This phrase, which is heard in churches these days, should make us think about its meaning—without getting lost in the religious rules that go with it, of which it is a part (Easter Katavasia, first verse).
How can people escape the passions they experience? How can people shine, and not just for a brief respite, a celebration that intensely expresses a deep need of people, as part of nature and as creatures in society?;
But first we must consider what era we live in, how our era is defined today. Because time is running out, and everything is changing, even though our consciousness is fixated on an endless present, with no future, no tomorrow, no hope...
A lot has happened in thirty years.
It was 1990 when George Bush Sr., then president of the United States, announced the «New World Order» (NDP). That is, the ongoing war against all to impose North American interests. The announcement of the NDP began with the Desert Storm, that is, the first war against Iraq. At that time, the USSR had not yet collapsed, but the processes leading to the fall of the Eastern European regimes were already underway, and China was not what it is today. The «New World Order» was a Nazi slogan: Hitler defined it as a period of a thousand years. Bush announced the NWO with a more limited duration of one hundred years. The US felt like the winner of the Cold War, and the «American century» of domination and world empire was opening up before them.
In the 30 years that followed, a lot happened, both in the direction Bush announced and in the opposite direction. For a decade (1990-2000), the US «partied.» In 2001, they felt a major blow with the Twin Towers, and started a new spiral of wars (which they did not win, despite their military superiority, as in Iraq and Afghanistan – because occupying countries is a difficult task). They failed to create the New Greater Middle East and, ultimately, felt the breath of their competitors, such as Germany in Europe and China globally.. The crisis of 2008-10 mainly affected the Western world and the US, while in Latin America a great wave of popular struggles gave rise to new regimes. During the same period Russia had already largely rebuilt itself, had emerged from the situation of mafia capitalism, and was showing with decisive steps that it would reclaim what had been taken from it in the years 1990-2000.
«Ethnolacism,» geopolitics, and the new «visions» of the elites
For about 15 years, a new cycle of struggles had begun and spread across the globe, viewing globalization, neoliberalism, commercialization, and privatization of everything with suspicion. The «American century» proved to be a utopia, and all the powerful of the Earth felt exposed: they could not inspire the peoples and nations of the world, they could not generate a wave of sympathy or support for the goals they set. Constant restructuring, impoverishment, prolonged austerity, and economic crisis were crippling the working class and the people, leading to the spread of discontent and dissatisfaction, along with uprisings and major struggles.
They saw and suffered in order to face this challenge: this was the main concern of the Powers That Be for a period of time, from 2010 to 2015 approximately. Then there was a downturn in the wave of protests around the world, but not a collapse. It inevitably took other forms and manifested itself in what they called «ethnolacism.» Quite «curiously,», the national element meets the popular element in a mixture that can create many problems for globalizers.
This is the moment when two different processes are taking place, which are, however, closely interlinked: firstly, we are entering a phase of geopolitics and confrontations in this field, with more centers intervening, and secondly, restructuring is being announced and promoted in the name of the «4th Industrial Revolution.» These will be interspersed a little later with the slogans of the «Digital Transition» and the «Great Reset.» Three global powers with broader geopolitical plans and hierarchies are emerging on the horizon: the US, China, and Russia. These have the potential to compete with each other in the most advanced fields (whether technological, economic, or military).
Pandemic, decline of the West, and «poor» alternatives
The appearance of pandemic, global lockdowns, the abolition of public space, the fear and terror that were skillfully cultivated, and the common treatment of «rebellious» citizens dealt a decisive blow to the popular factor—almost emasculating it politically and ideologically. It was not ready to face such an «enemy,» while the bourgeoisie (on a global level), after an initial shock, adapted more easily. And it used the pandemic in multiple ways to promote the restructuring demanded by capital and more terrifying forms of (biopolitical) control..
And while the popular movement factor seems to have been largely neutralized, a historical process we have called «decline of the West,» that is, a comprehensive process in which the West is losing the power and conditions of dominance it has enjoyed for over two centuries, and new productive and political centers are emerging that intend to play their own role. On a symbolic level, the war in Ukraine marks a series of processes that had become overdue and are now manifesting themselves in the violent form of war. This underscores that we have entered a new phase, where the main feature is the resolution of all problems through power and weapons. Power and weapons between emerging camps, with the forces we mentioned as the main protagonists.
Western discourse (deeply imperialist and reactionary) declared the NWO in 1990, in 2001 it declared the «war on terror,» and now it is declaring war on the «totalitarian regimes of Russia and China.» If one pays attention, today's declarations are more aggressively targeted than the NWO or the war on terror. On the other hand, the other two centers have no alternative course to offer beyond challenging Western hegemony. They have nothing to say about peoples, freedom, emancipation, or the sovereignty of countries and nations. The images of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the methods and rhetoric used to justify it, the images from Shanghai and the management of the pandemic, are not fake news. They are a reality that reflects the quality of the internal regime in each of these powers. The centralized (monopolistic), statist, authoritarian to dictatorial form of economic and political life cannot be the answer and alternative vision to the «decline of the West.».
So, what?;
Can we speak of a "Brilliance of Nations," and in what sense?;
Yes and no. No, in the form of a miracle, a magical day, a Messiah, a self-fulfilling prophecy. Nor as a «gift» from new tsars, new planetary rulers, new Mandarins, new Stoltenbergs, new Schwabs, new Erdogans, etc.
Faced with the «decline of the West» and the emergence of new aspiring cosmocrats and reactionary forces, a pole of peoples must be formed that will set its own «agenda.» This agenda cannot be the same as what the rulers of today's world proclaim, and especially what they implement. Some believe that the Bright Future will simply come if the West, the Western alliance led by the US, loses. This condition is not enough, especially if you expect it to happen through representatives – and reactionary ones at that, such as Russia and China. Because it seems to be forgotten that Many of the principles and values of the West (in the sense of capital as a social relationship) have taken root deep in the hearts of Putin's Russia and Xi Jinping's China.. Emancipation will not come from there.
What form can the «subject» take today? Peoples, nations, countries (small, powerless, medium-sized), social classes, the global proletariat. And through which paths, routes, and mediations can it emerge? This is not a brainteaser, it is a necessity. And as such, it cannot be satisfied without a leap and in the field of consciousness. A leap (qualitative) that can be supported by countless facts and events already provided by reality. Often, something is «right under our noses» and we don't see it. Perhaps this is what is happening now. The right side of history lies in the struggle to create a pole of the Peoples, not in joining forces with one of the camps of the cosmocrats (current and aspiring)..
By Rudy Rinaldi
