frachetti on non-conforming geo-politics
“I think some of our foreign policy complications derive from our inability to locate a nomadic dynamic within contemporary political structures.”
clearly geared toward contemporary ME military struggles (which may be as much driven by grant dollars as the thoughts themselves) but it does raise issues of benedict anderson's imagined communities worthy discussion - how does the poltical nation state interact with a culture and the political structure around it when the very state building mechanisms the nation states depend on for existence do not exist?
we see this in the comical attempts of the US to create street cred worthy arabic news sources that spin they way the US wants, but in even the most positive possible outcome, this scenario does more for a unified arab nation state than the baaths of the 40s (and later). Most importantly, in a world less dependent on the press to inform the dominant political space, the policy appears flailing and misguided, albeit potentially necessary for some segment of the arab street. This is necessarily a post-colonial construct of the street. It is also a construct of the street that never had sight (or at least concern, possibly even understanding) of the politics on the ground.
Quite literally, the street was where order was maintained by colonists, when and where popular dissent manifested itself in public display of anger; as the cults of personality and interpersonal loyalty of the corrupted baathists are destroyed or fall apart from old age (or death) we see what I think of as post-Tito-esque explosion - and we will likely see the same kind of partial failure at traditional nation building. Where the street is sufficiently similar to the kind we are equipped to deal with, there will be success (who knows to what extent) but where there is no street, we are no better or different than the ottomans El Orance was so disgusted with, but there are at least three generations of experience with modern colonial warfare to struggle against now. That and a whole lot of history.
clearly geared toward contemporary ME military struggles (which may be as much driven by grant dollars as the thoughts themselves) but it does raise issues of benedict anderson's imagined communities worthy discussion - how does the poltical nation state interact with a culture and the political structure around it when the very state building mechanisms the nation states depend on for existence do not exist?
we see this in the comical attempts of the US to create street cred worthy arabic news sources that spin they way the US wants, but in even the most positive possible outcome, this scenario does more for a unified arab nation state than the baaths of the 40s (and later). Most importantly, in a world less dependent on the press to inform the dominant political space, the policy appears flailing and misguided, albeit potentially necessary for some segment of the arab street. This is necessarily a post-colonial construct of the street. It is also a construct of the street that never had sight (or at least concern, possibly even understanding) of the politics on the ground.
Quite literally, the street was where order was maintained by colonists, when and where popular dissent manifested itself in public display of anger; as the cults of personality and interpersonal loyalty of the corrupted baathists are destroyed or fall apart from old age (or death) we see what I think of as post-Tito-esque explosion - and we will likely see the same kind of partial failure at traditional nation building. Where the street is sufficiently similar to the kind we are equipped to deal with, there will be success (who knows to what extent) but where there is no street, we are no better or different than the ottomans El Orance was so disgusted with, but there are at least three generations of experience with modern colonial warfare to struggle against now. That and a whole lot of history.
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