Global Perestroika

Abstract

Perestroika in the now defunct Soviet empire is perhaps the worst case of what has become a global phenomenon - worst not in an absolute sense but in the most dramatic descent from production to entropy. Global perestroika, more euphemistically called 'globalization', is not the consequence of a conscious decision of political leadership. It is a result of structural changes in capitalism, in the actions of many people, corporate bodies, and states, that cumulatively produce new relationships and patterns of behaviour. The project of global perestroika is less the conscious will of an identifiable group than the latent consequence of these structural changes. These consequences form a coherent interrelated pattern; but this pattern contains within itself contradictions that threaten the persistence of this structural whole in formation. Those of us who abhor the social and political implications of the globalisation project must study its contradictions in order to work for its eventual replacement.