Thread by @PeteGDunne

#geopolitics
1/There are many views of the world (Brzezinski's Grand Chessboard being one). In Europe & the Anglophone world we live supposedly in liberal democracies (contestable after the last 2+ yrs) - the "developed world".

2/ Perhaps, arguably, the two dominant worldviews could be labelled 'Growthism' (globalized capitalism, i.e., corporatism) versus 'Conservationism' (i.e., arguments for a centrally-planned, steady-state economy.) The latter espousing a Malthusian worldview.

3/ Two diametrically opposing views on resource management, i.e. extraction, distribution etc. The former connotes development, arguably (perhaps idealistically) in pursuit of improved human welfare. The latter connotes constraint - "there's not enough to go around".

4/ However, much of the world wants to develop its economy. That part of the world that occupies McKinder's World Island. Covid was fundamentally geopolitical. @denisrancourt explains:

5/ If we work on the assumption that resources are, in fact, finite but that need not necessarily imply scarcity, we could posit that, metaphorically, the deck chairs are being re-positioned.

6/ Resource extraction, allocation and distribution is shifting. The anthropogenic construct used to manage this is the Global Financial System. This is complex and has many elements and many participants. With varying degrees of influence and power.

7) There are many vestiges of power and types of power, e.g., nation states retain the exclusive right to deploy "legitimate" force, from which amongst other elements, derives economic power.
Corporations exercise economic power.

8/ Anybody over about 40 in liberal democracies will recall the so-called Iron Curtain, with the countries in the Soviet sphere of influence that lay behind it often referred to as the "Second World", implying a lesser state of development than W Europe/N America.

9/ The #IronCurtain connoted economic suppression, tyranny and authoritarian regimes. Propaganda. Information management. Central planning. Adherence to state sanctioned doctrine, regardless of eventual dysfunction and absurdity.

10/ The so-called #CarbonEconomy is approaching, simultaneously with an era of suppression, repression, loss of rights & freedoms, facilitated by information management, also regardless of dysfunction & absurdity.

11/ This thread doesn't claim to address the real origins or purposes of the #CarbonEconomy concept, or it's bedfellow #ClimateChange (or anthrogenic climate change) but merely to posit that we in supposedly (or formerly) "western", "liberal democracies"+

12/ may find in the near future that we do not live in the world we thought we did, but behind what might be termed the #CarbonCurtain, as the Eurasian Heartland continues its quest to pursue living standards that us "westerners" have formerly enjoyed.

13/ what nations will be behind the new #CarbonCurtain? (and experience an emergent #neofeudalism?) Broadly, Europe & N America, Australia, NZ (perhaps Japan, or perhaps not). Those places where Covid tyranny was most acute, not coincidentally.

14/ The war that Russia has been provoked into [contestable perhaps] is a desperate attempt by what I've termed the Conservationists [the #CarbonCult] to dominate global geopolitical resource management, with the GloFinSys the "lube in the machinery" so-to-speak.

15/, and may represent an attempt to draw Russia, and more broadly Eurasia in an unwinnable, moderate intensity, longer conflict that forces them to draw on their resources. China has challenges all of its own.

16/ What will happen? Will a wider conflict develop? Will Eurasia be permitted to develop? Can Eurasia maintain a series of strategic alliances, borne of trade, economic co-operation & resistance to the current empire?

17/ Because, ultimately what do the conservationists* want to conserve? (*not the poor fools with placards at protests or in NGOs but the top echelons of power centres incl oligarchical & plutocratic interests)

18/ They want to conserve their (financial, i.e., access to resources) empire. Their dominance (societally, locally, regionally & globally).

19/ Yes, also their environment (clean air, water, food - for them). By exporting inflation, pollution, externalities & liabilities to those places that want to develop. Time can only tell how successful they ("bankers"- globalist oligarchical interests wedded to empire) will be.

@threadreaderapp please unroll. TY.