Korea and creative stagnation in foreign policy

The Korean Peninsula is a late capitalist pastiche of failed policies

South Korea’s response to North Korea’s balloons of trash is representative of the creative stagnation in foreign policy thinking.

After months of trash balloons, the government’s response on 24 September was:

“If North Korea's continued trash balloons are judged to pose a serious threat to the safety of our citizens or to have crossed the line, the military will take stern military action.”

Yes. Stern military action. A threat of military force. If you feel like you’re on a merry-go-round, you’d be right. South Korea’s response to the balloons of trash is a late capitalist pastiche of failed policy. How did we get here? How do we explain this situation?

One answer may be capitalist realism. In the landscape of contemporary foreign policy, the echoes of capitalist realism reverberate with a disquieting monotony.

Mark Fisher's concept of "capitalist realism" posits that we are increasingly conditioned to believe there is no viable alternative to the current capitalist order. We are ensnared…