Professor Arnold J. Toynbee

In this third talk Professor Toynbee discusses the Jekyll and Hyde role played by nationalism in modern international economics. Before 1870, British nationalism, self-government through an elected Parliament, was widely copied by other States, and spreading in harmony with the British commercial system, resulted in a world order of large economic units developing and defending their 'national' prosperity. The last forty years have seen nationalism changed from a unifying to a disintegrating force. Under its new influence the British Empire has loosened into a 'commonwealth of nations,' and Europe has fought a disastrous war and abandoned Parliamentary government for various forms of absolutism; while in the economic sphere increasingly severe tariffs separate nation from nation.