This short essay deals with the question of whether the existing world order, which has regarded nation states as the smallest unit of international relations since the Congress of Vienna in 1815, will continue to exist, or whether a different world order will evolve. There are two extremes to choose from: complete globalization on the one hand and complete localization on the other. In between, there is a broad spectrum that includes, for example, the formation of new imperial powers or cooperation between eco-regions.
The director’s annual lecture at Chatham House somehow got my attention these days. How would one of the top think tanks on international relations see the year ahead?
In summary:
Director of Chatham, Bronwen Maddox, essentially wants the international order not to change. She puts herself and Chatham therefore into the camp of nationalist, i.e. those who want to keep nation states as smallest units of the international order in place. The other camp, the globalists, strive for the human being as the smallest unit of international order. For more on this, watch the great dialogue between Yuval Harari and Chris Anderson. I am truly disappointed in this lack of vision and was even more so in the mostly absurd follow up questions from the audience, which reflected how far current IR professionals are detached from what matters to the people on the ground.
In detail:
If we want something different than a pax americana or pax sinica, we need to reshape the World Bank into an organization which really serves the people and not their governments. One vision for a new World Bank would be an institution which deploys and safeguards global distributed value accounting and channels a conditional basic income to the bank accounts of planet Earths citizens according to their contribution to the health of natural and cultural ecosystems.
In summary:
Director of Chatham, Bronwen Maddox, essentially wants the international order not to change. She puts herself and Chatham therefore into the camp of nationalist, i.e. those who want to keep nation states as smallest units of the international order in place. The other camp, the globalists, strive for the human being as the smallest unit of international order. For more on this, watch the great dialogue between Yuval Harari and Chris Anderson. I am truly disappointed in this lack of vision and was even more so in the mostly absurd follow up questions from the audience, which reflected how far current IR professionals are detached from what matters to the people on the ground.
In detail:
- Her main objective is to salvage the international order, but isn’t this exactly what needs to change? She reiterates the words of Henry Kissinger, who perceived in 2014 the rise of China, Islamism and supranational organizations like the EU as the greatest threats to world order.
- She urges her audience to defend existing institutions and create new one’s - dont give up UN. But isn’t exactly the UN an institution which supports the current world order, an order of nation states, which is in contradiction with the science of biogeography and post-growth economics?
- Member states of the IMF and world bank should push back on the US’ cut of funding. But what a futile undertaking, when China has like with so many other Western institutions established a shadow organizations to the World Bank and actively works towards a sinocentric world order.
If we want something different than a pax americana or pax sinica, we need to reshape the World Bank into an organization which really serves the people and not their governments. One vision for a new World Bank would be an institution which deploys and safeguards global distributed value accounting and channels a conditional basic income to the bank accounts of planet Earths citizens according to their contribution to the health of natural and cultural ecosystems.
The next day, I facilitate for the probably tenth time a moderated screening of Helena Norberg-Hodge’s documentary The Economics of Happiness. The film is like the anti-thesis to the Chatham House recording. Norberg-Hodge preaches localism, Maddox lectures globalism.
The film in a nutshell:
Ladakhi practiced local agriculture and regional trade - their lifestyle was finely attuned to the local ecosystem > wide general well-being, nobody left behind. With the arrival of modern economics and global trade, the Ladakhis felt poor and miserable, how is that possible? Modern economics introduced most importantly a psychological shift from collective well-being to individual achievement. Compare this with Ken Wilber’s AQAL framework. The advertisement industry has contributed its fair share to this shift in self-perception.
Yet, making globalization the new enemy is distorting the focus. It’s not globalization, but the power and profit driven actors who use globalization as a vehicle to pursue their goals at the expense of human and natural resources, which are the enemy. 15 years after the creation of this film, it is evident that the dichotomy between globalization and localization must be overcome. We are members of one super-organism, one spaceship and need to collaborate to continue having a home. We need to move past in- and out-group thinking. That’s the globalist dimension in this equation.
We require however a human scale anchor in this world and we can only live in a concrete place and nourish the relationships with a handful of real people. As such we are as human species like any other mammal deeply tied to a specific local territory for which we should act as stewards, preserving its integrity for future generations. That’s the localist dimension in this equation.
The future is - in lack of a better wording - glocal. The picture which I have for this future in my mind is however a human hive, i.e. a global planet which is organizationally structured in local combs. What we need at this turning point in human history is an organizational backbone for the combs to interact with each other on questions of regional and global relevance. A new world bank, which adopts the human hive structure and abandons the nations state concept, could be very well such an organizational backbone.
It would however not be staffed by diplomats sitting in posh offices in New York, London or Hong Kong, but its delegates would be the mayors of villages, towns and districts who represent the interests of their community members. Compare Leopold Kohr’s The Breakdown of Nations. We need to rejuvenate democracy, make it agile and less representative. We need to break down power concentration with large countries and corporations.
Other observations - there is always sth new to be detected in this film:
The film in a nutshell:
Ladakhi practiced local agriculture and regional trade - their lifestyle was finely attuned to the local ecosystem > wide general well-being, nobody left behind. With the arrival of modern economics and global trade, the Ladakhis felt poor and miserable, how is that possible? Modern economics introduced most importantly a psychological shift from collective well-being to individual achievement. Compare this with Ken Wilber’s AQAL framework. The advertisement industry has contributed its fair share to this shift in self-perception.
Yet, making globalization the new enemy is distorting the focus. It’s not globalization, but the power and profit driven actors who use globalization as a vehicle to pursue their goals at the expense of human and natural resources, which are the enemy. 15 years after the creation of this film, it is evident that the dichotomy between globalization and localization must be overcome. We are members of one super-organism, one spaceship and need to collaborate to continue having a home. We need to move past in- and out-group thinking. That’s the globalist dimension in this equation.
We require however a human scale anchor in this world and we can only live in a concrete place and nourish the relationships with a handful of real people. As such we are as human species like any other mammal deeply tied to a specific local territory for which we should act as stewards, preserving its integrity for future generations. That’s the localist dimension in this equation.
The future is - in lack of a better wording - glocal. The picture which I have for this future in my mind is however a human hive, i.e. a global planet which is organizationally structured in local combs. What we need at this turning point in human history is an organizational backbone for the combs to interact with each other on questions of regional and global relevance. A new world bank, which adopts the human hive structure and abandons the nations state concept, could be very well such an organizational backbone.
It would however not be staffed by diplomats sitting in posh offices in New York, London or Hong Kong, but its delegates would be the mayors of villages, towns and districts who represent the interests of their community members. Compare Leopold Kohr’s The Breakdown of Nations. We need to rejuvenate democracy, make it agile and less representative. We need to break down power concentration with large countries and corporations.
Other observations - there is always sth new to be detected in this film:
- interesting interview with Chinese youth about cultural self perception. It would be difficult nowadays to find a Chinese saying this.
- urbanization is very resource intensive and has a higher ecological impact on the planet than rural living.
- we need to change the institutions which structure and run the world - individual choices can’t transform societies to the point it is needed
- we need to develop local identities: integrating bioregionalism in public education is a great vehicle to achieve that goal
- emotionally strongest scene: Ladhaki women in western elderly care home observing an apathetic old women sitting alone in front of the TV
- Norberg-Hodge’s solution is a match with Bill Plotikin’s observation that establishing a connection with others and the natural world is the most important task in the education of children and youth.
