In uni I have been treated to a number of social and political ideologies and movements that have done well to bring me around. A brief stint in student politics was some of the best training I ever had. This is turning into more of a biography than I had intended�
Currently, after mulling over such crazes as "the science question in feminism" and "Modernity" for a number of years, I have currently being sinking deep into "Voltaires Bastards" and "Bowling Alone". These books have been narrowing my beliefs about a couple of things that are being eroded in our lifetime and a number of trends that are increasingly dominating the folly of mankind.
I'll be blunt on one assumption. The world is not doing good. We are neither at the "end of history" nor are we on any sort of ecologically or economically sustainable path. Those that explain to me the logic that economies can expand indefinitely ring remarkably close to the phrase "more fish in the ocean than can ever be caught". That said both John Ralston-Saul and Robert Puntnam (the above authors) have put together to really insightful books; one on general political philosophy and the other on statistical trends in how people connect with eachother. Both books are disastrous on a couple of levels, especially Ralston-Saul's. The man wanks off harder than any other academic in ages, which wouldn't be so bad, if 3 of the cornerstones of his book weren't: that those in power today use complex language to stop understanding; that philosophers and social scientists are not able to be read by the general public and that this is a bad thing and; that efficient understanding of information is key for democracy to function in the way that some French revolutionaries and Thomas Jefferson envisioned. I am in full agreement with all three points. Tell me then why the man chooses to write passages that are difficult for a 4th year political science student to understand. Bah!
What is important about both books is the generality of the claims they make. I have always been quick to dismiss universal solutions to problems. Revolutions, market reforms and anarchy have always seemed to me to be poorly planned, not well coordinated and badly thought out remedies for a systematic problem that cannot be fixed by one quick change. Saul pins most of our political problems on our worship of efficiency, reason and expertise in society and goes in-depth to explain how men behind the scenes are pulling strings throughout the world through various means of manipulation. He believes that some of the most influential people on the planet would be lucky to pick up 1% on a survey that asks people to identify if their name sound familiar. These people are who believes are the culprits of democracy. Not that these people necessarily are evil. It's just that they are slaves to reason, and by reason he means that they believe that they are in a position of expertise and that those who go against them are non-experts that are threatening rational decisions by those who have information. These same people hide this information from anyone who wants it. They manage to control elected representatives (Saul points direct fingers at Canada) by withholding information, inundating ministers with facts, being suddenly unable to do things that are well within their power, etc. Basically, these technocrats, as Saul calls them, use information and reason to claim that they are the only ones in a position of authority on a matter. This leads to no debate, compromise or real meaningful discussion on issues, but instead turns into a debate of one side versus another. In my time in student politics, this level of manipulation was always apparent. Saul has basically opened my eyes to the reason why it existed within the provincial government, the university and the Student union that I was a part of itself.
I am really not doing his argument justice. Needless to say, it was reassuring to find out that the situation I experienced was not just an isolated case of bad management. These technocrats hold power, real power and defend it in ways unimaginable. Not really for any personal gain. They often times could do better financially in other things. In the circles of power however, they ensure that no major decisions can ever go through the system of authority without their touch of approval.
Putnam's book is much easier to read and practical on so many levels. It is also immensely boring and the last chapter is 20 pages of puff. His argument is that North Americans (and all of the western world in his follow up book) are becoming less connected to one another. By connected, he doesn't just mean that we are less politically engaged in unions, voting, religious institutions and parties. He also finds that our activities that connect people together: bowling, card playing, having people over for dinner, going out to the bar, going to see a movie with friends, etc. All these things are plummeting since the late 60's. This maybe wouldn't be so bad if the amount of connections that we have together wasn't related to our happiness, health, finances, and strength of our democracies. As our connections to eachother go down, so do all these things. In the end we end up as sickly people in front of the TV or internet, who don't earn much or talk much or care about politics in anyway- not reading the newspaper, voting, going to a meeting�nothing. Sound like anyone you know?
So why do I care so much to spend an hour writing about it? I have been constantly feeling for years that most of the problems of the world fro the last couple of thousand years have been caused by people who owned the means of production, that is, people who controlled the finances of a society (or world thanks to globalization) got to dictate the direction it went in. I begin to rethink my assumptions and hypothesis.
I took this course about a year ago that made the case that it has nothing to do with the rich-white-bastards. I mean it does�.but it is not their richness or whiteness or maleness that causes the problems. There are some good richies out there that would be happy to run with government policy and high social services and strict labour laws cause they understand that it is in the pursuit of happiness for the people as a whole. They are cool with this kind of stuff. But others will not have it be so. And it is not because they are rich or evil. It is the nature of the system of reason. It is actually more of a nature of the male-infused (patriarchical) competition that drives those who have the slightest edge of power to believe that they are right. The only way that they see to ensure that they get through their idea, their expertise, is through competition.
Robert Mcnammera, Kennedy's secretary of defense, the man responsible for the disastrous Vietnam war, the disastrous arms industry, the disastrous world bank debt crisis, and the 100,000's of thousands killed in Japanese firebombings during WW2, has never said that his methods were wrong. He has never believed that any of these ideas were ass backwards or illegitimate. He places the blame on human error, incomplete information, or unexplained world events that occurred after the fact. He has never questioned the fact that maybe such important decisions as the ones he made were allowed and protected from debate by a system that hinders democracy and produces the catastrophes without evaluation. This system is one of reason, were the expertise and efficiency of one person in power usually remains supreme.
This system only can function in one scenario. I saw it a number of times within the student society I was in. Often there were repeated attempts to block information from leaving the union and its inner circle. The reason had to do mainly with a fear that others who were not as knowledgeable as us (read not experts or technocrats) would influence or de-rail our projects. The way to stop decisions that we made (and here I stipulate that the same thing is done by any Western government institution with exception of a few I have had to deal with in Scandinavia) is by stopping information from getting out. How do you fight the evidence that the iraq war was based on if you have not the evidence. Same thing with cuts to women's centers, layoffs, economic plans etc. Public information has been reduced not only in its amount but also in its understandability. The only people who understand a decision are those who make it, and explaining it to you will never take place in the context of debate. Only in the context that "we are doing it because it is the right thing to do and here is all the evidence to back that up." Any information that runs contrary to this decision is hidden.
Any information that is found has to be spread. But how do you spread information to groups of people that do not connect with eachother any more? How do you charge up a counterattack, or a fight against this kind of subtle and insidious yet very powerful and secretive manipulation.
One of the problems is that the idea is so abstract and academic that it is hard for people to grasp and it takes time to explain. This isn't rich bastards trying to control the world for their benefit. Macnammera wasn't a very rich man and is currently an advocate against nuclear arms and was also against the Vietnam war. But he helped it happen and was one of the key people that ensured that it went off in the way it did. I don't think the problem is about rich white bastards anymore. And I certainly don't think that they hold all the power that they used to. I rather think, now, that money comes to those that are after a certain kind of thing. And that thing is power. Whether they can get money or not, they will always seek to have access to power in order to mold the world in the way they see fit.
Money changes nothing.