8 Dialog of Civilizations
Our world may well feature a clash of civilizations. (Huntington, 1996) That way lies ruin. Though we may, sadly, be doomed to clash, in the meantime while we are still here and relatively intact (writing from within the bosom of US democracy, military prowess and economic plenty), might we at least try a more gentle approach? Dare we say, a more civilized approach? Not much to lose, really, given the not-so-good alternatives. The key is development. That includes economic development, cultural development, and personal development. Potential solutions look more like a tapestry than a train track. The needed lines of development must wrap around each other, intermingle, and cross-connect. A global dialog in a global mesh.
Different civilizations bring different perspectives and different resources to the global discussion. World-systems theory with its core-periphery model provides an overview. Some groups are more central (in Wilkinson’s Central Civilization) than others. Niall Ferguson identified six “killer apps” that allowed the West to dominate the Rest. That may be true on some level, but it is also past-tense. Civilizations like to borrow things that work (and throw back items that conflict with local custom), so the deadliest of Western killer apps, like nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, are finding their way into non-Western hands. Western science and technology are now global science and technology, despite recent rear guard actions by Western powers to build mercantile walls around the export of innovation. A bit late in the game for that. Ferguson’s Rest will surely pick what they will from the West, which is only fair, given the historical freedom with which the West helped itself to the entire world. The interest lies in the elements selected. Development theories of the mid-twentieth century envisioned global development as a monotonic function in which the “underdeveloped” world could only progress by fits and starts along the very same trails the West had previously blazed (the train track model). Current realities suggest a more layered approach. Scientific weaponry in the service of medieval religion? Traditional cultures turning ultra-capitalist (while keeping their traditions)? The reassertion of particularistic identities in the face of ever-more penetrating networks of global trade and communications? It appears that for each current, there is a counter-current. How can we make sense of it?
Recent meta-models (Integral Theory, Spiral Dynamics, Metamodernism) can be read as New-Age-inspired updates to the classic “rise of the West” narrative, given their many charts of stages, levels, and lines of development. That would be a misreading. The “advancement” promised by such models leads, at its most elevated stages, to stages that circle back. The key to “integral” or “meta-modern” or whatever one might call the top rung, is that the most advanced sort of personal development has access to all p