L| GEOPOLITICAL REALISM

The arrival of the “New” Institutionalization

As it is known, political systems and governments have converged on one another as a result of changes in their political credos. The number of political ideologies has grown resulting from the exposure to, or permeation of, disparate or diverse social cultures. Governments have become more engaging with each other through trade or politically-driven economic arrangements such as regional trade agreements (RTAs). Engagement through trade has been greatly enhanced by a continually evolving technology as it affects behavioral patterns.

Furthermore, the borderless proliferation of technology has been instrumental to helping increase economic activity among nations that previously may not have had such capabilities. For instance, technology has helped upgrade economies of less developed countries (LDCs) and has allowed them access to markets.

The advancement of technology has given rise to the need to revisit the institutional character of an economy.  In fact, every facet of the political system, has necessitated the formulation of new or reformulation of existing policies, practices and behaviors.

Such institutional transformation is likely to affect political positionings within and outside ethnic borders. For instance, price stability, government debt and annual deficits, currency devaluation, and so on, were the convergence criteria imposed upon the member states of the European Union in the signing of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992.

Political Antagonism 

Political antagonism has grown resulting mainly from differences between nationalistic and globalist positions.  Although political antagonism is an integral part of any national political environment such antagonism has permeated the global political environment.  We will call the former micro-antagonism and the latter macro-antagonism.  

In micro-antagonism populists exchange against the elitists and this gives credence to the existence of oligarchy.  The exchange between such antithetical attitudes seems to underscore the pursuit of each group’s self-interest.  Furthermore, it would appear that as populism increases elitists become entrenched surging their oligarchical positions.  Seemingly, the said opposite positions can be lessened through political tolerance, which inherently is either absent or challenging to achieve, given that populism appears to exhibit more heterogeneous positions within it than elitism.  It follows that populists are less likely to uniformly agree to political tolerance than elitists.

Macro-antagonism concerns achieving hegemonic positions of dominance in world affairs.  This type of antagonism could potentially produce greater conflict, given that different political positions become even more deeply established as a result of different social cultures.  In other words, the greater the gap is between disparate social cultures, the more incongruent their respective political positions are likely to be. Different value systems produce and reinforce divergent political positions resulting in political polarization.  Furthermore, the pursuit of political hegemony necessitates a closer relationship between existing political culture and economic expediencies.  This means that political dominance is made feasible, by and large, through the use of economic capabilities.

Economic Antagonism

Relevant antagonism has proliferated due to political openness and an increase in world economic exchange, and the ensuing free trade.  Strong world economies show a definitive advantage in pursuance of antagonistic positions due to their economic prowess and the advantage of differentiation strategies in opening new markets.  For instance, we know that differentiation is a strategy indicated for building market share and for increasing revenues.

Economic antagonism, in our current global environment, has become an integral part of the overall political and military strife among dominant nations.  This antagonism has become fiercer due to differences in ideology.  For instance, BRICS countries have increased their investment capability, their international trade activity and their contribution to global GDP.  They have elevated themselves, as emerging markets, to become global economic players.  

Τhe global prospects of the U.S. economy are compromised by the proliferation of high technology, which the U.S. no longer controls, as well as, a continually increasing debt-to-GDP ratio of about 123%, as of November 2023.  The threat to these prospects is accentuated by a growing global geopolitical antagonism which presents an opportunity for BRICS economies to challenge the U.S. dollar as the international reserve currency.

BRICS’ effort to challenge the international status of the U.S. dollar is a difficult undertaking given that the hopeful "BRICS’ new reserve currency” will have to mitigate inherent weaknesses of those countries resulting from differences in their international trade and their socioeconomic cultures.  For instance, the currencies of the BRICS countries, i.e., Brazilian Real, Russian Ruble, Indian Rupee, Chinese Yuan and South African Rand, are fixed and not floating.  

Despite China’s quick industrialization and its impressive export trade, the Chinese Yuan needs to first become a floating currency so that the global market can assess the equilibrium of its demand and supply and stabilize its value.  Existing capital controls must be curtailed or even eliminated so that people who trade using the Yuan can increase their trust on that currency.  Yuan’s liquidity risk must be addressed and mitigated.  Reducing Yuan’s liquidity risk will persuade central banks to reserve it as a global currency.  Finally, the Chinese Yuan must show that it is a reliable and trusted global currency.  

The five countries of BRICS seemingly will have to create an economic and monetary system much like the European Currency Unit (ECU) of the European Economic Community (EEC), which was the precursor to the European Union’s currency, the EURO.  

In addition, the promotion of a new currency’s status, as an international reserve currency, will have to be embraced by the powerful central banks of the world through holding such new currency as a reserve currency.  International trade on strategic supplies like oil and gas, rare materials and other critical supplies may embrace a new currency.  For instance, the OPEC countries may decide that they wish to be paid with a currency other than the U.S. dollar.  Also, Chile, known to have the largest reserves of lithium, may elect to accept payment only in Chinese Yuan.  

Overall, China’s noted growth into the global economy and its ambition to compete against the dollar for the status of international currency reserve is impressive.  At any rate, the crowning of a new currency as a reserve currency will be conditioned upon the dollar’s continually increasing weakness and the relevant political decision of foreign governments.

Furthermore, the ostensibly pending introduction of a digital currency and its use, although not yet regulated, will be affected by the popularity and the value of the reserve currency and other major currencies.

"Faith"- An Ingredient In Culture 

The discussion on geopolitical realism would be relatively incomplete if it did not shed light on the issue of faith as, potentially, the ultimately critical core component of culture.  An effective geopolitical policy should look into the element of faith and how it affects cultural positions and cross-cultural behaviors.  

Culture flexibility varies from region to region, from country to country and even within a country.  For instance, the north-western hemisphere is, largely, individualistic, whereas the southern-eastern hemisphere is, mainly, collectivistic.  The complexity of culture is augmented because individualistic environments show collectivistic behaviors and trends, and, vice versa.       

An analogous phenomenon is observed if we look into the various subcultures within a country.  As evident, achieving tolerable uniformity between or among cultures is a challenge that must be addressed in a geopolitical environment if we hope to mitigate conflict and cultivate contrasting cultures.  Elements of culture such as norms, symbols, rituals, language and more may be negotiated.  But, values endure and they are considered to be the last frontier to achieving relative cross-cultural harmonization.   

The core element of values is defined by faith.  Faith is characterized by a relatively infinite number of levels that describe its depth and intensity.  Those levels exist on a continuum from Atheism to Theism.  This continuum includes Agnosticism.  Environments that are dominated by either Theists or Atheists reflect extremely opposite cultural values.  Even among Theists there may be great conflict.  For instance, Monotheists would never accept Polytheism.  Xenophon said: “God is one, Great, He does not resemble either in flesh or in mind with the human, He sees, understands, hears everything.  And, although He remains outside the movement of the universe (that is, outside the genesis and decay of that universe) with His mind moves the universe.”  Aristotle said: “God is one.”  (To the scholars of ancient Greek: "Eνα τόν θεόν προσήκειν εiναι.")

Western thought has been different than Eastern traditional thinking.  Western thought has evolved more rapidly than Eastern thought.  Secularism is far more dominant in Western societies than in Eastern ones.  In terms of faith, secularism promotes separation of State and Religion.  Eastern Orthodox Christian theology asserts that the Source of Faith cannot be separated from earthly existence.  In reality, such separation would result in effective disengagement of the Soul from the Body.  The only optimum choice is both evident and indisputable.

Geopolitical realism is multi-faceted, dynamic and multifarious.  Geopolitical realism requires broad unbiased reflection and analysis.  For instance, a geopolitical analysis of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine must examine the potential origin of the conflict as being the difference in their cross-cultural values as they relate to Faith between the two countries.  In addition to the political, economic, military and social interests, which may be implicated in the geopolitical analysis, the origin of such conflict may be deep-seated, faith-oriented, cross-cultural values. 

 

Cross-Cultural strife

The subtlety of the influence of culture upon relations and relationships should not be ignored or discounted.  Whether social or regulative, cultures exert great influence on behavior and they are hard to change.  A culture is what I call the “last frontier” to relative globalization.  The evolution of culture is a slow process, inhibited by the strength of values and the endurance of, and adherence to, tradition.

Simplistically, a culture may change either by adding to or subtracting elements from it.  The popularity of certain elements of a particular culture would be an important factor to making the culture attractive, contributing to the rate of acculturation.  [Acculturation is defined as learning a foreign culture.] For instance, the higher the level of acculturation of international business managers the greater the success of their business strategies in the foreign market.

American culture has permeated the psyche of foreign societies through the concept of individual freedom, the use of the American audiovisual industry, the rapid spread of the English language and other favorable cultural idiosyncrasies.  In my view, because of the above, the noted global impact of the American culture may offer an alternate name to globalization as Americanization.  

Adapting to a regulative culture is easier and less arduous given that such culture refers to performing agenda tasks.  On the contrary, adapting to a different social culture is painful and hard, and in some cases agonizing.  A change of a social culture may be expedited, and this is seemingly possible within a regulative exchange.  For instance, in a corporate environment, participants in a meeting may represent disparate social cultural values yet they observe the same regulative culture.  The interfacing of two social cultures produces a third cultural environment which I have called transcultural.

[Polychroniou, Constantine G., (2018).  

"Trans-culturalism and its effects on the internationalization of markets: A conceptual framework."  

Journal of Cultural Marketing Strategy, Vol 3, No 2, 

p. 199-215].  

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329402562_Transculturalism_and_its_effects_on_the_
internationalization_of_markets_A_conceptual_framework

   

Trans-culturalism may be viewed as an effective interim process to promoting cross-cultural integration and

multicultural harmony. 

Author: CGP .+.