Babak Fakhamzadeh
Scheidel sets out his claim early on; Four kinds of violent rupture flatten societal inequality: mass mobilisation warfare, transformative revolution, state failure and pandemics.
And, the author makes an irrefutable case. But, the book is also a barrage of facts and figures that quickly become tedious, even though Scheidel already uses extensive use of footnotes.
An interesting apparent contradiction that Scheidel implicitly points out is that higher level of inequality are associated with lower levels of growth. But also, more equal societies are an obstacle to development, as economic growth is facilitated by inequality, encouraging innovation.
So, the advent of agriculture and animal husbandry, both conducive for storing wealth, also facilitated greater inequality. Specifically, resource scarcity, ownership rights of land and livestock and the ability to transmit wealth between generations are strong determinants for inequality.
On the other side, labor shortage increases the cost of labor and is a leveller, decreasing inequality. And, as a corollary, the lower fertility rates in the West are a direct precursor to the global lowering of inequality, through the import of immigrant labor, remittances, and outsourcing of the production chain.
Before discussing the four ‘horsemen' of the inequality apocalypse, Scheidel discusses a number of historical societies that saw an increase, or decrease, in inequality.
One such account, on an emerging China, essentially posits that the current Chinese elite, in terms of wealth accumulation, is just a direct successor to earlier agricultural societies, with the economic elite accepting vast amounts of wealth through rents and the control of trade, the central point being that in pre-modern societies very large fortunes typically owed more to political power than to economic prowess.
One spectacular case of historical levelling is Japan, which went from an as unequal country as the United States on the verge of the 1929 stock market crash, to a country as equal as Denmark today, apparently the most equal developed country in the world, in the space of about 10 years, from just before to just after the second world war.
This, in part due to an extensive planned economy enforced to aid the war effort, then even more enforced by the American occupier.
Scheidel continues, showing that the world wars were huge levellers, compressors of inequality, followed by decades of policies that, until roughly the 1990s, saw inequality continuously, if slowly, drop in all countries actively and passively involved in either.
(An interesting observation on how the belligerents in the first world war dealt with their need for infusions of cash to support the war effort, was that the more democratic countries like the US, the UK and Canada taxed the rich much more, whereas the more aristocratic countries, like Germany, Austria Hungary and Russia chose to borrow and print money, but that the latter had to pay for these choices with hyperinflation and revolutions that followed afterwards.)
Indeed, the forcefully imposed fiscal changes implemented in the West after surviving the second world war, which changed war economies into social democracies facilitating consistent reduction of inequality, suggest that the primary reason for the West's privileged position in world affairs today, benefiting from strong democracies with broad societal buy-in, strong continuous economic development and long lasting peace, is only a consequence of the devastating effects of the two world wars and the subsequent superimposed societal change, the creation of the welfare state and strong international cooperation, fuelled by the fear of ‘never again'.
In that light, it's only logical that, with the increase of inequality from the 1990s onwards, the quickly rising share of income of the rich and the decrease in taxation of the rich, unrest is brewing and dissatisfaction is growing. Or, similar to events at the end of the 19th century, today's European peacefulness could be said to have retarded political reform.
(One fascinating consequence of mass mobilisation warfare: extending suffrage, that is, voting rights.)
Similarly, in ancient Athens, a huge driver for equality was the war effort, a democratically shared objective that resulted in the redistribution of wealth to the poorer citizens through a variety of means, all in the service of defense and the conquering of the Aegean.
(On the other hand, Spartan society, which started out quite egalitarian, saw this equality erode through the existence of hereditary wealth and the slow reduction of the number of Spartans who could qualify as ‘citizen'.)
The narratives for war, large-scale revolution, state collapse and pandemics as equalisers are all quite similar; Simply put, if large portions of the population die, when money or wealth are invalidated, intra-population inequality is compressed.
Scheidel continues to discuss alternative processes for levelling, and shows they are not nearly as efficient, if at all; Levelling through land distribution, which can be somewhat effective after major violent upheaval, or under threat of war, falls short in practice.
Similarly, neither debt relief or the abolishment of slavery have had meaningful results on their own, except perhaps when paired with violence. The only possible exception being Brazil, where abolition was non-violent, and was not followed by compensation for former slave owners. However, apparently, historical data is, so far, inconclusive.
Interestingly, macroeconomic crises appear to have no influence on inequality, except for the Great Depression, with banking crises typically increasing inequality.
The most painful observation is that democratic shifts, that are not the consequence of violent episodes, do not decrease inequality. Two possible reasons for this could be the capturing of the democratic system by the financial elite, and the democratic shift facilitating additional processes, like increased economic activity, that increase inequality.
Indeed, data shows that there is no meaningful correlation between increased GDP per capita and decreased inequality, long held as a given.
Perhaps even more painful, data shows that broader access to (better) education also sees no effect on levelling.
One interesting (mild) exception on requiring one of the ‘horsemen' to facilitate levelling, is Latin America in the 2000s, which saw a lowering of inequality in almost the whole region. Though, from highly unequal, to still very unequal (that is, more unequal than the United States).
The author credibly argues that Latin America's high level of inequality, in part due to low levels of taxation, is simply due to the absence of widespread historical violent upheaval, in the same way that Europe's equality is the consequence of two devastating world wars in recent history.
Scheidel finishes with some predictions of the future, ultimately concluding that we can't predict the future, while throwing around some derivative concepts that could suggest that Western societies haven't seen much change in ‘effective' inequality since pre-modern times.
The books central premise is extremely convincing.
One annoying shortcoming, besides spending a lot of time on going through vast tracts of data, making the book more like an academic thesis, is that Scheidel never clearly explains how the mathematical concepts he uses, like specifically the Gini coefficient, are calculated, constantly requiring the reader to somewhat guess the meaning of the numbers he throws around.
Bartlett is not too controversial in saying that tech and democracy are at odds with each other, but he sums up the challenges well, and gives a useful list of things we need to change.
Modern tech has empowered, but also undermines democratic principles by not being governed or being governable by individual jurisdictions.
Bartlett sees six fundamental pillars of democracy. These are:
+ An active citizinry.
+ A shared culture, which includes the spirit of compromise.
+ Free elections.
+ Stakeholder equality, including a sizeable middle class.
+ A competitive economy and civic freedom.
+ Trust in an authority that is accountable and enforces the people's will.
Bartlett specifically argues that...
The giant advertising panopticon we live in, keeps us addicted to devices, provides endless distraction through manipulation, and is slowly diminishing free choice and anonymity.
Specifically, we are prevented from maturing politically by having our decisions made for us, with the tools manipulating us, while we have to question whether we remain being able to actually make moral decisions at all, as, through self censorship, we lose the opportunity to make mistakes and, through that, learn.
While using these tools is tempting, as, with a utilitarian view and lots of data, an algorithm could calculate the action with the most positive consequence.
Perpetual connectivity, via suggestions and filter bubbles, leads to emotional tribal politics, favoring loyalty to the group and anger, outranking reason and compromise, paving the way for populist politicians and, eventually, totalitarianism.
Data analytics influences elections in ways we can not understand for it's complexity, allowing for rich and/or powerful groups to cement themselves into a position of strength.
(Here, Bartlett states that both Google and Facebook seconded employees to work at Cambridge Analytics, embedded with the Trump campaign in 2016. And, the person he interviewed at the Trump campaign admitting she wrote most of Trump's Twitter updates during the presidential election campaign.)
Individual political targeting switches the general debate to hyper localized ones that are practically impossible to unite and diminish accountability for their lack of transparency.
Here, Bartlett makes the excellent observation that “There is a chilling prospect that whoever owns the data also owns the future”
The AI, or robot, revolution has the potential to wipe out the middle class and create a ‘barbell' economy, detrimental to democracy in general, in part through the diminishing tax base this creates.
The monopoly of large tech companies are monopolies that own the platform for exchanging ideas, preventing the practice of free association by controlling the platform outside of accountability processes while amassing vast amounts of power.
As a perhaps surprisingly corollary, tech giants facilitating ‘grassroots' activism in their own interest results in civil society becoming arranged around platforms and abstractions rather than alert citizens practiced in locally rooted action.
“Total victory for the monopoly is not over economics or politics, it's over assumptions, ideas and possible futures. Because when that happens, big tech won't need to lobby or buy out competitors. They will have so insinuated themselves in our lives and minds, that we won't be able to imagine a world without them.”
The rise of crypto anarchy, the use of cryptography to exclude preying eyes, also excludes the state and thus undermines state control to the point of collapse.
All this means that the question is whether we will turn to more authoritarian systems and leaders to maintain control over society, slowly destroying democracy under the pretense of saving it.
Bartlett proposes 20 ideas to save democracy, grouped around the pillars of democracy::
Alert, independent minded citizens invested with moral authority.
+ own your opinion
+ fight distraction
+ replace the attention economy with an economy of human value
A democratic culture with a commonly agreed reality and a spirit of compromise.
+ smash your echo chamber
+ teach critical thinking
+ police the algorithms
+ break the ad model
Elections that are free, fair, and command public trust.
+ update election campaign laws
+ celebrate election day
+ monitor bot behaviour
Manageable levels of equality, and a vibrant middle class with a shared investment in society.
+ spread the wealth to maintain the middle class
+ tax the robots
+ a social safety net that favors education and training
+ stronger workers' rights
A competitive economy and an independent civil society.
+ pay for your online services
+ more comprehensive anti trust laws
+ regulate AI
A sovereign authority that can enforce the people's will, but remains accountable to them.
+ more government policing powers coupled with more transparency
+ regulate Bitcoin
+ carefully use new technologies in state owned processes
In the end, Bartlett is clear that, for society to change, the people, you and I, need to change. And that, of course, is the biggest single challenge.
It is not unfitting that Rory Stewart wrote the introduction to my copy of Thesiger's first and widely celebrated novel.
Stewart gained fame by foolishly walking some 6000 miles across Iran, Afghanistan and a few South Asian countries, when Afghanistan had just been overrun by the US, after which he became deputy governor for the American backed government in a province in Iraq.
Thesiger, of course, had a reputation of being the last of the great explorers.
Yet, Stewart points out that Thesiger, rather than the last Victorian, he was perhaps closer to being the first hippie on the overland trail, as, essentially, Thesiger travelled for the sake of travel, of discovery.
The collection of stories is superb, detailing a series of overland treks, by camel, in the south of the Arabian peninsula in the late 1940s. Thesiger documents, suffers, enjoys, struggles, fully aware that the life he is experiencing will soon disappear, the first western oil explorers having arrived on the edge of the peninsula. Even if the peninsula is still a hotbed of tribal warfare, this almost costing the author his life.
Perhaps one thing worth noting is how common slavery still was on the peninsula, not even 70 years ago. Also, Dubai and Abu Dhabi are still at war and are tiny villages.
An extensive description of ‘Zomia', the highlands of South East Asia, spread across countries like Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, India and China. On the fringe, ungoverned, considered barbaric, but, as the author successfully argues, purposefully so.
The hills of South East Asia, like fringe societies everywhere, are regions of political resistance and cultural refusal. Not being remnants of the past, nor a homogenous ethnicity or tribe, they consist of individuals who actively avoided being taken in by state control, leaving the governed lowlands for the ungoverned highlands.
Then, the author keeps on reiterating his central point until he's beaten the reader to near-death with it.
Thankfully, there are several interesting little tidbits to keep turning the pages, most of the time.
+ “Ethnicity and tribe begin exactly where taxes and sovereignty end.”
+ Rice farming is efficient for its yield and the concentrated populations it requires, and that the hills of South East Asia make travel difficult, and that land empires trump sea empires, essentially for the manpower they are able to muster.
+ Where in Europe wealth begat power, in South East Asia, manpower begat power, hence, South East Asia's poorer modern states were based on both rice farming and slavery.
+ “Far more egalitarian settlements were founded by runaways then by revolutionaries.”
+ Cassava is an easy crop to maintain, requiring virtually no attention, while it can be left to grow for years, underground, and while its leaves can also be consumed. Perfect to grow in many little plots over a large area, when you're forced to move around a lot.
+ The interesting point that the lack of writing and the shorter scope of history (of hill tribes), maintained through oral traditions, are possibly a coping mechanism to fight hierarchy and to facilitate societal fluidity.
Travel blogger Avant le lettre. Surprisingly current, considering Byron visited Iran and Afghanistan, as well as the greater Middle East, in 1933/4. A local Jewish leader in Jerusalem: “If the country is to be developed, the Arabs must suffer...“
Though, current travel bloggers no longer need to internalise the knowledge Byron left home with, now all just a Google search away.
Byron, perhaps not surprisingly for a 20-something European backpacker, is awed by, particularly, the architecture he encounters, with occasional hints of feelings of superiority towards the locals, and disdain towards fellow European tourists and travellers. Particularly those that don't take a year or two to move around, but rush in on steamships to take a week's whirlwind tour of the Holy Land, say, dressed in shorts, with cameras hanging around their necks.
How little has changed, indeed.
Byron's interests mean that a lot of pages are spent on comparing and describing the different styles of architecture he finds. Interesting, but often difficult to follow for its highly specialized vocabulary and the book's lack of imagery. But, it's hard not to be envious of his ability to travel for many months in obscure territories, pursuing his interests while not forgoing wines, whiskeys and cigars.
“Somebody must trespass on the taboos of modern nationalism, in the interests of human reason. Business can't. Diplomacy won't. It has to be people like us.”
With which Bryon must mean the modern travel blogger.
If anything, too short.The obvious comparison can only be with [a:Mary Renault 38185 Mary Renault https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1378247630p2/38185.jpg]. Renault's biography of Alexander was one volume, and her novel of his life a trilogy, Hunter's book has the brevity of Renault's biography, while really being quite a historically accurate novelization of Caesar's life, making at least me long for a more embellished description of the events leading up to Caesar's assassination, in the same way that Renault novelized Ancient Greece.That said, the story flows well, and the dialogs feel natural, even if the list of characters is confusingly long. And, at the end, I was left longing for more, in the same way that a small piece of your favorite chocolate bar leaves you longing for more of the same.
In the introduction, Eisner, the biographer, takes care of perhaps the biggest questions; the drug case against Noriega, for which he was convicted, was deeply flawed and wholly circumstantial; the US invasion was unjustified on legal, political and moral grounds.
Noriega's memoires, the bulk of the book, are interesting as far as they go, just; descriptive, less so analytical. They make a clear point: the US invaded because they stood to lose control over the canal, after Panama had secured the Torrijos-Carter treaty and was shifting focus on working with Japan to expand the canal. And, because Panama declined to kowtow (enough) to the US in their covert operations in Central America. On the downside, Noriega tries a bit too hard to prove the US was the only bad actor, making it appear as if he and his former boss Torrijos always and alone acted in good faith.
Eisner, in his afterword, starts of by reiterating the same points he made in the introduction; Noriega was not guilty of the charges against him, the invasion was not justified. He elaborates, and makes an easy case for what should now be widely known (the book was published in 1998); the US' constant and very extensive high level control of, what should be independent, countries in the Americas.
In the introduction, Anthony Grafton recounts Wedgwood's final judgement of the thirty years war: morally subversive, economically distructive, socially degrading, confused in its causes, devious in its results, the outstanding example in European history of meaningless conflict.
I picked up this book specifically because the war in the Congo, sometimes called Africa's first world war, is often compared to Europe's thirty year war. And, Wedgwood's judgement on the thirty years war could indeed have been written about the Congo.
This introduction was written early in the 21st century. It prefaces her own, written in the late 1950s, twenty years after the book was originally published. Here, she admits that, now, she no longer believes that all wars are unnecessary, though believing the thirty year war, was. And, the result of the dangers and disasters which can arise when men of narrow hearts and little minds are in high places.
Wedgwood mentions that due to environmental and societal factors, slow and faulty communications, and weather conditions, public opinion mattered and cared for little, resulting in the public acts and private character of individual statesmen assuming disproportionate significance, with dynastic ambitions governing the diplomatic relations of Europe.
Comparing the parameters of this conflict to the wars in Africa, the society Wedgwood sketches seems to have been much more volatile and violent than Africa now. But, then, wars were fought by professional armies, meaning that the negative consequences of conflict would take much longer for them to start to be opposed by the general population.
She then points out that, around the same time, a shift of power was happening from a time when land meant power, shifting control from what became the aristocratic classes; to a time where money meant power, with the merchant classes, often in opposition to the aristocracy.
This was combined with a profound desire for governance that was efficient, less so ‘right' or ‘wrong', while taxation was primarily associated with war, not with public service.
Continuing with a snapshot of Europe's religions in the run up to the thirty years war, the author makes the point that it was not Luther, who's new faith was quickly coopted by the German state as a way to avoid the Pope's control, but Calvin, leading the Reformation, but putting laymen in charge of society, but everyone under God, who kickstarted European religious change, with one of the consequences the Catholic counter Reformation and creation of the Jesuitic order, wanting to devoutly bring the Catholic faith to all corners of the globe.
Spain, with its ruler leading the vast Habsburg empire and relying on gold from the colonies, was faltering, but still powerful, but needed the rebellious United Provinces, roughly the Netherlands today, to come back into the fold, in order to stave of perpetual decline.
Yet, these United Provinces, with trade and commerce booming, were quickly gaining strength, while Britain was not yet powerful enough, and internally divided, to play a meaningful role in the conflict that everyone was waiting for after the 12 year armistice between the rebels in Holland and the Spanish king would run out.
Other northern powers were the strong Swedes, the somewhat less powerful Danes and the declining Hanseatic league. Poland, bordering both Russia and Turkey, with a king the son of the Swedish monarch, but Catholic, not Lutheran, was a more likely candidate for a Habsburg ally.
It was France, surrounded by the Habsburg, who were inclined to prevent a successful reconquest of the United Provinces. Though Catholic, they were not natural allies of the Habsburg and were strengthened by papal support, the Pope weary of increased Habsburg influence in Italy.
But, it was the chaotic collection of Germanic States, the holy Roman empire, that formed the key and became the central battle ground.
As, from the mid 16th century onwards, religious conflict, secular insecurities, and economic decline started to take their toll, it's perhaps a surprise the war did not erupt earlier. But, with the end of the Dutch truce between the United Provinces and Spain, set for 1621, which most concerned thought spelled the certain onset of war, a revolt in Bohemia was the eventual trigger.
The kingship of Bohemia was not hereditary, but elected. When the old king was to be replaced in 1617, a Catholic supported by the Habsburg rulers of Spain easily became the preferred candidate, mostly because the Protestants could not field a reasonably credible alternative. The Catholic Ferdinand II, holy Roman emperor, was expected to be sympathetic to the Habsburg throne, meaning he would easily grant access to Habsburg troops coming from Italy on their way to the Netherlands in the clash that was expected for 1621.
A devout Catholic, his new Protestant subjects were so disgruntled that, after moving the court to Vienna, two of his representatives were thrown out of a window in Prague.
Bohemian forces were starting to fight for independence, mostly religious, helped by those European forces who preferred a weakened Habsburg house. But, when the emperor finally died in early 1619, an unexpected turn of events brought the political challenges to a head with Ferdinand coming out on top. Though within a hair's breadth: Ferdinand was deposed as king of Bohemia, but too late for the news to reach the election of emperor, which he, as king of Bohemia, won.
Lots of back and forth later, soon, the armistice between Spain and the Netherlands ran out, those opposing the rising Habsburg influence in Germany realising too late that their inaction in the war over Bohemia had resulted in Spanish forces being stationed in the heart of Germany, exactly where the temporary and now deposed king of Bohemia had his heartland. Now, instead of fighting the Habsburg head on, the Dutch United Provinces were willing to sponsor the deposed king, Frederick, to regain his old home and kick the Spanish out.
This didn't work, Ferdinand handing over control of Frederick's land to a sympathetic competitor. Yet, power dynamics were such that the Habsburg also were not able to take back the Netherlands, yet. Meanwhile, Bohemia, coming back under Ferdinand's control, had become a distant shadow of it's former self, with war, repossessions, and hyper inflation having taken it's toll.
In the end, Ferdinand's objective of uniting the Holy Roman Empire resulted in the splitting away of the Austrian.
But first, the French, Bourbon, with Richelieu as their champion, entered the hussle, managing to unite the forces opposing the Habsburg.
A lull in the conflict arrived ten years into the war. At the start of 1627, the Brits declared war on France, Richelieu sued for peace with Spain, having to fight the Brits and the Huegenot revolt at home. The Northern Alliance under the Danish king had fallen apart, the Spanish were controlling the German heartland, while much of the Germanic lands were in ruins, disease spreading widely.
Ferdinand installed a new constitution for Bohemia, evicted the Protestants, crowned his second wife as empress and his son as the first hereditary king, both in Prague.
Then, an insignificant conflict in northern Italy saw the turning point of the war. In Mantua, a succession which saw a French nobleman take control of lands in Italy, saw the start of a prefect storm; the Polish and Swedish kings signed a truce, the Pope moved more and more away from the Habsburg, mostly due to Ferdinand's ignoring of the papal seat, while the Habsburg were becoming too poor and politically inept to survive, with their fight for the Netherlands being unsuccessful, slowly becoming the junior partner between the two empires of Spain and Germany. Then Piet Heyn conquered the Spanish fleet off Cuba.
Ferdinand nearly managed to establish a reasonable truce, but setbacks kept piling up.
The king of Sweden, Gustavus, landed in the north of Germany, but had a hard time rallying the German Protestant forces behind him, even if they also didn't support Ferdinand. Then, with Ferdinand's forces winning a pyrrhic victory over the city of Magdeburg, and the public disgust that followed, Gustavus found more monetary and real support both inside and outside Germany, resulting in a strong victory over imperialist forces outside Leipzig, while the Dutch defeated a Spanish fleet off the coast of Zeeland.
Now, control started to pivot away from the Swedes and the Protestants and towards Richelieu, who positioned the Bourbons against the Habsburgs. And, soon after, France openly declared war on Spain.
Due to religious affiliations being proven to be less and less an overarching reason for unity, religion started to recede to the background, becoming more of a personal relationship with God, less of a societal one. Meanwhile, science, philosophy and, above all, nationalism, were taking it's place.
In 1639, the Dutch admiral Tromp annihilated the Spanish fleet, essentially the beginning of the end of perpetual Habsburg decline, which was not stopped by the deaths of both Richelieu and the French king.
Shortly after the death of the latter, a decisive French victory annihilated the Spanish army.
Later, Ferdinand's army was also all but destroyed and though both the war and peace agreements carried on for several years, effectively, the end of the war had been reached.
Final agreements redrew specifically the borders of the German empire, Ferdinand retreating to what would become Austria-Hungary, with room in Germany opening up for the future Prussian state.
Spain had become a shadow of it's former self, with France becoming the new strongman in Europe and the Netherlands being free of designs of other European powers.
I wanted to read up on the thirty year's war for it often being compared with the drawn out war in the Congo. There are some obvious similarities, particularly the shifting allegiances of individual groups in a stretched out geographical area. But, on a political and societal level, these two conflicts could not be further apart; in 17th century Europe, though a patchwork of nations, each of these had a fairly reasonably defined national identity, based on a long history of cultural formation, going back, for most, a documented 2000 years. After all, the holy Roman emperor of the German nation styled himself the natural heir to the seat of Roman power. The conflict at the start of the war, in part, came from the desire of the Dutch to be religiously and politically independent from the Habsburgs, based in Spain, the latter a declining economic power of global importance, the former a global rising star.
This situation is vastly different from the Congo in the late 1990s.
In addition, the continuous scheming in Europe centered on well established cities with a long history and large populations, and around reasonably well established borders. In the Congo, most of the land was rural with only vague but artificial borders and little sedentary history.
Yet, specifically the shifting allegiances and desolation and destruction of the land sees a strong parallel.
Murray is sympathetic to Burnes, partially due to Burnes' Scottish heritage, partially due to Burnes having had to deal with similar issues as a representative of the British crown. Murray as an ambassador in Uzbekistan, Burnes as an envoy in British India and Afghanistan, during the first half of the 19th century, during the height of the Great Game.The chess game between Russia and Britain, with the objective control of Central Asia, is one of the most fascinating chapters in recent history, particularly well documented in Hopkirk's [b:The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia 138299 The Great Game The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia Peter Hopkirk https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1347279948s/138299.jpg 133307]. Burnes played an important and not much highlighted role in this, and his life story, up to his murder in Kabul, is fascinating.But, Murray's retelling is too wordy, contains way too much detail, and ends up being too tedious too often. Bits and pieces are captivatingly put down on paper, including Burnes' initial rise and move to India, and the British military advance towards Kabul, against Burnes' advice, being two of those. But it's not enough to save the book.
Kurlansky starts off by providing the four factors that contributed to 1968's flurry of revolts:
+ The example that was set in the early 1960s by the civil rights movement. + A generation that felt so different and alienated that it rejected all authority. + A war that was universally hated, providing a cause célèbre. + The emergence of yet-loosely controlled, and therefore much more raw and direct, television.
The book's interesting, but also feels a bit quaint. Focusing primarily on the U.S., with reasonable interest in Poland and Czechoslovakia and with a few sidesteps here and there, many of the stories are fascinating for the detail Kurlansky brings to them, but are also a tad obscure. Many of the leading roles were played by individuals that now have been all but completely lost to history. For example, I was very aware, growing up, of Jan Palace, the Czech student who immolated himself in Prague, protesting the Soviet-induced end of the Prague spring. But, in 1968, before Palach, Ronald W. Brazee did the same to himself in the US, after half a dozen or so had preceded him in the years prior.
There are clear parallels with the rampant dissatisfaction of a younger generation and the established order, then, and the more recent Occupy and Anonymous movements. Kurlansky's book, from 2004, predates these.
It's interesting Kurlansky puts the beginning of the end of the Soviet Union at the botched intervention in Prague in 1968. I'm now reading Charlie Wilson's War, where the author puts the end of the Soviet Union squarely on the shoulders on the American intervention, through the Mujahedin, in Afghanistan.
Kennard's story could be ‘the greatest story never (before) told'. The beans he spills on how big business and American political hegemony controls everyone else are painful, perhaps eye opening and certainly disheartening.
The Bretton Woods institutions, if not designed as such, quickly became vehicles for projecting American hegemony across the world. In economies where the IMF and World Bank are not dictating the Washington consensus, they and the global, to a large extent American, business elite, subvert those economies until they have no choice but to fall over and accept dictated terms. Or, as an alternative, they wait until some disaster, say an earthquake, allows them to step in and create neoliberal economies that benefit outsiders, as opposed to the indigenous population.
Kennard jumps from narrative to narrative, perhaps a bit too much, and would benefit from being more concise, but the sheer scope of the global cabal he describes, means that virtual all countries outside of Europe have had to face, and almost always lose against, ‘The Racket'.
The Racket is opportunistic, looking out for their own, ready to sacrifice the well being of unnamed millions for their own benefit. And, having honed their skills, they have perfected their methodology, getting away with it time and again, even when their plans, time and again, turn out to be the social failures, if big-business successes, that create the likes of Iraq.
It's not a stretch to discuss Israel as a client state of the US in this context, as Israel is an important extension of American foreign policy and thus business interests. Israel only became of strategic interest after Arab client states started to became more independent, or turned more towards the Soviet Union, specifically from the late 1960s onwards.
Amazingly, American ‘aid' to Israel has added up to more than 23000 USD per living Israeli citizen.
Kennard also spends time on the few cases where the US, and The Racket, have found some pushback. Notably Venezuela, Bolivia and the Zapatista movement in Mexico, while praising the Latin American shift to the left.
Yet, though Bolivia is still managing, Venezuela has become a mess, not in the least due to result of American policies, while much of Latin America has swung to the right in the last two years, typically by big media and big business being able to subvert truth, projecting a fantasy, any fantasy, as reality.
Almost a footnote at the end of the book, Kennard points out that ‘the racketeers are genuinely afraid of the creative arts', as artists exist outside of the conventional system and don't have to follow the narrative, and can not easily be controlled.
They therefore have more freedom and thus are more of a risk in overthrowing the system.
Kennard's book is essential, even though it would benefit from being slimmed down. Yet, I'm not convinced it's enough. The Occupy movement, the Arab Spring, the shift to the left in Latin America, none seem long enough lasting to make the difference society needs to be able to fight big business, the Bretton Woods institutions, and American hegemony.
Like a very, very long essay, but one that lacks focus and draws no overarching conclusions. Interesting for its many associations, all loosely related to ‘the city', there are plenty deductions the author implies as obvious that I have an issue with, leaving me with the impression that, at best, the book is a showcase for how much Darren Anderson has read.
Feiling spends a lot of pages on trying to explain the history of the conflicts Colombia has had to deal with over the past few decades, specifically the interplay between army, FARC and militias. Now, with the peace talks between FARC and the government having come to fruition (after a public vote rejected a deal earlier this year, a new deal was agreed on that didn't need a public vote), this takes up too much space and this four year old book already feels outdated.
Here are a few interesting tidbits:
+ Simon Bolivar considered making Colombia an English speaking country after independence. He was dissuaded by his second in command. + Colombia's rivers and lakes contain more freshwater than those of the US and Canada, combined. + Avianca is the second oldest operating airline in the world (KLM is just two months older). + Feiling suggests the Guane were a white tribe that did not arrive from Asia, but there seems to be little evidence of that, besides that they did seem to have been more European in their appearance. + Colombia has the largest coal mine in Latin America.
At some point, Feiling agitates against the modern backpacker, a troupe of which he encounters when hiking with a Colombian friend. He wonders about their disconnect with the 'real' Colombia while being continuously connected with their Facebook friends and this particular strata of information that includes knowing how to bridge the Darien gap and which hostel to stay at in Nepal. In short, the author likes to point out he is experiencing the real Colombia. But, he also suggests that these latter day tourists look for a mix of three things; the classical Grand Tour, with the objective of 'toughening up' by experiencing foreign cultures, the post 1960s version of the Grand Tour with the objective of loosening up, and the typical holiday maker, wanting to leave the cares of the world behind. To me, this analysis seems spot on, though the author seems to miss that he's just one of them, with slightly different weights attached to these three portions. Or not. Just a few pages later, he admits to joining them in their activities.
The author discusses places that have the power to speak to the imagination. Out of the way, or, for particular obscure reasons, isolated, off limits, or forgotten.
In the introduction, the author confesses the reason for his fascination as being a kind of need for discovery. ‘In a fully discovered world, exploration does not stop; it just has to be reinvented.'
The author does a good job at having collected out of the way ‘places' to conjure up just the right level of otherworldliness that comes with modern discovery, even a sense of psychogeography, even if, at times, his analyses as to why they impress us, are a tad too pretentious.
But, sometimes, some need meaning, perhaps the reason why we're curious, which is exactly what the author tries to address, even if it doesn't work all the time for everyone.
Here's the list of what Bonnett talks about.
Lost places
+ Sandy Island; the large sandy island off New Caledonia that an Australian ship in 2012 discovered to have been marked erroneously on offline and online maps for over 100 years.
+ Leningrad; representing the nostalgia, attitudal and ethnic changes that can come with a name change.
+ Arne; a now disappeared world war 2 decoy town in Dorset used to prevent a nearby factory from being bombed.
+ Old Mecca; all but destroyed by the Saudis to make way for the Muslim Disneyland around the pilgrimage, there's a nostalgia amongst some for how things were simpler, before.
+ New Moore; an island of the coast of India and Bangladesh that appeared in 1971, gave rise to a border conflict between the two countries, before sinking again in 2010.
+ Time landscape; a triangle of land in NYC, created by artist Alan Sonfist and filled with native flora from before the settlement of New York.
+ The Aralqum desert; the desert replacing the Aral sea. Fascinating, apparently, local legends exist that the sea was once land.
Hidden geographies
+ The labyrinth; an underground network in Minneapolis - St. Paul.
+ Zheleznogorsk; one of fourty or so formally closed soviet cities that have now, after the opening up of the Soviet Union, reinvented themselves as effectively gated communities.
+ The underground cities of Cappadocia.
+ A fox den in the author's back yard.
+ North cemetery, Manila; one of the cemeteries around the world that also houses squatters.
+ North Sentinel island; an island in the Andreman and Nicobar archipelago that hosts an uncontacted tribe.
No man's lands
+ The 27km stretch of land between Senegal and Guinea's border posts.
+ Bir Tawil; the stretch of land between Egypt and Sudan that neither claim, as both prefer differently drawn borders that give each control over an other stretch of land on the Red Sea coast.
+ Nahuaterique; one of the strips of land that changed between El Salvador and Honduras, after the soccer war of 1969 and a subsequent ruling by the International Court of Justice.
+ Twayil Abu Jarwal; one of a series of unrecognized Bedouin settlement in the Negev desert that regularly get destroyed by Israel.
+ A traffic island in Newcastle, sealed off from the outside world by three bordering roads.
Dead cities
+ Wittenoom; formerly a blue asbestos mining town, abandoned for health and safety reasons and deleted off maps and from references.
+ Kangbashi; one of the newly constructed but empty cities in China, this one in Inner Mongolia.
+ Kijong-dong; a fake village built in the 1950s, just north of the DMZ, separating the two Koreas, to impress the south with the prosperity of the north.
+ Aghdam; a town close to Karabagh, completely destroyed by Armenian forces in the early 1990s in the conflict with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabagh.
+ Pripyat; the town, next to Chernobyl that was eventually abandoned.
+ The ‘archeological park of Sicilian incompletion'; a collection of large unfinished buildings in the town of Giarre on Sicily.
Spaces of exception
+ Camp Zeist; the Dutch military base that, between 1999 and 2002, became Scottish territory to host the Lockerbie trial.
+ Geneva Freeport; a large storage space for extreme valuables that can change hands without accruing taxation.
+ Bright light; The code name for an inconspicuous house in Bucharest that was also a Black Site, one of the locations used by the CIA for interrogation of ‘terrorists'.
+ International airspace.
+ Gutterspace; the useless strips of land between buildings, typical for New York, apparently, that some enjoy collecting.
+ Bountiful; one of many utopian villages part of Russia's Green Exodus movement, this one close to the Siberian town of Novosibirsk.
+ Mount Athos; a rocky Greek peninsula that's effectively one big monastery and off limits to women.
+ Brotas Quilombo; a quilombo close to São Paulo. A quilombo is the name for settlements that arose when escaped slaves grouped together to form independent, free, communities.
+ FARC-controlled Colombia.
+ Hobyo; a ‘feral', lawless, town on the Somalian coast.
Enclaves and breakaway nations
+ Baarle-Hertog and Baarle-Nassau; the collection of enclaves and exclaves on the Dutch/Belgian border.
+ Chitmahals; the large collection of enclaves on the Indian/Bangladesh border, created as the consequence of deals and counter deals between regional princes in the 18th century.
+ Sealand; the now defunct but most famous of micro nations off the British coast.
+ United Kingdom of Lunda Tchokwe: an aspiring country in the east of Angola.
+ Gagauzia; the other, and even tinier, nation in Moldova that has a, albeit lukewarm, desire to breakaway.
Floating islands
+ Pumice and trash islands.
+ The floating Maldives; an upmarket tourist project of a series of interconnected highly expensive floating villas, in the Maldives.
+ Nipterk P-32; an artificial spray ice island in the Canadian arctic.
+ The World; a cruise ship with a permanent, rich, clientele.
Ephemeral places
+ Hog's Back lay bay; a lay bay in Surrey popular for dogging.
+ LAX parking lot; a particular section filled with motor homes, used by airlines staff as semi permanent accommodation.
+ Nowhere; a temporary festival, similar to Burning Man, but in Spain.
+ Stacy's lane; a small street used by the author, as a child, as a place for exploration and imagination.