American foreign policy since 1945 has been made by the often cumbersome processes of response of a representative republic to very rapidly acquired responsibilities as a world power. It involves the story of the transformation of an isolationist citizenry, who had frequently assumed that international order was of no vital concern to it, or that the order would be maintained automatically, or that American efforts to maintain world order could end only in disaster because of the inadequacies of American leaders and the sophisticated deviousness of foreigners. The transformation of a largely isolationist citizenry into the consenting citizens of a republic facing the demands of world rivalry has the epic sweep of a decisive world historical movement. The magnitude of the effort involved, however, dwindles when the dimensions of the challenge to the republic are considered.

There is a wide measure of agreement among contemporary observers that something is seriously wrong in modern industrial society. As to the exact nature of the disorder there are differences of opinion: some denounce above all a vulgarization of culture which they see as stemming from the supremacy of mass taste; others view modern men as victims of the illnesses of overorganization, with all spontaneity and uniqueness increasingly compressed within the patterns of public and private bureaucracies; still others believe that the crucial failure of present civilization in the West is that beneath the various forms of mass and organizational “togetherness,” the individual lies stranded, as it were, on the shores of nothingness, deprived of true contact with his fellowmen, with the physical world, or even with himself. Thus there is little agreement as to how the dehumanization of contemporary man is best to be described. That such dehumanization is a fact, however, is the subject of profound and widespread consensus.

Khrushchev has by now made an undeniable reputation for himself as a clever man. He has credit for the “de-Stalinization” of the Soviet system and a return to “Leninism,” but he also holds the reins to a system of controls largely created by Stalin. It is perhaps a bit early for judgments, but Khrushchev seems indeed to be having his cake and eating it too. A survey of the question of the transition to communism, for example, reveals that his position is nothing less than a synthesis of a most remarkable sort, and one well calculated to gain the benefits of both Stalinism and Leninism. He has apparently set out to achieve a wedding between controls and ideals which will both mark him as the builder of communism in the manner of Lenin and at the same time retain in his hands the power of a dictator.

Since the English conquest, the Quebec Roman Catholic Church has been the most important single agency for the defense and perpetuation of the French-Canadian heritage in North America. Although its commanding position is unchallenged, the Church has long shared its authority with elites in the political and economical spheres. These other elites, however, have by no means competed with the Church. Indeed, interchange and cooperation among elites have been characteristic of French-Canadian society. Viewed as essential to cultural survival, this close unity among elites has encouraged the retention of an ordered, hierarchical social structure with many pre-industrial features.

In 1860 French liberal Charles de Rémusat noticed that pessimism had made rapid progress during the preceding ten years and that his period, which was once reputed to be proud of its accomplishments, then counted more censors than admirers. A similar observation had been made in 1852 by the distinguished Catholic historian of democratic convictions, Frédéric Ozanam, who stated that the best minds believed in decadence and that the idea of progress had become a discredited notion.