ABSTRACT
The notion of heroic action implies a belief that the fate of peoples can hang on what one person decides or does, as against the determinist's conviction that the outcome of events is decided by historical laws or by the exigencies of the period in which the hero lives. The feeling that there is a need for a hero to initiate, organise, and lead' grows out of the conviction that choices are open, that where the historical situation permits of major alternative paths of development, heroic action can count decisively. Shaw's compromise position of grafting international socialism onto British Imperialism involved, in Chesterton's view, a repugnant conviction that it was necessary to eliminate political communities which were too small to be economically viable. Imperialism was motivated by a drive towards economic expansion. It was generally less acceptable, however, to celebrate a capitalist commitment to economic growth than to glory in the moral and imaginative possibilities inherent in the imperial adventure.
