THE GREEN BOOK thus defines the path of liberation to masses of wage-earners and domestic servants in order that human beings may achieve freedom. The struggle to liberate domestic servants from their status of slavery and to transform them into partners, where their material production can be divided into its necessary basic components, is an inevitable process. Households should be serviced by their habitants. Essential household services should not be performed by domestic servants, paid or unpaid, but by employees who can be promoted in rendering their services and can enjoy social and material benefits as any other public employee would.
Part Three
THE SOCIAL BASIS OF THE THIRD UNIVERSAL THEORY
The social factor, the national factor, is the dynamic force of human history. The social bond, which binds together human communities from the family through the tribe to the nation, is the basis for the movement of history.
Heroes in history are, by definition, those who have sacrificed for causes. But what causes? They sacrificed for the sake of others, but which others? They are those with whom they maintain a relationship. Therefore, the relationship between an individual and a group is a social one that governs the people’s dealings amongst themselves. Nationalism, then, is the base upon which one nation emerges. Social causes are therefore national, and the national relationship is a social one. The social relationship is derived from society, i.e., the relationship among members of one nation. The social relationship is, therefore, a national relationship and the national is a social relationship. Even if small in number, communities or groups form one nation regardless of the individual relationship amongst its members. What is meant here by a community is that which is permanent because of the common national ties that govern it.
Historic movements are mass movements, i.e., the movement of one group in its own interests differentiated from the interests of other communities. These differentiations indicate the social characteristics that bind a community together. Mass movements are independent movements to assert the identity of a group conquered or oppressed by another group.
The struggle for authority happens within the group itself down to the level of the family, as was explained in Part 1 of THE GREEN BOOK: The Political Axis of the Third Universal Theory. A group movement is a nation’s movement for its own interests. By virtue of its national structure, each group has common social needs which must be collectively satisfied. These needs are in no way individualistic; they are collective needs, rights, demands, or objectives of a nation which are linked by a single ethos. That is why these movements are called national movements. Contemporary national liberation movements are themselves social movements; they will not come to an end before every group is liberated from the domination of another group. The world is now passing through one of the regular cycles of the movement of history, namely, the social struggle in support of nationalism.
In the world of man, this is as much a historical reality as it is a social reality. That means that the national struggle—the social struggle—is the basis of the movement of history. It is stronger than all other factors since it is in the nature of the human group; it is in the nature of the nation; it is the nature of life itself. Other animals, apart from man, live in groups. Indeed, just as the community is the basis for the survival of all groups within the animal kingdom, so nationalism is the basis for the survival of nations.
Nations whose nationalism is destroyed are subject to ruin. Minorities, which are one of the main political problems in the world, are the outcome. They are nations whose nationalism has been destroyed and which are thus torn apart. The social factor is, therefore, a factor of life—a factor of survival. It is the nation’s innate momentum for survival.
Nationalism in the human world and group instinct in the animal kingdom are like gravity in the domain of material and celestial bodies. If the sun lost its gravity, its gasses would explode and its unity would no longer exist. Accordingly, unity is the basis for survival. The factor of unity in any group is a social factor; in man’s case, nationalism. For this reason, human communities struggle for their own national unity, the basis for their survival.
The national factor, the social bond, works automatically to impel a nation towards survival, in the same way that the gravity of an object works to keep it as one mass surrounding its centre. The dissolution and dispersion of atoms in an atomic bomb are the result of the explosion of the nucleus, which is the focus of gravitation for the particles around it. When the factor of unity in those component systems is destroyed and gravity is lost, every atom is separately dispersed. This is the nature of matter. It is an established natural law. To disregard it or to go against it is damaging to life. Similarly, man’s life is damaged when he begins to disregard nationalism—the social factor—for it is the gravity of the group, the secret of its survival. Only the religious factor is a rival to the social factor in influencing the unity of a group. The religious factor may divide the national group or unite groups with different nationalisms; however, the social factor will eventually triumph. This has been the case throughout the ages. Historically, each nation had a religion. This was harmonious. Eventually, however, differences arose which became a genuine cause of conflict and instability in the lives of people throughout the ages.
A sound rule is that each nation should have a religion. For it to be otherwise is abnormal. Such an abnormality creates an unsound situation which becomes a real cause for disputes within one national group. There is no other solution but to be harmonious with the natural rule, i.e., each nation has a single religion. When the social factor is compatible with the religious factor, harmony prevails and the life of communities becomes stable, strong, and develops soundly.
Marriage is a process that can positively or negatively influence the social factor. Though, on a natural basis of freedom, both man and woman are free to accept whom they want and reject whom they do not want, marriage within a group, by its very nature, strengthens its unity and brings about collective growth in conformity with the social factor.
THE FAMILY
To the individual, the family is more important than the state. Mankind acknowledges the individual as a human being, and the individual acknowledges the family, which is his cradle, his origin, and his social umbrella. According to the law of nature, the human race is the individual and the family, but not the state. The human race has neither relations nor anything else to do with the state, which is an artificial political, economic, and sometimes military, system. The family is like a plant, with branches, stems, leaves and blossoms. Cultivating nature into farms and gardens is an artificial process that has no relevance to the plant itself. The fact that certain political, economic or military factors tie a number of families into one state does not necessarily link this system or its organization with humanity. Similarly, any situation, position or proceeding that results in the dispersion, decline or loss of the family is inhuman, unnatural and oppressive, analogous to any procedure, measure or action that destroys a plant and its branches and withers its leaves and blossoms.
Societies in which the existence and unity of the family become threatened due to any circumstance, are similar to fields whose plants experience uprooting, drought, fire, weathering or death. The blossoming garden or field is one whose plants grow, blossom and pollinate naturally. The same holds true of human societies. The flourishing society is that in which the individual grows naturally within the family and the family within society. The individual is linked to the larger family of humankind like a leaf is to a branch or a branch to a tree. They have no value or life if they are separated. The same holds true for individuals if they are separated from their families—the individual without a family has no value or social life. If human society reaches the stage where the individual lives without a family, it would then become a society of tramps, without roots, like artificial plants.