GEORGE LlCHTHEIM
are concerned about the fate of a particular civilization: that of which
we are the heirs. The question what sort of future lies before us is
quite specifically the question whether our civilization will survive. In
a sense this is obvious, but one needs to see the implication: if we identify
the continuance of civilized existence with the survival of
our
civilization,
we are making a statement about European and Western history as
being in some sense unique. Such a claim is implausible unless it can
be shown that the "Westernization" of the world, now going on before
our eyes, is more than an accident due to passing historic advantages.
This is an instance of what may be called "grasping the logic of the
process." It calls for something more than the weighing of pros and cons.
Either our categories-which, needless to say, are themselves historical
--equip us for a proper understanding of the concrete totality known as
"history," or they do not.
If
they fail, we in turn shall fail to influence the
minds of people belonging to other cultures. That, so far as I can see,
is the only pragmatic test possible in the matter.
Concretely, then, it is here affirmed that Western history possesses
a paradigmatic value in virtue of certain traits which are currently in
process of being imitated by the remainder of the world. Sociologists
and economic historians are unlikely to find such a statement surprising.
They may even regard it as the kind of truism that is hardly worth
repeating. The relativistic mode of thought, which treats Western history
as a singularity among others, is more common among cultural anthro–
pologists than among scholars whose professional work is centered upon
the material process whereby the globe is currently being unified. They
know to their cost that Westernization is both urgently desired and
actively resisted: desired for its economic benefits, resisted because it
involves the radical uprooting of archaic cultural patterns and tradi–
tional ways of life. From a strictly European viewpoint it may be
doubted whether the transformation now in progress is worth all the
bother, since it is unlikely to produce any very exciting cultural con–
quests. But that is water over the dam; the decision is out of our hands.
We have let the genie out of the bottle (if I may vary the metaphor)
and must take the consequences, however disagreeable or unnerving.
And after all it is only right and proper that the European laboratory
should be thrown open, especially now that the period of experimenta–
tion is over and done with.
In
future the Europeans will take a back seat
and watch the others at the perilous game of employing the material and
intellectual tools that have been fashioned for them. Let us hope they
will not blow themselves up.
