 First edition | |
| Author | H. G. Wells |
|---|---|
| Original title | The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Manifesto, Credo |
| Publisher | Gollancz |
Publication date | 1928 |
| Publication place | United Kingdom |
| Media type | Print (hardback) |
| Pages | 200 |
The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution was published in 1928 by H. G. Wells, when he was 62 years old. It was revised and expanded in 1930 with the additional subtitle A Second Version of This Faith of a Modern Man Made More Explicit and Plain. In 1931 a further revised edition appeared titled What Are We to Do with Our Lives?. A final version appeared in 1933 under its original title. Many of its ideas are anticipated in Wells's 1926 novel The World of William Clissold.
The book is, in Wells's words, a "scheme to thrust forward and establish a human control over the destinies of life and liberate it from its present dangers, uncertainties and miseries."[1] It proposes that largely as the result of scientific progress, a common vision of a world "politically, socially and economically unified" is emerging among educated and influential people, and that this can be the basis of "a world revolution aiming at universal peace, welfare and happy activity" that can result in the establishment of a "world commonwealth".[2] This is to be achieved by "drawing together a proportion of all or nearly all the functional classes in contemporary communities in order to weave the beginnings of a world community out of their selection."[3] This will ultimately "be a world religion."[4]
- ^ H.G. Wells, The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Doran, 1928), p. 198.
- ^ H.G. Wells, The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Doran, 1928), pp. 28 & 44.
- ^ H.G. Wells, The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Doran, 1928), p. 65.
- ^ H.G. Wells, The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Doran, 1928), p. 163.