Na opinião de Klaus Schwab, fundador e presidente executivo do Fórum Económico Mundial, que reuniu em Davos durante a passada semana,"Estamos no meio de uma revolução. (...) O poder está a mover-se do centro para a periferia (...) está a tornar-se cada vez mais disseminado, mas, enquanto isso, está a tornar-se cada vez mais difícil de dominar. Temos um mundo efectivamente global, mas as nossas instituições e sistemas de governo global estão a desintegrar-se. Em princípio, deveríamos agora passar para um nível mais alto de consciência, de identidade e, claro, de estrutura organizacional, mas o princípio organizacional subjacente no nosso mundo mudou dramaticamente. O mundo está sem dúvida a ficar plano (...)"(cfr. aqui)
Leia, agora, este artigo publicado no "The New Yorker", onde se comenta a versão mais recente da história do Pedro e do lobo, e veja o que encontrei aqui, aqui e ainda aqui.
Já agora esta notícia também tem o seu interesse.
Depois disto, acho que vai gostar de ler este livro:
Leia, agora, este artigo publicado no "The New Yorker", onde se comenta a versão mais recente da história do Pedro e do lobo, e veja o que encontrei aqui, aqui e ainda aqui.
Já agora esta notícia também tem o seu interesse.
Depois disto, acho que vai gostar de ler este livro:
Só para ficar com uma ideia, comece por ler esta entrevista ao autor, Bryan Ward-Perkins, e em particular a resposta que ele deu à pergunta sobre as causas da queda do império romano, que passo a transcrever:
Ward-Perkins: I believe the Western Empire was brought down by a specific military crisis— Germanic invasion, made more serious by the arrival in the West of an Asiatic people, the Huns, and exacerbated by civil wars within the empire—rather than by any irreversible internal decline. The Eastern Empire was then very nearly destroyed some two centuries later by the rise of Arab Islamic power. Probably with a bit of good luck and perhaps some better leadership both crises could have been reversed (as had happened in the 3rd century, when the whole empire was saved from a seemingly fatal spiral of invasion and civil war). But all great powers (so far) have at some point or another declined, or been brought low, so it is reasonable to assume that Roman power would not have gone on forever! What is so striking about the fall of Rome is the collapse of material sophistication that ensued. This happened, I believe, precisely because the Roman world was not entirely dissimilar to our own: complex economies are very fragile because they rely on hugely sophisticated networks of production and distribution. If these are seriously disrupted, widely and over a long period of time, the entire house of cards can collapse. Although I have a great deal of respect for the new Late Antiquity, it does seriously worry me that it smoothes over the very real crisis that happened at the end of the Roman world. The Romans, like us, enjoyed the fruits of a complex economy, both material and intellectual. And like us, they assumed their world would go on forever. They were wrong, and we would be wise to remember this. The main lesson I think we should learn from the collapse of the Roman Empire and of ancient civilization is not some specific panacea that can preserve our civilization forever (since modern circumstances and the threats to our well being are ever-changing), but a realization of how insecure, and probably transient, our own achievements are—and, from this, a degree of humility. March/April 2006 •
Interessante, não é?
Ward-Perkins: I believe the Western Empire was brought down by a specific military crisis— Germanic invasion, made more serious by the arrival in the West of an Asiatic people, the Huns, and exacerbated by civil wars within the empire—rather than by any irreversible internal decline. The Eastern Empire was then very nearly destroyed some two centuries later by the rise of Arab Islamic power. Probably with a bit of good luck and perhaps some better leadership both crises could have been reversed (as had happened in the 3rd century, when the whole empire was saved from a seemingly fatal spiral of invasion and civil war). But all great powers (so far) have at some point or another declined, or been brought low, so it is reasonable to assume that Roman power would not have gone on forever! What is so striking about the fall of Rome is the collapse of material sophistication that ensued. This happened, I believe, precisely because the Roman world was not entirely dissimilar to our own: complex economies are very fragile because they rely on hugely sophisticated networks of production and distribution. If these are seriously disrupted, widely and over a long period of time, the entire house of cards can collapse. Although I have a great deal of respect for the new Late Antiquity, it does seriously worry me that it smoothes over the very real crisis that happened at the end of the Roman world. The Romans, like us, enjoyed the fruits of a complex economy, both material and intellectual. And like us, they assumed their world would go on forever. They were wrong, and we would be wise to remember this. The main lesson I think we should learn from the collapse of the Roman Empire and of ancient civilization is not some specific panacea that can preserve our civilization forever (since modern circumstances and the threats to our well being are ever-changing), but a realization of how insecure, and probably transient, our own achievements are—and, from this, a degree of humility. March/April 2006 •
Interessante, não é?
1 comentário:
É mesmo interessante, já é altura de rever um pouco a História e reconhecer a infabilidade como mito e não uma realidade do nosso mundo materialista, aliás nunca poderemos esquecer que qualquer civilização é limitada pela falácia da condição humana.
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