through an era of consolidation and integration that brought its
sovereign segments into increasing stable relationships. The most
advanced of these relationships took political shape in the half-dozen
European empires which controlled the planet in 1900. Side by side with
the consolidation of the planet into nations and empires there was
another process, world-wide in scope, which made the facts and products
of science and technology and their duplication the common property of
mankind, creating a cultural synthesis far more universal than the
political synthesis in nations, empires, the League of Nations or the
United Nations.

Any social synthesis includes positive and negative aspects which
function side by side. One builds up. The other wears down. For
centuries the building forces in western civilization were in the
ascendant. Since the turn of the century a shift of forces has been
under way. The wearing down forces presently are in the ascendant. Had
it been less competitive and more cooperative and co-ordinated, western
civilization might have taken another step in advance by extending
cultural unification into the political arena. The League of Nations and
the United Nations were efforts in this direction. Neither succeeded in
breaking down sovereignty far enough to permit planet-wide political
federation.

Having failed to co-ordinate and establish a planet-wide authority
during the critical years following 1870, western civilization accepted
the antithesis of co-ordination and entered a period of fragmentation:

1. During the century and a half from 1815 to the present
day, as facilities for co-ordination were multiplied by discovery
and invention, Europe remained stubbornly fragmented