Civilization and Beyond: Learning from History Part 9

Success in politics has been described as the art of selecting the possible and bringing it to fruition. Every community is more or less fragmented by deviations, contradictions, confrontations and conflicts.

These fragmentations begin in the personality and extend through the entire social structure--from the individual, through the family, such voluntary a.s.sociations as the sports club, the trade union, the merchants' a.s.sociation, the educational system, the political party, the munic.i.p.al or the national government.

Unrestrained and undirected social fragmentation leads to conflict, destruction, perhaps to chaos. Success in politics rests on an understanding of the chaos and its causes and an integration of conflicting forces behind specific programs and around charismatic personalities.

One aspect of the problem is especially disturbing and baffling to the uninitiated. Compared with the brief adulthood of an individual the life span of communities is immensely long. The individual is at his or her best for a few years or decades. Communities and their inst.i.tutions endure for hundreds and in some cases for thousands of years. Under the most favorable conditions an individual can hope to play a part in community affairs for a decade or two. Before he comes on the stage of public affairs and after he leaves it, social life stretches indefinitely.

Politics is one aspect of that more or less extensive social experience.

Its immediate objective is to bring order out of chaos and replace randomness by purpose and if possible by plan.

In the wake of the bourgeois revolution, which was directed particularly against monarchy and generally against absolutism, the most obvious and attractive social pattern was a republic, ruled by the citizens in a manner which in their opinion was best calculated to promote their safety and happiness.

Under a republican government public affairs would be openly and freely discussed by the citizens at a time or place of their choice by word of mouth, through a free press or in public gatherings. At stated intervals elections would be held at which all citizens of proper age would select representatives and a legislature or parliament where questions of public concern could be debated and appropriate measures adopted.

Implementation or execution of these measures would be placed in the hands of executive officers responsible to the parliament. As a safeguard against any miscarriage of the public will, the right of pet.i.tion was guaranteed. In some instances the right of referendum and recall was provided. To obviate any miscarriage of justice, provision was made for courts, responsible to the citizenry, as an independent arm of government competent to protect and a.s.sert popular rights.

Overall, citizens of the republic, through duly elected representatives, would draw up and proclaim a const.i.tution containing a general plan of the governmental machinery. When adopted by the legislature or parliament this const.i.tution became the law of the land. Governmental activities were carried out and laws were enacted in conformity with const.i.tutional provisions. In practice the citizens of the freest republic were face to face with one of the oldest political dilemmas confronting mankind: the question of leadership and followership.

In almost any social situation, from trivial to grave and critical, some one woman or man volunteers advice and often initiates action. If no one approves, the initiative falls flat. If there is a chorus of approval, the crowd follows the lead of its spokesman. If some approve while others disapprove or remain silent, a show of hands is in order. If there are real differences in the group, some taking one side, some another side with no chance of common action, the group may divide into several factions, some remaining in the a.s.semblage, others departing, with their spokesmen leading the way.

In such confrontations there are many determining factors, the experience and wisdom of the leadership; the urgency of the subject under discussion; the depth of the separation between opposing factions; the experience of the citizenry and their willingness to compromise on divisive issues; the willingness of the factionalists to abide by a majority decision.

Experienced leadership, which has enjoyed a period of public approval long enough to build up not only a group of devoted followers, but a group of place-men and office-holders who owe their positions to the leader, can a.s.semble a bureaucratic or political machine, adopt measures and take the steps necessary to keep its chosen leader in a life job, with the possibility of naming a successor.

Republics have adopted various measures to prevent the establishment of a self-perpetuating dynasty, by limiting public office-holding to a stated number of years; by providing that the office holder may not succeed himself. Political leaders may avoid such provisions by staying in the background, having their closest a.s.sociates elected to office, and when their term is ended, secure the selection of other a.s.sociates upon whose personal fidelity they can rely.

All such measures require that the leader keep the favor of a considerable number of his const.i.tuents. To avoid this often difficult or disagreeable task the leader and his close a.s.sociates may persuade their const.i.tuency to by-pa.s.s both const.i.tution and parliament, enlist the support of the military, seize power and establish an arbitrary dictatorship of admirals and generals or establish a committee of military leaders who will pick out civilian office holders willing to follow the political line laid down by the military leaders.

As republics gain in wealth, increase their power and broaden their geographical base by bringing outside peoples under their sway, their dependence upon military means of resolving public controversies becomes greater. This is particularly true where outsiders brought under the republic's authority have mature political inst.i.tutions including their own leaders and their own ways of dealing with public relations.

Given such a situation, the control by the republic over the policy-making apparatus of dependencies is likely to have been established by force of arms. In such a case it is only a matter of time and occasion when the dependency will demand the right of self-determination and be prepared to fight for independence of "foreign tyrants, oppressors and exploiters."

Minor inexpensive military operations for the suppression of colonial revolt which are quickly and successfully ended may add to the stature of empire-building leaders. But major operations, long continued, expensive and inconclusive, will undermine the prestige and weaken the position of the most firmly seated imperialist. The Boer War against the British and the wars waged by the Koreans and the Vietnamese against a series of occupiers and exploiters are excellent examples of the operation of this principle.

As empire building proceeds under its inescapable expansionist drive, a point will be reached at which the overhead costs of maintaining the empire will exceed the income. As that point is approached in one after another of the empires comprising the civilization, the central authority will be successfully challenged by the dependent, colonial periphery. Ordinarily, such challenges will coincide with the inter-imperial wars which have periodically disrupted every civilization known to history. When such a coincidence does occur, as it did in western civilization from 1914 to 1945, the bell is likely to toll loudly for the civilization in question.

Measures usually adopted to prevent such a catastrophe--martial law, military dictatorship, self-perpetuating monarchy, divine authority, are more than likely to heap fuel on the flames of rebellion and lead into a social revolution.

An unstructured social group operating under the compet.i.tive principle "Let him take who has the power" tends to develop into absolutism. At any stage in the history of a civilization this development can take place.

Civilization, therefore, comes into being with this built-in contradiction: the strong and predatory exploit the weak, but at a certain point protect the weak and nurture the defenseless. Exploitation by the rich and powerful is recognized and accepted as a prerogative enjoyed by the rich and powerful. At the same time limitations are placed on the character and intensity of the exploitation.

This dichotomy is perpetuated by agreements, laws and const.i.tutions which guarantee the property rights and social privileges by which the rich and powerful safeguard and increase their wealth and power. Under the same agreements, laws and const.i.tutions, the privileges and rights of the defenseless and weak, are specified.

Political inst.i.tutions in every civilization, including that of the West, have accepted and adopted a regulatory structure under which limits are imposed on profiteering. The domestic life of a civilization consists of an establishment within which exploitation can continue in a manner which the const.i.tution makers and legislators consider to be as efficient as possible and as fair as possible to all of the parties concerned.

As a civilization matures, wealth and power (the means of exploitation) are increased in volume and concentrated in fewer hands. The resulting absolutism with its immense structure of wealth production and its well-organized military arm, imposes conformity to its decrees, servility, peonage and even slavery on the working ma.s.ses. The ma.s.ses, in their turn, organize, agitate, demonstrate, strike, sabotage, and periodically take up, arms in defense of their lives and their livelihood.

We are describing certain political aspects of a process of social selection which has dominated one civilization after another. At the present moment it has reached a critical stage in the West. We apply the term "social selection" to the result of this process because there is a parallel between the natural selection of the biologists and the social selection which sociologists observe in the rapid and extensive changes presently taking place in the centers of western civilization.

Natural selection is a process in the course of which many compete and contend while only a few survive and mature.

Social selection is a similar knock-down and drag-out struggle in which peoples, nations, empires and civilizations take part. Many enter the contest but only a few live to write their story in the long and complex history of civilizations.

At the outset of such a contest, the European-Asian-African cradle of the coming western culture contained numerous political fragments--kingdoms, princ.i.p.alities, cities, city states, inert peasant ma.s.ses, migrating tribes--struggling locally and regionally for a place in the sun, or for additional territory and extended authority. These struggles reached the military level in local wars, regional wars, general wars. In the course of this survival struggle, the weakest and least effective contestants were defeated, dismembered and gobbled up by their stronger and more efficient opponents.

Local struggles--in the Near and Middle East, in North Africa, in eastern, central and western Europe--were trial heats in the course of which many contestants were eliminated, while the survivors continued the process of city, nation and empire building at higher and broader levels. It was only after five hundred years of such conflicts that the outlines of western civilization took definite political form:--a group of battle-hardened contestants, centered in Europe, heavily armed and equipped, intent on protecting and enlarging their home territory and extending their authority over dependencies and colonies in various parts of the planet.

This survival struggle continued for another three hundred years, down to the beginning of the present century, reaching its highest level of intensity between 1914 and 1945, with contestants from all of the continents taking an active part. In this present round the contestants are nations and empires, organized in ever-changing alliances. Some of the contestants are old, scarred and battle weary. Others are young and vigorous, recent entrants in the planet-wide contest for pelf, possessions and power.

During the later years of the struggle, after war's end in 1945, erstwhile dependencies and colonies of the disintegrating European empires declared their independence, joined the United Nations as sovereign states and played active parts in the battle for survival.

African development typifies the process during the later phases of western civilization. When voyaging and discovery became a leading activity of European nations around 1450 A.D. northern Africa was directly involved, but the bulk of the continent--Equatorial Africa--remained almost entirely untouched. After 1870 the pattern was dramatically altered as British, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German and Italian forces moved inland, staking out their claims.

Division of Africa among the great powers reached its culmination when this process was completed, about 1910, when the whole vast continent of Africa excepting Ethiopia, Egypt and South Africa had been parcelled out among the rival European empires. In terms of geography and population, Africa was still African. Politically it was pre-empted, occupied, dominated and exploited by European empire builders, who used the over, all trade name of western civilization.

Excessive costs of empire building, including the disastrous losses of military struggle from 1914 to 1945, impoverished and weakened the European overlords to such an extent that they could no longer maintain their footholds in Africa. At the same time African minorities in various parts of the continent launched independence movements under the slogan of self-determination, drove out the European occupiers, organized political states and declared that Africa must be governed by and for Africans.

Much of Africa, at the time, was organized along tribal lines, which cut across the boundaries drawn by the European imperialists between their colonial territories. The resulting chaos temporarily removed Africa from any meaningful role in the planet-wide contest for pelf and power.

Africans are politically sovereign. Economically and culturally they remain dependent on their former European masters.

Politically, western civilization is in a state of flux. Its European homeland is basically divided by potent fears, ambitions, feuds and conflicts, and separated geographically from North America and Asia.

Despite several attempts to unify the continent politically, Europe was disrupted, fragmented and weakened by two general wars in a single generation. The European empires were politically and economically upset by widespread colonial revolt in Asia and Africa. Spectacular achievements of socialism-communism, particularly in East Europe and Asia, added to the previous fragmentation a new line of division between capitalist West Europe and socialist East Europe. This process of fragmentation is giving separatist forces ascendancy over the forces of integration and unification.

In Roman and Egyptian civilizations, the period of survival conflict led to the centralization of wealth and authority. After five centuries of suicidal compet.i.tive struggle, the European homeland of western civilization is criss-crossed by sharp lines of division. Furthermore, the shift of production and military power from Europe to North America and Asia reduces the probability of speedy European integration.

In the more important centers of western civilization the chief item of public expenditure is preparation for a war of air, water and land machines that may extend technologically into a nuclear war. While we have no precedent that would enable us to gauge the consequences of an extensive nuclear war it seems reasonable to a.s.sume that it would further fragment an already fragmented European continent.

The heavy burdens of militarism which western civilization is presently carrying, have unbalanced budgets, which lead to inflation and to onerous burdens of debt and taxes. It seems unlikely that a group of warfare states like the top western European powers can escape the economic contraction which presently threatens them and regain solvency and stability through fiscal reforms or readjustments in tariffs and trade.

Our a.n.a.lysis of the politics of civilization may be summarized in four general statements:

1. Each civilization has consisted of a cl.u.s.ter of empires, nations and peoples which at some previous period have enjoyed independence and sovereignty.

2. Relations between these erstwhile sovereign units have been determined by a shifting mixture of diplomacy and armed force, with war playing a determining role in the process.

3. In the course of survival struggle, political leadership within the civilization has shifted back and forth as one group has succeeded in establishing and maintaining its authority over the entire civilization.

4. A general axiom of the politics of civilization might read:

At the conclusion of each war among civilized peoples the victors are ent.i.tled to make the following declaration: We operate under the Law of the Jungle: "Let him take who has the power and let him keep who can." We have the power. We have grabbed the real and personal property of our neighbors and we propose to keep it. Our friends are welcome to attend our Feast of Victory. Let our enemies beware.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE ECONOMICS OF CIVILIZATION

Politics involves the exercise of authority--the policy making, planning, control, direction and administration of a community. Economic forces provide the wealth, income and livelihood--the wherewithal upon which a community depends for its physical existence, its survival, its geographical extension, the continuance of its life cycle.