Cornelius Castorladls
DEFENDING THE WEST
"Man is born free and is everywhere in chains," wrote
Rousseau. No: no natural law or divine plan causes man to be born
free or not. But, ifhe is in effect everywhere in chains it is because he
is born amidst chains ready to bind him, chains that educate him so
that he asks to have them put on. Immaterial chains above all, which
are not forged by one social group in particular. No single group is
capable of keeping guard twenty-four hours a day over a society
whose vast majority rejects such domination.
That domination derives from an establishment, from estab–
lished law, from meanings and mores already instituted and sanc–
tioned . The most "egalitarian" savages are at least as alienated or
preconditioned as were Roman slaves or medieval serfs. None of
these groups could think that the social structure could be questioned
and changed. Almost everywhere, almost always, socialized human
beings - who would not be human without that socialization - have
not been able to exist except by completely interiorizing the estab–
lishment, by completely submitting themselves to it. This naturally
entails thinking that the institutions of
others
are necessarily inferior,
strange, monstrous, and diabolical.
Being heteronomous is the fate of man and reveals the intangi–
ble nature of extant institutions, the beliefs of the tribe. It has been,
almost everywhere, almost always, the reality of human societies.
That condition - "normal" over the course of most of history–
was only really broken in Europe.
It
was only in Europe, in Greece
at first and later in western Europe, that a society was created that
was capable of discussing itself and questioning itself.
It
was here
that such questions as, "What is just?" or, "What is true?" arose and
disturbed society, not as disputes for court philosophers or as inter–
pretations of a sacred text, but as questions that shaped social strug–
gle and political activity.
It
is for this reason that social strife has not
been blandly tolerated: it has led to revolts that go on for decades in-
Editor's note: This article appeared in
Vuelta
with "And Which Latin America?" by
Octavio Paz, in June 1983, as an extended version of an essay first published in
Le Montie.
It
was translated from the French by Alfred J . MacAdam.
