Re: general income, was RE: AUT: RE: fwd Ricercatori Precari

[Lowe Laclau <lowe.laclau@xxxxxxxxx>]

Nate,

Hey. Sorry for the delay in response. Was away on business for a
while. I'm not exactly sure what Hemon wants to state by that first
statement or if your paraphrasing is sufficient. I don't know him so I
can't really make inferences either. Clearly the problem of
"displacement" brought immediate concerns to the west. And yes, I
would think that any massive exodus of refugees is always cause for
intervention, whether that be peaceful or hostile. But the Balkans
situation is tricky because the West certainly aggrevated that exodus
with its "urbicide" bombing. I don't think to refugee situation would
at all be a sufficient condition for NATO intervention. I this they
were as well largely thinking about "the Wests" geostrategic concerns.

Actually now that I'm thinking about it one should perhaps distinguish
two separate problems in answering your question: the first (that
should be the most obvious but which I think most people still ignore)
is, "What really happened?", because from most of the accounts that
I've read of the war, the media distortion of the event in the Balkans
was HIGHLY distorted (I'm thinking of Virilio's Logistics of
Perception... a short little book on the topic). As they had been in
the 1st gulf war; the second is then the question of sufficient
conditions for NATO's intervention, which I think could only be
sufficiently answered by knowing question one. But to answer your last
question, I would say certainly. You can disrupt a LOT of things with
massive influxes of refugees. Thats why most wars waged by developed
nations today place a high concern of closing off borders, directing
flows of the displaced etc.

Not sure if thats sufficient... and I never got around to reading
those papers that I have saved someplace on my computer... but maybe
if I do find time for them and there was something else significant to
add, I'll tell you.

ciao

Lowe


> I have another question, unrelated. I've been reading an interview
> with an author I like, Aleksander Hemon, and he claims that the reason
> for military intervention in the Balkans was due to the number of
> refugees heading into EU countries. He makes the claim that 'the West'
> will fight against any war/conflict that creates an influx of
> refugees. I don't know much at all about international policy or
> conflicts. Does this seem true? Do the politicians and such take
> refugee crises into account in war-making decisions?
>
> cheers,
> Nate


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