Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 17, No. 2. March 11, 1953

[Introduction]

The thinking and the politics of today are leading us towards a massacre because they are abstracted from reality. The world has been cut in two and each half is afraid of the other. From then on everyone acts without knowledge of the wishes and the decisions of his neighbour across the street; we make our own conjectures, give no credit to what is said, make our own interpretations and frame our own conduct according to what we imagine our opponent is going to do. From that point the only possible position is the one summed up by that most stupid expression of all the ages—if you want peace, prepare for war. Triumph of abstraction? On this basis men themselves become abstractions. On this basis each man is the other man, the possible enemy; we mistrust ourselves. In my country. France. It is uncommon to meet men: in the main one meets only togs and names.

The new and admirable thing about this peace congress is that what it has brought together is men. Not diplomats, not technicians or ministers, but men of every kind, of every opinion. Not men from nowhere, of course, but Chinese, Germans, French. They all have nations and they have not come here to deny their nationalities. Quite the contrary, in fact. Only, for them their nationality is no abstract classification, but a part of their reality as men. It is the way they live and work and love and die. These are German men, Russian men. Italian men and fundamentally their nationality is simply their particular point of view about peace. In wartime nationalities become separated. Then they are nothing but permission to shoot the enemy on sight: a Frenchman is a target. Today, for the first time, they are coming together. We are meeting here not, as in the case of certain scientific congresses, in spite of our origins, but because you are German, you Vietnamese and I French. And Just as the abstract leads to conflict, so one might say that the concrete unites us. For the concrete is the totality of the bonds that unite men among themselves. And if we think simply of this totality of the bonds that unite us we shall sec that to make war on each other is a perfectly imbecile undertaking.

For you see, there have been in the past some wonderful meetings of men who wanted peace both before and during other wars, like those at Zimmerwald and Kienthal. But those men had powers and responsibilities, coming as they did as delegates of trade unions or political parties. But there are all kinds here, some who come in the name of political parties and some who come on their own. And here we are not trying to give directives to a political party, or to create one. No more are we trying to set up some great Ineffective pompous machine, as a super-State would be No! And the name of this congress says perfectly what it means—the Congress of the Peoples. We have decided not to put ourselves in the place of our governments, but to talks among ourselves without them. Some of us have even come against their wishes. And we are not thinking of setting up an abstract organisation which would give orders to the ministers of our various governments. No! But since sovereignty comes from the people, we the governed, have come here to reach agreement on our requirements, and when we go home we shall be able to express on a national basis a desire which will be at the sometime that of each people and of all peoples. Then we shall indeed see whether government is at the service of the people or people at the service of governments. No, it la not a question of putting ourselves in the place of the ministers, and people [unclear: of] still be able to make a career of [unclear: diplomacy]. But we must say to them: While you have been glaring at each other like china dogs in the United Nations and elsewhere, we, the men and women you claim to be defending, have got together and reached unity. While you have been hardening in your mutual defiance and mutual distrust, we the peoples have chosen mutual confidence; and we have seen that this is the most effective of all methods of diplomacy. If there are still people in UNO who are for thinking that the third world war will be the struggle of Good against Evil, we tell them they are wrong; for the peoples have seen each other, spoken with each other, touched each other and have agreed that under any circumstances the war which is being prepared for them is an Evil, and that under any circumstances the peace that they shall make is a Good. No more will they send us off crusading.