Stories of Menacing Globalization A Review of Two Books

Abstract

Susan Strange (1996) The Retreat of the State: The Drfision of Power in
the World Economy. New York, Ny: Cambridge University Press. 218
pages. $16.95 paperback.
Martin J. Beck Matustik (1998) Specters of Liberation: Great ReMals in
the New World Order Albany, Ny: State University of New York Press.
360 pages. $23.95 paperback.
In 1996, Philip Cerny wrote in the International Journal that globalization
literature is a set of contested stories that frame the categories and
concepts informing public debate. Retreat and Specters tell such stories to
shape perceptions of globalization as a threat demanding vigorous scholarly
attention and creative political responses. Both books depict globalization
as a frightening menace heralding social tumult; dislocation; “a
yawning hole of non-authority” (Strange, p. 14); and a terrifying legacy of
“economic immiseration, political oppression, cultural marginalization,
and racial and ethnic cleansing” (Matustik, p. x). Strange outlines potential
threats, leaving readers to conjure responses. Matustik seeks to open
the conceptual space necessary to craft alternative conditions, leaving
readers to specify the threats and imagine how to achieve alternatives.
Neither author explains or analyzes globalization. Strange disdains globalization
as no more than empty jargon, and describes it as an economic
and technological phenomenon with political consequences. Matustik considers
it to be social with political and cultural consequences.
Both authors address prevailing stories of globalization as much as
global conditions. Each exhorts readers to confront globalization by
exploring the gritty reality and actual conditions confronting individuals,
rather than by accepting prevailing stories. Thus, each confirms Cerny’s claim (1996:260) that globalization is more significant as a contested discourse
than as an analytical literature or global condition. In this light, one
does well to read Strange and Matustik as storytellers and to ask if their
interpretive tales reflect one’s experiences and impressions of global life.
Unsurprisingly, both authors tell only partial tales, but each poses worthy
questions ...