T HE NEW WORLD OF T H E GOTHI C FOX
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so- called rea l-existing socialist regimes in the East and the global victory
of th e capitalist model, th ere has appeared at the same titTle a bad after–
taste attac hed to this triumph. All over Eas tern Europe we find a con–
tinuin g resistance aga inst a cheerful adopti o n of th e W estern capitalist
system. And thi s is not so mu ch directed aga inst the economic paradigm
of free trade and market competitio n but against a systemi c ratio nale in–
trinsic to capitalism that threa tens to kill also those socialist ac hi evements
that many Eastern Europeans find still worthy o f preservati on. Even if we
disagree o n that account , and even if it is true that thi s process ca n be
described as a case o f indu ced " pregnancy" that is hard to stop , this
transformati o n may also be o ne o f transitio n , a transiti on that ultimately
may change th e face o f co ntempo rary capitalism as a whole. So fo r me,
neither th e costs of the transiti on are clear, nor has the process come to
an end . It is tru e that there is no socialist model out there any more, but
the prac ti ce o f capitalist globali za ti on may be much more complex and
unpredi ctable that we th o ught or think.
Claudio Veliz:
M ay I respo nd to Dr. Ari as C aldero n 's comment o n
my ve ry tentati ve attempt to indul ge in prophecy? There is a plausible
reason for my asse rti o n that it is unlikely that the metropolis of industri–
alism will mo ve away from th e English-speaking wo rld. I was born into
a world in whi ch th e
lingua jranca
was French. If o ne wanted to move
across boundari es o ne had to master the French language . Today there is
no do ubt that the
lingll a f ra nca
of th e world is English. Th e interesting
thing is to try to in"lagine whi ch is go ing to be th e next on e. Th ere was
a time, no t so lo ng ago, wh en some tho ught it was go ing to be
Russian , o r C hinese, but today our inabili ty even to imagi ne whi ch lan–
guage is goin g to take th e place o f English as the next
lingua fran ca
sug–
gests that we are going to remain wh ere we are fo r a considerable time.
Zachary Karabell:
Yes, French prevail ed as the
Iin<,<ua jra llca
for o ne
hundred and fifty yea rs, but it did no t lead to the revivifi ca ti o n of the
French empire.
Claudio Veliz:
That is prec isely the point I try to make in th e chapter
on th e " Hellenisti c Aftermath ." England, whi ch after all is th e source of
the
lill<,<" ajrallw,
has ceased to be a world power, but the culture o f the
English is being embraced everywh ere, and without duress. It is exactly
the H ell enisti c case; Ath ens never recove red from th e disaster o f Syrac use,
and foll owing the disso lution o f the D eli an Confederacy, ceased fo reve r
to playa min or rol e in world affairs, but that was also when the known
