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The concept of solidarity is broad and goes beyond the mere intergenerational relationship; In our globalized world, friendship and mutual support is a fundamental component of the relationship between countries. The history of Europe as a political fusion of nations is a long and complex process; when it seemed that the European Union was already consolidated, we see that the United Kingdom disengaged from the continent and now we are experiencing a critical moment on its eastern slope, with Russia invading Ukrainian territory.
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After the two great wars of the last century, it seemed that the first world had reached the end of its conflictive history and this was announced by Francis Fukuyama, the American political scientist who predicted the fall of the Berlin Wall, a year before this event took place. The following article makes a note about the evolution of historical time in the hope that, after centuries of wars, humanity has learned something and is heading towards a better future. THE END OF THE STORYWith the Enlightenment an idea of history as a social science arises, being Montesquieu the one who lays the foundations of his conception by affirming that "it is not fortune that dominates the world" and investigating the causes that determine the course of history, as a universal process directed towards a certain end. This vision contrasts with the pre-scientific character of Greek historiography, which lacked a linear sense of time: its conception was cyclical, of circular movement that repeated the same events, following the model of the "eternal return". Indeed, for the architects of the Western cultural model, temporal evolution did not obey an evolutionary process, aimed at achieving a specific goal; This finalist idea of history would emerge with the birth of Christianity and its connection with the Jewish tradition. As described in Genesis, the world was created by God so that men could fulfill their mission in it, following an eschatological process that would culminate in the salvation of humanity at the end of time. The idea of the perfect system that gives transcendent meaning to the world is recurrent in the great thinkers, who try to answer the primordial questions about existence by designing a cosmology in which everything fits harmoniously and perfectly; this would be the end pursued by philosophy, in its attempt to explain why we are who we are, beyond our material existence. The historical dialectic was formulated by Hegel, trying to explain how human becoming works and the contradictions of the real world: each thing is what it is in relation and dependence with others and, ultimately, with the whole. According to the great philosopher of German idealism, there would be a time when the process of human evolution would end, thus reaching the end of history. In his essay The End of History, published a year before the fall of the Berlin Wall, Francis Fukuyama predicted the disintegration of the communist bloc of Eastern countries, grouped around the USSR. This American political scientist understands history as a struggle between ideologies and affirms that the end of ideological-cultural confrontations would give rise to a post-historical time without major conflicts: the end of the cold war and the defeat of Marxism would leave no alternative to the political model of West. At this point, the Harvard professor sees the end of history as a sad moment and feels nostalgic for the times when ideals were fought for; He says that in the post-historic period, mere economic calculation and the interest in satisfying the lazy desires of a consumer society will prevail, in which art will no longer evolve and philosophy will no longer be necessary, leaving culture confined to the museums of history. Faced with this flat encephalogram panorama of society, Fukuyama reflects philosophically on the degree of laxity and frivolity to which our civilization has reached and adopts a stoic posture, wondering if the prospect of centuries of boredom that he glimpses will not make history go back to normal. on going. Well into the 21st century, we can see that, although the process of economic and political liberalization of Great Russia continues to advance, this vast country, which is far from being a Western-style democracy, could want to recover its imperial greatness, something not unreasonable and that in a certain way it is taking place; The analyst intuits that in a non-communist Russia ultra-nationalism would find fertile ground, worrying him about the possibility that in this vast country with such great military power fascism will make its reappearance, to the point that makes him doubt whether we have really emerged to the other side of the story. Unfortunately, it seems that the suspicion of the American political scientist was correct: nationalism can become a fundamentalist doctrine capable of generating great catastrophes, as happened with the National Socialist experience, causing the genocide that would unleash the Second World War. We hope that Humanity has learned something from its great setbacks and history does not repeat itself; May the arrow of time abandon its eternal cyclical movement, resolutely directing its head towards a better future. Francisco Ramírez |