1914 and now

If the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914 seems more remote from today than a mere one hundred years would suggest, there is a reason for that.  The European-dominated global power structure of that time, sustained by international trade and imperialist prerogatives, essentially collapsed in the cataclysm of the World War that ensued from this seemingly random event.  The power structure that replaced it was far more dynamic, meaning that it was far more violent, and subject to more frequent and equally catastrophic upheavals. 

About halfway through the interval between that day and this moment,  I was listening to my grandfather reminisce on some subject, and he used the phrase “this miserable century.”   Those three words rang in my ears like a bulletin from Sarajevo.  To understand them, I had to weigh the enormous material progress and expansion of opportunity that my grandfather had experienced in his lifetime against the horror of the Second World War holocaust and the looming threats of the atomic age.  Si Scheuer was a phenomenally successful businessman, motivated to provide for his offspring and his community.  He had succeeded, yet the bitterness that remained in his weary voice was justified by the enormous personal and cultural losses he had sustained.

The power arrangements that govern how the world does its business today seem as cumbersome and misdirected as those that were in place in 1914.  We can speculate about what might dislodge them, political realignments, economic shocks or whatever, but who can say that if they are swept away, a better alternative will replace them?