Power and Wealth

Democracy and the struggle for power and wealth

In the distant past, the vast majority of people were peasant farmers living around towns and villages scattered across the countryside.

These towns and villages were attractive targets for bandits, who preferred to take what they want rather than produce it themselves. Communities might band together to establish a common defense, but they could not hold back larger invasions. Settled areas would eventually fall under the control of the most powerful bandit army.

Successful bandit leaders rose to become regional warlords, who maintained their power by fighting off rivals, marrying for alliances, and passing their territory down to their sons. Each settlement shared its harvest with its warlord, who in return protected the peasants from raids and invasions.

Priests also took a share of the harvest. By enforcing strict morality and keeping peace between the warlords, they helped to protect the peasants from cruelty and abuse. The relationship between warlords, priests, and peasants was held together by feelings of fear, loyalty, and mutual obligation.

Very little changed over the generations. People followed customs and traditions that had been passed down from a time long before anyone could remember. Many believed they were born to follow in their parent's footsteps. Choices were few and people rarely questioned their lot in life. They simply did what was expected of them.

Items like clothing, pottery, and weapons were made in village workshops by skilled craftsmen using tools and techniques that changed little over the centuries, and very little improvement seemed possible. Animal muscle was harnessed to plow fields and transport loads. Wind and running water were harnessed to grind grain.

Nobody could produce anything more efficiently than anyone else. Transport was slow and difficult, so production was mostly local. Competing on price in the marketplace only reduced everyone's income, resulting in lower quality goods and services, which benefited no one. So craftsmen formed unions to protect their trade by enforcing fixed prices.

Gunpowder

Saltpeter is a white powder that forms around decaying vegetation. It can be used to make wood burn more easily. Sulfur is a yellow substance found around volcanoes and hot springs. It sizzles and pops near fire. Some time before the year 1000, Chinese chemists discovered that crushing saltpeter, sulfur, and charcoal together creates an explosive mixture known as gunpowder.

Europeans learned about gunpowder through the Mongol invasions of the 1200s. Ceaseless military competition then led to the development of powerful cannons. By the 1500s, musketeers were replacing swordsmen and archers on the battlefield. Gunpowder was one of a series of major inventions that would overturn the traditional way of living and usher in the modern age.

English kings

After the fall of Rome, tribes from northern Europe invaded the island of Britain in continuous waves until the final invasion by the Normans in 1066. The Normans established a new kingdom, and the land was divided among the chiefs of the conquering army, whose descendants ruled as warlords with the wealth to raise their own armies.

Over the generations, kings claimed the right to rule because they had descended from kings and conquerors. But in truth, their power depended entirely on their ability to use armed force to crush opposition. Authority is only meaningful as long as it can be enforced. Sentiment for tradition is only effective as long as it continues to persuade.

Whenever kings needed the support of the warlords on matters such as wars and taxes, they would hold a meeting known as a 'parliament'. These meetings were mostly power struggles between the king and his warlords. Whenever kings were strong, they ignored the laws and increased taxes to pay for wars. Whenever they were weak, parliament restrained them and secured more power for themselves.

As cannons became essential weapons for smashing through castle walls, the warlords came to depend more on the king and the parliament to preserve their power. English parliament became divided into the House of Lords, which included the warlords and bishops, and the House of Commons, which included knights and representatives from the shires and towns.

Power struggles continued until the 1600s when King Charles I, who was suspected of having Catholic sympathies, ignored his Protestant parliament and declared that kings had a divine right to rule as they pleased.

Hostilities between the king and the parliament escalated until in 1642, England erupted into a long and bloody civil war.

Parliament raised a powerful army which eventually crushed the king's forces, and he was executed for treason. The parliamentary army then seized control, and England was ruled for a number of years by a puritanical dictatorship.

Later, in a final bloodless revolution, the throne was offered to a Dutch prince, William of Orange. In return, he accepted a Bill of Rights, which limited the power of kings, gave parliament power over laws and taxes, and gave commoners certain rights and freedoms that could never be taken away by anything less than civil war or foreign invasion.

Being an island made Britain harder to invade, making it a more secure place in which freedom could grow. Relative freedom of speech and freedom of enterprise allowed the culture to flourish and the economy to surge ahead of authoritarian monarchies in mainland Europe.

Colonization

When the crusaders returned from the Middle East, they brought back Chinese silks, Persian carpets, sugar, spices, and other exotic goods which were previously unknown in Europe. The growing demand for these luxuries led to the launch of more crusades, giving Italian merchants better access to the trade routes of Asia. Italian cities soon grew famously wealthy.

As Turkish armies battled to establish a new Islamic empire, Italian trade routes became harder to protect. After the Turks captured Constantinople, trade between Europe and Asia was taken over by Muslim merchants.

Improved shipbuilding and new navigation instruments like the magnetic compass allowed Portuguese ships to begin exploring the Atlantic. By the 1500s, they had discovered how to sail around the coast of Africa, to reach the trading cities of southern Asia, effectively cutting out the Muslim middleman.

The Europeans had very little of value to trade, but they possessed superior naval firepower, which they used to plunder the riches of the Asian coast.

Spanish ships sailed west across the Atlantic hoping to find an easier way to reach Asia. But instead of bringing back spices from India, they returned with vast amounts of gold and silver plundered from native American cities. Spain was soon the wealthiest kingdom in Europe.

Lured by huge potential profits, Dutch shipbuilders began building bigger and faster ships with heavier firepower. After establishing their own trade links with Asia and America, Dutch ships soon dominated world trade, and Dutch cities became the financial and cultural capitals of northern Europe.

As France and England joined the rush to colonize new lands, the oceans erupted into open warfare. With so much new wealth to plunder, the old Christian loyalties were soon forgotten. Europe began tearing itself apart as northern states battled to free themselves from Catholic control. War raged for centuries from one side of the Atlantic to the other as Europe's aristocracy led a slaughter for wealth and power.

Christian missionaries played a vital role in the conquest of America and other newly discovered lands. Natives who refused to convert were often killed, and for those who did convert, there was no certainty of mercy. Many were enslaved and worked to death in silver mines.

The American Revolution

The English established colonies along the east coast of North America, but by the mid-1700s, the military and economic interests of the Americans were no longer compatible with those of the English.

After the English increased taxes in America to pay for their European wars, riots and rebellion throughout the American colonies forced the king to tighten his grip on power until the oppression became intolerable.

Thomas Paine was a writer who arrived in America in 1774. Sensing that loyalty to England had been stretched to breaking point, he wrote a radical pamphlet called 'Common Sense' in which he claimed that hereditary kings were greedy warmongers and that the English only cared about their own national interests. It was time for Americans to assert themselves in the world, to trade with whoever they wished, and not to allow England to drag them into any more senseless European wars.

Paine called for Americans to declare their independence and establish a democratic government based on freedom and equality. His pamphlet sold over a hundred thousand copies. Paine joined the army and continued writing to bolster the national courage, even when the cause seemed lost...

These are the times that try men's souls. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered - yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. Whatever we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly. Heaven knows how to put a proper price on its goods, and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated.

During the war for independence, the American states began experimenting with democracy. There was an immediate concern among the wealthy that too much democracy would give the majority of people the power to vote away the wealth of the minority. Some states soon discovered that unrestrained democracy made it too easy for people to oppress themselves with an excess of unworkable laws.

Several years after winning independence from England, a national convention was held to draft a constitution for the United States of America. Delegates to the convention wanted to permanently limit the power of the new federal government, knowing that politicians would forever be scheming to bypass the constitution to tighten their grip on power. Delegates wanted to create a political system that could only ever descend into corruption and oppression if the American people themselves became so corrupt that they needed an oppressive government to rule them.

Using the English system of government as a model, with a house of local representatives, a senate of state representatives, and an elected president instead of a king - they created a balanced democratic system in which each new law would need to pass through three stages of government before being interpreted by the courts. The idea was that by making it hard to pass new laws, it would also be harder to pass bad laws.

The new constitution became the supreme law of the land in 1789. However, it favored wealthy landowners who had managed to secure most of the political power for themselves. Over the next few years there was an intense political struggle to reform the constitution.

Reformers had learned the need for political and religious freedom from the wars, persecutions, and other oppressions which had ruined Europe for centuries. They eventually succeeded in amending the constitution to guarantee rights like freedom of speech and freedom of religion.

The establishment of a strong nation requires more than just a good constitution and a colorful flag. It also requires the passing down of legends about the heroes who built the nation. Legends like the Boston tea party, Paul Revere's ride, George Washington's cherry tree, and Thomas Jefferson's Bible.

As the symbols, traditions, and myths build up over the centuries, they help to enflame the patriotic passions of the people; giving them a common sense of identity, uniting them behind a common purpose, and making them believe that their land is sacred and their constitution is worth more than just words on a piece of paper.

The French Revolution

By the 1700s, France had become the most powerful nation on the European mainland. French kings took advantage of their nation's economic strength by imposing steep taxes and borrowing heavily in order to spend lavishly on extravagances and military adventures.

One king, Louis XIV, built a luxurious new palace while his armies battled for control of Europe and North America. His successor, Louis XV, plunged the monarchy even deeper into debt while scandalizing the nation with an endless series of tawdry love affairs.

Around the same time, French philosophers were writing that all men were equal and had a right to be free. They championed rights like freedom of speech, and they condemned the hereditary aristocracy and the oppressive behavior of the Church. Revolutionary ideas were beginning to simmer in the minds of the French people.

By 1788, the next king, Louis XVI, was so burdened by debt that he needed to raise new taxes in order to avoid economic collapse. But the common people of France, the farmers, merchants, and laborers were already overtaxed and could afford no more. On the other hand, the aristocrats and church officials paid no tax. They maintained their power by controlling the law courts, and the king failed in every attempt to tax them.

The king summoned a meeting of the French parliament (then known as the Estates General) to discuss the problem. It was the first such meeting in more than 170 years. The meeting consisted of representatives from the Church (the first estate), the aristocracy (the second estate), and the common people (the third estate).

The three groups argued about what to do. The third estate was excluded from much of the debate, and so instead of discussing taxes, they began to discuss how they might gain more power. After their demands were rejected, they declared themselves to be the National Assembly, the true representatives of the French people, and the population of Paris rose up in open rebellion.

As the revolution gained momentum, the aristocracy was abolished and the king was forced to sign a new democratic constitution based on liberty and equality.

Many of the ancient customs were thrown out by the revolution. Old systems of measurement were replaced with a new metric system based on multiples of ten. A new French calendar was declared with ten days in a week, and the numbering of the years was changed so that 1792 became the year 1.

The new revolutionary government raised funds by confiscating church property. All priests became employees of the state. Several attempts were made over the following years to replace Christianity with a new state religion based on the principles of natural religion as taught by the enlightenment philosophers.

Fearing the spread of the revolution, the kings of Europe joined forces to invade France and restore the monarchy. Meanwhile, driven by their newfound passion for freedom, the French army marched into Europe to liberate the oppressed masses from the tyranny of kings and aristocrats. Every available man and horse was drafted into the war effort and France soon had the largest army in Europe.

Amid growing hostility at home and abroad, the king was executed for treason. Faced with increasing civil unrest, the assembly was overtaken by revolutionary extremists who imposed harsh laws and instigated the Reign of Terror. They executed aristocrats, opposition groups, atheists, the royal family, and anyone else they did not like. Thousands were publicly beheaded until eventually the extremists themselves were beheaded by the mob.

A second democratic constitution was drafted in the hope of consolidating the achievements of the revolution while avoiding its excesses. But the old revolutionaries, who made up the bulk of the new government, overturned the results of elections, fearing what might happen to them if they lost power.

The government descended into the depths of corruption as each politician and army general schemed to entrench their own power and increase their own wealth. Meanwhile, the war of liberation in Europe had degenerated into a rampage of looting. As the French economy disintegrated, the government came to depend more and more on income from foreign plunder.

In 1799, after conquering Italy and invading Egypt, an ambitious army general named Napoleon Bonaparte returned to Paris to a hero's welcome. He quickly seized control of the government and embarked on a campaign to conquer all of Europe, eventually crowning himself emperor.

For the next ten years, Napoleon reigned supreme over the European mainland. But his attempt to conquer Russia was a disaster. After a series of defeats, France was forced into unconditional surrender and Napoleon was sent into exile.

The royalty and aristocracy soon came creeping back into power throughout Europe, but the expectations of the people had forever changed, and many nations now adopted constitutions limiting the power of aristocrats and guaranteeing rights for the people.

Conservatism

Years before, back in the early peaceful days of the French revolution, a British statesman named Edmund Burke published a book in which he fiercely defended traditional institutions like the monarchy, aristocracy, and church.

He claimed that the unequal distribution of power and wealth was natural, and that decisions were best made by an elite class who had proven themselves more capable. He argued that the wider population did not have the education or deep historical perspective to govern without guidance.

He argued that society is the accumulated experience of generations. And that some abstract notion like 'reason' is a poor foundation upon which to rebuild society from scratch. He insisted instead on caution and institutional stability.

He said that "religion is the basis of civil society" and that it is the primary bond that holds a nation together. He argued that people are religious animals by nature, and that we have no moral foundation without a spiritual framework.

Burke's ideas became the cornerstone of the 'conservative' political movement.

Mary Wollstonecraft

In response to Edmund Burke, an English writer named Mary Wollstonecraft published 'A Vindication of the Rights of Men' in which she rejected his faith in inherited privilege, instead championing radical change towards equality and freedom.

But then, some French revolutionaries began arguing that only boys should be allowed to attend school, while girls should only receive a domestic education at home.

In reaction to this, she wrote a second book called 'A Vindication of the Rights of Woman', in which she protested that any constitution based on 'reason' cannot exclude half the nation and still call itself reasonable.

She wrote that women are not naturally inferior to men, they only appear that way because they are denied education. She insisted that women should be properly educated so they could become useful citizens, professional workers, and equal partners to their husbands.

She said that a girl taught from infancy that beauty is her only power will shape her mind to fit her body, and spend her life decorating the bars of her cage instead of looking for the cage door.

Wollstonecraft even compared traditional marriage to a form of legal slavery or prostitution, where women were forced to rely on charm rather than intellect to survive.

She wrote "I do not wish women to have power over men; but over themselves".

After moving to Paris to witness the revolution firsthand, she narrowly escaped arrest during the Reign of Terror by pretending to be the wife of an American adventurer, who became the father of her first child.

She later married an anarchist philosopher named William Godwin, who wrote that all forms of government are inherently corrupt, and that society should operate on pure reason and voluntary cooperation without laws.

She died after giving birth to a baby girl who grew up to become Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein.

Following her death, her grieving husband published a memoir about her life, detailing her love affair in Paris, her illegitimate daughter, and her lack of religious faith.

This information was seized upon by her conservative enemies, and she was cruelly vilified by the press, effectively silencing her legacy for the next hundred years.

Thomas Paine

Thomas Paine had been a popular hero of the American Revolution. He later returned to England where he also published a book in response to Burke called 'The Rights of Man', in which he preached the need for democratic reform in England and throughout Europe.

Despite being widely banned, his book sold hundreds of thousands of copies. He wrote...

If universal peace, civilization, and commerce are ever to be the happy lot of man, it cannot be accomplished but by a revolution in the system of governments.

Paine became the most influential political writer of his time. He was invited to join the National Convention of the French Revolution where he participated in drafting the new French constitution.

When the Reign of Terror began, expecting to be executed, he wrote a notorious book called 'The Age of Reason' in which he attacked traditional religion. He finished it only hours before being arrested and handed the manuscript to a friend on the way to prison. In it, he wrote...

I believe in one God, I believe in the equality of man, and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow creatures happy. But I do not believe in the creed professed by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.

I have thought it exceedingly probable that a revolution in the system of government would be followed by a revolution in the system of religion. The connection between church and state has so effectively prohibited every discussion on the principles of religion, that until the system of government is changed, religious principles cannot be discussed openly before the world. But whenever change is done, then a revolution in the system of religion will follow.

Every national church or religion has established itself by pretending some special mission from God, which was communicated to certain individuals. And they each have certain books, which are supposed to reveal the word of God. And they each accuse the other of not believing the truth, and for my own part, I disbelieve them all. All national churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me to be nothing more than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.

Paine survived the Reign of Terror and eventually returned to America to find himself despised as a heretic by the Christian majority. After turning to alcohol, he died with few friends, his grave was dug up, his bones were lost, and his name was removed from popular American history.

Utilitarianism

Jeremy Bentham was an English philosopher who was both inspired and horrified by the French Revolution.

He hoped that overthrowing the French monarchy would lead to a much less corrupt and more efficient form of government. However, he fiercely rejected the moral justifications that the revolutionaries were using to excite the masses.

Revolutionary philosophers at the time were writing that all men were equal and had a right to be free. The American Declaration of Independence stated that all men have a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

These claims sounded good, and they gave inspiration to those who were struggling to free themselves from tyranny, but without being able to explain why we have these rights, other than arguing that they were 'god-given' or 'self-evident', then they could be dismissed as merely propaganda.

Having them as slogans embedded in the culture, or as political declarations written into foundational documents might give them power, but not everlasting legitimacy.

As the French Revolution degenerated into the Reign of Terror, Bentham believed those baseless claims about inherent rights were the cause of all the chaos and murder, because they were easily twisted into justifying every atrocity.

Fearing the chaos might spread to Britain, the government cracked down on freedom of speech. This convinced Bentham that the British ruling class had no interest in reforming their own oppressive industrial-capitalist aristocracy, driving him to become a fierce advocate for representative democracy.

Bentham established the philosophy of 'utilitarianism' which claims that the only measurably objective 'good' is whatever brings the greatest happiness to the greatest number of people. This makes democracy the only good form of government because it serves the wishes of the most people.

Slavery in America

Only wealthy landowners were allowed to vote in early American elections, but within a few decades, public protests and the threat of rebellion by workers and small farmers gradually forced the government to extend voting rights to include almost every white male.

For a long time, white men jealously refused to share the privilege of voting. No other group could elect representatives to pass laws to protect themselves from exploitation. Women were often treated like child-bearing domestic servants, indigenous people were killed or displaced, and enslaved black people were often treated like farm animals.

Frederick Douglass was raised as a slave in the southern states of America. He eventually escaped from slavery and became a leading campaigner against slavery, giving lectures to white audiences, publishing anti-slavery newspapers, and writing books about his experiences as a slave.

While condemning the southern churches for being the most vocal supporters of slavery, Douglass wrote...

Between the Christianity of America, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference - so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked.

I love the pure, peaceful, and impartial Christianity of Christ. I therefore hate the corrupt, slave-holding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity.

We have men-stealers for ministers, women-whippers for missionaries, and cradle-plunderers for church members. The man who robs me of my earnings, at the end of each week meets me to show me the path to salvation. He who sells my sister for the purposes of prostitution stands forth as the pious advocate of purity. The slave dealer gives his blood-stained gold to support the pulpit, and the pulpit, in return, covers his infernal business with the garb of Christianity.

Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, compare your facts with the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.

Public opinion slowly turned against slavery as books and newspapers continued to inspire political and social reform. When the northern states finally threatened to abolish slavery, the southern states broke away from the north and drew up their own constitution.

Some southern rebels dreamed of conquering Central America and establishing a new white empire powered by black slavery. In the long and bloody civil war that followed, Confederate forces fought to preserve a way of life that depended on slave labor.

By the time the southern states were brought back into the federation, around 750,000 lives had been lost in order to establish once and for all that slavery would never again be tolerated in civilized society.

The American constitution was amended to uphold equal rights for all Americans. However, these rights would not be fully enforced for another hundred years.

Industrial revolution

In the early 1700s, improved metalworking techniques led to the invention of the first steam-powered machines. Steam was soon powering factories, and with steam power for cutting, hammering, and rolling sheet metal, the design of steam engines and other machines rapidly improved.

Under the protection of the world's most powerful navy, British ships came to dominate world trade. After building family fortunes through trade with the American colonies, wealthy merchants started buying up British farmland from the aristocratic families who had managed the land for centuries.

New crops, new fertilizers, and the invention of mechanical devices for planting and harvesting made the land much more productive. Traditional English farming villages were soon being replaced by large commercial farming operations.

New machines had been invented for spinning and weaving cotton and wool, and many of the peasant farmers found employment in newly built factories in towns and cities. Originally powered by horses or running water, English factories were soon being powered by steam engines.

As cities choked with the smoke from steam-powered factories, steam trains revolutionized land transport, and steamships traveled the rivers and oceans, opening up worldwide markets for factory-produced goods.

Manufacturing became the driving force behind the British economy. Britain became the largest exporter of manufactured goods, and London became the financial capital of the world. But all this wealth was concentrated in the hands of a fortunate few at the expense of the vast many.

A large percentage of the population were factory workers who were paid just enough to make working for a living preferable to dying of starvation. Women and children were often recruited to tend the machines because they could be paid even less.

Most people were forced to work up to sixteen hours a day, six days a week, under oppressive and often dangerous conditions. Attempts by some factory workers to unite in their demands for shorter hours, higher pay, and better working conditions were crushed by armed forces.

For peasants who were unable to find work in the mines or factories, poverty and hunger became so widespread that new laws were introduced to keep the starving multitudes from begging on the streets. Homeless and destitute families were thrown into workhouses where they were deprived of rights and forced to work like slaves.

The wealthy often had little sympathy for the misery of the poor. While some Christians claimed that the poor were suffering as punishment for their sins, charities like the Salvation Army had an entirely different understanding of Christianity. Its workers braved the squalid conditions in the overcrowded city slums, comforting the sick, helping troubled children, and promoting cleanliness and sobriety.

The appearance of steam-powered printing presses and cheap daily newspapers led to a growing awareness of the scale of the injustice. Embarrassing reports of young girls being forced to work half naked in coal mines, and concern over a complete breakdown of family relationships among the working poor forced the government to introduce new laws to lessen the cruelty and suffering.

Widespread rioting and fear of revolution forced the government to gradually reform the laws, until by the 1870s, most working men were given the right to vote, child labor was outlawed, and compulsory education was introduced.

Labor unions were legalized and workers gained the right to strike for shorter hours and better pay. Higher pay for workers led to a greater demand for consumer goods, and this led to higher business profits, more jobs, and a stronger economy.

By the end of the 1800s, electric power was overtaking steam power, and the industrialized world experienced a sustained period of strong economic growth. Along with improvements in city sewerage and health care, the standard of living for most British workers became increasingly tolerable.

The invisible hand

In 1776, a Scottish professor named Adam Smith published a book called 'The Wealth of Nations' that became the rulebook for capitalism.

People previously thought the wealth of nations was measured by how much gold they had, but Smith pointed out it was actually the quantity of sellable goods their farms and other businesses produced.

Spain grew rich from its silver mines in South America, but as the flow of silver slowed, they became poor, because they were importing goods rather than producing anything themselves.

Smith detailed how market forces efficiently allocate scarce resources through supply and demand. When demand for something rises, its price increases, making it more profitable. This attracts new businesses to enter that industry to capture a share of that wealth.

Then as production grows to meet the demand, the scarcity fades, and prices fall back into balance. Through this fluid process, the market directs money and labor exactly where society needs them most.

He said that in a free-market economy, with every individual and business working for their own selfish desires, even without concern for others, they are all still contributing to the greater good, by helping to grow a wealthy, efficient, and well-supplied society.

Smith famously said that with everyone playing their part in the market economy, market forces would ensure continued economic growth, even without planning, as if guided by some kind of 'invisible hand'.

His theories inspired some economists to begin preaching unquestioning faith in the invisible hand. They claimed that selfishness was the key to progress, competition is nature's way, and that only greed and fear can be relied upon to motivate and restrain us.

These economists were opposed to any regulation of the free market, saying that governments should be strictly limited to protecting property rights, enforcing contracts, and maintaining peace.

Welfare, minimum wages, and price controls were seen as harmful distortions to the natural economic order. After all, there is no mercy in the cut-throat world of business. Competition is fierce in the international marketplace.

Staying in business requires stretching the rules as far as possible to minimize expenses and maximize profits. While buyers look for the best bargains, sellers try for the highest price while putting the least amount of cost into their products and services.

There may be widespread desire for ethical business practices, but you cannot blindly trust anyone in the business world. Maintaining a respectable reputation may help to attract customers, but in the end, business is business.

Many people have claimed that Adam Smith was like the prophet of the cult of the invisible hand. But he actually wrote that however selfish a man is supposed to be, something in his nature makes him care about the fortune of others. Everyone has a conscience.

World spirit

In 1806, as the German philosopher Georg Hegel watched Napoleon ride through the streets of his city, he was struck by the impression that he was witnessing the inevitable march towards progress of a collective global consciousness that he called the 'world spirit'.

Hegel wrote that each person contributes to the spirit of their culture and their times, but each person's life is merely a moment in the life of the world spirit. Our entire history can be described as this world spirit progressively emerging into self-awareness through the growth of knowledge and the struggle for freedom.

The events of world history are not just senseless acts of greed and violence, rather they are an interconnected series of actions and reactions through which conflicting ideas become resolved.

History is progressing according to a determinable logic that leads to the ultimate end of absolute global self-awareness, in other words, a world in which everything makes sense.

Hegel said that we are coming from a past full of mistaken ideas, and it is the purpose of science and philosophy to correct these mistaken ideas that prevent us from reaching a greater understanding. Sometimes we can do this best by examining history to show how the old misconceptions came into being.

Hegel said...

World history is the progress of the consciousness of freedom. The Eastern nations think that only one man is free. The Greek and Roman worlds thought that only some men were free. But now we know that all men are free.

Nothing great in this world was accomplished without passion. When we consider both the ideas and the passions they ignited, one is the thread, and the other is the fabric of world history.

Individuals pursue their own interests and satisfy their own ambitions. But something more comes of it, something hidden inside what they do, which was not their intention, and lay outside their awareness. In gratifying themselves, they bring into existence what the world spirit intended all along. And this is the cunning of it. It sets the passions to work in its service, so that they pay the price for whatever they achieve.

Hegel tried to trace the path of the world spirit as it moved through history towards the realization of its freedom, but he was barely able to guess its general direction, much less its final resting place.

He saw the awakening of the world spirit as being the emergence into the material plane of existence of the mind of God. He also saw this consciousness being ultimately embodied in the institutions of the state.

Hegel's ideas had a massive influence on modern philosophy. He inspired the German thinker Karl Marx, who also believed that history was unfolding in a predictable way. But Marx rejected the spiritual aspects of Hegel's philosophy, instead believing the universe to be thoughtless and materialistic.

Communism

The idea of communism had been popular among struggling peasants for centuries before the rise of industry. The thought of overthrowing the local warlord and sharing the land and its resources among the families who actually worked the land was an appealing dream. Only the threat of armed force and the fear of anarchy made such dreams impossible.

As the industrialization of Europe gained intensity, and as the powerless peasants were being crammed into factories and forced to work like slaves to an early death, many were dreaming again of revolution.

While working as a campaigner for the working poor, Karl Marx developed a convincing theory about politics, economics, and history. He wrote that the history of power and wealth was progressing through inevitable stages. Aristocratic power had been replaced by industrial power, and now the peasants were struggling against a new form of slavery.

Marx predicted that the long history of social, political, and economic oppression would finally come to an end when the working class rose up and overthrew the ruling class.

Under a communist political system, everyone would be employed by the state. The wealth of the state would be distributed equally among the people. All men and women would have equal rights. And the workers would be united and motivated by their belief in material progress.

As long as each person contributed to the best of their ability, and only asked for as much as they needed, then the continued development of science and technology would gradually lead to an ideal world.

Marx wrote that the ruling class used religion to reinforce its domination and suppress mass revolution by distracting the workers and molding them into servile conformists. He wrote "philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it".

Marx's Communist Manifesto preached using armed force to take power through violent revolution.

Committed to overthrowing the capitalist system, a growing number of communist revolutionaries preached to the oppressed poor and recruited peasant armies by promising a better life.

Whenever unpopular governments were weakened by wars or other events, Marxist revolutionaries would be there to rally the peasants into overthrowing the ruling class to establish communist states.

John Stuart Mill

The utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham helped to tutor his friend's son, John Stuart Mill, who was intensively trained from an early age in ancient literature, philosophy, science, and economics.

Mill later rose to fame in the mid-1800s with a series of books that gained immense popularity and transformed British society.

British conservatives had long defended historic conventions like the class system, the authority of the Church, and the subjugation of women, by arguing that the existence of God, moral laws, and the social hierarchy are hardwired into the human soul, making them 'natural' and intuitively right.

But Mill claimed instead that we were born knowing nothing, and all knowledge comes strictly from observation, experience, and science. Nothing can be intuitively known.

He said that if society made people unequal, then changing society could make people more equal. But while Karl Marx preached overthrowing the system, Mill convinced the British establishment that the obvious abuses of the class system and unregulated capitalism could be much better balanced by simply passing laws to protect workers, and by legalizing unions.

He said that silencing anyone's opinion robs everyone. If they are right, you lose the chance to discover the truth. If they are wrong, you lose the chance to fully understand why the truth is right, because it survived the challenge.

On democracy, Mill spoke about the tyranny of the majority. The majority being large does not make them right. Those who are outnumbered need protecting from the majority, through having the right for their voices to be heard. He also argued that educated and cultured people, like himself, should get more votes than everyone else.

Mill entered parliament where he fought for equality for women, including the right to vote and hold public office. He said a society could never truly progress while sidelining the minds of half of its population.

He said "there remain no legal slaves, except the mistress of every house".

Women in England continued to demand the right to vote in the face of fierce resistance from conservative politicians. Public demonstrations were broken up by police. Protest organizers were arrested, and many women continued their protests in jail by going on hunger strike.

New Zealand in 1893 and Australia in 1902 were the first democracies to grant women the right to vote. Women finally won the right to vote in England and the United States in the aftermath of the horrors of the First World War. French women were forced to wait until after the Second World War.

Modern technology

In the 1800s, curious minds began experimenting with magnetism and electricity. One discovery led to another and soon power stations were generating electricity for streetlights, telephones connected homes and businesses, and electric motors were powering more sophisticated tools and manufacturing processes.

Internal combustion engines were soon powering cars and aircraft. Cities once drowning in chimney smoke and horse manure were transformed by electric ovens and household plumbing. People were dazzled by the onrush of new inventions, and there was a growing spirit of enthusiasm for progress and optimism for the coming of a better world.

Military technology was also steadily improving. Soon machine guns, battle tanks, combat aircraft, and submarines were fueling the ambitions of kings, dictators, and generals.

First World War

For centuries, Europe was divided between nations of comparable military strength, each scheming to gain an advantage over the others. Whenever one nation grew too powerful, the others would form alliances to balance the threat.

As imperial competition grew and Christianity declined, without common loyalty to unite them, nations with the greatest military strength tried to dominate and exploit the weaker states.

Germany emerged as the dominant European power after defeating France in 1870. For the next 44 years, Europe remained largely at peace while each nation took advantage of rapidly improving technology to build up its industry, transport, communications, and military force.

In order for Europeans to take advantage of their growing potential, they needed to think beyond their national borders and begin organizing their institutions at a more European level. Progressive political thinkers anticipated forming some kind of voluntary union. But democracy had progressed too slowly in Europe, and the egos of hereditary rulers made any steps towards such a union impossible.

Instead, desperately fearing each other's growing power, the European nations armed themselves and made preparations for war. Their rivalry was intensified by the scramble to colonize any unclaimed land in Africa and Asia. The personal ambitions of a handful of aristocrats had become a contest between empires for domination of the world.

A political assassination gave Austria an excuse to invade Serbia, Germany agreed to defend Austria, Russia mobilized to defend Serbia, France allied itself with Russia, and a host of other nations eagerly joined in the fray. Oblivious old army generals then ordered millions of unknowing young patriots to be slaughtered by the deadliest array of weaponry that the world had ever seen.

The First World War was a painful lesson. World leaders had been too blinded by ambition to even think about how civilization might safely progress through an age of devastating new technologies. The world was beginning to learn the price of acting without thinking carefully in a potentially dangerous and unsympathetic universe.

After the war, the president of the United States, Woodrow Wilson, proposed forming a new international organization called the League of Nations, dedicated to promoting world peace. The people of Europe enthusiastically embraced the idea, but Wilson's own senate voted against it, and world leaders were not prepared to make compromises in order to secure peace, so the new organization was weak and ineffective.

The Russian Revolution

Due to the incompetence of the last Tsar of Russia, and the inefficiency and corruption of his government, more than a million poorly equipped Russian troops were needlessly wasted in the first year of the war. Mutinies broke out in the army and workers rebelled in the cities. By 1917, the people had lost any confidence in the old ruling class, and the tsar was forced to step down.

A provisional government was formed, which implemented reforms like freedom of speech and equal rights. A democratic election was organized, but armed communist revolutionaries seized government before the election could be held. The election went ahead anyway, and after losing the vote, the communists refused to surrender power.

The country erupted into civil war. The royal family was executed. Battles between the communist red and anti-communist white armies raged for years, killing millions of people.

After winning the war, the communists restructured the economy, triggering a series of man-made famines which killed many millions more people. Through total control of the flow of information, their failures were kept hidden.

The communists launched a program of forced industrialization, building massive industrial complexes from scratch, focusing on coal, steel, oil, and machinery. They seized private farms to create giant state-run farming enterprises, funding industrial growth by exporting grain, and directing millions of peasants to work on factory floors.

The communists knew that the success of forced equality depended on unquestioning faith in their ideology and absolute loyalty to the state. They purged society of anyone who could be accused of being against them. Millions were executed, and millions more died working as slaves in forced labor camps building roads, railways, and canals.

Military dictatorships

At the conclusion of the First World War, Europe's borders were redrawn and democratic governments were established across the continent. But in the economic chaos that followed the war, there was widespread hunger and unemployment.

People were dissatisfied with war, poverty, and the other failures and injustices of capitalism. Many were attracted instead to the communist experiment in Russia and its carefully orchestrated illusion of social justice. They were impressed by Russia's rapid modernization, and became convinced of the virtues of state-owned enterprise under a centrally planned economy.

As support for communism grew, wealthy businessmen across Europe feared losing everything in a Russian style revolution. Christianity was already seriously weakened by science, and churches felt desperately threatened by the rising tide of communism. They knew that a successful communist revolution could bring an end to Christianity in Europe.

Over the next twenty years, communist politicians were either elected or nearly elected throughout Europe. But each time the communists looked like gaining power, democratic political systems were overthrown by conservative coalitions of industrialists, church leaders, and soldiers. Right wing military dictatorships rose to power all over Europe, sometimes after long and bloody civil wars.

The Great Depression

While Europe was economically ruined by the First World War, America had grown prosperous by lending money and selling weapons and other war supplies to its allies. Now the wealthiest nation in the world, the United States enjoyed rapid industrial growth through the 1920s, spurred on by the construction of city skyscrapers, and by the mass production of cars, trucks, radios, and other consumer goods.

Share prices soared as investors rushed to buy stocks in American companies. But as the number of factories grew and production levels increased, there was not enough demand from consumers to return a profit for investors. Factories were producing more than the market could absorb. The problem was that average incomes had not kept pace with production capacity, and most people were buying on credit.

In 1929, stock prices collapsed. The fear and uncertainty that followed led to a sharp decrease in spending. As businesses saw their profits falling, workers were dismissed or given pay cuts. With fewer workers and lower incomes, consumer spending continued to drop. The economy spiraled into a deep depression. Businesses closed and small farmers went bankrupt and lost their land. Growing numbers of unemployed became homeless beggars.

There had been no government regulation of the financial markets, and after the stock market crash, many investment schemes were found to be bogus, having been set up by corporate thieves to fleece unwary investors. Unfortunately, many banks had invested in these schemes, and this led to a collapse in the banking system.

The American government tried to protect its failing domestic industries from foreign competition by imposing heavy import duties on foreign goods. In retaliation, other countries raised their tariffs on imports of American goods. This led to a rapid decline in world trade and the depression continued to deepen around the globe.

In order to create new jobs and stimulate demand, the American government began spending heavily on projects of national importance like roads, power stations, and communications. A welfare system was established to provide relief for the impoverished.

Although these policies helped reverse the damage and reinvigorate the economy, they were criticized by Wall Street bankers and conservative politicians as being the beginnings of American socialism.

The Nazi party

After losing the First World War, the German aristocracy was replaced by an unstable democracy. Germany had been forced to pay dearly for its surrender. Severe limits were placed on the size of its army. As a way of getting around these limits, army commanders supported a number of nationalist political parties, each with its own private army that could be called upon as reserves. One of these parties was the Nazi party.

With mesmerizing speeches about building a powerful new Germany, and driven by a vision of his own destiny, Adolf Hitler rose quickly through the ranks of the Nazi party to become its leader.

The German economy had collapsed after the war. Runaway inflation made the currency almost worthless. Before the economy could recover it was hit hard again by the Great Depression, causing the failure of many banks and industries, leaving a third of the workforce unemployed, and fueling widespread disillusionment and anger.

German voters grew desperate. The communist party was gaining popularity and there was fear that it may soon take power. But with the backing of powerful anti-communist businessmen, the Nazi party exploited widespread fear of communism to rise to power instead as a strong alternative.

With the help of other parties, Hitler gained dictatorial power. After destroying his political opponents, he led Germany towards economic recovery by building up its industrial strength through a massive investment in military hardware and advanced weapons technology. Through total control of newspapers and radio, he convinced the population he could restore Germany's pride.

Hitler's racism

At the time, Europe and its colonies had the most advanced technology, and European empires ruled much of the world. Many white people saw themselves as the winners of the evolutionary contest for 'survival of the fittest', and new theories about white supremacy gained popularity.

Hitler wrote a book in which his racist ideas reflected the views of many Europeans and Americans. According to Hitler, white Europeans were the creative force behind all civilized culture and technology. The best that other races could do was to copy white ideas. Hitler believed that early civilizations rose when Europeans conquered and enslaved other races, but then when they interbred with those races, civilizations lost their creative vigor and fell into decay.

Hitler calculated that it was not enough to have superior technology to win the evolutionary competition, he wanted to use this technology to defeat and eliminate the other races. He planned to conquer the world and complete the process of evolution by selectively breeding his own population and exterminating whoever he considered to be of an inferior race.

For thousands of years, the Jewish people had been inspired by their scriptures to preserve their cultural identity. After being banished from their homeland by the Romans, they spread out and settled around the world, becoming a nation without borders whose interests were best served through peace and trade. But because of their refusal to accept Christianity or Islam, they remained easy targets for cultural and religious intolerance. Over the centuries, they suffered from periodic oppressions, expulsions, and massacres.

In order to justify seizing their property, Hitler claimed that the Jews were conspiring to take over the world through control of the international banking system. He portrayed them as leeches who fed upon other cultures, and he was committed to either expelling them from Europe or exterminating them. Millions of Jews tried to escape, but very few countries would accept them.

Second World War

In Hitler's mind, the First World War was unfinished business. He began the Second World War by using superior weapons and strategies to rapidly conquer much of Europe. For several years he reigned supreme over the European mainland. Millions were enslaved by the Nazis and millions more were murdered.

Hitler planned to conquer Russia to plunder its vast natural resources and clear a new living space for the German people. But his invasion was a disaster. The Nazis were eventually crushed, Hitler committed suicide, and a defeated Germany was divided between the communist east and the capitalist west.

One consequence of the atrocities committed under Hitler was to help dispel myths about racism and discourage future wars of conquest. The war was so well documented that it will forever remain a lesson embedded in world culture. Any world leader who demonstrates unhealthy ambitions will be compared to Adolf Hitler.

Japan had astonished the world by transforming from an agricultural economy into an industrial and military superpower within the space of a few decades. Convinced of their own superiority, the Japanese military dictatorship embarked upon an aggressive campaign of territorial expansion to build a new Asian empire.

After the Japanese invaded China, and after they signed a pact with the Nazis, America ceased all trade with Japan. The Japanese dragged America into the war by launching a devastating surprise attack on the American naval fleet. The Americans ended the war by dropping two atomic bombs on Japan.

During the war, dozens of cities were bombed into rubble, and as many as 85 million people were killed.

United Nations

At the end of the war, representatives from 50 nations held a conference to discuss the formation of a new international organization called the United Nations with the aim of promoting world peace and human rights.

The United Nations officially came into existence in 1945 after its charter had been agreed to and signed by the member states. In the preamble of the charter, it is written...

We the peoples of the United Nations, determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and to reaffirm faith in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom, and for these ends to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbors, and to ensure that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, have resolved to combine our efforts to accomplish these aims.

Human rights

After the formation of the United Nations and the establishment of international law, many people came to see human rights as being so sacred that faith in them should not be questioned. But there is another more realistic understanding - that humans have no natural or god-given rights.

Whatever political rights we now enjoy, previous generations had to fight and sometimes die for. And those rights could be taken away at any time by imperialist superpowers, religious extremists, or any other group that would try to deceive or enslave us if they could.

We will forever be forced to keep fighting to defend whatever rights we have. If there is anything sacred about human rights, it comes from the hopes of those who have suffered, and from the blood of those who have died fighting for the cause of freedom in the historic struggle against self-serving opportunists and ideological extremists.

The Cold War

After the Second World War, some European nations returned to reclaim their colonies in Africa and Asia. The French, after having been liberated from German occupation, returned to reoccupy Vietnam. But now the Europeans faced fierce resistance from Asian independence fighters armed with weapons left behind by the Japanese.

Although Europe had been liberated from the Germans, eastern Europe was now occupied by Russian forces who were busy establishing communist dictatorships loyal to Russia. Popular uprisings against communist dictatorships in Hungary and Czechoslovakia were crushed by Russian tanks. Half of Europe's population became imprisoned behind an iron curtain of secrecy and fear.

Some of the scientists working on the atomic bomb projects in England and the United States were communist sympathizers who handed nuclear secrets over to the Russians. Now armed with nuclear weapons and committed to the aggressive expansion of communism, the Russians posed a menacing threat to democracy and freedom.

America, Russia, and other nations started developing and stockpiling huge arsenals of nuclear bombs and missiles. All around the world, any remaining optimism for a better future was soon replaced by the fear of nuclear extinction.

Revolutionaries backed by Russia fought to establish communist states throughout Asia. Meanwhile the Western democracies, fearing the rapid spread of communism, supported rebels fighting to establish capitalist military dictatorships loyal to the West. Many Asian states erupted into civil war.

A war that began with the Vietnamese fighting for freedom against the French slowly escalated into an international battleground as Western forces fought to resist the further expansion of communism. More bombs were dropped during this war than were dropped on Europe throughout the whole of the Second World War.

The communist threat to world democracy now seemed so serious that no price was too high to stop it from spreading, short of global nuclear war.

The election of communists usually meant the end of elections, so Western intelligence agencies conspired to overthrow emerging democracies whenever they feared the election of communists. They assassinated elected officials, supported military coups, and supplied arms to ruthless dictators employing death squads.

The collapse of the Russian Communist Empire

Marxist ideology offered little incentive to improve economic efficiency or develop new technology. Companies in capitalist countries competed to exploit every possible technological advantage. State-owned factories in communist countries could only try to copy capitalist innovations.

After capitalist countries developed advanced electronics and affordable desktop computers, the stagnant communist economies in Russia and Eastern Europe fell behind, becoming dependent on oil exports for hard currency to buy imported machinery and grain.

The collapse of the Russian Communist Empire began in Poland in 1989, when the Solidarity trade union movement was allowed to compete in elections. Solidarity won all but one of the seats it was permitted to run in. The Polish communist party peacefully surrendered power. People in neighboring countries began peacefully protesting.

For decades, the Berlin Wall stood as a symbol of Europe's division between the capitalist West and the communist East. An administrative error led to the sudden opening of its gates, and tens of thousands flocked to the checkpoints. Outnumbered and without orders, the border guards stood down. People from opposite sides embraced and together they hacked away at the concrete with hammers and chisels, uniting a divided nation in a historic celebration of freedom.

Soon, over 400 million people were free from totalitarian communist rule. But now with inefficient factories producing little of any value on the world market, the people, whose hopes had been crushed for so long, were left poverty-stricken and ideologically exhausted.

Some Eastern European countries were eventually absorbed into a prosperous European Union. Russia formed its own federation to try to prevent further splintering of its sphere of influence. Elections were held and many people tried to adapt. But the majority of Russians, impoverished by the economic upheaval, voted for a promise of reviving their collapsed empire. They got another murderous dictatorship instead.

Democracy

Without having been carved into the bedrock of existence by some ultimate authority, ideas about right and wrong can only be described as whatever is in our best interests at the time. But what is best for one person is not always best for others.

Claiming that we can make the best of our situation by seeking "the greatest happiness for the most people" might sound good to most people, but why should it be accepted by someone who would gladly seek their own happiness at the expense of everyone else?

The conflicting interests of competing groups lead to differences of opinion about right and wrong, and these differences escalate into political power struggles. The winners of these struggles get to impose their own ideas about right and wrong upon everyone else.

Whenever one group gains a position of power, they will usually use it to further their own interests at the expense of everyone else. Other groups can try to resist, but unless they can effectively threaten those in power, resistance can be futile.

Before democracy, political disagreements were resolved through naked power, often unrestrained by reason or morality. Changes of government required popular uprisings, military coups, or foreign invasions. Short periods of violence were often followed by long periods of oppression.

The spread of democracy helped to civilize this power struggle by providing a peaceful way to remove leaders people no longer wanted. Political violence was replaced by the delicate art of persuasion.

Democratic politics is driven by self-interest. Each election is a selfish grab for power. Political parties do whatever they can within the law and sometimes outside of the law to gain extra votes. People vote for the party that will tax them less, spend more on their personal interests, and bias the laws in their favor.

In two-party democracies, each party is a coalition of different interest groups. To win elections, groups with unrelated and sometimes conflicting interests often need to join forces. The coalitions look weak, they bundle incompatible policies into their belief package, and smaller interest groups often jump between parties depending on which way the wind blows.

Both parties are usually funded by wealthy donors, who are often the only ones who really get what they want. Voters who complain about not getting what they voted for are often made to believe it was the other party's fault.

Democracy did not replace the power struggle, it merely formalized the process. Institutions are not concrete buildings, they are people who can be replaced, intimidated, or persuaded. The words in a constitution or in a law are only as strong as the willingness to enforce them.

Democracies must expect shameless power centers to manipulate any weakness they can find in the institutions, using blatant lies and inciting violence to try to overturn election results and overthrow the democracy.

Every nation goes through periods when the political tensions rise too high and the government needs to be thrown out of office. Even in nations without effective democracy, changes of governments are inevitable. Without democracy, it is only a question of how it will happen, when it will happen, and how wisely the violence and destruction can be minimized.

© Cosmic Nexus