From the Times, the best article I have read on the NO tragedy, maybe the best article I have read recently period.
Inequality does not explain why anyone faced with the present crisis should wish to sexually assault a seven-year-old, as happened in the Louisiana Superdome, but it may help to rationalise the communal disintegration of the past week. Many of the boasts made on behalf of Western civilisation are just a handy by-product of Western money. We get along because we can afford to; in New Orleans, wealth was removed from the equation, and what values were left? This was not just a failure for central government but for social scientists, educators, mentors, role models, the supposed civilising influence we wish to impose around the world.
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
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2 comments:
Well yes and no - we never promised anyone civilisation if I recollect, just democracy and free markets... the killer deal is that if you totally free your market democracy becomes a saleable commodity (anyone for freedom and democratic markets, hey calm I'm only joking I KNOW markets can't be democratic - was that Milton Friedman I heard squeaking somewhere? - hey call the police there's a monetarist around...)
Anyway America is almost as far from being a free market as China is, and not awfully democratic either, given that voting is just one of the things that the poor don't do an awful lot of.
This however is a story about Empire and how the myth of society works in an imperial system - its one thing sending the troops out to conquer your enemies, its quite another building homes for heroes.
Thus what IS interesting given the deep if confused legacy of Vietnam (with its 60,000 or so casulaties) is what the medium-term legacy of both Iraq and New Orleans will be.
Some commentators have suggested America may wake up and address the social divisions at its core, and question what it actuals delivers for its citizens.
However this seems doubtful given that great division of wealth is necessary to deliver great wealth and power to those at the top of the pile and a reasonable amount to a large section in the middle, some of whom do vote.
Remember all that reaching out to Middle America? - Did someone say Middle England? And what was that about how great it is to be led by Atlanticists?
Well no and yes! The US and UK do not package free markets and democracy as simply their spin on the age-old argument but as the universal panacea. So I do think the author has a point in saying, if so, so what...?
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