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Protests against global capitalism reconsidered The secular ideologies reviewed in the sixth section, above, provided an outlet for creative talents throughout much of the twentieth century, and their demise has left a serious vacuum. The protesters at Seattle were struggling to find a relevant language in which to express their discontent. Their demonstrations showed that they did not trust existing international institutions to make the changes that they believed were required. They sensed intuitively that there is a lack of restraint by those who hold economic power – namely, by those who influence key decisions about future policy regimes in the global economy.

Taking a moral view of the problem, it could be argued that a more appropriate global objective is international development. From this broader perspective, most of the problems identified above disappear. The enlightened nation state educates people in skills that will serve the global economy rather than the national one. It regards the state-educated workers who emigrate as part of its contribution to world development. The diffusion of R&D is regarded in a similar light. What each government can afford to contribute to international development is dictated by the number of skilled workers it can retain as its citizens, since these constitute a major group of tax-payers.

It also compares these views with the view of human nature advanced in this chapter. In contrast to the strict Protestant view, a typical Freudian psychoanalyst would argue that it is the higher nature, rather than the lower nature, that is the major source of problems. Excessive self-control means that civilisation produces mass neurosis. It encourages people to be dishonest by denying the existence of their lower nature altogether. This repression forces the lower nature to surface through disturbing dreams and psychosomatic illnesses.