Capitalism with a Human Face:
A Proposal for the Establishment of a Sustainable
Capitalism.
(Draft)
In popular
theory non-regulated capitalism would take care of itself without
much intervention and regulation. The mechanism of demand and
supply would function like a well oiled steam engine. But due to
whatever causes, this pure capitalism has not been able to manifest
itself fully so far (too much regulation is being blamed for this,
mostly)--it so happens that now and then the economy system
collapses, or nearly so, with unwanted and dire side-effects.
This writing aims to propose a way of life that could still remain
a capitalism--not regulated as much as it currently is (with the
bellow suggested improvements), but one in which the worst of ills
associated with capitalism as we know it now (especially known when
the system doesn't perform well) would be mostly prevented from
occurring--most of criminality, homelessness, hunger, modern
diseases, mental disorders, wars, etc.
More-over--in this way the transition of humanity to living truly
sustainably would be made much easier.
This would be ensured by making it possible for people to provide
for themselves with the basic things necessary for human life by
people's having an access to, at the very least, a place
where to take the very necessary care of their basic needs--rest,
sleep, a way of keeping clean (a safe campsite?), and being able to
grow their own food (if need be), so that the worst that could ever
happen to anyone would be a life with, perhaps, no frills
what-so-ever, but a life where the basic necessities--a good basic
shelter and adequate, good basic food--would always be
obtainable; A life of a fundamental "social security"--not provided
by some complicated, resources-wasting state machinery that never
can take care of any problems adequately well enough ever, but
provided by those in need by themselves for themselves.
(Please read "Home: The Very 'Leverage Point'" - www.ModelEarth.Org/leverage.html )
The weakest point in our modern age society is the difficulty of
obtaining, having, and maintaining a good quality home. To exactly
here most of the problems that plague our society could be traced
to.
Currently it is as if the society that we live in were waging a war
against itself--the losers in the social mobility process not only
lose their social standing, but they are left in a position in
which life itself is almost impossible. As it is, people who are
unable to afford a place to live also find soon that even just to
sleep anywhere is impossible, unless they trespass, in most cases.
At the same time it is considered a good thing when the price of a
place to live rises. This simple fact causes a great stress within
the whole society, as no-one wants to share the fate of those at
the very bottom--the homeless--and yet many, paradoxically, strive
to make profit on the housing market, knowing fully that they are
making it difficult for themselves, should they ever become the
losers (as many indeed do).
This peculiar way of existence could be well understood in the
context of war. This continuous stressing of the whole society
could be seen as a winding up of a spring that is released in times
of a conflict with other peoples--the hostility that is "normally"
being directed towards the members of the society is released at
the now enemy to stress them, and hopefully cause
them damage. It is a picture of a continuously waged
war--even in the intervals of "peace" the society keeps in a
fighting shape by practicing cruelty on its own members.
This above mentioned mode of existence has no use for a lasting
peace in which the pursuit of gentle capitalism could thrive, and
vice versa--a lasting world peace has no use for such a
self-destructive, problematic behavior. If we truly desire a
conflict-free world (this is being professed by most, it would
seem) in which intelligent capitalism could exist, we first have to
stop waging war against ourselves at home, and start practicing
neighborly love. It would not have to mean that social mobility
would cease to exist (would capitalism be possible then?), but it
would mean that reaching the very bottom would not be a social and
a physical annihilation of a person, but only having to get by with
the bare-bone conditions necessary for life. This would take a
tremendous strain off the whole society--people would be less
likely to engage in anti-social behavior out of sheer desperation,
become addicts, criminals, mad, etc. (Please see Designing a Lasting World Peace
Together - www.ModelEarth.Org/peace.html .)
The Proposal:
No matter what economical or political misfortune befalls the
population, or just only individuals, in times when the
infrastructure and/or money either temporarily, or permanently
would stop providing the basic life-support properly, every
community should be prepared to enable its members to be able to
take care of their basic life needs--they should be assured of a
place to live (no matter if this should be only a decent
campsite--something that most homeless today can only dream of),
and they should be able to grow their own food--either on
individual and/or, preferably, communal basis.
There should be contingency plans that would as precisely as
possible detail what should be done in times of no money when rents
could not be paid, and when no food would be coming from the
outside of communities and would have to be grown locally, enough
for every member of the communities, so that no undue social
disruptions due to the lack of the basic necessities take place
ever. (I think that more communities today are prepared to deal
with riots, rather than with providing basic support to the
population in hard times that would pre-empt the occurrence of
social unrest.)
Unless we stop war at home first, we will never stop war anywhere
else, at least not for long. Unless we stop war for good, we can
never become truly sustainable.
I do realize that it might be considered naive to suppose that a
sustainable capitalism would come into being overnight, but it is
becoming increasingly obvious that the paradigm that humanity has
been operating under for so long needs to be changed fundamentally
for humankind to have any chance of a decent survival on this
planet.
The objective of the new paradigm is exactly this:
to compete at who is better at cooperating at making this
planet an ideal world; not to compete at who can exploit the Earth and others better!
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