Jamais sez, "WorldChanging interviews Naval War College professor Thomas Barnett. It's a lengthy, wide-ranging discussion of the differences between the 'Core' nations and the 'Gap' nations, the role of globalization in causing and fixing failed states, the need for a 'sysadmin force,' and the role of environmental collapse as a driver of conflict. You may not agree with all of his conclusions, but he makes a strong, insightful argument." This was a really thought-provoking peace; there's a seductive logic in the idea of replacing international Peace-Keepers with international System Administrators.
Well, it would be what I call the System Administrator Force. It would be a people-intensive, UN-peacekeeping-plus approach that could defend itself — could do counter-insurgency, could fight and not be some ineffective, pussy UN force where you shoot at them and half of them run away. It would be a tough force. You shoot at these guys, or start committing atrocities in their presence, and they would stop you, and if necessary, kill you. It could not only keep the peace, but enforce it.
It would also have a highly-trained civilian component. You'd have international, inter-agency teams. It'd look like the Casbah bar scene in Star Wars — you'd want to see loads of uniforms from all sorts of countries, and you'd want to see civilians from all sorts of NGOs and aid agencies: you'd want the whole package, acting in a Great Depression, FDR sort of mode, where the first order of business (after enforcing the peace) would be to get everybody busy. The government that would be there would be some sort of transitional organization, an international reconstruction fund, with the goal of getting things stabilized, an economy working and laws written.
(Thanks, Jamais!)
Update: Angus sez, "there's a tremendously compelling (albeit in .rm) presentation by Barnett at the CSPAN site that I watched a couple days ago. He's tremendously insightful, not just on military issues, but the nature of globalization the networked world."
Update 2: Jesse sez, "Here is an MP3 of Barnett's talk at poptech."
