NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20105, 16 November 1928, Page 12

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

AN INFORMATION BUREAU

The development in every important city or town of a central pool of information about all aspects of local life was advocated bv Mr. Alexander Farquharson. of Westminster, in an address to the annual conference of the Association of Special Libraries and Information Bureaux at Now College, Oxford. "Tt is when we come to present-day industry, commerce and finance." he 6iid, " that tho need for information bureaux becomes most apparent. Generally speaking there is 110 centre today in any given city from which tho facts about local economics can be obtained with certainty. It is one of the outstanding evils of our present economic system and one of the main obstacles to schemes for local betterment. This did not imply the setting up of a new institution specially for the purpose. The work could be done by a combination of the efforts of the local museum, the local library, the chamber of commerce, the municipality, and other local government bodies, and the local associations interested in social and philanthropic work.'/ THE PROBLEM FOR EUROPE. "There are only three ways of stabilising Europe, short of a political federation. Tho first is through the preponderance of one power or group of powers. The second is through a balanco of power. The third is through the method implicit in the League of ,Nations and the Peace Pact," writes Mr. Philip Kerr in the London Observer. "All history proves that tho first and second methods invariably end in war, and that the one and only hope for peace, freedom and progress for Europe is through tho practical realisation of the ideas implicit in tho League and the Peace Pact. Today Europe is politically stabilised on the basis of the preponderance of France and her military associates, with Great Britain standing rather uncomfortably in the background with the Locarno Treaties in her hand. That this system cannot and ought not to last is obvious. It is only a question of time for Russia, Italy, or Germany herself, to say nothing of Great Britain and tho United States, to upset it. As and when it goes, what is to be put in its place—a new balance or a real League system? That is *ho central problem of European politics for to-day and to-morrow. Euiope will drift back to tho Balance of Power unless there is a real limitation of armaments. If a new balance of power is reached through a grading of armaments upwards, and through the formation of another system of military alliances equivalent to tlioso between France and her associates, Europe will bo headed for a new war." ARMIES AT POLICE STRENGTH Tho road of the League is not so easy as many of its advocates believe, for it involves n complete break with all European history for 1000 years," Mr. Kerr adds. "It means the abandonment, of the use of war 11s the main solvent of European problems and of reliance on huge armies and navies as the main sup port for national security. It means acceptance of an alternative process which will m practice solve inter-State problems reasonably and quickly by pacific means. And it means the reduction of armaments to a police level, coupled with collective guarantees that such disarmament will not lead to defencelessness against lawless aggression. . . Europe is still divided between two schools. On the one side there is tho school which sees security oniy in the piling up of immense armaments and watertight treaties of guarantee to bo invoked against any State which seeks to alter tli" status quo. On the other side there is the school which is convinced that the only real road to peace is to accept the necessary corollary to the renunciation of war and allow the pacific machinery which lias been created to deal freely with any and all of Europe's problems, t« abandon all alliances and to reduce al l armaments to the level at which any sudden and successful attack on a neigh I,our becomes practically impossible and the validity of international guarantees against aggression therefore becomes effective If the first school prevails it means a new balanco of power and alii ames, followed by another European ..ar a decade or so ahead. If the second school prevails it means the moral unity of Europe and a fresh breath of civilisation foi mankind."