People's thinking about the roles of government and economics has been narrowed and stifled. We must get out of the box that the theories of Communism, Socialism, and Democracy put us in. Looking at Pre-Enlightenment times, when revolutions did not exist, and absolute monarchies has dominated the world for centuries, there was a huge paradigm shift in the way in which people viewed themselves in light of their government and their social economic status. The changes are of course multi-faceted and too complex to narrow down to a single cause as to why people changed their thinking, but that is not the purpose of this essay. It is crucial to securing a hopeful future that people should look at government and economics from a historical standpoint, temporarily setting aside the modern men that we are, and with that, pushing aside our desires and criticisms to look for the truth through the eyes of reason.
Today, as free intellectual thinkers, we should, by natural right according to Descartes, continuing to Locke, be able to think about the modern world's situation objectively and if possible, outside of the current manifestations of capitalism, democracy, socialism and communism. An alternative to capitalism BESIDES socialism is possible. An alternative to socialism BESIDES capitalism is possible. Looking at any form of economic standing requires a loss of some sort. It requires limitations. For a capitalist, limitations on what can be capitalized or marketed, sold or bought. For a socialist, what can be distributed, not everyone will have equality, there inevitably will be social injustice and inequality, unfair representation and compromise. The government not becoming a democracy, nor a tyranny, will find a wavering and sometimes unequal harmony in the middle. With capitalism penalized, and resources unavailable, a tyrannic ruler would not be able to oppress with the kind of limitless power that is possible today. With socialism criticized as a weak cry for a utopia, a democracy would not be able to thrive because the majority of citizens would have no desire to rule or make decisions, due to the consequential role their actions will take in matters of state and policy. The weight of decisions would be on the shoulders of one or a few well educated, experienced, COURAGEOUS people, that is, in the event of an aristocracy or oligarchy, decisions will be more critical, but the relationship between citizen and ruler would change for the better, because of the lack of a need for explanations. The citizens could live more peaceful, less harrowed lives, the ruler(s) could concentrate on the art of decision making and hopefully, discussions based on the knowledge and understanding they have of their citizens and land.
A person owning land changes things. With this type of government in place, the citizen would have the opportunity to work and own land and not feel compromised, because the ruler(s) having more of a moral sense, or ethics weighing on his conscience, would be caring more about what land is under his rule, the actual land, not considering only the capital which the land could produce. In this way, he is not separating what is from what could be, but he is looking at the development and well-being of not only the land, but of the farmer who tends the land as well. Depending on how wise or unwise this ruler might be, or how greedy or unselfish, he will have a smaller scope in which to deal with. In the event of a despot coming into power, he might require labor from the workers to serve his means, he might take away rights, and make unethical decisions, but is it any worse than what we see in the work force today? People don't know how to compare, having adopted narrow ways of looking at the world, the modern ideas of democracy and equality that have only been around for a couple hundred years. Compare, for example, the modern man working to feed his family at any job whether making a low income or high income (depending on whether the country leans toward socialism, not IF he is controlled, but HOW) He is required to pay taxes. If he is a wealthy man in a country that has high taxes, he is not making what he should, and is therefore being deprived of his due share, in the same way that a despot might take the produce of land from a farmer. If he is a poor man and makes a low income, depending on where he is, he still has no choice in his income and where it goes. If in a socialistic country, he will have his money and every other poor man's money distributed for him, for all his “necessary” expenses, but then again, he does not have much room for decision making, o r a direct say in it. If a rich man lives in a more capitalistic country, he will have all the option to expand freely, trample on others freely, and be tyrannical if he so wishes, because, he has the resources, and he can. If a poor man lives in this same capitalistic country, he, not only will most likely not be able to climb the social hierarchy to be able to amass as much income per capita as the wealthy man, but he is trampled on even more so, and becomes more and more a product of his environment, he becomes a helpless part of a system in which he cannot escape for fear of starvation or death, he is more apt to turn to immoral actions such as the capitalist on the other end, who has free range and limitless power to do immoral actions. Both breed repression and tyranny, not by one person, but by a never ending and complex system in which no single human has control.
With a moderate and limited economy in place, goods would not be available on such a vast, unlimited scale. With the resources and needs of each country addressed and focused on, the economics would be more stable and predictable, the knowledge of what cannot be produced, and what can be, the knowledge of what is scarce, and what is plentiful, all of these important matters would be impervious to the rest of the world, and would be considered where they matter most, on their own soil. A problem with Capitalism and Globalization, is that it takes concentration off of what one country has and places it's concentration on what it can get. It's focus is more on the other countries around it, which it has little or no influence on, and not adequate knowledge of. Even if the main distributors of products and marketing and even the world leaders have knowledge and understanding of surrounding countries, the citizens of the buying or selling countries will not have the same level of knowledge and they will not get the luxury of directly dealing in any of those transactions unless it so benefits the buyer or seller, and will not be given the power to take millions of important details into consideration, such as the effect on the environment, and every trade relation, or problem, will potentially cause shortages of resources or wasting of resources as many chains of bureaucracy mediate the produce and goods as they are exchanged from many different hands. The problem with such dealing is that no one is left responsible for the pollution, mistreatment of workers, contamination, waste, environmental destruction, not replenishing resources, etc. and if something goes wrong, the deal is not stopped, the trade agreement still goes on, the buyers and sellers making compromising decisions to any end to end up on top, to end up at the end of the day making money. No one in this situation wants to lose out on money, even if the rest of the world suffers from it, and the earth is permanently harmed.
It does not make sense to have a country using its resources to ship of to a second country, and the second country ships of its resources to the first country. It is a sign of greed, covetousness and non contentment to not settle for what one has, but to want, and EXPECT to get it from someone else, no matter what it takes. An example would be two families. The dad and mom of the first family see that the second family has something that they want, vise versa, so they both come up with an agreement and begin trading. This is fine, as in, trading goods is fine. The problem is capitalism. With capitalism in the picture, need and want become interchangeable terms. Whereas before, with the interest of the county at heart; meaning, a desire to promote and keep the natural resources of that country, and to grow them, for the gain of the country, trade was not an issue. The country would not be willing to plunder itself and demolish itself for the sake of gaining a few goods from a different country. When value is placed on what one has, the desire for something else is not non existent, or even lessened, but it is subservient to the desire to keep what one has, and develop that. The capitalistic family would perhaps decide to negotiate with the other family, with the goal of making as much as possible from it, always increasing for the sake of increase, instead of for the sake of necessity. This is where want and need can become interchangeable terms. The capitalist will use whichever makes for better capital in his negotiations, with the family at home, and with the other family whose goods he would like to have. This promotes dishonesty and illogical actions to be possible, whereas before, when the main focus is on his own family, and promoting what they have for the sake of bettering themselves, not for the sake of making capital, (which means that the capitalistic family will better itself as much as it can but only to make itself appealing to its buyer, to make the sale.) Genuine interest is not found in the right place, or for the right reasons.
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