(c) Some Non-economic Aspects of the Maintenance of Peace (1) The Limitation of Sovereignty Fundamentally, permanent peace means the limitation of sovereignty in international economic relations. The concept is not novel. The application may be. The smaller or weaker states were shorn of unlimited sovereignty by the great powers through the establishment of protectorates and of spheres of influence, through the neutralization of territory, and the guarantee of integrity. It is the great powers now that must impose restrictions upon such elements of their own sovereignty as may lead to international license. Is there any parallel? There are several. The political theories of Rousseau assumed the "natural rights" of the individual which at some time or other were surrendered in part and transferred to a common will, the sovereign state. Again, men had to socialize their lives in prehistoric days in defense against beasts. The motive of defense against other dangers, less tangible than wild beasts, led to the surrender of the sovereignty of the individual colonial governments in order to "form a more perfect union," the United States. So also the Swiss Confederation, the German Empire, the South African Union and other political aggregations resulted from the surrender of sovereignty rights by their constituent parts. As a defense against the common danger of war the nations of the world will have to surrender those economic rights, that part of their sovereignty that affects international economic relations, the unlimited exercise of which must breed wars. In resolving the old antithesis between liberty and authority, between freedom and power, the state must content itself with liberty within the law as the individual has had to do. Freedom without restraint, for nations as for individuals, constitutes license and a source of conflict. (2) The Ethics of the Limitation of Sovereignty What, shall we say, is the test of an international economic policy that will prevent wars? It is, as given above, Kant's categorical imperative, for each nation so to act that its conduct may be accepted as the universal standard. Any policy in trade that cannot work if adopted by all countries must be prohibited for any one country which seeks its own advantage in this way. It means that Germany's potash, for instance, must no longer be sold at higher prices abroad than at home, her copper must not be bought at a price under the world market price, her goods must not be dumped into competitors' countries, that all those trade practices which cannot be adopted by all nations, which cannot be universalized, may no longer be followed by any one country. In the words of President Wilson, no nation may ask for itself what it would not ask for all the others. By such tests, however, the Paris Resolutions and the scheme of British preference must go by the board. (3) Is the Present Economic Order Bankrupt? Does the application of this principle require the establishment of a new social order? The present economic order is based on the driving force of individual initiative, the stimulus to progress not only in economic matters but in all other spheres of human activity. Recognition is the determination of achievement. Slowly and increasingly the individual is being subjected to social control. The struggle between individual and society is not to be deplored any more than is the balancing of conflicting forces in all living organisms. Life is struggle. Spencer defines life as continuous adjustment to environment. The present system normally worked. It developed the world's resources. It spanned its continents with railroads. It laned the ocean with ships. It connected the seven seas by cables. It knit the cities by telegraph. It banished isolation by wireless. It gave us control over matter. It provided the machinery for increased social control. It clothed and fed the average man like the kings of previous ages. It increased productivity. It satisfied new human needs and multiplied new demands. It made possible raising the standards of living of civilized mankind and afforded an opportunity for the higher life to larger numbers. Is this force bankrupt? Has the present economic order outlived its day? Admittedly in lands that are highly developed, a large measure of restraint of the individual is possible without retarding the development of the world's resources and the consequent satisfaction of human needs. In fact, uniform restrictive economic measures cannot be applied everywhere, simultaneously, or according to formula. Our economic life does not move on an even front all over the world. The various regions of the world progress in Indian file rather than all abreast. Society advances in a procession, with the civilized countries in the vanguard and the undeveloped peoples in the rear. Our body of law, therefore, reflecting economic conditions can not be kept even in all countries. No single social scheme can apply equally well to all. To be sound our economic development must be gradual, as all organic change is. The advantage that accrues to the race is the possibility of capitalizing the successful progress of some countries and of avoiding the pitfalls in the experience of others. Society as a whole may gradually adopt the results of successful experiments in new forms of social organization. When all the regions of the world are more nearly equally developed perhaps the dream of the radical of to-day will have come true. Those who have faith in the ethical possibilities as well as in the pragmatic values of the present order must vindicate their belief. The opponents of the present system claim that capitalism as an economic system caused the war. The present order is on trial. Unless it can not only work but avoid a catastrophe like that experienced, unless it can adjust itself continuously instead of convulsively, it is in danger of going under; it should go under. If, as Norman Angell put it, the alternative is Utopia or Hell, the world will insist on testing Utopia before committing itself to the Hell of war. The standpatters would provide for war. The Bolsheviki would recreate a world in six days. Liberalism insists that the dilemma does not exist. An economic organization of nations to preserve peace will prove the fact. CHAPTER II NATIONALISM AND INTERNATIONALISM IN COMMERCE A. Commerce Before and During the War (i) Pre-War Conditions (a) Distribution of the world's resources The conduct of the economic blockade and the consideration of an after-war policy by the several countries have led to a world inventory. The French particularly have prepared statistical tables showing the distribution of the world's resources among the Allied states, the neutrals, and the Central Powers. Compilations of this character strengthened the determination of the Allies to prosecute the war vigorously and also led to the formulation of a program of economic war after the war. One of the French tables,' based on figures for the latest year available, or for the average of the last four years, is given on p. 50. The extent to which the non-Germanic powers control industrial raw materials is evident from statistics of the imports by Germany during the years preceding the war, when she had unimpeded access to all ports. The value of German imports in 1896 and 1912, in thousand marks, was as follows: 'An article in Opinion, Paris, by Alfred de Tarde; also Echo de Paris, May 1, 1918. |