“When you deconstruct a regime and you don’t have anything to put in its place you create a lot of chaos.” — Greg Guma, 2017
In 2017, I was interviewed by the Peace Economy Project about corporate globalization, the rise of Donald Trump, the decline of America, and how Vermont communities have responded to past challenges. The Project’s mission is to research military spending and advocate for a more stable, peaceful economy. The interview focused specifically on the relevance of analysis in my 2003 book, Uneasy Empire: Repression, Globalization, and What We can Do, but also referenced my work for peace and justice through journalism, essays, politics and civic activism over several decades.
A resident of Burlington, Vermont for more than 40 years at the time, I had previously edited the Vermont Vanguard Press from 1978 to 1982, published syndicated columns in the 1980s and 90s, and edited Toward Freedom, a progressive publication on global affairs, from the mid-90s to 2004. In 2000, I organized one of the first independent media conferences and in 2006 became CEO of Pacifica Radio.
Question: In “Uneasy Empire” you talked about the growth of an American Empire and the dominance of organizations like the North American Free Trade Agreement, the World Trade Organization and huge corporations in that empire. You see corporate globalization as crushing the power of the individual and placing it in the hands of transnational corporations and governing bodies that work on their behalf. Are you saying something about scale in our economy?
“Scale is an issue on a number of levels,” I said. “The world government we see around us seems to be in a period of realignment, and some of the old architecture is being taken down. Uneasy Empire offers a globalist perspective. There are many problems that transcend national solutions. A global governance regime to handle this would be very big, but the real issues are access and accountability. Donald Trump is currently trying to establish an alliance of rogue states. He’s also continuing a long-term centralization of power, even though it’s based on ad-hoc relationships among power groups.
During the interview, I noted that President Donald Trump’s nationalist-populist style of politics and the left leaning supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders, who had run for President in 2017, were both reacting against the type of globalism that only benefited corporate America. However, I argued that Trump’s administration was accelerating this trend.
“Trump’s regime is radical,” I said. “He’s letting many positions go unfilled and putting people in charge of agencies who want to destroy them. There has been an increase in smaller wars in the past 30 years. This helps companies associated with the defense industry and defense contractors. Going forward, I think we’ll see more small wars, environmental refugees and competition for resources. We know we need to establish bonds in our communities and build a different future, but right now we are stuck psychologically.”
Question: I’ll bet you feel the military-industrial complex is very much a part of the trends you are talking about in “Uneasy Empire: Repression, Globalization and What We Can Do?”
“The U.S. as a declining hegemon, and will become more of a mercenary state. We have matured as a global power. We once used soft power solutions like the Marshall Plan, aide and trade, but now we’re moving more and more toward military solutions. The US was considered a good partner in the past and there was more mutual respect. But Trump is accelerating a trend that would have happened anyway: He’s making us untrustworthy.
“Nation building is not something we do anymore. The American empire advanced through diplomacy and trade. Now we have a small arms race going on. We see the transfer of weapons to other countries and more arms proliferation. When you deconstruct a regime and you don’t have anything to put in its place you create a lot of chaos. This is a phenomena of growth and decay. We’re seeing it now in the decay of the corporate global system. Something will need to be built in its wake.”
Question: Now that we’ve heard the bad part, what do you recommend to combat the trends you’ve dissected?
“It’s going to happen at the local level. It’s good to have an eye on the big picture, but where we should spend our effort is where we live and where we can see change occur. This was a lesson I lived in Burlington, Vermont. In doing the peace work we did, we thought we would improve our lives. We were able to change the local culture and also have a ripple effect that changed the state.”
Since the late 1960s, the interviewer noted, Vermont citizens had created an economy with a strong local flavor. There were consumer cooperatives, community based agriculture projects, local businesses, alternative media outlets and social action oriented non-profits in the state. People worked on the local level for a new type of economy, creating something better.
“We had an influx of new people in the 60s and 70s,” I said. “Then you see this proliferation of activity around the environmental movement and the peace movement. We pushed agendas at town meetings. Vermont has a strong tradition when it comes to Town Meeting, and we used it to put peace proposals onto the ballot. This gave people a model to look at and led to a more tolerant, open culture. You can create something local that will spread.”
Question: I’ve heard people talk about thinking globally and acting locally. Can this work for those trying to create a more peaceful world?
“We did it here in Vermont. What we did was to use local initiatives to create something like our own foreign policy. We brought forward a series of initiatives to define what we wanted in a foreign policy. Local governments can have a big impact. We look stances on many issues. For example, we took an anti-interventionist stance on Latin America, opposed apartheid, and formed groups to educate citizens on these issues. We also had Sister City programs to promote tolerance and understanding. If you do this over a period of years it starts to change consciousness.”
In addition to working in journalism, in the 1980s I owned a bookstore that was often used as a hub of social activism and served as coordinator of Burlington’s Peace and Justice Center, a leading activist group during that period. Looking back, I recalled the effectiveness of the 1980s nuclear freeze movement. City councils in Vermont, and later around the country, passed resolutions promoting a freeze in the number of nuclear weapons in the US nuclear arsenal. I noted that a similar effort would still be effective in the movement to ban nuclear weapons.
“The circumstances are totally different now due to the freeze movement of the 80s,” I noted. “People’s ideas on nuclear arms changed. Even Ronald Reagan changed his mind. This was a real victory for the peace movement.”
The original interview:
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