Dr. Benjamin Barber, political theorist and former consultant to President Clinton, spoke in the Glass Pavilion last night as a part of the 2002 Symposium on Foreign Affairs. Dr. Barber spoke about the relationship between capitalism and terrorism in the aftermath of the attacks of Sept. 11.
"Interdependence is the reality of our times," said Barber. "In this world we either work together or we will falter."
In his lecture, Barber posed the question that many have been asking- why people in other parts of the world celebrated after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. He believes it is because even as capitalism breeds success in the U.S., it has bred dissatisfaction and taken advantage of people in other nations of the world.
"Capitalism seems as a form of oppression elsewhere because it has been stripped of the democratic institutions that humanize its character," he said.
According to Barber, people have equated the spread of capitalism with the spread of democracy, but in fact this attachment has not held true. What capitalism needs most to remain effective is democratic governments to regulate and watch over it.
"When we globalized capitalism, we took it out of the American envelope that had prevented it from being brought down by its own contradictions," he said.
Among these contradictions, he counted the competitive markets that tend toward monopolies and industries that were better at producing goods than producing jobs or consumers to buy their goods.
He decried the fact that America has been living in the political world of the past, where nation-states were more important players than they are now.
"We lived in a cocoon of innocence and independence," Barber said.
Before Sept. 11, America had not been attacked on its own soil since 1941, which Barber believes led to an attitude of isolationism and a feeling that the U.S. alone was in control of its own destiny. The terrorist attacks proved that belief devastatingly wrong.
"In the globalized world, it has become a race to the bottom, in which corporations move jobs to places where they can pay the least," he said. "Just recently, Black & Decker in Baltimore closed a factory and moved 400 jobs to China. What can the government do about that? Nothing."
Barber also said we should not fear other cultures because of the attacks.
"We have always feared differences from which we have so benefited."
In the end, Barber feels that we should not try to put a stop to globalization or capitalism, but merely put just as much effort into creating more democracies around the world.
"Don't back off globalization, just democratize and pluralize it," he said.
Students had mixed reactions to his speech.
"I thought he danced around a lot of issues and said things that everyone could agree on easily," said freshman Mark Belinsky.
Sophomore Feroze Sidhwa had another perspective.
"He was clear and made the point that he wasn't making a political or moral statement, just a straight-forward observation," he said.
Others were equally impressed with the event.
"I thought he spoke intelligently about democracy and how to improve it and I appreciated his commentary," said senior Frieda Hoffman.
French Graduate student Benedicte Meillon was happy to see the debate over capitalism is alive and well.
"In France, people would never believe that this type of dialogue would exist. People there tend to think all Americans are pro-capitalism and globalization," she said.
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