"Order and disorder" are under examination at a transcultural conference in Beijing jointly initiated by the Transcultura Institute International and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
Scholars from Europe and Asia are discussing war and peace, humans and rights, social justice and harmony. The issues are old ones, part of human evolution. But they are new as well because human history does not simply repeat itself.
New dimensions require that we put what happens today in new perspectives.
For example, cooperation between different groups of people, different regions and countries has occurred for centuries, but never before on the scale of today's globalization.
The same is true of war, which differs from past conflicts. As Italian semiotician Umberto Eco positioned it, marginalized warfare characterized by terrorism differs from traditional wars.
Under such circumstances, individuals and nation states are obliged to develop a global view. We need a global perspective on what we used to consider only from the viewpoint of individuals or a single nation.
Of course, effective dialogue between different sovereign states with different cultural and political backgrounds is a prerequisite.
While sharing the benefits of globalization, nations have a heavier share of responsibility to cultivate order in the global context.
Order does not mean political lockstep. On the contrary, maintaining cultural diversity is of great significance in building an orderly world.
That explains why China put forward the concept of a harmonious world, in which different cultures respect each other's right to exist and settle their disputes and differences through dialogue.
Globalization makes international efforts imperative in solving such hazards as poverty, environmental pollution, over-exploitation of resources, global warming and regional conflict.
To foster the consensus necessary for such joint endeavors, nations must learn to deal with common concerns through dialogue in transforming war to peace.
(China Daily March 8, 2007)
