Memetic Horizon

Currently there are negotiations between China and the E.U. over textile quotas, quotas designed to protect European textile producers from the low priced competition from the East.  Beyond the obvious meme of wearing clothing in general there is a meme of dressing well, per your social circle.  In Europe during its Medieval period Jewish taylors kept many aristocrats clothed.  A merchant family, the Medicines of Florence, became a noble family do to the power they were able to leverage from making the upper class clothes.  During the reign of Louis XVI silk was brought to France to be cultivated and is today the second largest exporter of silk goods.

Today many clothing designers via for the affection of their well-to-do clientele trying to appear as the greatest adherents of the nouveau reiche meme.  The consumerist meme has swept across the developed world and the sound of credit cards being swiped can be heard in background of the latest designer commercial.  Although these consumers are driven to buy because of style and not price, price does dictate how much they can purchase.  If the end user cost increases then the market becomes more vicious, but even more so if manufacturing costs increase profit margins squeeze. 

So here the memecomplexes of consumerism and protectionism faceoff.  Though consumerism itself isn't being challenged by financial pressure on designers, the culture may suffer.  If designers decide to cut back on advertising the  memetic integrity of the consumer culture weakens like the faith of a religious person missing weekly practices and reconfirmations.  Though protectionism appears to hurt more people then it helps it has the secret weapon of practicality.  Practicality, in this sense, is that which appears as the choice for long-term stability.  That which appears as a stable choice is determined by how vulnerable a people feel.  Thus it comes down to more simple memes of selfish, short-term thinking and selfish, long-term thinking. 

It is amusing that recently in the United States a treaty was agreed to where by the free trade agreement between Canada, the U.S. and Mexico now expands to most central American nations, at the same time concerns are voiced about Chinese companies purchasing foreign assets.