The grand narrative...

Joy linked to this blog: The question of how to help certain African countries change their governments once again cuts to the core of the classic neoconservative and neoliberal debate. Do we do it through war (either covert or overt) or increased trade and integration? In the case of Africa, I think the answer is especially obvious.

See, that's exactly the question I come to, but then feel really uncomfortable with, which is probably why I was such a bad IR student. :) Yes, these countries are lacking in the democratic governance, to use a catchphrase, necessary to redistribute wealth, yes their governments may be based on the historical rule by the elite and oppression of the masses. But I still feel uncomfortable thinking about how western countries can "help African countries change their governments". Can you be both anti imperialist and practical? I mean, this is the issue that I was grappling with before...any form of "development" would ultimately entail Western countries not only helping, but generally mandating, how countries rule themselves, and it's hard to see the distinction between that and neo-colonialism. At the same time, am I really advocating not doing anything? Am I really just offering a slightly updated version of dependency theory? Hmmm.

After about three vodka tonics last evening, the words came to me to describe why the media coverage of the London events is disturbing. It's because over the past few years, the media has been constructing a grand narrative of the world. I think that recent events, such as not finding WMD's and the Downing Street Memo, have made us question this narrative, which states that "our" (read: white) countries are under attack by terrorists, who strike randomly and hatefully, and that we must always be vigilant, and that sometimes protecting ourselves means taking preemptive action, etc. Yes, terrorist attacks have been random and hateful in the sense that they're killing innocent people. But they have not happened in a vacuum, and have not been random in the sense that they've come out of nowhere. By construing these attacks as random, the media is contributing to this grand narrative which ultimately leaves us paralyzed by fear and supportive of any government decisions that will make us feel more secure. This is why other things don't get as much coverage: they don't contribute to this grand narrative, which although better packaged and less nuanced than reality, is ultimately more deadly. As my mom would say, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. (No, I am not trying to be Norman Solomon.)