They were Western-educated Francophones who read deeply in the European canon, who believed in the “miracle of Greek civilization,” who drew on Plato and Virgil and Pascal and Goethe. At the same time, they argued for their own race’s civilizational genius, for a negritudethat turned a derogatory label into a celebration of African cultural distinctiveness.
.. And finally they believed that part of the West’s tradition, the universalist ideals they associated with French republicanism and Marxism, could be used to create a political canopy — a transnational union — beneath which humanity could be (to quote Césaire) “more than ever united and diverse, multiple and harmonious.”
This vision was rejected by both the colonized and the colonizers. But in certain ways it was revived by global elites after the Cold War’s end, with neoliberalism substituted for Marxism, and a different set of transnational projects — the European Union, the Pax Americana — taking the place of the pan-ethnic, multicultural French Union envisioned by Césaire and Senghor.
.. it is hard enough to for a political union to reconcile the different branches of the West — German and Mediterranean, French and Anglo-Saxon. It becomes harder when that same union is trying to manage a society so multicultural — as European nations under the pressure of mass migration may become — as to lack religious or linguistic or historical common ground. And it becomes harder still when your ruling elite’s cosmopolitanism is essentially superficial, more “eating ethnic food and cheering for Obama” than “celebrating negritude while reading Goethe.”
.. Today’s Western nationalists argue, also plausibly, that many European distinctives are unlikely to survive if nation-states are weak, mass immigration constant, Christianity and Judaism replaced by indifferentism and Islam, and young elites educated as global citizens without knowing their own home.
This nationalist argument comes in racist forms, but it need not be the white nationalism that Trump’s liberal critics read into his speech. It can just be a species of conservatism, which prefers to conduct cultural exchange carefully and forge new societies slowly, lest stability suffer, memory fail and important things be lost.
Trump-Putin Will Talk Against Backdrop of Broader Russian Mischief
Debate over Russia’s role in 2016 election blurs larger picture
Less obvious, but more important, is how any Russian meddling in the American presidential-election season—whatever form it may have taken—fits into a much larger tale. This is the tale of a systematic Russian effort to disrupt democratic and capitalist systems internationally, using an updated version of tactics Mr. Putin learned in the bad old days of the Soviet KGB... The Playbook is an in-depth study of Russian efforts to use overt and covert tactics over a period of a decade to expand its economic and political influence in five Central and East European nations. A group of regional leaders from such nations warned President Barack Obama in a 2009 letter—which also looks prescient now—that Russia was conducting “overt and covert means of economic warfare, ranging from energy blockades and politically motivated investments to bribery and media manipulation in order to advance its interests….”..The Russian strategy, the study finds, isn’t ad hoc. Rather, it is the implementation of a doctrine developed by Russian Gen. Valery Gerasimov called “new generation warfare.” One European analyst called that “primarily a strategy of influence, not of brute force” aimed at “breaking the internal coherence of the enemy system.”.. 1) The first track is economic. Russia seeks to find business partners and investments that allow it to establish an economic foothold, which in turn produces economically influential patrons and partners who have a vested interest in policies friendly to the Kremlin. That is a particularly fruitful endeavor in Europe, where many nations depend on Russian energy supplies.The goal on this track is to cultivate “a network of local affiliates and power-brokers who are capable of advocating on Russia’s behalf.”
2) The second track, perhaps more relevant to the U.S., is designed to disrupt prevailing democratic political patterns. The goal, the Playbook says, is “to corrode democracy from within by deepening political divides and cultivating relationships with aspiring autocrats, political parties (notably nationalists, populists and Euroskeptic groups), and Russian sympathizers.”
.. “an acceleration” of Russian influence-seeking, ranging from a plot against the prime minister of Montenegro to interference in the French election to cyberattacks in Ukraine.
Uber’s CEO Leaves, but Its Battles Won’t Go Away
Co-founder Travis Kalanick departs but for Uber battles remain
“We saw how Travis treated his drivers,” said Sayah Baaroun, head of a driver’s union in France, referring to an incident where Mr. Kalanick was videotaped arguing with an Uber driver. “But for us, the larger battle continues.” Mr. Kalanick later said he was “ashamed” of the behavior capture on the video.
.. Still, Uber’s aggressiveness around the world has often been viewed as interlinked with Mr. Kalanick’s own personality, and the change of leadership could offer a fresh start with some of the authorities with which Uber has tangled. Dave Ashton, co-founder of French car-booking app SnapCar, said Mr. Kalanick’s departure is “an astute move by the board” that could “repair Uber’s reputation and help the company mature.”
How Nationalism Can Solve the Crisis of Islam
Transnational liberalism breeds resentments and anxieties that are only beginning to surface across the developed world.
For decades, the West has seen itself as an empire of rights and liberal norms. There were borders and nations, but these were fast dissolving. Since rights were universal, the empire would soon encompass the planet. Everyone would belong, including Muslims, who were expected to lose their distinctness.
.. Trump wants to revive the nation-state as the primary political vehicle for encountering Islam... To the French philosopher Pierre Manent, such thinking is the beginning of wisdom. “We have a big problem with Islam,” he tells me. “And it’s impossible to solve it through globalist, individualist, rights-of-man mantras.”.. Emmanuel Macron .. “There is no such thing as a single French culture,” he said in February. “There is culture in France, and it is diverse.”.. He regards Islam as a powerful and “starkly objective” faith. Wherever it spreads, it brings a set of “authoritative mores,”.. This is in contrast to Christianity, with its emphasis on subjective, inner assent to the Redeemer, distinctions between the visible and invisible church, Caesar and God, and so on... since the Ottoman collapse in 1924, it “has been an empire without an emperor.”.. Liberals in Europe, and to a lesser extent the U.S., wish to dispense with both the modern nation-state, the political communion that once gave concrete shape to the open society, and Judeo-Christianity, the sacred communion that used to provide the moral and spiritual frame... For the West’s professional classes, Mr. Manent contends, the only acceptable sources of political communion are the autonomous individual, on the one hand, and humanity as a whole, on the other. He understands the jet-setters’ impulse: “We can go anywhere on the planet, work anywhere on the planet—these new liberties are inebriating.” Better, then, “to be a citizen of the world.”.. the “small, damaged” nations of Central Europe react most viscerally against transnational liberalism. Hungary fears “it couldn’t have endured and would have disappeared,” he continues, if it faced the same multicultural pressures as, say, France... The West has relegated faith to a purely private sphere.. In practice, this would involve the government’s insisting that mosques and cultural associations cut their ties with Algeria, Tunisia and other foreign countries and instead actively promote an indigenous French Islam.