If the West should ever exit the undercover civil war, a war that has become much less secret since 2020, there will be a need to upgrade our checks & balances. With collusion rife between judiciary, executive, media, technology, schooling, finance and the military, these safeguards have ceased to work and lost all credibility. Without robust checks & balances the West is nothing, having vacated the high moral ground.
My proposal is that the checks & balances have to be lived in terms of character and exist not just in theory. The seven or so “estates” as listed above must be constituted by people who protect the independence of their appointed domains jealously and compromise only reluctantly – i.e. men of character.
It is with this in mind that I advocate the creation of a new class-based society. But not, I hasten to say, classes defined along family lines.
The idea is that, for a professional career, a person must choose before the age of thirty which avenue they wish to pursue. They might choose a career in the law, or in business, or in science, or journalism. But they should not be able to swap arbitrarily or quickly between these.
Each of these avenues involves a different set of commitments and principles. In the case of law this will involve, among other things, due process. In the case of science, recognition of the criterion of falsifiability in the search for truth. In finance, not the maximization of cash flow, but selection of what best to fund for long-term prosperity. In investigative journalism a willingness to deceive combined with truthfulness in reporting. Schooling must enable pupils to discover and think for themselves, the opinions of the teacher taking a back seat.. The businessman will reap profits by providing affordable goods or services that improve consumer lives. And so on.
Each will have different rewards and therefore may, by custom or statute, exclude certain of the rewards available to other avenues.
For example, the successful businessman may accumulate many personal possessions (cars, villas, boats, prestigious art) and enjoy an extravagant lifestyle with travel and gourmet food. These prerogatives will be fulfilling enough for some characters, but not for all. The downside would be a prohibition of his financing journalism, pressure groups, politicians, or engaging in lawfare (i.e. the use of dubious or arbitrary legal complaints to harass enemies).
Those whose character has been formed by work in the judiciary, whether as attorneys or judges, will seek different rewards, such as the knowledge that they have repaired lives by promoting justice and enabling it to be seen that justice has been done.
The investigative journalist will, similar to a good actor, have to be a skilled liar, even relish the pretense. This is not a character trait suitable to some other lines of professional work.
A certain doggedness is required everywhere but is manifested in different ways. It needs to take root in a personality over time such as can best be done by the discipline of regular practice and the example set by mentors. These qualities (“virtues”) cannot be replaced overnight by others.
The doggedness involves upholding independence and the freedom it implies. Note that freedom is not opposed to discipline: freedom means being able to choose which discipline, i.e. unity of action, to adopt. Without some such focus (or rather, set of focusses) everything becomes arbitrary and eventually meaningless.
We have witnessed judges, journalists and other “professionals” asserting blatant lies and absurdities, suppressing truth, and otherwise making a mockery of the checks & balances needed for civilization. These people have clearly never internalized the hierarchy of values implicit in their functions. How to deal with them now is a separate chapter. Here the – radical – proposal has been for the long-term. The idea has been to use social classes to instill a limited but adequate sense of responsibility. It is part of reflections on how elites might be fostered to contain the morally best rather than, as now, these being sidelined in favor of criminally-minded characters.
These reflections are ongoing, and there is much more to be said.
I originally proposed these ideas in a book which I wrote in German and published in 2015: “Klasse Verantwortung – Weichenstellungen für eine starke Mittelschicht,” ISBN 978-3-00-049448-2 English: “Responsibility with Class – Direction of Travel.” The companion website is www.klasseverantwortung.de. Select there EN for English.
seven hundred words. i correct the 7000 typo to 700 on the app but the correction was obviously ignored.