Politics, Ethics and Culture in Our Time: A Post-civilizational Perspective (Social and Critical Theory, 29)

The book makes a unique contribution to civilizational theory. It traces contemporary social and political crises in Western and Eurasian societies to a process of civilizational decline initiated by war and revolution last century and now being completed by globalization. Half Title Series Information Title Page Copyright Page Contents Acknowledgements Part 1 West and East Introduction to Part 1 Chapter 1 The Ages and Stages of History 1 Land and Sea Civilizations 2 Oriental Despotism 3 Western Modernity 4 The Collapse of Europe 5 Civilization in America Chapter 2 The Resurgence of the East 1 Capitalist Despotism 2 The Eurasian Axis 3 Leviathan versus Behemoth Part 2 Politics Introduction to Part 2 Chapter 3 Egalitarianism and Socialism 1 An Outline of Western Republican Politics 2 The Exceptional Nature of Egalitarianism 3 The Failure of Egalitarianism in Socialist Societies 4 The Failure of Egalitarianism in Liberal Societies Chapter 4 Fraternity and Nationalism 1 German Nationalism 2 The Birth of Nazism from the Spirit of Classicism 3 Wagner, Nietzsche and Heidegger 4 The New Nationalisms in the World Part 3 Ethics and Ethos Introduction to Part 3 Chapter 5 Manners, Morals and Laws 1 Success and Succession 2 The Austen Paradox 3 The Rule of Law 4 Demoralization, a Short History Chapter 6 The Death of Culture 1 Sport as Surrogate Culture 2 The Sportification of Culture 3 Culture and the Media 4 Culture and the Internet Afterword – in the Twilight of a Cultural Dark Age Bibliography Index "We are now undergoing a historic transformation in the destiny of mankind that is in many ways as decisive as any of those in the historic past, perhaps as far back as the Neolithic Revolution. For the very first time in history mankind has come together in a global society that some have called a technological civilization. It is certainly thanks to technology that this unification of previously separated human groups - whether they be tribes, nations or civilizations - has been made possible. Will this result in a truly global civilization? This is still a moot point, which it will be our concern to investigate. But undeniably the conditions of human living have become more alike all over the globe, and these are certainly utterly unlike those of any of the previous civilizations. In short, we are entering a new age in the development of the whole of humanity"-- Provided by publisher Global capitalism is effecting changes in human life as momentous as those that occurred during the Neolithic Revolution, the Axial Age (700-300 BC), and the modern era post-1500, when industrial capitalism, state power, and science reshaped the civilized world. The transformation is paradoxical, however. Science and technology ensure material progress but the market promotes cultural obsolescence and erodes belief in the Enlightenment ideals that inspired the quest for progress. In Western democracies, liberty and equality are proving irreconcilable, citizens becoming demoralized, fraternity fractured; meanwhile despotic Eurasian states are recycling old faiths and concocting neo-imperialist ideologies. These contradictions must be confronted if the cultural values that sustain civilized life are to be conserved.