The Golden Rule by Dwimordene

[dwimordene_2011]

Title: The Golden Rule

Author: Dwimordene

Rating: G

Characters: Thrór, OC Dwarves

Warnings: Some may say this is AU. I say, would anyone expect Thorin to explain this up front? ;-D

Summary: Economic imperialism does Middle-earth, round 2: six drabbles on the Kingdom Under the Mountain and how to coopt people to your program. Because Himring set my brain

Comments

[dwimordene_2011]

Nothing makes gold sickness set in faster than when you've got used to having the stuff and there are reasons to fear that you will have less soon.

This is one of the most insidious, difficult things I see in society today. It's so easy to coopt people to a destructive program that looks mild but which assumes that society can only function at present levels and rates of profit, and of course that those who have always controlled the wealth will continue to control it and society. You just present a gigantic scare scenario, and tell folks who have no clue about how the society really works that if they don't support X, then they will suffer a fall in their standard of living.

once a particular approach to the problem becomes an established way of thinking in a whole society, it becomes all the harder to think one's way back out.

Witness today...

I suppose this would also provide strong motivation for Balin's attempt to take Moria. Because whatever Smaug did, he would not have refilled the mines...

Quite probably, although Moria wasn't a great choice - that was also clearly a case of the Dwarves exhausting the more readily available mines and having to dig deeper to exploit harder to reach veins of mithril ore. It so happened there was a Balrog waiting in one of them, but basically - same problem as Erebor has in this drabble.

Although of course, it was actually Moria that made me go in this direction - if it clearly was happening in Moria, why not also in Erebor? Maybe it was a less rich mountain than legend (and/or propaganda) would have us believe, and so was exhausted much sooner than Moria or the Iron Hills.

[hhimring]

I should also say--you've twisted the screw really well. One feels a certain amount of sympathy and perhaps even admiration for Darri and the guild masters, who think they are doing the patriotic thing. Then, with the counselors at the end, you feel you are peering into the depths--and is grateful that the king's grandson is described as being "hostile"!

[dwimordene_2011]

One feels a certain amount of sympathy and perhaps even admiration for Darri and the guild masters, who think they are doing the patriotic thing

Thanks! I think it's important to see that motivation - this isn't full-fledged capitalism. It's got strong nationalist/nativist tendencies, and everyone is primed to respond to that. Especially when you've got a war-hawk contingent, you may think you're saving the kingdom doubly - once from poverty, once from war.

I think the problem is that war's going to win in the end. You can't keep making money by trading higher. At some point, you will not have enough volume of goods to trade to keep the rate and amount of gold coming in at its current heights. This is strictly a temporary fix. Unless they start farming and scaling back on the role mining, metalsmithery and jewelsmithery have in their economy, the Dwarves are screwed unless they start taking resources from others or intimidating their neighbors sufficiently to keep a steady flow of goods coming in - and quite probably they'll have to do both.