[Nettime-bold] The end of the world as we know it? A view from Germany

[till@tillwe.de (Till Westermayer)]

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . till we *) . . .

The end of the world as we know it?

A view from Germany

Act 1. The Hague's climate summit fails. US president Bush declares, that  
the USA won't try to do a thing to realise the Kyoto protocol. In Bonn,  
strongly influenced by the EU delegation, a common declaration to save the  
climate is passed without the USA - a declaration which is seen as a  
document of the new multi-lateralism. At the same time, at the G8 summit  
in Genoa, the police violence against `the adversaries of globalization'  
leads to a new debate about the politics of globalization. Europe's  
politics seems to have found a new consciousness. Europe seems to be more  
sure about the European role in the world. For a short moment everything  
looks like the world of the 21st century will be governed by totally new  
constellations compared to the last century, the American century - new  
constellations, without the EU becoming a new USA. There is some quarrel  
about the question, how much self-consciousness Europe is allowed to have,  
about the best place for an European version of world society in this  
multilateral debate, about the borders set by respect for other ways of  
thought. Between the lines one can feel how the pride for the own model  
transforms into opposition against the American model extremized by Bush  
jr. Sporadically there are warnings about hazards of a new anti- 
Americanism, remembering the own left-wing history, emphasising the  
transatlantic solidarity. Nevertheless: The world policy seems to be in  
transformation.

Act II. September 11th, 2001: acts of terror in a new dimension have shot  
into the heart of the US and turned the world with them. The world has  
changed, they say. For some days the oceans become a invincible abyss,  
whereas the media broadcast in global unity. Bush declares war on the  
Evil, someplace they dig out Huntington's idea of an religious Clash of  
Civilisations. Solidarity and sympathy with the American victims are read  
as unrestricted support for the big brother. The North Atlantic Council  
guesses to be in a case covered by Article 5 of the Washington treaty. One  
mobilises for the military campaign against the Evil, against terrorism,  
against the network of Bin Laden, and at some places also against the  
Islam, against everyone who isn't a member of the West. The public opinion  
makes it difficult to analyse in a differentiated way, to ask, what may  
have lead to these stroke. One who remembers the dead which were killed  
directly or indirectly by the USA - or, maybe, to be more precise: often  
killed by the West as a whole - is suspect of anti-Americanism, is suspect  
to justify the act of terror. Only isolated voices call for solidarity and  
circumspection, only isolated voices warn that the war against the Evil  
lead by the US easily could become a global repetition of the Vietnam war.  
Only isolated voices consider the newness of terrorism at this scale, only  
isolated voices say that this leads to a need for new answers, for  
thoughts along the lines of an international court of justice, of an  
international police which isn't the world police also known as the  
strongest state. That new answers are needed to bring to justice the wire- 
pullers and people behind the stroke.

Act III. A lot is still in suspense, now. The news contradict themselves.  
New York as the centre of the news coverage becomes it's blind spot.  
Reaction, politics is everything that counts now. They talk about ending  
states. Whereas budgets in the millions are a reason for quarrel, now  
milliards are mobilised. The people flee from Afghanistan. In Germany the  
conservatives right of the centre of the ruling SPD talk about the  
necessary to end all party quarrel, to become Americans to the last one.  
In the US, it seems, one tastes the aftermath of September, 11th: The  
state control of Internet communication is a done thing, the first deadly  
attack against an Arabic looking American has happened. To be rational  
now, to save the virtues of an open, liberal and democratic society - all  
this is seen as an act against the solidarity with the US, as an act  
against the victims. A lot is still in suspense, now - how long will this  
be? What will be there of the new found consciousness of this world, of  
the consciousness to live on one planet, on a planet that has to solve  
it's problems together and without a strong leader - what will be there  
when the smoke has settled?

                                             Till Westermayer, 2001-09-16
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