The author may be right that businesses rise and fall faster than before, but the same cannot be always said of politics. After all, what have the Tea Party in the United States or the Pirate Party in Germany actually achieved? Did anything change fundamentally in Brazil after the historic protests in 2013? How do today’s protests differ from those in the 60s? Looking merely at the diffusion of power, how does the rise of pentecostal churches and the decline of Catholicism in Brazil fundamentally differ from, say, the Protestant Reformation in Germany in the 16th and 17th century? How are modern NGOs different from the global movement that ended slavery over a century ago? Are terrorist non-state actors such as Al Qaeda really new? And, more importantly, do they matter as much as Naím implies? While the rise of fringe parties, hackers and protests by leaderless youths is indeed fascinating, it is not yet clear whether and how they change underlying power dynamics. And yet, that main argument in The End of Power that things have changed radically is not entirely convincing. It remains somewhat unclear why the author insists on rejecting the importance of the internet in all this – he may be right in that technology is not the decisive factor, but it surely is a crucial one.įor many readers from countries that have recently experienced mass protests, all this will feel intuitively correct. Furthermore, citizens are increasingly able to influence issues without an expensive support network. Those in power are often constrained by competing actors. Companies are less likely to dominate their markets for a long time. Rather, according to the author, it will be increasingly diffused and ephemeral, and those who hold it must act quickly to achieve their goals.Īs Naím shows, the average tenure of CEOs and state leaders is shrinking and power changes hands more often. The title of the book is misleading: power is not about to end. The established actors now face the challenge to deal with the threat micropowers pose.
Traditional centers of power (governments, large private corporations, etc.) are increasingly facing more nimble “micropowers” such as hackers, single-issue activists and political fringe parties. Power is now easier to obtain but harder to keep and to use. “Being in charge isn’t what it used to be”, principally due to the “decay of power”, Moisés Naím writes in his latest book. R$ 20,50 ( Global Change, Peace & Security: formerly Pacifica Review: Peace, Security & Global Change Moisés Naím: The End of Power: From Boardrooms to Battlefields and Churches to States, Why Being In Charge Isn’t What It Used to Be.
0 kommentar(er)
