Giray's blog

Ultimate internationalism

Ultimate internationalism
I am sitting in a Korean diner in Washington DC that is showing the World Cup match between Cameroon and Denmark while listening to Shakira singing in Spanish while drinking a Canadian branded apple juice and typing on an American Apple computer purchased in France, shipped from the UK but assembled in China. I could go on and on.

Yes friends, we are in an international era. Yesterday I met an officer of the Montgomery County economic development department, she was of Belgian origin. We ran into the treasurer of said county, he was of Dutch origin.

Where are we headed? It's obvious that we are headed for fewer cultural borders, music is listened to universally, Ketchup is available in every country on Earth as is Coke, Mars and all the other usual suspects. Our haircuts are all similar, we all wear jeans…

So does that mean that some day we will be 'one'? I think so. I think that some time in the far distant future we will, if not be one, have different sub-divisions. We will not have 'national' borders per se. So what kind of borders will we have? How will we be compartmentalized? Maybe tomorrow's borders are online? Maybe they are local? Maybe they are professional? Let's briefly explore all three.

Our lives have become increasingly virtual. We are connected by our various online traits using various online tools that exist within online communities. Could this be tomorrow's world? If the online world remains as it is today, no, that won't happen. But things change, all things change, and so too will the online world. At some point the online world will have genuine impact, power, leverage or whatever we choose to call the concept of control.

Next there is the possibility of borders becoming local, or maybe provincial. In Europe, there is already a considerably influent movement calling for the 'regionalization' of the continent; no more countries, just regions. If this happens, what is to stop the process of decentralization from going to its extreme making the local community the one responsible for most of what affects our lives. I mean, simply, if we were to do away with external or foreign relations and the military would we need such a large federal government? We would need one, probably, but on an entirely different scale.

Last is the professional vision. Maybe some day we will be grouped into what we do. Maybe it will be by profession, maybe by supra-corporation (a kind of mega-holding concept). Imagine all athletes being grouped into one political entity. This is the least likely scenario but worth exploring.

That's all for today. I just wanted to make the point that in a world of extreme globalization we might want to start imagining where all this will lead us; if not for us, for future generations.

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Giray

Giray's blog

Welcome to my blog. In it you will find some of my thoughts on campaigning, institutional change, the issues and current events that shape them.

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