My favorite culprit candidate is the Network Effect. The Internet in prosperous countries, and the plummeting price of televisions elsewhere, has put more of the world in closer contact. 3 years ago, most Americans spent very few cycles thinking about the 1.2 billion Muslims we share the planet with, even though there are 4 Muslims for every single American.

Now we are well aware of the Muslim world: and they of us, and not just through the official apparatus of the mostly restrictive regimes that govern Muslim nations. Al Jazeera may have a distinctly Arab viewpoint, but it reports a wider range of news, including stories unfavorable to many Arab governments: it, and its competitors, represent information that was not widely available during the time of the first Gulf war.

On the Western side, the Internet allowed many to receive information and viewpoints that the woefully blindered 'embedded' media missed or downplayed in the Iraq excursion. As Iraq deteriorates, the Internet is at least one reason that legit media can't let that story be buried.

So, what's happened is, all of a sudden, we who used to think of ourselves primarily in terms of our nations, are now compelled to think in terms of a much larger community of people.

And this, while ultimately inevitable (and I think desirable) isn't easy. We know that countries in which the income distribution is way out whack are often unstable. And while the US and Great Britain have relatively equitable distributions, the world as a whole does not. Our countries were stable islands in a sea of discontent that we just tuned out.

No more. We're all much more aware of each other than ever before, and that's a trend that isn't going to reverse itself. We have bigger problems, and need better solutions, than we did only a little while ago...
Comments 3:39:54 PM    

Chris Gulker's view from Silicon Valley - in words and pictures