Thoughts on
Reading an Essay by Isaiah
Capitalism and the political structures
within which it operates, free market democracies, satisfy our material wants
and needs. They often do so, however, at
the expense of our spiritual wants and needs. That is part of the potentially cataclysmic
“dialectic” which we are now facing, as the inexorable march of free market
democracies seem to say to tradition and culture, where that culture has been
molded by different structures, be gone and make way for the new. Society, and people in society, need, if not
in actuality, the perception of some kind of permanence – something on which
and within which to anchor their lives.
For many, this stability is provided by tradition, whether those
traditions are rational or not.
Religion, customs and social mythology are also contributors. A social system within which the only
constant is change is self-destructive and must be balanced, if it is to
survive, by some stabilizing force.
Society requires stability and
predictability to survive and thrive. In
fact, the type of stability and predictability in large measure defines the
society. In free market democracies,
this stability and predictability takes the form of laws and the rule of law,
by the agency of which interactions and exchanges are imbued with some
predictability of success in achieving the ends sought. In societies ruled by tradition and custom,
these serve a similar purpose, though perhaps with somewhat less predictability
or less defined methods of recourse when others act contrary to these
traditions or customs. Stability and
predictability lend us some hope in the attainment of our diverse needs. Without the assistance of these external
agencies, individuals must rely solely on themselves, leading to a brutish free-for-all
of unconstrained competition between wholly sovereign individuals, the only
limiting force being their relative abilities to compel others to their
will. The presence of rules or norms of
interaction, in fact, are part and parcel of the definition of a society.
The individual, likewise, needs and seeks
this same stability and predictability to both survive and thrive for, without
some hope that his needs can be met, to continue the course is pointless.
As well, the stabilizing force must be
seen to be legitimate and effective in its stabilizing agency to realize broad
acceptance. If the only predictability
it offers is constant and rapid change, its effectiveness is minimal as each
individual’s hope for the attainment of their diverse ends is lessened. The larger the society which it intends to
encompass, the more difficult the legitimization of the force unless composed
of fewer and fewer, and more and more universally acceptable, constraints or
dictums. This is why the amalgamation of
many diverse societies into one great society is necessarily accompanied by the
adoption of normative standards. The
quickening integration of the world’s societies, aided by technological
advances and the information revolution, calls into question the viability of
that degree of liberty of conscience and individualism historically
representative of
It is these traditions and customs, be
they secular or religious, which have supplied the satisfaction of the
spiritual heretofore, and their destruction does nothing to obviate the need,
which continues to cry out for its fulfillment.
This cry takes many forms, the most evident being the hate and invective
hurled at
Other, more local obstacles are on the
horizon, however, as spiritual needs are not unique to the Islamic culture, but
are rather part of the universal human condition. In the quest for a universally acceptable
normative standard, all local norms are threatened, the degree of threat
dictated by the perceived necessity to or proximity of integration, with its
attendant consequences on local beliefs, customs, traditions, laws, etc... The Kyoto Protocol and the International
Criminal Court debates are recent examples.
As these threats become more evident and proximate, indigenous dissent
with the progress towards the universally normative will also increase, perhaps
to include the use of violence. Such a
potentiality necessitates, all the more, that a clear division between the
ideas of violence and the legitimate use of force be maintained, a goal which
runs contrary to the categorization of terrorists as combatants. The synthesis that occurs from this clash will
no doubt include changes to other commonly accepted meanings of old ideas,
perhaps even the idea of liberty, with attendant significant impacts on our
futures.
Disregarding the spiritual, in an
environment of constant and rapid change such as is characteristic of the
information age upon which we are still entering,
predictability in the attainment of material wants and needs is also
decreased. It is this universal desire
for some predictability in the attainment of our diverse needs, physical,
mental and spiritual, which will direct the outcome of this clash of cultures.
As Isaiah Berlin points out, the “emphasis
in the last half of the eighteenth century on non-rational factors, whether
connected with specific religious beliefs or not, which stresses the value of
the individual, the peculiar (das Eigentǖmliche),
the impalpable, and appeals to ancient historical roots and immemorial custom,
to the wisdom of simple, sturdy peasants uncorrupted by the sophistries of
subtle reasoners has strongly conservative and, indeed, reactionary
implications.” It is the sum of these
forces which will determine the degree of the cataclysm to come and our ability
to understand them the degree to which this transition will be made less
cataclysmic.