Learning Stories
by
Mario deSantis
mariodesantis@hotmail.com
“I am a Canadian, free to speak without fear,
free to worship in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to
oppose what I believe wrong, and free to choose those who shall govern my
country.” - -The Rt. Hon. John Diefenbaker, Canadian Bill of Rights,
1960
“The whole judicial system is at issue, it's
worth more than one person.”--Serge Kujawa, Saskatchewan Crown
Prosecutor, 1991
“The system is not more worth than one person's
rights.”--Mario deSantis, 2002
Ensign Stories © Mario deSantis and Ensign
| |
|
"If one could choose to sacrifice one's finger, and thereby to
save millions of people, one would do so. But those people still, in
some sense, matter to us less than our own fingers"--Emma
Rothschild (in explaining Adam Smith's sentiments)
American and British air strikes have resumed against the Taliban
and Osama Bin Laden, and missiles and bombs are being dropped along
with humanitarian food. Now there is the fear that other countries
may be bombed as well, and we don't know if humanitarian food would
be dropped in these countries yet. The war on terrorism must be won,
and I must tell you I don't like to dwell on the peculiarities of
this military strike; after all I am not a militarist strategist,
but then I wonder if there is any social learning in reporting the
ongoing details of these strikes. We have to fight Terrorism and we
have to bring justice for the atrocities of September 11, and we
must win this war on Terrorism with a human policy of inclusion.
Shifting our focus on civil matters, I must say that we cannot
socially grow as long as money is the measure of our well-being, as
long as we produce and sell arms for money, as long as the
'invisible hand' of Free Trade is the Master of the Universe, and as
long as children are raised in an environment of hopelessness and
hate.
As we wage a war against Terrorism so we must struggle for our
universal vision of peace. There is a traditional saying in Italy "chiodo
schiaccia chiodo" which means we can hide a nail by hammering
another nail on it. And some neoclassical Big Brains have profited
from today's Terrorism to ridicule the anti-globalization movement.
And I am not going to fall into this Big Brains' trap, and while
affirming that we must fight Terrorism at any cost, I am going to
have my saying on the wrongs of Globalization and on the wrongs of
today's Capitalism.
Capitalism is not an absolute concept distilling our human
aspiration to freedom; capitalism is a theoretical construct of a
social system focused on 'property right.' Capitalism's adaptation
to our societies has historically changed as our societies have been
changing; and now we have the Big Brains telling us otherwise and
misusing the concept of free trade as envisioned by Adam Smith.
Adam Smith didn't believe in the fragmentary division of capital,
land and labour and related class division of people. Adam Smith
believed in the local markets where the same local people would
provide at the same time capital, land, labour and entrepreneurship.
Our academic Big Brains are teaching our students the Transnationals'
version of Free Trade as we wage a global war against Terrorism.
And I have no interest in visualizing the 'convergence' of
economic Globalization with the global war against Terrorism as this
globalized convergence may create the New World Order of a police
state.
Some References
Globalization and the return of history.(Who is Europe?), Emma
Rothschild. She is married to economic Nobel prize winner Amartya
Sen. http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m1181/115/55015319/p1/article.jhtml
Adam Smith June 5, 1723-July 17, 1790 http://socserv.socsci.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/smith/ |
|
|
|