New technology/social structures/methods of rebellion currently possess the power to disrupt, but not replace the current structures. This seems to apply with causes across the board, loathsome and admirable alike.
The examples are numerous, but let's start with the aforementioned
Moldovan unrest. New technology (Twitter in this case), proved extremely useful in massing opposition to rigged elections by the ruling communists. The reaction so quickly surprised establishment forces that protesters essentially sacked the parliament building and presidential offices.
But what then? New methods haven't really come along (or haven't been developed) that would translate those same rapid protests into lasting political action long enough to completely topple the government.
Even if they had, it seems unlikely that the new structures exist yet to translate their rapid mobilization into enough political clout to shape whatever new government the country would have.
They're not the only mass movement in recent years to face this issue. In Lebanon's
Cedar Spring, new media and youth subcultures, including a
large heavy metal contingent, helped drive the Syrian army out after 30 years of occupation, but proved unable to shape the political battles that happened afterwards.
In both cases, there was true power there, a confirmation that world is changing in such a way that it's possible for masses of people or single individuals to suddenly disrupt entrenched powers.
But it seems, for the moment, to end there. Things don't seem to have changed so much that those powers can actually be replaced with anything as new as the methods that vex them.
Which brings us to Robb's hollowed states and "global guerrillas."
The many insurgent movements throughout the globe have also profited from shake-ups in the old nation-state structures and new technology that makes it easier than ever to shuttle tactics from one place to another.
But look at some of Robb's standing orders: co-opt, don't own, basic services and virtualize your organization. Those principles make for movements that are dispersed enough to increasingly hollow out states without being crushed by conventional forces.
However, that very dispersion makes it impossible for them to ever actually replace what they're fighting. At best, they may result in the collapse of the state they're fighting, but without any basic services or method for organizing society, will be unable to be anything more than just another armed faction.
This point has been reached before, the "barbarians" that the Roman Empire faced became increasingly adept at beating the legions into the ground, but had no ability to replace the structure of what they leveled with one that solved the very problems they had so adeptly taken advantage of. A similar dynamic happened with the Sea Peoples in the Bronze Age Collapse.
Alternatively, when the old medieval institutions began shuddering in the century before the Renaissance, the nascent urban-based cultures and nation-states that disrupted or destroyed them did offer a more viable and prosperous way of life.
This is a particularly dangerous crux to be at, because disruption without replacement of the old (and at a point like this the old is so full of holes it's going to be disrupted) is a path to a Dark Age.
This is why we pray for a new Renaissance.
Dare we dream it's happening right here, in the land of networked 1s and 0s.
The nascent net-based culture the nation-states are trying so hard to disrupt.
Posted by: m1k3y | June 10, 2009 at 10:02 PM