ENVISIONING A NEW GLOBAL CULTURE:
THE SEARCH FOR UNITY BETWEEN EAST AND WEST

While the current phase of globalization in human affairs often uses the language of unity, it largely reflects the prevailing culture of separation and materialism that inevitably exacerbates division. A new global culture requires a deeper era of thought, drawing on the ancient universal values of both East and West that can guide us towards a balanced relationship between spirit and matter.

The only way we can address the causes of the problems afflicting humanity today, is if we turn to narratives, mythologies and cosmologies from both Eastern and Western thought that shine a light on the oneness and wholeness of life. Only then will we be able to truly think and plan our societies in ways that value diversity and yet are centered in a profound sense of unity. It is this depth of thought and feeling that is missing from the current order.

In pondering the search for unity between east and west in areas as broad as philosophy, economics, governance and relations with the environment we will be contributing towards the envisioning of this new global culture.

Both East and West have specialized in their thinking. Each, therefore, has the virtue of its own sincerity and its own peculiar penetration. But specialization has its value only as it leads to an ultimate integration. Is not the time ripe for bringing East and West together in this profoundest region of the life of each of them, the region, namely, of their philosophical and psychological thinking?