Assignment 7 – On Political and International Community

Commanding Heights

As the 20th century’s final days are coming to an end, the world economy prepares for the birth of
the 21st century with a new victor between the battle of ideas between the two commanding heights: the
state/government vs the free market, and which kind of economic system would best benefit mankind.
The shift of the 20th century to the 21 st century opens up the opportunity for globalization which means
there will be a rise of free markets and gone are the old days that the influences of communism are being
reinforced into the economy. This raises the question on globalization if it will indeed benefit the market
economy or not and how the influence of politics will change the international landscape. This essay will
expound on the economic and political events that happened during the economic transformation and will
prove if the world economy was at the right status and at the right time for this shift to happen.

Commanding Heights Ep.1

The first episode of Commanding Heights takes the viewers into the context of the birth of the
new global economy. With the birth of a new economy comes to a popular debate over market forces and
there were two rivaling economists, Hayek and Keynes, who have opposing poles of thought about
economic policy. Keynes favored government intervention while Hayek favored free-market capitalism.
While these two economists became popular during the times of the economic transformation, this also
meant that people were given the freedom to conjure their ideas to contribute to making a better economy.
During this time, the economy was at a collapse, and every economist at that time was subjected to heavy
brainstorming to combat the issues of hyperinflation. It is also important to keep in mind that technology
was improving therefore there was a need for maximization of capital and these are the first steps of
globalization since the economy was desperate to pull in anything in hopes that their issues would be
solved. In the end, the events of 1910 up to 1979, special mention: ww1 and ww2 rise of communism and
socialism, and the necessary recession, still proved that the ideas of the famous economists were still
flawed as problems kept emerging in the economy and inflation was still a serious issue. However,
Hayek’s ideas proved successful with a need for a little tweaking thus the US had encouraged free-market
+ competition. Government intervention slowly went away, and the rise of the free market started to kick
in from, 1979 onwards with Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher as the spearheads for this cause to
combat inflation, and promote to the public the idea of a free market to maximize the capabilities of the
market forces in achieving economic progress. The main takeaway of this episode is that it gave a
breathing room for the people to think of alternative ways or better ways to tackle the issue, of course
many people started to play their hand in politics, but in the end it is about influence that will win a
decision and people would have to keep trying until they have finally gain back the stability of their
economy.

Commanding Heights Ep.2

Following the events that happened after the first episode of Commanding Heights, the second
episode places the viewers into the context of the free market succeeding and replacing government
intervention/control and these events occurred from 1985 all the way to 1998. The question lies if this
will prove successful in not just one economy, rather if it will be proven effective against multiple
economies so that the thought and process of globalization could be effective. Since communism was still
at large at these times, there have been people who doubt the free market economy since they believe that
this will just fall under manipulation and the reform would not just make sense since the government is
not in control anymore. However, the fall of communism happened because people did not want to work
anymore as there have been lacking of incentives which demotivated workers to further work since the
idea of the communists had no intention of increasing benefits as that would also mean that everyone
should increase benefits. Communism is meant to be equal with everyone and this principle also became
their downfall since at this time of economic shift and change, there had to be instabilities before stability
could be achieved which none of the communist parties saw as an optional choice. Furthermore, the rise
of privatization occurred privately which further damaged the reputation of the communist ideolog thus,
leading to the fall of communists and once more people saw the free market as an opportunity to start
earning for their own, as well as contributing for the betterment of the economy. It makes sense that the
communist ideology would fall at some point especially during this time because of how it becomes
unfair to the workers overtime as the economy slowly declines. The communist ideology is like a boat
and when it sinks, it sinks together with the passengers on board without any further exceptions because
that’s just how the principles of the communist ideology works. Since the free market is being looked
upon as the last bastion of hope for recovering the economy, people sought out to do their duties in
businesses that would both benefit the supply and demand chains that are happening around the economy,
maximizing the use of technology to have ease in production, manufacturing, import and export rates. In
this way, it gave the people a larger room of freedom to be flexible with their choices. The influences of
Ronal Reagan and Margaret Thatcher still proved that their influences further made an impact as it has
started a world revolution in the form of economic change as countries such as India, Russia, Chile,
Argentina, and Poland have turned their heads into embracing the new change that the world was going
through.

Commanding Heights Ep.3

Approaching modern times, the idea of a free market has already become the light of the global
economy. Episode 3 of Commanding Heights places the viewers in the context of globalization and how
the economies will take a new economic transformation to create a shared benefit amongst each other.
Since there was a large rate of acceleration in technological advancements, everyone wanted to maximize
this rate as it will prove profitable and beneficial to those who can maximize its capabilities in distributing
it to an international level. Since the government has less authority amongst the new rules of
globalization, it became risky yet progressive because the market and economy’s operations became
unpredictable since anyone could join in. This allotted freedom could also mean that there could be
terrorist organizations awaiting to sabotage the government at any time of the day to assume control once
again and reinforce the old ways or destroy once again the economies. Globalization was the new norm
for the economy yet it is still not the perfect economy for many as the world still has its share of
inequalities and it seemed that it has always remained that way up to the present. Many countries will
continue to progress but those who could not progress will struggle since these successful economies will
continue to make it difficult for the poor economies as they grow wealthier thus increasing their prices.
But despite the inequalities ongoing between the different economies, it has made everyone much more
aware of the statuses and conditions of the other economies that are struggling to strive to succeed. A
good thing about globalization is that it enables these economies to freely support one another without
having to worry of potential conflict because we are already in the free market era and boundaries or
borders are in a much more relaxed state than it ever was during the global economy collapses. Of course,
there are still countries that remain strict with their boundaries, but they could not fully keep it at a
maximum level of strict policy because these countries also rely on the globalization trend of market
supply and demand.
Conclusion

After discussing the three episodes of commanding heights, we can see how the influence of
politics, political leaders, and public opinion could drastically shift the way the economy thrives and
survive. It is without a doubt that there was a need for change during that time since the economies were
falling apart and people could not embrace the fact that they should remain conservative to their
ideologies because it has been proving consistently that no one is already benefitting from the collapse.
The birth of a new economy with globalization may have been indeed a rapid shift of the economic world,
but for now, even in modern times, it has been stable enough for other countries to work on each other
because of the freedom it has given the people to operate on their desires rather than be controlled by the
government which limited the flexibility of work to contribute to the progress of the economy. To go
back to the question if the global economy was at the right place and at the right time for this shift to
happen, there would be economists that would agree that all of these events had their perfect timing for
this shift to happen, and there would be economists that wished that these things could have soon
happened earlier.

The good thing is that globalization made people care for one another regardless of their cultural or racial
differences because they also realize that without cooperating with the different economies, there would
be no sign of progress and to an extent, another war could happen which could mean for another
economic collapse. Globalization is still young in modern times and there are still economic systems
being developed that will be better than our current economic system, but it is a step towards achieving
cooperation, good governance around the world.