Are The World's Historic Symbols Of Governance Wearing Out?

[Ken Gigliotti]

Are The World's Historic Symbols of Governance Wearing Out ? Is Something New Coming?

Are all the philosophies of governance and the symbols we all cling to with all our might, worn out?  Hopefully something new is forming. The fallowing are observations and there is a pattern. It is visible but unformed and it runs through, Russia, the US, and China as well as Iran. It seems like every major country's convoluted history and political philosophy of good intentions is having difficulty governing, and the pandemic is making things even worse.

The inspiration of this story came from Foreign Affairs magazine Jan. Feb. 2021 titled The Party That Failed by Cai Xia a former professor at China's Central Party School, she was tasked to write and interpretation of China's move to introduce limited capitalism called the Three Represents. They were “development... using “advanced productive forces, ” ... “cultural progress,and the interests of the majority.” It went on to say, the policy was, “Poverty is not socialism; development is a hard truth.”The problem came when it was realized it did not conform to the Communist Central Party (CCP)line and in fact was contradictory to the long held beliefs in Marx and Mao. The leadership did not want to rock the boat and  settled on hypocritical wording that did not explain the new ideology but also kept the bureaucracy happy. This is not an over simplification, but the story is long and well told.
In Russia, the Oligarchy bought up and privatized old Soviet assets creating  contradictions within the communist system not easily explained to it's people.
The contradictions in democracy, and communism are coming to matter and the governed have noticed.
So lots of questions are being asked and protest and violence begin.
Paul Light of Brookings Institute says that “successful reform must involve more than exhortations and slogans,”... and health care workers fighting the pandemic in the US faced 18 layers of bureaucracy to get access to PPE from the strategic stockpile, and small business had to navigate 16 layers to get financial assistance from the US Treasury.(Fareed Zakaria GPS, Take 2021-02-28)

JUST IN- (2021-03-03) CBC story Manitoba's Government Tabling Of 19 Mystery Bills Called Unprecedented and Undemocratic” by Darren Bernhardt .The story quotes Paul Thomas professor emeritus of political studies at U of Man. Manitoba's Conservative party is going to limit debate on 19 bills without providing the text of the bills.  The  lack of text prevents the public from knowing what is in them as well as the opposition. This is not how the federal nor other provinces work. Text of bills are normally provided with a short time of their introduction. This is due to apparent retaliation for NDP opposition to the last budget.
Anyway to me it is further evidence of polarization, the NDP and PC's have been going at it for the last  40 years I worked in the newspaper business and new lows are reached in each term. Bad for democracy,no wonder voters get discouraged. kg

Canada can say with all it's faults acted quickly for large numbers of people put out of work and would correct for anyone who was left out.Failures to produce PPE or vaccines are Canada's failures when vital job creating manufacturing left the country in the past decades.

Maybe politics and philosophy are not needed when we have Facebook nation, with YouTube support, a short history and no philosophy, just data to finance in a world that doesn't need to go far physically. A virtual log cabin,solar power, cryptocurrency, in a forest frontier of a virtual united nations. Just hack any threat with a keyboard and a mouse.

Clinging to historic symbols is not a good sign when the present is so unsettled. The left and right are both wrong in being polarized. Media can only find solace and greatness (“back in the day,” quoting any old man) in not so recent history. An answer could include total integration of technology, power grids, water and food production and distribution. A united nations of essential services crossing every border and ocean, including the Arctic. The crisis of climate change could create an opportunity and the reality of cooperation using this pandemic as a precedent.

When the philosophies of governance become threatened, change comes usually in a violent way, but not always. Before that happens the bureaucracies of the philosophy begin to cling to the last semblances of control and, that is usually the symbols of the historic philosophy.  The logic that first made those philosophies attractive to the governed have broken down and can no longer be justified with the logic of the printed word,nor the architecture built to reinforce the philosophy nor feeling that they are still true in the hearts of those being governed. When trust is broken,bad things happen. The lack of trust seems to be happening all over the world.

 Bureaucratic layers are the sign of dry rot of principles of governance fallowed by added layers of surveillance and security. Layers on layers of all, delay the inevitable. America's democracy innovation brought equality to all MEN. The founders of the American Revolution ,meant men when they wrote it. The founders did not even extend equality to all men. Washington and Jefferson had slaves, and Lincoln did not start as an abolitionist. He did lead historic change and if he lived longer the history of the United States might have been very different.
It is said they all thought slavery would would just die on it's own, but the American Civil War was about expanding slavery to western states. ( Kansas Nebraska Act)The post Civil War America institutionalized racism until the 1960's. Other countries have their own sad histories of racism and inequality. Multiculturalism is a very new concept, that can be back dated.
The hypocrisy of America's first, second and third founding still exists with states right's and voter suppression.

The words of the American Constitution do not match the reality for many Americans, starting with African American slaves and all women.  The right to education and the vote came first for women in the early 1900's in America, Canada and Europe.
Racist laws existed in the US until the 1960's. Chief Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg would say that there are now enough laws to protect minorities and she is likely right. The problem's with the strong ingrained racist subtext of hypocrisy.
The philosophy of the governance of the United States is floundering under aged-out  hypocrisy of it's liberal, progressive failures and undemocratic forces from the far right are rushing in to fill the void of a perceived security threat.

The logic of a democracy founded on hypocrisy has led to un-logic and the rise of the far right to authoritarianism. It is not too late. It is also looking like the signs are bringing war to North America.
North Americans have long looked with passing interest at the destructive wars of WW1 And WW2 and in the Middle East and the creeping anarchy is seeping inside fortress America. Modern technology,hacking, air power and space surveillance is equalizing great power advantages. It seems obvious. More security is one way to deal with it. BUT... work the problem and fix the historic and over arching causes. Home grown anarchy can be fixed, politically.

Add the pandemic and the racial and economic inequity as well as impending artificial intelligence and climate change upheavals, any one or all at once,democracy may not survive. Climate change strategy may decide the next American election. In a bad way. There is overwhelming stress on failing institutions strangled and stumbling by it's own defensive layers of governance. Look at the rejection of guard rails like science and journalism and  the fractured state of politics, not to mention an insurrection inspired by a president who would not relinquish power  after a decisive election.And HE'S back.   

The life cycle of philosophical principles is getting shorter and shorter as populations grow under pressure from not only population and nature but also by the push back to change. In this time, also add the pandemic. Ideas wear out,new ideas evolve, if they do not then violent insurrection or war happens. Clinging to change and the originalist logic creates a rejection of that logic and today's default to observable untruths and un-logic (chaos) shows it is time for a new philosophy to take hold.

War has always been somewhere else,this time it is likely to be in North America. It can all be fixed by looking at the conditions of the poorest people and the biggest complaints in that country.

It took hundreds of years to change aristocratic, god given rule of kings and queens with a peasant class bound to protection for food in a feudal system. In Europe cultural superiority of languages, English,French, Spanish,German and a host of other smaller cultural languages in a small space created the white western colonial warrior culture that depended on, often brutal practices to feed the entire system effected by famine and over  population. When supply lines got too long, colonialism collapsed. Supply lines of modern western democracy are getting very long. The democracy experiment on the island fortress America began in the late 1700's. It is creeping along since 1960.

The American and French Revolutions introduced new philosophical  ideas of democratic governance, division of powers of the republic, for the people,by the people. The British parliamentary system with a strong legal and property rights based system evolved. The Russian revolution and The Chinese Revolutions created similar but different systems based on what looked like democratic principles but it's lack of resiliency and descended into tyrannical,top heavy oppressive,welfare/security states. Governments based on religion fare no better.

The Soviet Union would fall in 1991 after 73 years. Communism in Russia still exists but it looks nothing like the ideas that first triggered the 1917-18 Revolution. Ironically in the aftermath of the American Capitol insurrection the Russian people are rallying in support of Russian dissident Alexey Navalny over 1000 were arrested at one rally.

China's communist rule that started with the Republic of China ending 2000 years of a feudal system governed by imperial rule. Mao Zedong would lead the country to Chinese Communism in 1949, with a second destructive revolution in 1966-76 Cultural Revolution. Today with the introduction of limited capitalism, the Communist Party is trying to control this new idea in a country with thick bureaucratic party structure and oppressive police and surveillance systems. Adding a coupling with a huge population and the internet and being a part of a world economy with ever increasing resistance. The freedom outside of China is looking more attractive and it's people are  beginning to search like other more developed regions for a democracy that lives up to it's philosophical ideals. The introduction of limited capitalism exposes hypocrisies in the system not unlike the racism in the American origin story. The gymnastics of language to justify  the oppressive system are becoming obvious to the billions of people being governed. Violent protests erupted over the last year in Hong Kong against the mainland China government with 10,000 arrested.

Progressives in the United States is also clinging to historic symbols of it's founding principles but has in reality tolerated systemic racism by using it's own version of historic European supremacy throughout it's last three foundings. Republicans were the party of Lincoln and Democrats (Dixiecrats) promoted racism and states rights. This chaos has been all been made worse by a technology awakening that has been bent democracy into a pretzel of progressive entanglements.  It is allowing the far right to stumble into the power play. 

The three foundings are, the Revolution of 1776, the American Civil War/Reconstruction and post Depression/WW2 New World Order. These were reinventions of the American experiment. Each would bring world changing wealth and reform but would not address it's original founding principles of equality,freedom and the pursuit of happiness for all Americans . All these things have become the hypocrisy of racism that stifles the one thing that prevents all three. Today all the great powers are under stress and may be looking for an enemy to save the bureaucracy or hopefully a new philosophy to govern. Hopefully looks more like the American/British/French model with true equality and without racism. Maybe something more global would be more helpful.

Each of the ruling global philosophies has a basic flaw that defaults to scar tissue of bureaucracy and surveillance and security dedicated to maintaining the status quo. Technology can do that, no problem.The delay during the status quo period can be used to fix catastrophic problems or make them worse. The rise of the far right can only make things worse and lead to more layers of distraction through bureaucracy, surveillance and false security or another revolution, disruption or civil war by another word.   

The Washington Post in 2010 reported that the US had 16 intelligence agencies, 1271 government organizations, 1931 private companies that contribute intelligence for foreign and domestic intelligence, military planning and espionage.

Russia has legendary security apparatus, both in country and abroad.
China the same with added leverage using acquired western technology and cheap labor.
The oil producing countries in the Middle East and South America struggle with low priced petroleum and their own public welfare system based on those revenues.
 Everyone can now see climate change with famine and mass migration, as well as an  end to the oil economy.
Opinion by Ken Gigliotti