Draft of a project idea

The world is in a bad [okay, need to clarify] state. An effective effort to change this state requires an accurate assessment of the problem. While current responses have been very creative organizationally [network form], the response has suffered from a theoretical poverty [in terms of fundamental processes at work, nature of process, where we are in the process]. The absence of a clear, coherent understanding of historical roots and current state has resulted in a scattered and generally ineffective response.

"Globalization" as a total umbrella of current period.

Confusion over what "globalization" is. Is it something different? If not, old strategies and tactics should work. Is it something new? Then new strategies and tactics are required.

If it is something new, what is it?

The answer to this last question should determine the political response.

-- globalization as something distinct is in dispute
-- idea of stages seems to be in some dispute
-- [proceed on assumption that there are stages] determining an appropriate political response requires an accurate assessment of current stage. If globalization is a distinct stage, it requires a distinct political response.

Research will explore concept of globalization as a stage, by exploring one aspect of globalization -- speculative capital -- and its relationship to the environment.

-- capital is a social relation -- describes a particular kind of relationship between people in act of production/reproduction.
-- through production and reproduction, this relationship extends to the environment as foundation of economy; also source of well-being (reproduction)

Look at three contemporary financial structures.

First, examine these structures

(a) in terms of infrastructure necessary to make them possible
(b) in terms of demands, needs, opportunities that make them possible

Are these structures possible under other conditions? Or, if there are historical precedents, how are they the same, and how different, if at all? So could they arise in their current form under other conditions, or are they specific to current conditions? If they cannot arise under other conditions, then they are evidence of something distinctive about Capital today [part of a general category I call speculative capital] and therefore globalization [which is capitalism today].

[Use Carolyn Merchant's "ecological revolutions" as a framework, although will need to fill out areas where I think that it is lacking. use other environmental historians, e.g. William Cronon. Basic concept is that changes in mode of production (although will need to break this into smalled chunks, to look at at level of stages of capitalism) result in different ecologies]

Second, examine the financial structures

(a) in terms of property ownership
(b) connection between immediate participants [investors mainly] and the environment; agents of the participants and the environment.

What are the features of these relationships to the environment? [These relationships are mediated throug property relations.] Are these relations to Nature the same as in the past? If they are similar, in what ways? If not, how are they different? If the relationships are different, that is, they describe a different ecology, how do we characterize it based on the cases? [Or, to use "ecology" in a more traditional or narrow way, how are the ecosystems different?]

If the relationships are different, they are evidence again of something distinctive about capital today.


jd