--- On Wed, 6/24/09, Dennis Claxton <ddclaxton at earthlink.net> wrote:
> In a nutshell that's what Michael Mann says in a book I
> picked up from the library last night. He calls what
> we have Incoherent Empire.
>
>
> Here's some excerpts from an interview:
>
> http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people4/Mann/mann-con4.html
>
> [...]
>
> ....this is the shift in political and ideological
> [ideals], which comes down to the very general assertion I
> made that this is not the age of empire, this is the age of
> nation state. The notion that Iraq is for Iraqis as Somalia
> is for Somalis, as France is for the French, this is
> dominant across the world. This is the main ideology of our
> times, national self-determination. That makes it really
[WS:] I am a bit skeptical. There is an upsurge of nationalist ideology, to be sure, but that does not necessarily translate into reality. I suspect that this ideological upsurge is a symbolic response to reality in which the actual level of national self-determination is declining. This is the same principle as magical rituals surrounding those aspects of human life which we cannot actually control - they are "verbal acts" that substitute real acts. (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coral_Gardens_and_their_magic ).
But, verbal or real - the concept of national self determination, and nationalism in general, really rubs me the wrong way.
Wojtek