Deviant Globalization: Black Market Economy in the 21st Century

by Jesse Goldhammer (Editor), Nils Gilman (Editor), Steven Weber (Editor)

This collection of essays introduces the thriving illicit industries and activities within the global economy whose growth challenges traditional notions of wealth, power, and progress.

Genres: Economics, Nonfiction

320 pages, Paperback

First published March 24, 2011

Reviews

[Jordan Peacock · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everybody needs to read this book. It's a crash-course in understanding the gradations of moderns politics and economics, and gives voice to the birth pangs of a post-state world, in all it's hope and terror. So suppress your gag reflex and dive into the world of transnational trade in drugs, weapons, labour, sex, organs, lumber and commodities; perhaps we can learn enough to begin to build a new world, rather than merely finding ourselves, one day, in it.

A couple side thoughts; what isn't stated clearly enough is how porous the divide between deviant globalization and the rest really is. Drug money is a huge issue that has plagued Wells Fargo after it acquired Wachovia recently, money from the Fed's bailout aided, amongst others, banks in Libya run by the Qaddafi regime, there are controversies over Kiva and Grameem bank for their externalities (leaving contract enforcement to local thugs, among other things), the Anonymous hacker collective is functionally similar to many of the botnet groups, particularly in it's lack of transparency or accountability. Alternate currencies such as flattr and bitcoin that have received notice after Wikileaks (another non-state actor of weight) had payments from Mastercard & Visa blocked are in tension with incumbent states - see the recent FBI actions against the Liberty dollar, for instance. And hell, even the suburb I live in funds itself with an enforced monopoly on liquor sales - not different from a narco-state except in degrees.

Would love to hear your thoughts. Most people are operating with a political or economic mindset that is a century or two out of date. Get an upgrade, and get active.

[Aron · Rating 4 out of 5]

An immensely important book, cutting through the intense-information biases common news-cycles are subject to - driven as they are by the need to find ‘new’ scoops rather than insights into the big picture.

Particularly impressive is the intensely focused empirical research carried out for this book: interviews with Chinese people illegally trafficked to the America’s, with underage prostitutes in the Philippines, with the slave labour class in Dubai, with hackers-for-hire in Russia.
Written by different authors with varying specialties, the quality of both research and prose remain constantly high. There even emerges, after a fashion, a central thesis, helpfully (although sloppily) set out in the introduction: ‘globalisation’ (the ever globalising system of trade) has a ‘dark’ side to it that is not simply a corruption of that system, but a central part of it, because it employs exactly the same mechanisms that are essential to the success of that global exchange of goods, information, etc., and needs little else or extra. That is to say: through common mechanisms of control and oversight it is not possible to manage these ‘darker’ sides of the global economy without destroying (or at least considerably hindering) the basis of that global system itself. If international trade, or for example the digital exchange of information that is the basis for the internet, has to be closely monitored, it will slow down to such an extent, lose its flexibility etc., that their potential benefits are largely defeated.
This is a strong central thesis.

As a point of critique, I would posit that the separate chapters nevertheless still lack a theoretical unity, or comprehensiveness. Why are the phenomena studied somehow representative? Are we not missing anything? Also: given that these ‘deviant’ phenomena are posited as an essential part of the ‘globalised’ system, it would have been interesting to have a discussion about the supposedly equally inevitable ‘darker sides’ of earlier ‘world systems’ (what was the ‘dark side’ of medieval Europe? Of the Han-dynasty? Can they teach us anything about the relative desirability of various possible world-systems??).

I feel this book proposes a study-program that, even if still underdeveloped, is highly relevant but has seemingly not (yet) been taken up by academia. Oh well, better do another study of public sentiment by means of Twitter-data.

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Books published as the result of contributions made by different authors and edited by a team of editors are often mediocre or unbalanced with a striking lack of balance in style and quality. This book however is the exception, it is perfectly balanced, the authors and subjects were well chosen and it seems as if they actually sat down and discussed how to combine their work as to not repeat each other. This factor made an interesting book an amazing book, every chapter felt in place and worthwhile.

The subject of the book is black market economy in its many shapes but more so. This book was meant to set right several misconceptions on the phenomenon of black market economy in this increasingly globalized world economy and what that signifies for state reactions towards it.

The subjects can be dived in four sections including three distinct types of black market economy: people, resources and drugs and a section on emerging black markets such as hacking service companies or state takeovers by criminal syndicates. Each chapter or entry is well documented and included a historical background of the trade, a contextualization trough use of eyewitness accounts and the insistence of all authors to try and frame the impact of the trade as experience for criminals, victims, law enforcement, activists and societies as a whole. What was truly remarkable to me was that even tough no author ever explicitly referenced an other chapter in this book but still at some points I could see the connections, the inter lapping of the different actors involved in these trades.All of this made it a coherent book that truly delivered what was promised, an in depth study of the global black market in its many forms.

This alone would have made a fine entry and worthwhile to read for anyone interested in any of the black market trades but this book stands out because it has a message, a message that all contributors support. This collection of authors wants people to acknowledge that this deviant globalization is not a minor aspect in world affairs but something that affects hundreds of millions of people worldwide. They go head to head with both (neo)liberal and Marxist economist's views on the subject; rejecting the Marxist notion that this is but a different aspect of the rich economies exploiting the weaker and rejecting the liberal notion that this black economy will fade away if free market led development is allowed to develop. The authors point out that these horrible economies are an integral part of the global free market economy and are a albeit harmful form of development and opportunity for millions of poor people in the global south.

The above is one side of the message this collection promotes, the other side is how to combat it. Every chapter is about something most people acknowledge that happens, everyone knows there are drug traders and trade in organs or export of illegal timber or hackers. Every chapter however shocked me to the core when the extent and impact of each of those was revealed to me and the wicked radical innovative spirit these black market entrepreneurs embrace to maintain and more often to increase their reach and influence over society to gain money and power. As shocking are the often pathetically inadequate government responses or society's apathy towards it.The other spectrum of reactions that this book diligently showcases are governments acceptance of these black markets and the complex relations they have with the deviant entrepreneurs and trade as well societies either reluctant or enthusiastic embrace of the opportunities these alternatives offer with or without knowledge of the impact.

The chapters make you very cynic and feel like well if that is the case then let us just give up. This is not the message that the contributors want to sent. They explicitly state that nihilism is not an option but neither is misguided reaction based on false assumptions or lack of knowledge. They promote a worldview that accepts that these forms of economy have dynamics that have far reaching impacts and that an effective struggle will be long, expensive and without guaranteed success. The cost of apathy however is a continuation of harmful long term destructive development led by the most ruthless organisations imaginable that are adapting rapidly to exploit every angle. An evolution that might lead up to ever more zones on the planet out of state control and in the hands of these new criminal lords as new forms of political actors and that embody everything global initiatives of progress and justice have fought to destroy.

The book most definitively convinced me of the importance of these phenomena and the risk that apathy towards the context's of local poverty, global demand, local supply, states weakness and international oriented robber barons presence that allows these deviant globalizing structures to take root in a region and the long term impact of allowing it to grow and entangle societies entails both on local and global level.

[Katherine Collins · Rating 4 out of 5]

To me, these books are a trilogy of tales for our new, webbed-together world: Slaughter discusses the political and philosophical implications of a system that is no longer structured by nation-states. Gilman explores the awful underside of globalization, where more efficient flow of trade combined with uneven social, economic, and legal conditions have led to an exploitable “moral arbitrage”. Neuwirth examines the gigantic informal economy (NOT the same as Gilman’s – we’re talking street vendors, care providers, agricultural workers…) – $10 trillion worldwide! – that is the basis of economic activity in so many communities, yet still uncounted by most analysis.

[Lacewing]

At one time, Nils Gilman's lecture of the same name was freely available online. I watched it more than once and recommended it even more often. Some might say it supports Libertarian politics; I avoid ideology but do attend to sociology, anthropology, psychology, etc.

[Guillermo Pineda · Rating 1 out of 5]

The essays were interesting and very informative. Unfortunately, the psycho-epistemology of the Editors is terrible and full of irrational arguments.

[Holmes CC New Arrivals]

(Goodman)