Month: June 2019

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Author’s Note: As readers may have surmised, the overarching point of this series is to sort out whether Nationalism or a One World Government is the better approach to governance. My plan for this morning was to finish this post. To my surprise this morning, a link to THIS SERENDIPITOUS VIDEO (which bears directly on that subject) appeared in my inbox. I encourage you to watch it after you have read this post. It provides a very optimistic spin on how the ideas of this series are gaining currency.

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As discussed previously, nationalistic, capitalistic, democratic republics have produced more successful and moral results for a higher percentage of their populations than any other forms of governance (and their research and inventions have been spread widely across the Earth). Sadly, however, they also create many problems, e.g., high levels of income inequality and other unequal outcomes, and imperialistic nationalistic nations have a history of starting wars.^[i] With the advent of weapons of mass destruction, humans now have the capacity to render huge swaths of the world uninhabitable, and conceivably do great damage globally. What is humanity to do?

An oft-touted alternative to nationalism that has not been fully tried is a “One World Government.”^[ii] Some intellectuals claim that a One World Government is the only way to avoid a nuclear holocaust.^[iii] If a One World Government could, (1) eliminate the possibility of a nuclear holocaust,^[iv] (2) not stifle human flourishing, and (3) be sustainable, the case for a One World Government would be compelling. Sadly, a One World Government could not achieve any of those objectives. Not only would a One World Government fail to achieve objectives that might justify it, but it would also make matters worse. Let’s sort out why that is true.

The primary purpose of a government is to establish and enforce rules that enable humans to fare better than if they were to live in chaos. The fundamental problem with governments, however, is that they are run by humans, i.e., a government allows some humans to set the rules under which all humans within the government’s jurisdiction to live. Granting people some power to rule over others enables them to obtain even more power than was granted. A ruler can simply use the power granted to withhold favors or inflict harm on those who are subject to their rules unless the ruled cede more power to a ruler. When it comes to expanding one’s power, the primary difference between a protection racket^[v] (e.g., The Mafia or Mexican cartels) and government action is that the government officials need not worry about an external law enforcement agency bringing the hammer down on their racket.

Consequently, because they are not angles,^[vi] unless rulers are restrained, they will eventually (and often quickly) amass enough power to do as they please. The more power they garner the less power “the people” have to stop them. One might suppose that rulers would be fearful of becoming so tyrannical that the people will find a way to forcibly dethrone the ruler. However, that so many rulers have been beheaded or dethroned throughout history reveals how much risk of going too far rulers will take to satisfy their lust for power. Gaining ever more power is in the best interest of the powerful and is, most definitely, not in the best interest of the vast majority of people living under the rule of the powerful. Rulers having too much power results in tyranny and misery for all but the most powerful. Yet, unless some power is not granted to rulers, there is chaos. What is humanity to do?

The most ingenious approach to addressing the problem of both granting power to rulers and restraining them from abusing it was devised by the American founders. The key was to set up the system so that rulers could not get anything done unless many antithetical interests, a.k.a, “factions”^[vii] agreed that a problem was sufficiently pressing and a proposed solution would be sufficiently effective that the proposed solution should be implemented. To further prevent unnecessary government action, they also added a Bill of Rights that, hopefully, would prevent the adoption of laws that infringed on certain inalienable rights. In this system, “the people” had the ultimate authority to “throw the bastards out” if government officials amassed too much power.

The founders, however, knew that the system was not foolproof. By responding to a lady who asked Benjamin Franklin what kind of government the Constitutional Convention would propose, he expressed his doubts about the sustainability of the proposed government when he responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”^[viii] As ingenious as it was, the idea that factions could be kept at bay came into doubt immediately after the founding. In his “Farewell Address,”^[ix] Washington signaled out factions as a primary threat to the republic. Interestingly, Washington urged nationalism as the solution:

“…you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the Palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion, that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts.”

As if the original constitutional structure was not weak enough in its defenses against tyranny, from the beginning, progressives have both whittled away at its protections and diminished the citizens’ fealty to the constitutional system. Consequently, we have only been able to keep some shreds of the checks and balances envisioned by the Constitution. Benjamin Franklin, in addition to his many other fine qualities, was prescient.

Today it is hard, if not impossible, to get American’s to rally around America’s relatively good set of principles. This is despite the country being mostly populated by people who, for the most part, embrace Judeo-Christian values and have a shared faith in the ideas of The Enlightenment^[x] (whether or not they acknowledge that source of their values and ideas). Although America is a relatively diverse country, its diverse citizenry is fairly homogeneous concerning values, ideas, and mores. The idea that all people of the world with profoundly different histories, values, and ideas could be motivated to adhere to principles, values, and mores dictated by a One World Government is preposterous. There is simply no way tribalistic humans can tribalize around one set of ideas, much less ideas dictated by faraway people with whom they have essentially nothing in common. In the 20^th Century not even three variations (U.S.S.R, Nazi Germany, and Maoist China) of one set of values and ideas, socialism, could co-exist with each other. None of them could even co-exist with their own citizens, collectively killing more than 100 million of their citizens who wouldn’t or couldn’t get in line with the state’s programs.

If ultimate control of all nuclear weapons were placed in the hands of a small group of people, those people would have as close to ultimate power as has ever existed on Earth. Absolute power will produce absolute tyranny. The notion that humans would thrive in such a world is untenable.

Consider the problems confronting the European Union which is a conglomeration of comparatively homogeneous fellow Europeans. The Brexit vote and the discontent in Germany of Greece holding Germans hostage are just the most visible of the EU’s problems.^[xi] In addition to being financially dysfunctional, the relatively globalist ideas that have taken root in Europe create other insolvable problems. Among them are too much welfare, low birthrates, and a necessity to take in more immigrants than can reasonably be assimilated. The confluence of these problems and ideas has created stagnation.

“The EU’s biggest problem is that its economic model has aged alongside its population. Europe has plenty of world-class companies but, unlike the US, none of them were set up in the past 25 years. In Europe’s golden age, Volkswagen was a rival to Ford, and Siemens could go toe to toe with General Electric. But there is no European Google, Facebook or Amazon and in the emerging technologies of the fourth Industrial Revolution, such as artificial intelligence, Europe is nowhere.”^[xii]

With a one-world tyranny, there would be no way out and no reason for the tyrants to ease their tyranny. Contrast that to a world in which nations with relative freedom exist. In such a world, tyrants are exposed to the possibility and reality that humans will flee to relative freedom. Non-enterprising, non-productive, and cowardly people will remain in the already dysfunctional society. (A common saying in the U.S.S.R. was, “we pretend to work and they pretend to pay us.”^[xiii]) As we saw in Berlin before the wall fell, enterprising, productive and courageous people who prefer to actually work and actually get paid will risk their lives to get out. As a result, the tyrannical country becomes poorer whether the person escapes or gets killed. Conversely, if the escapees make it out alive, the freer, receiving country is benefits.

By this process, the freer a country is, the more sustainable and prosperous it will be. The more prosperous a country is, the greater a magnet it is to those who are yearning to be free and to have opportunities to become productive and prosperous. Historically, people who have little initiative or courage tend to stay put and hope that the government will take care of them. (Today there are countervailing forces.^[xiv]) This reality is a motivation for countries to be freer.

The motivations described above (punishment of tyranny and rewarding freedom) are not merely theoretical. Demonstrations of the effectiveness of those motivations are played out daily in America today. When a U.S. state becomes too tyrannical (e.g., the state considers the wealth of its citizens to be communal, and, therefore, extract exceptionally high taxes on their wealthy citizens and subsidize those who do not work whether or not they are capable of working) migration happens. Wealthy people tend to leave^[xv] (with the occasional exception of people who are so wealthy that they need not sweat the loss of extra hundreds of millions in taxes—although even they often move their company’s operations to lower tax states) and less or non-productive people who are spared the high taxes tend to stay and non-productive people from elsewhere move to the state. The next thing you know, they have massive homeless problems.^[xvi]

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Please remember to watch THIS SERENDIPITOUS VIDEO.

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^[i] See “ See “Income Inequality Is More Than It’s Cracked Up To Be.”

^[ii] See “ See “World government.” The United Nations is an international body but has so few powers that calling it a government would be an error.

^[iii] See “ See “The case for a World State to wipe out war and nuclear weapons and bring global peace and prosperity” and “Pope Francis Calls For ‘One World Government’ To ‘Save Humanity’.”

^[iv] See “ “…widespread destruction and radioactive fallout causing the collapse of civilization, through the use of nuclear weapons.”

^[v] See “ See “Protection Racket.”

^[vi] See “ See “Milton Friedman on Greed, Virtue, and Angels.”

^[vii] See “ Originally the structural factions were “the people” (House of Representatives), states (Senate and the Electoral College), and the Courts. There were sub-factions within the House, Senate, and the Courts. To become and remain a law required surviving quite a gauntlet. It was institutional gridlock for all but the most compelling measures that did not violate citizens’ inalienable rights.

^[viii] See “ See “A Republic, if You Can Keep It.“

^[ix] See Washington’s “Farewell Address.”

^[x] See “ See “Ideas of the Enlightenment.”

“The Age of Enlightenment refers to a period in which reason was advocated as the primary basis of thought and authority. Logic and rationality were used to explain the ways in which the world worked as opposed to old traditions and superstitions. Free speech, individualism, and tolerance for other ways of life also became important ideas during this time. This period also coincided with the rise of nationalism and introduced great thinkers who later influenced developing democratic governments including the government of the United States.”

^[xi] See “ See “The European Union has bigger problems to deal with than Brexit.”

^[xii] See “ Id.

^[xiii] See “ See “ See “The Economist” Aug 26, 1999.

^[xiv] See “  See “The weaponization of Milton Friedman.” This article rightly points out how Friedman’s quote was misused. The article does not, however, prove that Milton Friedman’s statement (below) about immigrants coming illegally to America to have Americans provide for them was incorrect. The most they could say was, “not necessarily.” But the article simply describes some possible offsets to the costs of providing welfare to “illegal immigrants.” The article does not even attempt to put any numbers to determine the net flow of values. Here is what Friedman said:

“It is one thing to have free immigration to jobs, it is another thing to have free immigration to welfare. … [I]f you come under circumstances where each person is entitled to a prorated share of a pot … then the effect of that situation is that free immigration would mean a reduction for everybody.”

^[xv] See “ See “The Great Tax Migration,” and “Wealthy Americans flee high-tax states, take billions with them: ‘Tax the rich. The rich leave’”

^[xvi] See “As California’s homelessness grows, the crisis emerges as a major issue in state’s gubernatorial race.”

While nationalism produces many negative consequences, the fact that independent states—all of which are nationalistic to some degree—have survived the evolutionary test of time suggests, if not proves, that nation-states are, on balance, better for humans than chaos and the other approaches to governance that have been tried. At best, however, even the most successful nationalistic states create human conditions that are tragically short of idyllic. The human response to non-idyllic situations is to try to conceive changes to make things better. Such conceiving is noble and necessary if progress is to be made but, sadly, the vast majority of those conceptions when implemented do more harm than good. Even more sadly, no amount of conceiving will produce a set of policies that would create a paradise on Earth.

On the other hand, the fact that a vastly higher percentage of the people alive today are faring better than their ancestors shows that humans over the long haul and with much testing and many setbacks and failures can improve their conditions over time. Such progress can occur, however, only if the preponderance of changes that concern values and policies have been wise. The collapse of The Roman Empire, to name but one of many examples, demonstrates that humans are perfectly capable of choosing changes unwisely and/or failing to do what is necessary to protect and defend their wise decisions. Part of the mission of this blog is to help defer the day that the ideas, ways, and means that have enabled humans to reach the extant pinnacle of human achievement are not unwisely jettisoned in favor of unattainable perfection.^[i] [More on that point in future posts.]

With millennia of trials and much error and failures, natural evolution has deemed nationalism to be the winning approach to governance. That does not mean that nationalism is not destined to become extinct when a more successful approach is discovered. It does mean, however, that the odds of any proposed “fundamental transformation” of the evolved state of affairs will work better than the current one are low.

This is not a claim that things are satisfactory here and now. Far from it. Injustice, ill will, rightful righteous indignation (righteous indignation based on wrong analysis is unhelpful noise), unfairness, danger, tragedy, illness, outrageous fortune, and sadness abound. Because, however, (1) anything near creating a perfect form of governance is beyond human grasp, and (2) human’s infinite capacity to imagine how things could be better regardless of their absolute level of general wellbeing, injustice, etc. will always be a permanent part of the human condition—no matter how comparatively great conditions happen to be. For example, all but a tiny fraction of humans who currently live in America, Canada, Europe, Japan, Australia, and several other places have standards of living that rank in the top 1% of all the humans that have ever lived, yet all of the awful things listed above exist everywhere in the world. Jesus’s comment, “The poor will always be with you,” is an eternal truth that no fundamental transformation of policies will change.^[ii]

Nevertheless, things can be improved and wanting to improve things is virtuous. The problem is discerning which policies will produce more good than harm. Large human systems are astoundingly complicated and any significant policy change to such systems will produce both positive and negative consequences.^[iii] This problem is intractable because the smartest people in the world are not infinitely smart and most the knowledgeable people can obtain only a fraction of the information needed to assess whether a major policy change will, on balance, be positive or negative—although many people claim otherwise.^[iv] Making matters worse, in many circumstances the smartest and most knowledgeable people cannot know whether the fraction of the information they possess is a sufficiently high fraction of the information needed to justify the drawing of a conclusion. Examples of this reality were when some really smart, knowledgeable, and well-meaning people decided to remove wolves from Yellowstone National Park^[v] (which helped the elk and a few other animals and made the smart/knowledgeable people appear, for a while, to be smarter/more knowledgeable than they were, but destroyed the habitat of many species) and the revolutionaries thinking it was a good idea to replace the terrible czarist Russian government with a communist one^[vi] (which worked out well only for the U.S.S.R.’s General Secretaries and a few of their cronies). Contrary to what the instigators believed to be sound ideas, the Yellowstone idea was an example of the government not taking fully into account how nature works concerning wildlife, and the Soviet idea was an example of the government taking fully into account neither human nature nor economics (also a natural phenomenon). Natural, inevitable forces caused those ideas to fail—despite the science, logic, beautiful rhetoric, and good intentions of the ideas’ the “Intellectual Yet Idiot”^[vii] conceived.

Consequently, the most reasonable and reliable test of whether a system is worthy of preservation is whether it has persevered and produced above average results for an above average percentage of its citizenry over a long time. This is particularly troublesome because pretty good is not great. Humans can always imagine things being better than pretty good. They often want, ask for, or demand at least extraordinary, if not great, and sometimes demand near perfection if the status quo does not suit their fancy. (It doesn’t help when “experts” are paid to promote ideas whether or not they are good ideas and social merit badges are dispensed to vainglorious people who excel at demeaning the status quo.^[viii])

Though dreadfully short of great, a country that produces above average results for an above average percentage of its people over an extended period is a miracle.^[/ix] [In my estimation, the video in this endnote is a “must see.”] As nationalist America has demonstrated, pretty good can produce many miracles. Because there is a baby in that bathwater, significant policy change proposals should be met with great skepticism and the grander the proposal, the greater the skepticism should be. Doing otherwise risks not only a baby going down the drain.

Of course, nationalism has also produced many horrors and has failed to solve horrendous problems. On the other hand, things were never fine for everyone or even most people in the Roman Empire. On the contrary, by the standards of modern societies, things were always awful for everyone in the Roman Empire. More important, however, things were worse for most people both before the rise and after the fall of the Roman Empire. That history will repeat itself if the ideas of the Enlightenment, which enabled the West to achieve what it has for humanity, are not preserved and defended.

Hopefully, someday our bumbling trials and errors will produce an approach to governance that is far superior to nationalism. As the 20^th Century taught us, however, taking great leaps forward on a large scale tend to produce much worse outcomes.^[x]

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^[i] See “Perfect is the enemy of good.”

^[ii] See “Equal Rights or Equal Outcomes?”

^[iii] See “Unintended Consequences.”

^[iv] See “The Pretence of Knowledge.” “To act on the belief that we possess the knowledge and the power which enable us to shape the processes of society entirely to our liking, knowledge which in fact we do not possess, is likely to make us do much harm. In the physical sciences there may be little objection to trying to do the impossible; one might even feel that one ought not to discourage the over-confident because their experiments may after all produce some new insights. But in the social field the erroneous belief that the exercise of some power would have beneficial consequences is likely to lead to a new power to coerce other men being conferred on some authority.”

See also, “It’s a Wonderful Loaf.”

^[v] See “How Wolves Change Rivers.”

^[vi] See “Russian Revolution.”

^[vii] See “The Intellectual Yet Idiot.”

^[viii] See “The awful rise of ‘virtue signalling’.”

^[ix] See “Jordan Peterson- His Finest Moment.”

^[x] See “Mao Zedong- Great Leap Forward.”

Nationalism is often criticized because nationalism promotes tribalism.^[i] That nationalism promotes tribalism is true. The implication of the criticism, that tribalism creates serious negative consequences, is also true. Given, however, that every approach to governance creates serious negative consequences, simply alleging that nationalism promotes tribalism, which creates negative consequences, is not a serious charge. Serious charges along this line would be: (1) Nations can thrive without tribalism, which creates serious negative consequences, yet nationalism promotes tribalism anyway, and (2) Nationalism, which promotes tribalism, generates more negative consequences than alternative approaches to governance. Let’s sort out why those serious charges are not credible.

According to Merriam-Webster, a tribe is:

1            a: a social group comprising numerous families, clans, or generations together                     with slaves, dependents, or adopted strangers

b: a political division of the Roman people originally representing one of the three original tribes of ancient Rome

c: PHYLE

2            : a group of persons having a common character, occupation, or interest… [Emphasis added.]

According to Merriam-Webster, tribalism is:

1            : tribal consciousness and loyalty

                especially: exaltation of the tribe above other groups

2            : strong in-group loyalty

Given what tribalism is, to criticize nationalism because it promotes tribalism implies that there could be viable alternative forms of governance that do not promote allegiance to the ideas, ways, and goals of a nation and loyalty to the perceived virtues of the nation. That is an untenable implication.

Humans are tribal animals. Evidence of that is everywhere. Being proud of (embarrassed by) or promoting or defending one’s family, club, community, city, class, group, movement, political party, school, sports team, society, state, or nation are just some of the ways humans exhibit their tribal nature. An ironic example of tribalism is the large and growing tribe in America that rails against tribalism. They seem to be especially proud of their affiliation with their tribe, consider themselves virtuous for being members of that tribe, praise fellow tribe members, self-approvingly deride, defame, and/or demonize those who oppose or are nonplussed by their tribe (nothing short of admiration will do), and feel so confident of the superiority of their tribe’s values and perceptions of reality that they favor imposing their tribe’s views on everyone else in society—all to the jubilation of their fellow tribe members. Moreover, people who work well within tribes tend to fare better than those who do not, and people who do not fit into tribes tend to live shorter, lonelier, and less flourishing lives^[ii].

Consequently, criticizing or railing against tribalism is baying at the moon. No amount of baying will cause humans to shed their tribalism. To be viable, any proposed form of governance must accept and accommodate that human feature/bug.

Nationalism is viable in large part because it works with human nature instead of against it, i.e., it uses human tribalism for the benefit of the tribe (which need not be detrimental to other tribes (nations) and is usually beneficial to other nations^[iii]). Note also that even people who condemn tribalism also use tribalism to support their isms. For example, socialists who condemn tribalism in others use the rallying cry, “workers of the world unite” to motivate and increase the size of their tribe. Witness all the flag waving, military marches, and larger than life posters of Nazi Germany, U.S.S.R, North Korea, Cuba, and Venezuela. Rallying a group of people to a cause can be essential to motivating people to get involved and work for the success of cause—and it is an overt fostering of tribalism. Fight songs and flag bearers are on the battlefields a reason, i.e., they increase the chances of success. Doing that which helps their group succeed is part of the nature of humans.

Sebastian Junger explained how the point made above (tribalism is not dispensable) applies to society extremely well:

“… every society has to, first and foremost, take care of two things. It has to physically defend itself from enemies if there are any; and it has to keep itself together. It has to remain cohesive. If it doesn’t remain cohesive, there’s nothing to defend. And if there’s no defense, no amount of cohesion in the world will save you from an enemy. So, you have to do both things. And if you don’t, nothing else is really worth doing.”

Baying against tribalism is also baying at that which enables tribes (e.g., a nation), and their denizens, to flourish. Humans seek community and meaning in their lives. Tribalism is a means by which people can find community and meaning. People who find a sufficient amount of both tend to flourish. As noted above, people who don’t find enough tend not to fare well.

On a national scale, the more citizens work together as a tribe, all other things being equal,^[iv] the more flourishing there will be in their nation over the long run. A nation can and should^[v] tolerate a manageable (that is to say, “low”) levels of disagreements among tribe members and, though corrosive and destructive if taken to an extreme, even some number of dissidents fighting to fundamentally transform the tribe’s belief systems is not only survivable, it may be necessary to properly re-examine and improve (or reassert) the tribe’s values and ways. If, however, the manageable quantum of dissidence is exceeded, the social fabric becomes tattered, human flourishing diminishes, and, ultimately, can instigate a civil war. (Winning a civil war is usually almost as disastrous for the winner as it is for the loser.)

So, what is wrong with the critic’s charge, “Nations can thrive without tribalism, which creates serious negative consequences, but nationalism promotes tribalism anyway?” Its premise is incorrect, i.e., nations can neither thrive nor long endure without a sufficient amount of tribalism. In fact, tribalism is a big part of what enables a nation (or any other group) to thrive.

So, what is wrong with the charge, “Nationalism, which promotes tribalism, generates more negative consequences than alternative approaches to governance?” The problem is that there is no counter-factual with which to test the validity of the charge. Because there is no nation that has thrived without tribalism, there is no way to assess the kind and magnitude of negative consequences such a nation would generate. Because, based on the facts available to be studied, tribalism is essential to flourishing, it is fair to assume there will never be a test of the theory that a non-tribalistic would generate fewer negative consequences. However, we should all be open to the possibility that the charge is valid if such a unicorn ever appears.

There are, of course, untested theories to support the idea that a one world government (the ultimate imperialism) would be better. We’ll sort out some things about those theories in future posts.

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^[i] See “Bill Clinton slams tribalism, nationalism.”

^[ii] See “The Lethality of Loneliness.”

^[iii] For example, in 2018, customers in the U.S. bought $2.4 trillion of goods and services from foreign companies and individuals, i.e., U.S. imports were $2.4 trillion. Being able to sell to U.S. customers benefited those foreign sellers tremendously. U.S. consumers benefited by being able to obtain their wants and needs at a lower cost than would have been the case if the products had been produced in the U.S. See “US Imports by Year for Top Five Countries.”

^[iv] Natural and human-inflicted disasters can prevent flourishing despite the benefits of tribalism.

^[v] In order for a nation to improve over time, the ideas and institutions of a nation must be constantly examined to identify and examine the nature of societal/institutional problems, possible solutions to those problems must be proposed, and extensive civil debate must occur to determine what, if any, suspected problem or potential solution would be propitious. This is, at least in part, due to the fact that humans have a prodigious capacity to dream up what they believe to be improvements on the status quo, and will lose faith in a tribe that has little prospect for improvement over time.