James Robinson wonder in the Media page of the Observer 12.10.2008 (p 11) ‘Why didn’t the City journalists see the financial crisis coming?’; except a lone voice of Gilian Tett of the FT. One would expect that papers like FT, who has the resources, envy of many others, would have someone who is not involved in the day to day manufacturing of the NEWS, but who sits back and just takes long term view of the markets and the system as a whole, where it is coming from and where it is heading to?

I wonder why none of the journalists working for papers like FT, even the other broadsheet papers, couldn’t stand back and see the bigger picture; the media needs to think its role again.

I was an occasional writer for a small publication AN (Artists’ Newsletter) in 1980s and 90s, as an artist, I could see such a need to cast an overview of the humanity as a artist and creative person. I quote from one of the pieces I wrote in 1980s,

‘If we imagine, the whole of the humanity is a large caravan travelling with time. In this caravan most people are busy pushing pulling, carrying their possessions, sweating in a race of material achievements.
It is the Artist, who disengages him/herself from this entourage; frees from this rat-race, runs ahead of the caravan, finds a vantage point to grasp/intuit an overview, where the caravan is coming from and where it is heading to? Then the Artist expresses this vision by singing a song, playing a piece of music, writing a poem, making a painting or a sculpture to share it with the world.’
I commented again in 1989, when Francis *censored*uyama, made his big declaration of ‘End of History’, it was published in The Guardian Nov. 14, 1989,

“In the cycle of history, every system grows and vanishes. Russia and its allies tried to hold on to the wheel of time, hoping they might stop it. That was a mistake they are paying for. Capitalism is not absolute system. Its only advantage is that with liberal mix, it leaves a lot of breathing points, so the system survives longer.”

Now what we see now these breathing points what liberal Capitalism has grown so big that it exhausted all the energy, leaving a skeleton that came down like a carcass of a dead cow.

Its not only the meltdown of the core (Wall Street) of the Western financial system, but it is exhaustion of an idea/system that West wanted to project as an example of the monetary system for the rest of the world to follow.

As an outsider I could see it coming in 1995, when I wrote a proposal for a World Symposium to imagine a future in the 21st century.

The second major event since the 2nd world war has been the disintegration of the Soviet Union, which has its global implications. This one event did make you feel, as if you wake up one morning and hear the news that the Earth has lost its South Pole and was left with only one 'the North'. Imagine how much chaos it would create; the planet may lose its orientation and its annual cycle. Today, as a result of this one event in history, it is not only that any alternative view of the world have died a death, but we are left with a ‘one party/one opinion’ world.
(This was the opening para in a paper I presented in a seminar, 'Shaping Histories - Imagining Futures' At UNESCO Conference on Culture & Development, March 31, 1998, Stockholm.) (Clink on this link to read the full paper)
Now the real concern of George Bush, Gordon Brown other Western leaders, in not that few Banks have collapsed or they had to put trillions of dollars of public money to shore the system; the very idea/horse that they were riding to demolish all other kinds of ideas/systems in the world that very horse has collapsed. As a result they also lost the moral whip they used to most of the world.

Now watch it the day, the OPEC countries switch over from Dollar as trading currency to Euro, the Dollar will be worth very little may bring another major crisis in the US economy, no one has imagined. There are already countries Venezuela and Iran tried to put the currency change issue on the table in the last OPEC meeting early this year; Saudi Arabia, who has invested most of its reserve in the US, and strong supporter of the US, brushed aside the idea of currency change. But this postponement would not go on for ever.

Dollar, that was the choice currency at one time in the tourist trade in India, now the tour guides prefer to be paid in Indian Rupees that in Dollars. That is how the world values this currency now.

Can you imagine the scenario if only one country, say Saudi Arabia, who has invested over $750 Billion in the US economy, decides to switch its reserve to Euro-zone, America would not have resources to pay in any precious metal or the other currencies? Saudis certainly threatened to so when families of US victims of 9/11 tried to sue for damages personally 4 members of the Saudi Royal family in 2002.

This is the result of very arrogance of the US governments over decades since the 2nd World War, more so since the fall of the Soviet Union, it has become a bully/policeman of the world in a, what I called above the One Polar, world.

World, including me, is curiously waiting to see where it goes, when the planet seems to have lost it’s the only pole, we were left with, when Soviet power disintegrated in 1989. I am an incurable optimist, still believes that world will be more balanced without one dominating pole, it was left with. Francis *censored*uyama swallowed back its claim ‘End of History’; I believe this is the beginning of a very interesting history is in the making in the 21st century. Keep watching!!!


Avtarjeet Dhanjal