One of the things we talked about this week in class was the privatization and outsourcing of traditional state activities. We asked whether this undermines the state and whether all things can be privatized? I think we generally concluded that privatization, to some extent, undermines the state, particularly when it comes to privatizing use of force and the loss of control of critical economic actors. We disagreed on whether this could lead to the total collapse of the state and sovereignty as we know it, but generally agreed that to an extent it undermines the state.
As we were talking about this, Andrew made a comment about impermeability and permeability which got me thinking. Generally, as Americans, I think our policy makers and elected officials view the state as more impermeable than permeable. We are a super power, we can do as we like, and we are self sufficient (at least this is what we say about ourselves, the conceptual mask we wear). And yet, the US seems to be much looser about privatization than other powerful states. Compared to Europe, where many critical functions of the society are in the hands of the state, the US has immense privatization. I think of prisons, farming and agriculture, private land ownership, health care (to a lesser extent now, but who knows in the future!), federal work which is contracted out, etc.
I wrote my memo about the potential merger of Monsanto and Bayer, and in the research discovered how much the US has allowed Monsanto to make decisions about the American food and seed supply through a business lens. Rather than maintaining state control and maintaining the freedom to take a more holistic (health, environment, business, economics) approach, the US has allowed Monsanto to act as a corporation despite how critical the food supply is to basic human survival.
If we see ourselves as impermeable and strong in the US, why do we privatize so much? If privatization undermines the state to some extent, wouldn't this be against our priorities to maintain impermeability? How can we be both impermeable and supportive of privatization? In part I think it comes along with a Keynesian economic perspective and another critical part of American society (or the idea of who we are) being the capitalist system. Maybe it's like so many other things in life, that we hold two things in tension and try to keep a balance. And maybe the balance has gone off a bit, but to me this seems like a glaring contradiction. I don't have an answer or solution for it, but I have been mulling it over since class.
Hi Erica,
ReplyDeleteYou raise some important concerns in your post. However, privatization is not just an American phenomenon. As I had mentioned in my blog a few weeks ago, in Germany, airport security is now privatized at most airports. Also, there are a few prisons in Germany that employ private security companies as well (however, most prisons are still secured by state correctional officers, but for how much longer?). At large events like soccer games or concerts, for example, the majority of security is done by private security companies instead of police.
In the case of Monsanto in America and Bayer in Germany, I think it is wrong that states are willing to give up their state control but rather allow the corporations to make decisions about food and medication that is so critical for the survival of humans.
Erica -- it sounds like you are saying it is a bad thing to allow corporations control over the production of food and medicine. Maybe I am misreading this, but it seems as though a privatization of basic services is not a new phenomenon, since agrarian society developed there have been entities who devote their focus to producing those items which society could literally not live without (food, medicine...etc). If then these sorts of arrangements pre-date the modern state is it not reasonable to think that they are not at all undermining of it, but instead just a certain way of organizing the economics of a state?
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