Too Few Have Too Much, While Too Many Have Too Little.

 By David Starr

All in all, the title sums up the current world order and its consequences.

While human history has had numerous stages of inequality, there has been some progression as well. The revolution that birthed the United States was a triumph for shattering the dominance of feudalism and the monopolized power of the aristocracy.

As U.S. society developed, more of the common people got access to intellectual pursuits, a decent standard of living and a sense of security. But this cannot be called a paradise. Many, based on race, class and gender, were and are still held down by a world order that is dominated by the rule of capital. And the U.S., as an empire, has been the world leader in protecting and expanding it.

As a result, there are still a small number of “developed” countries and a large number of “developing” countries. The origins of this unequal relationship are essentially the results of European colonialism and later U.S. imperialism. Today, inequality has become even more prominent with the further pursuit of profits and the consequences be damned.

Wealthy individuals pride themselves on being generous but at the same time benefit from the structures in place that increase poverty for the many. While helpful, charity is a band-aid and doesn’t lift all people out of poverty once and for all. Ultimately, what is needed is real change, not charity. But there is the obvious roadblock: powerbrokers don’t want real change. Some think the system of capital can be reformed, but that’s already been tried and on a worldwide basis. There are further attempts to expand the current world order where capital is the superior to labor. (As Abraham Lincoln once said, labor is superior to capital, because if it wasn’t for labor, capital wouldn’t exist.

The attempted expansion has gotten more acute when the USSR dissolved. There is no longer a rival power that can equally compete with the west, especially the U.S. empire. So, those who are involved in various industries, organizations, think tanks and government that complement the rule of capital are trying to seize the opportunity to, yes, dominate the world.

Planet Earth cannot sustain this insanity. The world’s resources are finite but supporters of the rule of capital have veered on a destructive path, wanting to exploit resources to the fullest. As a result, many people will probably suffer from it one way or another since the goal of capital is to privately monopolize resources, wealth and labor. This leaves the few with a powerful grip on how these things are controlled. Private monopolies result where there isn’t really a democratic structure in place to clear the path for socialist rule worldwide.

There is an ideological difference between socialism and capitalism. Socialism is more complementary to democracy than capitalism is, despite the deformity of Stalinism. Socialism puts workers in a role where there is a priority for rights and responsibilities in the workplace. Essentially, workers’ control, but with managerial guidance. After all, different roles are being played out, but workers still get the fundamental rights accorded them such as voting on the goals for the means of production, voting, and running, for managerial positions, and where profits are distributed fairly.

Capitalism was dynamic in revolutionizing the means of production, but does not have safeguards within it to prioritize and protect workers’ rights, much less being a steward for the environment. Given how it has been practiced, capitalism prioritizes the voracious hunger of profits in the bottom line. Negative traits in human nature are prioritized over positive traits. The idea that humans are naturally selfish gets highlighted, many times at the expense of empathy and understanding. In short, capitalism is like an untamed beast. That’s where socialist rule comes in where the beast is tamed and made to be civilized.

The current world order characterizes the ideological goals of capitalism. There is further inequality and the entrenchment of poverty, even though production under capitalism has brought about improvements in consumption. But the level of consumption is generally unequal worldwide. Under those circumstances, people sometimes get desperate and do desperate things. Violence is an outgrowth of desperation which is an outgrowth of poverty.

The current world order is ultimately not sustainable. There has to be change, ideological change.