October 6, 1987

Speech by Henry Kissinger
at Investiture Ceremony
The Metropolitan Club
New York City

Rector, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen: It is a great honor to be admitted to the fellowship of the professors of the Universidad del Pacifico. I was privileged to participate at the ceremony here some months ago at which the great novelist Vargas Llosa made one of the most moving speeches that I have had the privilege of hearing. When I was in government, I confess I came somewhat late to the recognition of the crucial importance of Latin America, preoccupied as we were with conflicts that we had inherited in Vietnam and conflicts that were imposed on us in the Middle East. I came to it late from the point of view of practical foreign policy, but not from the point of view of conviction. The great issue of our time, as was pointed out so movingly here at our last session, is the issue of freedom against the totalitarian state. And regrettably, the apostles of state power are very often found in universities, and I have often reflected about this strange phenomenon, why it should be precisely intellectuals that are so attracted to Marxist ideology and I think one reason is that Marxism, which has been a total failure as an economic theory, provides an extraordinary tool for the maintaining of power. It is an instrument that legitimizes the manipulation of the individual by those who think they know better. And in that sense, the totalitarian state in its Marxist and militarist incarnation is a violation of the longest tradition of Western history. If one reflects about the course of

October 6, 1987

Speech by Henry Kissinger

Western history, there are at least four themes that have recurred throughout that period, with ups and downs, often disregarded, but always reasserting themselves. And they go back to the Greek and Roman period.

One is that the state is not the personal possession of the ruler, but that it reflects a community of citizens. All citizens possess equal rights and are involved in shaping the destiny of their community. Even at the height of the Roman Empire, it saw itself as a city-state governed by free citizens. And indeed, these rights were extended in time to the entire Roman Empire, the first such gesture in history.

The second principle has been that even the most powerful rulers are subject to law, written or customary. Western societies have always insisted that their governments were not based entirely on personal self-will. During the Christian era, or after the Christian era, this concept was amplified to include the idea that a divine law, administered by a separate hierarchy, was beyond the control of governmental authority. Of course, this hierarchy was governed in anything but a democratic manner. But no other civilization has developed the concept that there is a justice that is defined outside of state power, and that there are therefore inherent limits to what the state can do.

Third, in Western societies, officials must justify themselves by service. The very word "minister" suggests it.

October 6, 1987

Speech by Henry Kissinger

Fourth, to be a citizen, therefore a man, above all to be Greek,
even in Roman times, and from then on the one recurring theme of Western
history has been a never-ending struggle for freedom in ever-new forms,
first in the towns of Europe, in religious liberty, in the struggles for
national independence in Europe, and finally in the struggles for
national independence in the Americas.

We in the Americas have many differences in culture, in national
traditions. But the basic values by which the dignity of the individual
must be judged are common. And therefore, I am passionately convinced
that what we create in the Americas, in mutual cooperation, in respect
for human dignity, in democratic institutions, and in the encouragement
of the development of countries that for a variety of reasons have
started to progress later or have had special obstacles, is a test for
the basic validity of Western ideals.

It means a great deal to me that the Universidad del Pacifico is
dedicated to precisely these principles, and we in North America have a
special honor in being able to do whatever little contribution we can
make spiritually and materially to that great effort. In all our
societies, perhaps more so in the developing than in the developed ones,
there are profound challenges to these Western traditions that I have
outlined. There is the ambition of manipulation, and the excessive
confidence in abstract theories. The great curse of our period are the
bureaucrats who manipulate hundreds of thousands without love and
without hatred, simply in pursuit of an abstract sense of ideology and
often doom them to a terrible existence and sometimes even to death. So

[LC]

October 6, 1987

Speech by Henry Kissinger

I am honored to be able to be part of an enterprise dedicated to the humane values of Western society. The values that tie together Latin America and North America in what can be a great political and economic enterprise, so that we can all work together for a world in which the just can be free and the gentle can be secure.