Could we solve our problems?
In the first blog of this series I made a quick assessment of some of the problems facing the modern world: can we live in peace; will our economic systems keep working in the foreseeable future, and will the world be able to feed its exploding populations? My idea is to assess whether the answers to these questions are likely to be positive. Is there cause for optimism?
Living in peace
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| Peaceful togetherness. Marine iguanas in the Galapogos |
Taking them in order, the first is the matter of living in peace. If we look at humanity as a whole we have to admit that this is an unattainable goal. Humans are aggressive, argumentative and very prone to violence. But we could do better (that’s what I used to get on my school reports). Article 2 of the charter of the United Nations says that ‘All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.’ If all nations adhered to that, in good faith, it would be a good start. In that respect we have to note that one of the worst offenders is the United States, where there is a persistent belief that, in the long term, democracy is the only viable political system and a ‘uniquely American realism’ teaches that ‘it is America’s job to change the world, and in it’s own image’[1]. This breathtaking arrogance, based in neo-conservative rhetoric and evangelical Protestant beliefs, has been behind US military interventions in various countries (the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Panama (they pick their victims!) Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan – and perhaps Pakistan. Vietnam was slightly different: the rationale in that case was to prevent its take-over by Communism, a position fuelled by Cold War paranoia and the idea that Communism was a homogeneous monster intent on world domination.
Military interventions, far from introducing the American version of democracy, have frequently generated strong local resistance, in some cases dragging the US into drawn-out conflicts in which there is no prospect of victory in any conventional sense. This was certainly the case in Vietnam, whatever the reason for intervention there, as well as in Iraq and Afghanistan – where they’re still involved. The tendency to attack other countries has been reinforced by the idea that violence is a reasonable solution to anything that is contrary (or appears to be contrary) to perceived interests of the US. So we have the ill-advised and poorly conceived ‘war on terror’ in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks which led, for highly dubious reasons, to the second Iraq war and the current war in Afghanistan.
Picking on the US isn’t a matter of bias; the size and importance of that nation makes it’s behaviour central to the problem. For the world as a whole there’s not much chance of any sort of progress towards real and lasting peace unless nations genuinely respect the charter of the UN, and refrain from interfering with, or exploiting, each other. In other words, mind their own business. In the case of the US, this means that the country should abandon the idea of military intervention in countries that are not particularly friendly to them; it should dismantle the world-wide system of military bases that it maintains and make a serious move towards nuclear disarmament, which would entail a willingness to destroy – or at least radically reduce – its own nuclear arsenal. In the case of China, the question has to be asked: ‘What is your current massive military build up for?” The country would be regarded with much less suspicion if it wasn’t doing that. And so we could go on. Other threats to peace are Israel and the Arabs, Iran, North Korea… and then, of course, there’s the possibility that fundamentalist Muslims, fanatically committed to jihad and the destruction of the infidel west, might get hold of a nuclear weapon.
Questions also arise about interventions in countries experiencing civil unrest. There are UN rules that govern these interventions; they don’t work very well (note the failure in Rwanda, the mess in the Congo and Darfur), but one would have to argue that it would be better to work on and through these procedures and get them right, which would require more enthusiastic and unbiased support from countries like the US, China and Russia than they give now. Not much chance, I guess. As I write this Libya is in a state of upheaval and Gaddafi is killing Libyans by the thousand in his determination to hold onto power. It’s going to end in tears.
So, taken overall, I don’t expect harmony, altruism and peace to break out all over. My guess (for the little it’s worth) is that domestic upheavals in various countries will go on and Israel will probably have another go at Hizbollah in Lebanon which, since that organization is strongly supported by Iran may turn out even uglier than usual. There will be wars and violent upheavals triggered by terrorism, disputes over water, or oil or living space, but we will probably be spared another major war – one that will have large, direct effects on the western countries – for the foreseeable future (let’s say, the next 25 years). Most of us will be able to ignore those and go about our lives – as we like to do.
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