First degree murder?
October 13th, 2008 at 15:21
As la revolucion continues unabated, it’s making me wonder if this crisis is worse for me than I originally thought. My first degree was a degree in International Relations & Globalisation, and I’m somewhat concerned that it’s going to become meaningless because of this global financial crisis.
Back in those heady days of earlier this year, I was taught about Held and McGrew’s various characterisations of globalisation as a process. To cut a long story short, there are basically three schools of globalisation – the hyperglobalists, who reckon globalisation is in full effect, the world will never be the same again the very notion of the nation-state is laughable, and at the very least deserves sneering at, and there’s the transformationalists who believe that globalisation is an ongoing process – and there was a third school, the sceptics, who were could be characterised as having their heads in the sand, still believing in the nation state as an international actor and the like – basically they thought globalisation was a load of rubbish.
It was this last school of thought that I had the most contempt for, to the point where I really struggled to write about it – it felt so self-evidently ridiculous to posit that globalisation hasn’t changed anything that I just wanted to submit photos of me belming and point and my face as a critique of the sceptic position.
The trouble is, that with the on-going financial crisis, I’m starting to wonder if the sceptics sort of had a point, maybe. Banks are being nationalised, the international financial system is slowly creaking to a halt as states work to impose more regulation and it can only be a matter of time before barriers are raised back up and the post-1929 protectionist mantra becomes fashionable again. More importantly, it might take meaning from part of my degree.
You see, I’ve got something of a vested interest in globalisation being an actual thing. If they decide globalisation doesn’t exist, then my first degree may as well have been BA (Hons) International Relations & Homeopathy. This is probably why I’m so concerned about global financial meltdown.
I’m worried too that it might not end here. What if this collapse causes the entire international system to break down? What if tough economic times and the pursuit of resources causes war and strife? What if we end up destroying each other in a nuclear holocaust and go back to living in caves and a hunter-gatherer lifestyle? Then there won’t be any International Relations for me to be moderately insightful about. Meaning that theology students may have more credibility that I do, as we gaze up at the sky and wonder what that big ball that it hurts to look at is.
So please, international banking system, please don’t collapse… For my sake!
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