zhang.dianli

I have a crackpot model based on bits and pieces I've picked up from all over (including from the ancient text Discourses of the States; actually that informs a lot of my views on things these days).

There are, in most (all?) current societies, three general classes of people. I'm going to group them under the terms “Crown”, “Nobility”, and “Commoners”. I'm only using these labels as a short, convenient term intended as a placeholder for more complicated things. To ensure we're all on the same page, I'll explain each term as it is intended to be used in this essay.

Crown

In essence the Crown is the nominal head of state. The Crown is the person (or group) officially “in charge” on paper at least. It could a king in an ancient feudal state, or it could be a dictator in a fascist state, or it could be an elected parliament or some other such thing. The key is that the Crown is the titular (if not necessarily de facto) source of all authority in society for a given time. (In a democracy authority is supposedly the people's, but in practical democracies that authority is exercised in a punctuated way that swaps out authorities at need: in essence in practical democracies the people vote who gets to be the source of all authority for a bounded period of time.)

Nobility

Nobility represents, in this model, people of extreme power. This could be literal nobility like the powerful lords in feudal states, or it could be powerful corporations in fascist or democratic states. The source of the Nobility's power can be diverse: land holdings, military might, money, or some combination of all three. Whatever the source, however, they are powers to be reckoned with that the Crown and the Commoners both need to be aware of.

Commoners

Statistically speaking: you and I. Normal people without any formal authority, without any real, meaningful power at the societal level. Ordinary workers, small business owners, etc. Just regular people with varying degrees of mild authority or power or wealth, but nothing compared to the juggernauts of Crown and Nobility.

A little note on hierarchy

Note that some people who are Nobility at, say, a national scale might be Crowns at a local scale. For example a corporate CEO in North America is part of Nobility, but is also Crown of their corporation. This hierarchical arrangement goes right down to family structures where the parents might be Nobility in the neighbourhood association but Crown in their homes.

The eternal struggle

From Orwell we get the rather pessimistic outlook that the Crown (which he called the upper class) and the Nobility (which he called the middle class) are locked into an eternal struggle: Nobility wanting to exchange places with the Crown with Commoners (which he called proles) just useful tools of the middle and upper classes in their goals. And ... he's not wrong. This is pretty much identical to the model I'm using, but more pessimistically worded. In his view the Commoners (proles) are eternally getting stamped on by their “betters” of the Crown and Nobility.

In my model that struggle exists. It's just that the relationship of the commoners to the struggling parties is slightly different. This is because a Crown with any degree of enlightened, long-term self-interest will want to remain Crown for a long time and will not want to succumb to the Nobility.

Scenario 1: Crown sides with Commoners

In one scenario, the Crown sides with the Commoners, putting restrictions on the Nobility' powers for the benefit of the Commoners. The Crown is still the Crown, mind. The Crown still holds all the reins of power. The Crown doesn't have to be good, or kind, or moral ... just SMART.

See, there is one power Commoners have. (The secret word is Jacquerie!) They have the power to overthrow society entirely, and this is a power that fed-up Commoners have used through the ages. The Yellow Turbans of late-Han China. The Bolsheviks of Russia. The Revolutionaries of the USA. Yes, in many cases, that power was cynically directed by other powers, but the fact still remains: Commoners can completely tear down the social order.

A Crown who is aware of this power and who (rightly) fears this power will step gently. Will ensure that the Commoners are at least mostly satisfied with their lot. Will make sure that Commoners don't get fed up to the point of triggering empire-destroying wars.

A society which has such a smart Crown, working against the Nobility to keep the Commoners at least mildly contented will be a stable and long-lasting one. The moment the Crown forgets this, society gets unstable and, ultimately, when (not if!) taken too far, collapses at the hands of the Commoner mob.

Which brings us to...

Scenario 2: Crown sides with Nobility

When this happens, instability invariably follows. If carried on for too long, that instability causes society to fall apart, usually in an orgy of violence directed against the Crown and Nobility both. Society collapses and is replaced with something else. That something else always seems to be hierarchical in nature and always seems to have a Crown of some sort (Lenin, say, in Russia) and Nobility (wealthy landholders, say, in post-Revolution USA). The cycle repeats itself as Crowns side with Commoners to rein in the Nobility until the Crown takes the fatal misstep of working with the Nobility to ... lather, rinse, repeat.

So how does Scenario 2 happen? If it always leads to the eventual destruction of society, why would any smart Crown ever side with Nobility?

The key word there is “smart”. Nothing guarantees that the Crown will be smart. The Crown may have stumbled into power. Or maybe the first Crown was smart but the children/grandchildren/whoever inherited down the line were idiots. Or maybe the Commoners elected an idiot for any number of reasons (including machinations of the Nobility) in purported democracies.

Once a stupid, or at least short-sighted, Crown is in power, the siren's song of wealth and power from the Nobility is hard to resist. After all Nobility has more in common, socially, with the Crown than do Commoners. If the Crown isn't careful, they'll forget that the Nobility are their enemies and are trying to tear them down to put one of their own in the Crown.

And in the mean time the Commoners fester and stew in increasing resentment until it's time to burn everything down again.

Hopeless?

The picture I paint is bleak, but it's bleak because anything made with forced hierarchy is pretty much automatically bleak. When you embrace the concept of innate authority in any way, you're giving up and are falling into this model. (The fact that this model fits almost every historical society ever with only mild shaving needed around the edges is a tragic observation.)

Don't believe the lies of the Nobility or Crown, even if the Crown is “on your side” as in Scenario 1. There is no such thing as innate authority. Authority is granted and should be taken away as soon as it's proven to be unworthy. And if that means occasionally burning down a building or ten to hammer home the point, go for it! (Just be aware that the Crown and the Nobility both have very large amounts of power that they will direct against you! This will cost you, personally.)

And while you're not taking authority away, try ignoring it where it's convenient. Work with your fellow Commoners to make your life better while dodging the machinations and vile behaviour of the Nobility and Crown. Make the schemes of both as irrelevant as possible to your life.

For instance in the modern age that could mean not using corporate social media; use organic social media that's not driven by the corporate world and agenda instead. (If you're reading this it's likely that's what you're doing now, in fact!) It could also mean doing business with each other. It could mean learning how to repair goods instead of throwing them away and buying new ones. It could mean feeding those less fortunate than you, or giving them a place to at least rest.

Treat your fellow Commoners, in short, like humans instead of falling for the lies of the Crown and the Nobility.