My idea is that the salient fact of the last two centuries has been the replacement of the old landed ruling class of kings and lords by a new ruling class of the educated. In a sense Marx's Communist Manifesto was the Declaration of Intent of the new ruling class that was termed, in those days, Educated Youth.
We may say, perhaps, that the new ruling class proposed to rule by the words of its propaganda and its administrative bureaucracy, replacing the old ruling class that ruled because of its military power that enabled it to protect the tillers of the soil.
Now the only warrant for government power is the sense of existential peril. In the old days the existential peril was the armed warriors next door who might sweep down at any moment and seize the grain and sell the wives and children of the tillers of the soil into slavery. As bad and oppressive as the rulers were, there was no substitute for their protection. Either put up with their nonsense or deal with the Vikings -- or the Huns or the Mongols -- on your own.
The new ruling class came up with a new existential peril: the bourgeoisie and the capitalists. Where the old ruling class had promised to protect the peasants from the depradations of the old warrior pirates and plunderers, the new ruling class would protect the workers from a new eruption of piracy and plunder, the capitalist "robber barons."
You have to say: it was brilliant! Because a ruling class must conjure up some sort of existential peril: otherwise there is no justification for its political power.
Of course, if the educated ruling class had not conjured up this existential peril they would not have become the ruling class.
Now I say that the rise to power of an educated ruling class amounted to a Great Reaction and a profound misreading by the educated class of the meaning of the industrial revolution and the rise of the bourgeoisie.
I say that the educated ruling class's enthusiasm for socialism is nothing more that neo-slavery, and that its marquee political achievements of the Soviet Union and Maoist China are the most egregious slave states in history. Hey! How does that feel hanging round your necks, lefties?
And I say that the educated ruling class's welfare state is neo-feudalism, the reduction of the workers to the status of feudal peasants, their lives and occupations supervised by a bureaucratic army of educated experts. And the false promise of the new feudal lords is the same as the old ones: the promise to protect the peasants is always, in the end, reneged upon. This is not rocket science. The truth is that the world changes, and mankind must change with it. Whether we are talking about drought and famine or the interminable wars of the warrior class or the fluctuations of the modern economy and the successive technological revolutions of the last 200 years, the fact is that the feudal lords could not, and the neo-feudal lords cannot, deliver on their promise of security and safety.
But that is all beside the point. The Big Thing of the modern era is that while the peasant was worth a lot less than his grain -- which was why the Vikings killed the peasants and stole the grain back in the day -- in the new world the skills and the "intangible capital" in every human brain is worth more than the product the worker produces.
This means that good old armed plunder, or its modern equivalent, political plunder, does not pay.
For, how do you plunder the "intangible capital?" The simple answer is, you can't. The ruling class doesn't have a clue, and its constant plunder of the productive sector just means less for all. As any ruling class will agree, its instinct is to prevent economic change because such change always disturbs the status quo and hurts the ruling class and its little darlings. Look at all the technological revolutions of the past 200 years, from machine textiles for the masses to steam transportation for the masses to personal transportation for the masses to electrical power for the masses and now smartphones for the masses as in 4 billion smartphones worldwide. Every one of these innovations was a complete surprise and the educated ruling class had nothing to do with it. The only thing the educated ruling class could think to do was to tax it and spend the revenue on buying votes.
For years the workers seemed to like the rule of the educated class: the union wages, the pensions, the health care, the education that the educed ruling class shoveled out at them.
But now the bloom is off the rose. The workers just want a decent job, a decent home, a family; the educated ruling class wants something different: a world in which it can execute on all manner of creative projects from politics to art to sex. And the new warrant for political power is the existential danger of climate change.
If you are an ordinary middle-class or working-class person you are bound to feel that the educated ruling class "doesn't care about people like me." And you would be right.
That is the meaning of Trump and Brexit and nationalism in Europe. The ruling class has gone off at tangents, feeding its need for creative projects rather than stolidly providing a solid and stable ground for ordinary people to wive and thrive.
What will happen next? Obviously, things are going to change. The current ruling class will object, and it does object. Because when you have been a ruling class for a while, it is inconceivable -- inconceivable -- that the natives would be restless. Why, what would they do without us, the wise and compassionate ruling class, to run things for them? What do the deplorables know about politics and programs?
Thus we have predictions of civil war, of an end to the current era, of a Reign of Terror, of the conquest of the West by the migrants. And we have the spitting rage of the ruling class in its hatred of the existential threat of Trump and Brexit to its privileges and sinecures. And we have the educated ruling class plunging into cultish fantasies of white nationalism, toxic masculinity, and racism, racism, racism.
We do not know what will be the end of it.
But I tell you this. Whatever the future, the educated ruling class is going to hate it. Maybe they will get to reproduce Xi's China where everyone better toe the party line, but I doubt it, because that level of political control will throttle everything else in society and conjure up a head of rebellion. Or maybe we Normals will get to tell them to put it where the Sun don't shine.
It ain't gonna be Paradise, and it is not all going to be over by bed-time and all well, as Falstaff hoped.
We may say, perhaps, that the new ruling class proposed to rule by the words of its propaganda and its administrative bureaucracy, replacing the old ruling class that ruled because of its military power that enabled it to protect the tillers of the soil.
Now the only warrant for government power is the sense of existential peril. In the old days the existential peril was the armed warriors next door who might sweep down at any moment and seize the grain and sell the wives and children of the tillers of the soil into slavery. As bad and oppressive as the rulers were, there was no substitute for their protection. Either put up with their nonsense or deal with the Vikings -- or the Huns or the Mongols -- on your own.
The new ruling class came up with a new existential peril: the bourgeoisie and the capitalists. Where the old ruling class had promised to protect the peasants from the depradations of the old warrior pirates and plunderers, the new ruling class would protect the workers from a new eruption of piracy and plunder, the capitalist "robber barons."
You have to say: it was brilliant! Because a ruling class must conjure up some sort of existential peril: otherwise there is no justification for its political power.
Of course, if the educated ruling class had not conjured up this existential peril they would not have become the ruling class.
Now I say that the rise to power of an educated ruling class amounted to a Great Reaction and a profound misreading by the educated class of the meaning of the industrial revolution and the rise of the bourgeoisie.
I say that the educated ruling class's enthusiasm for socialism is nothing more that neo-slavery, and that its marquee political achievements of the Soviet Union and Maoist China are the most egregious slave states in history. Hey! How does that feel hanging round your necks, lefties?
And I say that the educated ruling class's welfare state is neo-feudalism, the reduction of the workers to the status of feudal peasants, their lives and occupations supervised by a bureaucratic army of educated experts. And the false promise of the new feudal lords is the same as the old ones: the promise to protect the peasants is always, in the end, reneged upon. This is not rocket science. The truth is that the world changes, and mankind must change with it. Whether we are talking about drought and famine or the interminable wars of the warrior class or the fluctuations of the modern economy and the successive technological revolutions of the last 200 years, the fact is that the feudal lords could not, and the neo-feudal lords cannot, deliver on their promise of security and safety.
But that is all beside the point. The Big Thing of the modern era is that while the peasant was worth a lot less than his grain -- which was why the Vikings killed the peasants and stole the grain back in the day -- in the new world the skills and the "intangible capital" in every human brain is worth more than the product the worker produces.
This means that good old armed plunder, or its modern equivalent, political plunder, does not pay.
For, how do you plunder the "intangible capital?" The simple answer is, you can't. The ruling class doesn't have a clue, and its constant plunder of the productive sector just means less for all. As any ruling class will agree, its instinct is to prevent economic change because such change always disturbs the status quo and hurts the ruling class and its little darlings. Look at all the technological revolutions of the past 200 years, from machine textiles for the masses to steam transportation for the masses to personal transportation for the masses to electrical power for the masses and now smartphones for the masses as in 4 billion smartphones worldwide. Every one of these innovations was a complete surprise and the educated ruling class had nothing to do with it. The only thing the educated ruling class could think to do was to tax it and spend the revenue on buying votes.
For years the workers seemed to like the rule of the educated class: the union wages, the pensions, the health care, the education that the educed ruling class shoveled out at them.
But now the bloom is off the rose. The workers just want a decent job, a decent home, a family; the educated ruling class wants something different: a world in which it can execute on all manner of creative projects from politics to art to sex. And the new warrant for political power is the existential danger of climate change.
If you are an ordinary middle-class or working-class person you are bound to feel that the educated ruling class "doesn't care about people like me." And you would be right.
That is the meaning of Trump and Brexit and nationalism in Europe. The ruling class has gone off at tangents, feeding its need for creative projects rather than stolidly providing a solid and stable ground for ordinary people to wive and thrive.
What will happen next? Obviously, things are going to change. The current ruling class will object, and it does object. Because when you have been a ruling class for a while, it is inconceivable -- inconceivable -- that the natives would be restless. Why, what would they do without us, the wise and compassionate ruling class, to run things for them? What do the deplorables know about politics and programs?
Thus we have predictions of civil war, of an end to the current era, of a Reign of Terror, of the conquest of the West by the migrants. And we have the spitting rage of the ruling class in its hatred of the existential threat of Trump and Brexit to its privileges and sinecures. And we have the educated ruling class plunging into cultish fantasies of white nationalism, toxic masculinity, and racism, racism, racism.
We do not know what will be the end of it.
But I tell you this. Whatever the future, the educated ruling class is going to hate it. Maybe they will get to reproduce Xi's China where everyone better toe the party line, but I doubt it, because that level of political control will throttle everything else in society and conjure up a head of rebellion. Or maybe we Normals will get to tell them to put it where the Sun don't shine.
It ain't gonna be Paradise, and it is not all going to be over by bed-time and all well, as Falstaff hoped.
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