The new state : $b Group organization the solution of popular governmentFollett, Mary Parker
Science
The new state : $b Group organization the solution of popular government
Follett, Mary Parker
Democracy; Political participation; Social psychology; State, The
WE have seen the true state emerging through the working of the
federal principle, dual in its nature: (1) created by the law of
interpenetration, the unifying of difference, and (2) representing the
multiple man in his essential nature. Through the further working of
this principle the world-state appears.
The lesson of the group is imperative for our international relations.
No “alliances,” no balance of power, no agreements, no Hague tribunals
will now satisfy us; we know that it is only by creating a genuine
community of nations that we can have stability and growth—world peace,
world progress. What are the contributions of group psychology to the
League of Nations?
There is no way out of the hell of our present European situation until
we find a method of compounding difference. Superficial moralists try to
get us to like some other nationality by emphasizing all the things we
have in common, but war can never cease until we see the value of
differences, that they are to be maintained not blotted out. The
white-man’s burden is not to make others like himself. As we see the
value of the individual, of every individual, so we must see the value
of each nation, that all are needed. The pacifists have wanted us to
tolerate our enemies and the more extreme ones to turn the other cheek
when smitten. But tolerance is intolerable. And we cannot dwell among
enemies. The ideal of this planet inhabited by Christian enemies all
turning the cheek does not seem to me a happy one. We must indeed, as
the extreme militarists tell us, “wipe out” our enemies, but we do not
wipe out our enemies by crushing them. The old-fashioned hero went out
to conquer his enemy; the modern hero goes out to disarm his enemy
through creating a mutual understanding.
The failure of international society in the past is a fact fraught with
deep significance: the differences between nations are not to be
overcome by one class of people in a country uniting with the same class
in another country. The upper classes of Petrograd, Berlin, Paris and
London have very much the same manners and habits. This has not brought
peace. Artists the world over have a common language. Workingmen have
tried to break down international barriers by assuming that their
interests were so identical that they could unite across these barriers.
But this has failed to bring peace as the other _rapprochements_ have
failed. Why? Because they are all on the wrong track. International
peace is never coming by an increase of similarities (this is the
old-fashioned crowd-philosophy); international peace is coming by the
frankest and fullest kind of recognition of our differences.
Internationalism and cosmopolitanism must not be confused. The aim of
cosmopolitanism is for all to be alike; the aim of internationalism is a
rich content of widely varying characteristic and experience.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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