"'Uprising, though unjustified, had causes...'"
For Charles' full speech, see Exiles.
Anderson's Dominic Flandry agrees. Although uprising is unjustified, its causes must be addressed. He tells a pretender to the Terran Imperial Throne:
"'...you radicals are all alike...You think everything springs from one or two unique causes, and if only you can get at them, everything will automatically become paradisical.'"
-Poul Anderson, The Rebel Worlds IN Anderson, Young Flandry (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 367-520 AT p. 511.
(Since McCormac wanted not to overthrow the Terran Empire but to become Emperor, I would not call him a radical!)
Flandry suggests other actions that McCormac might have taken:
complaints to Terra;
pressure to get the oppressive Sector Governor removed;
assassination;
a raid to free McCormac's wife and kill Snelund.
I think that radical change is certainly necessary when an ancien regime has become unable to continue ruling in the old way. That was not yet true of the Terran Empire in McCormac's time. Later, when the Empire did fall, some planets had prepared themselves to survive without it. No doubt they would have had to make further internal changes and adjustments when the time came.
Even within the Empire, a planetary population would be able to pursue radically different internal policies provided only that it paid modest taxes and kept the peace. That is why an interstellar civilization is in itself a radically different proposition and "...a consummation devoutly to be wished."
Flandry sends McCormac and his followers into exile.
8 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
But, I agree with Dominic Flandry's use of "radical." Because McCormac WAS acting radically, starting a rebellion and civil war. I know you prefer to use "radical" for people who want to somehow "transform" the human race or human societies, but I argue that word can be used in more ways than that.
Hugh McCormac was a fool, he did exactly what Aaron Snelund wanted when he rebelled. If he had chosen one of the alternatives listed by Flandry, a civil war, blessedly short lived tho it was, could have been avoided.
Yes, the populations of the planets of the Empire, human and non-human, could live as they liked, provided they paid modest taxes and lived in peace with their neighbors. I would be delighted to see an interstellar civilization like that!
Btw, you do realize that human beings tend to be fairly conservative? Therefore most planets settled by humans in the Empire did not have "radical" societies.
And I like how Flandry maneuvered McCormac and his most hard core supporters into concluding their best option at the end of THE REBEL WORLDS was to go into exile. Flandry COULD have simply let the loyalist Admiral Pickens destroy McCormac's fleet, but it was better and more humane to inveigle the rebels into fleeing the Empire.
Sean
Sean,
I do realize that most people are fairly conservative, if not also Conservative in a party sense. Most people most of the time support the status quo. Otherwise, it would not be the status quo.
"Radical" means either getting back to the roots or changing from the roots up. Thus, radicals are reactionary or revolutionary.
More later. Interruption here.
Paul.
Sean,
The Marxist version of "people tend to be conservative" or "most people most of the time support the status quo" is "The ruling ideas are those of the ruling class."
Existing social relationships always seem natural although they vary enormously. Of course there must be lords and serfs. There always have been and there always will be...
Conservatism explains the violence and upheaval of revolutions. People cling to outmoded institutions long after those institutions have ceased to have any basis in reality and therefore come crashing down. People say, "How sudden and violent!" because they have not been able to adjust gradually.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I partially agree and disagree. I don't think it would be wrong if most people in a nation or society support the status quo. Why shouldn't they if life is not too bad for them and they can hope it will be similarly so for their children?
I don't agree that all "outmoded" institutions are necessarily like that or that they can't be adapted or reformed. Even Tsarist Russia was not inevitably doomed to suffer a bloody revolution. The October Manifesto of 1905 and the reforms of Peter Stolypin and his successor Count Kokovtsov were starting to bear real fruits by 1914. All Russia needed to do was to stay out of any major wars for another years or so and she would have been drastically transformed. That was in fact Lenin's GREAT fear. Which explains why that monster was overjoyed by the Sarajevo Crisis and the outbreak of war in 1914.
Sean
Sean,
That most people most of the time support the status quo is simply a fact. Despite this, society changes for different reasons and the reasons include internal conflicts.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Of course I agree with this as a general statement. It gets more difficult when PARTICULAR cases are discussed. And not all social changes, or the reasons for them, will be beneficial. Or permanent.
Sean
Sean,
Still, this is progress:
hunting and gathering;
agriculture and cities;
slave-owning society;
feudalism;
mercantile capitalism;
financial and industrial capitalism;
new technology;
maybe the beginnings of a space program.
I hope that humanity will go a lot further.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
With the exception of slavery, I agree with this listing. I realize slavery made sense in eras before powered machines made that kind of labor obsolete, but it's nothing to LIKE.
Feudalism can still be a good thing, if you define it, broadly, as meaning decentralized gov't, under whatever form. Anderson's stories "No Truce With Kings" and THE HIGH CRUSADE gives us some examples of how he thought feudalism might work, under different circumstances.
Sean
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