Nations, Power, and Human Beings

Nations, Power, and Human Beings

Peter Schultz

            There is only one way to limit governmental power, by embedding it in a community. Once the connection between a government and a community is severed, the government will acquire great power, usually in the form of executive or bureaucratic power. Nations, which are not and cannot be communities, are created to facilitate the acquisition and exercise of great power, in the pursuit of greatness.

            There is a similar phenomenon regarding human beings. Once the link between human beings and community is severed, human beings will pursue power, power after power ceasing only in death. Without a community, a human being has no “place,” is left exposed, alienated and controlled by a fear of death, of annihilation. Thus, human beings pursue power to protect themselves, even while feeling and being alienated and fearful. Life becomes a “rat race,” an endless pursuit of security. It is not an accident that the specter of endless war is before us. It has always been there but is just now becoming visible. “The owl of Minerva flies only at dusk.”

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