Welsh Journals

The Businessman and the Challenge of Communism DR CHARLES MALIK We are privileged to publish a summary of an address given by Dr Charles Malik, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Lebanon and President of the United Nations Gen- eral Assembly. The address is the product of a profound, active mind and does, we think, provoke and deserve careful thought. D P, MALIK spoke of the three challenges to Western society: the problems of its own development, the challenge of Communism, and that of the awakened peoples of Asia and Africa. Western society had to ask itself, he said, how freedom could be reconciled with the growing pressures of government; whether the rise of 'the common man' entailed a decline in creativity; whether material abundance stood in the way of spiritual achievement and of faith; and whether it could prevent the enemies of freedom making use of freedom in order to destroy it. Communism presented another set of challenges: its economic and scientific successes, its military strength and its apparent impregnability to alien ideas. Ideologically, said Dr Malik, it challenged the funda- mental Western beliefs about God, man, freedom, society, history, and the purpose of life. 'And with respect to competition with the West in the unaligned areas, it appears that Communism is more resourceful and successful in penetrating the ideas and systems and allegiances of those peoples than the West. It follows from all this that the West can no longer be smug and self-satisfied it must honestly search into the strengths of Communism'. The third challenge, Dr Malik went on, came from the awakened peoples of Asia and Africa, most of whom were until recently ruled or dominated by Western peoples, most of whom were underdeveloped and possessed ancient cultures quite distinct both from the culture of the West and from that of Communism. 'What do these peoples really want? They want to rule themselves; they want sovereign equality; they want to develop their countries, economically and culturally; they want national freedom so as to be able to develop their own national genius in their own way; they do