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marmar

(76,985 posts)
Thu Mar 6, 2014, 09:27 AM Mar 2014

Noam Chomsky | Security and State Power


Noam Chomsky | Security and State Power

Monday, 03 March 2014 13:40
By Noam Chomsky, Truthout | Op-Ed


This article, the first of two parts, is adapted from a lecture by Noam Chomsky on Feb. 28 sponsored by the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation in Santa Barbara, Calif.


A leading principle of international relations theory is that the state's highest priority is to ensure security. As Cold War strategist George F. Kennan formulated the standard view, government is created "to assure order and justice internally and to provide for the common defense."

The proposition seems plausible, almost self-evident, until we look more closely and ask: Security for whom? For the general population? For state power itself? For dominant domestic constituencies?

Depending on what we mean, the credibility of the proposition ranges from negligible to very high.

.....(snip).....

Often the attempt to maintain secrecy is motivated by the need to guarantee the security of powerful domestic sectors. One persistent example is the mislabeled "free trade agreements" - mislabeled because they radically violate free trade principles and are substantially not about trade at all, but rather about investor rights.

These instruments are regularly negotiated in secret, like the current Trans-Pacific Partnership - not entirely in secret, of course. They aren't secret from the hundreds of corporate lobbyists and lawyers who are writing the detailed provisions, with an impact revealed by the few parts that have reached the public through WikiLeaks. .......................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/22221-noam-chomsky-security-and-state-power



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Noam Chomsky | Security and State Power (Original Post) marmar Mar 2014 OP
k&r for chomsky. PowerToThePeople Mar 2014 #1
"Security for whom?" bobduca Mar 2014 #2
Indeed ...security for whom? National defence for whom? NSA for whom? L0oniX Mar 2014 #3
K&R woo me with science Mar 2014 #4
Free Trade indeed...more like Free Reign. Jefferson23 Mar 2014 #5

bobduca

(1,763 posts)
2. "Security for whom?"
Thu Mar 6, 2014, 11:31 AM
Mar 2014

for the investor class.

These corporate-citizens are negotiating rules that will accelerate the raping of the commons, and continue to erode states sovereignty. All according to plan.

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