In Transit

It was 1999 when I published a book with this title - used as a calling card in Uzbekistan when I started what was to be an 8 year stint in Central Asia, with Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan following after 3 years. It’s a felicitous title since it is about a western “change agent” applying what he had learned about public admin in UK government to a very different environment. The change from a “communist” system to a “capitalist” one was one which noone had really theorised about. The sovietologists who inhabited the ituniversity departments of Soviet Studies soon found use in the new field of “transitology” Many theorists, however, had considered the opposite process, from capitalism to socialism. And still do – so far without convincing electorates although progressives can blame corporate media’s “divertissement” (such a lovely French word!) which has had two profound social effects

• diverting citizens’ attention with spectacle of scandal and entertainment (Mander; Postman)

• breeding alienation from their fellow man (jeremy gilbert)

Between 1950 and 1980, we had an effective and balanced system in which each type 

of power – economic (companies/banks etc), political (citizens and workers) and legal/admin/military 

(the state) – balanced the other. None was dominant.
Deindustrialisation, however, destroyed that balance – more specifically it destroyed the power 

which working class people had been able to exercise in that period through votes and unions 

has been undermined. Mintzberg’s Rebalancing Society  captures this argument best.
In its place a thought system developed - justifying corporate greed and the privileging 

(through tax breaks and favourable legislation) of the large international company.

• All political parties and most media have been captured by that thought system 

which now rules the world

• People have, as a result, become cynical and apathetic

• Privatisation is a disaster – inflicting costs on the public and transferring wealth to 

the few

• Two elements of the “balanced system” (Political and legal power) are now supine 

before the third (corporate and media power). The balance is broken and the dominant power 

ruthless in its exploitation of its new freedom

• It is very difficult to see a “countervailing power” which would make these corporate elites 

pull back from the disasters they are inflicting on us

• Social protest is marginalized - not least by the combination of the media and an Orwellian 

“security state” ready to act against “dissidence”

• But the beliefs which lie at the dark heart of the neo-liberal project need more detailed exposure

as well as its continued efforts to undermine what little is left of state power

• We need to be willing to express more vehemently the arguments against privatisation - 

existing and proposed

• to feel less ashamed about arguing for “the commons” and for things like cooperatives and social enterprise (inasmuch as such endeavours are allowed

But the elite - and the media which services their interests - noticed something was 

wrong only when Brexit and Trump triumphed – in 2016. But that was simply the 

point at which the dam broke – the pressure had been building up for much longer.

 If we really want to understand what is going on we have to go much further back – 

not just to the beginning of the new millennium when the first waves of populist anger 

started - but to the 1970s when the post-war consensus started to crumble – as Anthony 

Barnett, for one, most recently argued in his extended essay “Out of the Belly of Hell” (2020)
The demos have been giving the Elites a clear warning – “your social model sucks”. 

We may not like some aspects of what the crowd is saying – for example the need for border 

restrictions….but we ignore its message at our peril. So far I don’t see a very credible Elite 

response. Indeed, the response so far reminds me of nothing less than that of the clever Romans 

who gave the world Bread and Circuses. Governments throughout the world have a common 

way of dealing with serious problems – it starts with denial, moves on to sacrificial lambs, 

official inquiries and bringing in the clowns - and finishes with “panem et circenses”