Regarding Black Globalization
Adam offers some interesting thoughts on the concept of black globalization (and cites what has become, to my surprise, one of the most frequently linked posts here at OSD). His points regarding the existence of Gaps within the Core (such as lawless sections of the inner city) are good, and remind why the SysAdmin function applies both at home and abroad.
A point for further thought is whether there exists a useful distinction between general criminal activity and black globalization. Most of the time when I’ve talked about the former I’ve imagined transnational illicit activity such as pirated software, human trafficking, the international drug trade, and smuggling. While these illegal networks have contacts within the Core, I don’t know enough to understand whether they could effectively operate without overseas hubs in the Gap.
Adam raises the possibility that these illicit networks are sufficiently intertwined with legitimate globalization that they may never be separated. He questions whether they may perpetuate one another. This, in a Snow Crash/Diamond Age turn, could melt our current map into a scramble of digitalized independent tribes and communities that become increasingly self-reliant for security and energy.
What are the countervailing forces that impede this sort of dissolution? Given the global infrastructure needs of black globalization, could this foundation be maintained if the power of states and organizations of states waned? Lots more thinking to be done…
“What are the countervailing forces that impede this sort of dissolution? Given the global infrastructure needs of black globalization, could this foundation be maintained if the power of states and organizations of states waned?”
That’s the paradox–the power of nonstate criminal actors is in part due the globalized world of commerce built by regulated, stable states. I do think, though, that if states were to fade out, we might see a huge rise in informal trading networks like hawala.
Comment by A.E — February 22, 2007 @ 4:12 am
” the SysAdmin function applies both at home and abroad.”
True, but I recommend that we instead rely on tbe Blue Fairy (from Pinocchio, known as the “Lovely Maiden with Azure Hair” in the original story). Pretty, works cheap — both advantages over any Sysadmin Force we might create. And just as likely to appear as any effective US Sysadmin force.
Comment by Fabius Maximus — February 22, 2007 @ 6:50 am
Adam,
Good point - I hadn’t thought about that angle. I had been thinking more about how a decrease in state power would affect the infrastructure of the internet.
Fabius,
Most people would have executed that crack using the Tooth Fairy - you get points for using a more obscure literary reference! Seriously, though, if you take a look at the post I linked you’ll see an example of a SysAdmin effort that has already been effective [1].
[1]http://opposedsystemsdesign.blogsome.com/2006/02/12/gap-shrinking-in-boston/
Comment by Wiggins — February 22, 2007 @ 4:49 pm
Is that Fabius Maximus from Defense and the National Interest?
Comment by A.E — February 22, 2007 @ 6:06 pm
This is your website, but I’ll gladly help out.
“…I linked you’ll see an example of a SysAdmin effort that has already been effective.”
The referee has thrown a red flag on that play. Domestic programs don’t count as “sysadmin”, as the chief barrier to successful efforts to civilize the Gap is that we’re foreigners. We don’t know their culture, and they most likely don’t like us mucking up their society.
10 yard penalty!
You’re welcome! Glad I could help out with this.
Comment by Fabius Maximus — February 22, 2007 @ 7:04 pm
LOL
You must watch a different football league than I do. NFL penalty flags are yellow. A coach’s challenge flag, on the other hand, is red… which is apt, given your gamesmanship.
While in past discussions I’ve agreed that foreigners face daunting challenges when they attempt to conduct operations overseas, in this case I think you’re rushing the conclusion. The SysAdmin mission including executing operations like disaster relief and stability operations. Its mission is not to “civilize” the Gap.
Comment by Wiggins — February 23, 2007 @ 12:29 am
Football? Too organized, too many rules — hence unworldly. The only game I play is Calvinball.
(from Calvin and Hobbs, by Bill Waterson)
As for civilizing the Gap, perhaps I phrased it too kindly. Here’s a quote from the Master…
“LET ME TELL YOU why military engagement with Saddam Hussein’s regime in Baghdad is not only necessary and inevitable, but good. When the United States finally goes to war again in the Persian Gulf, it will not constitute a settling of old scores, or just an enforced disarmament of illegal weapons, or a distraction in the war on terror. Our next war in the Gulf will mark a historical tipping point — the moment when Washington takes real ownership of strategic security in the age of globalization. …
“The only thing that will change that nasty environment {the Middle East} and open the floodgates for change is if some external power steps in and plays Leviathan full-time. … Freedom cannot blossom in the Middle East without security, and security is this country’s most influential public-sector export. By that I do not mean arms exports, but basically the attention paid by our military forces to any region’s potential for mass violence. We are the only nation on earth capable of exporting security in a sustained fashion, … Until we begin the systematic, long-term export of security to the Gap, it will increasingly export its pain to the Core in the form of terrorism and other instabilities.”
Comment by Fabius Maximus — February 23, 2007 @ 7:46 am
I love that line “long-term export of security to the Gap”.
The iron fist in the velvet glove. He sounds like a Hollywood villain.
Like Khan in Star Trek: “We would have given the world order!”
Comment by Fabius Maximus — February 23, 2007 @ 10:29 am
There’s just something about strategic thinking that just begs for sci-fi metaphors. I never quite figured out what it is.
Comment by A.E — February 23, 2007 @ 1:12 pm