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RUSSIA vs. GLOBALIZATION
- Part 1
Author and correspondence:
AVEL V. KASYANOV,
Doctor of Science in Economics,
Deputy Chairman of the Centre for Change
in the Third Millennium
Moscow, Russian Federation,
Tel: 8-916-112-0598, Email: p.kasyanov@frecom.ru
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FOREWORD
This article appeals exclusively to
the reason and common sense of the
Reader capable of unbiased perception
of the facts and ideas, a perception
as free from any emotional and national
context as possible. Besides, the
author hereby states that the aim
of this article is to provide impartial
analysis and reasoned interpretation
of largely ascertained facts and obvious
processes rather than in condemnation
or denunciation of any kind. The author
insists that everything that has and
is now happening at the global, regional,
local and all other levels, including
an individual, is not merely incidental,
but wholly dependant on and determined
by, above all, INTRINSIC properties
and attributes of any system, whether
it be an individual or a country,
a corporation or the entire civilization.
Therefore, while aggression of the
modern Western/Occidental Civilization
(further referred to as "OC")
is described in distinctly negative
terms, the author, however, does not
blame the OC or the USA (as its "physical"
leader) for distress, disasters and
miseries experienced by both Russia
and many other countries as a consequence
of aggressive, deceitful and duplicitous
US policy (economic, military, "subversive",
etc.). If it is happening, then the
causes, prerequisites and preconditions
of those miseries are to be found
in the peoples of the affected countries.
But what are those
miseries? They are but "learning
and teaching situations", wherein
some receive and take advantage of
the given opportunities for individual
improvement while others, who cannot
stand the strain, surrender and degrade.
This also applies to Russia and its
people, who may either use the critical
situation to advantage and make a
qualitative breakthrough, primarily
with regard to the world outlook,
widening of perception and consciousness,
preservation and development of the
Russian civilization, or take no action
and eventually disappear from the
map of the world. There is another
relevant aspect worth mentioning in
this context: the OC in its modern
form or state is fundamentally incapable
of entering the world of Divine harmony,
as the very origin and further development
of this civilization has been based
on and governed by complete ignorance/
unawareness of the Divine dispensation
(world order), Divine laws and principles
of the universal existence. Other
modern civilizations do not essentially
differ from OC in their ignorance;
however, their life is controlled
by certain spiritual constraints/limitations,
first of all by belief in God. It
means that the lack of knowledge of
Divine dispensation is compensated
with the primacy of the Divine, spiritually,
which have not yet been eroded and
devastated like it has already occurred
in the more "advanced"/
forward countries of the Occidental
Civilization. As a consequence, other
civilizations have been incapable
of producing a global environmental
threat. On the whole, though, one
can't help noticing the presence of
some force or power that steadily
promotes vulgarization and materialization
of the mind and consciousness. Moreover,
one can hardly deny the fact, that
strange as it might seem, the clerical
institutes, chiefly Christian and
Judaist churches (not to be confused
with the religions proper) play a
most active part in this process by
interfering with the permanent "spiritual
activity" of an individual ("on-line'
communication with God) in an attempt
to confine it to "a specially
designated place", wherein a
visiting individual can regularly
"put in order and clear his dealings
with God" to return into the
outside world with a clear mind free
from any excruciating thoughts about
God, to say nothing of such ingenious
and clever tricks like indulgencies
or "indults" invented by
the church…
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The quest for the Russian
National Idea, along with the national identity
issues, has recently come into the focus
of public attention and has been continuously
and actively discussed in some of the Russian
mass media sources. The underlying cause
of the growing public anxiety is general
disillusionment and bitter disappointment
with the socio-economic and cultural consequences
of the "reforms" and with the
way Russia is being integrated into the
world community, with the so-called "universal
human values" of western ethics such
as "democracy", "liberty",
"market", etc. While the majority
of the rank-and-file population (who were
the first to feel the impact of the changes
"on their own back") realized
what was going on still in the early days
of the reformation process. The dramatic
character of the situation has drawn the
attention of most mass media only in recent
years, owing essentially to new leaders
and administration of the country. There
is an emerging understanding and recognition
by society of the gruesome reality: failure
to formulate, adopt (and further implement)
an adequate National Idea will inevitably
result in the economic and physical extinction
of Russia, which will be ultimately wiped
as such, from the world map. The speed of
this process entirely depends on the rates
of depletion of oil and gas resources or
the time required for hydrocarbons to be
substituted for alternative energy sources.
The author of the article
could not stay away from the discussion
and herein offers his own formulation of
the National Idea: Russia should take
the lead in showing mankind the way out
of the dead end of civilization[1].
Without adherence to and implementation
of this or any similarly formulated concept
of the National Idea, Russia will be unable
to survive globalization. Moreover, mankind
in general will stand very little chance
of coping with the challenges of globalization
in its present form, to escape destruction.
The Reader may be willing
to ask numerous questions and in the first
place:
- Can
it be that the mankind has reached any
kind of a deadlock? How does the crisis
manifest itself? How can you prove it?
-
Is it at all possible that there exists
some National or Planetary idea or concept
capable of ensuring stable and purposeful
development of a society, to say nothing
of mankind?
- Why should today's
backward Russia that has long ceased to
be a world power with influence pretend
to lead the entire world?
This article is intended
to provide answers to the above questions
and to offer an adequate substantiation
of the National (and Planetary) Idea. I
would like to conclude this introductory
passage with an indicative answer to the
last of the three questions formulated above
and namely about Russia and its destiny.
First of all, in the last century Russia
already demonstrated its willingness and
potential to go its own way. Please note
that the starting conditions at the time
were no better than those of today; it means
we do have a precedent. Secondly, as noted
above there is no future for Russia in the
world, which follows the western pattern
of globalization. In the third place, the
ideological basis for the new alternative
will be provided not by "communism"
associated with 'godlessness' and 'indiscriminate
equality', but by a fundamentally different,
superior perception of the world organization
and structure, of man and the meaning of
life and of the evolution of mankind, a
perception that is free from class bias
or any other limiting assumptions. One more
observation: one should not unconditionally
trust mass media condemning Russian leaders
for their actions and policies that do not
fit the conventional beliefs and convictions
of the leaders of the USA, NATO, IBRD, IMF
and other actors actively involved in the
globalization process. These (actions and
policies) are very likely to be primarily
aimed at the conservation of Russian civilization,
which may well coincide with the interests
of people living in the western countries.
It is a fact that mass
media has recently been using observers,
political analysts and economists to remind
us of the ongoing process of globalization.
Television reports and programs often feature
actions of antiglobalists. This biased coverage
of the events voluntarily or not contributes
to the creation of a negative image of globalization
opponents in the public opinion. What is
globalization after all and how should we
treat this phenomenon? Is it an unavoidable
"evil" or has the world an option?
These are the issues I am going to address
in this article along with offering my own
answer to both explicitly formulated and
implied questions. I assume that many people
would be willing to find out what globalization
is and where it is going to ultimately lead
mankind. The new outlook I am going to suggest
is largely based on historic review of the
development of the Russian civilization
that naturally includes recent developments.
Therefore the article particularly focuses
on analysis of the events of the recent
past and present processes in contemporary
Russia, in an attempt to provide a reasonable
explanation of the meaning and implications
thereof. This is especially important since
universally accepted and widely quoted interpretations
of Russian history of the 20th century are
primitive and oversimplified (i.e. lacking
a dialectic approach). However, any discourse
and rumination over the past and present
would be of little value without reference
to the prospects and future of Russia.
Review of the visible
history of mankind leads us to understanding
that globalization is in fact the final
and logical phase of a long-lasting (for
a thousand year period) process of consolidation
of the basic structural (or building) blocks
of human society (BBB or BSU)[2]. Since
prehistoric times those basic building blocks
have been consecutively (but not excluding
overlapping or parallelism, likely to have
been caused by regionally asynchronous changes
with a possible "delay" of several
thousand years) represented by family, tribe,
community, theocratic states and subsequent
later forms of statehood, which have been
progressively growing in size. The mechanism
of BSU agglomeration consists in incorporation
by a stronger (economically, militarily
or both) BSU of other BSUs of the same order.
The process developed further to the point
when individual states began to form alliances,
long-term blocks or even unions, wherein
many attributes of individual members were
and are obliterated. Such is the contemporary
situation in Western and Central Europe.
Apparently the world
is nearing the point when a BSU will be
represented by a CIVILIZATION to be further
replaced with civilization blocks made up
of a number of civilizations. This process
is being driven by Western Civilization,
to be more precise - by some driving forces
that manifest themselves and operate through
institutional structures (in a very broad
sense) of Western Civilization. The speed
and orientation of changes call forth association
ofa car rushing downhill without brakes.
The entire process is
primarily driven by financial interests,
by commitment of global financial "players",
both international financial organizations
(IFO) and transnational corporations (TNC),
to unlimited and unrestrained growth of
their assets. Thus, on the natural process
of BSU consolidation there is superimposed
a more radical globalization tendency: progressive
development of transnational financial and
industrial capital, which is guided solely
by the principle of self-expansion, and
for which interstate frontiers exist merely
in terms of time and effort required for
elimination of their influence and influence
of political forces that are associated
with particular states on financial and
commodity flows.
It is this statement
that puts Western Civilization in confrontation
with other civilizations, as IFO and TNC
belong to Western Civilizations and thereby
actually 'play' against the rest of the
world and, as it were, on the side of the
West. The most significant difference between
historical past and the present practice
is that conventional capture of the territory
of other BSUs, declarations of "hot"
or cold wars on them are no longer necessary.
Nowadays they favour smarter and much more
effective methods of subjugation and exploitation
perfected by IFO, when the subjects are
continuously reminded, in a fatherly manner,
of what they should do and how they should
behave to avoid displeasure of the real
"powers that be". Transition of
a medium-scale confrontation to the inter-civilization
level, is accompanied by a considerable
expansion of warfare arsenals through employment
of such weapons as financial, information
and cultural instruments that include corrupt
practice of bribing "national elites"
of the adversary and establishing of the
so-called financial and economic "pumping
stations". This is supported by the
development of WMD and conventional weapons,
which could serve as a weighty argument
in disputes with some "ignorant"
opponents who refuse to conform with the
requirements.
Thus, it may be concluded
that the modern globalization process is
dominated by and allegedly implemented in
the interests of Western Civilization[3].
The latter is undoubtedly led by the United
States, the most aggressive, powerful and
"forward" representative of the
Western Civilization (further referred to
as (OC - Occidental Civilization). Western
Europe is striving to maintain its own interests
in globalization. Aggression, expansion
and all kinds of pressure through information
wars, financial enslavement, puppet regimes
or open hostilities have become objective
and indisputable reality. Therefore ascription
to the West (the term naturally does not
imply ordinary citizens or peoples) of such
motivation and mental impetus as "Russia
is our friend" or "let us help
Russia" (to become a "democratic"
and "prosperous" nation like ours,
etc.) is a dangerous error or malevolent
and ill-intentioned lie devised by internal
or external OC agents who are using mass-media
to inspire the public with "mythology
of delusions"[4]. Confrontation between
the USA and the Islamic world is much more
open and expressed but it is a matter of
tactics only (at least as viewed by the
USA, as the Islamic civilization regards
this confrontation as of a more distinct
and fundamental character than that of the
struggle of the Russian civilization against
the pressure of the USA and OC in general).
These myths are supported
with seemingly obvious argumentation: the
"West" lives in a civilized, well-to-do
world, enjoys all kinds of "freedoms"
and if we borrow from them the fundamental
principles of social order, we will be as
well off as they are. It is not malicious
intent but evolutionary rules and imperatives
of development of Western and Russian civilizations
that govern aggressive policy of expansion
pursued by the "West" in its relations
with Russia: one civilization is trying
to suppress, crush and ultimately destroy
an alien, natural resource-abundant civilization.
If the western utopian projects of upgrading
Russia to the OC standard and hosting it
among the few so-called developed countries
could, in some miraculous way, be realized,
it would signify extinction of the Russian
Civilization (RC), i.e. its peaceful defeat,
whereby carriers of civilization are not
destroyed physically but undergo cultural
and spiritual degeneration. The scenario
that has been implemented in Russia since
early '90-s proves to be aimed not only
at cultural but also the physical elimination
of the RC along with the overwhelming majority
of its carriers; at the same time there
appears a possibility for a small group
of individuals who have risen to the very
top and who have generally lost any affiliation
to the RC, if any (in fact, they have never
truly belonged there), to painlessly join
OC. It should be noted however, that enslavement
of the RC through spiritual emigration,
alienation and retreat of the ruling elite
from RC towards OC, dates as far back as
a thousand years or more. The previous peak
of the process of the ruling elite alienation
was observed in 18-19 centuries. Apropos,
Peter I broke the window open from Europe
into Russia rather than from Russia into
Europe. Wild outbursts of corruption related,
among other spheres, to lobbying of interests
of third parties (read: foreign or European
states) reach a tremendous scale that has
been surpassed only in the last 15 years
of contemporary Russian history. It seems
superfluous to remark that the vanguard
ranks of the aggressors (acting "on
behalf "of the West, i.e. OC) were,
and still are, "reformers", oligarchs
and their henchmen, as well as corruptors
(corrupt officials) who betray the interests
of their people and motherland in whatever
field they bear responsibility for: it is
done through mass-media, indiscriminate
privatization (including defense sector
and strategically important industries),
promotion of foreign goods to the prejudice
of domestic manufacturers, etc.
Social Darwinism manifests
itself in the indiscriminate competition
for "one's place in the sun" with
a focus progressively shifting from relations
between individuals, social groups or classes
to the sphere of suprastate and supragovernment
relations between large or even global
financial-economic and other subjects (IFO,
TNC, NATO, unions, alliances, blocks, etc.).
While one TNC at first opportunity voraciously
devours and digests another that belongs
to the same OC and therefore is devoid of
any ideological and civilization antagonism,
the alien Russian civilization may stand
no chances in the fight against the vanguard
ranks of the west-driven globalization,
which will absorb, suppress and eliminate
it with still greater greed and pleasure.
It should be noted though that in the past
15/20 years or so the absorption of Russian
Civilization has been so effectively implemented
through purely informational methods of
influence that the younger generation in
Russia (at least its considerable part)
already belongs to the Western rather than
Russian Civilization.
A discourse on the modern
globalization process developing under the
pressure and auspices of OC would naturally
require some analysis of the essential characteristics
of this very civilization. The latter like
any other has its pros and cons, i.e. negative
and positive aspects. The scope of this
article does not allow detailed analysis
of all the advantages of Western Civilization
(moreover, those are well known and primarily
come down to highly organized material culture),
therefore I apologize for having to concentrate
on the negative aspects of the Occidental
Civilization. Please note, that least of
all do I intend to sound accusatory, incriminating;
denunciatory, revealing or abusive. This
is but a statement of ascertained facts.
So the negative charge of OC[5] consists
in its technocratic, atheistic and vulgarly
materialistic, acquisitive, selfish, earthly,
hypocritical orientation (essence) resulting
in progressing earthliness and loss of spirituality,
abnormal preoccupation with "economic
growth", i.e. increased consumption.
THE CRUCIAL POINT IS THE PRECEDENCE OF THE
MATERIAL OVER THE SPIRITUAL, SELF- IDENTIFICATION
OF THE PERSONALITY WITH THE EGO-MIND THAT
SERVICES THE INTERESTS OF THE BODY AND EGO-SELF,
AND, AS A CONSEQUENCE, TOTAL ALIENATION
AND LOSS OF LIAISON BETWEEN THE PERSONALITY
(EGO) AND THE DIVINE (COSMIC) UNIFORMITY.
As a consequence the modern civilization
of a western type is characterized by intentional
stimulation[6] of consumerism and human
vice, unscrupulousness ("a thief passes
for a gentleman when stealing has made him
rich - money has no smell", "after
us the deluge") and aggressiveness
toward any external or alien environment.
It looks like the OC is affected by some
malignant process gradually degenerating
into a global malignant neoplasm or tumour.
Health status of other civilizations is
far from perfect either, however they do
not pose a primary threat to the mankind
because they have not degenerated as far
as the OC have. Their conflict with the
OC is not caused by the backwardness of
the "uncultivated medieval East"
from the forward Western Civilization, but
by a dangerous evolution of the OC resulting
in alarming disbalance of the spiritual
and the material, and the latter has broken
free and ran away from the wise parents
like a naughty gosling. Due to FUNDAMENTAL,
PRINCIPAL and SYSTEMATIC CHARACTER of deviations
of OC from the harmonious (Divine) destination,
practically all aspects of life and organization
of this society have an intrinsic malignant
core element, be it medicine or television,
law or sport, economics or politics, including
the actively promoted and propagated institutes
of "democracy" and "human
rights". Naturally, I am all for democracy
and human rights if they are not enclosed
in inverted commas, i.e. when they are used
in their, original (unfeigned) sense not
distorted by overemphasized ego.
For comparison with
OC the modern Russian Civilization can be
described as techno?ratic, atheistic
and vulgarly materialistic, but in contrast
to OC the Russian Civilization has not yet
sacrificed spirituality and hearfulness
(German term "Innerlichkeit" most
closely conveys the idea) to consumerism
and egotism.
The Islamic Civilization
is highly spiritual but vulgarly theistic
because of obvious disbalance between Love
and Spirit in favor of the latter. This
turns faith of many into fanaticism, i.e.
believers become fanatics who involuntarily
and unconsciously act as opponents to God
(Allah), for it alienates an individual
from the "Ocean of Divine Love"
wherein the "supreme ego of every human
being resides".
To summarize the essential
differences, an ordinary individual in OC
has gone farthest along the road to spiritual
degradation and heartlessness and is still
proceeding in the same direction. RC is
characterized by greater spirituality and
Innerlichkeit, however the balance between
the spiritual and the material in RC is,
unfortunately, significantly shifted towards
the material values and thinking (materiality).
Perestroika triggered off the mechanisms
of precipitant degradation of personality
and degeneration of RC in a peripheral appendix
to OC. And it is us, representatives of
RC, who decide, both figuratively and literally,
whether we can stand up to the pressure
or surrender. The Islamic Civilization is
characterized by high spirituality but it
suffers from and is endangered by disbalance
between Spirituality and Love (in their
highest meaning and manifestations).
Of course the differences
between the Islamic Civilization and OC,
at least those clearly visible, are much
more essential than those between RC and
OC. That is why it became possible to create
and foment hostility between Moslems and
Russians and to direct and incite Moslem
terrorists against Russia, which, in the
eyes of Moslem fanatics, has become but
a stronghold and another bastion of the
USA and OC in general, and, consequently,
the source and carrier of all sins and vices
of OC. But the Islamic Civilization itself
may be exposed to erosion, which is intentionally
stimulated and facilitated by OC everywhere.
FOOTNOTE
Malignancy of OC (of
environmental, economic and spiritual nature)
and its inevitable collapse (individual
or involving the rest of the world) can
be convincingly illustrated by numerous
examples or facts, of which just few are
listed below.
Losses of tropical forests
are estimated to be 15-17 million hectares
per year. While a thousand years back they
occupied an area of 3.5 billion ha and
retained 3.3 billion ha still in 1955, in
2000 this figure came down to as low as
2.1 billion ha; this means that the losses
of tropical forests for the past 45 years
amounted to 86 percent of the total loss
for the entire known historic period (according
to official data of UNO). At least 50
thousand species of plants and animals disappear
from the planet every year. Needless to
say that the end-users or consumers of the
lion's share of all natural resources are
the OC countries. No modeling is required
to allow conclusion on a speedy progress
towards global environmental disaster we
are making.
- Fertility
of soils has substantially deteriorated
because of use of artificial fertilizers
and impact of waste and other environmental
pollutants. Application of pesticides
and other artificial substances results
in increasing risk of cancerous diseases.
- Particular case:
threat of destruction of the last world's
genofond "depository" of natural
salmon in Kamchatka under pressure and
onrush of interests of oil-gas-gold and
other producers of sub-surface resources
(no matter whether mineral resources will
be extracted and produced by foreign or
Russian companies, its is the OC that
is boosting consumption of hydrocarbon
and other resources an a global scale);
- Degradation of human
spirit and soul that is manifest, but
not limited to progressive growth of the
"economy of vice": markets of
drugs, pornography, yellow press, cinema
and TV narcotics, etc.
Why does modern OC
cultivate vice or, in a broader sense -
degradation of spirit, soul, and personality
in general? In terms of economy 'vice'
is just a public need in something that
is commonly prohibited, considered immoral
or wicked. The need generates demand, i.e.
an individual is willing to pay for satisfaction
of his perverse desires and fulfillment
of voyeuristic needs, and where there is
demand there is supply. Thus, when viewed
from this angle any civilization vice is
but another segment of the market. No
wonder: money has no smell and this delayed-action
mine had been in place ever since EGO broke
free from under CONTROL OF SPIRITUAL PRINCIPALITY
and FAITH degenerated from OMNIPRESENT,
ALL-PERVADING "MATTER", fundamental
base of personality, into something fragmentary,
accessory, and auxiliary. The apotheosis
of the process was manifested still in ancient
times with introduction of a most stunning,
even appalling but very characteristic of
OC institute of INDULT (the essence and
mechanics of this institute are beautifully
parodied in a short story by V. Sevrinovskiy,
"The White Knight": "…
The world debut of indults when they were
put out for public tender made quite a sensation.
Needless to say Van Burman managed to fetch
much more for it than he had originally
paid! His success opened the eyes for other
money-men who shrewdly and absolutely fairly
assessed high potential profit in trade
in indults by then circulating worldwide
in thousands. The Church at first attempted
to hinder the progress but, having realized
the futility of such attempts and having
made its own assessment of the new prospects,
it promptly monopolized the right for institutional
and technical organization of the trade.
It was then that the
famous Vatican Depositary was built next
to St. Peters Cathedral. The fully automated
depository held tremendous quantities of
indults put out for sale. Of course not
everything went so smoothly and the system
occasionally malfunctioned. Take that much-talked-of
featured scandal with investors protesting
against the issue of indults with serial
numbers containing three sixes…"
http://www.shandi.narod.ru/liter/Indulg.htm).
Apart from the fact, that vicious market
segments must objectively grow along with
the natural growth of the global market
("liberal economy") in general,
merely like filling or occupation of vacant
market niches, accelerated development of
the "vicious economy" is further
aggravated by the following two factors:
- DEGRADATION OF PERSONALITY
IS A MUCH MORE EASILY ATTAINABLE AND ALTOGETHER
EVEN ENJOYABLE ("KEIF", "HIGH"
AND "JOY RIDE") PROCESS (AND
RESULT) THAN DEVELOPMENT OF PERSONALITY,
which does not exclusively depend on external
conditions and possibilities, but above
all requires spirituality, tenacity of
purpose, strong will, inner strength and
dedication, continuous effort and self
improvement;
- THE FIELD FOR
CULTIVATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF ALL SORTS
AND FORMS OF VICE IS APPALLINGLY VAST
IN COMPARISON TO THE NARROW SECTOR OF
BALANCED DEVELOPMENT AND HARMONY; by analogy:
the field of variants for good performance
of Mozart is very small, whereas the expanse
for bad or bletcherous performance has
practically no limits.
That is to say that
the closer we are to the ultimate
(and inevitable) satisfaction of the natural
human needs the greater is the role of stimulating
artificial and unnatural needs of humans.
Those are not limited to drugs, alcohol,
pornography, but also include an industry
of blacksploitation, sexploitation and seamy-side
movies, as well as such seemingly harmless
market segments as sport and other shows,
pharmacy, legal (particularly advocation)
and medical services, stock markets. In
fact, all the above is a demonstration of
the LAW OF ACCELERATED OBJECTIVE GROWTH
OF THE "VICIOUS ECONOMY" INTRINSICALLY
TIED TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF TECHNOCRATIC,
VULGARLY MATERIALISTIC CIVILIZATION
towards achievement of the highest possible
level of satisfaction of the natural needs
of the majority.
In our opinion particular
attention should be paid to the economic
mechanism of interrelations between modern
OC and the rest of the world. I refer to
the article of Khozh-Ackmed Nukhaev entitled
"Genesis of Terrorism. Economy",
which was published in the "Russian
Journal / Policy" on December 26th
2002 (www.russ.ru/politics/20021226-nuh.html).
The article affords a brilliant explanation
of this mechanism; therefore I think it
would be appropriate to quote it here:
"An Everyman is
repeatedly told that terrorism will be quickly
and ultimately done away with "if the
WTO is granted an exclusive prerogative
in establishing 'rules of the game' and
'panhuman values'". 'The Banker' will
note, that in (a) situation when 'Country
A' (for example, Iraq or post-reform Russia
- P.K.), supplier of raw materials and of
low added value goods, is exporting them
to 'Country B' (an OC member -P.K.) in exchange
for finished (end) consumer products, the
structure of such 'free trade' relations
is contemporaneously and inevitably condemning
'Country A' to systematic, i.e. overwhelming
backwardness, and thereby to civilizational
subordinacy to 'Country B' It may be seen
with an unaided eye that under this economic
model … the poor will get poorer and
the wealthy - wealthier.
I consider it necessary
to stress one very important though pretty
rarely observed point, the significance
of which is not only altogether ignored
by the mass-media, but escapes analysis
in specialist literature as well: in spite
of the obvious unfairness and inequity of
those relations, it will never be reflected
in balance reports or records of profits
and losses of those two hypothetical countries.
On the contrary, both will "see"
mathematically precise and accurate proofs
of the economic growth of both countries,
which will be reflected in increased Gross
Domestic Product (GDP) figures, while GDP
indicator in fact remains a universally
acknowledged criterion for assessing progress
(prosperity) and backwardness (poverty)
worldwide, i.e. applied to all countries
of the world.
However, with all the
optimism inspired by the growing GDP indicators
in both countries, in real terms of "material
wealth" 'Country A' will find itself
on the way to bankruptcy to be inevitably
caused by its insolvency in relations with
the creditor. Ironically, though paradoxically
as it may seem, 'Country B' will be following
the same road to imminent bankruptcy as
a consequence of default of the debtor…
Meanwhile the very process
of such trade relations resembles circulus
vitiosus (vicious circle). As the added
value of consumer goods that are sold to
'Country A' by 'Country B' will be converted
in free monetary funds accumulating in the
banking system of 'Country B', this continuous
growth of liquidity will force it to offer
all kinds of loans to 'Country A' for the
development of the export potential of the
latter. For 'Country A", increased
long-term borrowing and subsequent growth
of raw material exports will result in increased
imports of finished consumer goods manufactured
by 'Country B'. Increased public consumption
in 'Country A' will be interpreted by the
society as improvement of the living standards,
regardless of the fact that this "growth"
will occur in direct proportion to the growth
of indebtedness of this society to the society
of 'Country B'… In reality, such manipulation
with the "arithmetic" of macro-economic
reports (that absolutely ignore all qualitative
factors incapable of monetary quantification)
is but another bold and shameless attempt
to conceal global injustice." Perhaps
it can only be further added that the above
mechanism of crediting also serves as an
instrument for raising and maintaining artificially
high dollar demand…. and, thereby,
supporting both the dollar rate and the
US economy as a whole.
Nevertheless the IFO
and other governing institutions are persistently
imposing on the so-called developing countries
financial and economic policy described
in the above paragraphs. There is no doubt
that the real meaning and implications of
the reforms having been proposed for Russia
were at the time perfectly clear to their
"architects" (let us say to the
leaders of IMF, IBRD, and WTO). Those practices
had been "successfully" used more
than once. Argentina, with its stunning
market of rat meat, is one of the latest
examples. Even the Chili case, which is
generally described as an economically successful
experience, has in fact been characterized
by deterioration of the socio-economic situation
in the country: per capita income had fallen
from $3600 in 1973 to $3170 in 1993. Argentina
has become fully dependant on IMF and USA;
appearance of a rat meat market in some
provinces of the country with the world's
best natural conditions for cattle-breeding
should have shocked the world. Persistent
attacks on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez
for his "excessive" independence,
wars on Iraq and Yugoslavia, and many other
similar developments - all these are but
variations of the USA aggression as a mode
of existence.
I would identify the
following essential imminent negative properties
of the modern OC (by the example of USA
as the most "forward" representative
of OC).
- Aggressive outward
activities (nature and environmental,
other civilizations, countries), beginning
with the level of an individual and driven
by unquenchable desire to maximize incomes
and volumes of appropriated material values
and benefits, pleasures, regardless (i.e.
without interest and understanding) of
what is happening to the "world"
(when understood in a broader sense, from
personality to society) apart from the
fact of appropriation (egotism, "tunnel
vision"/ narrow-mindedness, earthliness/
lack of spirituality).
- Inherent Antagonism
to the Divine Nature of the Universe and
planet Earth, and the man as such, because
the highest value by default recognized
by OC consists in wealth creation, acquisitiveness
and money-making, maximization of consumption
as opposed to Cognition (Knowledge), harmonious
development of personality, manifestation
of the Divine.
- Deliberate
and purposeful informational expansion,
continual "brain-washing". "democracy"
as one of the key myths. The public opinion
has been convinced that the political
systems of the USA and other Western countries
are democracies in contrast to "anti-democracy"
having been characteristic of, for example,
the former USSR (By no means is the author
trying to advocate the USSR (whose main
problem consisted in the primitiveness
of the vulgarly materialistic world outlook
that used to form the ideological basis
of the system); the reference was made
with the sole purpose of revealing the
truth, in particular by demonstrating
effectiveness of the informational war
waged by the USA) I admit that there are
formal grounds for such conclusions or
definitions. However, let us see into
the quick of the matter.
'Democracy'
literally means 'government by the people'
or 'rule of the people'. This form of government
existed in ancient Russia in the form of
Veche (popular assembly at local levels
in ancient and medieval Russia) in Novgorod
the Great ('application' of veche in Novgorod
was not an innovation but rather an echo
or backwash (repercussion) of the common
practice of government in pre-Christian
Russia). In the modern society democracy
is sooner understood as a set of formal
characteristics or indicators: electivity,
separation of powers, equality before the
law. Compliance with these formal requirements
automatically means presence of democracy.
However, in the USA the real power holders
are not elected at all and never advertise
their authority. The fact that the people
come to elections, vote and elect a president
for four years cannot be considered as sufficient,
moreover even as a necessary condition that
would allow conclusion on the democratic
character of government. Presidential elections
in the USA are a costly show, circus: people
are offered two advertised candidates and
finally "buy" one (even then through
'middlemen'). Besides, the choice between
essentially differing alternatives (options)
was made very long ago; therefore today's
elections basically boil down to a simple
choice between two boats to be hired for
traveling along the same river. The president
himself remains a fictitious temporary (transient)
"face" (rather than official)
of real or/and actual authority. It would
seem that even the slow-witted should have
guessed how the matters really stood after
the Kennedy assassination .It is very likely
that in relatively small OC countries (e.g.
Scandinavia )the situation with democracy
is much more favorable in comparison with
the USA and other big OC states. However,
it is not them who strike the keynote in
the making of the OC policy and development.
I can foresee the possible
puzzlement of some potential readers asking:
"Does the author really believe in
the atrocities he ascribes to OC while all
other civilizations are so "good' and
have nothing to be blamed for? He who says
so must be mentally ill; all know that the
'West" is indisputably heading the
progressive development on Planet Earth".
Let me answer here and now. The core of
the issue is "ego". As soon as
the ego is overemphasized with the personality
alienated and further opposed to the rest
of the world without any restraints or constraints
put up either by (i) the deepest realization
of the nature of human personality (wherein
ego is but transient and auxiliary phenomenon)
or (ii) by the dogmas of faith, or (iii)
strong moral principles, the personality
begins to use everybody and everything in
the surroundings with mercenary (in a broad
sense) sordid motives. The first (deep realization,
profound understanding) is not available
today (except the very few luminaries) both
to the OC and RC representatives with a
sole difference, i.e. most carriers of RC
have not altogether lost disquieting intuitive
sensation that the meaning of life cannot
be brought down to consumption alone. The
second (true and unrestricted faith) is
not applicable to or appropriate of either
OC or the modern Russian Civilization. The
third (morals and virtue) are subject to
intensive and progressive corrosion in both
civilizations. However, since in OC the
corrupt influence of consumerism as a way
of life has a much longer history and since
consumerism itself and associated formalized
economic and legal relations between individuals
have risen to much more impressive "heights",
the moral and ethical degradation is progressing
at a much faster pace as well (to be more
precise this was the case before the early
'90s when Russia made a giant leap towards
the values of consumerism). There arises
a natural conclusion that the difference
between OC and RC is mainly determined by
a much more continuous and much more intensive
exposure of OC to destructive influence
and impacts.
Thus, the ultimate,
global-scale victory of OC or the USA (which
are synonyms in the present context) will
inevitably ruin mankind as a result of the
conflict with the (Divine) Nature at a "crude
material" level (sphere), unless it
(OC) has enough time for qualitative transformation;
evidently, this conflict has already reached
or even exceeded critical level at other
("fine material') levels (spheres).
The chances to prevent accomplishment of
the longed-for (by USA) scenario of complete
global domination to be followed by the
total destruction of the mankind (an appalling
prospect to any human being) depend on all
of us, on the adequacy, sobriety and profoundness
of our understanding of the ongoing processes
in the world and in particular countries.
And this, in turn, is predetermined by -
along with factors beyond our recognition
and control - our will, healthy animalism
and hedonism, aspiration to cognize the
world and our own self; whether we will
succeed in adopting an outlook and behavior
that would be oriented towards achieving
harmony in relations with Nature, world,
and society. This transformation of the
outlook can be provided only by "reconstruction"
of science, mass-media performance, which
(reconstruction) should be based on the
new scientific paradigm ready to replace
outdated Newtonian-Cartesian paradigm that
has served as a basis for the now thriving,
philosophically primitive and naturally
incoherent, antagonistic OC.
But is not too late
to try to break and overcome destructive
tendencies, whether it be threat of global
disaster or obliteration of Russia? Has
Russia already been turned into a raw materials-producing
appendage, backward and dying-out periphery
of the Western Civilization? Perhaps, a
perfunctory overview of the situation would
result in exactly such a conclusion. But
will a more profound analysis of the issue
allow a different conclusion or offer an
altogether different understanding of the
events?
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