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Reimagining the State in a Global Space

Or Rosenboim

in The Emergence of Globalism: Visions of World Order in Britain and the United States, 1939-1950

This chapter examines perceptions of the state in a global context, arguing that the emergence of globalism encouraged mid-century thinkers to reimagine—but not abandon—the nation-state. In ... More

This chapter examines perceptions of the state in a global context, arguing that the emergence of globalism encouraged mid-century thinkers to reimagine—but not abandon—the nation-state. In particular, it considers Raymond Aron’s proposals to reinterpret the political space of the nation-state in the post-war era and how the war experience formed his conceptualization of international relations. While the state remained for Aron the main bastion of individual liberty, he acknowledged its conceptual and structural insufficiency in the age of globalism. Aron’s interpretation of political ideologies in conversation with the sociologist Karl Mannheim and the philosopher Jacques Maritain led to the development of his loose and pluralistic vision of European unity held together by “political myth.” The chapter also compares Aron’s vision of world order with that of David Mitrany.Less

Intelligence in States

John A. Hall

in The Importance of Being Civil: The Struggle for Political Decency

This chapter looks at the great contribution of Raymond Aron to the understanding of civil behavior between states. Aron's contribution to the theory of international relations goes well beyond what ... More

This chapter looks at the great contribution of Raymond Aron to the understanding of civil behavior between states. Aron's contribution to the theory of international relations goes well beyond what can usefully be termed “simple” realism. He offered a sophisticated version of that basic approach, at once more complex and more meritorious. Two elements are involved: first, the pure logic of realism, and then, necessarily deriving from it, the sociological elements that Aron brought into realism, not to deny or to replace the basic insights of that theory but rather to improve it by better explaining both the escalation to extremes and the periods of diminished conflict that mark the historical record. Both elements combine to form not just a descriptive system but a prescriptive view as to how one should conduct oneself. What is at issue is civility and prudence.Less

Raymond Aron: An Introduction

Christopher Adair-Toteff

in Raymond Aron's Philosophy of Political Responsibility: Freedom, Democracy and National Identity

This Introduction discusses Aron’s life and works. It provides an overview of the book’s chapters. It explores Aron’s response to the critical question: “What would you do?”

A Democratic Age

Martin Conway

in Western Europe's Democratic Age: 1945-1968

This introductory chapter explores French political philosopher Raymond Aron's thesis of a democratic stabilization of Western Europe, which he believed had occurred since the Second World War. ... More

This introductory chapter explores French political philosopher Raymond Aron's thesis of a democratic stabilization of Western Europe, which he believed had occurred since the Second World War. Compared with the destructive struggles of ideology, class, and ethnicity that had marked the first half of the twentieth century in Europe, Aron argued that a new form of industrial society had emerged in the fifteen years since the war, characterized by representative democratic institutions and guarantees of personal freedom. Stability was not, of course, guaranteed. And yet what Aron termed the démocraties stabilisées or pacifiées that had taken root in Western Europe since the Second World War were more than the by-product of the political immobilism imposed on Europe, west and east, by the Cold War. In Aron's view, they marked the coming of age of a new model of Western European government and society, which had not so much resolved the divisions of the past as rendered them obsolete through a combination of economic prosperity, effective governmental action, and social compromise. The book then studies the nature and development of democracy, as well as its limitations, in Europe between the end of the Second World War and the political and social upheavals of the later 1960s and early 1970s.Less

Anti-Communist Manifestos: Berlin and Cold War Politics

Joshua L. Cherniss

in A Mind and its Time: The Development of Isaiah Berlin's Political Thought

This chapter locates Berlin in the context of the political debates preoccupying the ‘non-Communist Left’—a loose, international network of liberal and social-democratic intellectuals and ... More

This chapter locates Berlin in the context of the political debates preoccupying the ‘non-Communist Left’—a loose, international network of liberal and social-democratic intellectuals and policy-makers united by their opposition to Soviet Communism, and commitment to social reforms and civil liberties in their own countries. It traces the disagreements and debates, both among members of the non-Communist Left and between members of the NCL and their rivals, relating to both foreign and domestic policy, and identifies the particular positions Berlin occupied in these debates—and how these positions were connected to his broader political and ethical stances. It also traces the intellectual relationships and affinities between Berlin and other leading intellectuals and political theorists of the non-Communist Left: his friends Reinhold Niebuhr and Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. in America, and Raymond Aron in FranceLess

Catholicism, Pluralism, and Global Democracy

Or Rosenboim

in The Emergence of Globalism: Visions of World Order in Britain and the United States, 1939-1950

This chapter examines the interplay of moral universalism and political pluralism as the foundation of a new global democracy by focusing on the arguments put forward by Jacques Maritain and Luigi ... More

This chapter examines the interplay of moral universalism and political pluralism as the foundation of a new global democracy by focusing on the arguments put forward by Jacques Maritain and Luigi Sturzo, who claimed that Christianity—and especially Catholicism—provided the theoretical toolkit for constructing a peaceful and prosperous post-war order for individuals and communities. Charting their interactions with other protagonists of the book, including Raymond Aron, Giuseppe Antonio Borgese, and Reinhold Niebuhr, the chapter considers Maritain and Sturzo’s support of federalism as a shape-giving principle for the new world order and shows that their visions differed on a crucial point: the place of democracy in the globalist agenda. It suggests that Sturzo’s attachment to social Catholicism led his vision of global order away from the conservative stance that characterized Maritain’s proposals, towards a dialectical interpretation of politics.Less

Against ‘Engineers of Human Souls’: Berlin’s Anti-Managerial Liberalism

Joshua L. Cherniss

in A Mind and its Time: The Development of Isaiah Berlin's Political Thought

This chapter reveals opposition to tendencies towards scientistic and/or technocratic paternalism—a complex of ideas and inclinations identified here as ‘managerialism’—to have been central to ... More

This chapter reveals opposition to tendencies towards scientistic and/or technocratic paternalism—a complex of ideas and inclinations identified here as ‘managerialism’—to have been central to Berlin’s post-war political concerns. The ‘managerial’ strains in post-war Western (and particularly British) thought, and their antecedents, are traced, as is Berlin’s perception of and reaction to these trends in his writings on politics, the philosophy of history, and the nature of the social sciences. The importance of his reaction against the various facets of ‘managerialism’ for Berlin’s thought is demonstrated; and his political and philosophical responses to these trends are compared to those of other prominent ‘anti-managerial’ and anti-scientistic liberals of the post-war period: Aron, Friedrich Hayek, and Karl Popper.Less