Been giving myself small nightmares again today in the breaks between lessons. I read too much.
Okay anyway, the resource curse. My favourite thing. Africa. Oil, diamonds etc. For a state to have too much of something is bad because it totally fucks the social contract. Why..?
Very simply (and I'm sure you'll forgive me if I'm missing something, or over-simplifying) the populace needs the machinery of the state and its various institutions for (a) defence, and a close second, (b) a stable, and above all predictable, social enviroment within which to prosper and multiply. In turn the state relies, all other things being equal, on its populace for revenue in the form of taxes or whatever, and soldiers.
However, money buys a lot of stuff. And if African Despot X has oil ie. money in abundance - he/she no longer has to depend on his/her populace for income, and since mercenaries abound within Africa, no need for homegrown soldiers either. The market for his/her oil is outsourced also, so he/she doesn't need his/her populace even as customers. The contract is broken, and to ADX, the populace becomes at best a hindrance and at worst a threat, to be subjugated/negated/controlled by fair means or (more usually) foul.
But who cares right..? We're only talking about a bunch of spear-chucker countries in the boonies, and whatever human collateral damage occurs only effects the headlines. Nuffin' to do with us.
Well, what if, now, in the developed West, a new form of resource curse is in operation..?
I'm not talking about the West's addiction to oil, or implying the US has so much as to create a curse in its own right. No, not oil. I'm talking about money itself, no actual physical resource involved. Just cold hard cash (hmm, even though 70% of it is actually virtual cash floating around invisibly).
I watched some bullet point video by some economist guy that said even though the economy of the US has grown like crazy over the last century, your average Joe's wage has remained comparitively flat and the money generated has found its way into the pockets of an elite - the old statistic 1% of the pop. owns 40% of the stuff. 1% though, of the US pop. is still a fuckhuge number. However, like mass, it's not so much how much of it there is, but how densely it is packed. And I'm willing to bet quite heavily that the 1-40 differential also exists, perhaps even to a greater extent, within that super-rich 1% - ie. 1% of that 1% owns a hugely greater part of all that stuff than the remainder put together. And the 1% of that 1% of 1% still more.
Sufficient money in one place, just like mass, causes other money to gravitate towards it - that first million is hard to come by, the next not so much, and the ones after that seem to just appear while you're brushing your teeth (apparently - I wouldn't know - just hearsay :D ). My point is - that super-concentrated monetary mass in the hands of a small numer of people has enough influence to effect a lot more money not directly connected to it, and that money in turn effects yet more. Meaning that maybe, even though that elite only directly controls 40%, that 40% influences/controls another what..? 20%..? 40%..? A controlling share of AmericaCorp™..?
And through the machinations of the stock-exchange, international currency markets whatever, this money simply generates money, without having to actually create anything much at all. It's out of the usual loop of production and consumption. ie. Like the despots in Africa, those who control that money increasingly do not need a populace to contribute to its wealth. Which leaves them with a problem, the only threat left to them, is
everybody else.
What about the second dependence of ruler on the ruled..? Soldiers. Still need cannon-fodder to fight those useful market-opening wars afterall, those wars ain't gonna fight themselves. Or are they..? Weapons are a form of military automation, just like machines in factories increasingly negate the need for actual humans. Give a guy a gun, and he beats 20 guys with swords. Give a guy a tank, and he beats 100 guys with guns, and so on. Still need that guy to pull the trigger though, damn.
Look at the trends. Factories are becoming almost totally automated, to the point where it's pretty easy to imagine a near future of completely zero-human-on-site robot production facilites. 3D printers, the works. Push button, recieve bacon. But warfare too, is becoming automated - Nuclear deterent is almost completely hands free - the two guys with the keys, if they still exist, would be easy to retire. The airforce..? How long till the drone-recons and limited-strike pilotless planes grow larger, and more destructive..? That leaves ground forces - how hard would it be to automate a tank..? And with the new combat exo-skeletons and walking machines being developed - how soon till you can simply remove the human from the equation and let RoboGrunt™ run free..?
Suddenly, the money no longer needs its populace for soldiers anymore, it can manufacture, and run its military materiél without them. That will indeed be a dangerous day for average Joe and average Jane, because on that day they will no longer be useful to the ruling elite - but it's a day the proles will still greet with thundering applause because none of their children will have to go and get shot up in the Middle East ever again. Hooray.
And my, my, but aren't we selling a whole bunch of stuff to China etc. these days..? You'd almost think we didn't need to buy anything at all, the economy would grind right on even if we boycotted the entire high-street... Isn't our custom important anymore..?
So what happens to the proles..? I think it is what is happening already. Think about it. New acts run through governments in the US and UK under the cloak of the (in my opinion artificially manufactured to a great extent) "War on Terror" to circumvent freedoms of speech, privacy and trial by jury. Cameras on every street. Dumbass educational systems, intended through neglect to manufacture generations of fat, unhealthy, religion-saturated, narrow-minded, unquestioning and entertainment-addicted bigots, fit only for the ever-enlarging service industry.
Ever thought what an ouroboros the whole service industry is..? And I include media and medical to a great extent in this - the old circular snake biting his tail..? You have humans working to serve the basic needs of other humans in order to earn enough the serve their own. Round and round it goes. It's as if the whole of 'lower' society is being put into a static loop, being rendered physicaly, mentally and politically unthreatening to the real ruling class - the money men, and the increasingly puppet governments they control.
And no-one with the power to reverse this trend, has any reason to do so.
And while we're in screaming conspiracy mode... The deficit, (??global??) economic crisis. Tighten your belts proles. What happened..? Did all the shops, and the crops, and the doctors, and the workers, and the roads and the, Jesus, the *everything* disappear overnight..? Nope, it's still there, all of it, in - for now at least - working order. What disappeared apparently, was the eminence-grise, the invisible grease that kept the engine spinning...
...The money.
That's what suddenly disappeared over the horizon, perhaps to a sunny beach where the drinks are cheap and the women all wear bikinis. And who controls the money..? And why, if everything that is needed to look after society is actually still here, is the situation so unfixable..?
Because fuck you prole is why, you are no longer required.
Ze future, boys and girls, ain't looking all that rosy - well, unless you have an absolute fuckload of cash anyway. Then it looks great.
