Noam Chomsky needs no introduction. At the recent International State Crime Initiative's launch of their new journal,
State Crime, Chomsky waxed eloquently for about an hour on the "Changing Contours of World Order," a talk that essentially followed the outlines of his recent Al-Jazeera article (you can read it
here), but conspicuously lacked any significant discussion of the recent riots in London or--perhaps more importantly--the recent "Occupy" protests. Although Chomsky gave his speech before the worldwide protests began on the 15th of October, one wonders whether or not his credibility suffered a little by not philosophizing on such an important matter. I was going to summarize his talk but considering that the majority of what he said was lifted out of his AJ article, I'll explore my opinion of his short but fascinating lecture (that's the disclaimer).
Chomsky's presentation style is super dry; it largely consists of regurgitating of facts that he claims are freely available to any one who wants to "dig through the archives" to find them. I have no problem taking him seriously: as an American living abroad I think it's hugely important to remember that countries and, more broadly, the nation-state (especially the US) are constructions that continually affect our daily lives, both in ways that are obvious and in ways we cannot possibly know, which may indeed be the central problem lurking behind the majority of Chomsky's arguments.
Much of Chomsky's talk explored the ideological motivation behind the previous sixty years of US foreign policy; essentially, he interprets State Department documents, media coverage, intellectual commentary, etc. from a perspective that sees consolidation of government power, both domestic and international, as its chief enterprise. Chomsky wouldn't agree, but I see this perspective to be quite similar to the arguments Foucault makes about power/knowledge, save the fact that Chomsky clearly believes in humanity's supposedly inherent sense of morality. When the riots did come up during question time, and someone asked what could be done about American hegemony and the crimes of a complicit world, he suggested that the we hold those responsible accountable by banding together in a decentralized way to govern ourselves (not particularly surprising from an anarchist), relying on our morality to do so.
This is a great suggestion, however difficult it may be. One need only look to the "Occupy" protests to see the grudgingly labored manifesto they have produced to confirm that this sort of democracy is indeed possible. But what I find inherently improbable about his suggestion and its implied decentralizated governance is the reconciliation of obviously varying moralities that it would require, a necessary requirement if Chomsky claims there is an ideal morality against which to gauge variations.
This is why decentralized governance cannot work in the real world, unfortunately. Still, his talk was both eye-opening and riveting.
