Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, November 18, 1994 TAG: 9411180075
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-23 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ROBIN TESKE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The Cold War was simple. It allowed us to look at the world in dichotomous terms, as a struggle between good (us), and evil (them), winning or losing, dominating or being dominated. The world was fragmented into numerous nation states, all of which sought to preserve their own ``national security,'' and didn't much care what effect their actions had on the national security of others. It was a world in which the military and technological aspects of power were emphasized. The assumption was that, through the exercise of power, it was possible to control others, to compel obedience.
The Cold War was synonymous with many aspects of modernity, a world view that arose several hundred years ago, and is often associated with such thinkers as Isaac Newton. For example, Newtonian physics thought nature was composed of ``basic building blocks,'' and that it was possible to divide the world into independently existing smallest parts, and then study those parts. The idea was that nature's fundamental units were distinct and separate, with no connection between them. The universe was seen as a vast machine, which contributed to the idea of controlling and dominating nature.
Many of the ideas of Newtonian physics have been challenged by 20th century physics, and by the new science of ecology. As Carolyn Merchant and others have written, the machine image may be giving way to something new. Reductionism is being replaced by holism, separation from nature with an emphasis on interconnection, domination and exploitation of nature with cooperation and interrelationship.
But if the modern era has ended, or is in the process of ending, what happens next? What is the so-called ``postmodern'' age? Perhaps the essence of postmodernism is that it resists categorization. Thinking is not either/or, good or evil, win/lose, but is rather both/and, win/win. Mikhail Gorbachev made a major contribution to the postmodern age in international affairs when he began to stress ``mutual security,'' rather than national security - if one side is insecure, both sides are insecure.
In postmodernism, interconnections are stressed, and an attempt is made to transcend dichotomous thinking, to move in two seemingly opposite directions simultaneously. State Department Counselor Timothy Wirth was perhaps referring to this when he said in a recent speech that the United States was dealing simultaneously with pressures up (the need to focus more on multilateralism), and pressures down (the need to focus more on local issues).
In postmodernism, control is seen as an illusion, although as Leonard Hawes has said, ``surrendering the illusion of control may be a terrifying prospect. It signifies the loss of science-based rationality as we know it.''
Perhaps what we need to do is to both expand and narrow our vision at the same time. We all should be engaged in a great debate. If the old categories no longer hold, if there are no categories, how do we understand the world? If the world must be understood as a whole, rather than as a collection of fragmented parts, what does that mean in practice? If it is no longer easy to distinguish between good and evil, what do we do? (Haitian President Aristide is good because he was democratically elected, but bad because he is allegedly unstable, and may not be committed to human rights; Bosnian Muslims are victims of human-rights violations by Serbs and Croats, but they also are committing human-rights violations themselves).
These questions are relevant for foreign policy, but they are relevant in other areas of our lives as well. And in essence the questions are spiritual, as president of the Czech Republic Vaclev Havel and others have known all along. Havel has said that ``a genuine, profound and lasting change for the better ... will have to derive from human existence, from the fundamental reconstitution of people in the world, their relationships to themselves and to each other, and to the universe.''
An old age has ended, and a new one is beginning. If we are lucky, it may be an age in which the words of the Persian poet Rumi will have some significance - `` ... eternity without beginning grasped the hand of eternity without end, and together they went to the palace of the moon ... ''
Robin Teske is an assistant professor of political science at James Madison University in Harrisonburg.
by CNB