The Principal Cause Of War

The Economy - Once A Great Scatter Of Small Productive Units In Autonomous Balance, Has Become Dominated By Two Or Three Hundred Giant Corporations, Administratively And Politically Interrelated... The Political Order, Once A Decentralized Set Of Several Dozen States With A Weak Spinal Cord, Has Become A Centralized Executive Establishment Which Has Taken Up Into Itself Many Powers Previously Scattered... The Military Order, Once A Slim Establishment In A Context Of Distrust Fed By State Militia, Has Become The Largest And Most Expensive Feature Of Government.

The Market Is Sovereign And In The Magic Economy Of The Small Entrepreneur There Is No Authoritarian Center... In The Political Sphere... The Equilibrium Of Powers Prevails, And Hence There Is No Chance Of Despotism.

If You Do Not Specify And Confront Real Issues, What You Say Will Surely Obscure Them. If You Do Not Embody Controversy, What You Say Will Be An Acceptance Of The Drift To The Coming Human Hell.

Power Is Not Of A Man. Wealth Does Not Center In The Person Of The Wealthy. Celebrity Is Not Inherent In Any Personality. To Be Celebrated, To Be Wealthy, To Have Power Requires Access To Major Institutions.

What We Experience In Various And Specific Milieux, I Have Noted, Is Often Caused By Structural Changes. Accordingly, To Understand The Changes Of Many Personal Milieux We Are Required To Look Beyond Them. And The Number And Variety Of Such Structural Changes Increase As The Institutions Within Which We Live Become More Embracing And More Intricately Connected With One Another. To Be Aware Of The Idea Of Social Structure And To Use It With Sensibility Is To Be Capable Of Tracing Such Linkages Among A Great Variety Of Milieux. To Be Able To Do That Is To Possess The Sociological Imagination