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Elections, Cultures, Leadership
IN EVERY calendar year, many presidential and legislative elections are held around the world. Just for the sake of information, in the year 2007 there were 137 political elections worldwide and in 2008, there will be 149 of them, a rough average of 11 or 12 elections per month or one every three days (see Wikipedia, “Electoral Calendar” 2007, 2008). Locally important, most of these elections are nevertheless ignored by the international mass media: it is a matter of fact that public opinion is used to these periodical events, for better and for worse, unless they are preceded, accompanied or followed by dubious or dramatic actions, as it has happened again recently in various countries. That is why to gauge the value and the meaning of these events for the national concerned communities, comparative studies of their contexts and aftermaths are certainly welcome. This issue includes some essays of this genre.
All of these national communities have their own cultural traditions through which they relate to the outside world. In the age of intensified contacts and communications, it would be a gravely illusory approach to think that these cultures develop themselves at the same pace and on the same paths. Recent histories of Central Asia and of the whole of Africa , with their tragedies, easily illustrate this. But the risk is great that geo-politicians or partisans of real politics blur the importance of this aspect for international peace, just for the sake of securing, for instance, energy resources ahead of time for their own national communities. For this reason political elections matter in these less important countries, all the more so when they are situated on the world “chessboard”.
With the changes of recent times, this “chessboard” seems to expand itself far beyond its earlier Euro-Asian focus. Some articles of this issue still report on past efforts to bridge the gaps between China and Europe . Yet, with some better understanding, lately obtained, among the nations of this old and twin “Eurasian” continent, new avenues are being discovered that have to face a new “global” setting. Letters and Arts are no exceptions to these new challenges. In a world that is more and more tightly interconnected, individuals and societies are at great risk of losing their own identities, as a recent symposium run by the Macau Ricci Institute has explored in the context of modern Chinese society.
Are all modern societies to be developed along the same patterns? Beyond sciences, technologies, trade exchanges and weaponry sales, should not institutions, Arts and Letters, Currents of Thought and Humanistic Values have some more important role to play? It seems in fact that, beyond the elections that are run each year around the world, an essential question remains to be tackled and is without an answer. Political elections are meant to yield political power: but would that, by itself, produce the ability to lead, with some real leadership? Without careful consideration, political power could just remain a mirage, a trap, as in the recent ethnic tragedies that have plagued some younger national states.
Political terminology should not lure people. Perhaps would it be helpful to reflect on some deeper experience lived through centuries until now by older corporations.(1) If these have succeeded in their endeavours, their leaders have fostered in themselves enough self-awareness to ward against their own weaknesses and to employ their talents, an awareness that has given them ingenuity and creativity in their initiatives, aimed only to the benefits of those they love, lead and serve, even at some heroic price paid to reach the intended goals. We may ask: how many present political leaders have in themselves fostered these values?
Yves Camus 赵仪文, Editor
1. See Chris Lowney, Heroic Leadership: Best Practices from a 450-Year-Old Company that Changed the World, Chicago, Loyola Press, 2003, 330 pp.
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