Glocalization and the New Local Transnationalisms: Real Utopias in Liminal Spaces

Abstract

‘The defining characteristic of utopianism is that it is a political theory specifically directed towards the creation of human happiness’ (Goodwin and Taylor, 1982, p. 207). Today, the goals of utopian thinking seem somewhat more circumspect. Thus Frederic Jameson writes eloquently of how ‘[t]he desire called Utopia must be concrete and ongoing, without being defeatist or incapacitating’ (Jameson, 2005, p. 84). We are now confronting the pessimism of the 1990s and the widely held feeling that alternatives were impossible. But the language in which it is done tends to be practical and pragmatic. Thus, Erik Olin Wright argues that ‘[w]hat we need, then, are “real utopias”: utopian ideals that are grounded in the real potentials of humanity, utopian destinations that have accessible waypoints’ (Wright, 2005, p. 1). The Rational Transformation of institutions under imperfect conditions for social change is a worthy, if limited, goal. It is also one deeply imbued with Western notions of rationality and pragmatism and thus rules out more outlandish, impetuous and seemingly impossible alternatives.