Trading blocs or perish

December 22, 2004

How can you be deemed "educated" if you do not have a philosophical view of the world and how your immediate landscape fits into the broad picture?

What is the inherent nature of the predominant system of relationships that exist in this world, or, better yet, who and what dictate what is to be done, by whom and by which means, and in so doing set the parameters that define the very nature of this world?

These are fundamental questions, and the capacity to answer them in unambiguous terms separates the truly educated from the mere academically-accredited and from all those destined to merely follow the dictates instinctively like herd.

To be able to think divergently, to think without employing solid categories and to comprehend that everything is in a state of flux, that everything is in a state of being and becoming something else, that there are no absolutes, is the key to the process of thinking and functioning as if truly educated.

It is really surprising how many people in the Caribbean still put up mental blocks the moment "Caribbean unity" is mentioned.

How can they view pronouncements about Caribbean unity as "claptrap" in context of what we know obtains in this here global world?

How can they after all that has been said and done already by generations of our visionaries of political-economy and our sons and daughters of letters?

What is the reality? In my last piece titled "To hell with backsliders," I said that, "All over the world regional trading blocks are either being formed or enhanced by political will. It is this political economic regional demand that will force us back to our historic mission"

The European Union comprises some 25 countries with a total population of some 450 million people, speaking some 18 different languages, and at this very moment Turkey with its 30 million Muslim citizens is being considered for membership.

There could not have been a more divided part of the world, given the much recalled ancient history of brutal conflict involving the Ottoman Empire, with Turkey as its centre, against the Greco-Roman world and the Austria-Hungary combination, to the extent that Suleiman the Magnificent, the Muslim conqueror, had reached as far as north as Bosnia and Serbia.

Yet in two short decades of recent time they could have moved so fast with the next step being a full-fledged Parliament of the European Union with a coherent and cohesive political agenda that will dictate their relationship to the rest of the world.

Watch the growing strength of the euro in relation to the dollar. That is a telltale sign. The Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) the Asian Tigers, are likewise rapidly pulling their bloc together to face the world. And as recent as December 9 the South American nations met to do the same, pulling the old "Mercosur" together with the Andean Pact group to crystallise a South American Union that will comprise some 400 million people.

The OAU of Africa has been transformed into an African Union and they are also moving towards a fully functioning African Parliament.

The world is moving rapidly. And North America is not to be left behind as they juggle with the cold realities of Nafta in which they had hoped to involve the US, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and countries of Central and South America, but the much touted starts and stops indicate clearly that this appears not to be a natural formation as the others mentioned above.

It is probably too grandiose a project, attempting to establish a trading bloc of well over 800 million people, as they eye the awakened giants of China and India across the Eastern Hemisphere.

Nafta will most likely have to be scaled back. That however is beside the point, which is that sooner than later the prevailing tendency is for the world to be made of solid competing trading blocs. And a country has to line up with its most logical and historically favourable partners or neighbours if it is to find its way forward.

The irony about all this is that the Caribbean was way ahead of everybody. To those who are unaware of our history, read what I wrote elsewhere:

"In the period 1937-1956, the struggles for the establishment of trade unionism and home rule had united the Caribbean islands on the ground as never before.

"The Caribbean masses, by their action and demonstration, which when initiated in one island would invariable spread to the others, had placed the issue of federation of the West Indies squarely on the agenda as the climax to any anti-colonial thrust. 'Independence' and 'federation' were inextricably tied together according to their demands.

"Political leaderships of the mass movements for independence from Jamaica to Guyana in the late '50s and early '60s could not ignore this common Caribbean quest and desire."

The evidence is clearly reflected in the manifesto of the West Indian Federal Labour Party (WIFLP) that was published in 1958.

Part II