[list_indonesia] [ppiindia] The End of the End of History
- From: "Ikranagara" <ikra@xxxxxxxxxxx>
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- Date: Mon, 28 Mar 2005 05:16:57 -0000
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from: http://www.geocities.com/postneoliberal_review/Gray1.htm
Post-Neoliberal Review
Significant Post-Neoliberalism Texts
=20
from the IWM NEWSLETTER 77 Summer 2002/No.3
=20
The End of the End of History
by John Gray
POLITICAL COMMENTARY
=20
THROUGHOUT MODERN TIMES liberal states have always co-existed=20
alongside
many kinds of tyranny. Similarly, the modern world has always=20
contained numerous
economic systems =96 many varieties of capitalism, planned and guided=20
economies,
and a host of hybrid economic systems not easily classified.
=20
Diplomacy and international law developed to cope with the fact of=20
diverse
regimes. Yet throughout the 20th century global politics was shaped=20
by the project
of unifying the world within a single regime. Insofar as it remained=20
committed to
Marxist ideology, the long-term goal of the Soviet regime was world=20
communism.
The whole world was to be a single socialist economy, administered=20
by forms of
governance that were to be everywhere the same.
=20
This Marxist project is now widely and rightly viewed as utopian.=20
Even so, its
disappearance as a force in world politics has not been accompanied=20
by an acceptance
of a diversity of political systems. With communism's fall we were,=20
in Francis=20
Fukuyama's famous phrase, at the `end of history,' a time when=20
western governments
could dedicate themselves to unifying the international system into=20
a=20
single regime based on free markets and democratic government. But=20
this project
is as utopian as Marxism once was, and promises to be considerably=20
more shortlived
than the Soviet Union.
=20
Many reasons exist for why the Soviet bloc collapsed, but =96 contrary=20
to conventional
opinion =96 economic inefficiencies were not central among them. The=20
Soviet
bloc disintegrated because it could not cope with nationalist=20
dissent in Poland
and the Baltic states and more generally because a single economic=20
and political
system could not meet the needs of vastly different societies and=20
peoples.
=20
Marxism is a version of economic determinism. It predicts that=20
differences between
societies and peoples narrow as they achieve similar levels of=20
economic development.
Nationalism and religion have no enduring political importance,=20
Marxists
believed. In the short run, they can be used to fuel anti-
imperialist movements.
Ultimately, they are obstacles to the construction of socialism.=20
Guided by these
beliefs, the Soviet state waged an incessant war on the national and=20
religious traditions
of the peoples they governed.=20
=20
In practice, Soviet rulers were compelled to compromise in order to=20
remain in=20
power. Few could be described as wholehearted ideologues. Even so,=20
the Soviet
system's rigidity was largely the result of the fact that it was=20
established on a false
premise.
=20
The basis of the Soviet system was the Marxian interpretation of=20
history in
which every society is destined to adopt the same economic system=20
and the same
form of government. The USSR fell apart because its monolithic=20
institutions could
not accommodate nations =96 Czechs and Uzbeks, Hungarians and=20
Siberians, Poles
and Mongols =96 whose histories, circumstances and aspirations were=20
radically divergent.
=20
Today, the global free market constructed in the aftermath of the=20
Soviet collapse
is also falling apart =96 and for similar reasons. Like Marxists, neo-
liberals are economic
determinists. They believe that countries everywhere are destined to
adopt the same economic system and therefore the same political=20
institutions.
Nothing can prevent the world from becoming one vast free market;=20
but the inevitable
process of convergence can be accelerated. Western governments and=20
transnational
institutions can act as midwives for the new world.
=20
Implausible as it sounds, this ideology underlies institutions such=20
as the International
Monetary Fund (IMF). Argentina and Indonesia have very different
problems, but for the IMF the solution is the same: they must both=20
become free-market
economies. Russia at the time of communism's fall was a militarized=20
rustbelt,
but the IMF was convinced that it could be transformed into a=20
western-style
market economy. An idealized model of Anglo-Saxon capitalism was=20
promoted everywhere.
=20
Unsurprisingly, this highly ideological approach to economic policy=20
has not
succeeded. Indonesia is in ruins, while Argentina is rapidly ceasing=20
to be a first-world
country. Russia has put the neo-liberal period behind it and is now=20
developing
on a path better suited to its history and circumstances.
=20
Countries that have best weathered the economic storms of the past=20
few years
are those =96 like India, China and Japan which took the IMF model=20
with a large
grain of salt. To be sure, like the few remaining Marxists who=20
defend central economic
planning, the ideologues of the IMF claim that their policies did=20
not fail;
they were not fully implemented. But this response is disingenuous.=20
In both cases,
the policies were tried =96 and failed at great human cost.
=20
If the global free market is unraveling, it is not because of the=20
human costs of its
policies in countries such as Argentina, Indonesia and Russia. It is=20
because it no
longer suits the countries that most actively promote it. Under the=20
pressure of a
stock market downturn, the US is abandoning policies of global free=20
trade in favor
of more traditional policies of protectionism. This turn of events=20
is not surprising.
Throughout its history, America has always tried to insulate its=20
markets from foreign
competition. So history has once more triumphed over ideology.
=20
With America's loss of interest the chief prop of neo-liberal=20
policies has been
pulled away. Mainstream politicians may still nod reverently when=20
the global free
market is invoked, but in practice the world is reverting to an=20
older and more
durable model. It is being tacitly accepted that in the future, as=20
in the past, the world
will contain a variety of economic systems and regimes. The global=20
free market is
about to join communism in history's museum of discarded utopias.
=20
John Gray is Professor of European Thought
at the London School of Economics. His
latest book, Straw Dogs: Thoughts on
Humans and Other Animals, is to be
published by Granta Books (London) this
September.
=20
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