The Post-Modern State
If you have access to jstor, there's a good article called The Post-Modern State, by James Kurth.
A brief summary:
We associate the modern era with the development of the nation-state, which is a fusion of national identity and central government. Britain was the first nation-state under the first Tudor monarchy, with France quickly following. Eventually Germany and Italy became nation states, each developing from a seed nation-state within them, Prussia for Germany, and Piedmont for Italy. Then Japan joined their ranks.
The main features of a nation-state are: mass education which establishes the literacy required for national identity, a cohesive political class which reinforces the power of the bureaucracy, a centrally controlled military which reinforces the nation's sense of place, and mass industry which, among other things, supplies the military.
The USA was a functioning nation-state from the end of the Civil War until sometime after WW2, when it began to evolve into a post-modern state (not to be confused with postmodern, although it's that too.)
A post-modern state (per Kurth):
1. Doesn't need a large conventional army, but rather defends through deterrence, and attacks via high tech stealth weapons.
2. Does not engage in mass production for a national market. It's economy is characterized by an economic divide. There's a "high economy" which is comprised of financial institutions and managers of multi-nationals which are focused on a global market, and a "low economy" made up of low-skilled service workers.
3. Does not contain a cohesive political class, but has a somewhat stalemated government running a multicultural regime.
Per Kurth, the US is the prototypical post-modern state: post-literate, post-conscription, and post-industrial.
A brief summary:
We associate the modern era with the development of the nation-state, which is a fusion of national identity and central government. Britain was the first nation-state under the first Tudor monarchy, with France quickly following. Eventually Germany and Italy became nation states, each developing from a seed nation-state within them, Prussia for Germany, and Piedmont for Italy. Then Japan joined their ranks.
The main features of a nation-state are: mass education which establishes the literacy required for national identity, a cohesive political class which reinforces the power of the bureaucracy, a centrally controlled military which reinforces the nation's sense of place, and mass industry which, among other things, supplies the military.
The USA was a functioning nation-state from the end of the Civil War until sometime after WW2, when it began to evolve into a post-modern state (not to be confused with postmodern, although it's that too.)
A post-modern state (per Kurth):
1. Doesn't need a large conventional army, but rather defends through deterrence, and attacks via high tech stealth weapons.
2. Does not engage in mass production for a national market. It's economy is characterized by an economic divide. There's a "high economy" which is comprised of financial institutions and managers of multi-nationals which are focused on a global market, and a "low economy" made up of low-skilled service workers.
3. Does not contain a cohesive political class, but has a somewhat stalemated government running a multicultural regime.
Per Kurth, the US is the prototypical post-modern state: post-literate, post-conscription, and post-industrial.
Comments (31)
Thus the world never knows what its going to get from the US. We see the US leading a war of sanctions on Russia to try to force it to stop its invasion of Ukraine, but if Trump had won, the US would be cheering Putin on. Per Kurth, this is a sign of a loss of nationhood which is expressed as no clear foreign policy.
"Post" means something after, yet many things can be far longer trends. Seems that people just have this urge to declare that just now an important change has happened and made us different from earlier times: hence the term "post". And that the change is happening just now.
I don't think it goes this way. With a lot of things, change happens very slowly, if not all. Once same technological solution has made something cost-effective, it doesn't change. Just look at how long we have had books. Sure, now we have all the electronic gadgets and listening to books is extremely easy (no hassle with tape recordings), yet I think books still will be around for some time.
Or Let's take the idea post-conscription, post-modern army. Kurth, a veteran of the Navy, has made his career in Ivy League universities, the Naval War College and top notch think tanks making himself part of the intellectual establishment in the US. What he explains sounds like the dominant narrative in defense circles during that time than anything else, especially after the victorious Gulf War. The idea of the Deterrence-armed forces had it's first heyday when the US was the sole owner of the nuclear weapon. But quickly it was understood that conventional forces were needed and conventional wars would be fought. The Gulf War 1991 gave a new boost to thinking of RMA (Revolution in Military Affairs), but the last two decades have shown something else. Americans loosing the war in Afghanistan shows the obvious limits of the tech approach to war and it's obvious perils, how it can all go wrong.
The answer to Stealth-bombers and long range precision weapons is simply not to have conventional targets for them: don't fight conventionally a superior adversary. Simple as that. It doesn't matter if you have a B-2 stealth bomber if the enemy is guys separately building fertilizer bombs in their separate small farm huts and then someone else plants the simple bombs on the side of the road (and we call them IEDs). Put then a satellite to track them and try to destroy each farmhouse with a submarine launched cruise missile (or an UAV launched missile) and you aren't anywhere close to cost effectiveness.
The whole "Revolution in Military Affairs" has again and again been proven that hasn't happened that way. Military technology hasn't made things obsolete as people have anticipated. The Taliban won the war in Afghanistan with Cold War era weapons and few if any modern weapons. In the Ukrainian war once the precision guided weapons have been used, then it's basically on to WW2 technology. They are digging trenches in this conventional war of the 2020's just as they did over 100 years ago in WW1. For the same reasons: trenches work. There is no counterargument in that a guided weapon can destroy easily infantry sitting in a trench. Well, go then and try to bomb every goddam ditch there is next to every field in a country of the size of Ukraine.
Quoting frank
Now this is the more interesting line with Kurth. But let's start from the basics: Francis Fukuyama was (and still is) an idiot, so let's forget the "End of History" bullshit. Samuel Huntington captured the moment thanks to 9/11 with the argument that it's going to be "The West against the Rest". Kurth argues that the real fight will be inside America with "multiculturalism vs conservatism". Of coures that Conservatism isn't said to be conservatism, but "Western culture". I would argue that "conservatism" is far better name here to what "Western culture" is for Kurth. Especially if we understand that "conservatism" can be thinking of old ideas and not just what is on the political right.
Because let's face it: Socialism is a Western thought and so is Marxism. And Feminism is really part of Western Culture too. In fact, a lot of "Western Culture" has allways been this radical anti-establishment bickoring starting from classical liberalism itself! Hence these issue have far more Longue durée than people want to admit, and there's actually not much "after modernism" in them.
US foreign policy is remarkably consistent: expand the reach of markets for the US, open up new regional zones to capital, destroy or hamper any emerging rival economic systems. Occasionally directly extract resources from a place with America's absurd imperial might, which is not in any way diminished. And the political class, as a whole, could not be more unquestioningly aboard this agenda. Even while idiots got duped that Trump was playing nice with Russia, he never stopped imposing sanctions on it up the wazoo.
But of course, blame the fact that the US is not more culturally homogeneous. What a shit article.
But we have one of the largest and possibly the most powerful militaries in the world. This only happened after WW2, where prior we only had a minor maintaining force. When we fought Britain for independence, we used ambushes and gurilla tactics instead of meeting them open on the field. As of the modern day, the United States aggressively uses its military for regime change as well as deterrence. Iraq and Afghanistan were not acts of deterrence.
Quoting frank
I don't see how this is different from economies once money and trade were invented. The high economy has always sought to obtain more capital at any means. They do not produce for the nation, they produce for themselves. The great pyramids were not for the benefit of the nation, but for the benefit of the "God emperor" who sat on the wealth built by the underclasses.
Quoting frank
I would re-read the history of the founding of America. America was so divided and multi-cultural that we initially had the articles of confederation which granted extreme power to the states with an incredibly weak federal government. The reason for this was the identities between the states, (And the political elections within the states) were so different from one another. America has always been a multi-cultural and non-cohesive political entity. If you read history, there are constant struggles and debates on how the country should be run over time.
Right. Kurth would say that points to one of the many limitations of being post-modern. If you can't deal with a problem with missiles and drones, you may ultimately just give up and go home.
But I think you're right that his categories are kind of contrived. The perfect nation-state, always patriotically committed at the grass roots level to military endeavors, is an idealized figure. Even the British weren't always like that.
Quoting ssu
Why do you think that?
Quoting ssu
I don't think that's what he meant. I think he was saying that acting as a nation-state (so having a cohesive political class) has always been a challenge for America because it's so big and it's basically the world in microcosm.
He's saying the US was only a nation-state for a few decades, and it ended with WW2. Since then, he's saying it's been post-modern, which is clearly not a good thing in his view. He ends with the conclusion that the American education system needs to be improved to keep America from sinking further into illiteracy.
The reason this is interesting to me is that I accidentally saw a portion of a Fox News broadcast and it was a little shocking how stupid the comments being made were. It actually sounded a lot like the stupider streams of thought that get vomited up on this forum. I'd heard that Fox was getting worse, but I didn't realize how much.
I was interested in whether Kurth might be right: that the American culture is going through disintegration that can manifest as a lack of coherent foreign policy. What do you think?
Sure. He would say the ever-waning commitment of Americans to foreign wars is a side effect of diminished national cohesion.
Quoting Philosophim
You're basically agreeing with Kurth that the US is an example of federalism. It's not much of a nation-state.
Wouldn't that be due to an increased national cohesion? If a broken up cohesion, there would be too many counter parties that would disagree with foreign interventions. Its expensive and costly to the citizens. We were in Afghanistan for 20 years. I'm not sure a nation with low cohesion could continue to support such a foreign war with the changes in elected officials.
Quoting frank
But you stated earlier:
Quoting frank
I'm noting that the USA was not a functioning nation state during this time. Arguably federalism took a nose dive during WW2 and that is when we became more nation-like. I suppose my point truly though, is that I don't understand how he determines his post-modern definition, and that America fits that definition.
But, I am also going purely by your summary and not his article directly. I'm quite sure I'm missing something or not understanding the full context.
Yes, but
"Observers have argued that the mission in Afghanistan was hampered by a lack of agreement on objectives, a lack of resources, lack of coordination, too much focus on the central government at the expense of local and provincial governments, and too much focus on the country instead of the region.[541]". - Here
This isn't how the British handled these things. Americans tend to go in clueless, win dramatically, commit a few war crimes, then it all falls apart. That's what Kursh means by "post-modern“
Quoting Philosophim
I think he was ultimately just whining about American education. I love patterns, though, and the one he provided was intriguing.
I remember everybody poking holes at Fukuyama's ideas even when they were stated. And when 9/11 happened, Fukuyama admitted that his view of the World wasn't happening. And later Fukuyama backed down from being in the neocon camp.
Basically Fukuyama's "End of History" shows that this was the pinnacle where America felt it had achieved supremacy. After, there wouldn't be such history as before. And now we see just how much Americans believed in this: when China had it's most rapid economic growth (which indeed was historical), Americans just assumed that this new prosperity would transform China also, just like the Fukuyama's argument went. But now we can see that the Chinese and especially the CCP saw this as a victory of true practical Chinese Marxism, not the dogmatic idealist Marxism leftist intellectuals drool about.
Quoting frank
Well, at least he himself in The Real Clash makes the juxtaposition between Western culture and Post-Western culture (that is multiculturalism, feminism etc.)
Unfortunately it seems that his articles are behind a paywall, so I cannot say much now. But I'll listen to some of the lectures/interviews he has given.
Sure, its an interesting thought to bring up! Appreciate the contribution.
No doubt the Civil War was a 're-defining moment' in American history, but it seems that a strong case could be made for the US being a functioning nation state before the civil war (but perhaps not immediately after the Revolution). It was certainly not a strong nation state until after the Civil War.
WWII was the end of the US being a nation state? Seems like a nonsensical claim. IF, as you say below this is what a nation state is...
Quoting frank
the US has these in abundance. We still have mass education. You or I may not like the way schools are run but they are turning out students who are more or less literate. 35% of Americans have a BA degree - which still requires that one read and write. We have a highly cohesive political class which reinforces the power of the bureaucracy and the centrally controlled military. How did Kurth miss that?
We fret a lot about manufacturing in the US. True, a lot of stuff is made in China and SE and S Asia, but last I heard, our aviation and rocketry and so on are made in America. Sure, I'd like to see more production brought back to our shores, but this isn't a recent development. Off-shoring production was a decision made by the highly cohesive political / corporate class that run the US,
There is an apocryphal story told about Zhou Enlai, the first premier of the PRC. "Was the French Revolution a good thing, Zhou? "It is too early to tell," said Zhou. Apocryphal as I said, but it makes a good point: It not only takes time to judge events, it takes time for events to happen.
The US is changing: how big a change and from what to what is not clear at this point. It is way too soon to announce--whatever is happening.
I also found this interesting in Kurt's article:
"Liberalism can provide a common ground, a least common denominator, for many states in one international organization in a way that nationalism, by its nature, cannot.“
Liberalism creates a motive for reaching out to the rest of the world with organizations like the UN and the IMF. Plus there's a moral imperative to spreading democracy from an American point of view. To admit that people in the middle east don't want or need democracy seems either insulting or it's a betrayal of middle eastern women, gays, etc.
And so there's an inevitable clash between a culture that isn't good at being a nation-state vs. cultures that know a kind of nationalism that Americans don't really have for lack of the religious, ethnic, or even linguistic unity to pass for a nation.
Is any of that true?
Is it cohesive? Maybe it depends on how you assess Trump. Is he an anomaly? Or a representative of the part of America that truly believes Democrats have been infiltrated by baby eating alien reptiles?
And that's not a joke.
Quoting Bitter Crank
:up:
Well this is one of various 'official stories' available about geopolitics that you can accept or reject, depending on your presuppositions - i.e., how you feel about the IMF; the UN; liberalism and corporate control of governments. Personally it sounds Panglossian.
Quoting frank
Isn't Trump the natural consequence of showbiz increasingly domaining the political process, along with an inchoate hatred of elites and professional politics? Wasn't Trump ultimately good for corporations?
Well I've never heard it before, so I guess I'm out of the loop.
Quoting Tom Storm
I honestly don't understand why everybody on this forum is fixated on corporations. Corporations are for raiding. It's all about finance now.
Quoting frank
He is a creature of television appealing to those whose sole education comprises what they absorb through television. I think those French post-modernist critiques of 'the society of the spectacle' and the 'panopticon' are relevant to him. Of course such critiques will never be understood by those to whom they apply.
The political class isn't homogeneous, certainly, but most members of the political class (at the federal, state, and local levels) are quite similar and cohesive. True enough there are some glaring exceptions -- and these pop up every now and then. But Trump and the portion of the Republican Party hoping to exterminate the alien reptile baby eating Democrats hold on to the Prime Directive of maintaining the capitalist system, along with the rest of the political establishment.
Trump's more egregious deviations are owing to his venality and stupidity.
I do not dismiss the far right as harmless, mind you. They may yet seize power (I don't think they will get it in an honest election) and if they do, repealing Roe vs Wade will be the least of our worries.
The radical right isn't new. They have phased in and out of importance ever since Reconstruction. Think of the KKK and the late 19th century authors of the Jim Crow laws; think of the violent reaction to the labor movement; think of Father Coughlin (an odd-ball fascist in the 1930s), think of Joseph McCarthy, the John Birch Society, and so on and so forth. They tend to be hateful bastards, and they have a much larger base than the sad left, which might fill up a good sized church if they all got together in one place.
Forgive me, then. As your OP was called 'the post-modern state', I thought it might have been.
The OP references an article written by a professor of political science. I mentioned that in the OP.
So they aren't a sign of national disintegration. Kurth might have been exaggerating.
I think there's a link here which is quite an American phenomenon, which then is copied in other places. It's what I'd call a populist right, which sees that the conservative foundations that the US was built on are under an attack by a leftist liberal elite which has forgotten them. This idea that a leftist elite is in control makes it populist. (Of course actual leftist liberals don't see it that way and likely emphasize how much the conservatives rule, but this is besides the point.)
Quoting frank
I think in this World many countries can be "nationalist", but yet participate in international cooperation. It doesn't have to go in hand in hand with American liberalism (free markets, individual freedom etc.) as it isn't the only ideology which can bind nations to cooperation. For example, The African states have many organizations or then there's the Arab League etc. Many of these organizations do have cooperation, but focus doesn't have to be in free-market capitalism. These naturally just don't come up in Western media.
(The complex arrangement of organizations in Africa)
Sure. And in general, he wasn't saying that all countries are headed to being post-modern, although he says America will tend to influence some countries in that direction.
But he says that when Britain became post-agricultural, it had the effect of increasing the agricultural output of the countries that hadn't industrialized, because Britain became a bigger consumer of their products.
In the same way, the US, by being post-industrial, increases the production of cou tries that are still industrial. In 1992, he was thinking of Japan and Germany. Obviously China is in that role now.
So a country doesn't have to fit the American model to participate in the UN or the IMF, but American liberalism is the platform for those entities.
I guess I'm left wondering if China will eventually embrace liberalism enough to take on that central role in the global economy, or if it's native nationalism will make it turn more inward.
Unfortunately we are not post bullshit yet.
Ask yourself what rhetorical advantage a writer gains by decreeing that we are "post binary" for instance. The term rhetorically relegates to irrelevancy the 99.9% of the world that clings to binary terminology. But the term, post-binary, is not substantive, It's just rhetorical vapor.
"Post industrial" relegates factories to irrelevancy. "We don't manufacture anything anymore." Industrial production has, in fact, been level since 1945. True, the number of jobs in manufacturing has declined. Anyone heard of automation? Most of what looks like decline is owing to price reduction, not volume reduction (according to the Federal Reserve).
As William Faulkner said (in a novel) "The past isn't even past." The UK may be post colonial, but a lot of colonial wealth is embedded in the UK, and the economic, social, and political problems caused by the British Empire have, in many cases, not been resolved.
"Everybody is shopping on-line; brick and mortar retail is dead." Odd, then, that on-line sales amount to only 13% of retail sales in 2021. 87% of retail in the flesh is a lot retail to overlook. And it's not like Amazon hasn't built a huge infrastructure of brick and mortar to enable on-line commerce.
:grin: :100:
So what we did there with the "real GDP" graph was subtract out the price portion of the value of goods. That graph basically shows that America makes cheaper stuff than it used to. It says nothing about what we make.
So could it be that instead of making 1000 high tech jobbies, we make 1000 packs of chewing gum?
Please explain so I'm not totally sunk in utter bullshit.
"And Jesus said, "How can you help your fellow philosopher from sinking deeply into bullshit, when you yourself are sinking pretty fast in the same bullshit?" Oh oh, my out of depth alert just went off.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Mine too. :grimace: