The events triggered by the special military operation have begun to affect globalization:
- First of all, the Kurdish diaspora in Sweden has always supported and financed all Kurdish separatist movements, so we should not be surprised by the position that Turkey has taken against the entry of Sweden and Finland into NATO. Interestingly, the reality of the Middle East directly affects the balance of power in Northern Europe.
- The food crisis (which is blamed exclusively on the war in Ukraine, but is the result of several causes), has provoked protests in Africa, especially in Uganda, due to rising prices as a result of sanctions against Russia.
- For sanctions against Russia to be effective, the United States must negotiate with the Persian Gulf monarchies or Iran. American politicians are not prepared for this and for that reason negotiations have stalled between.
All this demonstrates the very fragility of the current world-economy as described by Braudel and Wallerstein. Intraregional and interregional ties have become obstacles to the development or realization of many projects, especially since the major players now depend on small diasporas – previously insignificant – exiled in their countries to get what they want, while to gain certain advantages over other competitors it is necessary to reach compromises with secondary players. In addition, relying on the purchase of something produced abroad, instead of producing it domestically, can lead to industrial, food and energy collapse in the event that it is no longer available due to unforeseen circumstances.
The global capitalist world-economy was created thanks to Western hegemony, which resorted to all kinds of non-economic means (force) in order to achieve this goal. All countries that were incorporated into the world-economy ended up being exploited as if they were colonies, directly or indirectly. However, there are non-Western countries such as China, Iran, India and Turkey that have managed to achieve a political and economic development that makes them independent from the West and now the West is forced to negotiate with them. The imposition of sanctions, blockades or military invasions would mean destroying the foundations of the Western economy itself and would end up bursting all the foundations on which it is built.
Therefore, we can ask ourselves: what is the point of creating a system that does not give the West an advantage over the rest of the world?
All this will leads us to think that the world is moving towards the emergence of multiple world economies – empires (multipolarity) – or towards the creation of a post-capitalist world trade economy controlled politically and ideologically by the West (some countries such as China have managed to carve out their place in the world thanks to this).
In fact, the discourse of “putting aside economic benefits in order to save Ukraine” are an attempt to implement the latter scenario, because thanks to the advantages accumulated by the West (despite its declining economic, military and ideological power) it still possesses the necessary mechanisms to create a new system without fear of destroying the old one, including through the use of military power, in order to wipe out all its competitors.