6. Conclusion
Synthesis
In November 2006 the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) closed its doors leaving only a website and an internet archive. The Bush Administration, as a political unit, has also failed and will be unlikely to win a further term in office. However, this does not denote failure by any means, because, if their original goals and interests are considered, the Project for the New American Century and the individuals it helped place in government, has been a resounding and very profitable success. But, the American people will not profit from this success.
The groups former members have moved in different directions, all of them equally successful. Paul Wolfowitz[1] was appointed as head of the U.S. controlled Word Bank, although his position has recently been threatened with allegations of corruption; and, as already stated, the ‘principal author’ Thomas Donnelly is now on the board of Directors at the Lockheed Martin Corporation. This intimate relationship between the state, the economy and the corporate sector is reminiscent of Italian fascism, which now hides behind the name of corporatism.
The Project for the New American Century represents a pre-emptive shift from the economic being governed by the political to the political being governed by the economic. This sentiment is reflected in the language used to construct Rebuilding America’s Defenses as the critical discourse analysis has shown. The ‘War on Terror’ is a forced economic process: it is war for the natural resources, the land and the vast profits that the war-machine turns over; but, more importantly: it is about creating new markets through regional hegemony. Every aspect is profitable from the initial destruction, to the ‘constabulary duties’ that follow. These areas include not just security concerns, but the ‘re-establishment’ of public services, healthcare and judiciary, at a cost; the rebuilding of towns and cities, at a cost; the introduction of media and communications, at a cost; the development of food and agriculture, at a cost – and the inevitable introduction of consumerism through Anglo-American and European ventures, that will perpetually be at a cost. In every sense this is the ‘process of transformation’ that the PNAC refer to so frequently, the process of drawing order out of chaos – ordor ab chao – which is akin to the Hegelian dialectic reconfigured as a military driven, economic strategy.
Hegelian logic is perhaps the only means through which this debate can be vocalised. Popkin (1986:92) outlines Hegel’s development of the ‘dialectic’, the philosophical theory that Marx inverted. Rather than approaching history as an endless series of uncontrollable events flowing ever onwards, Hegel believed that history developed due to the opposition between two sides: the thesis and the antithesis. This opposition would result in conflict and the two would break down and merge to form the ‘synthesis’ – eventually, this state of ‘synthesis’ will divide and form a new state of opposition.
This exercise has exposed a vast terrain of conflict that can be seen as the emergence of a new site of class-conflict that has breached any national boundaries. It can be argued that we are at the stage of synthesis in the dialectical process. The PNAC have now played their part in this process: they have executed their roles effectively. The document has been assimilated into the public consciousness through cyberspace. Although, this assimilation has not been a passive process but it has come about due to the reaction against the Neo-Conservative’s movements on the world’s stage – epitomised by the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq – and to their socio-economic ideologies which have permeated beyond the usual domains of the media and Washington. As has been demonstrated, multiple factors have influenced this reaction: the group itself, the authors, and their respective economic interests; the history, or the constant revision of history that occurs on the internet due to the increased access to documentation, historical records and the opinions of others; and an enlarged perception of the world due to this increased access to information. In the ‘new world’ information is power. However, this is a reaction and not an interaction. The dynamic is decidedly linear and one-sided which raises grave questions about the functioning of ‘democracy’ in the contemporary age. After all, despite widespread opposition, the war still rages on in the middle-east.
Final Conclusion
It is no real surprise to discover that the discourse of the New American Empire is one of corporatism, pseudo-nationalism and unilateral military action for economic gain. However it is a surprise to uncover such vocal, active and widespread resistance to this form of discourse and to the ideology that it represents, albeit in a new and unfamiliar way. As such the social impact of cyberspace is undeniable. This exercise is the product of social networking as is the account of Assadullah. Without the resources provided on the internet and the people who have provided those resources, this investigation would not have been possible, perhaps not even conceivable. There would have been no knowledge of the Project for the new American Century and certainly no archived copy of the text. There would be no independent media, no bloggers, no forums, no chat-sites, no information-sharing on a such a large scale, but more importantly on a global scale. But the electronic resistance is not globalised, it is de-nationalised: it spans the globe, without preference for gender, ethnicity or skin pigmentation. There are no boundaries in cyberspace, no land to be claimed, no resources to pillage, no natives to exploit. Cyberspace is the new world.
Jordan (1999) argues that ‘information is endless in cyberspace and creates an abstract need for control of information, which will never be satisfied.’ He describes this as the ‘technopower spiral’. But, computer technology is limited in its current form of microprocessors and silicon as is cyberspace by the both the technology and the number of human beings needed to actualise its existence. Moore’s Law[2] (1965) states that the ‘number of components the industry would be able to place on a computer chip would double every year’, but, that this exponential rise would inevitably reach a peak. Even at the absolute limits of natural law, data could never be transmitted beyond the speed of light and so is ultimately limited even at the highest possible level. Similarly, information is not ‘limitless’ or infinite, although it is undoubtedly vast, it is also relative to the technology and ultimately limited by it. Nothing we have ever evidenced in the entire cosmos is infinite. In this sense then, it can be argued that the ‘technopower spiral’ is an essential process that drives forward technological progress, but the ‘technopower spiral’ is not infinite either, it will eventually unravel when computer technology inevitably stabilises.
The opening account of Assadullah was a deliberate subversion intended to ground this investigation in the real world; these final words will do the same. In all this talk of theoretical models, economic systems and socio-political implications, we must remember that there is a very real human cost to all of this. Over 600,000 people have lost there lives in the ‘War on Terror’, not just innocent civilians, but also soldiers on both sides of the ‘conflict’, who will never benefit regardless of how much they sacrifice. Tensions across the globe are rising every day, environmental catastrophe looms, and the poverty gap has never been wider. This is a dangerous time, but it is also an exciting time. Almost in unison, we have seen cyberspace rise from strength to strength, and we have seen it offer new methods of transgression when the old ones seemed to be lost. The dialectic is reaching the point of synthesis – technology will stabilise, society will progress – but what shape this ‘new world order’ will take is very much in our hands and on a scale that has been hitherto unprecedented. The only indecisive factor is whether or not we take the opportunity to set our world free.
(Total: 10, 479 words)
[1]The New York Times: May 18th, 2007: Wolfowitz Resigns
[2] Intel Executive Biographies: http://www.intel.com/pressroom/kits/bios/moore.htm
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