The most daunting facet of capitalism is its ability to adapt. Essentially, the system we have created is self-sustaining because, having established a means of isolating and accumulating power, the motivation (conscious or unconscious) is also established to consolidate and defend any advantage. In other words, the world’s elites are now wealthy and will use their power (influence/authority/etc.) to shore up the system to maintain that advantage.
This does not preclude a certain amount of progress in the treatment of the under-privileged and the environment, but the fundamental flaws will remain: the division of wealth, the impossibility of full employment, and the inherent unsustainability of economic growth.
Nothing new in that observation. But I recently realised that progress is being made in bringing fundamental change to what Orwell called our “smelly little orthodoxies”. It might not be enough, in itself, to topple the dominance of neo-cons and post-modernists (or any of the rag bag of what amounts to stasis), but seeds of radical thought are being left in unexpected places.
The established order is maintained because those with power can afford to populate the committees, councils and parliaments that set the detailed rules for how we run society. The interests of the wealthy are reflected in the skew of our criminal justice system towards harsh punishment for “poor people’s crimes” like drug dealing and robbery and little or no penalty for large-scale financial mis-management or fraud. The difference doesn’t end at the sentence imposed: if you are considered dangerous or likely to escape, then you go to a prison where, sure, you are less likely to escape, but you are also more likely to be a victim of violence, including rape.
As times change and questions are asked of the ethics of our system, those acting on behalf of the powerful ensure that new legislation, policies and procedures to not make a material change to the balance of power. So, for every political movement there is an approximately equal and opposite counter-movement. They might not be labelled as such—very few of these jabs and blocks, feints and counter-feints are ever categorized—but they happen nonetheless.
What I realised recently is that the counter-culture is also becoming more effective at evolving. The system has evolved to consolidate power but its harshest critics are learning how to infiltrate it effectively. Western democracy, in the first order, gravitates to the centre-right, which impedes any progress, but that doesn’t stop radicals from getting in.
I’m not talking about the so-called Marxists who have made a fool of themselves in cosying up to ultra-conservatives and big business. Neither am I too concerned with former radicals that have mellowed with age and found a comfortable place in the post-modern centre-left (such as Danny Cohn-Bendit and Joan Ruddock), although I’m glad to have them inside their respective parliaments.
In fact, many of those making a difference were never fire-brand protestors or politicians. What has evolved is the way progressive ideas get implemented: crudely speaking, it is not protest that pushes change by reluctant conservatives, it is infiltration of motivated people and ideas that make the changes directly.
There are several examples of the old way of making progress, including the Reform Act of 1832, reluctantly supported by the Duke of Wellington, and the US Civil Rights Act of 1964, reluctantly supported by Lyndon Johnson (I’m short of evidence on the latter, I admit). But protest has to be overwhelming to make a difference on its own; it has to be perceived as the manifestation of a majority viewpoint to influence government, and even then, the legislative process will water any new requirements down.
Protest is not dead, but capitol cities see protests almost every week, which makes media coverage and the attention of parliamentarians unlikely. Hundreds of thousands protested the Iraq War in London, New York and several other cities, and it made no difference whatsoever.
But here is a prime example of counter-subversion: having had “sustainability” co-opted and de-fanged to become “sustainable development”, which includes economic growth as one of its pillars, radical ideas have begun to permeate the implementation of sustainable development.
So, the British Standard guide to implementing sustainable development, BS 8900, insists that maturity against “principles of sustainable development” is measured and continual progress made. Those principles are to include: stewardship, transparency, integrity and inclusivity.
This is more powerful than it seems at first glance. Any organisation that claims to comply with a UK sustainable development standard must not only behave more sustainably (by environmental, social and economic measures) year-on-year, but it must demonstrate better performance against principles that will embed sustainable thinking and change its way of operating for the better.
No comments:
Post a Comment