BY PROF. G. N. SARMA, M.A.
(D. A. V. College, Sholapur)
PEACE is a subject of eternal significance, and has
to be thought out by every individual, for the conquest of peace depends upon
what, in terms of will, each individual is capable of contributing. But no
contribution in this direction is possible unless the concept of peace is
clearly understood, and human conduct guided and regulated by such an
understanding.
The beginnings of the peace movement may be traced
to the farthest limits of human history. From those remote times it has had a
steady and certain development through the forms of human association. History
is not a chronicle of war but is the record of peace. War is only the question
which imperfect human nature flings at those who would seek to realise the
ideal of peace all at once. The evolution of peace appears, therefore, to be an
unmistakable fact, though it may be delayed by the un-preparedness of man.
History may appear to reveal war as a fundamental
fact. Nor does a view of present-day society afford any grounds for optimism.
It is true that the dimensions of the world are shrunk owing to industrial and
scientific revolutions, but it is also true that primitive passions,
which before were dispersed and comparatively innocuous, have now
acquired a hitherto unknown intensity and centre round the forces of
Nationalism, Sovereignty, and Imperialism. There are further difference of an
ideological character between peoples of various States.
These facts, however, have to be placed in their
proper perspective. They have brought peoples together to some extent, but they
now divide men, for they are inadequate to the facts of present-day life. They
must be transcended in order that peace might be achieved. In such a context
there cannot be any ground for despair. Arguing, again, from the point of view
of ultimate ends, one finds that humanity is definitely advancing towards the
establishment of peace. From the purely institutional point of view also, we
find that there is an increasing realisation of the need to banish war from
human society and to set up a substitute for arbitrament by force of arms.
The evolution of peace, yes, but what is the kind
of peace that is being evolved? Is there any clear perception of the nature and
meaning of peace? We find that peace has so far been imperfectly understood as
an absence of war or as the preservation of the status quo, instead of
its being conceived in terms of will and consciousness, as something positive
and dynamic. Peace ultimately is a challenge to the spiritual nature of man.
The evolution of peace cannot be left to the painfully slow and uncertain
forces of history: they have to be directed towards the consciously realised
end by human effort. The failings of institutions so far built for securing
peace are a call to such effort.
The United Nations Organisation represents the
aspiration of mankind for a stable and peaceful world, and forms the
culmination of attempts at creating a peace-machinery. But mere aspirations,
howsoever lofty, will not do. The institutions that we build ought to be
embodiments of our ideas and aspirations. They should not, in being actualised,
suffer mutilation or distortion. Institutions divorced from ideas are phantom
bodies; ideas divorced from institutions and practice are bodiless
abstractions.
One of the fundamental bases of the United Nations
Organisation is the sovereignty of the members. No attempt is made to transcend
national sovereignty, and evolve a higher authority in which national
sovereignty may find its true meaning and fulfillment. In a world of sovereign
national units, the only method of maintaining peace can be collective
security. (Articles 41, 42, 43 of the U.N.O. Charter). Without a collective
sovereign, even the most solemn agreement can have no validity or binding
force. The absence of a collective sovereign indicates a glaring deficiency in
the will to peace. As Hobbes put it, “Covenants, without the sword; are but
words, and of no strength to secure a man at all”...“The bonds of words are too
weak to bridle men’s ambition, avarice, anger, and other passions, without the
fear of some coercive power.
The dominant position assumed by the ‘Big Five’ is
another notable feature of the United Nations Organisation. Unanimity among
these Powers is essential in all decisions on matters other than procedural.
Such unanimity implies a fundamental agreement among the Great Powers;
experience, however, has not revealed any common ground between them. In such
circumstances, unanimity becomes meaningless and insistence on it results in
obstruction. The power of veto vested in members of the ‘Big Five’ is an
unmitigated evil. It is a revival of the librium veto of the Polish
Constitution of the eighteenth century. The United Nations Organisation would
never be able to accomplish its work unless the ‘veto rule’ be abolished. The
enormous influence exercised by the Great Powers invites further criticism.
They would exert their utmost to preserve their overwhelming position in the
United Nations, to see that their monopoly of power is unbroken. There might
even be a conflict between the Great Powers for exclusive, unquestioned, and
absolute predominance.
Moreover it is in the nature of all post-war
settlements to maintain the status quo and to promote interests of the
victors by eliminating possibilities of future conflict. Peace is understood in
a negative sense, as the absence of War. We know, however, that even when there
is no actual war, there may be an atmosphere of suspicion and nervous
hostility, fraught with possibilities of conflict. Peace cannot be the absence
of war, any more than beauty can be the absence of ugliness, or health the
absence of disease. It is something positive, an affirmative quality.
No mere maintenance of the status quo, in
yet another sense, can be equivalent to peace. A settlement effected and
maintained by armed powers is external and formal, legal rather than moral,
based on force rather than on consciousness. Peace is positive; it is also a
self-imposed and consciously defined way of life. Equating peace with
settlement effected at any particular time is fallacious, again, in a
fundamental sense. It would mean that the final patterns of peace have been
woven, that it is achieved for all time in its ultimate perfection. Peace is
not a static concept; it is dynamic and evolves with the evolution of the human
will. Attempts at peace making have so far been unsuccessful; the concert of
Europe was shattered on the rocks of nationalism, the League of Nations on those
of national sovereignty and imperialist ambitions. The United Nations
Organisation is subject to the same forces and might well collapse under the
strain. It has to subdue not only these hostile elements, but it has also to
resolve what seem to be irreconcilable ideological differences between its
members.
Humanity has taken slow but sure steps in the
direction of peace. The failure or inadequacy of the attempts so far made must
inspire right excretion and serve to indicate the spirit in which the future
has to be faced. History is the revelation of the spirit working for peace and
for the ultimate unification of mankind. It began with the urge towards
corporate life, and, in the seemingly uncertain process of human development,
corporate life has been assuming larger and larger dimensions. The present
organisation of mankind into Nation-States represents the highest stage in the
development of communal living and points to a transcendence of nationality.
There is a dynamic law of life as well as of institutions. Nationalism in its
crude, militant form is a menace to civilisation. But it must be remembered
that it is a stage in the progress of humanity, and as such possesses spiritual
value. What we at present condemn are frequently the ossification’s of outworn
purposes. An institution is not merely what it is. It points to something
beyond itself. As an embodiment of present purpose, and as scaffolding for the
future, an institution like the Nation is no mean inheritance. Distortions of nationalism were
possible, because that to which the nation pointed was lost sight of. Therefore
man voluntarily shut himself in prison walls, and saw not what awaited him
beyond. Every aspect of man’s life has to be interpreted telelogically, that
is, in terms of ultimate purpose. So interpreted, nationalism is the last step
before the attainment of a world community. At a particular stage of evolution,
a certain numbness creeps over institutions, when they need to the renovated
and transformed. Impatience with their shortcomings would lead to their
rejection, and along with it the rejection of the values which they embody.
Similarly, there is a great deal of
misunderstanding regarding sovereignty. Sovereignty is a much-maligned word.
Recent writers have regarded it as an arid concept which ought to be
surrendered in the interests of political theory. In the well-intentioned
enthusiasm which inspires many of the tirades against sovereignty, thinkers
have invested it with implications which are quite foreign to it. “I would
point out to you,” says Professor Harold Laski, “….what is meant by the
political consequences of Sovereignty. The State is irresponsible.” Sovereignty
is a legal attribute of the State and by no means implies irresponsibility. The
exercise of legal sovereignty is hedged round with the limitations imposed by
public opinion, by the customs, traditions and conventions of the community. No
one would be more eloquent in pointing out these limitations than Prof. Laski
himself. Yet, the conclusion seems somehow to follow that, in spite of these
restrictions, Sovereignty can be equated with irresponsibility!
Sovereignty is an attribute of the Nation-State;
the law of transcendence which applies to the Nation-State must apply to its
attribute as well. Sovereignty will then be transferred to an organisation more
comprehensive that the nation. It must not be forgotten that world order and
world authority are correlative, each implying the other. The defect of the
peace projects so far formulated is that they have not created a world
sovereign. The demand for peace is also a demand for sovereignty, not of
exclusive groups, but of the widest organisation of which mankind is at any
time capable.
International law, which alone can secure peace, is
likewise misinterpreted. It is said to have no validity, for it is not backed
up by a sovereign power. It can be flouted by any national sovereign who, by
virtue of sovereign authority, can create law and enforce it. This distinction
fails to take into account the innumerable extra-legal forces which profoundly
influence the operation of law properly so called. Moreover, law represents, at
any particular moment, that part of social morality which has obtained State
approval,–the other remains yet un-recognised by the Sovereign, but is
nevertheless the law of the community. Even if we grant that international law
is nothing more than international morality, we must admit that it is a
preliminary to the creation of a Law of the Nations.
The absence of a sovereign who can enforce
international law is no argument against the possibility of peace. The common
spiritual allegiance of various communities is enough guarantee for its
obedience. “Why,” asks Lord Haldane, “if sittlichkeit is observed on a vast
scale within the State without any question of force; cannot it be so between
nations? Cannot nations form a group or community among themselves, within
which a habit of looking to common ideals may grow sufficiently strong to
develop a General Will and to make the binding power of these ideals a reliable
sanction for their obligations to each other?” We could not achieve a General
Will within our community if the individual will were not capable of
transcending itself. The process of transcendence cannot stop at the national
will for, will is dynamic and seeks ever widening circles of identity.
The task of the future is therefore to create a
will to peace. Attempts to secure peace have so far been directed towards the
creation of institutions rather than towards the generation of the
consciousness without which they can have no meaning. The problem of peace,
therefore, is a problem of will and of consciousness. The desire for peace has
ever been present: human history is the expression of that aspiration. But the
desire, though widespread, is not conscious and defined. This vague aspiration
has to be transformed into an energy of the will. The institutions which
mankind has evolved must be vitalised with the living force of consciousness.
It is in terms of the human mind that an answer to the question of peace is to
be found. As the preamble, to the constitution of the United Nations
Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation puts it, “Since wars begin
in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must
be constructed.”