A political goal of people world-wide is safety: people do not want
to die in an irregular manner. Suicide soldiers engage in missions in
which they die, but they seldom undertake their actions for
themselves. Instead, they act to preserve the safety of people who
are salient to them, or at least, that is what they intend.
Other soldiers figure that the probability of their dying is not too
high, and that in any event, their action is also for those who are
salient to them. In or shortly after World War II, studies suggested
that the `salient' are mostly others on their ship or others in their
platoon.
An implication of the desire for safety is that visible air pollution,
traffic jams, and the like are worse for political legitimacy than I
had thought: they suggest that a government will "wrongly do".
This implication is based on the presumption that people think a
government -- a `baron in his castle' -- can decide who does what,
how. And that if a domestic government is too weak, a foreign
government will not be. (As for the certainty of these notions, to
me, the first presumption is highly suggestive and the second
suggestive.)
If a government is foreign, as in a colonial or occupational
administration, then that government loses any legitimacy it might
have when there is pollution or traffic jams or other examples of
`externals' that local people think of as bad. Anti-colonialism and
resistance make sociological sense.
It was evident from 1910 or so onwards that cars do not scale well in
cities although they do fine in rural areas. So traffic jams in
cities have increasingly reduced the legitimacy of government.
Moreover, anti-technological romantics will note that old times had
less pollution: therefore, in the present, either a government or the
technology is bad.
At the same time, anti-technological feudalists will note that in the
old days, technology changed slowly and there was less, so even
tyrannies could provide some safety.
Consequently, modern governments in industrial or post-industrial
states will lose legitimacy from side effects of advances in
technology and the like, at least with current accounting and
regulatory control methods. Anti-technological romantics and
feudalists will tend to gain power.
This ... at a time when it is clear that we cannot return to the
efficiencies of a century ago, not without a large number of people
dying. And when it is clear that we cannot depend on mining petroleum
and more hydrogen-poor hydrocarbons like coal for ever.
Depressing thoughts.
--
Robert J. Chassell
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http://www.rattlesnake.com http://www.teak.cc
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