"Leaving the leftward political tilt of the UN aside, the most fundamental problem with the effort is the unwillingness of national governments to relinquish any real measure of their own sovereignty."
But the leftward political tilt of the US cannot be put aside: a fundamental REASON to not relinquish sovereignty is fear of the evil that would then be imposed. We've seen that in both UN agencies and the European Union.
My own project is Fr. Owen Francis Dudley: as was common at the end of World War II, he was initially hopeful about the UN--but it was an irrational, if widely shared, hope.
As somebody who was very much pre-Vatican II (d. 1952), he was absolutely clear about the centrality of Christ and His Church: why would he, nor any other Catholic, have hopes for a body primarily made up of non-Christian nations? Indeed, nations actually hostile to Christianity?
The quote from St. Thomas is the most excellent final word - For peace is not sought in order to the kindling of war, but war is waged in order that peace may be obtained. Therefore even in waging war, cherish a spirit of the peacemaker, that, by conquering those whom you attack, you may lead them back to the advantages of peace. Thank you for finding this and sharing it with us.
Also I am struck by the sentence "that burden is typically borne by the nation’s poor people, not its political leaders." The poor always suffer more, not only from war, but from all kinds of natural disasters and plagues, starvation and dispossession. May God have mercy on us!
Some very interesting thoughts for reflection in this substack.
Economic sanctions have had limited impact in many situations. How about the more recent imposition of tariffs or threats of tariffs? Not necessarily instead of war, but to bend other countries to our will.
For non-violence to successfully counter violence the party of violence has to have a moral sense of right and wrong. As others have said, England at the time of Gandhi had that moral sense.
Gandhi had also said that the Jews should have practiced non-violent resistance to the Nazis. There is no reason to believe that would have worked.
Also, in the 1960’s with MLK there were a significant number of people in the United States with a moral sense.
I remember reading long ago about Solzhenitsyn being transported to the Gulag. Along the Way he was put into a prison for some time waiting for further transportation. He went on a hunger strike. The warden eventually came to see him and said, “I do not know why you are doing this. I am the only one who knows, and I don’t care.”
For non-violence to work, the opposition has to care.
re: I do not know why you are doing this. I am the only one who knows, and I don’t care! I think that hunger strikes or other forms of non-violent resistance only work against a people/regime that has a sense of decency - or a memory of it.
You're exactly right about the requirements for successful non-violent resistance. Those in resistance need to make a real commitment, but those they're resisting have to care. If a regime is willing to hand out more and more brutal punishment to resisters, the resistance will fail. Non-violence succeeds if it awakens consciences. Either it awakens the consciences of the oppressors, so that they change their policies, or it awakens enough other people so that the resistance grows, to a point where there aren't enough jail cells to hold them or police to arrest them. That's a very tall order.
"Leaving the leftward political tilt of the UN aside, the most fundamental problem with the effort is the unwillingness of national governments to relinquish any real measure of their own sovereignty."
But the leftward political tilt of the US cannot be put aside: a fundamental REASON to not relinquish sovereignty is fear of the evil that would then be imposed. We've seen that in both UN agencies and the European Union.
My own project is Fr. Owen Francis Dudley: as was common at the end of World War II, he was initially hopeful about the UN--but it was an irrational, if widely shared, hope.
As somebody who was very much pre-Vatican II (d. 1952), he was absolutely clear about the centrality of Christ and His Church: why would he, nor any other Catholic, have hopes for a body primarily made up of non-Christian nations? Indeed, nations actually hostile to Christianity?
The quote from St. Thomas is the most excellent final word - For peace is not sought in order to the kindling of war, but war is waged in order that peace may be obtained. Therefore even in waging war, cherish a spirit of the peacemaker, that, by conquering those whom you attack, you may lead them back to the advantages of peace. Thank you for finding this and sharing it with us.
Also I am struck by the sentence "that burden is typically borne by the nation’s poor people, not its political leaders." The poor always suffer more, not only from war, but from all kinds of natural disasters and plagues, starvation and dispossession. May God have mercy on us!
Some very interesting thoughts for reflection in this substack.
Economic sanctions have had limited impact in many situations. How about the more recent imposition of tariffs or threats of tariffs? Not necessarily instead of war, but to bend other countries to our will.
For non-violence to successfully counter violence the party of violence has to have a moral sense of right and wrong. As others have said, England at the time of Gandhi had that moral sense.
Gandhi had also said that the Jews should have practiced non-violent resistance to the Nazis. There is no reason to believe that would have worked.
Also, in the 1960’s with MLK there were a significant number of people in the United States with a moral sense.
I remember reading long ago about Solzhenitsyn being transported to the Gulag. Along the Way he was put into a prison for some time waiting for further transportation. He went on a hunger strike. The warden eventually came to see him and said, “I do not know why you are doing this. I am the only one who knows, and I don’t care.”
For non-violence to work, the opposition has to care.
re: I do not know why you are doing this. I am the only one who knows, and I don’t care! I think that hunger strikes or other forms of non-violent resistance only work against a people/regime that has a sense of decency - or a memory of it.
You're exactly right about the requirements for successful non-violent resistance. Those in resistance need to make a real commitment, but those they're resisting have to care. If a regime is willing to hand out more and more brutal punishment to resisters, the resistance will fail. Non-violence succeeds if it awakens consciences. Either it awakens the consciences of the oppressors, so that they change their policies, or it awakens enough other people so that the resistance grows, to a point where there aren't enough jail cells to hold them or police to arrest them. That's a very tall order.