09-29-2024, 07:02 PM
Good day, DI.
Today, I post about the notion of “nationalism” and the associated dangers aligned with that “movement”.
I offer these thoughts as another way to frame our current state of affairs in the US as well as globally - you can define many issues as “nationalist” vs. “globalist” agendas.
Here is what I mean by that:
First, the notion of “Nationalism” is obviously the antithesis of “Globalism”. We tend to define political parties and assign a number of “conspiracy theories” to the “globalists” and “nationalists” more-less duking it out over who controls America and at least by some extension the world. So, are you a globalist or a nationalist?
You don’t need to answer, but that answer will frame how you view the balance of my post today.
When thinking about nations, America may be “the best” at some things but not all things. We’re good at arming the world, advancing technology, innovation at scale, finance, the sciences - and did I say defense? But, other parts of the NATO world are far more skilled in various areas than we are. We’re better together in many ways. This is why the world already exists as it does.
But, I get why people love their “home country” and its “culture” or “history” - the basis of “nationalism” isn’t really bad at the theoretical level.
We need to think on that point a bit though… what is the culture we’re preserving? What is the history or legacy that must live on? Where I live, we have lots of cultures in a very progressive environment. We don’t really have a unique “culture” beyond general acceptance. There isn’t “one” culture in the US any longer.
The problem that I identified with “nationalist” view is we already live in a global society at the level of business or “high society”. That’s now trickling down to the top 5%. Borders are just different sets of regulations if you’re multi-national. We are already there and going backwards from it would cause a lot of issues.
And from that, we now can see why many explain “Nationalism” as an “extremist” viewpoint. It is relative to our existing global system that is already hyper-interconnected and for various reasons we’ll need to come together (NATO) for our collective benefit - business, defense, populations - all of it. That’s why it’s happening and has been happening for 40+ years.
While globalists rarely say expressly why “nationalists” are bad, I submit that they don’t because there isn’t really anything exceptionally bad about being proud of their country. Globalists are proud of their country, too.
When Globalists suggest Nationalists are “extreme”, a component of that is history showing nationalistic movements lead to armed conflict. WW2, WW1, etc. That’s destabilizing. We also know that it’s good for the global economy to remain global.
And most importantly, defense of all of those markets and people requires a collective global approach.
The US and allies need to band together to remain dominant in the world as a collective region. If NATO didn’t exist Russia would have pushed way further west almost certainly as an example. The simple existence of NATO is keeping Europe largely safe at the moment. It’s hugely impactful to over billion people who collectively make up the western world.
But, you don’t get there with a nationalist movement.
These are just a few examples of how the nationalist movements impact everything from trade to defense to long-term security; the nationalist movement runs into problems by seeking less connectedness in a world that’s naturally becoming more connected - ongoing - and that isn’t going to stop.
Consider a “nationalist” US president if they took it to the extreme - Europe would collapse, war would break out - all kinds of issues erupt. The world would go back to being very fractious, we’d go establish treaties and do the whole thing over again in the future because where we are today is the natural evolution of this process - it would only happen again.
And in a twist of irony, nationalism actually created the bedrock for globalism. It was nationalist competition that drove various countries to compete on the global stage. That eventually made business global, interdependence was created and here we are.
Closing out my thoughts here, “nationalistic” movements tend to be popular in the short run but not so great over longer periods of time. Trying to be more nationalistic or isolationist in a growingly interconnected world harms growth and security - doubly so as more of the world forms larger alliances. This is likely why you see so much vitriol towards Trump, Putin and perhaps Iran. They all represent a nationalistic view that presents a threat to the global order that already exists over most of the western world in particular - and order that was generally successful until recently and specifically until Trump.
Ironically, this line of thought explains the “uniparty” view of the world - If you’re higher up in politics, you’re a globalist because your decisions have global implications (some of them). This impacts the economy, military, etc. and that has knock-on global impact. Those points explain the worry about nationalism in any country - by definition proliferating nationalism will make the world fractured and fractured societies tend to have more conflict and worse outcomes coupled with constrained economic activity.
I find this a perspective worth consideration in our “all or nothing” world and a lot of desire (or so it appears) for more nationalist mindsets.
Today, I post about the notion of “nationalism” and the associated dangers aligned with that “movement”.
I offer these thoughts as another way to frame our current state of affairs in the US as well as globally - you can define many issues as “nationalist” vs. “globalist” agendas.
Here is what I mean by that:
First, the notion of “Nationalism” is obviously the antithesis of “Globalism”. We tend to define political parties and assign a number of “conspiracy theories” to the “globalists” and “nationalists” more-less duking it out over who controls America and at least by some extension the world. So, are you a globalist or a nationalist?
You don’t need to answer, but that answer will frame how you view the balance of my post today.
When thinking about nations, America may be “the best” at some things but not all things. We’re good at arming the world, advancing technology, innovation at scale, finance, the sciences - and did I say defense? But, other parts of the NATO world are far more skilled in various areas than we are. We’re better together in many ways. This is why the world already exists as it does.
But, I get why people love their “home country” and its “culture” or “history” - the basis of “nationalism” isn’t really bad at the theoretical level.
We need to think on that point a bit though… what is the culture we’re preserving? What is the history or legacy that must live on? Where I live, we have lots of cultures in a very progressive environment. We don’t really have a unique “culture” beyond general acceptance. There isn’t “one” culture in the US any longer.
The problem that I identified with “nationalist” view is we already live in a global society at the level of business or “high society”. That’s now trickling down to the top 5%. Borders are just different sets of regulations if you’re multi-national. We are already there and going backwards from it would cause a lot of issues.
And from that, we now can see why many explain “Nationalism” as an “extremist” viewpoint. It is relative to our existing global system that is already hyper-interconnected and for various reasons we’ll need to come together (NATO) for our collective benefit - business, defense, populations - all of it. That’s why it’s happening and has been happening for 40+ years.
While globalists rarely say expressly why “nationalists” are bad, I submit that they don’t because there isn’t really anything exceptionally bad about being proud of their country. Globalists are proud of their country, too.
When Globalists suggest Nationalists are “extreme”, a component of that is history showing nationalistic movements lead to armed conflict. WW2, WW1, etc. That’s destabilizing. We also know that it’s good for the global economy to remain global.
And most importantly, defense of all of those markets and people requires a collective global approach.
The US and allies need to band together to remain dominant in the world as a collective region. If NATO didn’t exist Russia would have pushed way further west almost certainly as an example. The simple existence of NATO is keeping Europe largely safe at the moment. It’s hugely impactful to over billion people who collectively make up the western world.
But, you don’t get there with a nationalist movement.
These are just a few examples of how the nationalist movements impact everything from trade to defense to long-term security; the nationalist movement runs into problems by seeking less connectedness in a world that’s naturally becoming more connected - ongoing - and that isn’t going to stop.
Consider a “nationalist” US president if they took it to the extreme - Europe would collapse, war would break out - all kinds of issues erupt. The world would go back to being very fractious, we’d go establish treaties and do the whole thing over again in the future because where we are today is the natural evolution of this process - it would only happen again.
And in a twist of irony, nationalism actually created the bedrock for globalism. It was nationalist competition that drove various countries to compete on the global stage. That eventually made business global, interdependence was created and here we are.
Closing out my thoughts here, “nationalistic” movements tend to be popular in the short run but not so great over longer periods of time. Trying to be more nationalistic or isolationist in a growingly interconnected world harms growth and security - doubly so as more of the world forms larger alliances. This is likely why you see so much vitriol towards Trump, Putin and perhaps Iran. They all represent a nationalistic view that presents a threat to the global order that already exists over most of the western world in particular - and order that was generally successful until recently and specifically until Trump.
Ironically, this line of thought explains the “uniparty” view of the world - If you’re higher up in politics, you’re a globalist because your decisions have global implications (some of them). This impacts the economy, military, etc. and that has knock-on global impact. Those points explain the worry about nationalism in any country - by definition proliferating nationalism will make the world fractured and fractured societies tend to have more conflict and worse outcomes coupled with constrained economic activity.
I find this a perspective worth consideration in our “all or nothing” world and a lot of desire (or so it appears) for more nationalist mindsets.
