In this article I would like to briefly describe the causes of war according to Aldous Huxley – the British philosopher.
Huxley was profoundly influenced by Eastern Philosophy and the teachings of Christianity. According to him – “Our present economic, social and international arrangements are based, on large measure, upon organised lovelessness.”
According to Huxley this attitude of lovelessness leads to our exploiting nature (instead of living according to its laws) and our economic arrangements are such that relations within our society are based on coercion. The process has been accelerated over the past couple of centuries by the development of industrial techniques and science. This has led to an over developed capital goods industry and the concentration of economic power in the hands of a small minority. The majority of the people in society are comprised of migrant workers who are easily coerced by the government since they are without property.
But what is the reason such an unequal and flawed social arrangement is tolerated?
The reason this situation is tolerated is that the present system leads to efficiency in waging wars. It can be seen that the most powerful nations of the past two centuries (the UK, the nations of Europe and the USA) are organised on capitalistic lines with a strong industrial base.
It is because of the fear of being invaded and having your freedoms and properties taken away by a hostile nation state. Think India being invaded by China and Pakistan in the present case.
Nobody questions the fact that China has the right to invade India if it so pleases.
Hence the root cause of organised lovelessness is that any sovereign nation state has the right to coerce its members to steal and kill in the largest possible scale. Because of the threat of war preparations of war are required which is only possible effectively in an industrially developed nation.
For my part I see no solution to this problem other than a world government with a monopoly of armed force. This is not going to happen in the foreseeable future. For the time being (as the English proverb says) Live and let live.
For more on Aldous Huxley on the subject of war please do a Google search – “Aldous Huxley on war”.
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