Word: utopianism
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Hardt and Negri's signature tone is one of rock-anthem optimism, and Multitude is definitely animated by a warmhearted belief in human goodness. But it is, ultimately, a work of Utopian thinking, occasionally shading into utter fantasy. Multitude treats the global populace as if we were all one big, happy, left-wing underground, undivided by cultural differences, eagerly awaiting our chance to sock it to global capitalism. The authors' examples of multitude-style international activism--the World Trade Organization riots in Seattle in 1999 or the G-8 protests in Genoa in 2001--have a wan, quixotic...
...mostly African-American residents of East St. Louis, Ill., fed up with an electoral process that isn't working for them, seceded from the union and declared their city a sovereign state. Fred Fredericks, the mayor turned President of the newly named Blackland, must balance the country's utopian initiatives (adopting hitherto suppressed alternative-fuel technologies) with the difficulties of life in a rogue nation (where federal checks no longer come in). The satire is omnivorous, poking fun at the Bush Administration and Louis Farrakhan...
...from French Huguenots on his mother's side, Hamilton was fluent in French and had served as Washington's liaison with the Marquis de Lafayette and other French aristocrats who had rallied to the Continental Army. The French Revolution immediately struck him as a bloody affair, governed by rigid, Utopian thinking. On Oct. 6, 1789, he wrote a remarkable letter to Lafayette, explaining his "foreboding of ill" about the future course of events in Paris. He cited the "vehement character" of the French people and the "reveries" of their "philosophic politicians," who wished to transform human nature. Hamilton believed that...
...Geneva Conventions are also quite clear: "Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened, insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind." Then again, the Geneva Conventions also require that prisoners be paid a daily wage. Much of the language is too utopian to be taken literally by most nations at war, and since 9/11 the U.S. has ignored the conventions when convenient...
...Medicare prescription-drug bribe) and Latinos (immigration reform). But the dominant message coming from the White House is, We're right, we don't make mistakes, and anyone who disagrees better watch out. The essential Bush foreign, fiscal and social policies represent nothing less than a new political philosophy: Utopian conservatism, a messianic faith in the power of democracy to transform the Middle East and the power of tax cuts to produce prosperity. This is a radical departure from the mainstream traditions of American diplomacy and fiscal responsibility and should be grounds for a serious debate. But the Administration reacts...