Return of the Tribes

Ralph Peters, a retired Army officer, has an article in the Weekly Standard in which he argues that globalization has passed its peak and that tribalism is on the rise. One of his prime examples is the utter failure of the European Constitution at the hands of the Dutch and French voters despite massive support from the elites in both countries. This has been followed by and increasing level of nationalism in Europe with trade and other restrictions with the EU cropping up in almost every country.

It is even more evident in what Thomas Barnett called the unincorporated Gap with tribalism and local customs remaining a dominant factor in the people's lives often despite national or religious connections with a broader community.

He suggests that the flat world of Thomas Freidman is actually a collection of elites that are becoming more and more isolated from the broader populations becoming a feudalesque artistocracy with closer ties to their economic and social peers around the world than their ethnic or geographical neighbors much as the Feudal nobles of the Middle Ages had done.

An interesting article.