Dear Georgie,

You said you were undoubtedly a world citizen and also English. That's no contradiction.  Very few world citizens are brought up equipped with anything other than some large national language which they use to communicate with everyone else.  Usually that language comes with a culture - Francophone, Hispanic, American, for example - and so all of us start out from some base or other.  We do not usually spend out formative years with a grasp of global culture:  that comes with time and experience.

But just as we can choose between right and wrong - something we learn about inside our society - so we can choose between narrowness and breadth. We can decide to be nationalistic or we can accept our humanity and make known our world citizenship.  We do not have to renounce our culture to do that :  we need to recognize that it is an essential part of everyone to have a base rooted in the society that above all gave us language, for language is one of the distinguishing marks of humanity.

However, it is the diversity of human cultures and the blending of that diversity which leads to the richness and amplitude of our earth and human history.  If we all spoke only one language, whichever it was, the world community would be far poorer.  And equally, if we all pretended to be of one mind, rather than individuals with different tastes, views and experiences, the whole race would lose immensely.  It is the total of our different ideas and feelings that creates human culture, not the sum total of a mindless adherence to one set pattern, the ideal of the autocrat and the fascist.

So how do we reconcile the need for us to be different, even of different nationalities, with the need to transcend nationalism ?  The simple answer is - by abandoning exclusivity.  The deadliest aspect of nationalism comes with the pernicious doctrine that it is all or nothing, the myth that the model citizen is one who believes in 'my country right or wrong' and exalts his own nation above all other groups - family, friends, city and other nations.  That is what has doomed so many in the 20th and previous centuries to lives of conflict and conquest, mayhem and misery.

The human way is otherwise.  It is to see ourselves as part of many groups, many communities.  We may live in a village, and feel ourselves also citizens of the neighbouring town:   at the same time we have ties to the county and perhaps to our region of the country.  We are now, if European, likely to have reasons for feeling part of a continental unity and even part of a still larger whole, while still recognizing our part as world citizens.

It all boils down, in the end, to loyalty.  We have feelings of responsibility to our family, our locality, our country and beyond.  To be human means to have social ties:   living in community with others evokes the sense of loyalty that makes society cohesive and enables it to function effectively.  Without that sense the whole society suffers.  But the way to make it a practical proposition in the 21st century is to recognize that the size of the community  that will make sense for its citizens is no longer what was suitable in the 18th or 19th centuries. We must adapt to life in a a world that is one as it has never been before.

Chinese science, Russian literature, Indian architecture, Arab poetry, English history, Italian painting, Greek philosophy, Jewish religion,  the traditions of the Basque, Catalan, Tirolese, Yoruba and other peoples; these and a multitude of lesser or greater inheritances, swell the human sum of civilization.  If we were to imagine a single human civilization, which is not improbable, it would need to embrace all these and more, because during the coming century, when the new global civilization is being forged, there will be further creations to be brought within its ambit.

So ... although an auxiliary non-national language would be of benefit, by lifting that oppression by English, which is steam-rollering other linguistic traditions and may finish by conquering the world, we cannot rely on one  being adopted.  We must however, not imagine that the likely supremacy of  the English language will lead to the dominance of English ideas.  Already the dominant language is American rather than English and as it becomes used by a majority of non-native English speakers, the inevitability is that, like Latin in antiquity, it will be swallowed up in a vast sea of dialectical and fragmented linguistic communities, which will reflect their own traditions and culture rather than the original language of the European off-shore islanders.

That seems to me unfortunate, but to revert to our original question, you will not be asked to abandon your nationality because you are a world citizen.  It may have that effect for some outside this country, if they choose,  as immigrant Americans did in large numbers in the  19th and early 20th century, to abandon their native culture and become part of a melting-pot.  But my guess is that  within a generation or two there will be a massive rejection of such paths by native Chinese, Indian and Russian speakers.  Then the battle may recommence and a neutral second language will appear more necessary than ever.

This very considerable problem is one that will concern us more and more as the century proceeds.

In his plenary speech at the State of the World Forum (4-10 Sept 2000), a parallel event to the UN Millennium Assembly, Vaclav HAVEL called for direct global elections, saying the new bicameral chamber would then create global legislation. He called for a change of paradigm - from global diplomacy to global democracy.

(…) What will this world, and the United Nations, look like a hundred years from now ?

First of all, it should probably quickly change from a scene of clashes among particular interests of various states into a platform of joint, solidarity based, decision-making - by the whole of humankind - on how best to organize our stay on this planet.

Even more definitely, it should transform itself from a large community of governments, diplomats and officials into a joint institution for each inhabitant of this planet - who would all see it as their very own Organization for which they spend money not only in order that it defend them as individuals but also in order that, on the authority of the people, it looks for ways toward a lasting well-being of the humanity and toward a genuine quality of life.

Such a United Nations would probably have to rest on two pillars: one constituted by an assembly of equal executive representatives of  individual countries, resembling the present plenary, and the other consisting of a group elected directly by the globe's population in which the number of delegates representing individual nations would, thus, roughly correspond to the size of the nations.  These two bodies would create and guarantee global legislation.

President Bouteflika of Algeria also spoke about the need for greater democracy in international relations, saying

While democracy is widely promoted as a model for internal relations, it recedes more and more in the international order.

Later, commenting on the principle of humanitarian intervention he added that:

The international community must give itself the means to intervene when tragic situations demand it.  But it must do so within the framework of rules made democratically and according to procedures developed in broad consultation, not be left to the appreciation and the unilateral will of the strongest who would thereby be free to impose upon the weaker his truth, his sole truth.

This is why I consider that humanitarian intervention is inseparable from the demands for greater democracy in international bodies and in international relations, which is the only way to avoid the abuses and potential drifts which would perpetuate and entrench the present unfair global balance of power.

President Bouteflika is former President of the UN General Assembly and immediate past President of the Organization of Africa Unity.  In July 2000, during his mandate at the OAU, the historical decision to unite the entire continent of Africa in the United States of Africa was taken in Algiers.  The plan is for a common parliament for the entire continent, a common currency, a common court of justice etc.

Maximo Kalaw, Executive Director of the Earth Council said in response to my comments in the session about the Earth Charter, 'We need to globalise democracy and democratise globalisation.'

The World Constitution Project will culminate in a conference supported by the Swiss government, to be held in Geneva toward the end of 2001.  People attending the conference will include activists, government officials of all levels, businesspeople, and constitutional scholars.

… j’ai particulièrement apprécié l’originalité du texte de G. Krassovsky. C’est une étude qui s’oppose au point de vue général, mais qui me paraît sans hypocrisie et contenant beaucoup de vérité.

Quand l’auteur interprète l’Evangile du pharisien et du publicain et dit le faire « quitte à être mal vu par tous les chrétiens », moi je suis croyante chrétienne et je ne suis pas loin de l’approuver, d’autant que le pharisien ne se glorifie pas lui-même de ses bonnes actions comme de mérites personnels, mais en reporte le mérite à Dieu : « O Dieu, je te rends grâce de ce que… »

Simplement, je pense que la morale qu’il tire du récit n’est pas exactement celle que voulait démontrer Jésus. Certes il ne s’agit pas de nier la valeur des actes et de dire que seule compte l’opinion que l’on a de soi, mais seulement - à mon humble avis, je ne suis pas Docteur de’Eglise – de dire qu’il ne faut jamais se contenter du bien que l’on a fait, et toujours rester conscient de ce que l’on devrait faire en plus. Et puis, c’est peut-être surtout une consolation à tout homme, qui forcément sait qu’il a des imperfections, pour lui laisser entendre qu’il lui sera pardonné, comme à la brebis perdue (cela ne veut pas dire que les 99 autres ne sont pas aimées) et comme au fils prodigue (dont le frère est blâmé non d’avoir toujours été un bon fils mais de céder à la jalousie).

Bref, cet article m’a fait réfléchir.

Nous sommes tous mortels, c'est la loi de la nature. Pourquoi ne pas profiter de cette dernière et ultime occasion pour faire connaître l’idéal qui a conduit notre vie? Afficher sa qualité de CdM dans un avis d'obsèques ou de décès, trop peu y pensent, et l’inscrire en lettres d’or sur sa pierre tombale c’est encore mieux.

Voilà un affichage qui va durer longtemps. Chaque CdM devrait donner des consignes en ce sens à son entourage. Une façon de "mourir utile" en léguant un message d’espoir aux générations futures.

… Il n’y a pas d’exemple dans l’histoire linguistique de l’humanité que le marché des biens ne se double pas d’un marché du langage. La globalisation soutenue par Internet, vient d’opérer en quelques années, de façon galopante, la mondialisation de l’anglo-saxon américain. On peut regretter les relents d’impérialisme de cette opération. Il est vain de penser s’y opposer. La partie est déjà jouée…