Moral Responsibility for World Leadership

• Author: Fred Warner Neal
• Date: 01 December 1956
• Published date: 01 December 1956
• DOI: 10.1177/106591295600900402
• Subject Matter: Articles

826

MORAL

RESPONSIBILITY

FOR

WORLD

LEADERSHIP*

FRED

WARNER NEAL

University

of

California,

Los

Angeles

A MERICAN

foreign

policy

may

be

said

to

be

based

in

large

part

on

A

the

idea

that

the

United

States

has

a

moral

responsibility

for

world

&dquo;’

&dquo;’

leadership.

There

is

no

doubt

that

many

Americans

and

their

leaders

feel this

responsibility

deeply

and

sincerely,

out

of

a

desire

to

serve

not

only

their

own

interests

but

the

interests

of

humanity

as

well.

But

even

in

these

political

days

there

is

little

critical

and

objective

discussion

of

the

basis

of

our

responsibility

and

how

we

are

measuring

up

to

it.

If

the

brief

reappraisal

in

this

essay

is

&dquo;agonizing,&dquo;

and

courts

disagreement,

one

can

only

suggest

that

a

weakness

in

our

foreign

policy

is

that

&dquo;agonizing

reappraisals&dquo;

are

merely

threatened

but

not

produced

and

that

there

is

too

little

disagreement,

not

too

much.

First,

let

me

say

I

wish

to

stay

clear

of

the

dispute

over

morals

and

foreign

policy,

which

I

regard

as

a

dispute

productive

of

more

heat

than

light

in

any

event.

Both

&dquo;moral

responsibility&dquo;

and

&dquo;world

leadership&dquo;

are

dangerous

concepts,

possibly

better

avoided

altogether.

I

am

willing

to

agree

that

we

in

the

United

States

have

a

moral

responsibility

for

world

leadership

only

in

the

sense

that

all

nations

have

a

moral

responsibility

for

world

leadership,

the

small

no

less

than

the

large,

the

weak

no

less

than

the

strong.

I

am

not

sure

that

this

has

always

been

the

case.

I

also

accept

as

the

cardinal

fact

of

international

politics

that

we

are

dealing

with

sov-

ereign

nation

states

each

working

for

its

own

interest.

In

this

era

of

new

rising

nationalisms,

this

may

be

true

in

one

sense

more

than

ever

before.

But

whereas

in

former

years

the

national

interest

of

each

nation

was

usually

unique,

now

there

is

one

primary

and

immediate

national

interest

of

all

nations,

paramount

to

all

other

national

interests,

that

is

identical

and

overlapping

-

the

interest

of

survival.

The

unleashing

of

almost

total

destructive

power

by

the

Pandoras

of

science

has

made

it

clear

even

to

the

dullest

brain

behind

the

most

iron

of

curtains

that

we

survive

either

together

or

not

at

all.

Morals

are

basically

pragmatic

things,

and

certainly

survival

is

a

moral

concept.

Indeed,

it

might

be

well,

I

think,

to

limit

the

concept

of

moral

responsibility

as

used

herein

largely

to

this

-

survival,

for

ourselves

and

for

others,

as

long

as

survival

implies

the

right

of

each

people

to

its

own

development,

understanding

that

such

development

does

not

jeopardize

the

common

interest

of

us

all.

Based

on

a

paper

delivered

at

the

Institute

of

World

Affairs,

University

of

Southern

California,

December

14,

1955.