I can even check my email in Madagascar...

How long before every place on earth is effectively and redundantly connected to the world telecommunications grid? Not long it seems. The island nations of the Indian Ocean have spotty satellite connectivity now, but an international effort is afoot to connect them to each other and the grid, via Africa, by fiber optic cable. (The five nations of the Indian Ocean Commission are Madagascar, Mauritius, Réunion, Comoros and Seychelles.)

 

Here's an article from One World Africa and another from PC World.

Of particular note is the cooperation between these nations, the EU, and the UN.

The Addis Ababa ICT forum was organized by the European Commission, the European Union's executive and regulatory body, the United Nations Commission for Africa (UNECA) and African, Caribbean and Pacific countries.

Now if I can only get my cell phone to work in my house here in the United States.

News of the day.

While several of these countries don't get along very well, at least they're still talking. I do wonder about these regional unions - EU, ASEAN, African Union, NAFTA, MERCOSUR, CAFTA, etc. I think each union is progress, but can integration get stuck at this level? I choose to be optimistic. The article is about SAARC, South Asia Association of Regional Cooperation.

Moment of Truth. Religion poses interesting obstacles to the idea of one people, one world. This Economist article discusses the entanglement of politics and religion around the world, and difficulty, if not danger, of conversion. 

Turkey's top court rejects ban on governing party. It will be interesting to see how this development affects Turkey's dance with the EU over membership. One EU MP is quoted as saying, "There is a great sense of relief among Europeans."

The half-century trend toward trade liberalisation has been stymied for the moment. China and India are important players now, and this IHT article shows just how much. They're concerns about food security, and the US recalcitrance on agricultural subsidies threw a wrench into trade talks. What trade talks? The Doha Round, of course, which appears to have come to a screeching halt. The Economist explains.

The First One World President?

Wilson had his League of Nations. FDR and Truman got the ball rolling on the United Nations and Bretton Woods. Kennedy started the Peace Corps and famously claimed to be a Berliner. Nixon went the China and Bush 41 thought out loud about a New World Order. Unfortunately, Bush 43 has decided it's us against the world in a bloody clash of civilizations, but hopefully that will soon be an unpleasant memory. 

If elected, might Barack Obama be the first One World President? Black African father, white American mother. Raised in multi-cultural Hawaii with a several-year stay in Indonesia. Last week, in a speech in Berlin, Germany, he mentioned his fellow global citizens twice. While the right-wing and the ultra-nationalists are in a bother over his Berlin comments, might Barack Obama move the world closer to unity? I don't know for certain, but I'm hopeful. 

Here's a link to the Berlin speech, A World That Stands as One (video, pics, transcript). The talking heads spouted that anyone, even McCain could have given this same speech. I couldn't disagree more. They fretted that it was banal and unspecific, I say it was a global picture in broad brush strokes. 

President Barack Obama, of the United States of America. If we are able to say those words come January 2009, doesn't that mean the world has changed, at least a little bit?

Rethinking the World Can Start Anywhere

Even automobile marketers are encouraging us to rethink things...

Saturn, Rethink American.

The Internet Brings Us Closer Together... And Makes it Easier to Hate Each Other

I was just discussing with someone today how the ease of global travel and the reach of global communications are forces bringing us together. In the case of the internet, what the internet giveth, it also taketh away. 

This week's Economist details how hate groups are using the internet for dark purposes. Read The Brave New World of e-hatred.

Excerpt below...

"What is much more disturbing is the way in which skilled young surfers—the very people whom the internet might have liberated from the shackles of state-sponsored ideologies—are using the wonders of electronics to stoke hatred between countries, races or religions. Sometimes these cyber-zealots seem to be acting at their governments’ behest—but often they are working on their own, determined to outdo their political masters in propagating dislike of some unspeakable foe."

Countering the Clash of Civilizations

The Economist should be considered essential reading for all global citizens because of its...well...global coverage. Some recent articles show some cautiously hopeful signs that Huntington's Clash of Civilizations may not be as bad as he speculates.

There may be growing links between the EU and the Mediterranean states of northern Africa.

Club Med

The Med's Moment Comes

The View from Club Med

Sarko's Southern Dream

Common Terms

For those desirous of joining the conversation, it's always beneficial to have a common understanding of the terms. For those playing at home, I direct you to Wikipedia...

Cosmopolitanism

Transnationalism

Internationalism

World Federalism

Let's stipulate that Wikipedia may be imperfect and go from there. This ought to keep you busy for awhile.

Fareed Zakaria for Secretary of State

Ok, maybe I'm being overly enthusiastic, but I've read Zakaria's The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad, Revised Edition, and I'm reading The Post-American World and both are outstanding. I'm thankful to Fareed for helping me out with a recent discussion I've had with some friends. Here's the pertinent excerpt from pages 61-62...

"The late Daniel Patrick Moynihan, America's leading scholar-senator, once said, "The central conservative truth is that it is culture, not politics, that determines the success of a society. The central liberal truth is that politics can change a culture and save it from itself." That gets it about right. Culture is important, terribly important. But it can change. Cultures are complex. At any given moment, certain attributes are prominent and seem immutable. And then politics and economics shift, and those attributes wane in importance, making space for others. The Arab world was once the center of science and trade. In recent decades, its chief exports have been oil and Islamic fundamentalism. Any cultural argument must be able to explain both periods of success and periods of failure."

Zakaria states this in a section titled, Is Culture Destiny?, where he discusses the waxing and waning of civilizations based on characteristics of their culture. Examples include the heights of Arab culture in science and commerce at a time that Europe was a backwater, and China's turn inward at a time when it was arguably the most technologically advanced civilization on the planet. It's important to me because it highlights the fact that cultures do change and cultural characteristics that create conflict between peoples must not always remain so. I would like to learn the mechanisms by which cultural changes occur so that cultural conflict can be reduced. 

I think it important also that Zakaria (through Moynihan) points out a core difference between the academic conservative and liberal viewpoints. It seems to me that tradition-and-order-loving conservatives the world over believe the world is the way it is and certain cultural elements are immutable. You could probably follow this line of thought from Burke to Buckley. Liberals, or Progressives, believe that things can always get better, things can change, that we can make progress. 

By the way, a certain mover-and-shaker, likely future-leader-of-the-free-world, has read The Post-American World (besides me). Follow the link here.

Further btw, I will be joining a group to discuss Post-American World next week and will have a book report for you afterwards.

Human Universals

I read Donald Brown's Human Universals several years ago, and in developing a discussion of the prospects for long-term peaceful coexistence of humankind, pointing out the things we have in common is a good starting point. I will probably read the book again in the near future. It's still for sale, but only used copies are available. 

The list of human universals was also extensively cited in Steven Pinker's The Blank Slate. Read the list here. Interestingly, these are characteristics for which there are NO known exceptions. 

Following up on a recent discussion some of us have had, I will point out that culture is on the list. Culture is universal. It's the specific manifestations of cultures that differ and often trip us up. When you read the list it should come as no surprise that we all cry, we are all jealous, we are all proud, and we are all empathetic. There is a level at which we are all the same.

 

In looking for the cover art for the book online, I came across humanuniversals.com, which is the link to a college course on human universals (in which I'd love to enroll!) though it doesn't say which university, only that it's in the DC area. The link includes a great reading list, a cool FAQ, and other worthwhile bits of information. I've bookmarked it... I'll be reading it in detail.