continue for a certain length of time
to develop positively. The reasons for this are the newly opened markets of
Eastern Europe, Russia and South East Asia in particular. Countries which
had until now been culturally and politically isolated are now attractive to
foreign investors. Care will have to be taken that this growth does not give
rise to further "economic turbulence". For reasons of cheap labour in the
East many manufacturers in Western Europe and America are turning towards
Asia. In 1995 this caused much unrest amongst the German trade unions and
was one of the main factors for concern voiced at the congress of German
Social Democrats in Manheim in autumn of the same year.
There is no doubt that with the democratic development of China and the
smaller dragons within South Eastern Asia and with the opening of the
Eastern European and Russian markets world economic structures will undergo
significant changes. I am almost convinced that many governmental and
private structures will not be able to resist the temptation and will answer
the primitive instincts of competition and profit. This will have two
consequences with serious repercussions in the near future. The first is
that the world economic structures which have existed up to now will have to
undergo significant changes. Secondly, there will be an increased danger of
uncontrollable economic shocks.
Jacques Atalie in his marvellous book "The Millennium" recalls that the
Dutch cities which contributed so much to modern civilisation in the 15th
and 16th centuries declined because of the temptation to spend more than
they earned and to accumulate more debts than they could bear. Is this not,
however, the illness of all modern governments, from the USA to Europe,
Russia and Japan and the horrific debt problems of Brasil, Argentina and
Mexico? Is this not a warning of the potential collapse of the entire
financial system or at least of its entire lack of correspondence to modern
day needs?
Of course, these debts and the mountains of bad debts are not
distributed evenly between all states. The USA and France face huge
problems, Germany and Japan much less and least of all, and practically
non-existent - such countries as China, Indonesia and Southern Korea whose
economies are at the beginning of an undoubted period of ascendency. This
divergence in the positions of countries and nations in the context of
global economic transformations will alter their place and their role in the
world economy. The whole of the 21st century will be a time of economic
levelling if, of course, the world turns its back on the old order and
successfully enters the new civilisation. This process of levelling-out will
at the same time be in conflict with cultural and industrial traditions,
differences in social welfare, macro-economic criteria and standards etc..
The fundamental elements of the plan put forward by the French Prime
Minister, Alain Jupe, in the autumn of 1995 were targetted at France joining
the European Monetary Union and reaching a position level with the other
European states. We can all remember the huge reaction and the large-scale
protests in responce to the threat of losing social benefits and privileges.
Such shocks will be caused with every integration and this is one of the
most fundamental elements of global economic reform. Large scale structural
reforms will take place with the implementation of the common European
currency. The difficulties related to the integration into the EU of Eastern
European countries will be even more difficult. The integration of Russia
will be slow and painful and even more so in the case of the poorly
developed Asian and African states.
However, there is no reasonable alternative. The processes of
integration will continue to developed and will lead eventually to a
large-scale global renewal. For this reason, in my opinion, the change in
the economic roles of the various countries and nations, the globalisation
of financial and commodities markets, the opening of millions of niche
markets in Eastern Europe and Asia, the inadequacy of the world financial
system, the mountain of debts and the re-solution of economic imbalance must
be considered as the collapse of the old and the beginning of the new
economic order. It has taken many nations five hundred years to establish
their national economies. Today they are becoming integrated and this in its
wake will bring about the enormous integration of labour, knowledge and
abilities.
4. THE NEW MASTERS OF THE WORLD
The globalisation of the world has lead to the appearance of new groups
of leaders whose influence and power is many times greater than that of the
majority of politicians. They are not always well-known but they control a
huge portion of the world economy and finances, the global media and
communications and their power is not subject to any serious regulation.
E
very day billions of television viewers watch the leading world news
stories. Almost every day somewhere in the world there are elections or
other important political events. The politicians are presented or present
themselves as the most important decision makers. This was the case in the
20th century. With the demise of many monarchies politicians have become the
heroes and the undisputed leaders of the world. Is this still really the
case today?
Yes, but only superficially. Since with the consolidation of the global
world, the opening-up of societies and the embracing of the international
market there are new territories for world domination. Someone had to come
in to take control of international, economic, cultural and media business.
Someone who would not be limited by national boundaries and who had to have
enough money. These were the global businessmen.
At the beginning of the century, the trans-national businessmen were
mainly colonisers. Today they are legally in control of 80% of world trade,
about the same amount of technology and about 1/3 of world manufacturing.
The number and the influence of the transnational corporations is constantly
on the increase. Their leaders account for the major part of the new
economic elite of the world whose power is now unequalled. Who can predict
in what part of the world it is most profitable to manufacture a certain
type of item? Who can invest enormous sums into science and technology in
the aims of breaking into a market? Who can transfer billions of dollars
from one end of the world to the other in a matter of hours? Only they can -
the newly emerging leaders of the modern world.
Almost no-one stands above the international business leaders. They
control international technological and information exchange. They own the
majority of the satellites used for relaying television programmes. They
also own the global information and television networks. What is more
important, the leaders of the trans-national corporations are constantly
expanding their power. Now they want free, open markets, the removal of all
state limitations and the implementation of neo-liberal policies. On the
other hand the world economic leaders want more dialogue with each other.
How can they devide their spheres of influence? Where will they direct their
investment resources? Where and what markets and what to aim for? The common
objective uniting these new leaders is the removal of all state barriers to
their eventual domination of the world. If they persist at their present
rate to expand the international and industrial corporations within 20-30
years they will have succeeded in dominating practically the entire area of
international trade, and they will have achieved a monopoly of world
communications and distribution of technology.
Ted Turner and CNN, Rupert Murdoch and his media empire and even the
smaller press magnates such as M.Ringer in Switzerland today have much
greater influence over people than the presidents of the majority of
countries in the world. While in the context of individual national states
it is possible to speak of anti-monopoly legislation, in international
business "everything is permitted". If things continue to develop as they
have been doing up to now, within 15-20 years we will be faced with
extremely complex problems.
The media are little concerned with the new leaders of the world. Only
a handful of the great financial players find their way into the television
studios: owners of banks and financial companies who control the movements
of tens or hundreds of billions of dollars. Quietly but unerringly they are
creating a power, more powerful than any government and which creates its
own rules of its own game. The leaders of the world financial capital can
influence exchange rates and pour in funds from all corners of the earth.
Very often they are so influential in world economics that they can compel
national governments, including the great powers, to play along with them
and take the relevant decisions.
This is so incongruous! These new integrational economic structures
appear completely to lack any form of political regulation or at the best
have only some sort of political facade. This is one of the reasons why
global relations have been so undeviatingly infiltrated by the mafia with
enormous sums of money from drugs, prostitution, currency speculation and so
on. This is also why the citizens of the world are becoming more and more
dependent on the transnational economic elite, rather than the politicians
they have elected.
If rules are not brought into this international game, if the world
does not establish institutions for their regulation and control, if
policies towards the poorly developed nations are not changed, then very
soon the world financial elite will begin to rule world development alone.
This is the greatest contradiction used by the hidden leaders - while
economic and cultural life is becoming more and more internationalised and
globalised, governments are remaining nationally limited. People see them as
weak and helpless in the face of events. I am far from the thought that the
leaders of the world corporations are bad people or that they ought to be
proclaimed enemies and proponents of imperialism. The world cannot develop
without them but if things remain as they are, the positive role of the
transnational companies as the driving force in the world might be
undermined.
When I speak of chaos and disorder and the unsatisfactory regulation of
the world, I mean categorically the inadequacy of the international economic
infrastructure and the lack of of sufficient international political and
legal regulatory bodies. Such a situation hides many dangers for humanity:
unregulated financial operations, unregulated monopolisation, international
mafia, the danger of periodical crises. What is more important: the greater
the share of transnational companies in world production the more countries
will open up to one another, the longer there is an absence of global rules
to the game, the greater will be the danger of an increase in serious
crises.
5 THE MARCH OF THE POOR
During the blazing summer of the 1985 in Hungary, a tanker lorry was
stopped on a motorway. The tanker was filled with the corpses of Asians
travelling secretly to Western Europe. They had died of suffocation and heat
exhaustion in their flight from poverty to salvation. Every year millions of
citizens from the poorly developed countries set their sights on the rich
countries of the West, using all possible legal and illegal means. Their
march continues...
T
he politicians and their supporters in the most developed nations of
the world can recline in complete, blissful peace. They have complete
information on the condition of the poor, but they have neither experienced
their problems, not demonstrate any particular desire to help them. It is
difficult, very difficult, when you live in Zurich, Cannes, Barcelona or
Salzburg to believe that at the moment when you are giving a piece of meat
to your dog, somewhere in the world tens of thousands of children are
suffering from hunger and illnesses connected with hunger.
One of my friends, a member of the French parliament, told me recently,
"There has always been inequality between nations and humanity is used to
it." I do not agree. Despite the eternal inequalities between the developed
and underdeveloped, during the past 20 or 30 years something has taken place
which has radically changed and will continually the position of the
under-developed nations.
Thanks to world media and, in particular, to television for the first
time they have become aware of how really poor they are. 20 or 30 or even 50
years ago the citizens of India, Bangladesh, Congo or Ruanda were really
unaware of the huge difference in the living standards between their
countries and the most developed nations of the world. If they did know,
this was not common knowledge. The situation was more or less similar in
Eastern Europe and Russia where poverty and the reaction of the poor led to
the acceptance of social utopias and their elevation into official state
religions.
Globalisation brings peoples closer but also gives rise to new concerns
about inequalities. Via the medium of television and other means of
communication, people around the whole world have become aware of the
enormous differences in ways of life and the enormous injustices existing in
the world. This is a new phenomenon and if it persist then it will give rise
to a wave of reactions from the poorer nations. New means of communications
unite us, make us look at the world as a global village, but this openness
runs the risk of creating new conflicts arising from imbalance.
The largest and most compact populations of poor people (according to
the criteria of the UN on poverty) exist in Southern Asia - about 550
million people. 130-140 million poor people live in Eastern Asia and no
fewer than 220-230 million in the Middle East and North Africa. About 260
million live in sub-Saharan Africa and about 100 million in Latin America.
In addition, there are about 200 million poor people in the industrialised
countries.
The gap between the rich and the poor is dismaying. The twenty richest
nations in the world produce a GNP per head of population of between 16,600
(Australia) and 33,500 (Switzerland) USD. The twenty poorest nations,
according to the same criteria, vary between 72 USD (Mozambique) and 261
(Ruanda)[26]. This enormous difference cannot be resolved using
conventional methods.
Nevertheless, if we are to take the market and international
corporation as the only means of salvation, this would mean that the
technological, financial and social gap between the poor and the rich
countries would become even wider. This has been seen in the last 30-40
years. Even now the gap between the poor and the rich countries and people
is self-perpetuating. This is one of the most convincing signs of the crisis
of modern world structures.
Humanity undoubtedly is to blame for such a state in Mozambique,
Tanzania, Bangladesh, Laos, Vietnam, Ethiopia and other less developed
countries. They were all until recently former colonies of the most
developed nations and many of their priceless historical and cultural
artifacts can be seen in museums and private collections in Paris, London,
New York and Geneva. They have all experienced bitter armed struggles and
periods of instability. Measures taken by the UN and other world
organisations to assist the poor have been mainly cosmetic. If these trends
persist and if liberal market illusions are not substituted with something
else, then the hidden dangers may become apparent for all to see. In the
most general terms I refer to this danger as the march of the poor.
One of the most significant manifestations of this condition is the
migration of the poor to the larger towns. Tens of millions of people in
Asia, Africa and South America have left their places of birth to migrate to
the cities, transforming what until were recently small towns into
megapolises consisting of shanty towns and primitive suburbs with
multi-million populations. Despite the efforts of the national governments
this process continues. It has transformed Mexico city, Rio de Janeiro,
Calcutta, Bombay and tens of other cities into places with an enormous,
unmanageable poor population. The poor come to the large cities in search of
food, work and a chance for their children. Perhaps, the most important
reason for this is the desire to reap the benefits of the familiar values of
civilisation. The images on the television screen and mass advertising
campaigns are the most powerful of all magnets, compelling the poor to flee
from their traditional way of life. In all corners of the world where
poverty is a typical phenomenon, this process is continuing. This is
particularly the case in those places where there is no private land
ownership or where land ownership does not bring satisfaction of sufficient
economic results.
The second logical consequence of the march of the poor is emigration
to the most developed countries of the world. In recent decades the 25 most
developed nations have been the object of mass immigration for foreigners.
They enter their "Eldorado" with the help of relatives, false documents,
locked in goods containers and lorries. The liberal dream of the open
society will result in the increase of the flow of the poor looking for work
and peace of mind in the rich countries. In this way the liberalism of
openness will backfire.
Given the present world economic order the richest countries will have
to create stronger barriers to emigration and to build new Iron, Stone and
Wooden curtains between their countries and the rest of the world. I do not
want to be a prophet of doom but such divisions would drag humanity into a
dangerous dimension for human development. Forecasts show that the situation
in the European community will become particulary complex. At the moment in
Germany there are about 4.4 million immigrants, in France - 2.4, in Great
Britain - 1.2 and in Holland about 0.6. In the EU in total there are over 10
million immigrants. According to some calculations if the flow of immigrants
is not limited within the next 5-7 years this number could double. This
march of the poor could have explosive consequences in the developed
countries and at the same time result in a "brain drain" from the poorer,
limiting their chances of improving the standard of living. There is also
the danger of the rich western countries reacting by closing their borders
and isolating themselves. According to the agreement reached in Schengen
which limited the possibilities of many nations to travel within Western
Europe there has been a stream of reactions and disappointment which is
difficult to describe. Many Eastern Europeans are convinced that they have
been deceived by the West and that the Berlin Wall has been reconstructed by
western politicians. The pressure for free access to the rich West will
continue and no administrative barriers appear to be able to stop it.
When speaking of the march of the poor, I also have in mind their
growing tendency towards self-protection and resistance. I am quite sure
that if they do not receive the opportunity to make changes the poor of the
world will unite in search of a new universal ideology. The same reasons
which led to the October revolution in Russia and transformed communism into
the greatest utopia of the 20th century might also create new or re-create
old social views.
Poverty has always given birth and will continue to give birth to
utopian views and dreams of a rapid leap into wealth. The great leap
promised by Mao Tse Tung, the promises made by Khrushchev about the
communist paradise and even Hitler's Third Reich were part of the illusory
belief in the supernatural force of power, human will and violence. The 20th
century was a time of competing utopias. In the new era it will be much more
difficult to achieve similar unity simply because of the influence of the
mass media and economic dependence. However, these means of indirect control
might themselves be powerless. It is unlikely that the poor will look back
to communism. It is more likely that they will look for salvation in
nationalism and in particular in religious fundamentalism and new
totalitarian doctrines. The great danger for the world in the post-cold-war
period may come from the combination of economic problems and the struggle
for cultural survival. If the present world economic order is preserved, in
the next 10-15 years we shall undergo a series of strong economic and social
shocks which will come from the poorer regions. They may take the form of
local wars, the political influence of fundamentalist unions, protest
movements of immigrants in the industrial countries etc.. The other side of
the coin is a possible xenophobic reaction.
Xenophobia in the richest nations and fundamentalism in the poorer are
the two extremes, two major products of the emerging crisis. They are the
catalysts for other conflicts between cultures and religions and between the
ethnic groups in search of a unifying force. Many researchers believe
xenophobia a transitional stage. I, however, believe that it will
periodically re-occur in direct connection with the level of cultural
conflicts within the open world.
Those who are aware of their poverty will aspire to overcome their
problems and to identify their own fate with common ideas, common religions
or new idols and leaders. Today the situation is still transitional. The
poor are desperate rather than unified in a common awareness, but this will
change. The reaction of the poor contributed to the success of the Islamic
fundamentalists in Algeria, the high level of support for the fundamentalist
party in Turkey at the local elections in 1994 and the parliamentary
elections in 1996 and to the consolidation of the regime of the Ayatollahs
in Iran. The march of the poor is a fact and a product simultaneously of
globalisation and the world order which is still inadequate to meet its
demands.
If we accept liberal ideas as sufficient in modern times, this will
lead to a new division of the world, to the appearance of new leaders as
well as Utopias offering protection to the poor of the world. The way in
which we can avoid such a potential outcome lies in world integration, in
the establishment of a new world political and economic order and an
entirely new kind of global society. This is the task which faces us, which
faces the new generation of politicians above all in the industrialised
countries.
Such a task cannot be resolved at summit meetings, like the one in
Copenhagen in March 1995. It is not general discussion or promises of new
charity but profound structural reforms in the world economy which will help
to resolve the problems. This includes specific programmes for the
stimulation of investments in the least developed nations, an increase in
the role of the UN and the restructuring of the activities of the IMF and
the World Bank etc..
Fundamentalism and terrorism, the danger of reestablishing opposition
between political blocs, the appearance of new utopias are all dangers which
express the crisis of the transition to a new world. No-one will be spared:
not the Europeans bathed in the luxury of social welfare, nor the dynamic
USA, nor the over-ambitious Japanese. Realisation of poverty is one of the
most important phenomena which the opening of the world and new
communications has caused. It may lead to more and more violent reactions,
alienation and a hatred for the rich countries and their elites. Did anyone
believe that we would become witness to such senseless acts of terrorism as
the bomb attack in Oklahama city or the Tokyo Metro in 1995. The bomb
attacks in Paris and Lyons carried out by unknown extremists caused grave
concern throughout Europe. These will hardly be the last. This is how it was
in past civilisations when different cultures and different levels of wealth
clashed. The other possibility is a rapid and coordinated change in the
world economic order. The most developed nations and their governments will
have to make a choice between global concern and responsibility or growing
instability for all.
6. A NUMBER OF PESSIMISTIC SCENARIOS
Periods of transition in human development resemble a tunnel with a
number of exits. You can take the most direct route to thelight or enter a
side tunnel with a dead-end and fluster around in the dark, turn around and
return to where you started from.
T
his book is not meant to be either optimistic or pessimistic. It does
not make categorical forecasts but outlines the possibilities. For the world
in which we are living, this approach is particularly important. Our world
is in a state of transition between two epochs and is instable.The question
is which direction will modern humanity take? Summing up the conclusions to
this chapter, I believe that the dangers which I have mentioned can be
grouped into three pessimistic scenarios.
I refer to the first of them as the scenario of "long-term
indeterminacy", or perhaps the scenario of "continuing chaos". This would be
an extended 20 or 30 year period (perhaps even longer) of geo-political
instability and attempts to expand the positions of the great political
powers. France and Germany would want to establish for themselves a leading
role in Europe, independent of the USA and Russia. The Euro-Atlantic
partnership, the keystone of world politics in the last 50 years might be
threatened. Russia, threatened with the possibilities of becoming isolated
as a result of the expansion of NATO might look to the East to form
alliances. Very soon China might begin to have global ambitions and Japan
will turn its economic power into political ambitions. Given this scenario
the transitional companies will be compelled to play a greater "national
patriotic" role rather than the role of a globalising force.
Perhaps, you do not believe that this is possible. Take a look at
Bosnia, crippled children, dead and wounded civilians and raped women. Why
did the USA support the Muslims, Germany the Croats and Russia the Serbs?
Why at the end of the 20th century can we not put a stop to a senseless
letting of blood. Was it differences between three ethnic groups in this
long-suffering country which lead to the differences between the great
powers or was it the other way around?
There will be a constant series of conflicts on the periphery of the
entire post-Soviet system, in the border regions between Islam and
Christianity and in the regions of great poverty. Let us hope that they will
not be as bloody. The greatest danger in this scenario is the wave of
national, regional, cultural and religious egoism which it contains. The
"period of long-term indeterminacy" will not end before the advent of the
21st century.
This period might also be called a time of "chaotic policentralism".
Where there will not be a single super power. There will be no clear
international political or financial order. We will be witness to a slow,
contradictory and conflicting accumulation of aspirations, roles and egoisms
and of the grudging recognition of the rights of others. In the 1970's and
1980's a number of American politicians declared almost half of the planet a
zone of vital American interests. Today this is being done by a number of
Russian, Greek, Turkish, French and even Japanese politicians. The problem
is that in the majority of cases these zones coincide or overlap. The
Balkans is a typical example of an area which Europeans, Americans and
Russians consider an important region for their interests.
Chaotic policentralism is a state in which there are many centres of
power, but the poles of power change as a result of conflict. This disorder
existed at the beginning of the Second Civilisation albeit in different
historical conditions. Unfortunately, global thinking is at such a low level
that the danger of conflict cannot be avoided. This scenario will be
dominated by local conflicts. International crime will flourish and there
will be an increase in the wealth of a small group of international rulers.
My second pessimistic scenario could be called "Back to the bi-polar
world". In actual fact we are still partially in it. Psychologically a large
number of politicians, senior figures in the armies and security forces,
retired officers and a number of others still live in the bi-polar world.
Older people whose whole lives have been connected with the struggle against
the class enemy (communism or American imperialism) dream of a return to the
period of strong-arm politics. There are those in the East who consider
Gorbachev a traitor or an agent of the CIA and dream of the restoration of
the Warsaw Pact and the super power status of Russia. In the West there are
others who advocate the idea of a single world super power in the USA and
the transformation of NATO into a dominant world military force and the
casting out of Russia and China into the back-yard of international
relations.
It would be very easy for these people and their ideas to become
dominant in world politics: for example, the conflict in Bosnia and the
bombing of Serbian targets in September 1995; or the results of the
parliamentary elections in Russia in the same year and the presidential
elections in 1996. Despite perestroika and other great changes and despite
changes of attitude towards Russia, the trust which exists between
politicians in the East and West is still extremely fragile.
It is quite possible that the "bi-polar" model of the world could be
restored as a consequence of the conflicts for the fate of Eastern Europe.
On the one hand, Russia wants to preserve its influence in this region, not
to be isolated from Europe and to have guarantees for its future. On the
other hand, in the West there is an increase in the influence of those who
desire the expansion of NATO to the borders of Russia. The Eastern European
countries themselves, with the only possible exception of the socialist
government in Bulgaria, want to enter NATO and to guarantee its security and
existence within Europe. In this event, every incautious step, each hasty
move without considering the global consequences could turn the clock back
centuries and extend the life of the Third Civilisation artificially.
It is a complete illusion to consider Russia a weak country, engrossed
in its own problems. An influential American state department official told
me in 1994 that "now Russia is weak, this is best time to teach it where it
belongs". I replied that such an idea was imprudent and belonged to the
vocabulary of cold-war talk. Russia possesses a huge military might and huge
resources. And such a suggestion would be sufficient for confrontation to
reassert itself. Whether it is caused by nationalist forces within Russia or
naive politicians in Western Europe, isolation of Russia, in my opinion,
does not have any long-term prospects and hides great dangers.
The question of "whither Eastern Europe?": whether it should enter the
structures of NATO or not, hides a potential danger for the restoration of
the bi-polar world. However, this will not resolve the matter of the
proportionality of world forces. I believe that if Russia is alienated from
the European processes and in particular from mainstream world politics, it
will seek its revenge in Eastern Europe, the Balkans in particular, and in
Asia. The new Eastern bloc may include Russia, its former Asian republics
and China which very soon will be in a position to increase its world
political role.
The fact that a new bi-polar world will be based on a new combination
of states will not alter its inadequacies. Such a scenario would only slow
down the processes of world integration, exacerbate the universal crisis of
the Third Civilisation and cause unhappiness for hundreds of millions of
people. It would also result in a new spiral of armaments, new ecological
dramas and new even greater poverty for Africans and Asians.
The third pessimistic scenario is the "revolution scenario". This is
the least likely of the three, but should not be ignored. It is a revolution
of the poor, socially deprived nations and states, who have gained access to
powerful strategic weapons and nuclear weapons.
Another variation on this scenario is that put forward by the American
researcher Samuel Huntington, that the 21st century will be a century of
wars between civilisations. I shall later reject his theory since I believe
that he is mistaken about the common future of mankind. However, as a
scenario for the transition from one civilisation to another, as a temporary
or local delay to the processes of global reform over a period of about 20
or 30 years, this is entirely possible.
In each of these three "pessimistic" scenarios I can see the
possibility of an increase in terrorism and individual or group uprisings of
isolated and deprived peoples. The danger is that these uprisings might find
support and unifying influences within Islam, fundamentalist regimes or new
utopian doctrines. There is also the real possibility that these three
scenarios might appear in combination. None of them can contribute anything
positive to mankind. One should not forget that it was the idiotic ambitions
of dictators and global messiahs in the 20th century which killed hundreds
of millions of lives. There is a way of avoiding these pessimistic solutions
but it cannot be achieved by conventional means. The traditional solutions
with which we are familiar from recent decades will not help.
The big question is whether we are going back to the Third civilisation
of forward to a new civilisation? Back to the restoration of old
contradictions or forwards to their resolution and the formation of new
global structures. It will in no way be easy to change the stereotypes of
thought and to break the mould of the bi-polar world, protective nationalism
and all the theories and doctrines which supported and continue to support
the waning Third human civilisation. If the new communication systems and
world corporations are the bridge to new forms of imperialism, this will
undoubtedly create a new wave of protective nationalism and regional egoism
based on ethnic or economic factors. This will consequently lead to the
danger of new conflicts and struggles typical of the 20th century - the
century of violent, uncomprehended and savage globalisation, the century of
imperialism and world wars.
Section two
The Fourth Civilisation
Chapter Four
THEORY IN THE TIME OF CRISIS
1. FOREWARNING OF THE END OF TWO THEORETICAL CONCEPTS
Every change of epoch is a change of views of the world. The Third
civilisation not only gave birth to but was also served by theories which
are rapidly becoming a thing of the past. Today it is clear to all of us
that the changes which are taking place in the world can not be explained by
traditional doctrines. The crisis is evident...
T
he 19th and 20th centuries were a time of intellectual supremacy of
certain theoretical concepts and their numerous variations and
metamorphoses. One of them conquered the minds of the activists of the
French revolution, became enshrined in the American constitution and filled
the hearts of several generations of world intellectuals. The 19th century
was the century of liberalism. Its ideas still form the dream of the free
and the wealthy. The second was the theoretical system of Marxism which
appeared as the defender of the deprived and the poor and was a chance of
hope for those who had no property or education.
Or course, the 19th and the 20th centuries did not belong solely to
these two doctrines. The 19th century in varying countries and at varying
times was dominated by restorationism, enlightened absolutism, conservatism
or just reactionary monarchism. On the border between the two centuries a
period of belligerent nationalism and imperialism broke out. The period
between the two world wars saw the strong development of radical ideologies
- communism and fascism and a whole range of statist and semi-statist
doctrines. After the Second World War ideas of the social state (L.Erchard)
and the mixed economy (P.Samuelson) and the national democratic state
(Khrushchev) became popular.
At the same time Marxism as the ideological basis of communism, state
socialism and liberalism as the banner of individual freedoms and capitalism
became the two most powerful driving forces in the world and survived right
up to the present day. Even the "softening" of their ideological systems as
a result of "democratic socialism" and "state capitalism" or their
"hardening" in the forms of communism or fascism did not reduce their
significance as the fundamental ideologies of the Third Civilisation.
Perhaps, I should mention here why I have not included another
important ideological movement - that of conservatism. The conservatives
have always made a cult out of their loyalty to the traditional structures
of life. The conservative values of "hierarchy, order, authority and
loyalty" have not stood up to the test of time and new realities. Communism
and fascism appear to have been conclusively rejected. Monarchism is only
viable as a cultural tradition. Radical and revolutionary theories have lost
their power. Of the old political doctrines, only liberalism and Marxism in
its totalitarian version managed to retain any of their power, at least
until the end of the 1980's.
To what extent, however, can they benefit from the transition between
epochs? Do they answer the needs of the new global realities? Is it
sufficient to say, that liberalism has become a dominant and eternal global
theory, or that Marxism has been reborn in the form of democratic socialism?
Let us look at the first of these. The ideas of liberalism have a long
history going back to the awakening of civil societies, private ownership
and the rights of man. This is its huge historical significance. Hobbs,
Spinosa and Locke in different ways contributed to the creation of liberal
ideas. The geniuses of the Enlightenment gave it a more systematic form and
value system. However, the driving force behind the development of
liberalism was Adam Smith. He saw the state and state control as the main
obstacles to the development of the society in which we live. He was in
favour of the free movement of the work force, the abolition of semi-feudal
remnants and the regulation of industry and foreign trade. He was in favour
of the complete removal of all limitations on trade with land and goods.
A.Smith, D.Riccardo and A.Ferguson as well as all their followers advocated
the limitation of the role of the state to the functions of a "night
watchman" whose job it is to safeguard the freedom of the owners of property
and the means of production. "Anarchy plus a constable, freedom