ABSTRACT
Not quite forty years after Morse sent the world's first telegraph message only from Baltimore to Washington, Joseph Cowen gave the House of Commons a dramatic view of an entire world that was shrinking. His cautions about the meaning of all this are very pertinent over a century later. Anyone who has worked in developing countries knows that with the poorest educational opportunities their secondary students learn far more about the rest of the world and the U.N. than do their peers in the most richly endowed countries. The global village can actually be dangerous if it does not actively foster greater knowledge and understanding of people's and their aspirations beyond the frontiers of the West. If modern transnational public communication only perpetuates ignorance, strengthens disinformation, and exacerbates tensions, it may prove more dangerous to peace and the rule of international law than the world was without it.
