The problem of no politics
A rant about theories at odds with reality
If I were to be susceptible to a beautiful theory, and let us grant that Marxism is a beautiful theory, it would be the theory of anarchism, in one form or another (without indulging in the internecine warfare of the competing factions under that overarching term). This is a result of the Enlightenment, where all is reduced to what can be reasoned, and science can test and describe in quantitative terms. In such a world, theory is the highest proclamation about reality; modeling is the quantitative expression of theory. Today when reality is measured against theory (or model) and found wanting, it is reality that must be remade to conform! The reality of woman is no more - it is only what theory says a woman is (and biology is archaic - the real theory is decided beyond the limitations of formal science). Nietzsche feared that all belief would be lost, but he was wrong - belief is still alive, it has just been captured by insanity not nihilism.
I have expounded on the problem of politics, which implies per logic (our other unforgiving copybook header god) that the absence of politics should mean an absence of the problem of politics. Yet it doesn’t, we never can escape politics as long as we live in even a moderately complex civil society. Credit to the Marxists, they at least understood enough about humanity to realize what was necessary to organize a government, even if it was one doomed to fail for what it didn’t understand about humanity. The anarchists (and American libertarians, the weak-kneed step-children) abhor organization and so never even reach the stage of testing their theory as the Marxists did.
You’ll note that reality had the final say on Marxist governance (and spare me the talk of China or North Korea - they are about as Marxist as you or I or Genghis Khan). Reality brutally found theory wanting; and the modern progressive left (often mischaracterized as Marxist) learned from that. These are the twisted fruit of the Frankfurt School, and in another Nietzschean twist - they are cut from priestly cloth, these great purveyors of theory! You know this because their answer to the challenges of reality is the same answer priests have always given - oh ye of little faith.
So, Curmudgeon you plead - what is the answer? I say abandon all theory ye who enter here. Politics is a reality and if you think it can be contained by a theory, by a constitution, you are delusional. The American constitution couldn’t prevent the Civil War, it has not retarded the advance of Progressivism, and in our contemporary world it is deader than the trees that produced the paper it was printed on. Of course you will want me to point to some other, some enemy, that we might band together and crush them; that we could restore our glorious republic.
Alas, a republic is derived from, the public. While Franklin’s apocryphal quote “a republic, if you can keep it” [and this is generally ripped from the full context] is so well known, I’m more given to his lesser known quote that I’ve mentioned before:
…when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other.
If our republic is deformed today it is because it mirrors our public and the decadence that public has toward the proper, and limited, role of government. This corruption isn’t some recent thing; it is, as Franklin presumed, inherent within us. I would argue that it runs right back to the creation of the constitution, where an error is introduced by Madison in Federalist No. 45 - when he argued that the federal government was few in powers (expressly granted by the proposed constitution) and those held by the states (with a few specific exceptions) were “numerous and indefinite”. We of course know now that the federal government has arrogated powers both formally (via amendment) and informally (and one might even argue extra-legally) vastly beyond Madison’s imagination. Part of the reason for that is that the states were presumed to have sovereign power, that is, the authority to do damn near anything. If you grant that to the state in a confederation, it is only a matter of time for it to migrate to the federal level. We can argue about when the inflection point was (for all that it matters), this flaw was built in from the beginning. It is a similar flaw that now infects Europe via the EU “governance”. Just as water only flows down, power always flows up.
Sovereign power originates in monarchical government - it’s good to be the King. It is the power to compel via force the subject population (always for the good of that population of course). Even Rome, our great source of inspiration for republican governance, was first a kingdom. We tend to think of monarchy as only being particularly bad when it is absolute - no distribution of power amongst the nobles (which is what limited monarchy was before it devolved to the common folk1). What we fail to grasp is the problem isn’t the person, the problem is the power. What is the justification for any use of sovereign power, whether in the form of a king or an elected government?
Politics is all about the use of power. The joke about academic politics as the most vicious is because so little is at stake, that is, there is no real power in play2. No one is put to death because of academic politics even if reputations and relationships are shattered. Likewise politics in all other human organizations that are less than a matter of life and death3. Which leaves us with government, and that wonderful monopoly on force. Now politics are really consequential, and with sufficient resources, of nearly unlimited scope.
So we have an eternal, recurring struggle for power - oh, how Nietzsche would love that. This is fueled by the strangest dichotomy of human nature of all - the desire of most people to follow rather than lead, paired with the innate desire to tell other people how to live. You got a theory that explains that? I didn’t think so. When all of us have that odd struggle going on inside us, how it bubbles out from time to time is going to be rather unpredictable. It’s not very likely to be consistent either - the person who argues bodily autonomy in the abortion debate will abandon that principle in any of a dozen other debates (guns, drugs, etc.). The one who argues for the sanctity of life in abortion is reasonably likely to be unconcerned with that sanctity when it comes to the death penalty or war. Free speech and free association are all well and good - as long as you don’t use them in some unapproved manner4. We are all for privacy unless you have something to hide.
We humans are a mess; is it any wonder that our government should be one as well? This might not be as large a problem in our lives if political fanatics (those in office and those supporting them) just had some anchor of humility. If they could conceive that they have no right, no legitimate authority to impose upon us all as they see fit5. I don’t give a damn about consent of the governed, because the governing don’t really care about my consent. The legitimate functions of government - the things that ONLY government can effectively do - are few. Government is no exception to the limitation of all organizations - the broader the scope the worse the performance. Our politics would be nearly trivial if that was all we - we, the people - asked of our government. But I know for sure that I’m stepping on someone’s toes as I say this - that I am goring your ox, and not just the ox of your opponents. Whatever your ox is politically speaking, remember that Eric Garner died because of it.
You want to know why our politics suck - take a look in the mirror.
The Enlightenment drives the concept further - that The People are Sovereign. Which is a rather dreadful extrapolation, as The People is an abstract way of saying, as they did in Rome - the mob. It is for this reason that fascism is not the abomination you think it is, we are stronger when bound together, and strength is the only thing that matters politically. Get out the vote is just the polite version of get out the rampaging mob.
The growth of politics and bureaucracy at Burning Man may actually put academic politics to shame.
Church politics are mostly a matter of post-death consequences. If the ancient Greeks were wrong about human duality there are no eternal stakes in the game of life.
The disapproval will only vary by tribe/sect and subject.
Again, this isn’t partisan. You find this as much with conservatives as you do progressives, not to mention those in the squishy middle.
This reminds me of a couple of Joseph Conrad novels (Chance and Nostromo) that describe a primary female character as being “without theory” or something like that, always juxtaposed against other characters that are engaged in well-meaning but ill-fated grandiose ideological endeavors that blind them to the reality within their own home. The female character who is described as without “theory” by contrast is devoid of grand ambition except to lift and heal and love others within her immediate circle (whether large or small). This seems to represent Conrad’s moral worldview - skepticism of the power of (masculine, for Conrad) rationalist schemes and lauding a more simple (and more feminine, at least for Conrad) interpersonal hospitality.
I would be careful about abandoning theory. Theory basically just means a plan with principles for people to rally around. If you don’t have a theory you will be ruled by someone else’s theory. That’s why conservatives (at least the sort whose only plan is “not that!” or “slow down!”) will always lose.