Social equality is an ideal which, in reality, never
happens. However, gross inequality -- such as we obviously have
today -- ultimately leads to one of two consequences: (a) the elite
survive while the remainder tend to be extinguished or to wither
away; (b) a breakdown in the strategies of the elite and a subsequent
take-over by another group.
Social equality is an ideal because random genetic inheritance at
birth (and cultural conditioning by parents) gives each of us a
unique potentiality of individual abilities and, furthermore, a
powerful shared proclivity to rank order, as in thousands of other
mammalian species. This maintains the quality control of each
species. How this usually expresses itself is by means of the female
of the species generally choosing the best genetically equipped male
in her social circle as her sexual partner and avoiding breeding with
the inept males. Anybody who would seek to deny both the fact and the
expression of social ranking in the case of the human species would
have to try and contradict both the historical record and also the
modern genetic findings in evolutionary biology.
Considering (a) above, attempts at extinction, or genocides, are
frequent enough in past and present history and, nasty though they
are to our modern sensitivities, there doesn't appear to be any
let-up. However, the withering away of groups or supposed inferiors
is a more modern phenomenon, due to population surpluses. Up until
recent decades, low ranking parts of populations didn't wither away
because they were necessary food growers for the overall economy of
the country. Without virtually 100% employment of the masses then the
elites themselves could not have survived.
This is now changing. Mechanization on the farm or in fishing fleets
means that only small numbers of workers are needed to grow or hunt
for food. Increasing automation in the factory and increasing
competition between major manufacturers is driving down profit
margins to zero and thus making mass production of new versions of
traditional products increasingly risky. At the same time,
increasingly versatile robotic methods of production are bringing
about more customization and shorter production runs of more
specialized, fashionable products for a smaller elite market able to
afford prices too high for the masses. There isn't as yet a sharp
dividing line between the two customer markets but the income and
inherited wealth gap is growing.
The result of this is that the proportion of workers required for
value-added production is now much less than 100% of the available
adults. It also means that median wages for most jobs in advanced
jobs has been declining for about three decades now. Because the cost
of raising children is now very much greater than it used to be then
it's understandable why families in all the advanced countries are
now smaller than replacement size. The masses in all advanced
countries are now withering away. The numbers of the elite may also
be declining but, of course, they can always recruit enough of the
more talented from the general population in order to make up
required numbers to keep the economic system going.
Considering (b) above, the elite of the last 30 years has been mainly
composed of the financial sector, and its attendant top politicians
and civil servants, which at present are at the top of the larger
business heap (of transnationals right down to freelance businesses).
The financial elite, together with a few choice governmental
personnel, exercise their wealth and power by means of complex games
they play with artificial money (technically called fiat currency)
which have been perfected for about a century and which very few
others understand in detail even when publicly available.
However, there are more than a few signs that the fiat currency
system is about to collapse. In governmental and banking hands, two
of the major world currencies, the dollar and the euro, are now
seesawing about quite erratically, both depreciating against the
value of commodities. Both America and the Eurozone simply don't know
what to do about their currencies in a fundamental way, never mind
how their huge debts are ever going to be repaid. Instead, all they
can think of is to print more fiat currency and hope that some sort
of future economic growth will reverse the trends of the last 30
years, make the masses prosperous again and thus be able to recoup
debts from increased taxation. As for China, the third major leg of
the modern economic world, its fiat currency is still tied to the
dollar. So whatever fate awaits the dollar also awaits the renminbi.
When the fiat currencies collapse then, if the (b) scenario wins over
the (a), the governmental-banking elite will have to give way to
another. It is unlikely to spring up from the masses of the advanced
countries because they are so lamentably educated. They would need
three or four generations of cultural development -- such as the
present elite has had -- in order to cope with the complex economic
and social systems of modern times. But another sub-elite group,
whose services have already becoming absolutely essential to the
power of the present elite, is waiting in the wings. I write, of
course, of the scientific class.
So far, the scientific class have been kept very much on tap by the
present governmental and banking elite. Their personnel hardly
feature at all. They are, however, breaking through very rapidly at
transnational business level and even of many smaller businesses.
Indeed, increasing numbers of our most powerful corporations are not
only saturated with scientists but have often been founded by
individual scientists who've developed their research interests into
commercial feasibility.
My money is on (b). If so, this gives some hope that the masses in
the advanced countries won't wither away completely. Once science
has more sway in the design of policy then we can have more hope that
a far superior education will become available for the masses. Even
if equality is never achieved, then new-born children will at least
be given vastly more opportunities in their early care, socialization
and education. When young adults, they will be much more capable of
insisting on sharing the much more interesting and well-paid jobs
that the present elite presently exclude them from with all sorts of
protective practices. Status differences could be far more modest and
much more accessible than they are now.
Keith
Keith Hudson, Saltford, England http://allisstatus.wordpress.com/2011/10/
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