One hears that the future of our world, as a natural system, will depend on the willingness of the developed countries to temper their consumerism, on the one hand; and on the other, on the willingness of the developing countries to mitigate the effects of their industrialization.
Though some would try to cast doubt on this hypothesis, all evidence points to it as framing the most important question facing the world community today: how do we carry on our characteristic activities, and still maintain a habitable natural environment?
There is another question one might ask. If, through enlightened policies, technological advances, and collective discipline, we are able to fulfill our basic needs, while also maintaining the integrity of the environment, would we still have a world one would want to live in?
This might seem absurd on the face of it. If our material desires were perfectly balanced with the natural order, would this not be a perfect state of affairs? Regrettably, though, it seems that in spite of any hoped-for future triumph of science and rationalism over our destructive tendencies, a kind of cultural disaster may still come to pass, the threat of which we are almost completely overlooking. I am referring specifically to the general eradication of authentic indigenous cultures throughout the globe, which is happening as relentlessly as the clear-cutting of the world’s rainforests, and whose effects are almost as pernicious.
Though a cultural bleaching process is occurring world-wide (in tandem with the degradation of the natural world), with special intensity in rapidly growing nations like China and India, the country that may most determine whether local cultural practices survive at all in recognizable form is France.
France (although some other nations, such as Italy, have also been successful at this as well – the United States has not been, however, not having tried) may be the best example of a country that has (until recently) successfully embraced capitalism and materialism while preserving practices and traditions that are distinctly local in character (in agriculture and the culinary arts especially, though also in other areas of daily living). It has consciously preserved its agrarian traditions, which (again, until recently) have been authentically integrated into the lives of its citizens, and form part of the national identity to a degree that is uncommon elsewhere in the world (it is to our discredit that we have practically eliminated most traces of our own agrarian traditions in this country).
Foreigners may or may not be aware that the indigenous culture of France is under every bit as much threat of eventually disappearing as that of the tribes of the Amazon rain forest. The French ways of life that those from other countries have alternately envied, dismissed, or idealized are eroding under the pressure of the same larger forces that threaten local cultural peculiarities everywhere.
One would reflexively blame America for these trends, but though the tendency to destroy everyday culture is something that we Americans harbor, and in many respects, have originated and propagated, to do so would be simplistic. The forces that are eroding the traditions of France and certain other countries are at once less visible and more widespread than some may think.
The tendency of contemporary progress is to seek a convenience that is almost purely material in nature. The intangible qualities of a way of doing things, the ineffable pleasures of daily existence, are under constant and growing threat by the desire to carry out normal activities with the least possible trouble to the individual. The subjective experience of that individual, possibly because it can’t be measured, is of no importance. In our own country, the customs related to meal-taking, for example, have almost completely vanished, even in the more favored classes of society. Greater social and economic stresses on families are usually blamed for the ever greater rarity of shared family meals, but the real cause, in my opinion, for Americans consuming ever more dreadful food on an as-needed basis, rather than sharing a home-cooked meal around a table, is the toxic individualism of a technological, materialistic society lacking in cultural counterweights.
At the risk of reiterating an obvious point, France is, again, a consumerist, materialistic society. Its level of religious devotion is at historically low levels. Yet it has preserved its civilized rituals of life doggedly (this tendency is associated with the “snobbery” which is often misapplied to the French). But the cultural dam surrounding the country is weakening. Snacking between meals, once unheard of, is making inroads; fast food, which arrived in the 70’s, is taking ever greater hold. Hundreds, if not thousands of English words, most of them unnecessary to making one’s point in the language, have seeped into the French dictionary. Wine consumption, which is a good measure of how much the French are really savoring life any more, is on the decline. The mood in the country, which even in the best of times might tend to be pessimistic and otherwise dissatisfied, is unsettled. France’s current debate on “national identity”, which has been spurred by the presence of non-Western immigrants, is, under the surface, every bit as much about the place of the country’s cherished customs in a “globalized” world.
Though in this country we are completely indifferent to preserving group rituals and practices, the forces of cultural homogenization are, at this point, transnational. One is shocked at the degree to which we (when we have even cared to notice) accept the cultural leveling of the planet as inevitable. “One World”, however seductive it may be as a political ideal, might end up a cultural wasteland. There is also evidence that the erosion of cultural norms and practices ultimately affects our safety (I didn’t mention that France is aghast at a recent wave both of street crime and school violence, which, though having multiple, complex causes, has been contributed to by the weakening of traditional culture and societal order, in the eyes of some commentators).
France is gamely trying to keep the forces of generic consumerism at bay. It has, for example, a nursery school program that introduces pupils to good cooking and table etiquette. The Acédemie Française has attempted to find authentic French equivalents for the foreign words that are entering the language (though with mixed results, by the looks of things). But there are probably limits on what can consciously do to maintain a nation’s cultural heritage. One approach is to make museum piece out of one’s patrimony. Though the French have tried that as well, here is wishing them success in their efforts to preserve the authenticity of their way of life against the depredations of cultural globalization.
