(lawyer, president of LawMarket Co.) phone # 02-555-3601) |
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II. Dilemmas of the 20th century.
III. Decline and Demolition of civilization
IV. Transformation of civilization: reformationof structures.
1. Implementation of the transformationof
civilization.
2. Reformation of the modern states.
3. Reformation of the capitalist marketstructure.
4. Implementation of the reformation
ofstructures.
V. Transformation of civilization: reformationof the spirit.
1. Beyond rationalism.
2. Beyond materialism.
3. Rebellion against avarice.
4. New spirit.
5. Change of the spirit and the generation.
Conclusion: Struggle with time.
An anecdote: The declination of civilization/transformation and religion.
One hundred years ago, in 1895, no European thought that there wouldbe a world war in 20 years. Furthermore, nobody could foresee that the20th century would be a century of massacre by two world wars, revolutions,and civil wars. It was the period of veneer stability until 1914 sincethe end of the Napoleon War, in 1815 and such crisis as world war was faraway from people's imagination. 100 years later, our 1980's was the timeof proliferation of Marxism belatedly, instead.
Some 20 tears ago when communism was on its peak after Ho Chi Minh wonthe Vietnam war, I was once ridiculed as I said that communism would witnessits end. At this point, when capitalism is on its peak. We are in the moodas if globalization would promise prosperity and peace. I will state myperspective different from the current general mood. That is the demolitionof capitalism and modern Western civilization . This is the main idea ofmy argument.
Current human civilization is what modern Western civilization has beenglobalized. The essence of modern civilization can be defined by individualism,rationalism, and materialism. This is also having to do with the capitalistmarket structure. Such modern structures of the West and its civilizationhave achieved an epochal result by science, technology and economic development.
My claim in this essay is that such dazzling modern civilization individualism,rationalism, materialism, nation-states based on liberal democracy, andthe capitalist market structure has finished. This is our main thought.In discussing the thought, let's start from understanding today's realityin the turning point to the 21st century.
After cold War, the world shows several conspicuous trends of the time.These characterize the situation at the century's end reality.
1) Annihilation of the enemy and declining influenceof super violence
The original propulsion that has driven the world into advancement sofar was the modern violence(military power) supported by science and industry.Now, after the end of the Cold War, world military order has been establishedwhich places the US in its center. The enemy rebelling against the Westhas disappeared. The US is firmly grabbing the neck of world military hegemony,but the influence is different from the past, decling.
But the fact that the enemy has disappeared also means that the frontierof Western civilization has disappeared. At the beginning of modern ages,America, Asia, and Africa were frontiers in the view of western civilization.Western civilization was born by plundering those frontiers. Then, in thetime of imperialism, the West made them colonies. Two World Wars were internalhostilities in Western civilization. And then, on beginning the Cold War,communist states had come to the front line of the group of enemies againstthe west. Now, all those enemies have been annihilated. Enemies who fueledinternal solidarity to the West were disappeared, and the frontiers thatnourished the expansion of western material civilization had disappeared.
Simultaneously, the role of modern violence(military power) itself hasbeen downscaled. In this situation that the enemies and frontiers are absent,military power have become less efficient. In the same way. the SovietUnion, once a huge military body, was demolished in such a short periodof time, the absolute military power of the US becomes less influential,different from the past situation. In fact, America couldn't apply itsmilitary power in the same way as they did in the past in places like Yugoslavia,Somalia, Rwanda, and North Korea. Violence is available only when its intimidationis able to overshadow human consciousnes obey. Violence is useful whenit is able to subordinate 100 people by killing one. Now, however, violencehas no target to kill; or cannot leave anybody to subordinate by killingso much; or is not able to acquire the compliance of the rest. In addition,violence cannot control such expansion of communications as the informationtechnology and society advance. It means that violence is useless in controllinghuman consciousness any more. The influence of modern violence has beenweakened.
That is the reason that the overwhelming US military cannot resolvethose worldwide struggles and confrontations. This gives economy superiorityto military power, of course. Additionally, this is why democracy is gaininguniversality. Because an autocracy is not able to suppress the communicationsof the public by means of violence any more.
2) Formation of the world single market.
People say the economy has been globalized. This implies a capitalism-basedworld single market is being formed. With the end of the Cold War, socialiststates have had no alternative but to choose the market economy. The entireworld has become networked by the information technology. Furthermore,multinational corporations(or ultra-state capitals) having a stage namedthe world are strongly forcing the world to conform to the world singlemarket and states are trying to bring that to real life.
This is basic differencies of the world single market from the conventionalmodern economic structure defined by state markets(internal markets) andinternational trade. At first, long-distance trades were developed priorto markets. Then, local markets and state markets had been formed, and,in sequence, international trade relationships(long-distance trade of thepast) were established among states in the the modern age. But now theworld is getting into the age of a single market, and long-distance trade(internationaltrade) is losing its meaning. Anyway, it is the first time in history thatthe entire world is arranged a unique capitalist market.
3) Decline of the modern states.
The modern states were a subjective to and also a unit of history inthe modern age. The history of the modern age was the history of statesand that of relationships among the states. But the function of such modernstates is being weakened. Modern states are attacked on both sides by thefollowing two factors. The first is that modern states are not able totake any effective counteract against competitors in the world market basedon capitalism. The other is the fact that the meaning of state is beingreduced by a trend of localization. The EU is trying to construct a decision-makingprocess in a level of Europe continent beyond that of individual states.
What supported the establishment of the modern states and its continuationwere three mainstays; military, beaurocracy, and control over the monetarysystems. But as we have already discussed above, military influence(violence)is losing its effectiveness. Things that can be resolved by means of policeor military measures of a nation(or nations) are gradually diminishing,and even bringing an order in a society or keeping security in a societyis going beyond the control. As beaurocracy composed of traditional ranksystems turns out to be incapable of the impact of advancement of the informationtechnology, it is forced to restructure itself. Traditional beaurocracycame to be not appropriate to control the increasing complexity and knowledge-dependentsociety and the economy effectively. Besides, control over monetary systemsis showing a trend of independence from government. It is because authorityand politics of the the modern states are not able to control the economyproperly. The modern state is becoming incompetent in function becauseof the progress to the world single market and of the impact of knowledgeinformationization.
4) Informationizing Knowledge.
In modern Western civilization, what dominated human consciousness wasrational knowledge instead of past religious tenets of the middle age.Rational knowledge was expected to conquer medieval superstitious and tolight up a torch of truth. In that sense, knowledge also a basis forconviction.Once ideology(conviction based on knowledge), instead of religion, generatedthe Cold War as well. But now, that knowledge is expanding enormously.As we contain all knowledge accumulated from the birth of humanity on theearth until 1980 in one book, it can be considered as two books in 1987,and four in 1994. How does the result affect human consciousness?
It was not long ago that people found that those truths believed withconviction were no less than knowledge-information that has reciprocalvalue. Theology in the middle ages was the truth that nobody could standagainst. In the modern age, however, academia has been the place to studythe truth, and some knowledge was considered to be truth. The end of theCold War, however, swayed the pillar of this belief. The end of the ColdWar was the close of an age dominated by ideologies. It means that theperiod of absolute knowledge that gad taken the place of medieval theologywas over. Then a lot of new knowledges having the same value as what isflourishing all over the world. Now, knowledge is not the truth any morebut the information and data which covers every part of our life and society.
Knowledge impacts on human and society in two aspects.
The first is that every field in military, politics, economy, society,and culture
are redefined around knowledge. Knowledge becomes a sourceof benefit, power,
and social hegemony. This is what destroys the materialand economic structure
supporting modern civilization of the West so far.Competition to acquire knowledge
is replacing that of economy.
The second, by contrary, the informationzation of knowledge is destroyingthe foundation of value consciousnes. Even if it is a knowledge illuminatedby the guide of rationality, it cannot provide a common standard of convictionand of value to all people. A fact or a thing being right to you is notalways right to me, and vice versa. That is just a kind of informationwhat you believe truth. Sometimes, the truth in the West is not that inArabia. The right in the west is a piece of information of the West. Thismeans the change in human spirit. This also means the collapse of the spiritualbasis(modern spiritual civilization of the West) having supported modernsociety and of its civilization so far. Now, modern ideologies are losingtheir persuasiveness for the integration of society and the world. Post-modernismis a reaction to the above trend. We are now losing the common spiritualbasis, and the human race is also losing its universal spiritual foundation(themodern spirit)
All these changes have been brought by the splendid success of modernwestern civilization. In other words, those changes are the product ofa completely successful result by the modern Western civilization thathad continued the development of weapons to preoccupy the superiority inviolence. And, such superiority had globalized modern Western civilization.It was gunpowder that gave birth to Western civilization. After a seriesof staggering developments, nuclear, biochemical, and space weapons wereinvented at last. These absolute weapons have made violence ineffective.Those absolute weapons made by Western civilization have gone beyond thecertain level of proprietary(to intimidate 100 by killing one) for theuse of violence. Being powerless in violence(military power) is a resultof complete success by which the West had been propelling consistently.
On the one hand, the history of modern capitalism is that of marketexpansion. Market expansion had started from the slave trade and was performedthrough pillage, by imperial way, and by the way of world division, and,with the end of the Cold War, the world single market has been established.Genghis Khan used violence in trying to make the world one civilization.However, the modern Western civilization has used not only violence inbinding the world into one civilization, but used the economic method ofmarket expansion. Now, all these changes reached a stage of completion.
The modern Western civilization was a process of development of nations.Then mankind has created a strongest nation like the US for the first timein human history, and has made the most perfect democratic country thatthe human race can ever reach. Although, somebody sets up an ideal standardand embellishes democratic reality, that is just an idle ideological argumentignoring reality as Norberto Bobbio indicated in his book "The Futureof Democracy". No nation is able to deny the liberal democracy nowadays.And there is no more room to advance liberal democracy. Today's nationis the last stop in the history of the modern age. By that way, ironically,the completed nation became powerless.
Knowledge informationization originated from the completion of the modernWestern civilization. At the extreme point of intellectual advancementsince the modern age, knowledge creation and supply is exploding now andthe very explosion itself makes knowledge the information. Human occupationof the knowledge that has a status of the truth is because of its rarityand/or monopolization. The limited possession of knowledge had made itsoutfit to be truth. However, such rarity and monopolization is rapidlybreaking down. That is also a result of the splendid development of moderncivilization of the West.
The modern Western civilization has come to reach its last stop by itssuccess after all. Then, what is the next stop? This - the last stop- isour historical reality.
Now, we are trying to figure out if the last stop is safe and is a utopia,or if there is another stop to go, though invisible, and also trying tofigure out if we have to transfer to plane or if there is a plane to transferto.
The present tragedy is that the internal validity(homeostasis) to datehas collapsed as modern Western civilization being completed. Modern Westerncivilization used to give following internal validities. On the first hand,the Western market structure had been protected conflict and the internationalconflicts had a structure being resolved by violence(police, military).On the other hand, rationality-based advancement of knowledge had grownup moral civilians, and had provided common convictions to unify individualsaround the state by spreading knowledge. As this internal validity of themodern structure collapses , however, the following "century-end dilemmas"are being generated.
1) Dilemma of the World Market and Modern State.
The economic structure of modern civilization was a market structureprotected and regulated by the state. But now, with the formation of theworld market, the state became unable to control its market. The marketbecame larger beyond the control of a state. Today, no nation can controlthe world market -- even if it is the US. Right after the Second WorldWar , the US was occupying about 50% of the world's production. Therefore,the entire economy of capitalism could be regulated as the US regulatedits own market. That has become impossible now. Lester Thurow(in his work'Head to Head') said that the engine driving the world economy has goneaway. This is not merely a matter of economy but civilization.
It is widespread economic knowledge that the capitalist market structureis not self-completive(or self-controllable), and history proves it. Duringthe reign of neoclassical economics, it was believed that the market automaticallycontrolled itself by the 'Invisible Hand'. However, the Great Depressionin 1930 blew up the belief all hollow. Keynes insisted that the marketwhich is not revised by government should fall into a deep depression bynot keeping full employment because of unstable investment demand. Eventhough we do not depend on Keynes' theory, not even an economist wouldnot believe the arrival of the depression, in the case that there is nogovernment intervention. If we look into the history of capitalism, ourargument becomes very clear. Internal markets in Western states grew upby pillaging non-Western areas or by colonizing them under the lead oftheir own government. After World War II, the US had selected Keynes' theoryand controlled the economy on the background of huge productivity and itsinternal market. Nowadays, the US has discarded the policy to correct theworld market only with a great amount of financial deficit and trade deficit.The US has turned into an individual state that competes with others byopenly suppressing small countries. Eventually, the current dilemma isthat states are still local ones, though the economy has become globalizedalready. There is no state that can lead and correct the world market.States are temporarily copying throughout the international cooperationor that among developed countries currently. They also form local economiccommunities to cope with ultranational markets like the EU. But this cannotbe a fundamental solution. Regulating an internal market was difficultas a unit of nation, but regulating the world market by means of internationalcooperation or economic organization of an economic community is quiteimpossible. The extreme situation of that appeares as an instability ofthe world financial structure. In today's world economy, financial transactionpart is much fatter than that of material transaction. Speculative financialtransactions are 37 to 120 times larger than financial transactions formaterial transactions(in 1995, 120 in London, 37 in Tokyo, and 38 in NY).Such financial part is so instable that no country can correct it-- Recently,the Bank of Japan poured $10 billion into the Tokyo foreign exchange marketduring March to prevent the slump of the dollar, but the average transactionvolume in Tokyo foreign exchange market is about $200 billion a day.
Under such circumstances, today's economic structure has become a mechanismwhere a mistake in speculation by an employee of a multinational corporationcan make a negative impact on the entire world economy(ex. Bearing Co.).Whole industry of speculators (in the recent case of Mexico) is the sameas well. Radical changes in exchange rates and stock prices are what statescan hardly control. The world economy is in a situation where a crisisof depression is opening its mouth in a step ahead and there is no entity(ex.world government).
This shows that the most important foundation of the modern Westerncivilization(economic structure) is in a severe dilemma. The world marketand local states(modern nations) are incompatible. The modern structureis the structure that is not able to work properly anymore.
2) The Dilemma of the Information Society and theMarket Structure of Capitalism
Pseudo prophets are confident as if the human future will be optimisticbecause of the information revolution. But the most severe problems ona society from knowledge informationization are an aggravation of employmentand distribution problems. Knowledge informationization is rapidly diminishingemployment in the fields of conventional industries such as manufacturing(forexample, the world's 500 biggest sales enterprises fired 4.4 million peoplebetween 1980 and 1993, however, sales increased 1.4 times and assets 2.3times more than before). Knowledge informationization is surely forcingindustrial society to end. But there is no industry that can absorb thosejobless people drained from conventional industries.
The modern age of industrial society is the time, so to speak, whenthe ratio of people engaging in agriculture has decreased to 20 25% from70 80% the past. Modern civilization is, in a word, manufacturing civilization(orindustrial civilization). But now, the employment ratio in industry(manufacturing) is walking the same step that are agriculture did. Currently, the employeesin manufacturing industries are around 18% of the entire employment, and,by the year 2010, it is predicted that the ratio will have fallen to under10%.(Peter F. Drucker: "Post-Capitalist Society") The problemin the current capitalist market structure is that there is no industrythat can absorb the jobless --they are drained from conventional manufacturingindustry-- into work. The generally spoken knowledge information industrycan never bring such a number of people into work. Most of the employeesdismissed from conventional manufacturing industry are absorbed by a lowerclass service industry paying less. However, it is not enough to accommodatethe unemployed. The results turn out to be an increase in unemploymentand aggravation of distribution. The 10% unemployment in average is beinggeneral in Europe(with 20% in Spain), and this ratio is considered to beconsistent until the beginning of the 2000's. The product of the informationrevolution in the capitalist market structure is all unemployment and theaggravation of distribution.
In addition, the capitalist market structure does not match with theinformation society. Excludable goods like material goods(excludability:a characteristic that if one person possess something, nobody can affordit) are the premise of the capitalist market structure. But knowledge hasan intrinsic characteristic of inexcludability. Therefore, artificial excludabilityis now created by legal manipulation. However, the higher the ratio ofknowledge and cultural goods, the more the struggles by such artificialmanipulation, and the economic distribution will be a matter of legal struggles.
By the way, when information becomes a source of profit, those who haveinformation may sweep money rather than those working in manufacturing.This trend makes an economy a place of speculation, while increasing theproportion of the financial division. Speculators make more money thanthose manufacturers do, and a multitude of people come to devote theirtime to speculation. Thus, today's capitalism is 'Casino Capitalism'(SusanStrange). This means we are accumulating the danger of depression. Thecharacteristic of the information revolution differs from that of the industrialrevolution(Information skills have a characteristic of social organizingor cultural skills rather than industrial skills). Those talking aboutthe 'third wave' fail to notice the fact that the information industryis not a field that can absorb a number of employment as the manufacturingindustry did in the past. It is manifest that the information revolutionis breaking down the industrial society that was once the foundation ofthe modern Western civilization. We are now going to the era of post-industrialsociety. Nevertheless, the capitalist market structure is not suitablefor the new society. Information revolution may destroy the capitalistmarket structure; otherwise, the capitalist market structure will ceasethe information revolution(throughout the devastation of civilization).
3) Dilemma of Materialism and the Environmental Crisis
The essence of the modern Western civilization that peeled off the religiousworld of the Western middle ages was mundane material advancement. Suchmaterial civilization shows off its bottom. Wealth has always been consideredto be goodness, and the mythic conceptions of advancement and economicdevelopment for wealth have dominated us. However, this kind of materialismdoesn't gather the attentions and expectations of people in developed countriesany more. It is often said that the current age is a period of decreasinglydiminished expectation. (Paul Krugman:"The Age of Diminished Expectation")The marginal utility of material abundance is diminished itself; furthermore material abundance is not anticipated any more. Today, increasinginvestment is required to make individuals feel the abundance. As comparedwith the above fact, the progress in material abundance has become worthless.We are keeping production not for abundance but for the maintence of employment.The rich chase the accumulation of financial assets, not material abundance.
Additionally, the environmental crisis has posed a fundamental doubt.The environmental crisis has shown us ths absence of free goods(goods thatpay no cost). There is no production and consumption without pollution.Production and consumption of material goods also mean producing and pilingup pollution. As well as pleasure, progressand development carry pain,too. The increase of pain from the environmental crisis is very conspicuous,rather than the scale of economic growth that people cannot feel in reallife. The environmental crisis is scattering the convictions of limitlessmaterial advancement. The awareness of environment protection is spreadingin al lot of countries, even though they abandon higher growth(numericgrowth).
The environmental crisis was out of arguments in the modern Westerncivilization. When the economies of Britain and the US were growing up,nobody worried about the environment. But, the nature is holding back materialdevelopment now. In other words we are facing "natural hostility".Is modern Western civilization subtainable, though the engine of moderncivilization, material growth, has become useless? This is another dilemmaof modern Western civilization. To Westerners, civilization has meant overcomingnature. But humans live in nature, not on the death of nature.