The summer of 2018 was the 25th anniversary of Samuel P. Huntington’s famous article in Foreign Affairs magazine, “The Clash of Civilizations?” It predicts that major conflicts in the future will lie along cultural lines—specifically Western, Confucian, Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin American, and possibly African. Nations will coalesce around these established cultures—or civilizations. The ideological wars of the 20th century are a thing of the past.
With 25 years of history having passed since its publication, it is easier to draw a different conclusion. Nations will aggregate (whether or not formalized politically), but the aggregation will lie along geographic-regional lines rather than cultural-civilization lines. Economics drives aggregation and the economic synergy between two countries bordering each other is greater than that of two nations thousands of miles apart despite sharing a cultural heritage.
Furthermore, geography creates culture. People who live together eventually intermarry and become one people. Latin America was formed by combining Spaniards, Native Americans, and Africans. In San Juan, there is even a statue celebrating this convergence as the birth of the Puerto Rican people. And this is nothing new. Researchers have found that the DNA of Native Americans is roughly 2/3 east Asian and 1/3 northern Siberian—a culture was created 15,000 years ago when two groups met in one corner of the world and mingled on land mass mostly submerged today (called Beringia).
While ethnics clashes will continue from time to time in various places around the globe, these will not likely be the predominant pattern of future conflict. Rather regional identity will be the basis for competition (though one hopes that this competition will not rise to the level of open conflict.) The forces driving regionalism are greater than the forces driving ethnic division.
References:
Samuel P. Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 72, No.3, (Summer 1993), pp. 22-49.
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