1 Year Later...

Hello!

Well it's been a full year it seems since I wrote in this.

This is going to be long, and probably convoluted to most, but take a read if you want to see where I've been at in the past year, and by the end you'll get a picture of where I am now! :) <3 to you all!

I. Europe

My life is markedly different than it was a year ago, and my incredible European life, while devastatingly fun, exciting and enriching didn't serve to provide me with the deep answers to life as I had hoped.

II. Idealism

I felt I had finally achieved the sense of 'global' perspective I had sought since my first trip to Central America and ensuing explorations in Asia, Australia, and Europe... Notwithstanding my European and North African playground all within a 100 Euro flight's reach, my little 200 student school itself was a microcosm of our globe. With representatives, albeit highly educated, from every corner and continent of this earth we pooled into a rich global pond glistening with sparkling reflections of cultural beauty and nuance that could only come with such a collective.

While my world had never been smaller, my faith in humanity and the the world being changed for the better had never been bleaker. They say that oftentimes youthful idealism wares off with age or time, but growing up I was certain mine would never. My childhood, youth, and early career was overabundant with success, opportunity, encouragement, and a deep conviction that the world is for our taking and it can be changed. Until my "awakening" so to speak witnessing poverty and the deeply unjust global structures that entrench the developing world in poverty at the developed countries gain... my perspective was more in personal, religious, and familial matters. After my initial and subsequent adventures in the developing world, my purpose was deeply affected and I realized my North American opportunities were unique, and I wanted to right the wrong and create a world where the opportunities I had could be shared with the developing world. While my heart's calling was irrecoverably changed, I still exuded the youthful optimism and believed the world could still be changed.

I distinctly recall explaining to people who questioned me why I wanted to study International Development that, I just knew there was a key that needed to be turned, a secret switch that could be flipped, and voila! Everything will snap and aright and finally this world can be wholly reflective of the fair, just, loving community I had so deeply longed for and seen in all parts of the globe. Those flashes of hope do exist, apart from each other, with different cultural clothes, but the same deeper expression. Things like love, community, sacrifice for the greater good, sharing... I knew greed exists to the greatest levels and the world system daily promotes audaciousness beyond what the common mind may imagine for corporate, regional, and governmental egotistical and material gain, yet, I believed if somehow we could find out just what is going on, we can act to fix it.

III. Devastation

Academic-
This line of thinking, while admittedly naive and idealistic, prompted me to shift my area of study from poverty studies, which I believed to be a symptom of the deeper rooted world system, to the heart of the matter - the international political economy. If one wishes to shoot down naive ideals, the study of the politics of money is a great place to start. If one wants to witness the gnarly, twisted roots of power and greed at their utmost low in the world's highest places - begin here. From my studies in Latin America, I was aware of concepts such as the 'dependency theory'- that the organization of the world is such that the 'core' developed countries purposefully create economic and diplomatic ties that restrain and extract desired economic needs from 'peripheral' developing countries. Not a new concept, but studying international economics at a grad school level, from an extremely critical social science perspective, in Europe (which unlike the US doesn't feel a need to promote any sort of optimistic spin on the news or materials presented) was a sobering experience to say the least. Learning to a greater extent the behavior of governments and supposedly 'beneficial' institutions such as the WTO and IMF with their ever increasingly manipulative and strong handed tactics to promote the interest of the developed world simply makes me disgusted.

I had a hint of how messed up the world system is from previous education and experiences, but I thought that deeper study of it might show a path or even a sliver of direction, towards a hopeful angle. My studies from a international political, labor rights, and even human rights perceptive painted some very, very depressing pictures.

IV. Hope?

I did find a kindling of great hope in my Advanced Sociology class where we examined post-development. I studied post modern social theory, from the likes of Escobar and De Sousa Santos to critical theorists, Horkheimer and Chakrabarty. Many of them being developing country scholars - looking at the world as not a 'provicialisation of Europe' but as each country, culture, space, and place as originating from it's own experience, history, and design and thus the best author of its own future. The idea of not just economic and political regionalisms, but the regionalization of histories, presents, and futures - the allowance for each country or region to determine its own destiny - economically, politically, socially, in every way. Not the way the US or Europe has determined or now determines, but the way each determine for themselves. Its a beautiful thought and the fear that each will isolate into a mercantilist pre-19th century economy isn't valid in today's global economy... Even if some do wish to isolate, groups such as the Zapatistas show that groups within even hostile surroundings can be a viable entity, produce enough shared resources and outside commerce to support a large community. Scarcity is a myth. As social movements spring up globally and locally, global CITIZENS are connected in newer and more exciting ways not just for commerce but personal, social, and community exchange. I think if we can tap our global technological and connectivity resources in a post-modern perspective our would can and does yield so much more hope.


V. Paradox

Being a person who likes to try to pit paradoxes against each other for a semblance of unity - I decided to tackle both my heart for social justice against the unwieldy rules of economics in the increasingly complex arena of 'corporate social responsibility'. Can corporations, the driver of this heartless profit driven economic system be promoters of social justice and positive change?

Like most people find in the higher echelons of education - the answer is always yes and no. Rather, there 'is' no 'answer'... there are many ways at looking at a situation and certain angles and perspectives yield different outcomes, but the more variables examined shows only an increasing complexity. One can hope that this complexity reveals trends and that if certain prescriptions are followed, hopeful outcomes can result. That is pretty much what I found in the quagmire of rhetoric that is corporate social responsibility (CSR). I examined CSR through a dialectic social science lens to determine if in its roots, history, failures, reactions, and changes if positive outcomes can be drawn from this seeming contradiction. In the end, I said yes and no.. but it is up to citizen action to continue to pressure businesses to be accountable to their workers, the environment, and the communities they produce in. There have been hopeful trends, but in the end it is up to us force them to behave. Pressure works, and it seems to have a contagious trend, if nothing else than positive non-economic actions does often, in the long run, be reflected by positive economic movement, and businesses follow trends so if we can push the trend to higher and real accountability, there just might be hope after all.

The intense academic, world perspective and intellectual experience was also matched with intense personal experiences: most very positive and some very negative - something I had yet to really experience. I had been extremely blessed to be around solid and honest people most of my life but I suppose the more of the world you see, the more likely you will meet people with very different value systems than your own. I had a few unfortunate relationships both friendship and romantic which really really disappointed, betrayed my trust, and hurt me, leading to periods of sadness, anger, doubt, and confusion as to why some people treat others so poorly. While hard situations like are deeply sobering, they also teach us important lessons. By working through the hurt rather than being jaded by it, we become more of a whole person, and better able to help others who are going through similar experiences.

IV. Results

In the end I finished up my year and a half in Europe with visiting over 16 countries, from Moscow to Marrakesh, ended up getting a merit for my thesis, research experience with Oxfam Novib, and the Transnational Institute in Amsterdam, some lifelong, fabulous friends, and truly savored adventures, experiences, and lessons. The whole experience, but particularly the last few months in Europe were nothing less than a torrential whirlwind. The quiet snowfall that gently clothed the quaint dutch streets and my seaside apartment was perhaps the only calm I felt in the last week before Christmas as I desperately tried to tie up the loose ends and pack up probably the most intense, insane, incredible jam-packed year and a half of my life into a flyable luggage size.

By the grace of God I did made it home, however that was just the beginning!

V. The Winter of Despair (I'm not just talking about unemployment)

I don't really know how to express the feeling that results from tearing oneself abruptly away from the chaotic into the entirely unknown...

Some people are perpetual wanderers, and never feel the need to set down roots and 'build' any sort of traditionally expressed cohesive, stable way of life. Deep down I knew I wouldn't always wander but I hadn't been convinced to stay in any particular place yet. I didn't know enough about the world or what was most important to me to dedicate myself to a single place.

My time in Europe, while much of the time draining and extreme, also did yield a lot of time for personal reflection. Particularly in the summer, when I spent long days researching, reading, reflecting, gazing out my apartment window into the North Sea's sunsets and ever changing seascapes... I thought. I thought about myself, who I was, where I was going, what I wanted, what would make me happy, what I was good at, what had privileged me to have such an incredible set of experiences already at such a young age. How did I get to that place, what it was preparing me for? Many, many thoughts. No real answers, but myriad ponderings.

I had enough savings, I could have moved anywhere in the world and would have been ok for probably half a year. I had no possessions except an ailing computer (which promptly died upon return to the US), my surfboard, a large collection of mostly chinese import and second hand clothes and shoes, and quite a few books. I could have gone anywhere. China? Latin America? Stay in the Hague? Move to Amsterdam? Go to Spain, France, Korea, Mexico??? The world was my oyster... but I just didn't know what I wanted. If i did go back to the US, should I return to San Diego where I had some of the happiest years of my life? DC where political action and social justice orientation is the way of life for many? Seattle, where I grew up but hadn't lived for 4 years? I just didn't know.

... and now i am out of time but more to come...

1) Unemployment
2) Financial Crisis / Global Decline = Global Solidarity
3) Unexpected Career Turn in a usual last minute dramatic fashion
4) Buckling Down to "Autumn"
5) Content and beginning to build again.