"Globalization is not a random-walk process. It moves
forward according to a tangible, coherent and well-planned strategy.
This article offers the reader a glimpse into one aspect of the
globalization stratagem – one that recast Europe and is now reshaping
north America. Regionalization, as you will see, is a necessary
stepping-stone toward and an essential component of globalization. This
article lays the groundwork for future articles that will lay bare
elements of regionalism in the Americas such as NAFTA and CAFTA."
Patrick Wood, Editor,
The August Review
“The two
processes of globalization and regionalization are articulated within
the same larger process of global structural transformation…” Björn
Hettne, “Globalization, the New Regionalism and East Asia,” Globalism
and Regionalism.[1]
Strategic landscapes are radically changing. No longer does a person’s
country represent the core of citizenship or identity. Today, a new murky
world is dawning, one that advocates global governance
[2] as the portent to humanity’s social, political, and
economic future. Indeed, in this post-Cold War environment, “nation-states”
– like the societies they serve and accommodate – find themselves in a
relentless swell of transformation. National interests give way to global
loyalties, just as world citizenship is touted as preferable to the narrow
views of nationalism; no individual, corporation, or country is immune to
this revolution. Welcome to “globalization,” where everyone is either a pawn
or a player.
As an end to itself, the concept of globalization seems to rest on one
central pillar: the consolidation of power. No matter what stripe or
ideology globalization comes packaged in, this singular component cannot be
denied. And in a society where “power begets power,” a global system, by
definition, has the capability to expand this characteristic to new levels.
Politically, globalization represents the leveraging of power beyond
that found in any one nation. Using the clichés of global governance, we
would call this a “new world civilization,” one that’s built with
international management in mind. Mikhail Gorbachev, the last true master of
the Soviet style of centralized power explains, “The time has come to
develop integrated global policies."[3]
But political globalization is not an overnight game. We don’t stop work
Friday afternoon, take a break over the weekend, and poof, find ourselves on
Monday morning immersed in global governance. Rather, this macro-political
transformation is the product of generations of changes, bumps and
corrections, and decades of decisive planning. Already in 1945, leading
socialist Scott Nearing penned,
“A world society cannot be haphazard.
Since there are no precedents, it cannot be traditional at this stage in its
development. It can only be deliberative and experimental, planned and built
up with particular objectives…”[4]
Much more recently, Trilateral Commission co-founder
Zbigniew Brzezinski
espoused similar notions, albeit with an American-focused bent. In his book,
The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and its Geostrategic Imperatives, the
former National Security Advisor maintains that America’s purpose for global
engagement is “that of forging an enduring framework of global geopolitical
cooperation” and to “unapologetically” position itself as the arbitrator of
“global management.” [5]
Capping off this assertion, Brzezinski closes with these sobering words,
“Geostrategic success in that cause would represent a fitting legacy of
America’s role as the first, only, and last truly global superpower.”[6]
Jim Garrison, founder and President of the
Gorbachev Foundation/USA
(at the behest of Mikhail Gorbachev), [7]
likewise sees America as the forging element in globalization.
“…America must consciously view itself as a transitional empire, one whose
destiny at this moment is to act as midwife to a democratically governed
global system. Its great challenge is not to dominate but to catalyze. It
must use its great strength and democratic heritage to establish integrating
institutions and mechanisms to manage the emerging global system so that its
own power is subsumed by the very edifice it helps to build.
"President Wilson established the League of Nations out of the ashes of World
War I. President Roosevelt and Truman established a new international order
after World War II. America must now build the third iteration of global
governance. If it attains this level of greatness, it could become the final
empire, for it will have bequeathed to the world a democratic and integrated
global system in which empire will no longer have a place or perform a
role.”[8] [italics in
original]
Nearing, Brzezinski, and Garrison all point to the reality of
internationalism – it’s not accidental. And the last two individuals, global
players in their own right, directly
call for America’s guiding hand in
planetary transformation.
America, however, isn’t the only major agent for global change. Europe too,
and more specifically for the 21st century, the European Union, is a
fantastic factor in the globalization process. Indeed, Brzezinski calls for
America to act with the European Union “for sustained global political
planning.”[9]
Not surprisingly, an American-European approach to global order already
exists under the Transatlantic Alliance heading. Over the years, this
alliance has been greatly shaped by men such as
Brzezinski,
Henry Kissinger,
and John J. McCloy on the US side – and by key Europeans such as Paul-Henri
Spaak, Jacques Delors and
Javier Solana.
Presently this Transatlantic system is comprised of a myriad of political,
military, and economic linkages. Some of its components include,
- NATO (North Atlantic Treaty
Organization)
- OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe)
- OECD
(Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development), which originally
started out as the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation).[10]
- Various joint commissions and private policy groups – such as the
Trilateral Commission,
[11]
the Atlantic Council of the United States, the British American Security
Information Council, and the less well known Streit Council – along with
numerous programs such as the Transatlantic Foreign Policy Discourse.
Massive business and corporate ties within aircraft and
shipping industries, petroleum and petro-chemical companies, defense and
aerospace ventures, all major automobile manufacturers, and many more
commercial connections.
This last point bears special significance. Elizabeth Pond, writing for the
European Union Studies Association’s U.S.-EU Relations Project, tells us,
“So intertwined have transatlantic companies become, especially in the past
decade, that it is often impossible to tell if firms are actually ‘American’
or ‘European’.”
[12]
For many outside observers, the question arises: Does this Transatlantic
connection represent the Americanization of Europe, or is Europe shaping
America?
Maybe it’s neither. Too often we in North America perceive such quandaries
through nationalistic lenses, instead, when viewed through the glasses of
globalization, a whole new world comes into focus.
What the
Transatlantic ideal ultimately represents is the “Third Wave” – the route of
globalization. As social scholars Alvin and Heidi Toffler assert, “what is
happening now is nothing less than a global revolution, a quantum leap.”[13]
But please don’t misunderstand: this “global revolution” is not a
seamless process. As one facet of the revolution, the Transatlantic
partnership – like all other relationships – has growing pains, setbacks,
and observable differences. Indeed during the last number of years, sizeable
rifts have occurred between European and American population segments,
especially in light of Middle Eastern developments.[14] Although this
fissure is more apparent in the general citizenry and within certain policy
circles, and may even have spill over effects within Transatlantic markets
such as defense spending,[15] it’s a rift that temporarily detracts from the global
reality.
And what is the “global reality”? That America is on the threshold of having
to reshape itself, just as it helped re-shape post-war Europe, and is now
looked upon as the “midwife” of a new global order.
It’s the shift from nationalism to globalization, via the European model of
regionalism.
Globalization, European Regionalism, and Anti-Nationalism
Immediately after the close of the Cold War, the Trilateral
Commission – a private policy group comprised of American, European, and
Asian counterparts – released its study, Regionalism in a Converging
World.[16]
According to its Introduction,
“…regionalism need not be opposed to globalism. The world should not have to
choose between one or the other. It needs to live with both. The
challenge…is how to channel the forces of regionalism in directions
compatible with and supportive of globalism.”
[17] [italics in original]
It’s important to understand that sponsorship for regionalism as a step in
the globalization process hasn’t just been confined to the Trilateral
Commission and its members. Thankfully, the many builders of this
regional-global order have left their fingerprints plastered throughout the
twentieth century. More significantly, their motives are also discernable.
Back in 1942, The Brookings Institute released its report, Peace Plans and
American Choices, highlighting a variety of hopeful post-war concepts for
“world order.” Options were reviewed such as explicit US mastery over
international affairs, the creation of a British-American Alliance,
harmonizing world order through a “Union of Democracies” (which was being
touted at the time by Clarence Streit [18]
), and the collaboration of a larger “United Nations”
package. Regionalism was considered in detail, with the Western Hemisphere,
Europe, and Asia comprising the main blocks.
Arthur Millspaugh, author of the Brookings report, was candid in his linking
of regionalism to the “bigger picture,”
“Such regional arrangements
may be considered either as steps or stages in the evolution of a universal
world order, as substitutes for a universal order, or as something to be
combined with a world-wide system.”
[19]
Although the Brookings report focused on the anticipated aftermath of World
War II, the idea of a Europe-State had been birthed decades earlier. Already
in 1914, the first year of The Great War (WWI), Nicholas Murray Butler –
President of Columbia University and later recipient of the 1933 Nobel Peace
Prize – suggested that European unification and the advent of a
supra-national government was needed to replace the “existing national
system.”
“What will be in substance a United States of Europe, a more or less formal
federation of the self-governing countries of Europe, may be the outcome of
the demonstrated failure of the existing national system to adjust
government to the growth of civilization…
"There is no reason why each nation in Europe should not make a place for
itself in the sun of unity which I feel sure is rising there behind the
war-clouds. Europe’s stupendous economic loss, which already has been
appalling and will soon be incalculable, will give us an opportunity to
press this argument home…
"…the time will come when each nation will
deposit in a world federation some portion of its sovereignty for the
general good. When this happens it will be possible to establish an
international executive and an international police, both devised for the
especial purpose of enforcing the decisions of the international court.”[20]
Attempts to promote European integration and cooperation after The Great War
were made. In 1923 the Pan-European Union was founded, attracting a number
of individuals who would later play a post-Word War II role, including
Konrad Adenauer.[21] And
France’s foreign minister, Aristide Briand, envisioned a scheme to organize
Europe around unified lines as opposed to nationalistic tendencies, even
bringing the debate to the League of Nations.
[22] None of these campaigns, however, were generally
effective.
Ironically, while the League of Nations and the Pan-European Union ideas
floundered, a type of continental integration almost occurred via the
National Socialist German Worker’s Party – better known as the Nazis. John
Laughland, author of The Tainted Source, details the extensive European
unification platform espoused by the Nazi leadership, including plans for a
Central European Economic Community, a customs-free market area, and the
eventual creation of a European monetary area.[23] What’s more, as Laughland
points out, “Nazi plans for European integration were as political as they
were economic.”[24]
The influence of Nazi-era concepts on European integration cannot be
understated. Stationed in Germany during the early years of World War II,
George F. Kennan, one of the most important American diplomats of the
twentieth century and the first Director of Policy Planning Staff at the
State Department, candidly shared his observations,
“When stationed
in Berlin during the war I had been struck with the fact that Hitler
himself, albeit for the wrong reasons and in the wrong spirit, had actually
accomplished much of the technical task of the unification of Europe. He had
created central authorities in a whole series of areas: in transportation,
in banking, in procurement and distribution of raw materials, in the control
of various forms of nationalized property. Why, I asked myself, could this
situation not be usefully exploited after an Allied victory?
"What was needed
was an Allied decision not to smash this network of central controls when
the war was ended but rather to take it over, to remove the Nazi officials
who had made it work, to appoint others (and not necessarily all
non-Germans) in their place, and then to supplement this physical
unification with a new European federal authority. When I returned from
Germany, in 1942, I tried to win understanding for this idea in the
Department of State…”[25]
After the war, Kennan (who was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
and later in life involved in the Trilateral Commission) became the US
counselor to the European Advisory Commission and a primary architect of
the Marshall Plan – America’s rebuilding program for Europe. In his Memoirs,
the diplomat noted,
“The United States government, animated primarily
by a belief that something should be done to ‘integrate’ the economies of
the European countries in the interests of economic recovery, had been
adding words of encouragement, if not pressure.”[26]
This immediate post-war “encouragement” was essentially channeled via the
Marshall Plan, with European integration “tacked on every proposal made in
Washington for export to Europe.”[27]
Theodore H. White, a US foreign journalist and later member of the Council
on Foreign Relations, describes the situation in his book, Fire in the
Ashes,
“American’s had, for many years, been loftily instructing Europeans in the
virtues of their own great Union of the States, and chided Europe on the
stupidities of its rivalries and separatisms. During the war several
American brain trusters had even toyed with the idea that, come Liberation,
it would be best to sweep away all currencies of the Liberation countries
and replace them with one new common European currency issued by the United
States Army…”[28]
White continued,
“It was the Marshall Plan that hardened American convictions that Europeans
must unite…When visiting Congressmen asked the Marshall Planners what they
were trying to do, they would answer, ‘We’re trying to pull them together,
we’re trying to integrate them.’ ‘Integration’ was a convenient word and
each successive delegation asked sternly, ‘How far have you got with
integration now?’ as if expecting the Marshall Plan to pull out of its desk
drawers a draft constitution and a design for a European flag.
"By
1949, in the second appropriation of the Marshall Plan, Congress, without
debate, set the unification of Europe as one of the major purposes of the
Plan.”[29]
Later in life White would reflect, “The
story of the Marshall Plan, it turned out, began with the Meaning of Money.
It was also about Money and Europe, and Money and the Peace – but above all,
Money and Power and America.”[30]
While the Marshall Plan was operational, three members of Europe’s Christian
Democratic community – Alcide De Gasperi, Konrad Adenauer, and Robert Shuman
– led the way towards rousing continental interest in unification. Giving us
some insight into the motivational factors of these three “Fathers of
Europe,” R.W. Keyserlingk, General Manager of the British United Press
during the 1940s, writes,
“…all three [had] been formed in their youth by the Catholic social
movements activated by the papal teachings of Rerum Novarum. They were all
deeply religious, fervent patriots but determined anti-nationalists. All
three came from frontier areas of border disputes and border
contacts…This had taught them that only a Europe as a federation, not
Europe torn by hatreds bred by narrow nationalism, could assure freedom
and liberty to their beloved, more intimate border homelands.”
[31] [italics in
original]
Demonstrating the depth of this European ideal within an anti-nationalistic
framework and of the subsequent roadmap to regionalism, Keyserlingk reminds
us, “Integration into a federal system, along political, economic and
military lines, involving the sacrifice of absolute national sovereignty,
was their objective.”[32]
How to achieve this objective? The continuity between assimilation
approaches is truly remarkable,
“First, the political line was attempted and although this proved almost to
be putting the cart before the horse, it had considerable merit for the
future. It created the Council of Europe and the European Parliament…
"When the political approach revealed the insurmountable difficulties of
getting down to practical working measures, Robert Shuman came up with the
second possibility, economic integration; a merging of interlocking
interests, the abolition of trade barriers eliminating economic
competition…working out of common policies for use of the labour
market…freedom of movement for workers…and a gradual strengthening of joint
economic policies…”[33]
Through this decided act of economic amalgamation, which has since borne
itself out via the European Union and Euro currency, Europe became for the
rest of the world a recognized model to advance internationalism above
single state interests. This reality was perceived early on by European
federalists and is evident in the 1946 Hertenstein Program,
“A
European Community on federal lines is a necessary and essential
contribution to any world union…The members of the European Union shall
transfer part of their sovereign rights – economic, political and military –
to the Federation which they constitute…By showing that it can solve the
problems of its destiny in a federal spirit, Europe will make its
contribution to reconstruction and to the creation of a world community of
peoples.”[34]
Less than one year after the Hertenstein announcement, the “World Movement
for World Federal Government” released a similar platform known as the
Montreux Declaration. After stating that national sovereignty required
limitations and that nations needed to transfer powers to a “world federal
government,” the Declaration added,
“We consider that integration of
activities at regional and functional levels is consistent with the true
federal approach. The formation of regional federations – insofar as they do
not become an end in themselves or run the risk of crystallizing into blocs
– can and should contribute to the effective functioning of a world federal
government.”[35]
In the decades immediately following World War II, Transatlantic ties
between Euro-federalists and American elites broadened international
acceptance of a European Community. Moreover, Europe’s march to amalgamation
successfully achieved strategic goals. The European Coal and Steel
Community, the Treaty of Rome and the subsequent European Economic Community
and Euratom agency, and the gradual harmonization of agricultural and fiscal
policies all demonstrated the strength of this trans-national agenda.
By the time the 1970s rolled around with its OPEC petroleum crisis and the
revamping of the Bretton Woods financial system, the opportunities
regionalism offered as a tool for global transformation was clearly evident.
The Trilateral Commission, the Club of Rome, and the Institute for World
Order all looked to regionalism as a trump card over nationalism.[36]
As one of the most prolific advocates of regional modeling, the Club
of Rome – an elite body acting as a “global catalyst of change” [37]
– deserves special attention. Its report, Mankind at the Turning Point,
envisioned a world zoned into ten different blocs, and acknowledged that the
regional view was necessary for global development.[38] In another report released
during this same time period, the Club of Rome merged the steering of world
change, anti-nationalism, and regional cooperation.
“In the present
international order huge power is concentrated in individualized
nation-States. Seen from a world viewpoint, this must be deemed undesirable.
Some of the means which could be employed to attain those objectives of
vital importance to the international community can more effectively be
handled by higher levels of decision-making…the achievement of some aims,
such as the creation of larger markets through regional and sub-regional
cooperation (collective self-reliance), would be facilitated by
decision-making on a level higher than the nation-State.”[39]
Richard A. Falk, a Professor of International Law with connections to the
Council on Foreign Relations and the World Federalist Association,
postulated similar directives in the mid-1970s. Contributing to the World
Order Model’s Project (a program of the Institute for World Order), he wrote
that,
“…regionalism has considerable appeal as a world order half-way
house. It seems more feasible in the near term as a step beyond state
sovereignty that can be used to dilute nationalist sentiments during a
period when global loyalties need to grow stronger.”[40]
Falk had seen the handwriting on the wall less than a decade earlier.
Touching on the increasing role of regional institutions and the United
Nations as it related to global transitional strategies, he offered an
interesting perspective to the World Law Fund’s Strategy of World Order
program: “The result of these challenges to the traditional international
legal system is to create a situation of transitional crisis. For the
inadequacies of the old order have given rise to the beginnings of a new
order…”[41]
Today, global elites from both Europe and America consider regionalism to be
a prime stratagem for global governance. In fact, this “new regionalism” is
now embraced by a multitude of key individuals, organizations, and
governmental agencies. As two United Nations University document released in
2005 state,
“…regional governance is not incompatible with and does
not negate global governance. On the contrary, it has the potential to
strengthen global governance. The regional logic has always been inherent to
the global body…”[42]
And,
“Regional integration between sovereign states…is a booming phenomenon, and,
not surprisingly, it is nowadays seen as a process that, together with
globalization, challenges the existing Westphalian [Ed., nation-centered]
world order.”[43]
American Choices and World Realities
Nations-states will not go away, either under regionalism or through some
form of global governance. Roles, functions and the sovereign status of
nations, however, will be fundamentally altered. But the “country,” like
state/provinces and city/local governments, will remain intact. Just add
another layer to the pile – after all, it’s the Third Wave style of global
transformation.
As social engineers Alvin and Heidi Toffler reminds
us, “Change so many social, technological and cultural elements at once and
you create not just a transition but a transformation, not just a new
society but the beginnings, at least, of a totally new civilization.”[44]
Globalization and regionalism go hand-in-hand, and the relevancy of this is
extraordinary. Currently, the EU is assisting in the creation of new
regional blocs around the world: including the Gulf Cooperation Council, an
Asian zone, the development of the South American Community of Nations, and
new blocs in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean.
One 2004 EU document spells out this strategy,
“Because of its history and its own integration process, support for
regional integration is an area in which the EU has real added value to
contribute. The EU is ready to share this unique experience with other world
regional groupings. It also hopes to help them draw on the substantial gains
made in the regional integration process. It therefore encourages other
countries in the world to forge even stronger links with their neighbors
and to organize themselves within institutionalized regional organisations.”[45]
In discussing its own enlargement we can, moreover, catch a glimpse of what
the EU envisions: “Enlargement strengthens the role and position of the
Union in the world, in external relations, security, trade and in other
domains relating to world governance.”[46] And, “In political terms, by adding to the power, cohesion
and influence of the Union on the international arena, enlargement
strengthens the Union’s hand when it comes to globalisation…”[47]
What does this have to do with the United States of America? Everything.
At the financial level, the US has to monetarily and economically compete
with the European Union and its Euro currency. This competition not only
impacts America’s trading power with Europe directly, but the growing
influence of the Euro around the world raises the stakes even higher. In
2004, Toshihiko Fukui, a board member with the Bank for International
Settlements, noted; “Today, we can discuss the euro’s potential to bring a
sea change to the global financial architecture, without being criticized
for fantasizing.”[48] Fukui then talked of a time when, like
the European Union, Asia too will work as an economic bloc with a single
powerful, globally recognized currency.[49]
The Euro’s importance as a rival to the US dollar, and as a model for other
currency zones, cannot be ignored. And as different regions develop – with
the possibilities of China, India, and Brazil becoming natural magnets for
the creation of massive economic/regional power blocs – America, with its
debt loads expanded beyond comprehension and its dollar losing face
internationally, finds itself treading economically dangerous waters.
But there’s one other element added to this mix. As stated earlier, the
European Union is involved in creating other competitive regional blocs. Not
only does this cause a deflection in US dollar strength at the international
level, it also shifts foreign interests away from the US and back to Europe.
Hence American influence, especially in terms of advancing US interests
abroad, weakens as Europe’s influence grows.
These facts haven’t escaped US policy makers. The irony is that America’s
answer is to follow Europe’s footsteps, blending domestic realities with
regional/global trends, and try to assist foreign nations to integrate under
US guidance. The paradox deepens: America, in order to counter the Europe it
helped establish, now has to create a North American Community incorporating
itself, Canada, and Mexico into a new super-region. However, this is only a
paradox to those in America who view the US through nationalist lenses, as
already witnessed, its elite view things very differently.
North American integration isn’t a pie-in-the-sky idea. It’s been batted
around by a host of privileged tri-national organizations, including the
Canadian Council of Chief Executives (Canada’s top business leaders), the
Mexican Council on Foreign Relations, the
Center for Strategic and
International Studies
(a Washington DC think tank with Trilateralist
Brzezinski playing a key role), and the New York Council on Foreign
Relations.
In the spring of 2005, the CFR came out with an
“independent task force” report titled Building a North American Community.
This document details an economic and security mandate that binds North
America by establishing a common security perimeter, a North American border
pass program, common external tariffs, the seamless movement of goods, full
mobility of labor between Canada and the US, a continental energy platform,
and the creation of a single economic tri-national region; with 2010 as a
target date for many of these arrangements.[50]
Responding to this report, the US Embassy in Canada – “pointing to increased
competition from the European Union and raising economic powers such as
India and China” – called the CFR’s agenda a “blueprint for a powerhouse
North American trading area.”[51]
A few short weeks after the CFR
announced that its upcoming integration report would go public,[52]
US President Bush, Mexican President Fox, and Canadian Prime Minister Martin
met in Texas to announce a tri-national agenda to “ensure that North America
remains the most economically dynamic region of the world.” [53]
The Council on Foreign Relations final report directly acknowledged this
tri-national leadership summit, and pointedly said that, “The Task Force is
pleased to provide specific advice on how the partnership can be pursued and
realized.”[54] And tucked into the taskforce chairman’s
statement was a simple but vital comment; the “process of change must be
properly managed.”[55]
This wasn’t anything new to the
banking community. In 1991, the Dallas Federal Reserve issued a research
paper titled, North American Free Trade and the Peso: The Case for a North
American Currency Area.[56] In the late 1990’s the Bank of
Canada published a string of working papers looking at the pros and cons of
a North American economic and monetary zone.[57] One US
Treasury Department official, outlining world financial trends at the
Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta in October 2000, candidly remarked that “a
quantum increase in global economic and financial cooperation” would be
needed to meet future international challenges,
“Successful globalization requires a parallel international process of
harmonization of rules, including rules governing the financial system, a
process that has been going on largely silently for many years in the
central banking community…
"…I believe that it is at least possible that in the years ahead we will
witness a dramatic decline in the number of independent currencies in the
world…I would not like to put a time frame on an evolution to a world with
substantially fewer currencies, but I am sure you have noted that the
president elect of Mexico, Vincente Fox, has suggested a long-term evolution
towards a North American currency area. Such trends may lead to new
challenges and institutions in the area of international economic
cooperation.”[58]
Regionalism as a stepping-stone to globalization is the inseparable blending
of politics and economics across the board. On the “political side,”
consider what Richard N. Haass had to say when he was the Director of the
Policy Planning Staff at the US Department of States back in 2002 (remember
George F. Kennan was its first director).
“There clearly is a consistent body of ideas and policies that guides the
Bush Administration’s foreign policy. Whether these ideas and policies will
evolve into a formal doctrine with a name, I’ll leave to history to decide.
But this coherence exists and can be captured by the idea of integration.
"In the 21st century, the principle aim of American foreign policy is to
integrate other countries and organizations into arrangements that will
sustain a world consistent with U.S. interests and values.
"…Integration is about bringing nations together and then building frameworks
of cooperation and, where feasible, institutions that reinforce and sustain
them even more.
"…Integration reflects not merely a hope for the
future, but the emerging reality of the Bush Administration.”[59]
Haass should know. Not only is he a member of the Trilateral Commission,
he’s the President of the Council on Foreign Relations. In fact, Haass wrote
the forward to the CFR report, Building a North American Community.
The bottom line is this: Just as politics and economics are bonded at the
hip, regionalism and all it entails – including the unification of North
America – fits part-and-parcel with the strategy of globalization. It’s the
pursuit of the Third Wave global society as a replacement to the archaic
world of nationalism.
In conclusion, the question must be asked; How far will this process reach?
Alvin and Heidi Toffler let the cat-out-of-the-bag.
“The fact is that building a Third Wave civilization on the wreckage of
Second Wave institutions involves the design of new, more appropriate
political structures in many nations at once. This is a painful yet
necessary project that is mind-staggering in scope…
"In all likelihood it will require a protracted battle to radically overhaul
the United States Congress, the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the
French Chamber of Deputies, the Bundestag, the Diet, the giant ministries
and entrenched civil services of many nations, their constitutions and court
system – in short, much of the unwieldy and increasingly unworkable
apparatus of existing representative governments.
"Nor will this wave of political struggle stop at the national level. Over
the months and decades ahead, the entire ‘global law machine’ – from the
United Nations at one end to the local city or town council at the other –
will eventually face a mounting, ultimately irresistible demand for
restructuring.
"All of these structures will have to be fundamentally
altered, not because they are inherently evil or even because the are
controlled by this or that class or group, but because they are increasingly
unworkable – no longer fitting to the needs of a radically changing world.”[60]
Can’t you hear it? That’s the sound of the crucible of globalization being
fired up.
Endnotes:
[1] Björn Hettne, “Globalization, the New Regionalism and East Asia,” Globalism and Regionalism (Selected Papers Delivered at the United Nations University Global Seminar '96 Shonan Session, 2-6 September 1996, Hayama, Japan).
[2] For one example of this global governance calling see
Our Global Neighborhood by The Commission on Global Governance, 1995. See also the reports from the Montreal Global Governance conference series, hosted by Forum International de Montreal.
[3] Mikhail Gorbachev, The Search for a New Beginning: Developing a New Civilization (HarperSanFrancisco, 1995), p.26.
[4] Scott Nearing, United World (Island Press, 1945), p.221.
[5] Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and its Geostrategic Imperatives (Basic Books, 1997), pp.214-215.
[6] Ibid., p.215.
[7] See, James Amon Garrison, Jr. Biographical Summary, released by Berrett-Koehler Publishers, attached to its press release on Garrison’s book, America as Empire. Biographical summary/press release on file.
[8] Jim Garrison, America as Empire: Global Leadership or Rogue Power? (Berrett-Koehler, 2004), p.9.
[9] Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Choice: Global Domination or Global Leadership (Basic Books, 2004), p.222.
[10] OSCE is the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, which originally started as a transatlantic Marshall Plan tool known as the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation, is predominately an Atlantic-Euro-American body which has grown to include Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand.
[11] The Trilateral Commission also incorporates Japanese interests along with American and European players. To read more about the Trilateral history and its role in the Atlantic Alliance, see The Trilateral Commission at 25 (Trilateral Commission, 1998).
[12] Elizabeth Pond, Friendly Fire: The Near-Death of the Transatlantic Alliance (EUSA, 2004), p.xiii.
[13] See, Alvin and Heidi Toffler, Creating a New Civilization: The Politics of the Third Wave (Turner Publishing, 1994/95), p.21.
[14] See Elizabeth Pond, Friendly Fire (EUSA, 2004).
[15] See Terrence R. Guay, The Transatlantic Defense Industrial Base: Restructuring Scenarios and their Implications (USArmyWarCollege, Strategic Studies Institute, 2005).
[16] See, Regionalism in a Converging World (Trilateral Commission/Trilateral Papers #42, 1992).
[17] Ibid., p.3.
[18] Clarence Streit and his book Union Now were influential forces in shaping the Transatlantic ideal, and supported a larger vision for NATO. Streit was a Rhode Scholar, an American delegate to the Conference of Versailles, a New York Times correspondent at the League of Nations, founder of the Atlantic Union Committee and the Association to United the Democracies – which has had close ties to the World Federalist Association. See, Clarence K. Streit, Union Now (Harper and Brothers, 1940) and Union Now with Britain (Harper and Brothers, 1941).
[19] Arthur C. Millspaugh, Peace Plans and American Choices (The Brookings Institute, 1942), p.49.
[20] Nicholas Murray Butler, A World in Ferment: Interpretations of the War for a New World (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1918), see the section entitled “The United States of Europe,” pp.27, 31-32, 36.
[21] Derek W. Urwin, The Community of Europe: A History of European Integration Since 1945 (Longman, 1991), p.5. The Austrian aristocrat was Count Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi.
[22] C. Grove Haines and Ross J.S. Hoffman, The Origins and Background of the Second World War (Oxford University Press, 1943), p.265. See also, Urwin, The Community of Europe, p.6.
[23] John Laughland, The Tainted Source: The Undemocratic Origins of the European Idea (Little, Brown and Company, 1997), pp.24 and 30.
[24] Ibid., p.29.
[25] George F. Kennan, Memoirs, 1925-1950 (Little, Brown and Company, 1967), p.417.
[26] Ibid., p.449.
[27] Theodore H. White, Fire in the Ashes: Europe in Mid-Century (William Sloane Associates, 1953), p.272.
[28] Ibid., p.271.
[29] Ibid., p.272.
[30] Theodore H. White, In Search of History (Harper and Row, 1978), p.284.
[31] R.W. Keyserlingk, Fathers of Europe (Palm Publishers, 1972), pp.2-3.
[32] Ibid., p.137.
[33] Ibid., p.137.
[34] The Hertenstein Programme developed out of a meeting between European and world federalists, and was hosted by the Swiss Europa Union Schweiz. The conference was held from September 15-22, 1946.
[35] The Montreux Declaration, August 23, 1947.
[36] For the Trilateral Commission, see their 1974 report, The Crisis of International Cooperation. For the Club of Rome, see their report, Mankind at the Turning Point. For the Institute for World Order, see their World Order Models Project report, On the Creation of a Just World Order (1975).
[37] See About the Club of Rome at www.clubofrome.org/about/index.php
.
[38] Mihajlo Mesarovic and Eduard Pestel, Mankind at the Turning Point: The Second Report to the Club of Rome (Club of Rome/Signet, 1974/76), p.39.
[39] Jan Tinbergen (coordinator), RIO: Reshaping the International Order (Club of Rome, 1976), p.100.
[40] Richard A. Falk, “Toward A New World Order,” On the Creation of a Just World Order (Institute for World Order, World Order Model’s Project, 1975), p.229.
[41] Richard A. Falk, “Historical Tendencies, Modernizing and Revolutionary Nations, and the International Legal Order,” The Strategy of World Order, Volume 2: International Law (World Law Fund, 1966), p.180.
[42] Tânia Felício, Managing Security as a Regional Public Good: A Regional-Global Mechanism for Security (United Nations University-CRIS Occasional Paper, 2005). See the section, “Security as a Regional Public Good,” third last paragraph.
[43] Luk Van Langenhove and Ana-Cristina Costea, Inter-regionalism and the Future of Multilateralism (United Nations University – CRIS Occasional Paper, 2005), p.10.
[44] Alvin and Heidi Toffler, Creating a New Civilization, p.29.
[45] European Commission, The European Union, Latin America and the Caribbean: A Strategic Partnership, 2004, p.32.
[46] Ibid., p.34.
[47] Ibid., p.35.
[48] Toshihiko Fukui, Governor of the Bank of Japan, “The Euro-Dollar Regime and the Role of the Yen – Their Impact on Asia,” speech given at the 13th International Monetary Symposium, 12 November 2004. Speech can be accessed via the BIS.
[49] Ibid.
[50] The full report can be accessed via the Council on Foreign Relations website (
www.cfr.og).
[51] Press Release; “Task Force Urges Measures to Strengthen North American Competitiveness, Expand Trade, Ensure Border Security,” Embassy of the USA in Canada, Ottawa. This press release can be accessed via the US Embassy in Ottawa homepage,
www.usembassycanada.gov.
[52] This pre-release announcement received virtually no media coverage in the US, although it was a top story in Canada, making all the news wire services and national television broadcasts.
[53] “Joint Statement by President Bush, President Fox, and Prime Minister Martin, Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America” (
www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/03/20050323-2.html).
[54] Building A North American Community, p.3.
[55] Creating a North American Community, Chairman’s Statement, Council of Foreign Relations, 2005, p.5.
[56] Darryl McLeod and John H. Welch, North American Free Trade and the Paso: The Case for a North American Currency Area, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Research Paper #9115, August 1991.
[57] Three examples are: Canada’s Exchange Rate Regime and North American Economic Integration (1999), The Exchange Rate Regime and Canada’s Monetary Order (1999), and Why Canada Needs a Flexible Exchange Rate (1999).
[58] Treasury Assistant Secretary for International Affairs, Edwin M. Truman, Remarks at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, October 12, 2000. Speech can be accessed through the US Treasury Department website.
[59] Richard N. Haass, “Defining U.S. Foreign Policy in a Post-Post-Cold War World,” speech given to the Foreign Policy Association, New York, April 22, 2002.
[60] Alvin and Heidi Toffler, Creating a New Civilization, p.91.
Note: Carl Teichrib, a Canadian citizen and resident of Canada, is a Senior Fellow at World Research
Carl Teichrib is a Canadian-based researcher and author whose primary work
is on globalization and its impact on Christianity, the family, and nations.
Please visit his website for more vital information:
www.forcingchange.org
His earlier articles include:
The Merging of the Americas
in a New Global Order
Globalization: The Final
Demise of National Security
|
Under
War’s Bloody Banner
Bloody Utopian Dreams, Part I: Hammer and Sickle |
Part 2: The Enigma of the
Third Reich
Bloody Utopian Dreams, Part 3: The Politics and
Religion of Population Control
Flattery and the Big Lie | Global Citizenship 2000
| Lucifer Rising - 1,
2,
3
Re-zoning
the World: The Merging of the Americas in a New Global Order
- 2003
The Millennium Messiah and World Change
|
Esoteric Christianity
Esoteric Christianity
| Re-Creating Eden |
A Short Guide to Occult
Symbols
Re-zoning the World: The Merging of the Americas in a New Global Order
A New
World Agenda - Canada's Role In Sustainable Development |
Global Citizenship 2000
