Last issue I wrote in support of those working to reverse “corporate globalization”. As I try to deepen my awareness of these many issues, I find myself sidestepping the phrase “corporate globalization”. The phrase does not lead to what feels like the heart of the matter. The phrase overly focuses on corporations which are just easily visible players. For me, the issue is the snowballing feedback loop of concentrated wealth using its power with humans to alter human topography so that even more of the flows within this world will flow towards that wealth in the form of more wealth. The internal logic of this feedback loop leads concentrated wealth to direct part of its power to reshape or diminish political and cultural institutions that resist that concentration so that there are more opportunities to concentrate wealth even further. This then gives these concentrations of wealth even more power to reshape the cultural landscape even more. Many of the institutions being reshaped by this concentrated wealth are ones that have evolved to protect and enhance the commons. The issue of “corporate globalization” is what this expanding feedback loop is doing to the entire constellation of socializing forces that help shape who we are, how we see ourselves within the universe, and how we define our purpose. This snowballing feedback loop feels like the hypnotizing or anathaetizing of a historically great species for wealth’s sake.
The potential anathaetizing of our entire species is, I think, why people use the phrase “globalization.” It tries to capture the world-shaping power that the feedback loop is acquiring; that is why the issue is so crucial. And I think the word “corporate” arises because corporations symbolize large forces of money that are wielded by legal, non-living entities that are especially prone to becoming disconnected from human needs and becoming warped towards short-term interests. I don’t necessarily object to the rich growing richer. There is a certain cybernetic wisdom in giving greater power to people who have demonstrated with their life some ability that others view valuable enough to give money towards. This snowballing feedback loop, however, is kept in check by the fact that everybody eventually dies. That is part of the reason for the emphasis on “corporate globalization”. Currently, corporations don’t die. This allows the snowballing feedback loop of concentrating wealth to cycle far more times, accumulating amounts of power harder for mortal humans to control.
Focusing on snowballing feedback loops leads me to see these issues as systems’ problems that don’t necessarily require villains. For example, one factor feeding into the loop of concentrating wealth is population growth. Because of the dynamics of supply and demand, a growing population of potential workers shifts power from employees towards employers, diminishing the power of citizens and enhancing the power of money. Many times a community will sell out the long-term health of its citizens in order to attract jobs. In a declining population, power will shift towards the citizenry.
Focusing on snowballing feedback loops leads one beyond the specifics to pay more attention on the direction and momentum of the changes. Snowballing feedback loops sets off warning lights because such feedback loops, if unchecked, accelerate in a way that send them hurtling out of control in a destructive way. (The historically correct phrase for these loops is “positive feedback loop” but the words “positive” and “negative” have emotional overtones that override the mathematical meaning of these words. So I shall use “snowballing” and “stabilizing” feedback loops.) Realizing such loops can spin out of control helps one step out of the internal logic of the snowballing loop and ask “what purpose is being served by this loop?”
Stepping outside of the logic is important. Some people defend “corporate globalization” by saying it is inevitable, that there is a overwhelming logic to it that guarantees its destiny and that those who oppose this are misinformed people out of step with the direction of history. From within the logic of money, it all seems inevitable. But there are greater logics. There are greater accounting systems. Money is a tool created by us. It is to serve us in the creation of human aspirations. We do not have to sacrifice human aspirations to money.
Stepping outside the loop of internal logic is one of the lessons the fields taught me. Erosion is a snowballing feedback loop, a downward spiral with an internal logic that implies that greater erosion is inevitable. I described this loop in my book. Erosion leads to less vegetation which leads to greater runoff which leads to greater erosion which leads to less absorption which leads to declining water tables which leads to less vegetation which leads to greater erosion which …. All I see within this feedback loop are factors that contribute to the loop’s perpetuation and growth, making it feel inevitable.
But life has ignored the “resistance is futile” proclamations of this loop’s internal logic. Lichens grow on rocks, soil-anchoring grasses grow on slopes, beavers build dams. A whole host of living things exert their energy to reroute the power of rain onto paths which nourish more life. And as they exert their efforts, forces come into existence which dramatically alter the feedback loops of erosion until grasses and willows grow in the gullies. What seems inevitable at close hand is seen from the hilltops as one set of forces among many shaping the land. On the slopes, other feedback loops with their own particular logic and perspective are supported. Less water flows down the gullies: more water soaks in.
I feel this image is also relevant to “globalization”. Fields that are managed to deliver as much rain as possible downstream will be very different (paved) from fields that are managed to absorb as much of the rain as possible. Similarly, a country that is managed to convert as many of its ecological and community flows as possible into money will be very different from a country that is managed to recycle flows in ways that increase the amount of flows.
I am a blade of grass. I will live my role undaunted by those who say there is only one inevitable destiny. I see a different way that soil and rain, human spirit and the Earth can dance. I will interact with this feedback loop to lead it in a direction that enhances rather than reduces life.
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