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GLOBALIZATION AND RISKS

And in a more Durkheimian vein, on the vital importance of preserving
a space for ‘the sacred’ in modern society, he wrote further:

‘Yet fundamentalism isn’t just the antithesis of globalizing modernity, but
poses questions to it. The most basic one is this: can we live in a world where
nothing is sacred? I have to say, in conclusion, that I don’t think we can.
Cosmopolitans, of whom I count myself one, have to make plain that toler-
ance and dialogue can themselves be guided by values of a universal kind.’ 3

Although Giddens does not elaborate, unlike Durkheim, such ‘sacred’
traditions would not be inculcated by the education system or some form
of dirigiste syndicalist corporate state. Neo-liberalism rules out dirigisme
and the militantly left British trade union leadership are unlikely partners
for the Giddens’s venture into ‘organic solidarity’. Instead what is pro-
posed as means to the same end are various forms of legislation, social
reforms and the incorporation of single-issue civic activism such as the
environmental movement. In practice, this area is a bastion of the civic-
minded middle and upper middle class which is hardly where the prob-
lem of alienation from monopoly capitalist society lies. These groups are
already influential in society, already ‘organic’. The problems of alien-
ation, or to use the Durkheimian term – anomie – lie elsewhere.
They are several additional problems with Giddens’s approach. In the
first place, what is the root source of this lack of ‘continuity’ and of
‘form’ to modern life referred to in the quotation above? Is this a meta-
physical human deficiency of all times and all eras – characteristic of the
human condition in general – or is this ‘discontinuity’ and ‘formlessness’
the result of a specific organization of society in a particular period of his-
tory? If it is the former, then clearly Giddens is right. One has to make
the best of a bad situation, introducing what reforms one can but ulti-
mately one must resign oneself to this existential reality. If, on the other
hand, it is the latter, then the preservation of non-rationalistic traditions
would serve only to obscure, temporarily, the real nature of the problem.
Moreover, a rationalistic ‘invention’ of modern civic ritual is an inher-
ently contradictory venture which may have been viable in the nine-
teenth or even early twentieth century. Then literacy levels were low, the
mass media were underdeveloped and, most important of all, the mass of
the people had not fully entered the political arena. People deferred
to ‘their betters’ – especially in the British aristocracy and monarchy.
Millions of people were still struggling to form their independent politi-
cal judgments and organizations and were still very vulnerable to the
blandishments of opportunistic politicians. Today, however, much (but
not all) of that initial political naïvety has largely passed. The harsh blows

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