Transient Forms of Government and the Drift towards a World State

There are many histories of the 193 individual nation-states that are members of the United Nations. There are few histories that show the rise and fall of all civilizations and consider how a World State might emerge. (Toynbee's A Study of History and my own The Rise and Fall of Civilizations are two of these.) There are no histories that show humankind as a whole drifting in one direction from the primitive to globalisation like a river flowing towards the open sea: humankind advancing from simple family groupings to tribal states, to more complex city-states, to feudal baronial states, to nation-states with national governments to colonial empires and colonies, to confederations and federations, to regional organisations and eventually widening into a World State.

Transient Old Forms of Government

Homo sapiens sapiens emerged from Africa less than 100,000 years ago and probably between 70,000 and 50,000 years ago (after 13 previous species of Homo and a previous 9 intermediate forms), and co-existed with Cro-Magnon man who occupied the Dordogne until c.10,000BC.

Tribal states

In Neolithic times (c.10,200–4500/2000BC) there were groups of families, and from at least c.10,000BC the tribe emerged, a loose association of families who were nomadic. They wandered the steppes seeking new pastures for their domesticated animals, and they fought other tribes and conquered their territories. A conquering tribe imposed its leadership on the tribes it subjugated, and the first primitive government was within the tribe.

Subjugated tribes could continue as they were, so long as they acknowledged the victorious tribe's leadership. Tribes therefore exercised loose control over their subjects, and in some tribal states tribes negotiated how they would be governed. At some stage nomads began to settle in villages as farmers.

The Celtic tribes emerged. In the UK there were Celtic tribal states: the Trinovantes, the Catuvellauni and the Iceni (who resisted the Roman occupation under Boudicca).

City-states

Primitive government had become enmeshed in primitive religion, which had expressed itself in shamanism and the painting of animals in dark caves. This can be traced back to c.40,000BC. Tribal leaders encouraged primitive religion as it strengthened their control of their tribes.

A more sophisticated form of government came into being within city-states. Tribes had been brought together round religious buildings as in early Sumer. The Sumerians appeared c.3500BC and by 2500BC built ziggurats, stepped towers surmounted by a temple, man-made mountains from which they practised their religion. Tribes came from far and wide and camped round these religious buildings, and primitive cities were formed that were really enlarged villages. Their tribal leader turned himself into a monarch and ruled by one-man rule.

Over time he became a priest-king who led religious rites that brought rain and guaranteed good crops and harvests. Village councils practised division of labour, and tribal villagers specialised as warriors, farmers, tax collectors and priests who protected their city from attacks and natural disasters. Fields were cultivated and agriculture was settled round the city-states. In Sumerian cities there were arguments as to which city owned the nearby water of the river Tigris and the river Euphrates. Nomads envied the wealth of the new cities and stormed their walls.

The Greek city-states had monarchies ruled by tribal kings. Over time they developed into military aristocracies and plutocracies, and democracies. There were conflicts between the aristocratic, plutocratic and democratic factions within city-states, and different Greek city-states had different emphases. Athens became a democratic power whereas Sparta remained an aristocratic power, and the Peloponnesian Wars of 431–404BC between Athens and Sparta represented a collision between these two rival forms of government that weakened the Athenian Empire and Greek power.

Rome's city-state also had conflicts between aristocratic, plutocratic and democratic factions. It was referred to as res publica, a "public thing", and its legislative Senate was at first drawn from the aristocratic classes, but eventually from all classes of citizens. The unity of the city-state's factions was advertised in letters on Rome's buildings and battle standards: "SPQR", Senatus Populusque Romanus, the Senate and the People of Rome. The city-state's executive power was invested in two consuls, and after the end of the Republic it was headed by divine Caesar, who commanded the legions, the military. By the 3rd century AD Italian city-states were heavily taxed by the imperial administration, and many were eventually bankrupted. The Roman State and the...