Privatization and foreign trade, the fabric of the Golden Straightjacket, cause a state's economy to expand and its politics to shrink. A state cannot thrive without plugging into this Electronic Herd and cannot survive unless it protects itself from the herd. The quality of the government matters more, not less, because it is the conduit into which the system is plugged. If a state amounts to a faulty plug, the country will neither thrive nor survive. The new challenge is to reduce the size and increase the quality of the state.
Countries are like computers.
Cold War geopolitics were characterized by the chessboard and the checkbook. The world was a chessboard in which the competing superpowers worried about every pawn of a little state. Soviet and American taxpayers pulled out their checkbooks as needed to secure the loyalty of each state. Under globalization, geopolitics continue, but little countries often do not matter anymore. The checkbook is no longer controlled by the superpowers.