The Unification Of The World – OpEd
Competition has always been a unique feature of human race. The ineradicably inherent hunger of one state to expand the tentacles of its expansive territories across the length and breadth of the globe sets the stage for the competition for the others to either yield to its supremacy or face the wrath of warfare. The fittest will survive in the waging cauldron of this inevitable showdown and the order of the world will be shaped by the hegemonic powers assuming tremendous political clout and territorial leverage.
The historical progression of the world testifies to the postulate that the nations awash with natural resources and equipped with cutting-edge military technology encountered no scruples in running amok to further swell the margins of their territorial compass. The appetite for the expansion has always been accompanied by the episodes of unspeakable bloodshed and inexplicable bloodletting. Yet the desire to extinguish the fire of warfare set on the ship of this world has led many a thinkers to carve a way through which a perpetual peace will prevail on this earth for good. Essays have been made to seek a plausible recipe that will set the world free from the ills of warfare, evil competition and usurpation and establish a global environment conducive for peace. K’ang Yu-wei, a Chinese Philosopher, in his treatise Abolishing National Boundaries and Uniting the World propounds the idea of a universal government that would ensure a permanent peace in the world by eradicating the hardships of the mankind. The writer, by resorting to several examples from the past, claims that the human race has always been trying to make unions for its convenience. He, by dent of intuition and his knowledge about the prevailing geo-political dynamics, predicts the union of different nations into diverse alliances before the formation of a single universal government. The writer holds the contention that the emergence of the conventional “states” injected into the masses an aura of patriotism that negates universal brotherhood. The urge to knock adversaries down and expand into its territories stems from the notion of nationalism reinforced by the prevalence of nation-states. This notion of nationalism further ignites the passions of states to proliferate their martial arsenal in a bid to showcase their might viz-a-viz military. A chunk of expenditure is ploughed into the business of warfare under the excuse of raising soldiers primed for combating any insurgence. The overriding intent to claim victory over the others convert them into “bloody butchers” who rob their adversaries with impunity. K’ang argues that the primary rationale behind the eruption of wars is armament which, is precipitated by the idea of nationalism. Nations, intoxicated by the frenzy of competition, equip themselves with lethal armory to subdue others. Kang proposes the idea that the process of disarmament which will ultimately cease the wars that have taken heavy toll on the world will not pan out if the nations of the world are not wedded with each other under the umbrella of one union. With the “abolishment of nationalism” and the merging of states into one union through the fibers of economy, politics and laws, the curse of wars will cease to exist and an environment lucrative for the genesis of peace will emerge. Intriguingly, several other academic attempts have been exercised to institute a global governance body which would assuage the pains of the human race and engage the global community in a concerted activity auspicious enough to bind the 7 billion occupants into the tapestry of oneness. Kishore Mahbubani in his book, The Great Convergence: Asia, the West, and the Logic of One World, envisages a universal government that will herald the cessation of bloodshed, violence and war-mongering. The writer contends that the absence of a theory of one world prevents world leaders from taking effective global action and calls upon the premiers of respective countries to ponder over the gravity of the danger looming on the horizon for the world citizenry. Echoing the same line of thinking embraced by Kang Wei, Mahbubani reiterates the notion that the nation-states in a bid to gain political mileage stoop to every act of brutality. The writer alleges that the small states spread across the Eastern and Western Hemisphere tend to examine the challenges of universal nature through the prism of their cubical national interest and the traditional units of old global social and political order, including the veritable nation-state, are proving to be less and less useful in managing these great changes. Therefore, there is an urgent need of a paradigm shift in the patterns on which the states are crafted and tailored. K’ang Yu-wei had already implicitly impeached the foundational structure of nation-states by decrying nationalism, per se, to be antithetical to the universal brotherhood. There appears to have a strong sense of resonance in ideas of both the writers in approaching the model on which the world should be governed. There is hardly a scintilla of hyperbole in the painfully astounding allegation leveled by Mahbubani that the nation-states cling on to their national interest and undermine the severity of the global challenges. The heed-seeking issues ranging from the scourges of terrorism, poverty, human trafficking, and child labour to the erratic disruptions in the climatic patterns are criminally brushed off against the petty skirmishes over territorial claims. Out of the total world GDP of 63 trillion dollars, a significant amount of 1.6 trillion dollars are squandered on the territorial defense collectively by the world economies putting the meager budget of United Nations hovering around 2.6 million dollars annually to shame. The US alone has an arsenal of 7,700 nuclear warheads along with Russian warheads spiraling to 8,500 in recent declassified reports. As soon as the states morph into an economic giant with robust military muscle, they find it justified to flout the International Conventions. The US, having being a global custodian, yet does not shrink away from violating International conventions like Biodiversity Convention, The Kyoto Protocol and law of the Sea Treaty. China disrespects the sovereign waters of other countries by staking claim to 85% of the South China Sea. The same fear is evidently articulated by K’ang Yu-wei who deemed the military training to be an unlimited waste and sought to disarm the states. The economic, social and political canvass of the world is often characterized by the upheavals and nagging disruptions owing to the nonchalance of world leaders to collectively stitch together their well-directed efforts for sustained development. Turning a blind eye to the global challenges by deferring to the national agendas over the universal causes will further embroil this tiny community of 7 billion occupants in the cesspool of violence. The march towards weaving the embroidery of a union might be strewn with a train of ordeals, seamless tribulations and unabated difficulty, but has the potency to bail the ship of this world out of the tumultuous tides of tribulation to the shores of perpetual peace and harmony.