transnational corporations and those ofrnsociety.”rnThe dimensions of the new globalrnpower structure are more than economic,rnhowever, and the means by which thernemerging global elite seeks to extend andrnentrench its hegemony are only in partrneconomic. “The West,” Mr. Goldsmithrnwrites, meaning the dominant elites whornprevail in the nations of the West, “believesrnthat its destiny is to guide or coercerndiverse human cultures into a singlernglobal civilization. It cannot tolerate therncoexistence in the world of differentrncultures. . . . This acute form of culturalrnimperialism is reinforced by internationalrnbusiness, which considers that it wouldrnbenefit from the destruction of socialrndiversity and its replacement by a globalrnmonoculture hungry for western-typernproducts.” “Global democracy,” “nation-rnbuilding,” and (most recently) U.N.rn”peacekeeping” missions are the currentrnincarnations of the imperative to reconstructrnand manage the planet alongrn”Western” lines.rnMr. Goldsmith argues that one of thernmost brutal consequences of GATT andrnthe regime it institutes will be therndestruction of the rural and agriculturalrnsocieties of the Third World as thern”Western”-imposed economic modernizationrnthat GATT is supposed to encouragernuproots whole populations fromrntheir cultural and economic soil andrndrives them into megalopolises as urbanrnproletariats or into the developed worldrnas culturally alien immigrants. Thern”morbid intumescences” that deracinatedrnand impoverished urban massesrncreate he sees as the direct result of thern”Green Revolution” and the intensive,rnscientifically based, elite-dominated,rnand high-capital agribusiness it spawned.rnMexico’s Chiapas revolt that erupted therndav NAFTA went into effect is fueled byrnthe same nightmarish perception by itsrnpeasant participants.rnhi the United States, he sees the transformationrnalready well under way. Herncites the Time magazine cover story ofrnApril 9, 1990, which predicted that byrnthe early part of the next century “the averagernU.S. resident, as defined by censusrnstatistics, will trace his or her descentrnto Africa, Asia, the Hispanic world, thernPacific islands, Arabia—almost anywherernbut white Europe,” and he citesrnOakeshott and Santayana to the effectrnthat “one of the disasters that can befallrnany community is that its shared understandings,rnin other words, its commonrnculture, be dissipated in too rapid or toornsweeping change.”rnWhatever the outcome of this extraordinaryrnand grand experiment,rnit will be impossible to avoid socialrntorment. The destabilization andrnin some cases social breakdown ofrnthe cities, the multiethnic, multitonguedrnpopulation, the rapidrngeographic mobility which hasrnresulted in uprooted nuclear orrnbroken families, have all contributedrnto widespread disorientation.rnInstead of the emerging global regimernbased on free trade and denationalizationrnfor the benefit of global managerialrnimperialism, Mr. Goldsmith argues forrnwhat he calls “regional trade blocs” andrnsubsidiarity in social policy and politicalrnauthority, the very opposite of the MaastrichtrnTreaty, which “seeks to create arnsupranational, centralized, bureaucraticrnstate—a homogenized union. It wouldrndestroy the pillars on which Europe wasrnbuilt—its nations. It would convertrnEurope into one multicultural space, inrnwhich national identities would be fusedrnand sovereignty abandoned. It would coercernancient European nations to mergerninto the ultimate artificial state. AsrnGeorge Orwell remarked, it is characteristicrnof intellectuals to pass over inrnincomprehension the dominant politicalrnpassion of the age. Today, that passion isrnthe search for national identity. And thisrnis the moment when European rulingrnelites arc seeking to destroy the identityrnof every European nation.”rnThe later chapters of The Trap arernmarred by Mr. Goldsmith’s invectivesrnagainst science and technology themselves,rnand he winds up praising non-rnWestern cultures and religions for theirrnvision of man fused with nature in distinctionrnto the Western view of manrnas nature’s master. He is right that thernEnlightenment lies at the root of bothrnMarxist and Western managerial globalismrnand the imperial homogenizationrnthey command, but he grossly overstatesrnthe need to retreat from scientific modesrnof thought. He winds up his book with arnlong quotation from a letter to PresidentrnJames Buchanan from an Indian chiefrnthat warbles endlessly on about how “wernare part of the earth and it is part of us.”rnAll of this is nice, but, as he notes, thernchief was able to write the letter onlyrn”with the help of an amanuensis,” andrnit is only because such institutions asrnwriting, pen, and paper were producedrnby the civilization of the West that thernchief was able to compose it at all. ThernHindu, Buddhist, and primitive culturesrnanimated by the visions of man as arnmerely passive appendage of nature thatrnMr. Goldsmith so warmly endorses remainedrnthe victims of nature—and thernvictims of whatever rivals were able tornmaster nature more effectively—preciselyrnbecause of their vision. It is not justrnthe Enlightenment and its legacies thatrnMr. Goldsmith winds up rejecting butrnthe whole body of Western civilizationrnsince the time of the Ionian naturalrnphilosophers. Without that body ofrnthought and discovery, the people of thernWest too would have long since disappearedrnbeneath the hooves of naturernor their human adversaries.rnNevertheless, apart from such excesses,rnThe Trap remains a classic source forrnthe case against the transnational powerrnthat now has the allegiance, not of arnsmall band of ideologues, but of thernleaders of the major economic, political,rnand cultural forces of the worid. Whateverrntricks and slogans pseudo-revolutionariesrnlike Newt Gingrich and BobrnDole may devise to steal the authenticrnrevolution that put them in power, Mr.rnGoldsmith’s argument is one to whichrnan increasing number of Americans andrnindeed non-Americans subscribe. It isrnthose who share his beliefs and values,rnfrom Chiapas to Chicago, who constituternthe real revolutionaries at the end ofrnthe 20th century, and regardless of thernnational and cultural divisions that separaternthem, they should start workingrntogether against a common and globalrnenemy that has come to define both thernconventional right and the conventionalrnleft. They have nothing to lose but thernchains those enemies are forging forrnthem. crnMrn0rnVrnIrnNrnGrnTo assure uninterrupted delivery ofrnCHRONICLES please notify us inrnadvance. Send change of address onrnthis form with the mailing label fromrnyour latest issue of CHRONICLES to:rnSubscription DepartmentrnCHRONICLESrnRO. Box 800rnMount Morris, Illinois 61054rnNAMErnH ADDRESSrnJUNE 1995/9rnrnrn