Reprint from "The Aryan Path", January 1958

WORLD PEACE BY INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENT

[Dr. Hugh J. Schonfield was introduced to our readers in our "Ends and Sayings" columns in June 1956 (Vol. XXVII, p. 288) in a note commenting on his striking pamphlet, Birth of a World People. A Greek scholar with a Doctorate in Sacred Literature and the founder in 1956 of the Commonwealth of World Citizens, he pens here his reflections on the problems of World Government. He brings the issue down to just and peaceful human relations and the creation of an atmosphere conducive to mutual understanding. His reflections merit wide and thoughtful consideration. ? Ed. ]

As a young man working in Fleet Street my way took me past the Law Courts in London. Often when I went by an old man would be there parading up and down before the entrance carrying a placard on which three words were boldly printed: Arbitrate don't Litigate.

The advice impressed itself strongly on my mind, and I have never taken legal action against anyone. To have done so, even when I felt that right was on my side and that I had been materially wronged, would have meant that I had abandoned all hope of agreement by mutual understanding and accommodation. If I won my case my opponent might not be peacefully disposed towards me: if I lost it I might continue to labour under a sense of grievance.

Nearly two thousand years ago Jesus of Nazareth gave similar advice in the Sermon on the Mount: "Come to terms quickly with your opponent while you and he are on the way to court."

Since the objective in disputes should always be reconciliation and peace between a man and his neighbour, it has to be considered whether recourse to law is the best means of achieving this.

An imperfect society must of course live under law; otherwise it would cease to cohere and there would be no restraint on evil-doing. But such law can only function equitably when two factors are present, (i) the existence of highly developed underlying principles of both justice and mercy which control the character of law, and (ii) when the society consents to be governed by its law-making body and possesses the power to change it.

In countries where law is greatly respected this respect has been gained as a result of a long process of social and political progress and enlightenment, whereby the administration of law has become identified with the dispensing of humane and impartial justice. In such countries it seems natural and obvious that if tranquillity, good order and fair treatment is secured under law then the extension of law to apply internationally would assure like benefits to the community of nations. The slogan is coined, "World Peace through World Law."

The proposition is so attractive on the face of it that it is rarely submitted to searching examination. Yet it is imperative that we should understand what the implications are in order to discover to what extent it is valid.

It is proper then to consider that in democratic countries the laws are made by a legislature, not by the judiciary, though judicial counsel may be sought. Whatever confidence there may be in the impartial dispensa­tion of justice, judges can only administer and interpret the law as it is. They may sometimes feel and even point out that a law is harsh or unjust, or alternatively not sufficiently severe, but they are bound to rule in accordance with its terms.

Thus, while laws may often be founded on custom and usage, those at least to which penalties attach for infringement or violation derive their authority from a law-making body, a government. And whether they are good or bad laws depends upon the character and attitude of that government. For World Law to operate in the same way as State Law it follows that there must first exist a World Government, both to legislate and to have the power of enforcing the verdict of the courts given in accordance with the law.

On this basis, "World Peace through World Law" means that a World Government has to be devised, accepted and instituted by all nations before World Peace can be assured. A Common Superior of all States has to be acknowledged, and sovereign powers vested in a World Legislature and Executive. These requirements are indispensable, and are fully recognized by the majority of World-Government advocates: "Federate or Perish," they insist.

Those who are of this opinion are perfectly right to press for World Government as a matter of extreme urgency, whether by changes in the structure of the United Nations, or by progressive stages of Regional Federations, or by a Constituent Assembly elected by the peoples, or by other methods. They are logically putting first what they see should come first, World Government before World Peace.

We have to be quite clear about this and not try to evade the issue or get mealy-mouthed about how much force would be employed by a World Police Force taking the place of national armies. This is the Law in all its majesty and terror to evil-doers, with all risks taken of corruption, tyranny and despotism, legal violence and brutality, perhaps even atomic weapons used against rebels. Federalists naturally declare that the only kind of World Government they will be satisfied with is one which is civilized and has been democratically elected and is hedged with every kind of check and safeguard against oppression and domination. But once the die is cast, and certain sovereign rights are surrendered, who can tell? Instead of "World Peace through World Law" we might have World War to resist World Dictatorship.

This fear was cogently expressed some years ago by the Mexican diplomat Don Alfonso Reyes: ?

The average Latin American still carries in his imagination the figure of a Monster State, ruled by two or three great Powers, all-embracing, resolved to impose their decisions to the detriment of the weaker nations. This fear possesses his mind when he hears talk of a co-operative organiza­tion of the world....He reacts to world-wide plans with the lack of confidence which is characteristic of citizens living in minor states, who are disillusioned by past vicissitudes. The Latin American does not want possible abuses of hegemony to acquire legal sanction under a contract which in embracing all the nations submits them automatically to the one which is strongest.

Such a spectacle frightens many other people away from World Government in its political significance. They see no evidence in the present behaviour of the Great Powers of capacity to govern well and wisely the whole human race. Yet frequently such people are found hanging on grimly to the idea of World Law because it seems so right, while divorcing it from the institutions which alone could make it effective. When pushed, they take refuge in vague generalities about World Order, the Rights of Man and so forth.

I am not arguing here against World Government: I believe in it. But I am not prepared to delude myself about it so as to imagine that it is practicable or even desirable in the stage of human and international relationships we have now reached. In that case I am compelled to abandon the proposition "World Peace through World Law" as a policy for our time, since World Law is contingent upon World Government.

The position might be quite different if the adjective "Great" as applied to Powers was an indication of moral qualities rather than of magnitude of dimensions and resources. It is abundantly evident in this costly scientific age that world war-making capacity is in the hands of a few Big Powers and their associates. To eliminate this capacity and make way for an acceptable form of World Government to assure world peace would require nothing less than the total abolition of Big Powers. This in due course may come about. The old Empires are already in process of resolving into a number of more loosely associated independent sovereign States; and this process may be expected eventually to dissolve the United States, the Soviet Union and other big power aggregates. To quote a famous dictum: "All power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely." As long as there exists any large-scale concentration of power, so long will there be ambition for mastery and domination.

The Super-State can never be the answer to the problem of world peace, and consequently World Government is not to be conceived in terms of a universal authority "with teeth in it." It seems extremely doubtful whether the Nation-State pattern, whether of a unitary or federal character, can apply to a World Government. In this case we do not have to consider the operation of World Law as requiring the same kind of legislative machinery as State Law. In the world context we are free to look both at government and law with greater vision and imagination and with deeper insight. It is only when we press these ideas into the moulds with which we are familiar that they assume a rigidity which, while it may make sense logically, is quite unrealistic spiritually.

Somehow we have to achieve world peace in advance of World Govern­ment and World Law in order that the nature of such Government and Law shall express an already conscious and prevailing acceptance of international obligations of mutual respect and good will.

It is an antiquated notion of law that sees it as an instrument of vengeance and suppression. Passion should have no place in it, or use of threats. The angry man or nation abuses law by shouting, "I'll have the Law on you for this." Law at its best is not punitive but corrective; but even this requires some qualification. People are not made good by law: they are largely law-abiding to the extent that they are happy and contented. Law can offer little protection to society unless society is fully alive to its responsibility to ensure that its members are happy and contented.

I believe this to be true of the World Society. Nations are not to be arbitrarily classified as peace-loving or war-mongering, as criminal or good, as slave or free. Their condition substantially depends on whether they are happy and contented. It is the function of the World Society to make every people feel that it is wanted, welcomed and understood by fostering fellowship and promoting mutual service without strings attached.

Differences and disputes, some of them very grave, cannot be avoided.

Then the aim should be to create an atmosphere in which they can be settled by accommodation and agreement. Sometimes this can best be accomplished with the help of an impartial Court; sometimes out of Court. But fundamentally it is an atmosphere conducive to understanding that counts. This is where the United Nations and the League of Nations before it have so grievously failed. How can nations clash in denunciation and recrimination in the General Assembly, and even the so-called Security Council, and under such conditions of tension and conflict be expected to take their causes to the International Court ? How can countries reprimanded or condemned in Assembly resolutions, and thus prejudged, be expected to have confidence in the impartiality of international justice ? So long as any institutional relationship exists between the United Nations and the Hague Courts, so long as any powers of Judgment attach to the United Nations, both justice and peace must suffer. It is vital to the settlement of disputes by peaceful means and inherent in the principle of arbitration that parties should be able to rely on the complete disinterestedness of the agency to which a dispute is referred. This was recognized by the Hague Peace Conference of 1907 in setting up the Permanent Court of Arbitration, and it will be profitable to remind ourselves of some of the Articles agreed upon by States at that time.

Art. II. In cases of serious disagreement or conflict, before appealing to arms the signatory powers agree to resort, as far as circumstances permit, to the good offices or mediation of one or more friendly powers.

Art. III. Independently of this recourse, the signatory parties deem it expedient that one or more powers, strangers to the dispute, should, of their own initiative, in so far as circumstances favour it, tender their good offices or mediation to the litigant states....

Art. IV. The role of mediator consists in the reconciliation of opposing claims and the removal of ill - feeling to which the dispute between the states may have given rise.

Art. XV. International arbitration has for its purpose the settlement of disputes between states by judges of their own choice and upon a basis of respect for law.

Art. XX. To the end that recourse to arbitration may be facilitated, in respect to international differences which cannot be adjusted in the diplomatic way, the signatory powers agree to organize a Permanent Court of Arbitration, accessible at all times, and performing its func­tions, save in the case of contrary stipulations, in accordance with the rules of procedure set forth in the present Convention.

Because of our fears of world domination resulting from two World Wars we have largely nullified these sound ideas, and switched over to the control of aggression by a Collective Security system, trying to combat the forces of which we are afraid by the employment of more powerful force. It has been a bad move, and has landed us, as was to be anticipated, with opposing blocs competing to equip themselves with the most superior and destructive weapons. Any prospect of mitigation is being confined to such narrow areas of agreement as would assure no tac­tical advantage to either side. This is madness.

Peace is only to be achieved by reconciliation, the removal of ill-feel­ing, mistrust and misunderstanding. But where is the impartial and totally disinterested agency which can help to bring this about ? It is not the United Nations, but a mockery of its title. Nor are there any longer, in the strict sense required, any uncommitted and uninvolved powers which could act as mediators.

But in this impasse, and hopefully for mankind, a new agency has begun to appear, a World People without territory, without armament, without political power, without any partisanship. It bears the name of the Commonwealth of World Citizens, and is composed of those individuals throughout the world who pledge their loyalty and service to all humanity as the commencement of the United World of tomorrow.

Already this new nation, distinct from every State, has reached the stage of constitution, which took place at a Constituent Assembly held in the Temple of Peace at Cardiff in Wales, August 27th~3oth, 1956. It is now building up Communities in every continent preparatory to the holding of its first parliament in the autumn of 1958, and every week new applications for citizenship are being received at its world office in London at 13 Prince of Wales Terrace, Kensington, W.8.

Here is no purpose of domination or power-seeking. What has come to birth in this time of unprecedented crisis and opportunity is a Servant-Nation to demonstrate active good will and helpfulness, and to exhibit in the sight of all nations the way of peace and harmony. Here is strength of the spirit, made perfect in weakness, charting the international path for our feet by experiment and example.

In the end there must prevail a will to live together in harmony. To cultivate and develop that will offers the only sure safeguard of our peace we can ever have. To understand, and to be understood, to reconcile, and to be reconciled, this is the only basis for Peaceful Co-existence. Any ideology for mankind which does not preach and practise this is a sham and a fraud. To express it concretely and constantly is the only aim worthy of the dignity of men and nations.

Hugh J. Schonfield