English 
Español 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHBoxRdd08o
Peter Kopa, Prague 1.4.18
The game of ‘Rise and Fall of Civilizations
Political hegemony seems to be a law of history, by virtue of which a power, such as Rome, has been the leading political power for more than eight hundred years in the entire geographical area of the Mediterranean. Previously the hegemony belonged to the Greeks, to the Persians to the Egyptians and so on. There were as many hegemonies in Asia, of which the oldest are China and then Japan. Also, in pre-Columbian America we can observe these ups and downs of kingdoms, civilizations and cultures: it is what in technical terms is called the ‘Rise and Fall of Civilizations’, which is the title of a book written by N. Hagger, which had a great diffusion in its time. The Holy Roman Empire, which laid the foundations of what is now Europe, imposed its authority for almost a thousand years.
After the Second World War, the United States established its hegemony throughout the world, something that had not been possible before because they did not yet have the technical means to mark their own presence, such as weapons, ships and planes. Before, British world hegemony was very important for the formation of the countries that are now members of the Commonwealth, but its protagonism was gradually passed to the USA since 1945.
The American hegemony was inspired by the rationalist, the religious-puritanian and the liberal currents, based on the rule of law, the human rights included in its own Constitution and on the respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of all nations. Closely linked to these principles has always been the democratic system of government, as conceived in the USA. To this end, under the initiative of this country, the United Nations, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization were created. And all this was protected by the American military power, based on a network of alliances the most relevant European and Asian countries. This world order, which is now being eroded, was based on both political-doctrinal principles and military force.
Russia’s hegemonic ambition has been reborn with force with Putin, who seeks to update the ancestral hegemonic zeal of the Czars, who have always been considered – on the basis of their own theocratic system of government – as those destined by divine providence to reign over that empire in the East that appeared after the schism in the West, a thousand years ago. The Russian political-military movement in Ukraine and elsewhere confirms this tendency, which is more dangerous than it seems for the tranquility of Europe, because Russia still sees the former countries of the Warsaw Pact as its geographical area of influence, analogous to how the USA looks at the countries of the Caribbean, and, a little less, at all of Latin America.
Today, almost thirty years after the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union, which had always tried to impose its own hegemony on the world, the American-style world order is being called into question, mainly because President Trump’s United States sees things differently and also because the way of thinking has changed. Globalism is losing ground to political demands that seek to enhance the very cultural personality of nations, which either take the form of populist movements or manifest themselves as tendencies opposed to elites. All this contributes to the fact that today’s world is a conglomerate of a rather regional order. The Brexit is in this sense a great paradigm
Globalism in retreat
At the same time the cold war is re-emerging, but no longer bipolar, as before, between Russia and the USA, but multi-polar, between the USA, China and Russia. And in this game of political poker, Europe is looking for its place, well aware that its population and economic wealth demand a much more important and stronger coordinated military power, in order to be able to position itself as the fourth world potential. The crises of the Middle East act in this game of power as a provocative revulsive, which continuously distributes the cards of political power with constellations of circumstances that are changing with unexpected speed. At the same time, the ‘enfant terrible’ of North Korea adds to this dance a note of continuous stress, since in the background there is always the danger of atomic war, which is equivalent to a war without winners, a war of total reciprocal extermination.
Towards a new conception of the ‘Rise and Fall of Civilizations
It is said that history is the great teacher of the people. But the persuasion that man never learns from it is also widespread in intellectual circles, falling again and again into the same pit of his own fallibility, into the pit of his irresistibly light and whirling being. Gradually, the conviction is opening up that the blame for the disasters in history does not lie mainly with the great systems, nor with the rulers, but with the individuals, whose personal moral behavior projects its consequences on the group in which they live, determining political options. And these have been, are and will be so much better, according to the quality of the projection of personal moral behavior.
An example from life itself, which is happening anywhere in the world: Jeff, married with small children, at a certain point begins to have adulterous affairs. This breaks down his moral principles, passing him off as a lax conscience. As a public official, he begins to accept money in exchange for authorizations. This bad example corrupts his wife, who, not wanting to separate from her adulterous husband, seeks her own adventures. In the end, the children receive the impact of neglect, and at puberty, in addition to other vices, they turn to drugs… Now let’s imagine that many people in a village do not seek to overcome their weaknesses either. The result is the widespread moral rot that ends up distorting the political government because it is composed, in part, of personnel with a very low moral profile. In the end, administrative corruption will appear, and then the indebtedness and the growing dependence of the country on foreign creditors that will end up turning them into puppets in their games of world influence.
The big question posed by this real situation is this: how to make citizens acquire an adequate moral profile, because the State has neither competence nor capacity for this. Historically this great service has been given by the Church, which through the centuries has managed to turn the savage into a gentleman, creating a vast culture of good art, values and ethical behavior patterns. If this service were to succumb, the peoples would also succumb, returning to barbarism, but with atomic bombs in their hands, instead of spears and arrows.
