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A Journey Through Another Dismal Science

A Journey Through Another Dismal Science In memoriam Professor Silviu Neguț (February 1, 1945 - September 15, 2024)

I first met Professor Silviu Neguţ as a name on a book cover, probably the noblest of encounters between a (timeless) master and a (future) disciple.

 

In my wayward youth, I was enamoured of everything that resembled geography, a passion second only to football. I have matured since then into the fullness of my wisdom and subtlety of pursuits ;-), therefore I can no longer claim a passion for geography. I just… love it. (As for football, the passion remains, defying maturity, wisdom and subtlety :-D). Back in the day, I might have had a previous run-in with Prof. Neguţ mediated by radio waves in the ’80s. Yet I did learn about this much later. The radio set, for me, the child, was synonymous with alert senses and whatever keenness I could muster for around 90 minutes: with pen on paper, I was collecting, calculating and compiling match scores and league rankings listening to the Romanian Football minute by minute radio-show. I am not sure when Prof. Neguţ was on air with his own “radiophonic course”, but I remained to this day captiv(at)e(d) by the physical, political, human geographies of the football armada of Emerich Jenei’s 1986 Steaua Bucharest: Vejle, Budapest, Lahti/Helsinki, Brussels, Seville…

 

Early on, my mother had given me a geographical atlas, a concentrate of my kid world, to map my football dreams. The “geo-” seeds were sowed.

 

I met Prof. Neguţ in the flesh at the Bucharest University of Economic Studies, where I was exempted from the admission exam thanks to my national Olympics awards for… geosciences. Already, my somehow static high school geography (however, acting as a solid foundation for acquiring knowledge, for instance way beyond the “green rectangle” limitations) was being refreshed by the dynamics of geopolitical/geoeconomic/geostrategic thinking. As student in “international relations”, I was learning that resources are scarce (economically), regardless of whether some regions are full to bursting of them and others are bereft (geographically), laying the ground for peaceful trade, investment, migration, as well as for warlike bluffs, bullyings, bloodbaths. Geopolitics was like a blockbuster saga, SN-signed, only with Silviu Neguţ instead of Sergiu Nicolaescu (the “patriarch” of Romanian patriotic cinema propaganda), and the geopolitics course was the movie reel, mixing fluid borders and fixed beliefs, salted with canny argumentations and peppered with cool anecdotes.

 

In spite of real(geo)politik cynical sincerity, I soon started experiencing a dissatisfaction with the parade of unethical and inefficient power play.

 

The budding economist in me started understanding that free(d) markets may be the best of all forms of heinous globalization of which so many of us are afraid (while, serenely, enjoying it). Of all imperfect instruments imaginable, private property and consented contracts act as a coordinating institution of the constellation of exchanges in society (to the anti-capitalist exasperation of both communist egalitarians, hating class-divisions, and conservative elitists, hating change-disruptions). But beyond basically “domestic” ideological fracas, there are the “alien” plagues. Instead of persuading the other that apples are a fine exchange for his oranges, the (geo)political character explore and exploits the means to make his counterpart abdicate his rights because, in the logic of history, power (rough or refined) is the supreme argument (even if needing no argumentation) for it globally grants the survival of those endowed with it: be it a singleton, a society or the species. Power may be, surely, “domesticated”, softened, but it is best served hard. Welcome to… (geo)politics 101!

 

Economics is the “dismal science” of human action for it informs us of our societal limitations. Geopolitics is dismal for it skips any debate on that.

 

Speaking about one’s power (either bluntly aggressive or cunningly political), geopolitics acknowledges planetary malaises, preaching surgery even when speaking to each other suffices – it is the mindset of governments, language of forthright diplomats and excuse of warlords. Economics argues that in unhampered and lawful (national or international) markets, scarce resources get in the hand of those who value them best, so putting them to good use for the rest. Geopolitics replies saying that purchasing power is a too weak substitute for predatory power. Economics argues that in a free market, there is a place for everyone under the Sun (even if not the sunniest) as long as he/she is willing to find this place, working to his/her best abilities. Geopolitics asks for finding vital spaces even if in the middle of other ones’ sacred homelands. Economics hails the hidden faces of the market process – entrepreneurs, savers, workers, technicians, educators etc. –, acting united by the extended (cross-border too) division of labour. Geopolitics divides people into “heroes” and noise.

 

I owe Prof. Neguţ the understanding of the world as it is. Geopolitical, and therefore unsettled. I owe myself that I was not resigned to this thought.

 

Coda: This text was originally written in Romanian in 2010 and revised (in letter, not in spirit) in 2024, after the Professor passed away. Even if he did not shared my football obsession, even if I objected to epistemological, economical and ethical fissures in the geopolitical narrative, we (ab)used the academic and amical freedom of exchanging ideas with a smile on the lips and a sparkle in the eyes. In your face, dismal sciences!

 

 
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