During the nineties uncertainty was the common ground to many publications assessing the state of democracy or predicting future geopolitical scenarios. Huntington 's Clash of civilizations , Fukuyama 's End of History and Kaplan's Coming Anarchy represent few examples of this. Hertz's Takeover can be placed next to these works.
Another common baseline was the rise of term globalization as an object of study in the social sciences, becoming an institution almost compulsorily present in any social research. Moreover, globalization became also a fashionable issue in popular best selling journalistic works. Naomi Klein's No Logo became the most successful hit. Hertz's book can be defined in the same way as No Logo . Nevertheless, if we were to give a scientific label to The Silent Takeover , the globalist discourse would be the one in which Hertz sets her arguments. If we use Held's typology of scientific approaches to the phenomenon globalization, Hertz can be labeled as a pessimistic globalist (Held, 2000) because she considers the rolling back of the state as a negative development for the good functioning of society.
As I said before, the lack of a clear international world order and the rise of globalization determine Hert'z book. She analyzes the state politics in a globalized world and the result of her analysis is the next powerful message: the government's main priority has become creating a proper environment for transnational investment and protecting the world free trade system. According to Hertz this means that providing quality public goods and guarantying well being (among other basic functions of the state) have become a minor issue. The corporate world rises as the most influential player in society and pursues economic profit as its main goal. This means that ethical considerations, human rights and environmental problems are to be disregarded whenever profit is in danger. Seeing that governments fail in monitoring corporations, traditional forms of political expression, like voting, do not have much sense. Consumer activism and political protest appear to be much more effective monitor weapons until the government reconsiders its main priorities and reclaims citizens back.
The book wants to raise awareness among civil society about the silent takeover of corporations so that the civil society grows in members. In other words, Hertz wants to spread her message to a wider public expecting more activism and more protest. In this regard her audience is pretty extensive. It provides arguments and background to antiglobalist activists and it addresses consumers and passive citizens disenchanted with traditional politics telling them how to buy and when to protest.
Her argumentation is built upon the following three pillars: the rolling back of the state and the rise of the corporate world, the pervasive influence of corporations in society (caused by their priority for profit search) and the answer of civil society through consumer activism and protest. Hertz reports an extensive account of events, developments and historical facts in order to make her point clear.
