THE IMBALANCE OF THE POLITICAL FORCES
Has it ever occured to you that you live as if in a dream? You live mechanically, like a robot and perform actions on an autopilot. As if you’ve been programmed to perform acts, which are not typical of you and are not interesting to you. As if you were playing a game, where your role of a marionette (a pawn) is predetermined, because your life is fully in the hands of other players. Deep inside you feel that you are a pawn only because rules of the game have been imposed on you. In reality, if you wake up, you can change the rules yourself and have them the way you want them to be.
What makes people sleep in waking, live mechanically? First is the inner unwillingness to live to other people’s, imposed rules;
Second is the imposed idea of the impossibility to change anything;
Third is the fear of changes.
Why is the fear so great that it robs people of the will and wish to act? Because the threat is real. An ordinary person is not protected and very vulnerable in the world. He has no safe hinterland. It takes getting ill, losing a job, support from your kin, savings (if there are any), meaning it takes to find oneself without means of living to have your existence threatened. The fear to be without means of living is tantamount to the fear of death, it makes the man easily ruled (prone to manipulations) and obedient.
Mass media plays a serious negative role in instillation and manipulation. On the one hand, mass media instills the fear of reality, one the other hand, it convinces of the uselessness of attempts to change anything. On top of that, mass media clutters up our mind with a huge amount of excessive information, unnecessary garbage, which literally cans it and suppresses the ability to take your bearings correctly, to argue right and think independently. The cinema lulls us with various stories, fairy tales of glamorous life, turning us into television addicts, and deprives us of a will and wish to act.
As a result, people form an upended value system, negative thinking stereotypes, the philosophy of deficit and social restrictions, lay hope on others (‘a kind uncle’, who will solve all problems and fix everything), a passive citizenship.
Why am I writing this?
Any crisis happens because the balance of forces gets broken. Huge slants in the financial sphere and economy as a whole are initially caused by an imbalance in the political system.
The bipartite political system in America, is, of course, more democratic, than the system with a dominating party of power, which has been created in Russia. There is political competition in America. Although everyone is unhappy with the policy pursued by the ruling party, there is a real mechanism of replacing the ruling establishment (the mechanism of electoral accountability). There is no mechanism of electoral accountability in modern Russia, accordingly, the Russian political system is even less balanced than in America. But if we take an unbiased look at American parties, we’ll see that they are both ‘ruling parties’. The democratic party as well as the conservative party pursues the policy aimed at preserving business’ interests in the producing and financial sectors of the economy. Interests of the population are represented very poorly.
Passive citizenship, a low level self-comprehension are systematically formed with U.S. society (voters). As a result, the bulk of people does not want to see further than their noses. They are told that people’s wellbeing will automatically improve with the development of business.
But business interests, from a tactical point of view, are in getting a maximum profit, in increasing competitiveness of goods. To attain these goals, business is interested in cost cutting, meaning in job cuts and lower wages. This is why the producing sector of the economy moves their factories to Asian countries and develops technologies which replace people. The modern crediting banking system in the long-term causes a wide-scale growth of debt burden for the society.
All the obligations inevitably lead to a lower prosperity of households, and, accordingly, to lower purchasing ability of the population, meaning to lower demand. All this results in huge economic slants. Money-denominated supply exceeds money-denominated demand manifold. This discrepancy in the end resulted in the global economic crisis, which hit production, the financial sector and the population, meaning the society as a whole. Carried away with its tactical goals of profit increase, the business forgets about strategic goals linked with interests of the whole society, namely, increased wellbeing and a harmonious development of the civil society.
Does it mean that the population is interested in slower technological progress and economic modernization? Of course, not! New mechanisms, which would provide for the growth of households’ wellbeing (ref. Financial Democracy at Work ) must be worked out and introduced simultaneously with the technological progress. If people’s prosperity does not grow at about the same rate as the technological progress develops, if immediate business goals take priority over the goals of the whole society, all participants of the process, the whole state loses.
But who will take care of introducing necessary mechanisms, if not the society itself? The civil society is potentially a huge driving power. The only thing this driving power lacks is the support point, or organization. It resembles the fairy tale hero Ilya Muromets, who sleeps on the stove. He wakes up and starts acting only when enemies deprive him of the stove, when a crisis happens. But it’s better to prevent any crisis than fight its fallout.
The only correct conclusion is suggesting itself - the state as a political system must be interested in active participation of civil society representatives in politics. To achieve this, we have to increase the level of self-comprehension and stimulate active citizenship among people. The political balance must be in the presence on the political stage of at least two heavy political powers. Interests of the people, from a strategic point of view, cannot contradict business’ interests, because business is developed to satisfy households’ needs.
Russia now has a unique chance to make a correct conclusion from the crisis. If leaders of the state have a strategic view, they should not try to put the population to sleep. On the contrary, it is necessary to help increase the level of people’s political activities in every way. It is necessary to help the appearance and a speedy development of a new power on the political stage, which would represent people’s interests. This could be a new PUBLIC OPINION party which would unite existing and budding civic movements as well as all active citizenship.
The United Russia, the party of power, which unites the elite of the Russian business and management, must have a strong counterbalance, which represents interests of the people (citizens). It is only in this case that Russia will become a truly democratic state.
The PUBLIC OPINION party cannot essentially be an opponent to business. The two political organizations are aimed at the development of the state, economic progress, prosperity of the society. The two powers must on the one hand, adjust, and on the other hand, complement well each other to work out balanced decisions together.
Only if interests of business and population are served equally, the state can develop dynamically and nip in the bud various economic slants which lead to long systemic crises and civilization decline.
What makes people sleep in waking, live mechanically? First is the inner unwillingness to live to other people’s, imposed rules;
Second is the imposed idea of the impossibility to change anything;
Third is the fear of changes.
Why is the fear so great that it robs people of the will and wish to act? Because the threat is real. An ordinary person is not protected and very vulnerable in the world. He has no safe hinterland. It takes getting ill, losing a job, support from your kin, savings (if there are any), meaning it takes to find oneself without means of living to have your existence threatened. The fear to be without means of living is tantamount to the fear of death, it makes the man easily ruled (prone to manipulations) and obedient.
Mass media plays a serious negative role in instillation and manipulation. On the one hand, mass media instills the fear of reality, one the other hand, it convinces of the uselessness of attempts to change anything. On top of that, mass media clutters up our mind with a huge amount of excessive information, unnecessary garbage, which literally cans it and suppresses the ability to take your bearings correctly, to argue right and think independently. The cinema lulls us with various stories, fairy tales of glamorous life, turning us into television addicts, and deprives us of a will and wish to act.
As a result, people form an upended value system, negative thinking stereotypes, the philosophy of deficit and social restrictions, lay hope on others (‘a kind uncle’, who will solve all problems and fix everything), a passive citizenship.
Why am I writing this?
Any crisis happens because the balance of forces gets broken. Huge slants in the financial sphere and economy as a whole are initially caused by an imbalance in the political system.
The bipartite political system in America, is, of course, more democratic, than the system with a dominating party of power, which has been created in Russia. There is political competition in America. Although everyone is unhappy with the policy pursued by the ruling party, there is a real mechanism of replacing the ruling establishment (the mechanism of electoral accountability). There is no mechanism of electoral accountability in modern Russia, accordingly, the Russian political system is even less balanced than in America. But if we take an unbiased look at American parties, we’ll see that they are both ‘ruling parties’. The democratic party as well as the conservative party pursues the policy aimed at preserving business’ interests in the producing and financial sectors of the economy. Interests of the population are represented very poorly.
Passive citizenship, a low level self-comprehension are systematically formed with U.S. society (voters). As a result, the bulk of people does not want to see further than their noses. They are told that people’s wellbeing will automatically improve with the development of business.
But business interests, from a tactical point of view, are in getting a maximum profit, in increasing competitiveness of goods. To attain these goals, business is interested in cost cutting, meaning in job cuts and lower wages. This is why the producing sector of the economy moves their factories to Asian countries and develops technologies which replace people. The modern crediting banking system in the long-term causes a wide-scale growth of debt burden for the society.
All the obligations inevitably lead to a lower prosperity of households, and, accordingly, to lower purchasing ability of the population, meaning to lower demand. All this results in huge economic slants. Money-denominated supply exceeds money-denominated demand manifold. This discrepancy in the end resulted in the global economic crisis, which hit production, the financial sector and the population, meaning the society as a whole. Carried away with its tactical goals of profit increase, the business forgets about strategic goals linked with interests of the whole society, namely, increased wellbeing and a harmonious development of the civil society.
Does it mean that the population is interested in slower technological progress and economic modernization? Of course, not! New mechanisms, which would provide for the growth of households’ wellbeing (ref. Financial Democracy at Work ) must be worked out and introduced simultaneously with the technological progress. If people’s prosperity does not grow at about the same rate as the technological progress develops, if immediate business goals take priority over the goals of the whole society, all participants of the process, the whole state loses.
But who will take care of introducing necessary mechanisms, if not the society itself? The civil society is potentially a huge driving power. The only thing this driving power lacks is the support point, or organization. It resembles the fairy tale hero Ilya Muromets, who sleeps on the stove. He wakes up and starts acting only when enemies deprive him of the stove, when a crisis happens. But it’s better to prevent any crisis than fight its fallout.
The only correct conclusion is suggesting itself - the state as a political system must be interested in active participation of civil society representatives in politics. To achieve this, we have to increase the level of self-comprehension and stimulate active citizenship among people. The political balance must be in the presence on the political stage of at least two heavy political powers. Interests of the people, from a strategic point of view, cannot contradict business’ interests, because business is developed to satisfy households’ needs.
Russia now has a unique chance to make a correct conclusion from the crisis. If leaders of the state have a strategic view, they should not try to put the population to sleep. On the contrary, it is necessary to help increase the level of people’s political activities in every way. It is necessary to help the appearance and a speedy development of a new power on the political stage, which would represent people’s interests. This could be a new PUBLIC OPINION party which would unite existing and budding civic movements as well as all active citizenship.
The United Russia, the party of power, which unites the elite of the Russian business and management, must have a strong counterbalance, which represents interests of the people (citizens). It is only in this case that Russia will become a truly democratic state.
The PUBLIC OPINION party cannot essentially be an opponent to business. The two political organizations are aimed at the development of the state, economic progress, prosperity of the society. The two powers must on the one hand, adjust, and on the other hand, complement well each other to work out balanced decisions together.
Only if interests of business and population are served equally, the state can develop dynamically and nip in the bud various economic slants which lead to long systemic crises and civilization decline.