Beyond patriotism

As world rapidly transforms into a global economy

If you subscribe to what Donald Trump said at the UNGA, “The future does not belong to globalists. The future belongs to patriots”, you are at a wrong place. Those who misperceive themselves as ‘strongmen’ remain stuck in what has been proverbially called the ‘refuge of the rascals’. Don’t get me wrong, patriotism of the healthy type has done wonders for people, won them homelands, saved their nations and prospered in all facets of life by enthusing a zeal which gave rise to good nationalism — the one that won Germany and Japan their status of the wealthiest nations of the world and helped them rise from the ashes of WWII. The same nationalism in the hands of Adolf — the Nazi — Hitler was another proposition, destructive in intent and manifestation.

The Quaid aroused nationalism on the basis of political acumen and cut-and-dried analysis of the state of political India which he then led to effect a drive for a separate nation. He calibrated nationalism just enough to forge a united movement from disparate conglomeration of sub-nationalities. When we lost one half of the country twenty-four years later it was the exact opposite — disproportionate nationalism which diluted identity of a half to the point of losing its loyalty. Something that you now see Europe suffering through. But suffering, deprivation and identity have all been used, sometime together, to achieve political aims and create nations.

One of my favourite writers from very early years was Leon Uris, the author of Exodus and Mila 18, to name two that caught my special fancy. He depicts the historical narrative of the evolving agenda of the Zion as Israel was won and became a nation. It isn’t different from anything that you might notice happening in Kashmir. In forming ‘new’ China, Mao Zedong led his people through thousands of miles to literally swamp his country and its people with his pervasive presence to establish himself as the unquestioned leader and laid foundations to new China — the flagship of progress and proud nationalism. Yet this is where it stops and calibrated just enough to not irk others.

China, not without reason then insists on calling itself a middle-income nation. Even as it embraces modern technology faster and more pervasively than those who may lay claim to its sole ownership. It mimics, replicates and then scales exponentially to massively reproduce it. In mimicking it learns to innovate and charts its own separate route to progress. And more importantly makes it available to the world to share and move ahead in unison. Inherently it builds alliances when dependencies take effect.

Among others I relish reading the inimitable Thomas Friedman of the NYT — a thinker-philosopher- ‘technobuff’ and a sworn futurist who thinks climate change is a reality and has written a marvelous book recording the impacts of how the earth is being destroyed by its inhabitants. And is thus hated by Trump who usually has some choicest words for him. His book The World Is Flat outlines the future in how technology will shape the future human society. He calls technology a leveler enabling equal opportunity for all to tread the future together. His Hot, Flat and Crowded is the tale of how humanity is destroying its abode and accelerating climate change. If you haven’t read these yet, you must. You still aren’t late.

As Artificial Intelligence beckons, his other work, Thank You for Being Late is something to spend your days with. The title explains it all — ‘an optimist’s guide to thriving in the age of accelerations’. To explain the last bit he refers to exponential scaling which technology has enabled forcing humanity into the age of acceleration. The freedom to tap into the new wealth denominator — big data — and then sourcing it to multiply the rate of innovation in the shortest time gallops the world forward at unprecedented scale. The dilemma is the human mind which isn’t developing fast enough to correspondingly assimilate the magnificent possibilities being enabled by technology around him. Data to him is now a Supernova, beaming explosive power and energy. And a wealth of opportunity. To tap into isn’t novel anymore; the tools are all there, It’s the application of it which needs creative and innovative minds.

Some examples: “(Someone in Mexico) has created an after-school program of blended learning — teacher plus internet — to teach math and reading to poor kids and computer literacy to adults. (They) have graduated eighty thousand people in the last three years. (They) plan to start seven thousand centers in the next three years and reach six million people in the next five”. Similarly, medical facilitation and helping connect with the right physician. A program in Madagascar called the 3-2-1 service is exemplary: “At a moment of need, callers use their own simple mobile phones to proactively retrieve information across a range of topics. Would you like to know about health? Press one. Agriculture? Press two. Environment? Press three. Sanitation? Press four? Land tenure? Press five. Micro finance? Press six. Family planning? Press seven?”

None of this is superfluous to our needs. Instead Mayors scream for lack of funds. Which of these applications may need inflated funding? Open source software has made it possible for people to coordinate and value-add to what already exists to optimise towards targeted application of a service. It asks Karachi’s Wasim Akhtar to source a few creative minds to develop services around simple applications which can assist his role and task.

The 3-2-1 service is currently live in twelve countries with plans to extend into Africa and Asia. The market, innovation and logistics is so innately interlinked in the world that no patriot can dismantle what technology has already put in place. The only thing that President Trump holds as his saving grace is the US dollar and that because of a global and economic order that was put in place after WWII to ensure American primacy. The institutions that came about to give meaning to such order like the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO etc are the tools that keep the dollar relevant. One of the leading US creditors is China which holds the largest stock in the US in multifarious investments. Obviously, not patriotism but globalism is what is keeping the US afloat. Take the dollar out from under this carefully structured edifice and the American primacy will come falling down despite all its military strength.

It is the time of the globalist and even as the world fears regressing back to the times of pre-WWI, there is little chance that globalised economy will let such sentiment even nurture than sustain. The realities of an interlinked world are far stronger than a sentiment of disassociation. The earlier a nation learns this lesson more progress will it accrue in this age of accelerations. Travel and connectivity enables ideas, goods and people to intermingle and enrich. Building walls stales what is inside and decays what is not refreshed. Closed and walled patriotism is rancid and regressive, globalism is enriching and progressive. It is time to take Thomas Friedman’s advice.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 11^th, 2019.

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