**DOC TAYROC'S [UNSOLICITED] BOOK REVIEW - *GLOBALISTS* by Quinn Slobodian**

It strikes me that many of the people reading this aren't economists, and so they've seen me toss around some economics terms, perhaps without fully understanding them, so let me quickly remedy that, especially for some that might seem misleading in the current political climate in the English speaking world. Namely, the term 'liberal', used by some to discuss everything left of centre, despite that not really lining up, historically or presently, with many of the political ideologies. The idea of the political parties being represented as right, centre, and left dates back to the first French Revolution, when people sat in the National Assembly according to their political beliefs. You can go ahead and infer the seating arrangement by the fact that over two centuries later we still reference all political parties by that spectrum, past, present, and future regardless of whether or not modern or previous political people would have sat in Paris/Versailles that way in the late 18th century.

Liberalism, in its current form, would be very recognisable to Thatcher and Reagan. Desirable even. I say this because its present form is neo-liberalism, and the advent and widespread nature of neo-liberalism in its current form is typically affiliated with the governments of Thatcher and Reagan. Whilst the spread I will still hold firmly in the hands of Thatcher and Reagan, Slobodian asserts that whilst one might associate the birth and spread of neo-liberalism with the decline of the British Empire or the premature dwindling of the 'American century' in the midst of the 1970s energy crisis, the dawn of neo-liberalism should actually be linked, argues Slobodian, with the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of the First World War.

As will be discussed in this week's 'death of the author and Marx' post, coming tomorrow, a facet of the economy that neo-liberal economists tend to overlook or downplay is the notion of power. There are countless instances, such as the example at Amazon with its unionising warehouse workers, where it would be cheaper, both in the short term and 'long run', for the capitalist to meet the demands of the union in order to end or prevent strike action. Regardless, the capitalist will insist on not giving into the demands of the union, and instead will pursue extensive and expensive union-busting behaviour. Through this we see that whilst cost is the excuse the capitalist rests behind, the actual concern is power and control. This understanding is important to remember when examining how the final collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire meets up with the birth of modern neo-liberalism.

'Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac', once quipped Henry Kissinger, before committing countless war crimes across Asia, Africa, and South America. It is also a security blanket for the capitalist class, who often experience some form of stunted emotional growth around their teen years or early 20s. The Austro-Hungarian Empire didn't die overnight, indeed it wasn't even the First World War alone that killed it. In an alternate universe where the First World War somehow never happened, there's every single chance that the Austro-Hungarian Empire collapses regardless, as it spent most of the 19th century in steep decline. You see, the Hapsburg had relied on their excessive inbreeding and continued domination of the 'Holy Roman Empire' to keep Vienna, and by extension Austria relevant. Napoleon's disillusion of the HRE and the subsequent growth of the Kingdom of Prussia and later the German Confederacy/Empire would mark the continued retreat of Habsburg power. The crescendo of a series of set backs that had ruined Hapsburg dominance of Europe that had started with the disastrous crime against the known laws of God and Man alike that was Charles II of Spain's 'life' and reign, that had caused the War of the Spanish Succession that saw Britain, France, and the Netherlands finally displace the Hapsburg monarchy as the ruling family of Europe. By the time of the dual-monarchy, the Austrian/Austro-Hungarian Empire was living on borrowed time. The time they were borrowing was mostly borrowed from the very German Empire that had set this latest stage of decline in motion. Unfortunately for the Austrians, the German Empire was led by a different product of excessive royal inbreeding, and Freudian case study Kaiser Wilhelm II.

That is to say, when the Austro-Hungarian Empire finally collapsed during and after the First World War, it was to the surprise of no one. Even the Hapsburg themselves had largely given up, considering that their previous inability to give up had caused the sudden addition of a member of a periodic table to the head of a member of their family back in 1914, kicking all this off. Before a certain member of the Black Hand had introduced Franz Ferdinand to applied physics, there were already academics, capitalists, and civil servants alike in Vienna trying to figure out how to maintain favourable access to materials and cheap labour in the areas that the Hapsburg had already lost. This need only accelerated after the emergence of the modern Republic of Austria, which it does not take long to notice is only a fraction of the size of the Austrian Empire at its height.

It is here we should circle back to that 'cheap labour' thing. You see, the Austro-Hungarian Empire occupied the part of Europe we more commonly than not today identify as 'Eastern Europe'. Indeed, the above mentioned physics teacher was himself Slavic. Slobodian reminds us that the modern word for slave's likely etymology either is based on Slav, or Slav and slave have similar roots. This is largely because Slavs were not equals to Austrians or Hungarians in the eyes of the Empire. The Austro-Hungarian Empire was a deeply racialised empire, and the cause of many of the economic and social inequalities that separate Eastern Europe and Balkans from Western Europe. And no, noted racist, segregationist, and uncritical fan of The Birth of a Nation US President Woodrow Wilson did not help things. Eastern Europe, and especially the Slavic regions, had been a source of cheap and exploitable labour during the Hapsburg era. It was this fact that had led to the numerous independence movements in the Balkans that ultimately proved to be the Empire's undoing.

Whilst the Austrian Empire was never a colonial empire, per se, it still relied on a fairly colonial method of wealth extraction, as empires of the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries were wont to be. Everything outside of 'German Austria', and later Hungary, which had to fight to be treated equal to the German Austrians, hence the dual monarchy, was ripe for the picking by the German Austrians, who extracted resources and labour in ways that would be familiar to their British counterparts working their way through India, Africa, Australia, and Canada (amongst others). The loss of these territories was felt painfully by the Austrian capitalist class, as Slavic independence meant that, for the first time in centuries, Austrian capitalists had to negotiate with them, as equals. Slavic Parliaments could protect workers' rights, and the raw materials within would be locked behind tariffs. Worse, in the eyes of these Austrian capitalists, the Slavs might develop their own corporations that would make the same goods, and be able to charge a lower rate, since they wouldn't have to barter for the raw materials now locked behind tariffs. The Austrian corporations would no longer have first go at these materials.

In comes the inter-war organisation and known failure the League of Nations. The LoN, despite being a failure, was notable to the Austrian economists for two reasons: first, despite its best attempts and the largely nominal inclusion of Japan, the LoN was a European organisation. Second, it was the first supranational organisation birthed entirely in a post-Westphalia world. It obviously wouldn't be the last, even of the inter-war era as the British would begin building the Commonwealth, and as 'internationalism' would start to become the trendy new idea to replace dynastic empires of old. The LoN, Slobodian argues, is also where the first attempt at creating a body to dictate terms of international trade emerge, and begin to push the free movement of goods and capital, though not of people.

Of course, despite the efforts of many (and even the wishes of H.G. Wells, such as in the case of the odd, odd book The Shape of Things to Come, which is, admittedly not one of his better works) we all know the League of Nations did not radically alter the way the world economy worked, or even the ways in which nations worked with each other. It would take the Second World War to further encourage a radical rethink on internationalism, helped along by the decolonisation of Africa and Asia. Slobodian effectively points out how the decolonisation of Africa and Asia was like the end of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, albeit on a much larger scale, and how this unsettled White European economists like Wilhelm Ropke who remarked that the UN was 'Western state wisdom constructed such that Europe's voice could barely be heard in comparison to the developing countries'. (Oh won't someone think of the poor Europeans). Without any sense of irony accusing the developing states of 'economic nationalism' for attempting to do the same kind of protection that Western states had done for centuries, and attempting to, God-forbid, develop their own indigenous economies, independent from their former colonial masters. Obviously someone or something needed to stop these developing nations from, you know, developing. As such, the UN would develop a couple of 'fail-safes' to protect those Europeans. Namely, the UN Security Council, where multiple colonial powers, most notably the US, UK, and France would retain 'veto power'. Further, the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and ultimately the World Trade Organisation (after the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs) would all be formed to prevent developing states from raising tariffs against their former colonial powers, or new ones.

Here Slobodian argues, that contrary to the narrative that the neo-liberal wants the abolishment of state, they actually seek the furtherance of state, but only to protect the sanctity of 'the economy' above all else. Ropke, who would go on to support apartheid in South Africa, again based on economics, wanted to ensure that established corporations would maintain access to the raw materials and cheap labour in the decolonising lands. Further, the state had the right to intervene in other states on behalf of the rights of investors and corporations to enforce the rights of investors. If this sounds like we're drifting nearer and nearer to the 'right to protect' (R2P) rhetoric sprouted by Tony Blair in the lead up to the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars, or like the modern motto or the Royal Navy's role to defend 'Britain and British interests abroad'. The neo-liberal believes that the economy is a sacred object to defend, and the rights of the corporations are necessary above all to defend in order to make sure the sacred economy is safe above all else. Especially from democracy.

If you're reading this, you likely survived the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns, and so already have a feeling that the neo-liberal state will indeed happily kill your grandmother to save the economy. You've also likely noticed throughout the entirety that the neo-liberals state capacity to react to anything but 'the economy' was severely lacking after decades of hollowing out. Slobodian does a fantastic job of tracing neo-liberalism from its Austrian roots to the Thatcherite/Reagonomics hollowing out of not only the UK and US, but of EU member-states and nations reliant on the IMF and World Bank. How the states that once successfully fought fascism, built the largest social safety networks known to man, and rapidly lifted quality of life for millions of people across the US, UK, Europe, and Russia now fall apart the moment a natural disaster occurs, a worrying development as climate change is increasing the intensity of natural disasters the state will need to respond to. And why, despite the state's increasing inability to address the needs and wants of its citizenry, it remains ever capable of waging war. Albeit, cost effective, economically profitable wars.

If you want to figure out how we went from the humanity that would someday establish the United Federation of Planets to being the Ferengi, give Globalists a read. Especially if you're going to be reading my Marx and the Death of the Author posts, as he will be one of the authors most frequently cited.