Authors: Benjamin Barber, Andrea Schulz
ISBN-13: 9780345383044, ISBN-10: 0345383044
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Date Published: July 1996
Edition: 1st Ballantine Trade Paper Edition
Jihad vs. McWorld is a groundbreaking work, an elegant and illuminating analysis of the central conflict of our times: consumerist capitalism versus religious and tribal fundamentalism. These diametrically opposed but strangely intertwined forces are tearing apartand bringing togetherthe world as we know it, undermining democracy and the nation-state on which it depends.
On the one hand, consumer capitalism on the global level is rapidly dissolving the social and economic barriers between nations, transforming the world's diverse populations into a blandly uniform market. On the other hand, ethnic, religious, and racial hatreds are fragmenting the political landscape into smaller and smaller tribal units. Jihad vs. McWorld is the term that distinguished writer and political scientist Benjamin R. Barber has coined to describe the powerful and paradoxical interdependence of these forces. In this important new book, he explores the alarming repercussions of this potent dialectic for democracy.
A work of persuasive originality and penetrating insight, Jihad vs. McWorld holds up a sharp, clear lens to the dangerous chaos of the post-Cold War world. Critics and political leaders have already heralded Benjamin R. Barber's work for its bold vision and moral courage. Jihad vs. McWorld is an essential text for anyone who wants to understand our troubled present and the crisis threatening our future.
Expanding on a 1993 article in the Atlantic, Rutgers University political scientist Barber offers a stimulating, tartly written survey of two paradoxical world trends: the looming balkanization of nation-states (Jihad) and the inexorable force of integration by technology (McWorld). The trends are in dialectic, not opposition. In McWorld, Barber notes, national boundaries become less significant in the face of multinational corporations and resource interdependence. World culture, he observes, is driven by the ``infotainment telesector,'' characterized by American advertising, film and MTV. Noting that McWorld can serve Jihad, Barber sketches the rise of nationalism in European democracies, in central Europe's emerging democracies, in Islam and, intriguingly, in the American Christian right. McWorld, he writes, threatens democracy by deadening debate and accepting inequalities, while Jihad threatens democracy by sacrificing tolerance and deliberation. ``[T]hey both make war on the sovereign nation-state and thus undermine the nation-state's democratic institutions.'' Barber believes each culture must build its own institutions of civil society. More wishfully, he suggests that a form of confederalism-not that of the European Union but of pre-1800 Switzerland-might serve to knit both regions and states. (Aug.)
Acknowledgments | ||
Introduction | 3 | |
Pt. I | The New World of McWorld | |
1 | The Old Economy and the Birth of a New McWorld | 23 |
2 | The Resource Imperative: The Passing of Autarky and the Fall of the West | 33 |
3 | The Industrial Sector and the Rise of the East | 50 |
4 | From Hard Goods to Soft Goods | 59 |
5 | From Soft Goods to Service | 73 |
6 | Hollyworld: McWorld's Videology | 88 |
7 | Television and MTV: McWorld's Noisy Soul | 100 |
8 | Teleliterature and the Theme Parking of McWorld | 118 |
9 | Who Owns McWorld? The Media Merger Frenzy | 137 |
Pt. II | The Old World of Jihad | |
10 | Jihad vs. McWorld or Jihad via McWorld? | 155 |
11 | Jihad Within McWorld: The "Democracies" | 169 |
12 | China and the Not Necessarily Democratic Pacific Rim | 184 |
13 | Jihad Within McWorld: "Transitional Democracies" | 195 |
14 | Essential Jihad: Islam and Fundamentalism | 205 |
Pt. III | Jihad Vs. McWorld | |
15 | Jihad and McWorld in the New World Disorder | 219 |
16 | Wild Capitalism vs. Democracy | 236 |
17 | Capitalism vs. Democracy in Russia | 247 |
18 | The Colonization of East Germany by McWorld | 260 |
19 | Securing Global Democracy in the World of McWorld | 268 |
Appendix A. Justice-of-Energy-Distribution Index | 293 | |
Appendix B. Twenty-two Countries' Top Ten Grossing Films, 1991 | 299 | |
Notes | 302 | |
Index | 363 |