Civilizations and time 1３ ( Social science and various forces )

I have thought about what the forces mean, and I have thought about the five principles and what they mean. Now let's go back to the expression Cs+Cp=F(E,S,R)=F{g(f(t)),h(f(t)),R}. This formula is inspired by the concept of the production function* in economics. The formula states that the amount of production is determined by the amount of investment, labor force, and technology input. The formulas in this paper express the 'relationships' in which creations are determined by the input of values, technological efficiencies, social structural forces, and counteracting forces. No attempt has been made to express the function numerically.

 

*Production function

Thinking about the production function in economics, it is possible to calculate the amount of production, and it may be possible to calculate the amount of input capital and labor. This is because these concepts can be expressed by the ruler of "money." It expresses what kind of production can be achieved by inputting the ratio of capital and labor. It is unclear at this stage whether it will be possible to do so, and whether it will be possible to express technological efficiency, social structure, and reaction force like  terms of money. It is here that one realizes that economics is a discipline built on concepts based on "quantity" such as money, commodities, and services. On the other hand, it also makes me wonder if civilization studies can be constructed with concepts and worldviews that are different from those of economics. And in the era of big data and AI, the foundation would be established.

 

It may be said that the 19th century was the age of physics and the 20th century was the age of economics. As a result, we have entered an era in which many people act with "economic ideas." The pattern of behavior is based on profit motives, and the value is placed primarily on ``economic reasons''. The number of “rational individuals” may have increased, but bubbles and recessions have continued to occur. Recently, I have come to feel that economic value is not everything for human beings. What, then, are the concepts necessary for civilization studies that are different from economics? Is it really possible for civilization studies to have a concept that serves as a standard unit like "money" in economics?

 

Since money expresses the amount of production, investment, and the amount of labor, it is established as a mathematical formula. On the other hand, the above formula for the driving force is not a mathematical formula but a formula that simply expresses the relationship. Creations are just creations, and can be products, philosophies, or cultures. In contrast, technical efficiency, social structural strength, and counteracting force, rather than quantitatively, are factors that improve people's lives, such as technological innovation and the economy. If it's a factor that causes it, or if it's a counteracting force, it may be the factor that tries to return to the original.

 

In the social sciences as well, there are two grounds for establishing these various concepts of forces. This is probably because the ``problem of quality and quantity'' is a peculiar factor as the ``problem of the structure of various forces''.

In order to make analysis possible in the social sciences, social sciences should no longer focus on the characteristics of various forces like gravity, electric power, and magnetic force, and build a systematic worldview, like in physics textbooks.  Technological efficiency (the force to improve life), social structure force (the force to develop the collective strength of the community), and counteracting force (the force to return to the original) are the discoveries of various forces in social science. It seems that clarifying the characteristics and structures is necessary as a method for analyzing the individuality of each civilization.

 

In a sense, as I briefly touched on in Ranke, world history is still limited to metaphysics by historians.

Another thing is that the concept of various forces in social science is the combined force of the qualitative force of some creative human beings and the quantitative force of many people who imitate it. Isn't it different from the concept of force in Toynbee called this force "Mimesis".

With that in mind, when we think about forces in the social sciences, we have technical efficiency force, qualitative force, and quantitative force. Social structural force, qualitative force, and quantitative force. A combination of reaction force, qualitative force, and quantitative force may arise. There will also be combinations of technical efficiency and social structure, social structure and reaction, and reaction and technical efficiency. Other combinations like this, that is, syntheses of forces, will appear, but the premise for this is the analysis of the various forces. In the first stage, we extract the “force to improve life” in history, and consider under what circumstances the creative rulers who caused it appear, and under what conditions the people who imitate them. It is necessary to work to verify whether it appeared below and how fast it proliferated. In the same way, under what circumstances did the creative ruler who extracted the ``force to develop the community'' emerge, and under what conditions did the people who imitate it emerge? It is verified whether it appeared and at what speed it proliferated, and the reaction force is also verified in the same way.

 

However, this is not the end of the story, and the issue of "synthesis" of these various factors is a problem, but it will take a long time to reach that point. Series", Hari Seldon's psychohistory* is expected to be a long way off.

 

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Civilizations and time 12 ( the environmental principle, and the external principle )

Next, regarding the 5th principle, the environmental principle, and the external principle, these 1st to 4th principles are constrained by the 5th principle. Think about it. Or you might want to think about Japan's isolation from the rest of the world. Considering the former, Europe was shut out from the Mediterranean Sea because of Islam, and its character as an agricultural civilization was strengthened. Markets and cities were established. It can be said that other environmental principles were also at work. Germanic, Magyar and Norman invasions would have had a great influence on the shaping of medieval Europe. Hicks touched on the market and trade based on the royal economy, but in the case of Europe, the establishment of the market along with the development of agriculture was dominant, and the development of the market and trade due to the royal economy was seen along with the development of the Roman church. (Venice, Genoa), ``The impetus for capitalism was in northern Europe,''* it seems that the impetus for its development was the development of a market based on agriculture.

* When did capitalism emerge?

The buds of capitalism are said to have originated in the Italian city-states and spread to northern Europe. However, the Italian cities were commercial capitalist, which seems to have been close to Islamic civilization (think of the relationship between Venice and the Byzantines and Levant). There was a relationship between Atlantic trade and Genoa (Spain's source of funds), but the establishment of capitalism was largely influenced by the rise of the "Netherland" as the center of a group of cities that developed based on agriculture. Beginning with Gentry (emerging agricultural entrepreneurs), the rise of the Netherlands against the background of the Baltic Sea trade (Hanseatic League) that handles daily commodities, the soil for the rise of Protestantism was in northern Europe, and the capital (for the masses) It can be said that a civilization in which accumulation itself was the goal, a civilization of capitalism, was decisively established here (consumption was also popular during the Italian Renaissance).

 

Japan's national isolation is an example of the constraints imposed by the environment on principles 1 through 4. This can be cited as a rare example where there was no outside influence. If medieval Europe is a closed model with a certain degree of openness, Japan during the period of national isolation can be said to be a closed model of  closed models.

The open-type closed model was a civilization that was constantly influenced by the outside but built up forces by defending it. Although it has been influenced, closed models are fortunately less affected by external influences, so we study unique values, technological efficiency, social structural forces, generation of counteracting forces, and the flow of change. It can be said that it is a material that can In the case of Japan's national isolation, it can be said that the geographical conditions are the constraints imposed by the environment. Medieval Europe is a very interesting period from the point of view of accumulating power, but from the point of view of how the mentality changes in a so-called "vacuum", the state of isolation in Japan is a more interesting period. Maybe.

 

It is necessary to look at examples of environmental principles and external principles, but it is also necessary to select cases in which the external influence is strong and weak, and to consider the nature of that strength. right. Japan's policy of national isolation can serve as a reference as an example of how history progressed only through internal principles, excluding influence from the outside, as an environmental principle. On the other hand, when thinking about the external principle, Macneil's conception of "world history" may serve as a reference as a broad framework.

In Macneil's "World History", the movement of world history up to now is largely captured in four periods.

 

The first is the age of Orient dominance.

The second is the era of multicultural coexistence and prosperity.

The third is the era of European dominance.

Then comes the era of unification and parallelization of multiple civilizations.

 

These four forms were established by some kind of forces, and during the period when the Orient was dominant, the Orient civilization influenced other civilizations. The principle was working.

On the other hand, in the era of multi-civilization coexistence and prosperity, Chinese civilization, Indian civilization, and European civilization coexisted with Islamic civilization at the center, and external principles worked on each other, but their influence was still small. However, a small shift in balance can change the situation, such as the Mongol Empire. The example of the Mongol Empire, on the other hand, suggested that the world was getting smaller.

 

The movement in Eurasia came about as a reaction to the increased seafaring activity in European civilization (the Age of Discovery). European civilization emerged from this. European civilization expanded its world through seafaring, fighting or avoiding Islamic civilization, and as a result, the industrial revolution blossomed in Britain, and competition with the forces within European civilization chasing it began. Among them, the era of European civilization's predominance came, but it had an influence on civilizations other than Europe, and it can be said that external principles worked from European civilization to Islamic civilization, Indian civilization, and Chinese civilization. 

 

And it seems that the present age is clearly heading toward an era of multicultural coexistence and prosperity. Looking at it in this way, it seems that there is a cycle from multiple civilizations to unipolar civilizations and from unipolar civilizations to multiple civilizations as an external principle. And perhaps the background behind this phenomenon is the transition of power relations between civilizations. The power of civilization itself is internal, and is the combined force of value, technological efficiency, social structural force, and reaction force. While each civilization has a relatively equal overall strength, the unipolar era can be seen as an era in which civilizations stood out in terms of their combined strength of value, technological efficiency, social structure, and reaction force.  Environmental and external forces are the forces that arise from the relative relations of forces between civilizations, and they influence the interior of civilizations and exert pressure on values, technological efficiency, social structure forces, and counteracting forces. It can be said that it has come.

 

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Civilizations and time 11 ( 5 principles )

Having considered the forces, let us consider what kind of world these forces constitute. First, we defined the forces. There are three fundamental forces. This definition and identification of types of forces is in keeping with Newton's attitude in Principia. It is an attitude of trying to explain with as few tools as possible. For example, whether it's rain in New York or London, you could say that the essence of making it rain doesn't change. This attitude is also found in Toynbee's historical studies.

 

There is value as the essential force that moves history, there is technological efficiency that is the force (technology, economy) that constantly tries to improve people's lives, and there is the force that tries to improve the organizational strength of society and it is the social structural force. I thought there were. All forces have a reaction, and this force is called the reaction force. And let us hypothesize that the forces defined in this way follow the following principles when organized.

 

1  Value changes with time and is the premise of all forces. (principle of value)

 

2  There are always forces at work in all human societies to improve life, and these are influenced by values. (Principle of life improvement →         technological efficiency)

 

3  There are always forces at work in all human societies that seek to increase the organizational strength of the community, and these are     influenced by values. (Principle of community development → social organizational strength)

 

4  New values and their forces are repelled by old values and their powers. (Principle of reaction force)

 

5  Human society is influenced by its environment, and principles 1 to 4 are influenced. (environmental principle and external principle)

 

These principles of forces can be regarded as the "elements" of forces that make up Toynbee's framework of civilizational dynamics. Each of these principles may need to be tested. I plan to examine the first principle, the principle of value, in more depth on another occasion. Regarding the second principle, the principle of life improvement, it is necessary to collect and enumerate the factors that have improved life in each civilization. I'm planning to try it civilization by civilization. It will be a material to verify E=g(f(t)), which expresses technical efficiency. We will analyze what caused the technological efficiency, that is, the factors that improved our lives. We analyze that this formula of technological efficiency force is composed of the value related to time (V = f(t)) and the growth force included in the force itself (which is included in the function g). . Implicitly, "life-enhancing things" refer to things that are relevant to the times and utility .

 

Regarding the third principle, the principle of community development, as a methodology, it seems necessary to collect and enumerate the factors that contributed to the development of the community for each civilization, as with the second principle. This will serve as a material for verifying the formula S=h(f(t)) that expresses the social structure force. It investigates what caused the social structural strength, that is, the factors that improved the organizational strength of the community. It is composed of values related to time (V=f(t)) as well as technological efficiency, and of developmental forces contained in the forces themselves. Things that develop society are things that are in line with the times, and they seem to point to things that have their own development. This is the same for technical efficiency, but it implies that social structural power can be changed by changes in time-related values, by changes in the power itself that develops organizational power.

 

Let's think about how to examine the fourth principle, the principle of counteracting force. It is also necessary to collect and enumerate examples for each civilization, but what to see is important. The principle of reaction is the principle that there is a force that opposes the second principle (the principle of living improvement) and the third principle (the principle of community development), and it is necessary to search for such a phenomenon. I mentioned the Reformation and imperialism as examples of such phenomena before, but I believe that these phenomena are not composed of simple forces, but of complex systemic forces. Why is the Reformation a reaction? Why is imperialism a reaction? The "Reformation" is a reaction from the perspective of the European medieval world as a perfection type, and the "imperialism" is an industrial revolution or Pax Britannica as a perfection type. In this case, it is a counteraction, but it may also be understood as a manifestation of conservative power in which technological efficiency and social organizational forcse collide with and fuse with reaction. As the times change, technological efficiency and social structural strength will develop, but the meaning of technological efficiency (improvement of life) and social structural strength (community development) will also change due to changes in their respective values or reaction. It would be better to think of it as solidified and conservative. This is called "maintenance ability".

 

Conservatism, in Toynbee's sense, can be said to be the force to resist "the forces acting from within and outside the system" during the period of civilization's decline. How the system adapts to these internal and external forces, and adapting with mature technological efficiency and social structural strength is the position of "conservative power", that is, conservatism. It may be said. The counteracting force and the conservative force were different forces, but at some point they will join forces. Against the creative ruler or the minority ruler who arises from the deterioration of this creative ruler in Toynbee, what used to be a counteracting force turns into a conservative force.

 

It is important to analyze each force, but it may have been difficult to clarify the concept of conservative force. But there are some good writings. For example, Burke's "Reflections on the French Revolution" and Bagehot's "British Constitutional History" probably analyzed the structure of conservative force.

 

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Civilizations and time 10 ( Value - formula )

The fact that time has no meaning without human intervention, that is, all created things must be some kind of human labor W (abbreviation for work; (included in labor W) and time t (abbreviation of time). Therefore, it is assumed that the output of a creation of a certain civilization, nation, etc. is simply expressed by Wt.

However, as we thought about time, t itself has no meaning. W's incentivizing values are more meaningful, and value is the direction and efficiency of the production of what is produced, be it a mental or physical creation.  The contents of creations differ greatly depending on what kind of values each civilization or nation has. For example, China and Taiwan, South Korea and North Korea, would have naturally produced different creations.

In addition, with the development of the means of production (the object of production activity here is not limited to commodities, the spiritual and material products produced by religion and culture are also included in the object of production activity, and commodities, culture, etc. are all included in this article. The rate of production of creations (which we call “creations”) will also vary. Changes in the social structure will also affect the speed of production. There will also be counteracts to such efficiency gains and changes in the social structure. And those powers are combined and transformed into conservative power.

Values influence and are exerted on (1) the efficiency of the production of creations, (2) the social structure, and (3) the content of reactions. Technical efficiency and social structural force has a certain value and try to develop it mentally and materially , but compared to that, the counteraction and the conservatism that is the combined force of them ,grasping the structure may be more difficult. In the first place, the value of a certain era itself is complex and diverse, and the strongest value and impulse among them ultimately pulls us in the direction. Based on that, technical efficiency and social structural power are determined, but even if reaction forces are assumed in an easy-to-understand manner (because they are likely to be opposed by vested interests), what kind of compromise will settle them as "conservative force"? By the selection of values, it seems to be a difficult process.

 

Now, using the ancillary concepts we have considered earlier, let us come up with a formula for the relationship between the structure of mental energy and the output of its creations.

V=f(t)...1 The value V is related to the time t.

E=g(f(t))..2 Efficiency E is related to value V, and value affects efficient technical ability E.

S=h(f(t))·····3 Social structural force S is related to value V, and value affects social structural force S.

R...4 Reaction force R is a force that arises as a repulsion against the actions of E and S.

 

In addition, it is thought that there is a synthetic force that combines E, S and R, that is, there is a conservative force, but we ignore it here and do not consider V, E, S, and R to be concepts with quantities. Taken only as a relational expression, and with the above in mind, if we consider the production of creation,

A simple formula is W×t=F(E, S, R) . . . 5.

 

This formula means that "the production of creation is the output resulting from the input of E technical efficiency force, S social structure force, and R reaction force."

Furthermore, W t = Cs + Cp ... 6

shows that creation output can be divided into Cs (mental creation output) and Cp (material creation output),

Cs+Cp=F(E, S, R) 7

Substituting 2, 3, and 4 into 7 gives Cs+Cp=F(g(f(t)), h(f(t)), R)...8.

Equation 8 means: That the output of creation is a function of value.

t: The breakdown of the amount of production of creation changes depending on how V=f(t) changes with the passage of time.

What is meant by formula 8 is that the state of production of mental and material creations is determined by the combination of value, technical efficiency, social structure and reaction forces.

The expression on the right side expresses that the value fluctuates with time, and the amount of production of creation fluctuates according to that value, but the left side simply expresses the amount of production of spiritual creation and that of material creation. This formula does not express how the breakdown is determined.

 

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Civilizations and time 9 (Reaction force)

6 Reaction force: About R

Reaction force R is a force deeply related to culture, but if a certain value V exists, E: efficiency efficiency force and S: social structure force change depending on that V, and in this world there is some kind of creation, the amount of output .Suppose there is a significant expansion. Let us divide them into mental and physical things and name them Cs mental creations and Cp physical creations. However, while such things appear in the world, there is a force that tries to return them to their previous state, the state before the change, and this is defined as a counteracting force. No attempt is made to formulate the reaction force.

 

Examples of counteracting forces abound in cases of conservatism. Especially in Chinese history, this element seems to come out strongly. Confucianism has long overshadowed Chinese history. In the case of China, there has been a conflict between legalists and Confucianists since the Warring States period, but especially since the Sung period, large landowners, merchants, and bureaucrats have come together, and the emperor has acted as an intermediary. The examination questions for the imperial examinations to be selected were also based on Confucianism, that is, the rule of man. Until the society before the Republic of China based on Western thought, conservatism in China meant returning to the stable society of the former three parties, and in that sense it did not change.

 

Conservatism in Europe, on the other hand, changed rapidly. This may be due to the experience of a significant change in value. European civilization was based on Greece, the Roman Empire, and Christianity, but first, the coexistence of the sovereignty after Charlemagne, which was established after the invasion of the Germanic peoples, and the priesthood of the Roman pope, including pioneering by monasteries, was a major cornerstone. It seems that Thus began the Middle Ages in Europe, among which the value of the papal system exerted a great influence on technological efficiency and social structural power, giving birth to spiritual and material creations. It seems that the phenomena up to this point did not occur in Indian civilization or Islamic civilization, which were both religious civilizations. Neither Indian civilization nor Islamic civilization has ever had a large-scale bureaucracy of religious power, exactly like the secular one. The expansion of religious power in European civilization ended with the limit of agriculture, and after that it began to expand to the sea like the Crusades, but it led to the rise of commerce in Venice, Genoa, and Florence, the downfall of small and medium lords, and the rise of nations. , the Middle Ages lost their grounds and the Reformation, a force that denied them, eventually came into being. The activities of the Society of Jesus and the anti-religious revolution against it are conservatism, and may be given as an example of counteracting force.

 

As another example of conservatism, the value of the industrial revolution in Western Europe has influenced technological efficiency and social structure, and has produced spiritual and material creations . and it may be possible to point out that the power to deny it arose.The value of trying to make an industrial revolution may have been seen more strongly in France than in England. This is because Britain seems to have naturally accomplished the industrial revolution, while France seems to have consciously tried to start the industrial revolution. The French Revolution itself was started by enlightened aristocrats and bourgeoisie who felt a sense of crisis after watching the industrial revolution in England. It seems to be a typical symptom of the manifestation of counteracting forces." The example of France shows that, given the emergence of various forms of political regimes, counteracting forces can manifest themselves in many different forms. Europe was divided between Catholicism and Protestantism, but in 1830 and 1848, the ripples of civil revolution spread, centering on France. While France itself, the center of the ripples, was a haven for many forms of reactionary forces, and conservatism in other parts of Europe was also varied, the diffuse reflections of reactionary forces became very colorful. It seems that it was Germany that tried to lead to the industrial revolution in the most forcible way.

 

The Bismarck regime is said to be Bonaparteism*, but because it lagged behind France, it was unable to obtain overseas colonies in the way that Britain and France compromised on their overseas colonies. Although it was forced to move toward militarism, it was the same as France in that it tried to preserve conservatism and reactionary power. France spent a long time working out its problems with the Catholic Church (especially education). Such militarism rooted in conservatism is similar in Russia and Austria, and after World War I, the Russian and Austrian empires collapsed, Russia became a communist country, and Austria became a number of republics. 

 

* Bonaparteism

The foundation of the state is to promote capitalism and the interests of the bourgeoisie, but the forces of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat are in opposition, and in the transitional period when they cannot rule alone, they must seize and maintain political power with the support of the peasants in the middle and the middle classes .

 

In this way, conservatism and reactionary force remained relatively strong in England and France, but there was one country that developed differently, the United States. Unlike other European countries, the United States did not have an aristocratic or landlord class, which was originally conservative, and because of the size of its own country, it followed a different history from that of Europe. The United States sought to expand economically, rather than through blatant imperialism (although its neighbors were different), to acquire markets and resources (this is an important point in thinking about the era that will follow imperialism). 

 

During the Great Depression, fascism, in which the ruling class took control of the military, emerged as a countermeasure against the masses. In a sense, nationalism was also about preserving the long-formed conservative culture cultivated in the age of religion and aristocracy. For this reason, it should be considered that the culture of militarism already existed due to factors different from those of fascism. For example, in Japan, it could be called "Bushido".

 

If militarism is the result of conservatism and counter-acting forces, it is because there are conflicts between classes within the country, and the old powers of the church and the aristocracy are being oppressed by the industrialists and workers. It is thought that this is due to the fact that they tried to protect by force. In this era, the reason why they were oriented toward external development was that they used their political power in accordance with the times to acquire social status overseas and convert their land assets into financial assets in order to maintain their own vested interests.  and militarization was probably closely tied to it. In addition, the officers who commanded the armies were former powers of Britain, Germany, and Russia, and were of the aristocratic landlord class*.

 

*Gentleman Capitalism

The export of capital did not begin on top of the accumulation of capital by the Industrial Revolution, but the development of industrial capital as an investment destination (initially, it grew through the cooperation of industrial capitalists) at the same time as the capitalization of the nobility and gentry progressed. Together, Britain is said to have developed gentleman capitalism. Britain's trade balance declined early on, earning from its non-trade and capital accounts. And the culture built on this economic prosperity was the gentleman's culture, the Victorian morality.

 

In contrast, the United States did not have the old powers of nobility and churches, and although it was able to avoid blatant imperialism because of its vastness and its proximity to South America, it seems that it didnt formed its armies like Europe. The fact that there was little power of strong landlords and nobility would also be mentioned. It seems that this has become a form of economic expansion through business expansion overseas. This state of affairs in the United States seems to have had a great influence on the phenomenon of the latter half of the 20th century . Although there may have been something like an admiration for the British style.

Therefore, it seems that there was a feudal aristocratic value as a reaction to the spiritual and material creations of the Industrial Revolution (together with materialism), and this was linked to militarism (nationalism). In order to protect their feudal and aristocratic values, which were ending their historical role in relation to bourgeois and popular values, militarism was not denied, and colonial competition was affirmed. This reactionary force was stronger than expected, and lasted until World War I was inconclusive and Britain was exhausted in World War II, after which the colonies were liberated after the war. The result was the United States, a purely business  and a social organization for the industrial revolution. After the First World War, the reaction force declined greatly, the world changed greatly, and the modern world started, but the Second World War put an end to the reaction force originating in Europe.

 

Conservatism and reactionary forces in Europe are, in a sense, historical, and are closely related to the religious civilization that was established together with the agricultural civilization, such as the counter-reformation and militarism based on the aristocracy. was also a doctrine. The common root of all these is feudalism, but it might be a good idea to go back to Chinese civilization here. If the religious outcome of agricultural civilization in China was Confucianism, if Chinese civilization never became a feudal state in the sense of European civilization, and if conservatism, reactionary forces were to return to the Confucian classics, In the first place, Chinese civilization probably did not have anything equivalent to the religious reformation in European civilization*, and it may be said that there was no era of militarism.

 

In other words, the conservative and reactionary values that Europe has suffered for so long are not the ideas of the Industrial Revolution or the French Revolution, but rather the old religious and feudal values (Nietzsche's dying Christianity), the industrial revolution, Democracy is an advocacy of production and organization based on human reason, and it may itself be an unchanging ideal that is still in the process of evolution.

I have written conservatism and reactionary force side by side with similar meanings, but strictly speaking, they are different things. Reaction force is the "reaction" to technical efficiency and social organization power, whereas conservative force is the force in which technological efficiency and social structure force harmonize with the previous creative ruler or minority ruler. You should think In that sense, "conservative" may be said to be fusional and "synthetic".

 

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Civilizations and time 8 (social structural force)

5 Social Structural force: About S

 

Social structural force S is a force that is deeply related to politics, military, and integration , and is defined as a force that tries to realize an integration value V, given that there is an integration value V. The relationship between S and value V can be expressed by the following formula.

S=h(V)・・・③ From V=f(t), social structural force is a function of value, and value is a function of time. ＝h(f(t))・・・④,

which expresses that social structural force is a function of value. Values are chosen within the constraints of the times, and organizations are formed based on those values.

What has been realized in history is that the people who lived in that era chose the best values and organized the best in the challenging environment.

As an example of such social structural force, if we take examples from successive social organizations in China,ｗe can see that the history of Chinese dynasties was a history of repeated restructuring of social organization. From the Western Zhou to the Warring States period, it was domestic economic development that prompted the formation, but in the case of China, a radical regime (in this case, Qin) was established for a short period of time, and then a long-term regime, the Han, was established. , undergoing a process of stabilization. In the Han dynasty, conflicts between the public and private sectors arose, and the system was established in the midst of it.  During this time, challenges from the Xiongnu from outside also continued.

 

This mechanism continued to occur, and after the period of the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the Sui dynasty was established for a short period of time, followed by the Tang dynasty for a long period of time. The various systems created by the Sui dynasty were born during the Wei, Jin, and Southern and Northern Dynasties, and after a short period of radical Sui dynasty, they were stabilized under the long-term Tang dynasty. There has been economic development for some time, and among them, there have been conflicts between the public and private sectors, and new systems and both tax laws have emerged. In China's history, the reorganization of social systems and tax laws to grasp the people has been repeated repeatedly. It is also the reason why it is possible.

 

Later, after the turmoil of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, the Song dynasty arose. At this time, radical governments like Qin and Sui were not established, but instead, from the era of Sejong in the later Zhou to the establishment of the Song Dynasty , it occurred in the process of conflict. Based on the Shidaibu, they built up an excellent economist system consisting of bureaucrats, landlords, and big merchants. The Song dynasty tried to control the challenges from outside the country (Liao, Jin) with economicism (tribute diplomacy), replacing the domestic rule from soldiers to literati. However, here too there was a conflict between the public and private sectors (Wang Anshi's reforms). In the case of China, the conflict between the public and private sectors is the conflict between the government that protects the small and medium-sized landowners who bear the tax burden and the government that protects the interests of the large landowners. In the meantime, there was an emperor, with eunuchs as his servants.

 

After the Song dynasty, the Han Chinese continued to be challenged by outsiders in northern China, and the period of conquest dynasties continued. Liao, Jin, and Yuan followed, but the invention of social organization in the Liao and the ``system centered on nomads'' and the ``system centered on farmers'' such as North and South officials (so to speak, the beginning of one country, two systems) ) was the premise of the conquest dynasty. At the same time, the establishment of a system of bureaucrats, large landowners, and large merchants in China must have been important. After the Liao and Jin, the Yuan Dynasty was established from the 12th century to the 14th century, but although it was one country, two systems (in terms of taxation), it did not respect the Han people, but respected the people of the eyes. It was originally a trading nation, and it may be said that Han Chinese landowners and merchants were taken in by it. Originally, a coin called kosho was established with salt as the source of capital, but due to the wasteful spending of finances and the inadequacy of the method of succeeding to the government, the Ming dynasty was established after a peasant rebellion and compromise with the large landowners. Although the Ming revived the policies of the Han people (Riko system, Yurin Huangshu), they had no choice but to follow the movements of the world, creating a silver-based monetary economy, and the tax system was established as a one-paragraph expedient law. . After a period of restorationism, the Ming, unlike the Yuan dynasty, established relations with foreign countries under state control . In the first place, Ming did not have the radical leading nations, Qin, Sui, and Later Zhou like Han, Tang, and Song before it, but it was a trading nation, a nation in which the Yuan dynasty collapsed and the Han people revived. During the emperor's era, there was an aspect that he tried to inherit the Yuan line (Zheng He, who made a great cruise abroad, was a eunuch and a former secular man), but this was no longer possible in Hokuroku Nanwa, and the Han people's old landlords. , bureaucrats, and merchants may have been frozen in the trinity system. In the Ming dynasty, the economy developed, but Tsukudado's anti-ancestor movement also became active. There was growth to free farmers, but it did not lead to the industrial revolution due to usury and the production process being meticulously controlled by commercial capital. In the Ming political system, the power of the emperor and eunuchs (after the Yongle emperor) was strong, and the rule of the emperor was strengthened from the bottom at first, but the structure was such that local gentlemen, who were granted special privileges by the government, suppressed small and medium-sized landowners. Instead, it became a typical example of how the "social structural force" created by large landlords, bureaucrats, and large merchants (triangle) suppressed the "efficient technological power" of the economy. Financially, the emperor should stand between the general public and the wealthy, eunuch politics (one of the most prominent Chinese social structures, probably established to respond to the powerful bureaucracy or to back up the imperial dictatorship. The reason why it fell into the “things” is probably due to the inclination toward the Trinity. As a result, a peasant rebellion broke out, and it was put under control by the Qing, who were not the Han Chinese. Achieved equilibrium (Emperor Kangxi, Emperor Yongzheng). However, this equilibrium was broken during the Qianlong emperor's long prosperity.

 

I have looked at the history of China as an example of social structural force, and I have taken up it as a typical example of the suppression of efficient technological force. For a long time in other civilizations as well, the mainstream of change seems to have been a change in social structural force. The rapid expansion of the Islamic empire after Muhammad and the rapid expansion of the Mongol empire after the advent of Genghis Khan can be cited as such examples. they reformed military administrative organizations to control trade routes, and a society that encompassed religion and culture. I believe that the invention of the system was the secret to success. The history of China's dynasties can be said to be a treasure trove of such history.

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Civilizations and time 7 ( Efficient technical capability : E)

4 First, let's briefly consider value. Value will be considered in another article, "Civilization and Value," but if I explain only the conclusion, value will arise with the transition of the creative ruler . Synthesis of ``quantitative'' changes that occur with ``qualitative'' changes and the transitions of the imitative masses  is formed by “quality and quantity synthesis”.

So it would be a combinatorial problem. For example, what happens to society when the leaders of society lose their creativity and the masses are self-actualized?

This seems to be a problem relevant to modern Japan, but when a society's leadership groups respond creatively to the challenges of the outside world, and when the public's mentality is strongly communal-oriented, the society is strong. Conversely, when the leadership group can only take compulsory control and the masses are self-fulfilling and disjointed, society seems to be weakened.

 

With that in mind, let's consider value: V (V alue ) and time: t (T ime ).

Here the value V is given. The formula V=f(t) . . . 1 is a conceptual formula expressing that value is a function of time. This means that the value changes with time. Values change because, with changes in the external world and environment, the contents of challenges change, the ability of creative leaders to respond to change, and the intentions of the masses change. ) simply states that "value changes with time" including all such things.

As for the question of how "value" changes due to what influences time, it can be said that the external world, changes in the environment, the position of the creative ruler, and the position of the masses correspond to the function "f".  Whether V or f or anything can be quantified is not considered here, and I think there is a certain significance in the sense of how these relationships are positioned in the system of the driving force of historical change.

On the other hand, t is time, and time exists trivially as a quantity, just as the chronology of history does. However, the historical chronology was not treated as if Tyco Brahe observed celestial bodies and organized the data.

What should be considered here may be the work of selecting examples from many histories. For example, if we think about the transfer of hegemony, what kind of challenges did the Netherlands receive from the outside world, what kind of creative leaders emerged, and what was the state of the public at that time? This will be arranged along with a chronology (as objective time), and this will probably be how the "celestial bodies" in the world system of Holland, England, and America moved.

 

Accepting V=f(t) as a rough hypothesis, let us not consider the content and state of V for the time being, but consider the system of driving force.

 

4 Efficient technology: About E

Efficient technical capability E is mainly related to efficiency and technology. When a certain value V exists, it is defined as the ability to achieve technical improvement among the powers that try to realize that value. As a case to think about this, a comparison of "South Korea and North Korea" or "China and Taiwan" may be appropriate. If the value is different, the meaning of "efficiency" and "technology" to realize it will be greatly different. South Korea's national policy was economic growth, and North Korea's national policy was military . In this way, the value regulates and controls the content of efficient technical capabilities. In that case, the most important thing is to “find out values that match the trends of the times and the world,” and it will be the market, capitalism, or the government that will make this possible. Again, it may be interesting to see what happened in the case of Wallerstein's hegemonic states, Holland, England, and America. For the time being, let's express the relationship between efficient technical ability E and value V in a formula.

 

Since V=f(t)…(1), E=g(V) is E=g(f(t))…(2)

 

Formula (2) expresses that efficient technological capabilities are a function of value from formula (1) V = f(t), and that value is a function of time. In practice, values are chosen within the constraints of time, and technologies are chosen based on those values, within the constraints of limited resources. In other words, what has been achieved in the past history was achieved by the people who lived in that era choosing the best value in the environment as a challenge and investing limited resources in the best efficient technology. That is what it means. Regardless of whether it is truly optimal.

 

As an example of such efficient technology, if we take the case of the industrial revolution in England,

Invention of coke production method with coalfields (1709) "change from wood to coal"

Newcomen, Steam Internal Combustion Engine (1712)

Watt, Steam Internal Combustion Engine (1769) with further efficiency

Development of spinning machines and other machinery Use as a power source (Jenny, Arkwright, Cartwright, Mule)

Development of transportation (railway, steamship)

 

The use of coal as a power source and from wood to iron as a material was a technological innovation accompanying the reduction of wood resources and a response to environmental challenges. That kind of value existed in England at the time, and I can feel a strong obsession with "power" in particular. The raw material of iron and the power of the steam engine gave birth to full-fledged "machinery", supporting productivity and transportation, and at the same time becoming the source of the power of the British nation*. However, in the case of the British Industrial Revolution, before the leap in efficient technology, there was also a major element of the leap in social organization power (deregulation, centralization, fiscal reform, financial system), which will be discussed later . It was largely the non-mainstream Puritan middle class or Scots* who were responsible for the innovation,  and the fact that there were people with values that compelled them to go in that direction. 

 

In addition, there was a market in which capital (Atlantic trade: triangular trade with America and Africa) was accumulated from the beginning, but according to Ashton's "Industrial Revolution" , industrial entrepreneurs initially It was thought that the businessmen who expanded the factories were able to accommodate each other's capital. After production got on track, Gentry and financiers may have invested heavily in the factories, but looking at the background to the abolition of the grain law, it seems that it was not so simple*. Also, unlike London, Lancashire, where the Industrial Revolution took place, did not have a large population, which may have been a factor in promoting mechanization*. When it comes to technology, there were talents (Dissidents, Scottish Enlightenment) and resources (coal, iron ), depletion of timber, population scarcity as challenges, fostering value for innovation and has hatched. And there were favorable conditions such as the agricultural revolution in East Anglia such as Norfolk, strong centralization centering on London and deregulation after the Glorious Revolution, investment from the Netherlands, and overseas markets due to the Seven Years War. The appearance of a completely different world from the era before it, such as the Industrial Revolution, would not have appeared without the discovery or creation of "value" and rational (not only empirical) efforts* toward it. In a sense, then, by losing the creative middle class, Britain lost rationalism, and creative leaders degraded under empiricism.

 

The Industrial Revolution was cited as the best example of efficient technological power. would be mentioned as an example. These are interesting themes about what kind of challenges they faced, what kind of creative leaders emerged, how the masses followed them, and how civilization developed. At that time, social organizational power might be at work as well, but when looking at what kind of power was most dominant, it is fair to think that it was an era when efficient technological power was at work most. I wonder. The present age is truly an era of efficient technological power, and the value of technology is the most dominant situation .

 

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Civilizations and time 6（about five forces)

3 If we organize the above dynamical system into several "force" concepts, what would it be like?

Pressure from the environment or from outside civilizations or forces (which we call external forces).

Creative Minority Capabilities. A shift in the energy of creative faculties.

capacity as the susceptibility and comprehension of many imitators.

Self-development capacity of the inner proletariat.

Self-development capacity of the external proletariat.

 

How to judge a challenge is a matter of "value", and in the sense of responding to "value" efficiently and systematically, there are two main types: "efficient technical ability" and "social organization ability". I think.

And these forces, being forces, will also have counteracts.

Internal proletariat, external proletariat, world empire against environmental control

World Churches, Fighting Groups as counteracting forces against It

These can be thought of as different forms of social organizing power.

 

Therefore, I would like to cite 1 value, 2 efficient technical power, 3 social organizational power, 4 reaction, and 5 external power as the minimum form of the concept of force in social science. And add "time" to it. These forces change over time. Wallerstein's conception could be included as an example of an external force that influences these forces. In reality, there are various forces at work in this human society, but I have tentatively extracted these forces from among these various forces.

  

Braudel aside, Wallerstein's theory seems to be more spatial than temporal. Wallerstein's time axis is, for example, the A phase and the B phase*1, and the world system is assumed to be a movement between the central country, semi-peripheral countries, and peripheral countries. Therefore, the dependency theory is accepted, and the stage of development theory is not accepted. it may be correct. However, from the perspective of the emergence and growth of capitalism, Tadao Umesao's Ecological Historical View of Civilization seems to make good use of Marx's materialist historical view. There was a region where capitalism naturally arose and developed (transitioned), and along with that came the central country, semi-peripheral countries, and peripheral countries. In other words, movements have arisen in semi-peripheral and peripheral countries.

 

※１The Kondratiev cycle is the basic cycle of expansion and stagnation in the capitalist world/economy. One cycle, which consists of the so-called A phase "expansion period" and B phase "stagnation period", generally has a length of about 50 to 60 years.

 

Western Europe and Japan had undergone an ecological transition from feudalism to capitalism, while other regions were formed as empires rooted not in feudalism but in domestic farming and pastoralism. Based on this way of thinking, Marx's materialistic view of history is not necessarily connected to the theory of the stages of development, and capitalism is a phenomenon that occurred specifically in Europe and Japan. The central country, the semi-peripheral country, the peripheral country, the A phase, and the B phase are the concepts taken up by Wallerstein, but Umesao believes that the former empire, which is not a capitalist country, can achieve economic development with an approach different from that of democracy. 

 Wallerstein's theory seems to address the quantitative (such as the volume of trade) rather well from the standpoint of quality and quantity*. However, from the perspective of history and futurology, it seems that there are still many blank areas in how to predict "quality" and "essence." Why, then, is Toynbee's theory of civilization capable of predicting something qualitative? That's because Toynbee's theory is vague, but it's also qualitative and dynamic.

 

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Civilizations and time 5 (the driving force that changes history and dynamic system)

6 About the driving force that changes history

I first touched on Spengler and Toynbee because they are historical researchers who place more emphasis on the time axis (which is also a bridge to the future), and Spengler and Toynbee also have many shortcomings. I also pointed out While paying attention to such points, we will think about the driving force that will change history, but for the time being, it will have nothing to do with Spengler. Qualitatively, Spengler is still inaccessible at this point, and it seems that Spengler may deepen in relation to the theory of value. This time, I would like to think about the time axis, and later, I would like to think about the theory of value. Therefore, in considering the driving force of historical change here, if anything, the relationship with Toynbee will often come up. In a sense, I think that Toynbee's theory of history can serve as a signpost for expressing the human world as a dynamic system.

 

 

(2) Approach to motive force analysis based on time

1 When thinking about the driving force of civilizational change, I am reminded of Ranke's interesting point*1. Ranke regarded world history as a place of conflict of spiritual energy, but he said that spiritual energy could not be defined. This trend may come from Hegel. Or perhaps the great event of the French Revolution created the atmosphere of that era. This led to Marx's historical materialism, and Weber's "Ethics of Capitalism and Protestantism" and "Sociology of Religion." So to speak, from Kant to Hegel was the origin, Ranke, Marx, and Weber were also their cultural descendants, and Spengler was ahead of them. Because Ranke was a historian, unlike a philosopher, he would have seen something more individual with spiritual energy. Spengler's era also passed through such an era, and it was the era of the philosophy of "life" that occurred as a reaction to the age of physics. Thinking about values is very important, but in natural philosophy it is the same as thinking about the existence of "God", which is the last thing to think about before looking at each civilization individually. However, at this stage, let's set aside "value" for the time being and, based on the definition of "force," let's approach Newton's position, who unraveled the structure and function of the natural world.

 

However, as I thought earlier, German culturalism (a flower that bloomed because political and economic liberalism was not recognized for a long time) seems to have a big hint when thinking about "value". It was no coincidence that Weber turned to the study of Protestantism as an ethic of capitalism, and to the sociology of religion in civilizations other than European civilization. Even if it is a negative thing *2.

 

*1 Ranke's theory of spiritual energy "Great Powers"

"What we perceive in the development of world history are the forces, especially the spiritual power, the creative power which gives rise to life, and life itself, that is, the spiritual energy. This Power cannot be defined or abstracted, but we can intuitively perceive it and empathize with its existence. Enchanting, appearing to us in various forms, fighting, restraining, and overcoming each other, in the interaction and succession of these forces, in their birth and death or revival, that is, greater fulfillment and greater significance. In those resurrections which envelop the vast expanses, the secrets of world history lie hidden."

Ranke is a historian who believes in the importance of verifying historical facts and their causal relationships, and was the first historian to try to grasp the flow of world history. As the background of the development of world history, it is said that some "various powers" are taken as the driving force. Among them, mental energy is the greatest driving force, but it seems that he also thought that it was impossible to define or abstract this power. What should be remembered here is that the position of mental energy dominance in the West is indicated. An image like a dynamic system of various forces is shown. Nevertheless, it is abandoning the definition of mental energy. In the first place, is mental energy something that cannot be defined? In modern times, the digitization and accumulation of data has finally progressed, and it seems that it is becoming possible.

 

*2 Weber's Sociology of Religion, Kenichi Tominaga, "Max Weber and the Modernization of Asia," 

In Weber's sociology of religion, it was written from the perspective of why religions in civilized spheres other than Europe did not give birth to capitalism and the industrial revolution, so the expression was negative. But in modern times there is a big breakthrough in the Asian region, and this needs to be explained.

 

2. Now, if we set aside the issues of culture and value and explain the human world, not the natural world, with "power," what would be the hint? One approach would be to look at it from the perspective of economics and material civilization. France's Braudel and America's Wallerstein seem to be close to this position. In Braudel's case, he himself disclaimed that his approach was a limitation*1. Moreover, it was said that there are three time axes*2. Braudel must have had the eyesight to be worthy of the pope of history, but there was one thing he couldn't do*3. Wallerstein took over Braudel's work, and although there were moves to incorporate his methods into historical studies , they were not enough to supplement Braudel's missing parts.  The reason why this has happened is that no theory or concept that could be put into perspective or has been discovered.

 

Braudel himself did not have a Weberian view of the establishment of capitalism, and it seems that modern times are also in the midst of such a trend. The missing part of Braudel is the elegant history (as Braudel puts it) that Lucien Faivre intended to write, the thought or philosophy, the ``theory of value,'' as it were. And more than others. , but it is about the "world and economy" of various civilizations before the establishment of capitalism. Futuristic studies. Looking at it in this way, it seems that Wallerstein's theory and problem posing* are very useful in the present age, but it is undeniable that there are still some missing parts. What will fill that void? One of them is Toynbee's view.

 

Why is Toynbee qualitative? It is qualitative because there is almost no quantitative consideration, and in the secular sense it does not necessarily mean that it is popular, but its theory is easier to understand than, for example, culturalist Spengler. would be in Toynbee's theory of civilization is that civilization is first challenged by the environment and the outside, to which a creative minority appears and reacts, and many imitators appear, but eventually the creative rule deteriorates. It is said that they will become a dominant minority, which will give rise to an internal proletariat, an external proletariat, and a world empire, a world church, and a fighting group.

First, there is the pressure exerted by the environment, external civilizations and forces, and second, the ability of the creative minority. capacity as the susceptibility and comprehension of many imitators. A shift in the energy of creative faculties. Self-development capacity of the inner proletariat. The capacity for self-development of the external proletariat. The inner proletariat, the outer proletariat, or the world empire as a controlling force against environmental change, the world church, as a counteracting force against it, the fighting group. In this way, Toynbee's theory of civilization can be read as a dynamic system in a qualitative sense.

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civilizations and time 4 (what Spengler and Toynbee were missing)

5 What were Spengler and Toynbee missing?

 

What Spengler overlooked was his failure to explore more deeply the meaning*1 of "time," which is one of the resources for human beings. In his way of thinking, civilization is consequently represented only as a life cycle. He showed how the form of civilization can be transformed by the involvement of time in terms of trends (life cycles) and examples of how mental conditions have affected culture and civilization. However, it was not possible to explain the structure well.

 

What Toynbee overlooked, I think, was that he was unable to investigate more deeply the trends in the activity of the mental energy behind the historical changes. He also focused on mental energy. It can be said that the development of civilization is caused by the emergence of creative individuals and imitation by the masses, and the decline of civilization is caused by the deterioration of creative individuals. However, it is less persuasive because it lacks consideration of "what kind of efficiency and organization led to such an individual's mental energy." However, Toynbee partially explained the causes of efficiency and organization with the concept of "challenge and response".

 

*1 For Spengler, the meaning that time has for civilization is simply the process of decreasing life energy, and he finds many detailed descriptions of this process in art and culture (including mathematics). However, even though culture represents value, it cannot be said that culture alone is the world, and there should be value in economics and politics, but Spengler, being German, does not touch economics and politics very much.  In that sense, Spengler's explanation lacks detailed analysis and is biased in its coverage.

 

*2 Spengler, like *1, but probably more intuitive than Toynbee. One of them is that the Western concept of time is calculus. However, despite Spengler's argument, as a result, he did not consider the changes in civilization in terms of calculus, but ended up with fatalism. Spengler's thought was surrounded by many intuitions that grasped the truth, but it tended to be fragmentary and stop there.

 

*3 I will explain about efficiency and organization later. Toynbee focused on mental energy as the driving force of history. But it was in his later years. Newton tried to explain the natural world with the "concept of force" and succeeded in doing so, but did not dare to mention the subject that caused it. And post-Newtonian scientists never questioned it. On the other hand, in the human world, we knew the beginning that the "force" was being generated, and it was humans. There are changes in the environment, but it is certain that human beings are the subject of change in history. It seems that Toynbee realized that there was a faint "force" at work there. Challenge → Birth of the creative individual → Creative dominance and mimesis ( imitation of the masses) → Change to the dominant minority → Rise of the internal and external proletariat → Respond In this scheme is the power of influence and adaptability. It seems that Toynbee did not have the idea to propose and explain some new concepts of force. However, it is felt that he was trying to describe the human world or civilization by "some kind of dynamical system." The reason why Toynbee was unable to depict the dynamic system of the human world may be that the various forces in the human world were not recognized in ordinary life. However, even in the human world, there is the power of value, technology, and organizational innovation, and responses to challenges will be born through this.

 

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civilizations and time 3 (world seen through time axis)

3 What Toynbee and Spengler have in common

Despite their differences, Spengler and Toynbee were beginning an interesting study. The two of them are often regarded as the originators of the relativization of European civilization, often beginning their research with the unit of civilization, but it seems that the starting point of their research was thinking about the future of European civilization. It seems that the research was oriented toward the future . This is a major difference from other historians who have explained various historical phenomena . These two are not strictly historians, nor are they different from modern social scientists (political scientists, economists, sociologists). However, there may be other researchers who have viewed European civilization mainly as the history of capitalism, not the history of Europe. Marx, Hicks, Braudel, Wallerstein, etc. seem to be such people. These four people have drawn up Europe's past, present and future from economic and material life*1.

 

*1 Marx and Hicks categorized the periods of European history chronologically according to the production system. Marx's ancient production system, feudal production system, market production system, capital production system, and socialist production system. Hicks describes the command economy, the market economy, the city-state economy, the national economy, and the command economy again. Although these are based on the realm of nations, Braudel and Wallerstein have the "world and economy" in mind as a viewpoint of the present age. Their perspective is how this "world economy" has changed over the long, medium, and short term, and it is said that this was established because capitalism was born as a result of the development of the market economy. These two schools do not merely examine history, but both seem to have the aspect of theory that can predict the future. If anything, Braudel and Wallerstein may be more important in modern times. This is because there is still little to see from a global and economic perspective. Compared to Braudel and Wallerstein, Wallerstein is too biased toward economics, which is a difficult point for future studies. It seems that Braudel at least understood his difficulty. This is so in the sense that the world economy existed before 16th-century Europe.

 

The second thing that Spengler and Toynbee have in common is that they were both strongly aware of the "time axis." The obvious difference between these two and other historians (including those who emphasize capitalism and material life) is that historians have investigated historical facts and their causal relationships to weave history and historical views. On the other hand, it may be that he placed greater importance on the existence of the time axis than on the chain of historical facts*1. It means that they felt something (spirit or creativity) that faded with time.

 

*1 In addition to Spengler and Toynbee, there is Braudel as a person who pondered deeply about time. In a sense, Braudel was more than the former two. Braudel divides time into three parts. Long term time: geography, environment. Medium-term time: economy. Short Time: as a political and event history .Braudel wrote "Mediterranean Sea in the Time of Felipe II". However, it is quite different from the "time axis" here. From now on, time is considered to be one of the "resources", and even though it is a resource, people, ethnic spirits, and creativity deteriorate with the passage of time, and civilization eventually declines. I think of that figure as a time axis (it flows past, present, and future), and in the sense that I look at it, it is similar to Spengler's and Toynbee's time, but has a point that is different from Braudel's time. 

  

4 What drives history

What I want to think about here is the driving force that changes history. Without human involvement, time by itself produces nothing. If so, what part of human activity is related to time and what creates creations and innovations? The new part of Spengler and Toynbee's thought that has not been paid attention to yet *1 is the theme of "What do humans create while consuming time as a resource?" Isn't it at the point? In this section, we will try to intuitively grasp the image of the driving force of historical change from the writings of past historians, look at some of its essences and structures, and deepen our thoughts on the concept of the time axis. I would like to consider a simple hypothetical model of historical change.

 

*1 Today, it takes patience to read the works of Spengler and Toynbee. Even the reduced version seems to be hard. Rather, Braudel and Wallerstein are much easier to approach. Its views are clear, concise, and all concrete because it is a reflection on material civilization. Braudel's sources are astonishing. Compared to this, the subjects of Spengler and Toynbee, especially Spengler, also deal with spiritual civilization, and are often abstract and self-righteous. Therefore, reading Spengler and Toynbee carefully will not give you a clear understanding of something. Spengler and Toynbee are mentioned here as founders of thought that attempts to grasp the world through the time axis that connects "past, present, and future." In this way they tried to explain the workings of all civilizations.

 

Looking at it from a different point of view, it can be said that it means recapturing the relationship between humans and resources. This is because the resources that are the source of all power are ultimately reduced to time, spiritual energy, and material energy, and the time axis is a world cut from one of these resources, time. This is because it can be said to be a view. It can be said that it is a world view that is constructed with time as a resource at the center*1 (When it comes to environmental issues, thinking backwards from the catastrophe will also become important). On the other hand, mental energy is all human thought energy and has various orientations. Material energy is kinetic energy and materials activated by petroleum, nuclear power, etc., and performs various activities and productions according to human will.

 

*1 The world cut out from the resource of time is, for example, the history of the Korean people and the Han people. South Korea and North Korea, China and Taiwan, and the 70 years since the end of the war are both unchanged, but completely different politics, economies, and cultures have been formed, and the products (including various things) that have been born from them. there was a clear difference. Differences in values and worldviews have resulted in differences in the distribution of resources, which in turn has resulted in differences in what is produced. We can look back on the past, but applying this idea to the future means that we need tools to predict what will happen and what will be produced in the next five years, for example. It can be said that thinking about such things is "the work of cutting out and digging up the world from time."

 

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civilization and time 2 (differences between Spengler and Toynbee)

2 What was Spengler

Spengler is difficult to call a historian. In 1918, the work DIcline of the West had a similar relationship to history*1 as Nietzsche's Also sprach Zarathustra had to philosophy. Maybe. The work is more philosophical than historical. Spengler's morphology *2 seems to be a field of study that has the perspective of looking at how history changes over time. Spengler made an interesting point about the Western sense of time (a calculus image), but as a result, civilization was vitalistic and deterministic *3.

 

*1 Was Spengler a historian?

The historian Bernheim seems to include Spengler in the expressionist view of history in "What is history?" Spengler's concepts ``Faustian'', ``Magi-like'' and ``Apollonian'' were inspired by Nietzsche's ``Apollonian'' and ``Dionysian'' in ``The Birth of Tragedy''. It is thought that he was in the midst of the trend of "expressionist art" centered on Germany at the time of World War I.  "The Decline of the West" is similar in position to Nietzsche's "Also Thus sprach Zuarathustra." It is questionable whether Spengler can be called a historian in the present age of 2018, but even though he influenced historical studies, Wallerstein of ``World System Theory'' was a ``sociologist'' and Braudel was a ``historian'' who wrote ``Markets, Capitalism, and Material civilization''. However, Germany or European civilization at that time seemed to be in a state of historical mental tension, and there may actually be much more things to be learned from this.

 

*2 Spengler's morphology

Spengler wrote that he was inspired by Goethe about the method of witnessing. Goethe was also a naturalist, and by contemplating the life of nature, he tried to master the essence of life. The same is true of human beings and society and this thought is reflected in many of his novels on human beings, the highly abstracted expression of "Faust", and probably the "Wilhelm Meister" series on society. It is said that Goethe drew the flow to the future here. It may be necessary to interpret Spengler's morphology based on this. The driving force that changed Spengler's form was "life", and it was the moral "ethics", a code of conduct that disregarded the profit and loss accounting rooted in "land" and "ethnicity". In a nutshell, Spengler's morphology is to learn the form of "moral" change. It may be possible to view it as just an analogy. Toynbee's criticism of Spengler therefore seems somewhat irrelevant. Toynbee believes that human history is not destined, but something that can be changed, and that the decline of the West and the organic theory of civilization are false. As such, there are various changes, but they will eventually die, and I believe that there is a process between birth and death. In any case, it may be said that there is a difference between the British way of doing things and the German way of doing things, but considering these two together is actually of great significance.

 

*3 Vitalism and determinism

According to Bernheim, Spengler's vitalist and expressionist positions came from Bergson and Husserl. The difference in interest from the present is probably that while Europe in the latter half of the 19th century was the age of physics, the 20th century was becoming the age of reaction to it. Spengler's determinism seems to be a simple derivative of vitalism, as I considered in *2, but what Toynbee criticized was that he asserted, like a prophet, that the West would fall in the 21st century. It must have been Spirit or morality was Spengler's lifeblood.

For example, Toynbee writes in `` Studiy of histry'' . He believes that the relaxation of tension caused by the establishment of the world state of society has caused the decline of human qualities.

"One of the cancers of modern human mental life is the reduction of mental tension, and all of us, with the exception of a select few, lead a relaxed life. Even at work, we find distraction. Even in

is quoted. In Toynbee's later years, too, interest turned to the energy that drives civilization, but Spengler intuitively asserted that life-based energy would one day run out. Therefore, one of the themes we will explore would be how spiritual energy changes in individuals and societies. I plan to think of it as 'Civilization and Value'.

 

Toynbee rejected Spengler's determinism. Toynbee studied various structures and functions that change history, but as a result, he believed that history did not progress deterministically. Whereas Spengler saw primarily the spirit (e.g. Christianity, rationalism, democracy, nationalism) as the driving force that drives history, Toynbee drew on the tradition of British empiricism and focused more on the secular. He may have seen the driving force in the power of *1. However, there seems to be little consideration of the energy that drives history, probably because he was a people in the country where the industrial revolution originated, perhaps because they were unable to become conscious of it. Spengler deterministically advocated the decline of Europe because he placed too much weight on its "spirit," whereas Toynbee rejected determinism by focusing on something other than "spirit" *2. It seems that it was because he did not clearly understand what it was.

 

*1 As mentioned above, Toynbee also mentions the tension of mental energy. In Toynbee's case, mental energy is not specified. In response to the challenges of the times, creative individuals and creative minorities emerged, which eventually relaxed and transformed into ruling minorities, within which the internal proletariat and external proletariat emerged.  Toynbee does not seem to have used his own formula to explain how the Industrial Revolution occurred in England. However, it is possible to say that "the driving force in the world" is the spiritual energy that supports the response to the challenges of the times. And the challenges of the times are always mundane. In that sense, compared to Spengler's abstract energy view of vital energy aimed at the land and people, Toynbee's may be said to be secular.

*2 If Spengler's spirit is the feeling of life that is aimed at the land and the people, then the spirit of the people is finite, just like life. Even if it doesn't die, it may weaken. On the other hand, Toynbee finds a driving force in something other than the spirit, in the mundane, because history and environmental challenges collide with the vital feelings of the people, and history changes and develops by responding. This is probably because they think they will go. What is important here is the emergence of a creative minority in a wide range of genres and how the masses who imitate it (which Toynbee called mimesis*) will react. It does not mean that it is destined to decline because it exists, but it depends on how elements such as challenge, creative individual, creative minority, and response are involved as variables, and rather the relationship with the world. 

 

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Civilizations and time 1 (Times of Spengler and Toynbee)

Serching for lost  civilizations theory

 

1   Times of  Spengler and Toynbee

Looking at various histories, we sometimes come across similar scenes despite being in different times and places. People such as Spengler and Toynbee, who were living in the twilight of European civilization in the early 20th century, were the first to notice it. They looked at the past civilizations as if they were "life" and warned of the future of European civilization. Looking at the sinking European civilization, they began to think about what civilization is.

This study seems to have had several characteristics. It seems to have appeared in a contradictory manner, especially in Spengler's book The Decline of the West. Spengler picked up Nietzsche's awareness of the problem and, in the process of overcoming the decline of Christian civilization, set out to explore the biological regularity of civilization (but,which Spengler calls morphology, not regularity). However, he chose Goethe's phenomenological methodology as a way to express his thoughts. Investigation of biological regularity and coexistence of phenomenological ethodology. ``Nietzsche gave me an awareness of the problem, and Goethe gave me a methodology.''*1 That may be what it means.

On the other hand, as far as Toynbee is concerned, I can see in his work "Study of History", rather than looking at phenomena, it seems that he collects historical facts as examples of his own theory, although it is an ambiguous theory. Moreover, Toynbee seems to have pursued various structures and functions of civilizations, rather than looking at it organically*2.

Civilization got attention as European civilization began to decline, but it was received differently. Germany's Spengler sees the way of mind (or morals) *3, while Toynbee of England, the mother country of Newtonian mechanics and economics, sees the structure and function of civilization *4. It seems that

 

*1 Spengler's motivation, Nietzsche and Goethe

Law and Witness. Both Spengler and Toynbee must have had a strong awareness of these two things. However, Toynbee seems to have been skeptical about the laws of human history (because, in Spengler's terms, the decline of European civilization would be inevitable) and that he was aware of the uncertainty. Spengler also advocated a new field of study called 'morphology' instead of 'law', and called it the last study of European civilization.

 

*2 Toynbee's motive, the mechanism of civilization

Toynbee's theory of civilization has something of a "dynamical system" to it, and it feels like many of its concepts involve something like power. The relationship between the "creative minority and mimesis" (the masses as imitators) lies behind the concept of "the growth and disintegration of civilization." A creative minority loses its creativity and becomes a dominant minority. “Internal proletariat, external proletariat”. It is a mechanism born in the midst of decline, the process of which is “challenge and response”, and the concept of “world nation, world church”. It seems that it is necessary to decipher them one by one.

 

*3 The state of mind

Spengler believed that the spirit as life, rooted in each land and ethnic group, goes through the ages of birth, youth, maturity, and senescence, just like humans, as it undergoes urbanization and globalization (generalization).

 

*4 Dynamic function of civilization

Toynbee's historical research touches on many historical facts as examples of theory. In that sense (although Toynbee himself may not have been conscious of it in that way), this "study of history", which seems to have attempted to interpret human society dynamically.  Newton didnt write "Principia" in calculus,Newton wrote it  in geometry which was mathematics at the time*. It seems that there are some similarities with Toynbee's case, there was still nothing like calculus for analyzing human society, and there is still none today. Perhaps, time is before Newton and Kepler, Tycho Brahe.  But big data may make it possible in the future.

* There are many classical expressions of Greece and Rome, or Bible which are traditional culture in writing expressions.

 

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文明と価値２３（日本準文明にとって価値）

　価値について、それがどのように形成されるかについて考えてきた。外部的な力によって形成される価値と内部的な力によって形成される価値とに分けて考えてきた。そしてその考察の場は日本に限定してみた。そこから得られたイメージは日本社会において新社会勢力が旧社会勢力を乗り越えようとしているというイメージであった。そして社会科学の在り方自体が変わろうとしているというイメージもあった。つまり日本固有の事情と世界全体の大まかな流れとが重なって現れている状況だろう。

 

　日本固有の事情として、五つの項目を挙げた。１高齢少子化、２財政赤字化、３新産業革命、４天災（地震、気象変動、感染症）、５外交（アメリカと中国の対立）がそれだが、特に中心となって影響力を持ち始めるのは、新産業革命だと思われる。新産業革命の本質はそれが知力の機械化と深く関係していることである。ITC、ビックデータ、AIといった分野ではアメリカが最先端を進んでいるが、中国が追いつこうとしている。自動車も自動運転化へ進もうとしているが、こういった流れが究極まで進んだ時、何が起こってくるのだろうか。もしかしたら政治、行政の自動運転化がそれではないか。しかしそこへ至るためには、その前に社会科学の進化が前提となってくるように思われる。社会科学の進化とは社会科学で設定された諸概念を力学的に捉えることによってはじめて構築されるものであろう。新産業革命は他の四項目とも深く関わっている。関係あるデータ群のピックアップとそれらの数字が持つ力とがどのように関係しているか、そして問題を解決するためには何が必要かが、それぞれ四項目にも答えを出してくれるだろう。

 

　政治、行政の自動運転化の問題はアメリカも中国も実は手が出しにくい問題である。アメリカには民主主義の理念があり、中国には共産主義の理念がある。中国における共産主義とは共産党が国家を支配するということであるが、アメリカも中国もそういう意味では「価値」を明確に持っている国ということができるだろう。

 

　それに対して、日本はその中空構造を利用したしなやかな政治、行政の自動運転化を志向するのがいいのかもしれない。アメリカや中国のように硬質な価値を持たずに、資本主義が逐次もうかるところに資本が流れていく経済システムであるように、価値も時代ごとに変更し、流れていく価値システムであるのが望ましいのではないだろうか。

 

　『文明の研究』の中では「五つの力」について触れてきた。1価値、２技術的効率力、３社会構造力、４反作用力、５外部力・環境力がそれであったが、価値がそれ以外の四つの力に影響を及ぼすとしていた。しかも価値がそれぞれ様々であり、それ自体が広がり、空間を持っていた。

 

　思い返せば、1991年以降の30年間とは日本がそれ自体で価値を持てなかった時代ではなかったか。中空構造である真ん中に「価値」がはいらず、舵をとられることもなく漂流していた時代だったのではないか。それは日本人にしてみれば違和感はなかったのかもしれない。元々日本人は雑種的な民族だともいわれてきた。

 

　しかしそうした違和感のない中で先の四項目、高齢少子化、財政赤字化、災害（地震、気象変動、感染症）、外交はだんだん深刻な状況になってきた。こうした現実の問題に対して、どういう価値で臨み、5つの力を活用していくかということであるが、硬直的な価値を持つのではなく、日本準文明のプロトタイプを簡潔なモデルとして理解することがまずは大事なのではないかと思う。そういう意味で今となっては異世界であるといってもいい江戸時代を見つめなおすことはこれからの日本人にとって、日本人であるだけに必要になってくるのではないだろうか。まぎれもない私たちの価値がそこにあったわけだから。

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文明と価値２２（新しい学問及び大世界史編纂）

　問題の本質は社会構造力の進化にあり、それを技術的効率力の発展のスピードに近づけることにある。社会構造力と ＡＩ、ビッグデータ、ＩＣT、ロボット、電気あるいは水素による自動運転、新エネルギー等がどのように結びつくか。スマートシテイ、スマートステイト※となりえるか。自動化されるのは自動車の運転だけではない。政治、経済、社会それ自体が一部、自動化していくことなのではないだろうか。それらが新産業革命の内容の豊かさを最終的には裏付けるものとなることだろう。

 

※スマートステイト

 　スマートシテイとは狭義においてはICT、AI、ビッグデータを結合させたデータによる都市運営ということができる。そのような都市が生まれ、都市国家群が成立し、やがて国家が成立するように、ヨーロッパ文明的な形でスマートステイトが成立するのか。それとも中国のように国家による上からの形でスマートステイトが成立するのか。その発展の形は様々だろう。スマートシティで評判が高いのはコペンハーゲン、アムステルダム、ストックホルム、スマートステイトではエストニアなどである。かってのハンザ同盟の地理的な範囲と近い感じで興味深い。スマートステイトは都市連合か、国家によって上から強権的に新技術をとりいれるかでその社会の雰囲気を大きく異なるものにするだろう。

 

　また内面的な価値のより簡潔な事例として江戸時代の心性について、少々詳しく見てきた。それは社会秩序の心性の変化の特徴を見るためであった。しかしそれだけでない。西洋的な知識もさることながら、今の日本人には自分自身、特に江戸時代を振り返り、深く観察してみることが必要なのではないだろうか。自分自身のルーツを知らずして、そもそも価値のなんたるかもわかるはずもない。我々が時代を漂流しているのもそんなところにも理由があるのだろう。新しい学問とは内向的な価値と外向的価値の発見およびそれらの融合を図るための学問ともいえるのではないだろうか。

 

　文明と価値というテーマで書いてきたが、諸文明をそれぞれ生命体と考え、あえて分類する作業は今の時代のSDGｓやESGの考え方と合わないのかもしれない。これらの概念はグローバル経済における一般理念の掲示のように思われるからだ。気象変動の問題もある。全体として対応しなければならない問題であろう。しかし一方で文明間における生き残りをかけた対立はなくなりそうもない。中国が民主化されなければ、産業のデカップリングは不可避であろう。これは日本にとっては新大産業革命を迎えるにあたってチャンスではある。けれども中国が分裂しないで、民主化を進めることが長期的には極東地域にとって望ましいことだろう。それはEUのように長い道のりを経た共同市場でなく、いわば比較的早期にCU（china union）という共同市場を設置することにもつながっているからだ。しかし中国が新疆、チベット、内モンゴルでやっていることを見ると今までの同化政策の域をでないもののようである。これらの地域と中国との歴史には長い経緯がある。また大地主、大商人、官僚が長く統治していた中国文明としては、中華人民共和国とは新しい文明といっていいものであろう。

　集団指導体制に戻ることはあっても、民主化されることはないのかもしれない。

　したがって経済的には深い関係を持つが、政治的には対立が続く、このため日本は太平洋、インド洋の諸文明、準文明と協力していかなければならないのだろう。まずはもっとこれらの文明群に親しむことが必要であり、こうした文明群の価値を理解することが必要であろう。アメリカの世界戦略に乗っているだけでは厳しい時代になりつつあるののかもしれない。太平洋諸国、インド洋諸国の情報が集まり、それに基づいてアメリカに提言できることが望ましい。そういう意味では国連大学の拡充はそうした契機の一つになるかもしれない。SDGｓ、ESGをもっと地域化することを目指すのだが、その反面、一方で普遍化する研究機関が日本にあることは日本にとってもいいことであろう。徳川光圀が大日本史を編纂したように、大世界史を編纂することも、それがその後、日本に影響を与えたように、世界においていい影響を与えるかもしれない。そしてこれは太平洋諸国、インド洋諸国の情報を収集する上で大きな力となっていくことだろう。

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