Responsibilities

It is true that a Globalcitizen has responsibilities beyond his/her own yard. But in what form do those responsibilities materialize?
My definition of the responibilities are as follows: A Globalcitizen is responsibile to help others if able without risk for the own person. The citizen is not supposed to go around and force a certain way of thinking or a specific culture or a political system onto others that are different and for some reason considered wrong.
Western powers have managed to involve themselves in many struggles in which they had no reason for being. The western powered displayed an shocking amount of ignorance towards other cultures, this ignorance has caused even more problems when the western cultures tried to 'liberate' certain people. It is not to say that the Soviet Union was any better while it was in place, it seems that the more recent 'super-nations' or 'super-powers' have been very interested in other nations or other cultures politics and costums. There were empires that reigned before the British ,which I would define as one of the first recent 'super-nation', those other older empires at least most of them showed by far greater tolerance than it seems possible to see from today's 'super-nation'. It might be that certain customs seem unfair and anti-human, but the same might be true for western costums out of the perspective of those whom we judge.

Democracy at Work

The current political situation in Canada is most curious or at least in B.C. it is. The population of B.C. has started to state the opnion that the Canadian armed forces should not be in Afghanistan louder and louder over the last weeks. The population of B.C. has the opinion that there should not be a Canadian military presents in a war that they have no part in. (The U.S. American war against Terrorism) It is not that the people of B.C. agree with the methods of the Al-Quaeda, it is that they disagree with using military forces in a already torn nation and destroying it even further. Past expirience has taught that violance only creates better grounds for even stronger and more fanatic terrorist groups, which by the way are always freedom fighters against one or another oppressing force.
Of course it would help more to support the people of Afghanistan instead of forcing them to fear the 'civilized' world which is hunting their own creation over their lands. The U.S. government made a mistake but instead of admitting that and trying to solve the problem in a peaceful manner they start bombing the people that fight back. The Al-Quaeda admittedly has pushed it too far, but does it really help to hunt them when it is well known that you can't kill a certain believe. At least not with bullets and bombs. Are the military forces not proving the Al-Quaeda's point of an oppressed world in which the western powers force their will upon other nations?
Yes, the terrorists that aid in attacks against any civilian target should be brought to justice, but is not even more important to do so without any more civilian victims.
The population of B.C. seems to think along those lines or they are just concerned for the children that are in Afghanistan. Now the Canadian government has reacted in a most curious way, to the growing part of the population that wants the Canadian military out of Afghanistan. The Canadian government has found the one weakness the population has, they have made the perfect coup. The Canadian government is going to spent fifteen billion Canadian dollars on new equipment to aid the soldiers in Afghanistan. Isn't that great? Isn't that exactly what this growing part of the population wanted?

Civilization?

Civilization

Definition¹: A society is a Civilization if it has, culture (arts, language written and spoken), a written law code, must be non-nomadic (settled in towns and cities), must have agriculture, the distribution of technology (tools), centralized political power, religion and some sort of priesthood.

The term “civilization” implies one society being superior to another that is considered primitive and/or less socially developed. The concept of civilization appears to have been made to fit specifically the western nations. The Europeans were able to justify the destruction of many societies between (470 B.C. until late 1900's) that managed to coexist with their environment, that were peaceful and sometimes nomadic. All Indian tribes that were encountered in North America were automatically labeled as savages and thus considered 'inferior'. This further implied that any society that is inferior can be destroyed because 'inferiority' makes them less important than the 'superior' society. An 'inferior' society is at risk of being attacked attacked by a superior military force. The brutal and disrespecting manner which the 'superior' societies employ gives the less militarily advanced one no, or only a very slim chance of surviving intact. It is curious that the definition of Civilization does not imply respect other cultures, acceptance of other religions and humanitarianism. Is a civilization not supposed to be a highly developed society? It seems as if the concept of civilization includes only societies that are imperialistic and, for the greater part, European in origin. The Mongol empire for example was not accepted into the fraternity of “civilizations”. This may be because they showed the world that there is only one thing required of a society to become a civilization within a few decades which is a strong will and a strong army. The Europeans conquered by the means of brute force which is surprisingly similar to the way the Mongols those 'Barbarians' did it.
If we follow the model of a civilization which Oswald Spengler presented² in his book “Der Untergang des Abendlandes” than the Mongol Empire lived through the spring, summer, and fall in less than a century. After which the empire broke apart in many smaller nations. Spengler as well distinguishes between culture and civilization, the former growing inward inside a society while a civilization is outward growing. This outward growing presents itself inform of conquests³, while the inward growing took form in cultural growth⁴. The argument presented by Arnold Toynbee was that civilizations needed challenges, that if the challenge was insufficient than this civilization would stagnate while if it was too great than it would be crushed. But both authors arguments would imply that the Mongol Empire was a civilization. Even the controversial Samuel Huntington with his book “The Clash of Civilizations” considered the Mongol Empire a civilization. He argued that every region with different religious interests would automatically become it own independent civilization. Now the question is why is it that the term civilization is only applied if it seems fit for the Europeans?
All three authors have their own concept of what civilization is, all their definitions have only one common point which is that civilizations reach something of a critical point when changes have to come but the power elite is holding on to the power it managed to gain. This is where the Mongol empire differs from the European, the Mongol Empire went silently while European Empires never did, they went with civil wars, which always caused many problems.
Not one of these authors as acclaimed and controversial as they might be have written what might happen at this point. Huntington seemed to think that if every region was 'westernized' that than the world would be come peaceful.

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1Sources Meyers Neues Lexikon and Wikipedia.org

2 Spring: Intuition, powerful cultural creation from awakening souls, unity and abundance. Religion: Birth of a grand myth signifying a new conception of God. Fear and longing for the world. Earliest metaphysical organization of the world. High scholasticism.

Art: Religious art considered as an integrated part of religious devotion. Gothic cathedrals, Doric temples. Politics: Feudalism, warrior aristocracies.

Summer: Maturing consciousness. Earliest urban-civil socity and critical thought.

Religion: Reformation: revolt of the religious moderates against the early religion. Beginnings of a purely philosophical movement. Contrasting idealistic and realistic systems. Mathematical breakthroughs leading to a new conception of the world. Rationalism. The depletion of mysticism from religion.

Art:

Politics: Absolutist states. Conflicts between aristocracy and monarchy. The political centre shifts from castles and estates to the cities.

Fall: Urban rise. High point of disciplined organizational strength.

• Religion: Faith in the omnipotence of rationality. Cult of Nature. The height of mathematical thought. The last idealists. Theories of knowledge and logic.
• Art:
• Politics: Struggles between the aristocracy and the bourgeoisie. Revolutions. Napoleonism.

Winter: Coming fissure in the world-urban civilization. Exhaustion of mental organization strength. Irreligiousness rises.

• Religion: Materialism: Cults of science, utility, and luck. Ethical-social ideals: philosophy without mathematics, scepticism. The last mathematical thinkers. Decline of abstract thinkers, and the rise of specialized academic philosophy. Spread of the last ideas.
• Art: End of symbolic art. All art becomes meaningless subjects of fashion.
• Politics: Democracy, the rule of the rich, followed by caesarism and bureaucracy.

3As seen in the Roman (470B.C.-2006A.D.), Mongol(1211A.D.-1420's), British (1588 A.D.-1945A.D.), Japanese (1904A.D.- 1945A.D.) Empires

4The best examples for that would be the Greeks before being conquered by the Romans, the Japanese before the contact with the European powers which caused a stagnation and later the fall of the Samurai which allowed the Nationalists to move in.

The Bibliography can be found under comments...

How much democracy?

Why is it that we manage to come up with the same elitist system, even though we just destroyed one. Why is it that there is not one single state that is not governed by an eltist group. (I know that this statement is very strong, and I' am willing to admit that there maybe some states that are different, but I could not name one.) Why is it that the ruling class has so many privileges? Admittedly they do have a great responsibility but they gain great power as well. They should not be treated as if they were better or more important than any other one being in the nation which they govern. What kind of an democracy is it that only allows one specific group to govern?
Of course I hope that this is not misunderstood, I do not mention states which are reigned by kings, feudal lords and dictators because those are obviously governed by an elitist group.