Hi, my name is Mark Sleboda, and I will be your English language commentator for this section of GRANews, a segment called 'Dissent'.
In this, the time we are living in, it is often difficult, even with the seemingly unending diversity and plentitude of the internet, to find reliable sources of information amid the sea of deceit and disinformation, that the Western Mainstream Media spills into our heads. A veritable 'Tyranny of Choice' indeed. But it is difficult to find perspectives and voices that stray from the narrative of Western governments and the Western MSM. This segment is about deconstructing and dissenting from that tyrannical narrative. I hope to provide an alternative analysis and perspective of International Relations, crises and events informed from a distinctly non-Western perspective. This is our revolutionary act of 'Dissent' from the Western narrative.
Does this mean that 'Dissent' claims to be an 'objective' source of truth that you can trust implicitly? Certainly not. Such a thing does not exist. All media and theory are biased by national, ideological, religious, and economic interests and paradigms. If I may paraphrase Robert Cox, all theory (and media) 'is for someone and for some purpose'. 'Dissent' will strive to examine and deconstruct Western discourse of international relations, crises, and events, and present an alternative non-Western point of view. As with any other source of news and analysis, it is left to you to consider the arguments I raise, verify and compare them with alternate sources and perspectives, and in the end make up your own mind. I simply aim to present an oft unheard and alternative perspective from that presented by the Western government, MSM, and analyst narrative, as if from 'the Other'. Today I will be painting a broad brush stroke of the themes that the segment 'Dissent' will be exploring in the future.

Toen ik aanvaardde een essay te wijden aan het werk en het denken van de schilder, dichter en kunsthistoricus Marc. Eemans, heb ik me afgevraagd of het in mijn geval geoorloofd was te spreken van een zekere continuïteit in zijn geestelijke ontwikkeling. Langzaam maar zeker kwamen elementen en argumenten aan het licht om mijn overtuiging te staven dat die vraag positief macht beantwoord worden. Aldus is deze geschiedenis van de intellectuele en creatieve levensweg van Marc. Eemans ontstaan. Daarbij werd de klemtoon vooral op zijn denken en op zijn poëtisch oeuvre gelegd, vermits het illustratiemateriaal dat deze uitgave verrijkt, als een soort picturaal complement van mijn stelling kan beschouwd worden. Overigens bleven om voor de hand liggende redenen, biografische en andere gegevens buiten beschouwing.

Hopelijk vergeeft de lezer het me dat ik met hem wegen ga verkennen, die men normaliter in essays van het onderhavige genre links laat liggen. Maar op de eerste plaats is het zo dat ik geen kunsthistoricus ben en het derhalve als een punt van elementaire intellectuele eerlijkheid beschouw me onbevoegd te verklaren om een verantwoord waardeoordeel over het schilderkunstig werk van Marc. Eemans uit te spreken. En voorts is er het oude adagium « de gustibus et coloribus non disputandum », dat in de loop der tijden zijn geldigheid heeft behouden. Waarom de lezer dan ook willen beïnvloeden met een onvermijdelijk subjectieve analyse van de boodschap die de schilderijen van Marc. Eemans brengen?

Does financial capitalism represent just a random variant of the common essence of the development of the capitalist system ? Or is it rather the definitive incarnation of its whole logic, its triumph ?

The answer to this question can not be found within the classics of economic theory, their horizon being limited to the industrial phase of development - the general trend and the full economic significance of which they (and above all the Marxists) did investigate completely and correctly. Post-industrial society is still in many ways an obscure reality.  
In its analysis there are no adfirmed classics, although many authors have cast a deep-searching look upon this phenomenon. The task of understanding "financism" is ours, whether we like it or not.

Even to move the first steps in the direction of a consistent overview of this theme, we have to consider the whole history of the economic paradigm, and individuate there the place of "financism"- not just from  the point of view of quantitative chronology, but from the point of view of the qualitative relevance of this phenomenon in the general development of economic models.

The second point. When we speak or write Russian, French, Serbian, Polish, German, Arab, Turkish, Iranian and so on we are linked to the regional perspective. Our native languages impose on us the concrete national borders, historical experiences and idiosyncrasies. So we count on understanding and presume that listeners know the contexts. So the social context dictates the form of expression and affects thus the various semantic levels. Using English we are free from all these, so we try to be understood by anyone including by those whose historical experience is different from ours. So we choose the words and terms carefully, explaining the details and doing so we rethink what we are to say.

There are no universal patterns of development. The plurality of landscapes on Earth produces a plurality of cultures, each one having its own cycles, internal criteria and logics. Geographical space has a huge (sometimes decisive) influence on peoples’ culture and national history. Every people, as long as it develops within some given geographical environment, elaborates its own national, ethical, juridical, linguistic, ritual, economic and political forms. The “place” where any people or state “development” happens predetermines to a great extent the path and sense of this “development” – up to the point when the two elements became one. It is impossible to separate history from spatial conditions, and the analysis of civilizations must proceed not only along the temporal axis (“before”, “after”, “development” or “non-development”, and so on) as also along the spatial axis (“east”, “west”, “steppe”, “mountains” and so on). 
No single state or region has the right to pretend to be the standard for all the rest. Every people has its own pattern of development, its own “times”, its own “rationality”, and deserves to be understood and evaluated according to its own internal criteria. 
The climate of Europe, the small extension of its spaces, the influence of its landscapes generated the peculiarity of the European civilization, where the influences of the wood (northern Europe) and of the coast (Mediterraneum) prevail. Different landscapes generated different kinds of civilizations: the boundless steppes generated the nomad empires (from the Scythians to the Turks), the loess lands the Chinese one, the mountain islands the Japanese one, the union of steppe and woods the Russian-Eurasian one. The mark of landscape lives in the whole history of each one of these civilizations, and cannot be either separated form them or suppressed. 

The largest landmass in the world, the Eurasian continent, connects East and West via communication, transportation, and trade routes. More importantly, Eurasia has long been considered the geopolitical heartland of the world, one necessary for any future world power. Due to its historical sense of identity, vast amounts of resources, capable population, and location in the heart of Eurasia, Mother Russia is the nation most likely to take its rightful seat at the head of a new Eurasian power structure destined to offset American influence in the world and help derail the New World Order by creating a multipolar world. The Eurasian idea will likely become the official post-Soviet national ideology of Russia and a banner under which the oppressed peoples of the world can fight.

The Eurasian idea is not a new one, even though it might currently be relevant more than ever before. Russia’s Eurasian movement traces its roots back to the 18th century in the historical conflict between pro-Western “reformers,” who wished to modernize Russia by adopting Western political solutions to solve Russian problems, and Slavophiles, who saw Russia as a unique nation set apart from both the West and East, which must find its own path. The question of whether Russia is part of Europe, Asia, or something unique has had a tremendous influence on the Russian national mindset. The Slavophiles did not look kindly on Western materialism and considered the Enlightenment a source of moral decay that was destroying traditional Russian values.

After the Gulf War, almost all mass media outlets in Russia, as well as in the West, injected into the common speak the formula "New World Order," coined by George Bush, and then used by other politicians including Gorbachev and Yeltsin. The New World Order, based on the establishment of a One World Government, as has been candidly admitted by odeologists of the Trilateral Commission and Bildenburg, is not simply a question of politico-economic domination of a certain "occult" ruling clique of international bankers. This "Order" bases itself on the victory on a global scale of a certain special ideology, and so the concept concerns not only instruments of power, but also "ideological revolution," a "coup d'etat" consciousness, "new thinking." Vagueness of formulations, constant secretiveness and cautiousness, deliberate mysteriousness of the mondialists do not allow, until the last moment, to clearly discern the contour of this new ideology, which they decided to impose on the peoples of the world. And only after Iraq, as if following somebody's orders, certain bans were take off and multiple publications appeared, which began to call things by their own names. So, let us try, on the basis of analysis conducted by a group of employees of the editorial board of "Elements," to, in the most general terms, define the basics of the ideology of the New World Order.