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Our systems – especially our governing-infrastructure – affect our psychology and, therefore, our motivations, attitudes and behaviour, which is why the same person will be different depending on whether they’re brought-up in, for example, prehistory or modernity; Gaza or Australia.
So, what system universalises citizen ‘can-do’ positivity?
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An Optimal Civilisation Hypothesis
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January 1, 2024
Hello
Happy New Year and may 2024 be the year in which ‘Optimally Civilising Governance’ is deciphered then implemented.
Optimal National-Systems: The Universal Empowerment Criterion
An optimal national-system maximally-efficiently delivers universal Empowerment.
And, each sovereign nation has full-control over whether it optimises its national-systems (or not).
While national-systems impact citizens differently depending on the individual and their circumstances, if the systems are optimal, they will maximally-efficiently catalyse Empowerment for all law-abiding citizens, which includes not creating Empowerment-obstacles that Disempower such citizens.
Accordingly, given Disempowerment is everywhere rampant and possibly increasing, it’s clear no country’s national-systems are optimal.
Yet, if one feels Empowered then one is likely to think the system is okay or, at least, bearable; on the contrary, if one feels Disempowered or is concerned for others who are Disempowered then one may be less positive.
This Empowered/Disempowered deviation is the source of our internal division, which saps (and may wholly threaten) even the Empowered’s prosperity – i.e. one way and another, we’re all losing.
Meanwhile, no matter that Disempowerment (and other inefficiencies) arise from suboptimal national-systems, the Empowered often blame the Disempowered and the Disempowered often blame the Empowered, which leads to anger toward the other and toward government and toward society per se, which, in turn, saps loyalty and promotes an attitude of ‘if one can get away with it then fine’ – for example, where it’s possible, isn’t tax-avoidance rife?
Moreover, the external and the internal are interrelated – i.e. external global ructions and internal national ructions accentuate each other.
And, with grievance breeding grievance, the results aren’t necessarily rational, which is why, at Western protests, notwithstanding ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’ mantra, there can be rainbow flags alongside Hamas ones.
So, though Western countries are increasingly under existential threat from a mutually-reinforcing mesh of external and internal forces, with our governance-systems the most important variable and one we can fully-control, it’s possible to create ‘The Optimised Western Model (OWM)’.
This is where the West will win or lose because OWM promises ‘universal sustainable SEE-in stability-prosperity optimisation’ where SEE-in is: Socio-Econo-Enviro-[international/natural].
What follows is an OWM statement of hypothesis detailing the government system of ‘Coopetism’.
The Optimised Western Civilised & Civilising Model
‘Individual authoritarians such as Putin, Xi & Sinwar are not the source-problem;
the source-problem is systems that nurture behaviour such as theirs;
furthermore, the Russian, Chinese and other Authoritarian systems only exist because we haven’t optimised our Western Model,
which means, by blaming them, we are avoiding taking responsibility for our own failings, which in turn means we aren’t correcting those failings.’
The CDO hypothesises humanity’s creation of ‘The Western Model’ has been motivated by a desire to create a government-system that, across a ‘conglomeration of strangers’, is civilised and civilising.
[In terms of this model, democracy, free-markets and equal-access to education are typically emphasised; however, while they’re important, they’re not civilisation per se. This misconception explains why Afghanistan failed – i.e. there was an uncivilised interrelated troika of deficient-security, poverty and corruption, which democracy, free-markets and girls’ education didn’t address. This is pertinent for Post-War Gaza (and, also, Israel).]
Regarding the Western Model, while Greek/Roman, Judeo-Christian and some other human influences are rightly credited, the source driver is a subconscious (hitherto flawed) attempt to transpose a nature-based organisational form into the artificiality of human-government.
That natural organisational system is ‘Coopetition’ – i.e. ‘Cooperation first & foremost and, within that context, Competition as the treasured second’.
In nature, Coopetition is ubiquitous and its supreme manifestation is ‘a society’ – i.e. from bacteria to traditional tribal Homo Sapiens.
That is, our concept of civilisation subconsciously derives from Coopetition.
For humanity, Coopetition is both a Human-Organisation system and a secular-morality system – for example, the “Don’t bully” double-negative is captured within the “Be Coopetive” umbrella.
[Aside: Isn’t the secular-morality-system of Coopetition consistent with most religious moralities? If so, perhaps it can consensually be adopted as a morality-commonality. What if we societally aspired to it (including if it were taught in schools)? Also, regarding AI, what if the embedding of Coopetition-morality became the universal standard?]
In human affairs, Coopetition patterning exists in everything from sport to democracy to our courts wherein there are rules that demand cooperation yet, within that guard-railed context, there may be the fiercest of competition.
Competition can spur dynamism, vitality, efficiency and self-actualisation; however, without it being contextualised within cooperation, it is chaotic, violent, oppressive and manipulative.
War, authoritarianism, slavery, street-fighting and snobbery (including racism, sexism etc.) are all examples of competition without cooperation.
Regarding violence, it can be necessary when the other is not Coopetive especially if they are of bad-faith and in the case of self-defence.
Maximally Coopetive government is denoted as, ‘Coopetism’.
Coopetism: Maximally Coopetive & Coopetising Government
The Coopetism vision:
‘universal sustainable SEE-in stability-prosperity optimisation’.
{SEE-in: Socio-Econo-Enviro-[international/natural]}
With Coopetism hypothesised as being synonymous with The Optimised Western Model (OWM), it refers to government-infrastructure that maximises inter-citizen Coopetition.
Regarding our current suboptimal Western Model, it consists of 4 Coopetition-enhancing cornerstones:
- Universal Rule of Personal & Property Coopetition Law
- Universal Liberal Democracy
- Universal Education
- Universal Healthcare.
While each of these is a prerequisite for generating Coopetition/Civilisation, the 4 together are insufficient because there still exists, Subsistence-Income-Servitude (SIS).
Subsistence-Income-Servitude (SIS)
SIS is, effectively, our single source-problem.
In a modern society, every citizen requires a Subsistence-Income – i.e. prior to the 1760’s, most Westerners were subsistence-farmers, which gave them direct responsibility and control over their subsistence needs; however, the Industrial Revolution forged a machine-led universalised economy, whose inherent promise was subsistence-transcendence.
Thus, with the individual giving-up control over their subsistence needs, the subsistence-transcendence benefits of our ancestral technology should have been universally inherited.
Instead, there evolved Subsistence-Income-Servitude (SIS) – i.e. the conditionalization of a Subsistence-Income.
[Even in a Western jail (and irrespective of their incarcerated-behaviour), prisoners unconditionally receive an in-kind Subsistence-Income – i.e. shelter, food & water.]
SIS violates Coopetition/Civilisation – i.e. it’s uncooperative akin to denying a player a half-time drink or banning a candidate from projecting their ideas or restricting a defendant’s access to a lawyer.
While SIS is best eradicated via The Universal Subsistence Income (USI), despite 260 years of exponential Science, Human-Organisation & Technology (SHOT) productivity improvement, there’s a widespread conviction we can’t afford it, which stands both as history’s most damaging mass-misunderstanding and as a measure of SIS’ hidden distortion/wastage.
The Subsistence-Income-Servitude (SIS) Catastrophe
Insidiously, any person who isn’t independently wealthy directly suffers SIS irrespective of whether they’re living in poverty, which means most in the First World suffer it and all are indirectly disaffected by it.
SIS operates at the physiological/survival level via the threat of poverty, homelessness and starvation for oneself and one’s family, which means ensuring a Subsistence-Income will always be a SIS-sufferer’s highest priority (including over caring for nature).
This Subsistence-Income prioritisation ubiquitously de-civilises every facet of society starting with the economy – i.e. our so-called free-market system is an oxymoron because it’s based on the anti-freedom of SIS.
Citizens’ subsequent necessity for paid-work to acquire a Subsistence-Income leads governments to distort the economy every which way (including excessive regulation, ‘jobs-for-jobs’-sake policies and exorbitant taxation).
With personal-income-tax an indirect-tax on business, if business ownership is a function of:
- Control over that business
- Access to its profit
then ‘private’ businesses are about 70% government-owned, which translates into a vast impediment on economic-activity and, therefore, our prosperity.
SIS Band-Aiding includes:
- Universal Minimum Hourly Wages (UMHoW); and,
- Income-Welfare.
However, not only are they unsuccessful at addressing SIS (and don’t even eradicate poverty), they generate further problems.
UMHoW is supposed to reduce paid-worker exploitation; however, via creating unemployment/underemployment, increases it.
To be definitive, all unemployment/underemployment is manufactured via UMHoW – i.e. it prevents wage adjustment, which distorts ‘the participation rate’ (those either in paid-work or seeking it).
And, unemployment creates fear in those with a job that, if they lose their job then it may be difficult to find another and this fear means they may accept being exploited.
Also, for those whose labour is worth less than $23.23 per hour (the current Australian UMHoW), it doesn’t matter how many jobs are ‘available’, they are locked-out.
So, Australia’s hundreds-of-thousands of volunteers ($0.00 per hour) are rightly lauded yet they and others who are happy to earn something between $0.01 and $23.22 per hour are prohibited.
Regarding income-Welfare (and without including in-kind versions such as social-housing for the able), it is the government-budget’s largest component.
Regarding a comparison of income-Welfare and The USI, the tendency is to compare them in the same light dollar-for-dollar; however, while waste and distortion are rightly associated with the former, prosperity and efficiency should be (but are yet to be) equated with the latter.
First, while income-Welfare is a transfer from taxpayer to an exclusive minority of citizens, The USI is a transfer from taxpayer to all citizens (with, therefore, plenty of overlap between payers and receivers).
Second, with The USI, there’s next-to-no bureaucracy (Centrelink etc. are dissolved) because there’s no targeting – this means there’s next-to-no money lost as it’s transferred from taxpayer to citizen.
Third, there’s no longer a situation of one citizen demanding another do such and such on threat of homelessness and starvation.
Fourth, citizens never lose The USI (short of being overseas or in jail) so there’s no ‘gain-paid-work-lose-income-Welfare’ distortion, which invigorates the low-skilled because they can also asset-build.
Fifth, it catalyses societal-vitality including entrepreneurialism – i.e. with a guaranteed Subsistence-Income, citizens can take risks.
Sixth, there’s no ‘dole-bludger’ narrative, which also halts its racist/sexist/disablist flow-ons.
Seventh, it doesn’t manufacture mental-illness, which means it doesn’t manufacture domestic-violence, substance-abuse, crime etc. and, on the contrary, alleviates them.
In sum, Subsistence-Income-Servitude (SIS) and its UMHoW and income-Welfare Band-Aiding manufacture poverty, unemployment/underemployment & government-budget-pressure.
Moreover, these 3 pervert the allocation of social-status such that it’s skewed toward personal materialism and other attainments rather than social-contribution.
Meanwhile, at an individual level, for those not independently wealthy, SIS demands an Agency of Choice forfeiture.
While, for some, this may appear to have little effect – i.e. they invest their time and effort in a job they like – for others it can mean prioritising it over:
- Their children’s emotional needs
- The natural-environment
- Domestic safety (including for one’s children)
- Safety in their paid-workplace
- Self-actualisation, which may seem like a matter of tough-luck but it causes mental-illness that also disaffects their family and society per se
- ‘Doing the right thing’ such that it raises the likelihood of criminality.
[Regarding citizens’ collective ‘societally-contributive self-actualisation’, nature has ensured there are people suitable for every situation and that they exist in roughly the right proportion (the economy’s wage-mechanism can do the rest). Also, we should accept that each individual is the best for determining their particular manner of societally-contributing, which means they need the freedom to do so including via Subsistence-Income-Emancipation.]
Furthermore, SIS’ social, economic and natural-environmental disaffections give Authoritarians a free-pass as, with the help of their propaganda machines, their exclamations of, “Look at their problems; our system’s better” get traction.
Thus, regarding our Socio-Econo-Enviro-[international/natural] (SEE-in) catastrophes, Subsistence-Income-Servitude (SIS) (and its Band-Aiding) manufacture:
- Socio- Disempowerment
- Econo- Inefficiency
- International-Enviro Corruption (including Authoritarianism)
- Natural-Enviro Wastage.
The solution to all this is ’The USI-4-UMHoW-&-income-Welfare Reform’, which is shortened to ’The USI-4-UMHoW Reform’.
Coopetism’s ’USI-4-UMHoW Reform’
‘The USI-4-UMHoW Reform’ involves substituting The Universal Subsistence Income (USI) for Universal Minimum Hourly Wages (UMHoW) & most income-Welfare.
This eradicates:
- Poverty
- Unemployment/Underemployment
- Government-budget-pressure.
Thus, ‘The USI-4-UMHoW Reform’ delivers push/pull-perpetual-positivity – i.e. via eradicating poverty it is perpetually hope-pushing and via eradicating unemployment and government-budget-pressure it is perpetually hope-pulling.
[Regarding Post-War Gaza: ’The USI-4-UMHoW Reform’ is incorruptible (i.e. everyone knows whether they received The USI or not), it promotes individual-freedom, which undermines Authoritarianism, and catalyses contentment, which alleviates terrorism.]
Also, it means there’s no longer the mix of UMHoW locking citizens out of paid-work and income-Welfare locking the same people into ‘dole-bludger’ humiliation, which saps their hope – this is the source of ‘The Gap’ between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians including via the ‘locked-out, locked-in then locked-up’ causality.
Moreover, ’The USI-4-UMHoW Reform’ alleviates all our Socio-Econo-Enviro-[international/natural] (SEE-in) challenges.
Lastly, without firing a shot, optimised civilisation’s light will ‘boil’ Authoritarians from governance – i.e. Authoritarians’ citizens, becoming like stove-heated water molecules, rather than disjointedly and half-heartedly dissenting, will ubiquitously and emphatically mass-agitate in demand for the government system of ‘Coopetism’.
To defeat Authoritarianism, we only need optimise our own system.
Conclusion
The CDO hypothesises the Optimised Western Model (OWM) is Coopetism, which is a maximally civilised government system involving nature’s Coopetition being transposed into government-infrastructure where Coopetition is ‘Cooperation first & foremost and, within that context, Competition as the treasured second’.
However, currently, due to Subsistence-Income-Servitude (SIS), Western nations don’t yet have Coopetism.
The solution is ‘The USI-4-UMHoW Reform’, which means we will possess all 5 [RIDEH] Coopetising infrastructures of:
- [R] Universal Rule of Personal & Property Coopetition Law
- [I] Universal Subsistence Income (USI)
- [D] Universal Liberal Democracy
- [E] Universal Education
- [H] Universal Healthcare,
which, in turn, will automatically ‘right the ship’ and ‘clear the decks’ of our Socio-Econo-Enviro-[international/natural] (SEE-in) problems.
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Because we haven’t implemented the Optimised Western Model (OWM) of Coopetism, nature in the form of anti-Coopetive Authoritarian influences (including Religious-Extremism) is rebelling.
Thus, if we don’t implement Coopetism, the whole Western model may fall.
We need full-fledged national discussions of Coopetism and ’The USI-4-UMHoW Reform’ – like Australia had for ‘The Indigenous Voice to Parliament’ – then, should its veracity stand, it should be a.s.a.p. implemented.
Upcoming elections can become ‘USI-4-UMHoW Reform’-mandating elections.
Thank you.
May we make it a great Year
Paul Ross
The Citizens’ Dividend Organisation (CDO)