To Change Everything 1up

8/10/2019 To Change Everything 1up

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If you could change anything,what would you change?Would you go on vacationfor the rest of your life? Makefossil fuels stop causing climatechange? Ask for ethical banksand politicians? Surely nothingcould be more unrealistic thanto keep everything the way it isand expect different results.

Our private nancial andemotional struggles mirrorglobal upheaval and disaster.We could spend the rest of ourdays trying to douse these resone by one, but they stem fromthe same source. No piecemealsolution will serve; we need torethink everything according toa different logic.


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Tochange

anything,start

everywhere.


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start with

self-determination


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The phantom of liberty still haunts a world cast in itsimage. We have been promised complete self-determi-nation: all the institutions of our society are supposed todeliver it.

If you had complete self-determination, what wouldyou be doing right now? Think of the vast potential ofyour life: the relationships you could have, the things youcould experience, all the ways you could give meaningto your existence. When you were born, it seemed therewas no limit to what you could become. You representedpure possibility.

Usually, we dont stop to imagine any of this. Onlyin the most beautiful moments, when we fall in love orachieve a breakthrough or visit a faraway land, do wecatch a dizzying glimpse of all our lives could be.

What limits how you can fulll your potential? Howmuch leverage do you have over the environmentaround you, or how you spend your time? The bureau-cracies that appraise you according to how you followinstructions, the economy that empowers you accordingto how much prot you generate, the military recruiterswho insist that the best way to be all that you can beis to submit to their authoritydo these enable you tomake the most of your life on your own terms?

The open secret is that we do all have completeself-determination: not because its given to us, but be-cause not even the most totalitarian dictatorship couldtake it away. Yet as soon as we begin to act for ourselves,we come into conflict with the very institutions that aresupposed to secure our freedom.


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start by

answering toourselves


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Managers and tax collectors love to talk about personalresponsibility. But if we took complete responsibility forall our actions, would we be following their instructionsin the rst place?

More harm has been done throughout history by obe-

dience than by malice. The arsenals of all the worlds mil-itaries are the physical manifestation of our willingnessto defer to others. If you want to be sure you never con-tribute to war, genocide, or oppression, the rst step is tostop following orders.

That goes for your values, too. Countless rulers and

rulebooks demand your unquestioning submission. Buteven if you want to cede responsibility for your decisionsto some god or dogma, how do you decide which one itwill be? Like it or not, you are the one who has to choosebetween them. Usually, people simply make this choiceaccording to what is most familiar or convenient.

We are inescapably responsible for our beliefs anddecisions. Answering to ourselves rather than to com-manders or commandments, we might still come intoconflict with each other, but at least we would do so onour own terms, not needlessly heaping up tragedy in ser-vice of others agendas.


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start by seekingpower, not authority


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start withrelationshipsbuilt on trust


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start by

reconciling theindividual andthe whole


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Your rights end where anothers rights begin. Accordingto that logic, the more people there are, the less freedom.

But freedom is not a tiny bubble of personal rights.We cannot be distinguished from each other so easily.Yawning and laughter are contagious; so are enthusiasmand despair. I am composed of the clichs that roll off mytongue, the songs that catch in my head, the moods I con-tract from my companions. When I drive a car, it releasespollution into the atmosphere you breathe; when you usepharmaceuticals, they lter into the water everyone drinks.The system everyone else accepts is the one you have tolive underbut when other people challenge it, you get achance to renegotiate your reality as well. Your freedombegins where mine begins, and ends where mine ends.

We are not discrete individuals. Our bodies are com-prised of thousands of different species living in symbiosis:rather than closed fortresses, they are ongoing processesthrough which nutrients and microbes ceaselessly pass. Welive in symbiosis with thousands more species, corneldsinhaling what we exhale. A swarming pack of wolves or anevening murmuring with frogs is as individual, as unitary, asany one of our bodies. We do not act in a vacuum, self-pro-pelled by reason; the tides of the cosmos surge through us.

Language serves to communicate only because wehold it in common. The same goes for ideas and desires:we can communicate them because they are greaterthan us. Each of us is composed of a chaos of contraryforces, all of which extend beyond us through time andspace. In choosing which of these to cultivate, we deter-mine what we will foster in everyone we encounter.


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Freedom is not a possession or a property; it is a rela-tion. It is not a matter of being protected from the out-side world, but of intersecting in a way that maximizesthe possibilities. That doesnt mean we have to seekconsensus for its own sake; both conflict and consensuscan expand and ennoble us, so long as no centralizedpower is able to compel agreement or transform con-flict into winner-takes-all competition. But rather thanbreaking the world into tiny efdoms, lets make themost of our interconnection.


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Growing up in this society, not even our passions are ourown; they are cultivated by advertising and other forms

of propaganda to keep us running on the treadmills ofthe marketplace. Thanks to indoctrination, people can bequite pleased with themselves for doing things that arebound to make them miserable in the long run. We arelocked into our suffering and our pleasures are the seal.

To be truly free, we need leverage over the processes

that produce our desires. Liberation doesnt just meanfullling the desires we have today, but expanding oursense of what is possible, so our desires can shift alongwith the realities they drive us to create. It means turningaway from the pleasure we take in enforcing, dominat-ing, and possessing, to seek pleasures that wrench us

free of the machinery of obedience and competition. Ifyouve ever broken an addiction, you have a taste of whatit means to transform your desires.


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Bigots typically blame a specic group for a systemicproblemJews for prot-driven capitalism, immigrantsfor economic recessionthe same way people blameindividual politicians for the corruption of politics. Butthe problem is the systems themselves. No matter whoholds the reins, they produce the same power imbalanc-es and petty indignities. The problem is not that they arebroken, but that they are functioning in the rst place.

Our enemies are not human beings, but the institu-tions and routines that estrange us from each other andfrom ourselves. There are more conflicts within us thanbetween us. The same fault lines that run through ourcivilization run through our friendships and our hearts;this is not a clash between people, but between differ-ent kinds of relations, different ways of living. When werefuse our roles in the prevailing order, we open up thosefault lines, inviting others to take a stand as well.

The best thing would be to do away with domina-tion entirelynot to manage its details more fairly, notto shuffle the positions of who inflicts and who endures,not to stabilize the system by reforming it. The point ofprotest is not to call for more legitimate rules or rulers,but to demonstrate that we can act on our own strength,encouraging others to do the same and discouragingthe authorities from interfering. This is not a question ofwara binary conflict between militarized enemiesbutrather of contagious disobedience.

It is not enough only to educate and discuss, waitingfor others hearts and minds to change. Until ideas areexpressed in action, confronting people with concrete


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choices, the conversation remains abstract. Most peopletend to remain aloof from theoretical discussions, butwhen something is happening , when the stakes are highand they can see meaningful differences between op-posing sides, they will take a stand . We dont need una-nimity, nor a comprehensive understanding of the wholeworld, nor a road map to a precise destinationjust thecourage to set out on a different path.


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There are many different mechanisms for imposing in-equality. Some depend on a centralized apparatus, likethe court system. Others can function more informally,like good ol boy networks and gender roles.

Some of these mechanisms have been almost com-pletely discredited. Few still believe in the divine right ofkings, though for centuries no other basis for society waseven thinkable. Others are still so deeply ingrained thatwe cannot imagine life without them. Who can picture aworld without property rights? Yet all of these are socialconstructs: they are real, but not inevitable. The existenceof landlords and CEOs is no more natural, necessary, orbenecial than the existence of emperors.

All of these mechanisms developed together, rein-forcing each other. The history of racism, for example, isinextricable from the history of capitalism: neither oneis conceivable without colonization, slavery, or the colorlines that divided workers and still determine who llsthe worlds prisons and shantytowns. Likewise, withoutthe infrastructure of the state and the other hierarchiesof our society, individual bigotry could never enforce sys-temic white supremacy. That a Black President can pre-side over these structures only stabilizes them: it is theexception that justies the rule.

To put it another way: as long as there are police, whodo you think they will harass? As long as there are prisons,who do you think will ll them? As long as there is pov-erty, who do you think will be poor? It is nave to believewe could achieve equality in a society based on hierarchy.You can shuffle the cards, but its still the same deck.


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the problem isborders


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Leadership is a social disorder in which the majorityof participants in a group fail to take initiative or thinkcritically about their actions. As long as we understandagency as a property of specic individuals rather than arelationship between people, we will always be depen-

dent on leadersand at their mercy. Truly exemplaryleaders are as dangerous as the obviously corrupt, in thatall their praiseworthy qualities only reinforce their statusand others deference, not to mention the legitimacy ofleadership itself.

When the police arrive at a protest, their rst question

is always Whos in charge?not because leadershipis essential to collective action, but because it presentsa vulnerability. The Conquistadores asked the samequestion when they arrived in the so-called New World;wherever there was an answer, it saved them centuriesof trouble subduing the population themselves. So long

as there is a leader, he can be deputized, replaced, or tak-en hostage. At best, depending on leaders is an Achillesheel; at worst, it reproduces the authorities interests andpower structure inside those who oppose them. Its bet-ter if everyone has her own agenda and a sense of herown agency.


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the problem isgovernment


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Governments promise rights, but they can only takeliberties. The idea of rights implies a central power togrant and guard them. Yet anything the state is power-ful enough to guarantee, it is powerful enough to takeaway; empowering government to solve one problemonly opens the door for it to create more problems. Andgovernments do not generate power out of thin airthats our power that they wield, which we can employfar more effectively without the Rube Goldberg machineof representation.

The most liberal democracy shares the same prin-ciple as the most despotic autocracy: the centralizationof power and legitimacy in a structure intended to mo-nopolize the use of force. Whether the bureaucrats whooperate this structure answer to a king, a president, oran electorate is beside the point. Laws, bureaucracy, andpolice are older than democracy; they function the sameway in a democracy as in a dictatorship. The only differ-ence is that, because we can vote about who adminis-ters them, were supposed to regard them as ours evenwhen theyre used against us.

Dictatorships are inherently unstable: you can slaugh-ter, imprison, and brainwash entire generations andtheir children will invent the struggle for freedom anew.But promise every man a chance to impose the will ofthe majority upon his fellows, and you can get them alltogether behind a system that pits them against eachother. The more influence people think they have overthe coercive institutions of the state, the more popularthose institutions can be. Perhaps this explains why the


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global expansion of democracy coincides with incredibleinequalities in the distribution of resources and power:no other system of government could stabilize such aprecarious situation.

When power is centralized, people have to attaindominion over others to gain any influence over theirown destinies. Struggles for autonomy are channeledinto contests for political power: witness the civil warsin postcolonial nations between peoples who previous-ly coexisted peacefully. Those who hold power can onlyretain it by waging perpetual war against their own pop-ulations as well as foreign peoples: the National Guard isbrought back from Iraq to be deployed in Oakland.

Wherever there are hierarchies, it favors the ones ontop to centralize power. Building more checks and bal-ances into the system just means relying on the thing weneed to be protected from for protection. The only wayto exert leverage on the authorities without being suckedinto their game is to develop horizontal networks thatcan act autonomously. Yet when were powerful enoughto force the authorities to take us seriously, well be pow-erful enough to solve our problems without them.

Theres no way to freedom but through freedom.Rather than a single bottleneck for all agency, we need awide range of venues in which to exercise power. Ratherthan a singular currency of legitimacy, we need space formultiple narratives. In place of the coercion inherent ingovernment, we need decision-making structures thatpromote autonomy, and practices of self-defense thatcan hold would-be rulers at bay.


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the problem isprofit


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Money is the ideal mechanism for implementing inequality.It is abstract: it seems to be able to represent everything. It isuniversal: people who have nothing else in common acceptit as a fact of life. It is impersonal: unlike hereditary privileges,it can be transferred instantly from one person to another. Itis fluid: the easier it is to change position in a hierarchy, themore stable the hierarchy itself is. Many who would revoltagainst a dictator readily accept the authority of the market.

When all value is concentrated into a single instrument,

even the irrecoverable moments of our lives are drained ofmeaning, becoming tokens in an abstract calculus of pow-er. Everything that cannot be nancially quantied falls bythe wayside. Life becomes a scramble for nancial gain:each against all, sell or be sold.

To make a prot: that means to gain more control overthe resources of society relative to everyone else. We cant

all prot at once; for one person to prot, others have tolose leverage. When investors prot on employees labor,that means the more the employees work, the wider thenancial gap between them becomes.

A system driven by prot produces poverty at the samepace as it concentrates wealth. The pressure to competegenerates innovations faster than any previous system,but alongside them it produces ever-increasing dispar-ities: where equestrians once ruled over pedestrians,stealth bombers now sail over motorists and homelesspeople. And because everyone has to pursue prot ratherthan accomplishing things for their own sake, the resultsof all this labor can be disastrous. Climate change is just

the latest in a series of catastrophes that even the mostpowerful capitalists have been powerless to halt. Indeed,capitalism doesnt reward entrepreneurs for remedyingcrises, but for cashing in on them.


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the problem is

property


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The foundation of capitalism is property rightsanothersocial construct we inherited from kings and aristocrats.Property shifts hands more rapidly today, but the con-cept is the same: the idea of ownership legitimizes theuse of violence to enforce articial imbalances in accessto land and resources.

Some people imagine that property could exist with-out the state. But property rights are meaningless with-out a centralized authority to impose themand as longas a centralized authority exists, nothing is truly yours,either. The money you make is minted by the state, sub- ject to tax and inflation. The title for your car is controlledby the DMV. Your house doesnt belong to you, but tothe bank that gave you the mortgage; even if you own itoutright, eminent domain trumps any deed.

What would it take to protect the things that are im-portant to us? Governments only exist by virtue of whatthey take from us; they will always take more than theygive. Markets only reward us for fleecing our fellows, andothers for fleecing us. The only real insurance is in our so-cial ties: if we want to be sure of our security, we needmutual aid networks that can defend themselves.

Without money or property rights, our relationshipsto things would be determined by our relationships witheach other. Today, it is just the other way around: our rela-tionships with each other are determined by our relation-ships to things. Doing away with property wouldnt meanyou would lose your belongings; it would mean that nosheriff or stock market crash could take away the thingsyou depend on. Instead of answering to bureaucracy, we


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would begin from human needs; instead of taking ad-vantage of each other, we would pursue the advantagesof interdependence.

A scoundrels worst fear is a society without prop-ertyfor without it, he will only get the respect he de-serves. Without money, people are valued for what theycontribute to others lives, not for what they can bribeothers to do. Without prot, every effort must be itsown reward, so there is no incentive for meaningless ordestructive activity. The things that really matter in lifepassion, camaraderie, generosityare available in abun-dance. It takes legions of police and property surveyorsto impose the scarcity that traps us in this rat race.


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the last crime


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To Change Everything 1up

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