Globalization Will Be the Economic and Political Battle of Our Time
President Trump told the UN General Assembly that the future does not belong to the globalists. The impact of his war on trade is proving him wrong.
The bad news is we are starting to see the effect of Trump’s trade war in the economy, and it isn’t pretty. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Trade is the glue that largely holds together and fortifies the global economy. Unravel it, and the impact makes itself known - quickly.
So far, we have seen U.S business confidence drop for several months. Germany barely escaped a recession earlier this year. Global economic results have been sluggish. This is largely because of U.S trade wars. It’s just the start.
It is important to keep in mind that the global nature of the economy serves our wealth and needs. And one cannot build walls around it, or try to turn the oceans into moats. Problems in Europe are felt on this side of the pond, as are growth bonanzas in the Pacific.
Some such as Trump are no doubt unaware of the sordid history of the term globalist, but it originated as a cant word for supposedly Jewish lack of loyalty to a country, much as “rootless cosmopolitan” evoked in the days of the Czar.
While Trump is no doubt ignorant of that history, his ally Steve Bannon has no such excuse. Not surprisingly, his final TV commercial of the 2016 presidential campaign fit the anti-Zionist bill. Trump talked about “globalism” and featured former Federal Reserve Board Chair Janet Yellen, George Soros, and then-Goldman Sachs Chair Lloyd Blankfein as well as Hillary Clinton. Spot the connection? But let’s forget that, at least for the moment.
Globalization offers the world enormous benefits, and has been doing so for hundreds of years. It brings together the widest possible circle of people who need capital to produce new and better technologies and systems, and the widest base of people to provide it. It creates a worldwide pool of talent that makes new international products possible. It gives consumers the ability to choose from a greater range of choices. And it makes wealth independent and free, able to create economically dynamic projects in all parts of the world.
But it does more than create wealth for the wealthy. It steps into areas of need. Blockbuster medications have the opportunity to move through a busy pipeline. Medical technologies like MRIs become available. What exactly is the problem with all that?
The problem is fear. Of change. Of being left behind. Our global economy is the greatest wealth producing and distributing forum the world has ever had. But it inspires fear among people who worry it will not benefit them.
This is not a new phenomenon. For hundreds of years now, people have reacted viscerally - often violently - to this supposed threat. It spawned a wave of nationalism that we continue to feel the effects of. At its worst,it has contributed to the growth of racist regimes, such as Hitler’s and Mussolini’s. While leftist, anti-capitalist nationalism is the natural resting place of opposition to globalization and the irrational fear of profit, the right seems to offer the most threatening form of retrenchment.
Left wing nationalists are often inspired by a fear of the past, right wing nationalists are more likely to be petrified of the future.
And out is always the enormous potential for the future where globalization points.
What we are seeing today is a prolonged reaction to the 2008 financial meltdown. Despite recovery, it left a deep sense that fear - of change. Characterized by unwillingness to take a risk, suspicion of institutions that are the hallmarks of capitalism, including universities, the reaction of fear could well slow down globalization in its tracks, slow the wheels of progress, grow divisions in society - and leave billions outside globalization’s wide walls. Imagine the protectionism of the interwar years - lasting through an even longer period of peace.
This is the battle in which we are currently drawn - between an open and closed society, between countries with walls and barriers and ones with avenues of growth, and one with a reservoir of resources for those who seek growth and change and one with regulations and red tape to tie down those who fear them. This may be the economic and political battle of our time. Its resolution will decide between a bright future for those who sign up for it - and a place of fear for those who don’t.
