In Working Toward the Next Economic Paradigm by Mohamed A. El-Erian, at Project Syndicate, the problematic opening:
For decades, the Western world put its faith in a well-defined and broadly accepted economic paradigm with applications at both the national and global levels...
The paradigm that, until recently, dominated much of economic thinking and policymaking is embodied in the so-called Washington Consensus – a set of ten broadly applicable policy prescriptions for individual countries – and, at the international level, in the pursuit of economic and financial globalization. The idea, simply put, was that countries would benefit from embracing market-based pricing and deregulation at home, while fostering free trade and relatively open cross-border capital flows.
The paradigm, apparently accepted with no acknowledgement of its internal contradictions, includes the goal of "economic and financial globalization".
Why? Because "countries would benefit".
Countries would benefit. Nations would benefit.
But the ultimate objective of globalization is the subjugation of nations to a global political authority: France becomes the new New Jersey.
Look, if you like globalization, fine. I won't try to change your mind. But be honest with yourself: Acknowledge the objective. Think about what you really want.
I'm sure you don't want to be tricked into giving up the nation-state.
And what makes you think global government will be able to solve the economic problems that nations cannot solve? The wrong solutions don't work, no matter who applies them.
Global government and "relatively open cross-border capital flows" will lead to greater concentration of wealth, not less. That's why globalization moves forward: The wealthy at the top of the heap are bumping into the ceiling created by the existence of nations.
They want to remove that obstacle.
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5 comments:
I have been, and always shall be, a fan of Star Trek. I am comfortable with Gene Roddenberry's globalist vision. I don't object on principle to globalization.
I object to having globalization forced down my throat by people whose objective is to accumulate more wealth for themselves at the expense of people like me.
As I see it we have to fix the economy first. After that, we can see how things really are in the world. And after that, we might want to move toward political globalization. We might.
I guess there would be some (non-economic, or at least peripherally-economic) benefit to it, if having these extensive trade relationships means that the nations involved are less likely to go to war with one another.
I don't know whether that actually works or not, though.
Jerry, the "to avoid war" argument strikes me as more wishful thinking than anything else. If we can't solve our economic problems because we refuse to do the one thing that would work (reduce private debt) then any other solution is bound to fail sooner or later.
I remember the interdependency argument used to defend the expansion of US-China trade. I think relations on the economic level (and not on the eye-to-eye level) really do little more than bring problems to a head.
And maybe create new ones.
I've also heard "trade with China" described as a way to fight inflation. Yeah, right. What was it Milton Friedman said? Inflation is always and everywhere a not enough trade with China phenomenon.
Dani Rodrik:
The creation of the World Trade Organization, for me, is the turning point. In the ’50s and ’60s, the world was very heavily protected, economies were insulated from each other, and the struggle then was to push against the prevailing protectionism. By the 1990s, the world economy had already become fairly open, and the WTO marked a fundamental transformation in the nature of trade agreements. They changed from trying to remove barriers at the border—the traditional import tariffs or quotas that economists tend to think about when they talk about trade barriers—and instead began to focus increasingly on behind-the-border rules and regulations...
There is ALWAYS this evolution toward greater power for the superstate. From tribe to city-state to feudal state to nation-state to superstate.
Establishment of the "universal state" is part of the decline of civilization, as Toynbee tells it.
Bill Mitchell in Latest Europhile advocacy beggars belief – surrender sovereignty to regain it, 5 April 2018:
"Here is a selection of the latest input from the elites on how the EU is the salvation of democracy and sovereignty and yet Eurozone Member States are to be treated like high risk car drivers – paying more for a pittance of fiscal protection from the technocrats. It really beggars belief.
On March 28, 2018, ECB Executive Board member Benoît Coeuré demonstrated how far removed from reality the Eurozone elites have become when his contribution to the 2018 Schuman Report on Europe – Taking back control of globalisation: Sovereignty through European integration – was published.
Need I say that Robert Schuman would turn in his grave at what has been going on in Europe over the last several decades..."
Looks like Bill and I agree on this topic.
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