Review: “In Defense of Civilization” by Michael R. J. Bonner

“Bonner has done a great service in reminding us what true civilization means, the cost of losing it, and how we can regain it.”

Civilization is something that we live within without realizing that it is a striking achievement of human ingenuity, courage, intellect, and will. We have become so accustomed in the West to things working at a basic level that we have for too long simply assumed civilization’s permanence and vitality. Lately, this blithe complacency has started to shift as a result of what some have called the “crisis of competence,” wherein our complex system of systems that comprises our modern industrial civilization is starting to come apart at the seams. This crisis of competence underlies a sense that things are coming apart, and the only question is whether we are in the “gradual” stage of our civilizational bankruptcy, or the “suddenly” stage, to paraphrase Ernest Hemingway.

Historian Michael R. J. Bonner is driven by these questions to mount a defense of civilization in the face of proliferating assaults on its very foundations. His book, which was published earlier this year, is a wonderful explanation of what civilization is, how it arises, how it is threatened, and why it matters. Bonner’s purpose in writing this book is to “explain what makes civilization what it is, to show what we are in danger of losing in the event of collapse, and to point the way toward renewal.”

As Bonner reminds us, what we take for granted is more fragile than it appears on the surface, and we can lose what we have if we are careless. As he writes, our present circumstances are “a vivid reminder of the fragility of civilization and the threat of collapse.” Even so, “our reflections should not be confined to the melancholy contemplation of disaster and destruction.” This is because, he writes, “Human civilization has extraordinary powers of recovery; and, since its original appearance long ago, civilization has always been preferable to barbarism or anarchy. Renewal is possible even after a long interval, as is shown, for example, by the revival of Europe after the collapse of the Roman Empire, or the ebb and flow of civilization in China despite repeated foreign conquest.”