TheMillerCircle.org

If you ask ten people what globalization is or what it means, you may get ten different answers. Globalization and free market economy are vaguely intertwined with one another, but the words themselves have been coined and propagated into our contemporary lexicon in such a way that they seem like the inevitable process by which countries relate to one another economically. And, it seems that globalization was the inevitable outcome of our social and economic evolution: we finally arrived at a state of interdependency where everyone is equal. The slow process of natural selection finally determined how countries would relate and trade with one another. Indeed, we live at a time when it seems any opportunity to discuss globablization, either its meaning or its value, has long passed. It’s here to stay. After all wasn’t it Bill Clinton that told us we had better jump on the train of globalization or get left behind? And isn’t Thomas Friedman daily reminding us that the World is flat because of globalization? So entrenched is the term globalization that it is generally identified as positive by both political parties. Yet, this passive attitude that globalization is already here and entrenched in cement, prevents us from seeing the social upheaval and struggle that awaits the World order as the Bush/Cheney era comes to a close.

First, a little bit on terminology. If you consider globalization nothing more than a re-introduced form of "classic liberalism" ; and then think of it as neoliberalism , you have a different perspective on the topic and, perhaps it becomes easier to see it as a fault line in our recent history, rather than a bridge to the new world order. Better yet, perhaps it is easier to see it as a bridge to nowhere, except further separation of the rich and the poor and the engine responsible for the creation of our second Gilded Age. The word "liberalism" is a bit confusing in the modern era, but it originally derived from the libertarian virtue of going it alone, without interference from government in our private and economic affairs: that’s sometimes referred to as "classic liberalism" and its formulation as an economic policy, or "economic liberalism" , can be traced back to Adam Smith, the Gold Standard for the American businessman: it means little government and lots of individual, economic freedom. In contrast "social liberalism" is the philosophy that government functions are necessary and can serve valuable, critical social needs. But in terms of an economic model, "liberalism" refers to the laissez-faire attitude of celebrating the individual over the state. Remember that it was Adam Smith who said if everyone goes about their lives behaving selfishly, by acquiring their own wealth, serving their own interests, jobs will be created and society will prosper. Ronald Reagan referred to this as the "trickle down economy."

In the nearly 30 years of Reaganomics, or neoliberalism , the spigot of trickle down got plugged up somehow and, for the average worker in this country, their march to prosperity stagnated. Stagnation of the middle class proved to be a prominent component of the countries and regions that installed a free market economy and nowhere was this more apparent than in the South American Countries, beginning with the CIA-backed overthrow of Allende in Chili and the installation of the dictator Pinochet, Dick Cheney’s favorite ruler.

The driving force for the coming social upheaval has been the eight years of the Bush/Cheney administration: it has little to do with the average citizen or worker in the country, but we can affect the outcome of this struggle by affording a sweeping mandate for change. Obama is very likely going to try and re-establish the Clinton era of corporate globalization, whereas McCain will likely continue with the imperialist policies of Bush and Cheney. Big business has not prospered in the Bush/Cheney era. They don’t like getting shouted at by their international colleagues and they are uneasy with the unilateralism of Bush. They see the economy in shambles, a war without end and the fragmentation of our society as a direct result of Bush’s policies and his hubris.

While there are some in the corporate world, such as Haliburton, that have prospered by the war, the more common belief in corporate America is that Bush’s imperalist version of globalization has been ruinous to their interests. They want to retreat to the Clinton years, where a form of globalization–corporate globalization–was in play and the World seemed to be ruled by a much more multilateral state of cooperativity, with US leadership and a World order fed by the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO.

The great irony of Bush is that through his neoconservative, imperialist approach, he has destroyed the multilateralism of his predecessors that was in fact supremely unilateral, as the US usually got its way and was always at the head of the table in just about every issue of foreign diplomacy and economic control. Bush’s destructive policies have thrown open the entire tablet of World order, established at the end of WW II and the state of collapse in which we find the IMF, World Bank and the WTO, means that even a return to the Clinton era of corporate globalization probably cannot be achieved, not without serious modifications. Thus, the more we demand the label "neoliberalism " rather than "globalization" or "free market economy," the more readily we engage ourselves in an argument that neoliberalism has failed, just as liberalism failed as a philosophy for economic justice in the past.

The only system of broad economic justice we have witnessed was what we achieved under the FDR administration as a direct outcome of the failure of the liberalism policies that led to the depression. Once we stop people from thinking about the accumulation of personal wealth as their only mantra, we might begin to seriously address issues like global climate change and protection of the environment and endangered species, issues that truly affect our future and that of our children.

It is not just the collapse of the World Trade Organization, the World Bank and the IMF that we are witnessing. The World Economic Forum of 2003 in Davos, Switzerland, which had to be held in military bunker-like conditions, was the gathering of the economic rulers of the World, including the Fortune 500 CEOs. That meeting at Davos, where US military leaders introduced the plans for the invasion of Iraq as the first step in a long war to "cleanse the World," was one in which the mood was highly negative about the war and many participants were openly hostile to the US for its unilateralism. When Colin Powell delivered his speech at Navos to convince the group about the virtues of invading Iraq, he was not criticized by Amnesty International or someone from the Islamic world, but he was denounced by the head of the largest bank in the Netherlands, who saw the US policies as ruinous to his own interests. The international business community saw the Bush policies as destructive to their economic fortunes. Thus, a meeting which has always adhered to US leadership was now hostile to its unilateralist approach and viewed it as destructive to the World economic order. With the collapse of the dollar as an international currency of stability and many countries threatening to diversify their holdings to include other currencies, together with the dismal future projected for the US economy, the likelihood that the US can restore business as usual is exceedingly remote.

While at one level we can say that globalization started with the voyage of Christopher Columbus, the common usage of the term was very seldom heard before the mid 1990s and the current meaning of the word is merely a substitute for neoliberalism in order to avoid the debate that was never held, but that should now be brought alarmingly to the surface. The protest that began at the WTO meeting that Clinton organized in Seattle was the opening salvo. Mark Engler in his book "How to Rule the World. The Coming Battle Over the Global Economy" has pointed out how Pope John Paul II, no flaming liberal, and an ardent anticommunist, spoke in Cuba in 1998 and talked of the world "witnessing the resurgence of a certain capitalist neoliberalism which subordinates the human person to blind market forces." In his speech, he contended that "from its centers of power, such neoliberalism often places unbearable burdens upon less favored countries as a condition for further assistance." Because of these programs, he said, we "see a small number of countries growing exceedingly rich at the cost of the incresing impoverishment of a great number of other countries: as a result the wealthy grow ever wealthier, while the poor grow ever poorer."

For an American listener the Pope’s use of neoliberalism rather than globalization might have seemed confusing. Although you might argue with many of the Pope’s policies in areas such as abortion, his choice of neoliberalism instead of the more benign and confusing word "globalization" was purposely chosen to identify the process that he then saw as the force creating a more unbalanced World. What he didn’t see was that even within the one wealthy country that was leading the march towards neoliberalism , the United States was creating its own internal form of class separation along the precipice of wealth and income, until the current period of the second gilded age was upon us.

During the Eisenhower administration the highest personal income tax rate was 91%. While this rate seems excessively high by today’s standards, it had a calculated effect on corporate leaders. They viewed their responsibilities more in terms of Gold Watches for retirees rather than a Gold Parachutes for themselves. It was the company, not the stock market that prevailed over corporate attitudes. They accepted the idea that the purpose of a corporate license was to benefit society, not an invitation to rule the world. They also expected and accepted the idea that a single payer, national health insurance system would and should be installed. But, then came the Vietnam War and indirectly we got Ronald Reagan to tell us fairy tales about matters of economy and the mortal enemies we faced. And the rest is about globalization that should now be more properly identified as neoliberalism.