Mar 25 2006
After the Empire: The Breakdown of the American Order (European Perspectives: A Series in Social Thought and Cultural Criticism) Emmanuel Todd.
Sat 25th March, 2006 - Introduced by George Blecher
After the Empire: The Breakdown of the American Order (European Perspectives: A Series in Social Thought and Cultural Criticism) Emmanuel Todd.
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First review (of 2)
We tried to deal with this diffuse but provocative book by breaking the discussion down into three general areas: Todd’s thesis that American democracy has evolved toward oligarchy, and is no longer held up as a general standard by the rest of the world; the thesis put forth by Todd (and Francis Fukuyama) that modernity brings stability, and that the conflicts in transitional societies like the Middle East are actually short-term reactions to a more general movement toward democratization; and an examination of the US as a reluctant empire, and specifically in what sense it is or isn’t “universalist.”
Regarding the first point, the general sense of the participants was that perhaps US democracy had moved somewhat toward oligarchy, but this was also true of other democracies, and that within the “ruling” class there was little organization or even communication, and there was also a good deal of elasticity, as evidenced by the warring factions in the Republican party. The group seemed to think that Todd and Fukuyama were onto something in their view of the stability that modernism brings, and that beneath the sensationalistic headlines and Huntington Manicheanism there were indications of a general movement toward democracy even in the Middle East.
The point about universalism produced a number of interesting responses. One of the participants suggested that French universalism was only skin-deep, and that in terms of a “successful” empire, the British with their policy of indirect rule were more effective than the French and Russians. Also, one could make a case that multiculturalism was just as “universalist” as inclusiveness, and that the real problem with American hegemony was that it offered hollow slogans instead of the procedural apparatus for real change.
Review by George Blecher, Introducer
