ROW Episode 44

In this episode we highlight some ideas from the works of Arnold Toynbee, the famous 20th century world historian, about the stark choice that humanity would face in the atomic age of either achieving political unification or committing mass suicide and his prediction that in in the face of an existential threat brought about by circumstances of our own making, humanity would turn on a dime and voluntarily adopt a limited world-state even though it would likely do so kicking and screaming.

Episode Transcript

Sovaida (00:08):
Hello and welcome to Reimagining Our World, a podcast
dedicated to envisioning abetter world and to infusing
hope that we can make theprincipled choices to build that
world.
In this episode, we highlightsome ideas from the works of
Arnold Toynbee, the famous 20thcentury world historian, about

(00:31):
the stark choice that humanitywould face in the Atomic Age of
either achieving politicalunification or committing mass
suicide, and his prediction thatin the face of an existential
threat brought about bycircumstances of our own making,
humanity would turn on a dimeand voluntarily adopt a limited

(00:54):
world state, even though itwould likely do so kicking and
screaming.
Today I'd like to take usthrough some highlights of a
book that contains a collectionof his works called Change and
Habit.
I've got it here for you to see.
It's a wonderful book and veryilluminating.

(01:14):
I wanted to share some of thehighlights I had gleaned from
reading this book, because theyare very pertinent to what's
going on in our world today, andI think we should consider them
seriously.
Arnold Toynbee starts with avery interesting kind of
assertion.
It's pretty powerful.
He says that today, humanityfaces a stark choice, or at the

(01:36):
time he was writing in the 1960sand 70s, would very shortly be
facing two stark choices.
Political unification or masssuicide.
He contends in this book, Changein Habit, that in the atomic
age, humanity would have tochoose between these two.
And then he goes on to say thereare two questions we must

(01:57):
answer.
The first question he says weneed to answer is, what are the
obstacles?
What are the obstacles to thisworldwide political unification?
And the second question is, howdifficult is it to overcome
them?
Or to put it differently, howconceivable is it that we can
achieve political unification orwhat he calls a world state,

(02:21):
worldwide government.
Those are his words.
Very interesting.
So let's start with the responseto his first question.
What are the obstacles?
These are the responses that hegives.
He says the key obstacle is justan old, outworn habit that
humanity has, but particularlythose of us in the West.

(02:41):
He says it's the habit of theWestern liking for political
disunity and the dislike ofpolitical unity.
Isn't that interesting?
He talks about the long standinghabit of divisive feeling that
we have.
He says because it's an oldhabit, it tends to reassert

(03:05):
itself or we tend to just fallprey to it, because it's the
easiest thing we know how to doversus reaching for what he
calls the relatively recenthabit of world mindedness.
That is also a very interestingcomment that this secularist
historian in the 20th centuryhad perceived through his study

(03:30):
of world history.
That humanity had recentlystarted a habit of world
mindedness, but was havingtrouble.
As we all know, when we want tostart a new habit, we want to
lose weight and we get off thesugar and we do it for a day or
two and then we fall off thewagon.
It's so much easier to reach forthe old habit of reaching for

(03:52):
the snacks and the junk food andthe sugar.
So adopting new habits is noteasy and it takes quite a while.
The same is true here.
We have this relatively newhabit of world mindedness, but
we're having trouble rememberingto reach for it, and we tend to
sink back and reach for the oldhabit of divisive feeling.

(04:14):
What he says, though, is havehope, because this is not a
built in trait of human nature.
It's merely a habit.
And the good news about habitsis that they can be modified and
abandoned just as they can beacquired and adopted.

(04:36):
We're willing as human beings togive up even our most dearly
held habits when it becomesclear that it's disastrous to
persist.
And again going back to givingan example, when I reflect on
this, I think about the habit ofsmoking.
So many smokers say,"Oh, I'vetried so hard to quit.

(04:57):
It's impossible.
There's no way.
I have to have my cigarettes inorder to function, to think
clearly, to not put on weight,whatever it is to be calm, not
to be anxious." And yet when thedoctor gives the diagnosis that,
you have emphysema and if youpersist, you're likely to
develop lung cancer.

(05:17):
--I have had a few of my friendswho've been in that boat, and
it's amazing how they werewilling to turn on a dime and
give up the habit of smoking,their longstanding habit, even
though for years they had swornup and down that this was an
impossible thing to do.
That's humanity for you.
Now, what is the new habit thatwe need to adopt?

(05:40):
We talked about worldmindedness, that's really more
the mindset we need to adopt,but the new habit that Arnold
Toynbee highlights is commonaction, on a worldwide scale.
Already in the 60s, when he wasgiving these talks and having
these conversations and writinghis material, Toynbee thought

(06:03):
that it would already bedisastrous not to give up a
habit of political disunity, atleast in two spheres, and that
we needed already then to adopta habit of common action in at
least two areas.
One was the area of the controlof atomic energy, and the other
area was the area ofadministering the production and

(06:25):
distribution of food.
He thought we need to set up aworld authority to control
atomic energy and also a worldauthority to administer the
production and distribution offood.
50 years from when he wassharing these thoughts, I think
that we could add at leastclimate change to this list

(06:47):
where we need to actcollectively in order to solve
this collective challenge thatis existential.
Now he emphasizes the point thatthe disaster we will ultimately
want and need to avoid is death,that we need to choose between
death and life.

(07:07):
And he says that what'shappening in the world is that
our technological advancementand revolution has shifted our
circumstances and created asituation where we are going to
be faced with this stark choiceof do or die.
He calls the choice betweenadopting this habit of common

(07:28):
action versus the old habit ofwhat he calls the great refusal.
I love this term, great refusal.
Which means saying,"No.
Thank you very much.
We don't want politicalunification.
We prefer to stick with our oldhabit of divisive feeling."
Anyway, I've put this up on theslide because I thought that it

(07:49):
would be interesting to lockthat into our brains.
Do we really want to go for thegreat refusal?
Now here was his prediction, 60sand 70s.
He says, if he had to predict,he predicted that it was
probable that humanity wouldsubmit to at least a minimum of
world government to the extentthat we perceived it was

(08:12):
immediately necessary for oursalvation, that we would do it
kicking and screaming--so evenadopting a limited form of world
government would come with greatresistance and reluctance-- and
that we would hold off doing ituntil the eleventh hour.
We wouldn't go willingly.
We would wait essentially tillthings got so bad and our choice

(08:36):
became so stark between doing itor facing existential crisis
that we would then do it.
Now, his second question aboutwhether it's conceivable to have
a world government.
He starts by saying, let's lookour fears squarely in the face.
Why is it we're so allergic tothis idea?

(08:59):
And he says, the reason it givesus nightmares is that we have a
vision of a centralizedbureaucracy administering the
details of local government allover the world and having
basically their talons in us.
Responding to this fear, hereare the thoughts that he has to
offer to allay our fears.

(09:20):
He says, first of all a worldgovernment must be limited to
what is strictly necessary.
In other words, it must belimited to a very narrow sphere
of action, because, he pointedout, people will only accept a
world government reluctantly,and so statesmen and women

(09:41):
shouldn't try to get them toswallow large doses of
government that are not strictlynecessary right now.
Again, I believe that in thearea of climate change, we
definitely need to have someworld government that has the
authority to legislate and takeaction, binding action on all
the nations of the world,because it is an existential
problem.

(10:02):
Controlling nuclearproliferation, which is the
equivalent of controlling atomicenergy, is another one.
As he points out, as a practicalmatter, nations will only
surrender the amount necessaryfor self preservation.
So that's the first thing.
Limited world government is thefirst key to allaying the fear.

(10:22):
The second point he makes, whichis really fascinating, is that
world government in this day andage has to come about
voluntarily through the consentand cooperation of countries.
He points out to prior times inworld history where a nation has
tried to expand and develop anempire and so on, subsume a

(10:46):
whole bunch of other nationswithin its sphere of influence
and authority.
And he says this has usuallybeen done by force, but he says,
we know from experience now thatdoing this sort of thing by
force doesn't end well, becauseit results in a huge backlash
and great resistance, and assoon as there's any weakness in

(11:08):
this body the individual unitswill revolt, because nationalism
will have resurged.
So the resurgence of nationalismand strong resistance, he says,
will be there if we ever try todo this by force, which we must
not do.
It has to be done voluntarily.

(11:29):
He also adds that in this dayand age, because we have this,
the atomic bomb and the atomiccapability, we simply can't use
force anymore to bring aboutsuch a world government because
we would destroy ourselves.
If we try to force a nation thathas nuclear weapons, we know
what the result of that will be.
So it has to again be done byconsent and cooperation.

(11:50):
I just want to pause and reflecthere for a moment.
For that to happen, it meansthat countries will all need to
come to the independentconclusion that it is in their
best interests to adopt a worldgovernment.
They'd have to make thecalculation that they'd be

(12:12):
better off developing thislimited world government that
has authority in very limitedspheres of endeavor, as opposed
to trying to go it alone.
Again, I point to climatechange.
The only way we can do thissuccessfully, mitigate climate
change and stop our world fromspiraling into the disaster that

(12:33):
it's spiraling into right now,to avoid the absolute
catastrophic effects, is for allnations to recognize, We're
better off working together onthis," Not the way they did with
the Paris Agreement, which isthrough a system of voluntary
pledges, but by creating a bodythat is capable of conducting

(12:55):
global consultation where allnations are properly
represented, their voices areheard, and that can make
decisions and pass internationallaws that are binding on all
nations in order to mitigate theeffects of climate change and to
stop burning fossil fuels.
Okay, so the third thing thatArnold Toynbee says is that we

(13:17):
need to also develop the correctmindset, and that is the new
habit recently acquired, as heputs it, of world mindedness.
He calls it an ideology of beingworld mindedness.
So again, this is something thatis definitely worth reflecting
on.
Now, the next thing he tacklesis what form or structure will

(13:38):
this limited world governmenttake?
He says that he believes thatbecause it has to come about as
a result of the voluntary unitof a number of previously
separate and independent smallerunits, so countries basically
coming together to create alarger unit, it will need to be
federal.
And he offers three reasons forthis.

(14:00):
First of all, he says statesprefer to retain their identity.
They also prefer to retain theirlocal autonomy.
And thirdly they want to limitthe power of any union
government to that which is intheir interest.
So whatever powers they arrogateto this limited world government

(14:21):
will have to be powers thatbenefit them.
Otherwise, no point in handingthese powers, ceding these
powers to them.
Now, he also knew that therewere certain arguments that
people would raise in oppositionto this idea of a limited,
voluntary world government.
First one has to do with,"Ohhuman beings are so different.

(14:43):
How could we possibly unite allthese very different human
beings in a politically unifiedlimited world government?" His
response was, the majority ofhumanity has always interbred
readily.
This is what history shows us.
Also, important point, suchdifferences are not correlated

(15:04):
with how smart you are, howstupid you are, mental ability,
moral sensitivity, or whetherone has a good or bad character.
I love that he's sostraightforward about this.
And the last point he makes tohammer home one of the problems
is that he says, Antipathytowards other races is a moral

(15:27):
infirmity that tends to beprevalent more among some groups
than others." And he lists thosegroups he thinks are more
susceptible to this moralinfirmity, but the main point is
it's a moral infirmity.
That's all it is.
There is no reality to it.
There is no substance to it.
Secondly, he says psychologicalobstacles don't exist.

(15:49):
He makes a really good pointthat"A community that remains
limited in size to a number ofpeople who can know each other
personally will be too small andtoo weak to undertake the
collective enterprises that havemade the achievement of
civilization possible." Theseare the words of Arnold Toynbee.

(16:12):
Wow, it's so true.
If we want to take a magnum leapand create the kind of world
civilization that we deserve, wecan no longer afford just to be
talking to the people who arelike us, whom we already know.
We have to forge a bigger andbroader and wider union.

(16:34):
There's no technologicalbarrier, he says, to creating
such a limited world governmentbecause technology's at the
point where we can do thiseasily.
It's actually a perfect tool forwhat humanity needs today.
So our scientific andtechnological advancements are
meshing with where humanityneeds to go in terms of its

(16:54):
social advancement and its itsmove towards collective
maturity.
The next thing, which isabsolutely fascinating, is he
acknowledges that we need somekind of spiritual union.
I was very struck when I readthis.
This man was a secularist, buthe had studied world history and

(17:15):
knew about the positiveinfluences of religion in
building civilization.
In fact, he believed that veryoften religion is the driving
force in creating worldcivilizations.
But he says we need thespiritual union in order to
harmonize different social andcultural heritages that we have

(17:37):
developed independently of eachother, as we've each been
developing and evolving in ourown silos.
So now we need a force,something that can harmonize all
of these and pull them alltogether.
In particular, he pointed to thefact that we need unity of
thought as to what is right andwhat is wrong because when there

(18:01):
are fundamental differences inmoral issues then, he points
out, it's very hard to createpolitical unity.
The next thing he says is thatthe this unity of values, unity
of thought about what's rightand wrong, is not pre existent
but it's the product, the slowproduct of a gradual process.

(18:23):
And he gives examples.
He says history shows that, forinstance, missionaries won
converts over who built a newculture of a world state.
He points to the individualconversion of the Roman Emperor
Constantine to Christianity, whothen was able to implement these
moral principles across thewhole empire.

(18:46):
Friends, we're left with thechoice about what are we going
to do?
What choice are we going tomake?
Are we going to choosecollaboration, cooperation, and
deeper integration andunification in the form of a
limited world government, wherewe can engage in collective and
consultative decision making inorder to meet the greatest

(19:09):
global challenges of our time?
Or are we going to opt for thegreat refusal and stick to our
old habit of divisive feeling?
Thereby ensuring continued andescalating carnage and
devastation on a scale neverbefore seen.
We have a choice to make.

(19:30):
If you liked this material,first of all, pick up your copy
of Toynbee's book, Change inHabit, but also look for an op
ed I just wrote that's beingpicked up around the country in
the U.S.
It's called Humanity Has TwoChoices, Political Unification
or Mass Suicide.
Here's the link to one of theplaces you can find it Peace

(19:53):
Voice, peacevoice dot info dotorg.
You can go to their website tofind it.
I will bid you farewell and Ilook forward to seeing you again
a month from now.
Goodbye for now.
That's all for this episode ofReimagining Our World.

(20:14):
I'll see you back here nextmonth.
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This series is also available invideo on the YouTube channel of
the Center for Peace and GlobalGovernance, CPGG.