After the Second World War we witnessed the aggregation of local markets into universal markets. This trend was driven by at least two postulates: that the market for all would be the secret formula for success and that a liberal guiding nation had been given the mission from heaven to lay down the rules and set the game.
Aggregation was seen as a good thing, as progress exported to peoples who, while maintaining a certain identity of their own, finally accepted the idea that their world was not the ‘right’ one, but that what was right was aggregation behind a demigod-nation that would lead everyone to the highest peaks. So, union of markets and hegemony of a nation.
The problem is that participating in the same market doesn’t mean becoming friends. On the contrary, if everyone looks out for themselves, we can maximise well-being, as Adam Smith said, but it’s also easy to end up in conflict. It’s the defeat of a philosophical project that dates back to the 1700s. To avoid religious wars, to avoid mass killings, it was thought that the best weapon was to build a social environment where culture, religions and opinions - causes of conflict - were not shared, but only the market and money: money, the real glue of a post-civilisation.
In fact, the contemporary gnoseological, moral and existential relativism, arrogant and supercilious towards all values, retreated in fear in front of the only totem, impassable, presumptuous, aggressive and vengeful: money, whose semantics are universal. The universal market project didn’t work because a supermarket is not enough to create a shared society. And without sharing ideals, values and customs, we are alone in the world. Alone among enemies.
Furthermore, if the leading nation becomes a gambling den croupier, it can sometimes go bankrupt. And then the only way is to favour luck with the usual methods of the wolf and the lamb of ancient memory. As long as the winner is the one who should win, the casino is peaceful, everything is as it should be. But when a new player breaks the bank, then everything has to stop, and – with a little pushing – be escorted to the exit. The whirlpool of interest wraps around itself and drags everyone into the abyss.
Yet humanity is a kind project, a marvellous experience. Men and women all, as if we had a special joy in living in this world. Sweetly young, and in love with life. Why hold back this joy? The real problem with liberalism is that it has chosen individual freedom, a necessary condition for joy, but not a sufficient one. They wanted us to believe that a kind humanity could only achieve goodness if it went from innocence to self-interest. So we lost what is best in us: the sweetness of life as privileged beings in this marvellous world. We lost everything. We have to take it all back.