{"id":3156,"date":"2013-07-13T01:46:21","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:46:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=3156"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:46:21","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:46:21","slug":"02-introduction-vol-the-ideal-of-human-unity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/02-other-editions\/the-ideal-of-human-unity\/02-introduction-vol-the-ideal-of-human-unity","title":{"rendered":"-02_Introduction.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n

\n
\nINTRODUCTION<\/b><\/font>
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nA<\/font>T THE<\/font> time when this book was being brought to its
\nclose, the first attempt at the foundation of some initial hesitating
\nbeginning of the new world-order which both governments and
\npeoples had begun to envisage as a permanent necessity if there
\nwas to be any order in the world at all, was under debate and
\nconsideration but had not yet been given a concrete and practical
\nform; but this had to come and eventually a momentous beginning was made. It took the name and appearance of what was
\ncalled a League of Nations. It was not happy in its conception,
\nwell-inspired in its formation or destined to any considerable longevity or a
\nsupremely successful career. But that such an organised endeavour should be launched at all and proceed on its
\nway for some time without an early breakdown was in itself an
\nevent of capital importance and meant the initiation of a new
\nera in world history; especially, it was an initiative which, even
\nif it failed, could not be allowed to remain without a sequel but
\nhad to be taken up again until a successful solution has safeguarded the future of mankind, not only against continued disorder and lethal peril but against destructive possibilities which
\ncould easily prepare the collapse of civilisation and perhaps
\neventually something even that could be described as the suicide
\nof the human race. Accordingly, the League of Nations disappeared but was replaced by the United Nations Organisation
\nwhich now stands in the forefront of the world and struggles towards <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-1<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nsome kind of secure permanence and success in the stupendous endeavour on which depends the world’s future. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nThis is the capital event, the crucial and decisive
\noutcome of the world-wide tendencies which Nature has set in motion for
\nher destined purpose. In spite of the constant shortcomings of
\nhuman effort and its stumbling mentality, in spite of adverse possibilities that may baulk or delay for a time the success 
\nthis great adventure it is in this event that lies the determination
\nof what must be. All the catastrophes that have attended this
\ncourse of events and seem to arise of purpose in order to prevent the working out of her intention have not prevented, and
\neven further catastrophes will not prevent, the successful emergence and development of an enterprise which has become
\na necessity for the progress and perhaps the very existence of the race. Two stupendous and world-devastating wars have swept over the globe and have been accompanied or followed by revolutions with far reaching consequences which have altered die
\npolitical map of the earth and the international balance, die
\nonce fairly stable equilibrium of five continents, and changed.
\nthe whole future. A third still more disastrous war with a prospect of the use of weapons and other scientific means of destruction far more fatal and of wider reach than any ever yet
\ninvented, weapons whose far spread use might bring down civilisation with a crash and whose effects might tend towards some
\nthing like extermination on a large scale, looms in prospect
\nthe constant apprehension of it weighs upon the mind of the
\nnations and stimulates them towards further preparations 
\nwar and creates an atmosphere of prolonged antagonism, if not
\nyet of conflict, extending to what is called "cold war" even in
\ntimes of peace. But the two wars that have come and gone have
\nnot prevented the formation of the first and second considerable
\nefforts towards the beginning of an attempt at union and the
\npractical formation of a concrete body, an organised instrument
\nwith that object: rather they have caused and hastened this new
\ncreation. The League of Nations came into being as a direct
\nconsequence of the first war, the U.N.O. similarly as a consequence <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-2<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nof the second world-wide conflict. If the third war
\nwhich is regarded by many, if not by most, as inevitable, does come it is likely to precipitate as inevitably, a
\nfurther step and perhaps the final outcome of this great world endeavour. Nature
\nuses such means, apparently opposed and dangerous to her intended purpose to bring about the fruition of that purpose. As
\nin the practice of the spiritual science and art of Yoga one has
\nto raise up the psychological possibilities which are there in the
\nnature and stand in the way of its spiritual perfection and fulfilment so as to eliminate them, even, it may be, the sleeping
\npossibilities which might arise in future to break the work that
\nhas been done, so too Nature acts with the world-forces that meet
\nher on her way, not only calling up those which will assist her
\nbut raising too, so as to finish with them, those that she knows to
\nbe the normal or even the unavoidable obstacles which cannot
\nbut start up to impede her secret will. This one has often seen
\nin the history of mankind; one sees it exampled today with an
\nenormous force commensurable with the magnitude of the thing
\nthat has to be done. But always these resistances turn out to have
\nassisted by the resistance much more than they have impeded the
\nintention of the great Creatrix and her Mover. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nWe may then look with a legitimate optimism on what
\nhas been hitherto achieved and on the prospects of further achievement in the
\nfuture. This optimism need not and should not blind us to undesirable features,
\nperilous tendencies and the possibilities of serious interruptions in the work
\nand even disorders in the human world that might possibly subvert the work done.
\nAs regards the actual conditions of the moment it may even be admitted that most
\nmen nowadays look with dissatisfaction on the defects of the United Nations’
\nOrganisation and its blunders and the malignancies that endanger its existence
\nand many feel a growing pessimism and regard with doubt the possibility of its
\nfinal success. This pessimism it is unnecessary and unwise to share; for such a
\npsychology tends to bring about or to make possible the results which it predicts but which need not
\nat all  ensue. At the same time we must not ignore the danger. <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-3<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nThe leaders of the nations who have the will to succeed and who
\nwill be held responsible by posterity for any avoidable failure,
\nmust be on guard against unwise policies or fatal errors; the
\ndeficiencies that exist in the organisation or its constitution have
\nto be quickly remedied or slowly and cautiously eliminated; if
\nthere are obstinate oppositions to necessary change, they have
\nsomehow to be overcome or circumvented without breaking the
\ninstitution; progress towards its perfection, even if it cannot be
\neasily or swiftly made, must yet be undertaken and the frustration of the world’s hope prevented at any cost. There is no other
\nway for mankind than this unless indeed a greater way is laid
\nopen to it by the Power that guides through some delivering turn
\nor change in human will or human nature or some sudden evolutionary progress, a not easily foreseeable leap, saltus<\/i> which will
\nmake another and greater solution of our human destiny feasible. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nIn the first idea and form of a beginning of world-union
\nwhich took the shape of the League of Nations, although there
\nwere errors in the structure such as the insistence on unanimity
\nwhich tended to sterilise, to limit or to obstruct the practical
\naction and effectuality of the League, the main defect was inherent in its conception and in its general build and that again
\narose naturally and as a direct consequence from the condition of the world at
\nthat time. The League of Nations was in fact an oligarchy of big powers each drawing behind it a retinue
\nof
\nsmall States and using the general body so far as possible for the furtherance of its own policy much more than for the general
\ninterest and the good of the world at large. This character came out most in the political sphere and the manoeuvres
\nand discord, accommodations and compromises inevitable in this condition of
\nthings did not help to make the action of the League beneficial
\n<\/i>or effective as it purposed or set out to be. The absence of
\nAmerica and the position of Russia had helped to make the
\nfinal ill-success of this first venture a natural consequence, if not
\nindeed unavoidable. In the constitution of the U.N.O. an a
\ntempt was made in principle at least, to escape from these errors; but the
\nattempt was not thoroughgoing and not altogether successful <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-4<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\n A strong surviving element of oligarchy remained in the
\npreponderant place assigned to the five great Powers in the
\nSecurity Council and was clinched by the device of the veto; these were concessions to a sense of realism and the necessity of
\nrecognising the actual condition of things and the results of the
\nsecond great war and could not perhaps have been avoided, but
\nthey have done more to create trouble, hamper the action and
\ndiminish the success of the new institution than anything else
\nin its make-up or the way of action forced upon it by the world
\nsituation or the difficulties of a combined working inherent in
\nits very structure. A too hasty or radical endeavour to get rid
\nof these defects might lead to a crash of the whole edifice; to
\nleave them unmodified prolongs a malaise, an absence of harmony and smooth working and a consequent discredit and a
\nsense of limited and abortive action which has caused the widespread feeling of futility with which the world at large has begun
\nto regard this great and necessary institution which was founded
\nwith such high hopes and without which world conditions would
\nbe infinitely worse and more dangerous, even perhaps irremediable. A third attempt, the substitution of a differently constituted body could only come if this institution collapsed as the
\nresult of a new catastrophe: if certain dubious portents fulfil
\ntheir menace, it might emerge into being and might even this
\ntime be more successful because of an increased and a more
\ngeneral determination not to allow such a calamity to occur
\nagain; but it would be after a third cataclysmal struggle which
\nmight shake to its foundations the international structure now
\nholding together after two upheavals with so much difficulty and
\nunease. Yet, even in such a contingency, the intention in the
\nworking of Nature is likely to overcome the obstacles she has
\nherself raised up and they may be sot rid of once and for all. But for  that it will be necessary to build, eventually at least, a
\ntrue World State without exclusions and on a principle of equality into which considerations of size and strength will not enter.
\nthese may be left to exercise whatever influence is natural to
\nthem in a well-ordered harmony of the world’s peoples safeguarded <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-5<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nby the law of a new international order. A sure justice,
\na fundamental equality and combination of rights and interests
\nmust be the law of this World State and the basis of its entire
\nedifice. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe real danger at the present second stage of the progress
\ntowards unity lies not in any faults, however serious, in the
\nbuilding of the United Nations’ Assembly but in the division of
\nthe peoples into two camps which tend to be natural opponents
\nand might at any moment become declared enemies irreconcilable and even their common existence incompatible. This ii
\nbecause the so-called Communism of bolshevist Russia came to
\nbirth as the result, not of a rapid evolution, but of an unprecedentedly fierce and prolonged revolution sanguinary in the extreme and created an autocratic and intolerent State system
\nfounded upon a war of classes in which all others except the proletariat were
\ncrushed out of existence, "liquidated" upon a "dictatorship of the proletariat" or rather of a narrow but all
\npowerful party system acting in its name, a police state, and a mortal struggle with the outside world: the fierceness of this struggle generated in the minds of the organisers of the new
\nState a fixed idea of the necessity not only of survival but of
\ncontinued struggle and the spread of its domination until the
\nnew order had destroyed the old or evicted it, if not from the whole earth, yet
\nfrom the greater part of it and the imposition of a new political and social gospel or its general acceptance by the
\nworld’s peoples. But this condition of things might change, lose
\nits acrimony and full consequence, as it has done to some degree
\nwith the arrival of security and the cessation of the first ferocity; bitterness and exasperation of the conflict; the most intolerant and
\noppressive elements of the new order might have been moderated
\nand the sense of incompatibility or inability to live together or side by side
\nwould then have disappeared and a more secure
\nmodus vivendi<\/i> been made possible. If much of the unease, the 
\nsense of inevitable struggle, the difficulty of mutual toleration
\nand economic accommodation still exists, it is rather because the
\nidea of using the ideological struggle as a means for world domination <\/span> <\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-6<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nis there and keeps the nations in a position of mutual
\napprehension and preparation for armed defence and attack than because the coexistence of the two ideologies is impossible. If
\nthis element is eliminated, a world in which these two ideologies could live together, arrive at an economic interchange, draw
\ncloser together, need not be at all out of the question; for the
\nworld is moving towards a greater development of the principle
\nof State control over the life of the community, and a congeries
\nof socialistic States on one side and of States coordinating and controlling a modified capitalism might well come to exist side by
\nside and develop friendly relations with each other. Even a
\nWorld State in which both could keep their own institutions
\nand sit in a common assembly might come into being and a
\nsingle world-union on this foundation would not be impossible.
\nThis development is indeed the final outcome which the foundation of the U.N.O. presupposes; for the present organisation
\ncannot be itself final, it is only and imperfect beginning and useful and necessary as a primary nucleus of that larger institution
\nin which all the peoples of the earth can meet each other in a
\nsingle international unity: the creation of a World State is in a
\nmovement of this kind the one logical and inevitable ultimate
\noutcome. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nThis view of the future may under present circumstances
\nbe stigmatised as a too facile optimism, but this turn of things is
\nquite as possible as the more disastrous turn expected by the
\npessimists, since the cataclysm and crash of civilisation sometimes
\npredicted by them need not at all be the result of a new war.
\nMankind has a habit of surviving the worst catastrophies created
\nby its own errors or by the violent turns of Nature and it must
\nbe so if there is any meaning in its existence, if its long history
\nand continuous survival is not the accident of a fortuitously self-organising Chance which it must be in a purely materialistic
\nview of the nature of the world. If man is intended to survive and carry forward the evolution of which he is at present the
\nhead, and to some extent a half-conscious leader of its march, he must come out of his present chaotic international life and arrive <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-7<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nat a beginning of organised united action; some kind of
\nWorld State, unitary or federal or a confederacy or a coalition he
\nmust arrive at in the end; no smaller or looser expedient would
\nadequately serve the purpose. In that case the general thesis advanced in this book would stand justified and we can foreshadow
\nwith some confidence the main line of advance which the course
\nof events is likely to take in at least the main trend of the future
\nhistory of the human peoples. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nThe question now put by evolving Nature to mankind
\nis whether its existing international system, if system it can be called, a sort
\nof provisional order maintained with constant evolutionary or revolutionary
\nchanges cannot be replaced by a willed and thought out fixed arrangement, a true
\nsystem, eventually a real unity\u2014serving all the common interests of the earth’s
\npeoples. An original welter and chaos with its jumble of forces forming wherever
\nit could larger or smaller masses of civilisation and order which were in danger
\nof crumbling or being shaken to pieces by attacks from the outer chaos was the
\nfirst attempt at cosmos successfully arrived at by the genius of humanity. This
\nwas finally replaced by something like an international system with the elements
\nof what could be called international law or fixed habits of intercommunication
\nand interchange which allowed the nations to live together in spite of
\nantagonisms and conflicts, a security alternating with precariousness and peril
\nand permitting of too many ugly features, however local, of oppression,
\nbloodshed, revolt and disorder, not to speak of wars which sometimes devastated
\nlarge areas of the globe. The indwelling deity who presides over the destiny of
\nthe race has raised in man’s mind and heart the idea, the hope of a new order
\nwhich will replace the old unsatisfactory order, and substitute for it
\nconditions of the world’s life which will in the end have a reasonable chance of
\nestablishing permanent peace and well-being. This would for the first time turn
\ninto an assured fact the ideal of  human unity which, cherished by a few, seemed for so long
\nnoble chimera; then might be created a firm ground of peace an
\nharmony and even a free room for the realisation of the highest <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-8<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nhuman dreams, for the perfectibility of the race, a perfect society,
\na higher upward evolution of the human soul and human nature. It is  for the men of our days and, at the most, of tomorrow to
\ngive  the answer. For too long a postponement or too continued a
\nfailure will open the way to a series of increasing catastrophes
\nwhich might create a too prolonged and disastrous conclusion
\nand chaos and render a solution too difficult or impossible; it
\nmight even end in something like an irremediable crash not only
\nof the present world civilisation but of all civilisation. A new,
\na difficult and uncertain beginning might have to be made in
\nthe midst of the chaos and ruin after perhaps an extermination
\non a large scale and a more successful creation could be predicted only if a way was found to develop a better humanity or
\nperhaps a greater, a superhuman race. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nThe central question is whether the nation, the largest
\nnatural unit which humanity has been able to create and maintain for its collective living, is also its last and ultimate unit or
\nwhether a greater aggregate can be formed which will englobe
\nmany and even most nations and finally all in its united totality.
\nThe impulse to build more largely, the push towards the creation of considerable and even very vast supranational aggregates
\nhas not been wanting; it has even been a permanent feature in
\nthe life instincts of the race. But the form it took was the desire
\nof a strong nation for mastery over others, permanent possession
\nof their territories, subjugation of their peoples, exploitation of
\ntheir resources: there was also an attempt at quasi-assimilation,
\nan imposition of the culture of a dominant race and, in general,
\na system of absorption wholesale or as complete as possible. The
\nRoman empire was the classic example of this kind of endeavour
\nand the Graeco-Roman unity of a single way of life and culture
\nin a vast framework of political and administrative unity was the
\nnearest approach within the geographical limits reached by this
\ncivilisation to something one might regard as a first figure or an
\nincomplete suggestion of a figure of human unity. Other similar
\nattempts have been made though not on so large a scale and with
\na less consummate ability throughout the course of history, but <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-<\/font>9<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nnothing has endured for more than a small number of centuries.
\nThe method used was fundamentally unsound in as much as it
\ncontradicted other life-instincts which were necessary to the vitality and healthy evolution of mankind and the denial of which
\nmust end in some kind of stagnation and arrested progress. The
\nimperial aggregate could not acquire the unconquerable vitality
\nand power of survival of the nation unit. The only enduring
\nempire units have been in reality large nation units which took
\nthat name like Germany and China and these were not forms of
\nthe supra-national State and need not be reckoned in the history
\nof the formation of the imperial aggregate. So, although the
\ntendency to the creation of empires testifies to an urge in Nature
\ntowards larger unities of human life and we can see concealed
\nin it a will to unite the disparate masses of humanity on a larger
\nscale into a single coalescing or combined life-unit, it must be
\nregarded as an unsuccessful formation without a sequel and unserviceable for any further progress in this direction. In actual
\nfact a new attempt of world-wide domination could succeed only
\nby a new instrumentation or under novel circumstances in englobing all the nations of the earth or persuading or forcing them
\ninto some kind of union. An ideology, a successful combination
\nof peoples with one aim and a powerful head like communist
\nRussia, might have a temporary success in bringing about such
\nan objective. But such an outcome, not very desirable in itself,
\nwould not be likely to ensure the creation of an enduring World
\nState. There would be tendencies, resistances, urges towards
\nother developments which would sooner or later bring about its
\ncollapse or some revolutionary change which would mean i
\ndisappearance. Finally, any such stage would have to be over-passed; only the formation of a true World State, either of
\nunitary but still elastic kind,\u2014for a rigidly unitary State might
\nbring about stagnation and decay of the springs of life,\u2014or
\nunion of free peoples could open the prospect of a sound an
\nlasting world-order. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/p>\n

 
\nIt is not necessary to repeat or review except in certain directions, the considerations and conclusions set forward in this
\n<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-<\/font>10<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nbook with regard to the means and methods or the lines of divergence
\nor successive development which the actual realisation of
\nhuman unity may take. But still on some sides possibilities have arisen
\nwhich call for some modification of what has been written the conclusions
\narrived at in these chapters. It had been concluded  for instance, that there was no likelihood of the conquest
\nand unification of the world by a single dominant people or empire. This is no longer altogether so certain, for we have just
\nhad to admit the possibility of such an attempt under certain
\ncircumstances. A dominant Power may be able to group round
\nitself strong allies subordinated to it but still considerable in
\nstrength and resources and throw them into a world struggle
\nwith other powers and peoples. This possibility would be increased if the dominating Power managed to procure, even if
\nonly for the time being, a monopoly of an overwhelming superiority in the use of some of the tremendous means of aggressive
\nmilitary action which Science has set out to discover and effectively to utilise. The terror of destruction and even of large scale
\nextermination created by these ominous discoveries may bring
\nabout a will in the governments and peoples to ban and prevent
\nthe military use of these inventions, but, so long as the nature
\nof mankind has not changed, this prevention must remain uncertain and precarious and an unscrupulous ambition may even
\nget by it a chance of secrecy and surprise and the utilisation of a
\ndecisive moment which might conceivably give it victory and it
\nmight risk the tremendous chance. It may be argued that the
\nhistory of the last War runs counter to this possibility, for in conditions not quite realising but approximating to such a combination of circumstances the aggressive powers failed in their
\nattempt and underwent the disastrous consequences of a terrible
\ndefeat. But after all, they came for a time within a hair’s breadth
\nof success and there might not be the same good fortune for the
\nworld in some later and more sagaciously conducted and organised adventure. At least, the possibility has to be noted and
\nguarded against by those who have the power of prevention and
\nthe welfare of the race in their charge.  <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-<\/font>11<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nOne of the possibilities suggested at the time was the growth
\nof continental agglomerates, a united Europe, some kind of a combine of the peoples of the American continent under the leadership of the United States, even possibly in the resurgence of
\nAsia and its drive towards independence from the dominance of
\nthe European peoples, a drawing together for self-defensive combination of the nations of this continent; such an eventuality of
\nlarge continental combinations might even be a stage in the final
\nformation of a world-union. This possibility has tended to take
\nshape to a certain extent with a celerity that could not then be
\nanticipated. In the two American continents it has actually assumed a predominating and practical form, though not in its
\ntotality. The idea of a United States of Europe has also actually
\ntaken shape and is assuming a formal existence, but is not yet
\nable to develop into a completed and fully realised possibility
\nbecause of the antagonism based on conflicting ideologies which
\ncuts off from each other Russia and her satellites behind their iron
\ncurtain and Western Europe. This separation has gone so far
\nthat it is difficult to envisage its cessation at any foreseeable time
\nin a predictable future. Under other circumstances a tendency
\ntowards such combinations might have created the apprehension
\nof huge continental clashes such as the collision, at one time imagined as possible, between a resurgent Asia and the Occident.
\nThe acceptance of Europe and America of the Asiatic resurgence
\nand the eventual total liberation of the Oriental peoples, as also
\nthe downfall of Japan which figured at one time and indeed actually presented itself to the world as the liberator and leader of a
\nfree Asia against the domination of the West, has removed this
\ndangerous possibility. Here again, as elsewhere, the actual danger
\npresents itself rather as a clash between two opposing ideologies,
\none led by Russia and Red China and trying to impose the
\nCommunistic extreme partly by military and partly by forceful
\npolitical means on a reluctant or at least an infected but not
\naltogether willing Asia and Europe and on the other side a combination of peoples, partly capitalist, partly moderate socialist
\nwho still cling with some attachment to the idea of liberty,\u2014to <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-12<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nfreedom of thought and some
\nremnant of the free life of the individual. In America there seems to be a push,
\nespecially in the Latin peoples, towards a rather intolerant completeness of the
\nAmericanisation of the whole continent and the adjacent islands, a sort of extended Monroe doctrine, which might create friction
\nwith the European powers still holding possessions in the northern part of the continent. But this could only generate minor
\ndifficulties and disagreements and not the possibility of any serious collision, a case perhaps for arbitration or arrangement by the
\nU.N.O., not any more serious consequence. In Asia a more perilous situation has arisen, standing sharply across the way to any
\npossibility of a continental unity of the peoples of this part of the
\nworld in the emergence of a communist China. This creates a
\ngigantic bloc which could easily englobe the whole of Northern
\nAsia in a combination between two enormous communist Powers, Russia and China and would overshadow with a threat of
\nabsorption South-Western Asia and Tibet and might be pushed
\nto overrun all up to the whole frontier of India menacing her
\nsecurity and that of Western Asia with the possibility of an invasion and an overrunning and subjection by penetration or
\neven by overwhelming military force to an unwanted ideology,
\npolitical and social institutions and dominance of this militant
\nmass of Communism whose push might easily prove irresistible.
\nIn any case the continent would be divided between two huge
\nblocs which might enter into active mutual opposition and the
\npossibility of a stupendous world-conflict would arise dwarfing
\nanything previously experienced: the possibility of any world-union might, even without any actual outbreak of hostilities, be
\nindefinitely postponed by the incompatibility of interests and
\nideologies on a scale which would render their inclusion in a
\nsingle body hardly realisable. The possibility of a coming into
\nbeing of three or four continental unions which might subsequently coalesce into a single unity would then be very remote
\nand, except after a stupendous conflict, hardly feasible. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nAt one time it was possible to regard as an eventual possibility the extension of Socialism to all the nations; an international <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-<\/font>13<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nunity could then have been created by its innate tendencies
\nwhich turned naturally towards an overcoming of the dividing
\nforce of the nation idea with its separatism and its turn towards
\ncompetitions and rivalries often culminating in open strife; this
\ncould have been regarded as the natural road and could have
\nturned in fact into the eventual way towards world-union. But,
\nin the first place. Socialism has under certain stresses proved to
\nbe by no means immune against infection by the dividing national
\nspirit and its international tendency might not survive its coming
\ninto power in separate national States and a resulting inheritance
\nof competing national interests and necessities: the old spirit
\nmight very well survive in the new socialist bodies. But also there
\nmight not be or not for a long time to come an inevitable tide of
\nthe spread of Socialism to all the peoples of the earth: other
\nforces might arise which would dispute what seemed at one time
\nand perhaps still seems the most likely outcome of existing world
\ntendencies; the conflict between Communism and the less extreme socialistic idea which still respects the principle of liberty,
\neven though a restricted liberty, and the freedom of conscience,
\nof thought, of personality of the individual, if this difference perpetuated itself, might create a serious difficulty in the formation
\nof a World State. It would not be easy to build a constitution,
\na harmonised State-law and practice in which any modicum of
\ngenuine freedom for the individual or any continued existence
\nof him except as a cell in the working of a rigidly determined
\nautomatism of the body of the collectivist State or a part of a
\nmachine would be possible or conceivable. It is not that the principle of Communism necessitates any such results or that its system must lead to a termite civilisation or the suppression of the individual; it could well be, on the contrary, a means at once of the
\nfulfilment of the individual and the perfect harmony of a collective being. The already developed systems which go by the name
\nare not really Communism but constructions of an inordinately
\nrigid State Socialism. But Socialism itself might well develop
\naway from the Marxist groove and evolve less rigid modes; a cooperative Socialism, for instance, without any bureaucratic rigour <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-14<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nof a coercive administration, of a Police State might one day come
\ninto existence but the generalisation <\/b> of Socialism throughout the world  is not under existing circumstances easily foreseeable, hardly  en a predominant possibility: in spite of certain possibilities or
\ntendencies created by recent events in the far East a division of the
\nearth between the two systems, capitalistic and socialistic, seems
\nf r the present a more likely issue. In America the attachment to
\nindividualism and the capitalistic system of society and a strong antagonism not only to Communism but to even a moderate Socialism remains complete and one can foresee little possibility of any
\nabatement in its intensity. The extreme success of Communism
\ncreeping over the continents of the Old World which we have had
\nto envisage as a possibility, is yet, if we consider existing circumstances and the balance of opposing powers, highly improbable
\nand even if it occurred some accommodation would still be necessary unless one of the two forces gained an overwhelming
\neventual victory over its opponent. A successful accommodation
\nwould demand the creation of a body in which all questions o\u00a3
\npossible dispute could be solved as they arose without any breaking out of open conflict, and this would be a successor of the
\nLeague of Nations and the U.N.O. and move in the same direction. As Russia and America in spite of the constant opposition of policy and ideology have avoided so far any step that
\nwould make the preservation of the U.N.O. too difficult or impossible, this third body would be preserved by the same necessity or imperative utility of its continued existence. The same
\nforces would work in the same direction and a creation of an
\neffective world-union would still be possible; in the end the mass
\nof general needs of the race and its need of self-preservation
\nwould well be relied on to make it inevitable. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nThere is nothing then in the development of events since
\nthe establishment of the United Nations’ Organisation, in the
\nsequel to the great initiation at San Francisco of the decisive step
\ntowards the creation of a world body which might end in the establishment of a true world unity, that need discourage us in the
\nExpectation of an ultimate success of this great enterprise. There <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-<\/font>15<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nare dangers and difficulties, there can be an apprehension of conflicts, even of colossal conflicts that might jeopardise the future,
\nbut total failure need not be envisaged unless we are disposed to
\npredict the failure of the race. The thesis we have undertaken to
\nestablish of the drive of Nature towards larger agglomerations
\nand the final establishment of the largest of all and the ultimate
\nunion of the world’s peoples still remains unaltered and this is
\nevidently the line which the future of the human race demands
\nand which conflicts and perturbations, however immense, may
\ndelay even as they may modify greatly the forms it now promises
\nto take but are not likely to prevent; for a general destruction
\nwould be the only alternative destiny of mankind. But such a
\ndestruction, whatever the catastrophic possibilities balancing the
\nalmost certain beneficial results, hardly limitable in their extent,
\nof the recent discoveries and inventions of Science, has every
\nchance of being as chimerical as any early expectation of final
\npeace and felicity or a perfected society of the human peoples.
\nWe may rely, if on nothing else, on the evolutionary urge and,
\nif on no other greater hidden Power, on the manifest working
\nand drift or intention in the World-Energy we call Nature to
\ncarry mankind at least as far as the necessary next step to be
\ntaken, a self-preserving next step: for the necessity is there, at
\nleast some general recognition of it has been achieved and of the
\nthing to which it must eventually lead the idea has been born
\nand the body of it is already calling for its creation. We have
\nindicated in this book the conditions, possibilities, forms which
\nthis new creation may take and those which seem to be most
\ndesirable without dogmatising or giving prominence to personal
\nopinion; an impartial consideration of the forces that work and
\nthe results that are likely to ensue was the object of this study.
\nThe rest will depend on the intellectual and moral capacity of
\nhumanity to carry out what is evidently now the one thing needful. <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nWe conclude then that in the conditions of the world at
\npresent, even taking into consideration its most disparaging features and dangerous possibilities, there is nothing that need alter <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-<\/font>16<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nthe view we have taken of the
\nnecessity and inevitability of some kind of world-union; the drive of Nature and the compulsion of
\ncircumstances and the present and future need of mankind make
\nit inevitable. The general conclusions we have arrived at will stand and the consideration of the modalities and possible forms
\nlines of alternative or successive development it may take. The  ultimate
\nresult must be the formation of a World-State and the most desirable form of it would be a federation of free nationalities in which all subjection or forced inequality and subordination of one to another would have disappeared and, though
\nsome might preserve a greater natural influence, all would have
\nan equal status. A confederacy would give the greatest freedom
\nto the nations constituting the World State, but this might give
\ntoo much room for fissiparous or centrifugal tendencies to operate; a federal order would then be the most desirable. All else
\nwould be determined by the course of events and by general
\nagreement or the shape given by the ideas and necessities that
\nmay grow up in the future. A world union of this kind would
\nhave the greatest chances of long survival or permanent existence. This is a mutable world and uncertainties and dangers
\nmight assail or trouble for a time; the formed structure might be
\nsubjected to revolutionary tendencies as new ideas and forces
\nemerged and produced their effect on the general mind of humanity but the essential step would have been taken and the
\nfuture of the race assured or at least the present era over-passed
\nin which it is threatened and disturbed by unsolved needs and
\ndifficulties, precarious conditions, immense upheavals, huge and
\nsanguinary world-wide conflicts and the threat of others to come.
\nThe ideal of human unity would be no longer an unfulfilled
\nideal but an accomplished fact and its preservation given into
\nthe charge of the united human peoples. Its future destiny would
\nlie on the knees of the gods and, if the gods have a use for the
\ncontinued existence of the race, may be left to lie there safe. <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-<\/font>17<\/font> <\/font>
\n<\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

INTRODUCTION   AT THE time when this book was being brought to its close, the first attempt at the foundation of some initial hesitating beginning…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-ideal-of-human-unity","wpcat-63-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3156\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}