A New International System

3. The Challenge

7 The Challenge 3 The Challenge For many, perhaps the majority around the world, economic globalization possesses one and only one advantage: higher growth and higher standards of living. To achieve this, they are ready to sacrifice part of their own cultural identity, tastes, and original consumer preference, etc. Some observers put this more bluntly: they are willing to go to the pawnshop with their soul or part of their soul. There is a trade-off. At some point the increased material benefits may no longer be judged as sufficient to warrant the loss of identity. This balance may change over time; it may be different for different peoples according to culture and traditions, but it is there. What has been seen during the last 8 J. Oerstroem Moeller ten years and especially in the aftermath of the financial crisis in East Asia in 1997–98 is that a large majority of the population joined economic globalization because they thought it was unstoppable and could only move in one direction — upwards. When the harsh realities showed up in the shape of economic contraction and decreased living standards, they felt betrayed. No one had told them it could also go downwards! It seems that internationalism has weathered this storm — at least for the time being. But how many more backlashes can be sustained? And what will happen if or when an economic crisis hits China where a whole generation since 1979 has only known double-digit or near double-digit growth? To put it in the prism of balancing growth and identity: what happens if or when global growth falters and alternative economic models appear to offer growth comparable to economic globalization? Can we then count upon global support for internationalism? If we dig a little bit deeper we find four specific challenges to internationalism: 1. A dichotomy inside all nation-states between the elite and the majority of the population. The elite have chosen inter- 9 The Challenge nationalism; they communicate with the elite in other nation-states but not with the majority of the population in their own nation-state. The majority gets more and more introvert and partly nationalistic. Thus we have the phenomenon of double seclusion. The two groups inside the same nation-state do not communicate with each other. They communicate and hook on to comparable social strata in other nation-states. This double seclusion signifies a sociological breakup of the nation-state. The elite does not any longer demonstrate true leadership. The majority of the population lack guidance and risk sliding into some state of spineless acquiescence. 2. Disparities within nation-states and between nation-states • Economic and social. In 1820 the ratio of GNP per capita between the richest and poorest nations was 3:1; in 1913 it had deteriorated to 11:1; in 1950 it was 31:1; in 1973, 44:1; and in 1992 it was 72:1. • The digital divide today. Who has access to the Internet? 10 J. Oerstroem Moeller • Educational. Who gets the education to perform in the new international and more competitive society? All these factors point to a dangerous split where a small part of the population is rich, well educated, uses the Internet and communicates internationally while the majority of the population is not so rich and in many cases outright poor, poorly educated, has no access to the Internet, and communicates domestically within its nationstate . These disparities produce one mindset for the elite and another for the majority of the population. 3. The minorities within nation-states were kept quiet until the 1980s; now they insist on voicing their opinion and being heard. The European Union has, broadly speaking, not solved this problem but has prevented it from erupting into what could have been very nasty in-fighting between the nation-state and its minorities by developing a model based upon Economic Internationalization and Cultural Decentralization. The virtue of this model is that it opens the door for participation in the international economy for 11 The Challenge regions within a nation-state without their having to kowtow to the centralizing government in the nation-state. Formerly — to use France as an example, though many other European nation-states also qualify — a French region had to pay allegiance to Paris and the French government to achieve a slice of the cake accruing...