Sunday 4 June 2017

We Are Not Cavemen

Introduction

It is, in my opinion, a common ailment of the 21st century world (or, I concede, perhaps just the Western world) to take a paradoxically good and bad view of the future. It is my thesis that these contrary yet simultaneously occupied outlooks merely reflect a disparity in perspective. For the average Westerner living today is probably experiencing an existence that is – on average – significantly improved compared to their contemporary from any period prior, and so, surrounded by an abundance of items they believe necessary for the continuity of their existence, and safe in the assumption that such abundance will continue (for, perhaps you could argue, they have never known any different) will, from this perspective, project their future life to be quite a positive one.

However, that same Westerner, when pressed on their supposed future from the perspective not of what do they have now compared to what others did not, but rather what do they want in the future compared to what others have now, will take a more cynical view. It is possible this is an anecdotal perspective, and if that is the fatal weakness of this piece, so be it. But I believe it speaks to the human condition that we see progress as more challenging than preservation. I am not an evolutionary scientist, but I would hypothesis there is something primal about this condition, for if one can eat tonight, why risk it on the hope of eating tomorrow too?

As a means of function

If we wish to explore this phenomenon, and perhaps to discuss solutions to the problem this creates, it is useful to understand the paradigms in which the phenomenon exists. Almost all debates in the Western world are phrased as opportunities, with – I’ve often found – most dichotomised debates ultimately offering, regardless of outcome, the pathway to the same opportunity. Education is framed as an opportunity, and so is business, with risk existing not just as a hazard, but as an opportunity prime for exploit. Even disaster is an opportunity for some. The phrase, “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade,” could quite easily be, “when Earth gives you earthquakes, make infrastructure improvements.”

Opportunity, on a basic level, must exist to keep the average person content with their place in the world. For we are often not content creatures for very long, and so opportunity, even in the form of change, must linger within our social zeitgeist constantly, or else peculiar things will happen. Furthermore, opportunity as an ambiguous concept (though if I had to describe it I would suggest the word is meant to conjure visions of rolling green pastures and warm bathing sunlight) is useful as a product for universal agreement. It is a product in the sense that it can be bought and sold, often bought at the ballot box and sold in a catalogue one might call a manifesto published several weeks prior.

In fact, I suggest the packaging of the idea of opportunity in such a way has not just been politically useful, it’s been politically revolutionary, moving politics away from trivial issues (triviality, often I’ve found, being proportionally higher the more local the issue, but that is an issue for another day) and towards much more personality-based, grandstanding, universal ideas (whether these ideas, which are often long-lasting, national and legacy building policies, are actually any of these things is, as always, debatable).

John Kay in his book, Other People’s Money suggests the idea of financialisaton; similarly Sandal in his book What Money Can’t Buy and the authors Earle, Moran and Ward-Perkins in their book The Econocracy. Financialisaton, as an idea, speaks to the ever-increasing quantification of previously unquantifiable (or previously dubiously quantifiable) entities/products/concepts, often with little thought given to the human and/or environmental narrative behind that which is being quantified. I believe the same is true for opportunity.

But opportunity is different in that it doesn’t necessarily suffer because of being quantified, but rather can advance society when given prominence, which quantification does do. Let me be clear: it is good that politicians regularly, almost to the point of annoyance, phrase their arguments in such a way as to emphasise the return to You, the voter. It is only right that, on a certain level, the democratic ritual of voting can be viewed as a transaction between the electorate and the elected.

Of course, it can also be argued (and it has been) that it reduces politics down to personality competitions and soundbites – perhaps called slogans – as politicians peddle their opportunity-cum-wares, but that is a wider discussion for another day. No, the issue with opportunity as a quantified and sold idea is the same as is experienced by any product – it is an economic one of supply and demand.

As a means of preservation

It would take a fool to argue against universal opportunity, if for one reason it will (on average) benefit the fool, but, for a second reason, it benefits society too, provided of course it works. Machiavelli pointed out, in much more exemplary terms than I, that if you must wrong anyone, you should ensure you do not wrong the largest group, or, failing that, the most powerful. Opportunity, as a means of advancement (which I would argue is how politicians will almost always phrase opportunistic ideas) is a policy idea that wrongs the fewest number (but arguably the most powerful) of people, namely those at the top, and even here, the wrong is more a lack of perceived benefit rather than an actual ill being committed. But this is a short-term perspective. However, when we accept the promise of opportunity being made by a politician, and pay for it with our vote, we create an expectation of eventual delivery.

Here we observe a second advantage of opportunity – ambiguity in timing. The politician that promised to make the entire electorate rich overnight would be a politician that succeeded only in making the electorate poor in a day. People accept, quite obviously, that change (particularly substantiated change, and particularly change for the better) takes time, if for no other reason than we, as a collective and under the guise of the elected few, must encourage our societal caveman to step out of our comfortable, safe cave. But just as a caveman would curse the alluring horizon if he found, upon arriving there, that the land was harsh and barren, so too will the electorate curse the elected if, after forming a sacred bond at the ballot box and perhaps suffering hardships since then until now, they find themselves stuck and stagnant and above all without opportunity.


As an aside, one should remember that once the promised benefit that comes with promised opportunity is met, that does not eliminate one’s obligation to those they have provided said benefit too. Citizens, rightly or wrongly, will always seek more, and as such will always demand ever present opportunity. Therefore, one cannot rest on one’s laurels; you must add rungs to the ladder and offer those below you a hand to reach ever growing heights, as opposed to being satisfied when touching the ceiling.


As a second rule of political practice, any idea that is powerful in moving the people in your direction can be just as powerful in moving them against you. And it is a most fatal error of the politician to be deemed unable to provide promised, substantiated opportunity to their masters. Let’s return to the idea of supply and demand to articulate this point. A society might function, though be dissatisfied and in famine, leading to co-ordination such to ensure the small amount of resource the society does have is shared equally. In this hypothetical, whilst the baker will never have queues of expectant customers outside their door, they will never be longing for willing customers.


As an aside, if there is another lesson to be learnt here, it’s that dissatisfaction is not necessarily unsustainable, provided an alternative to dissatisfaction is never proposed. See above: one does not have to break through the ceiling if one does not help another climb the ladder in the first place.


But suppose one day a new baker opens shop, and this baker, keen to maximise their sales, professes to have enough bread to feed the whole starved society. Well, what would we expect other than all residents to queue for as long as is necessary to receive the food they have been promised (implied by their being part of the society)? This baker may well have found a solution to the society’s famine, and if so they will most certainly be the most popular baker in that society for a long time (subjectively). But if it transpires that, after a lengthy wait (of which the starving populous were initially quite happy to part take in), that the baker is all out of bread, or is perhaps so overwhelmed by demand they cannot bake the bread quick enough, and in that time those already starving have now starved and fallen to the ground immobile or worst, well that baker will be destroyed in reputation (if not worst) and that idea they promised will die.

Obviously, the bread is opportunity.

As I have said above, without society believing that opportunity is always present, peculiar things will happen. In the baker analogy, the bakery shuts, and people fall ill, and cynicism re: a solution to the famine spreads as fast as the hunger and the anger. Now one could argue that the fault of the baker is not in their aspiration to feed all the people, nor in their secondary aim of benefitting themselves, but in their execution of their ambition – in their marketing their proposal as an immediate panacea. And this is a valid argument, though, I would suggest, only in a meritocracy, where the honour of advancement (opportunity) may only be bestowed at the whim of those already powerful and following a set of criteria only few can complete without prior (often inherited) advancement. So, whilst panaceas are dangerous, we cannot escape the need for them, as for a democracy to have opportunity, it must be universally attainable, or else that society is not a democracy.

(Maybe?) Understanding the problem

Hollywood will often tout the phrase, “nothing left to lose.” The same phrase can be applied to a society without opportunity.

On one level, one could argue adherence to the laws or social norms of a land is through the basic good of humanity, for we often do not seek to wrong those for whom wronging would not benefit ourselves. On another level, adherence is through fear of the consequences. But a fine bears little threat when one is already indebted; prison bears little threat when one is already trapped; death bears little threat when one already sees little worth living for. On an extreme level, opportunity keeps societies together, and its lack of tears them apart.

It is here then we understand the ground on which the Western paradox stands. In the wake of financial crisis and growing inequality, as well as perhaps cultural changes and automation, previously held notions of advancement, and in turn notions of opportunity, are being strained and challenged, if not abolished.

In Alec Ash’s book Wish Lanterns, there is a brief discussion of the materiality of modern day China versus the implied more developed West, the notion being that when the material is provided for, as it is in the West, people will focus more on personal development, identity and spirituality. This makes sense if we consider the caveman analogy again: once the caveman has food, he has time to ponder much more intricate ideas. I bring the idea of materiality up as a means of explaining my belief that Westerners in the 21st century (again, I concede this is very general, and a flaw within this piece) are, in the short-term, rather optimistic about their lives, but in the long-term are not.

Materiality explains the short-term because the Western world is very good at supplying what its citizens need, and as such those short-term desires such as food and water (and, I would suggest, technology, or at least electricity) are readily met. In the short-term, we have it pretty good. But greater materiality, in part due to decreased income (which I argue is directly related to opportunity) suggests materiality is being used as a supplement for a lack of quote unquote hope for the future – the long-term spiritual desires (if not needs). Aspiration is the word that comes to mind here, and the lack of opportunity proceeds the lack of aspiration, which in turn demands short-term reward over long-term gain.

Forgive me for not providing an exact reference, but if we accept the idea that humanity exists as two pillars, one spiritual and one material, then we must accept that when one is falling to support the structure the other must grow to carry the weight. Spirituality is vague, and purposely so. But materiality is immediately obvious and so very tangible. It is so much easier to grasp (literally). Opportunity should facilitate the short-term materiality and the long-term spirituality that make us fulfilled, but in its absence, the material suffers less than the spiritual.


As an aside, I dislike using the word ‘spiritual,’ because it conjures up doctrines I do not wish to bring into this discussion. Alas, I find myself without an appropriate alternative, or perhaps just without a thesaurus.


This thesis may explain other phenomena. The rise in nationalism across the Western world in the mid-2010s is explained by many pundits and political sciences drawing on data and observation. I rely only on observation. For if the State serves any purpose other than protection and governance it is to provide individuals with an identity larger than themselves. To bolster the individual by making them part of a collective. However, the need for this bolstering seems to only exist when one cannot find something deeper in themselves on their own, or one is not enabled by others to find this. In other words, when opportunity is not provided by society to the individual.


I have spoken in broad terms, and this is not helpful. But this is a problem we must tackle, or at least acknowledge honestly. Short-term consumerism will do little but leave a great many dissatisfied from what is ultimately a nihilistic endeavour. It will breed apathy in some and radicalism in others, as well as mistrust and distain between all of us. Universal opportunity betters all our lives; a lack of opportunity degrades all our lives. Let us not be cavemen frightened to pursue the horizon for fear of being left in the cold.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Cryptocurrencies and Corpocracies

Cryptocurrencies are not libertarian. To be sure, aspects of cryptocurrencies, and the blockchain technology on which they are built, reso...