02-24-2017 (Photo:imagined ) http://JohnBatchelorShow.com/contact http://JohnBatchelorShow.com/schedules http://johnbatchelorshow.com/blog Twitter: @BatchelorShow

First Draft of the New Anglosphere. Michael Vlahos @JHUWorldcrisis

"Kinship drives culture, and cultural rules shape society. National community in modern times is shaped by imagined kinship and the need for collective belonging and identity. Modern nations construct kinship through the belief that all citizens are related, and thus committed, to one another, and the state itself becomes the central meditative and celebratory agent for the affirmation of national kinship, especially in war. This core dynamic of modern society—the process of building imagined kinship—is projected outward through a nation's relations with other societies, whether they are peaceful or hostile. The nation most dependent on invented kinship as the basis of its politics is the United States, and this characteristic confers both advantages and limitations for the conduct of foreign policy.

The advantage of invented kinship is that Americans can theoretically pick and choose both whom in the world we call kin and the importance that their kinship has for our national identity. The limitation of invented kinship is that America's ties of kinship to other societies have a life of their own, waning or deepening over historical time.1 At present, the United States faces a global smorgasbord of kinship needs and clinging legacies, a feast of opportunities and obligations it can neither completely swallow nor walk away from.

Imagined kinship is the foundation of national community. It is the cultural process that permits people in a national society to believe collectively that they belong to each other—that they are part of the same kinship construct—even though most of them are likely to be strangers to each other. Imagined community also makes the state the trusted manager of this process, powerfully affirming our connection and commitment to each other in, for example, a time of war. Thus, the collective kinship construct is essential to the very idea of a modern nation-state...."

https://globalecco.org/vlahos-america

However, since the Anglosphere well serves the interests of both countries, the governments will likely find compromise on trade, security, and defense. Outside the European Union, and without an alternative in the Anglo-Saxon world, the United Kingdom would count little in the global arena. At the same time, the Anglosphere could alter the geopolitical balance in Trump’s favor, attracting countries such as India, Israel, South Africa, Singapore, Hong Kong, and other former British colonies. With China and Russia increasingly assertive in the global arena and with the European Union deeply embroiled in internal crises, maintaining close ties with a united and prosperous region such as the Anglosphere would be appealing both in economic and security terms. Besides the special relationship between the United Kingdom and the United States, within the whole Anglosphere there is momentum behind reinforcing bilateral relationships. In his recent trip to Washington, even Justin Trudeau, prime minister of Canada, whose political style is very different from Trump’s, declared, “No neighbors in the entire world are as fundamentally linked as we are.” Both Canberra and Wellington are working hard to forge a strong relationship with a post-Brexit London. And despite a less-than-amicable first call between Trump and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, the White House emphasized “the enduring strength and closeness of the U.S.-Australia relationship."

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/world/2017-02-21/future-english-speaking-peoples?cid=nlc-twofa-20170223&spmid=53490172&sprid=dGlwcGFpbmUyMDE1QGdtYWlsLmNvbQS2&spMailingID=53490172&spUserID=MjEwNDg3NjE1OTQyS0&spJobID=1103856293&spReportId=MTEwMzg1NjI5MwS2