WORLD’S CONSCIENCE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 14 January 1936, Page 8

WORLD’S CONSCIENCE

ETHICS OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS “The Ethics of International Relations” was. the subject of a lecture given by Mr H. Wilson Harris at the Bedford College for Women. Why, he asked, were the ethical standards observed by States lower than those observed by individual citizens. The answer, he said, must vary according to whether a country was living under . democracy or dictatorship. A dictator had not merely to seize power, but to continue to display his power. He could concede nothing for that would be a sign of weakness. With democracies the 'case was different, but not so completely different as might sometimes appear. A' Government was trustee for the whole nation and discharged its stewardship in the light of its own conception of what the nation expected of it. Mr Harris took.the view that the world is developing a conscience. Lip service was'paid to ethical considerations hi the relationships between States as it never was before. And, in fact, it was more than lip-ser-vice. If in recent months the British Government had taken-an essentially ethical stand at Geneva it was because the country had insisted'that it should. Even dictators could not openly fling themselves athwart the current. The nations as a whole were beginning haltingly to recognise an ethical factor in their relations with each other, and it might fall to Britain primarily to give that process impetus and direction. It would be a better service to the world Ilian she had ever rendered it in any war. GOVERNMENTS CONTROLLED Discussing the- lecture on “The Ethics

of .International Relations,” Lord Crewe said that Mr Harris had pointed out a Tact .which 'often created to a greater extent than; was supposed difficulties for a- Government. Governments were not .able in all cases to follow their own inclinations, to carry out their own sense of ,what was the straight and, therefore, the nearest course. Tney were trustees for the nation they represented and politicians were bound to study .public opinion, especially in democratic countries. In theory a dictator was free front that, but dictators never seemed to be in a position to follow out thenfirst ethical .impulses if they entertained any. One could hardly think of a dictator since Oliver Cromwell who had stood out. as a great figure in international relations. It was the gross act of invasion of ; Belgium -which provided the final impulse that brought the British people into the war. It might conceivably have been otherwise. Tho French War .Office did not think it quite certain that Germany would invade France through Belgium. What the precise effect would have been on . British public opinion if the direct attack had come through a violation of Swiss territory it was not easy to say. This would have been a gross international outrage, but wc were not bound ■ to defend the Swiss frontier as we were bound by the treaty to defend Bel-. gium. There were members of the Government \vho were so convinced that the mind of Germany was absolutely fixed on war that they would have thought it fight and, indeed, imperative, to join however the attack had been made, hut all his colleagues might not have been of that opinion, and certainly the nation would not have been aroused in the way it was.