1989 Effect
I. Hardly earned time.
I was born in Warsaw in the winter of 1975. By the year 1989, I’ve grown enough to understand rapid changes happening around me. So I witness them consciously as for the fourteen-year-old.
And it was truly one of those years that the world shifted on its pivot. Some things did change and changed utterly; we are living with their consequences still.1
Thus, the last Soviet soldier has left Afghanistan, George Bush Senior become elected the president of the United States, the Round Table talks took place in Poland, death penalty on Salman Rushdie was pronounced by Ayatollah Khomeini for publishing Satanic Verses, a landslide of the opposition in the elections on 4th of June in Poland, tanks crush the protestors in Tiananmen Square in Beijing — China, football fans trampled to death at Sheffield stadium in the UK, Tadeusz Mazowiecki becomes the first non-Communist prime minister in Eastern Europe Bloc, the fall of the Berlin Wall, bloody revolution in Romania leads to execution of Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena, Vaclav Havel elected President of Czechoslovakia.
Some things ended then; some has only begun.
Amongst those new developments most significant was the collapse of an idea that the international system is driven solely by state action2 — most significant and most disturbing at the same time.
Even at present, some influential people cannot accept the fact that they and their countries are only elements of a larger puzzle in a globalized world as we may read in Zbigniew Brzezinski’s The Grand Chessboard.
But earlier, which is not an accident, at the same reviewed year Francis Fukuyama have managed to publish his essay “The End of History” in which he argues that the advent of Western liberal democracy may signal the endpoint of humanity’s sociocultural evolution and the final form of human government.
What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War or the passing of a particular period of post-war history, but the end of history as such: that is, the endpoint of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.3
Indeed, something was on top of things by then. It seemed that the world crumbled apart, or that good old history right at that very moment would throw itself into a scary pit of oblivion, thus our eternal companion a future will be no more. Oh… but the future was newer more than by then. We were just too terrified and so confuse to foreseen it. We could not give a whisper in favor of tomorrow, nor we could give a gesture in favor of today. But we were hoping to end history to prevail beneath the rubble of our past.
Suddenly next day has come upon us and history has not ended. And guess what? It does not end today or tomorrow; it goes on and on — paraphrasing Agata Christie — the mills of history grind slowly4. Although events overlap, engage, and develop in an unexpected direction, however, this is not an excuse for inaction in process of creating the future. This potential of historical events must be exploited and forged into a push for forthcoming times.
In many ways, 1989 was an open doorway leading straight to a place where we are now, both in terms of the intensity of events and in terms of their importance. So, at this point, we know that all these years are not to be underestimated — unless we want to repeat once completed lessons. Which in fact would be a tremendous waste of hardly earned time.
II. The wall that never falls
Within European culture — especially in the West, a figure of stranger exists fairly outside the defined area of sympathy. Somehow, we have ruled out “others” beyond the pale, were we confined almost fifteen thousand wars, that over the years and centuries have become our participation. In each, we used such terms as “they”, “strangers”, “invaders”, “oppressors”, “enemies”, “saboteurs”. As result, we refused “them” human qualities and we brought to life the impersonal concept of the Others.
This is a convenient and easy way to wash up the conscience, to gain an effortless absolution, and to purify all that’s left of the human spirit. However, here we find a significant problem, a question: how „others” see us? Isn’t that so, that for them we’re just the same — an impersonal, dehumanized „something” that must be get rid of as a pest?
In 1993 Samuel P. Huntington wrote an essay The Clash of Civilizations. The very title itself suggests that as result one will crush on another — but is this inevitable? It seems that Mr. Huntington fell into a trap and become a hostage to common interpretation jammed in the grip of haste judgments derived from stereotypical meanings. Let us think for a moment that perhaps it never was, and it’ll never be a clash? Perhaps we just poured in ourselves (East and West) into the same kettle, where from time to time ferments the foam of dangerous moods — for it, we did heat up that kettle by our impetuosity, and by all means, we’ll going to drink whatever eventually comes out of it… of that, we can be certain.
When in 2015 refugee crisis hit Europe unexpectedly walls began to grow. Hungarian border guards have set the iron fence with barbed wire on top — in the likeness of an old Iron Curtain. France, Germany, and Austria reimplemented temporary border controls within the Schengen area. Along with these real obstacles also a mental wall arises, and who knows maybe those dividers ultimately prove to be much more difficult to collapse. Their psychological binder is a combination of fully understandable fears — born as a result of attacks perpetrated in Paris by people who could move freely back and forth by the Franco-Belgian border — with vulgar prejudices, fostered by xenophobic politicians and irresponsible journalists.5
Europe of 2015 seemed like an inverse carbon copy of 1989, very much the same6, but while 31 years ago athwart European borders many walls and barbwire fences were literally taken down by ordinary people, now same were rebuilt by governments and designates EU agencies.
This was a sorrowful burial of Europe as we know and to which we used to. Especially in the bustle of nationalism, which always increases whenever people feel insecure. Interestingly: place of residence, social status, and often, (and regrettably) education do not have an impact on this increase. Using today’s nomenclature: when fear is involved, the curve cannot be flattened, it rises very rapidly. In this sense, every crisis is the perfect fuel for all sorts of radicalism when populists and the press are reaping the harvest that under normal circumstances would not bring such a crop.
It was seen very much in Poland and Hungary where Muslim refugees mostly from Syria were perceived as a thread and consequently rejected. The more saddening is the fact that the governments of both countries have engaged in this strange hate campaign in an unprecedented way, deliberately nourishing anti-immigrant hysteria. Those were cynical, but also typical for eastern dictatorships efforts serving only one purpose of strengthening power and divert public attention from politically and economically inconveniences.
As it often happens with politicians an average Joe is worth for them as much as the ink in his pen, which is nothing when it comes to refugees. Thus, tired, and terrified of war, people became pawns in the game of major political forces or were vulgarly used as a springboard for all kinds of aspiring propagators of revealed truths or ordinary populists.
We observed the same pattern in the United Kingdom during the Brexit campaign which was in fact highly misinformative and thanks to it chaos populists caught the wind in their sails. This is a great lesson for all niche political forces lurking in the shadow of common sense, a kind of guidebook revealing how through disinformation, appealing to the lowest human instincts, by stereotyping of reality or fueling fear achieve goals and seize power. Looking back at the events in the UK, one can safely say that Brexit is another wall built of bricks of fear, aversion to strangers, and misunderstanding of the mechanisms that rule today’s world.
Honestly: I don’t know what is worse: ignorance lined with fear or belief that even horrible deeds in some instances can be justified; that we are in right to persuade ourselves and others with an old claim that desperate times call for desperate measures. It seems that we have heard it before and the effect, as we know from history, was horrible.
III. Not entirely our world
Whereas today, however unique, and different in its nature appears is nothing more but a consequence of yesterday. The sooner we accept it, the sooner and easier we’ll be able to implement the countermeasures. And there is no doubt that they need to be put in force, a pandemic is our least concern, although it should be admitted that it has accelerated certain processes, especially in the field of digitization of everyday life.
And again, as with the wave of migration, so in the case of a pandemic, very soon emerged those who were able to forge all its disadvantages into their benefit. The bill, as usual, will be paid by the poorest and precariat, it is a giggle of fate that at the end we will all pay for the leash and collars, or (more expressively) for the chain and the shackles.
The precariat is neither wealthy, poor nor medium-earning people, in short, they are those who, for various reasons, are not able to save enough to create a financial cushion, e.g. in case of illness.
It was the precariat in France that created the revolutionary movement of “yellow vests”; the precariat is responsible for Brexit; it is the precariat that is voting massively for populists who promise to re-establish their rightful place in the system. This kind of people, especially under existential tension and constant uncertainty are willingly giving up a significant part of their freedom, which in addition comes with a promise of unconditional loyalty in exchange for safety, predictability, and healthcare. If there is any power out there willing to offer such a deal, they will accept it, without looking at democracy and freedom.7
This kind of behavior will only deepen, especially in the medium strata of society, who suffered the most when the pandemic struck. Thus, shrinking or collapsing of the middle class will significantly affect the economic models reproduced so far, and may force new solutions, not necessarily corresponding with today’s broadly understood capitalism.
In this regard, technological progress and the increasing need for security on many levels, not just financial, are the factors accelerating the process of atomization of the current system. With the increase in the use of algorithms and information noise, manifesting itself in news overload media are exerting booming influence on politics, basically becoming its active participants.
One who selects and regulates information creates reality, usually in line with their expectations and tailored exactly to the user’s needs. This is how models of social behavior are created. The easiest way to introduce a new illiterate, someone who does not understand what the critical selection of sources is, or for other reasons consciously evades selection is literally subjecting such a person to information bombardment. The situation is further aggravated by social media, creating information bubbles around people, i.e. virtual worlds of seemingly coherent information, which is often a fake segment of reality.8 Here appear algorithms that are used to manage the excess of information. But who guarantees that while organizing, information wasn’t manipulated or sanctioned by falsehood? So is our freedom an illusion, who decides what we will perceive as knowledge and what we will know because it is not the same — thinking that we know and knowing.
Google, Amazon, Facebook, they know what you think, they study you as school kids study ants above the dome of glass at biology classes. They know where you go when you eat when you are asleep, they know your taste, your sense of humor, for them you’re just one of billion Truman shows, they get to watch every day. They shape you in their own fashion and for their use, we are their product and we have long lost what they tell us every day that they respect it so much. Freedom is the biggest fake news in today’s world, it is a fantasy in the likes of Atlantis. The Matrix is here, and we live in it, so in the final conclusion it is up to you what tablet you chose — at least you think so.
In this regard 1989 seemed different, because many of us were driven by hope, with a bursting sensation of freedom, felt in every surrounding atom. We did not have to give up anything, instead, we were gaining all that was within a hand reach. Sometimes what we feel is much bigger than what we expected, what we ever could wish for. Where did we lose it, when did we lose it? Time flies, history is rolling people walk, web surrounds — it’s impossible to keep up. So, we sat in a chair and the chair holds us, although we think the opposite. We always think the opposite and the opposite is where we are now.
1Shifting on Its Pivot, by Michael Elliott, Thursday, June 18, 2009 — Time.com
2Op.cit
3Francis Fukuyama The End of History? The National Interest, Summer 1989
4See: Agatha Christie’s A Holiday for Murder, 1938
5Timothy Garton Ash*, przeł. Andrzej Ehrlich, Europa. A mury rosną, rosną, rosną, Wyborcza.pl Magazyn 12.12. 2015
6In terms of importance and intensity of historical events.
7New Middle Ages are coming. Era of state erosion, technological unification of the world and irrationalism
8Op.cit
