s participants and other interested bloggers or scholars who would like their views published here.Link Preface: Globalization and War by Dave Schuler “Globalization […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1513"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1513\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}