The Iron Law of Oligarchies

 I thought tonight would be a good time to review Peter Turchin's book on Ultra Society. More than a few people at work are very concerned about the US' political instability. There's an equal number worried about the monoparty's authoritarianism as there are about the monoparty's media narrative.

The Iron Law of Oligarchies says that democracies and authoritarian states both tend, over time, to Oligarchies. Peter Turchin favours this view. That's pretty strong evidence. After all, he's got a good database to work from that most other social historians don't.  (see his book Ultra Society)

One of the drivers into the Iron Law of Oligarchies is bureaucratization.  I think you need to go a bit deeper though.  That seems to be a symptom, not a proximate driver.  I think we've got 3 main biologically selected drivers.

1. Progressivism - kings and dictators need to provide some adaptive benefit to their group. That is often in the form of good military leadership in times of threat. But, I'd suggest progressivism also works. And, perhaps works better.  This might be Egyptian grain stores or welfare pyramid building work. Progressivism also seems to be an ideal solution to group expansion. Selection at the elite levels for progressivism seems to me to be a natural evolutionary well.

2. Intra-elite competition (multi-level selection)- you can tell I'm reading Turchin right now... :)  You always have intra-elite competition. Turchin's data is hard to deny here.  If that's accurate I have a hard time seeing how natural tendencies for hierarchies (think Jordan Peterson's lobster logic here) don't get expressed here.  Control just seems to fit a power law distribution too well for it to be coincidental.  Instead intra-elite competition I'm fine with the term multi-level selection.

3. Technocratic detachment - I think this is the last driver. Systems gradually and inevitably become detached from their current niches. This basically happens as per strange attractor dynamics. Over the last few years I've typically thought biological systems in terms of a Lorentz Butterfly attractor.  That's because multi-level selection logic has two attractors. Other two attractor solutions are possible. I'm no expert here. Technocratic detachment can be seen as related to transformational exploration. For example, the only way to see if globalism is good is to disregard the nay sayers, jump in, and let people see that it isn't so bad after all.  That such moves almost always fail isn't an evolutionary reason not to do it. It just reflects the fact that transformational moves which occasionally succeed bigly are adaptive on long time scales and landscapes with significant intergroup competition.  I'd also note that technocratic detachment is best done at the elite level and not at the commoner level. That's because at the commoner level, technocratic detachment has major existential risks. Your masses are conservative. At the elite level, the risks are mostly offloaded onto commoners. This minimizes the size of failure, making a sub-group of people more risky, but less able to get everyone on board.

If I was being more concise I'd probably sum up these three drivers as 

1. an evolutionary arrow for progressivism 
2. an evolutionary arrow for larger group size
3. selection for a complex dynamic of transformative exploration (and pull-back/failure)

The net result for the US, as I see it, is an inevitable strengthening of its Oligarchical dynamics. The hysterical reaction to Trump shows that the system doesn't want populist outsiders. You don't really have a true representational democracy down there anymore. Trump (and Trump party 2.0 in 2024 if impeachment doesn't happen on Jan 21 may be the last kicks of the can here for a while.

Today in How to out Putin Putin

Paul Sperry 

@paulsperry_ 

DEVELOPING: Democrats in both the House and Senate are planning to draft legislation to classify MAGA rallies as "domestic terrorist activity" and require the FBI, DOJ & DHS to take steps to prevent such "domestic terrorism." Sen. Durbin is leading effort along with Rep Schneider 

 I still can't quite figure out what is the best historical foil for current events - The War of Independence, The 17th C war of religions, or the fall of the Roman empire.

I like Rome for the rise of Christianity, as I equate that with our current rise of wokeism and its take over of politics. You also have the elite over-production angle which enables religion to be the tool used to cull out old elites and filter aspiring elites.  

But, I like the war of religions for how you squirm your way into sacred values that can't be negotiated through.

The negative sum thinking of the Roman empire is also apt. Pelosi's / McConnel's sabotage of 2k stimulus checks makes me think of that. As does the resistance against Trump's military pull backs. But, we're not yet at the point where people would purposefully tank lives for the sake of vengance.

So, I would say it's a combination of Christian Rome and the war of religions. The American Revolution is very close, but you're missing out on the religious angle, and that is definitely very unique right now.

An astute albeit non-academically grounded current event analysis

 

Enforcers & Legitimatizers

The German Nazi party and Mussolini's facists benefitted greatly from a core group of enforcers that could be used to shift the overton window while providing cover for their public facing movements.  It's a good technique. Religions often do this.  It's all about 'layers'.  Getting things to nest properly and in resonant ways is no easy task. It's why some scriptures are good and some are awful.

This summer we saw Democrats exploiting Antifa and BLM wonderfully. It filled their coffers unbelievably well, and that, I have no doubt, enabled a lot of ground game energy & shenanigans.  

Right now we may start to see the Right follow suit. Trump has publicly denounced Capital violence. Is that just a cover-your behind move? Was he just really naive about a big show of numbers without expecting any real violence (other than ANTIFA counter violence)?  Who knows. I'm not much into conspiracy.  But, what is certain, is that groups which have a violent fringe movement, are an adaptive solution to inter-group competition.

There's no doubt the US is now split into distinct groups. The adaptiveness of a single group is not there.

Thus, I suspect Trump will continue to push a law and order theme. But, I suspect a splinter group will form, as radical as ANTIFA or BLM but with different specific tactics (targeted assassinations?). Trump's 3rd party will disavow, but these disavowals, no matter how clear, will be interpreted as messaging requiring further force.  That will give them a leg up on ANTIFA. The left doesn't disavow ANTIFA, so ANTIFA is functionally limited in how far they can push things. The next evolutionary step is the one I mentioned.

US Way Behind Poland in Modern Free Speech Mediums

 It looks like the US is way behind Poland in modern free speech mediums. I suspect ideological uniformity in US institutions led to this. As technocracy increases, the temptation to simply ban ones foes grows too great. Severe competition between the two sides just magnifies these temptations. Unless, of course, one side's unifying principle is libertarianism. But as we saw in the American Revolutionary war, that really didn't change the dynamics too much. You just find another term to wiggle around those ethics. Right now its hate speech. In the 50's it was communism..

And don't forget, Poland has a history of some rather progressive political principles.

Purge Dynamics - Context Matters

 The current purge dynamics, including the likely impeachment of Trump and removal of his ability to ever again take a public office, has to be seen in broader contexts.

For instance, who knows if this is real or fake. The fact that it came from Nov is worrying. The fact that no one heard about it is worrying (& a signal that it may be fake). But, purge dynamic context requires admitting that mass censorship, deplatforming (ala Parler's likely dehosting), and perception of a one-sided rule of law, make authoritarian actions especially explosive.

I think the hope is that you can break the ability of the resistance to organize. If you turn the entire country's morals against them, you can redirect lock-down energy into a Germanesque societal cleansing.

But what happens if that forces unstable people into identity fusion (like jihadi's)? And what happens when the first imolator gets lionized and the copycats start to come. Targeted assassinations, including Pelosi, news media, lock-down governors, perceived traitors like McConnel, will have to worry. That was the dynamics of the American War of Independence....

As I've said - the truth of these Italian election stuff doesn't matter for first order reactionary dynamics. But if it is true, it certainly matters for what is left of trust in the rule of law and general societal trust.

Here's the snippet (which I suspect google will censor...despite it's use as an educational data point for academic discussion of moral group dyanmics.)

HUGE!!!! ECHO!!!! Relating to the post below. There is a link to this video testimony of an ITALIAN JUDGE about LEONARDO’S role in switching votes from President Trump to Joe Biden!!!!

--  Saturday, January 9, 2021

For context of the purge (especially if your news and associations tend to be siloed - like what is inevitable in post secondary institutions) - Tim Pool is reporting Rasmussens polls which have Trump approval (after the Capital breach) at 49%. It has gone up.  Context matters. Cultural biology is like hydrodynamic instability, the more forcefully a light fluid accelerates a heavier one, the greater are the non-linearities. You get rapid bubble anti-bubble formation. In biological approaches to network theory, that tends to represent splinter group formation.

Impeachment & Civil War

 I'm pretty sure Pelosi won't be able to resist impeaching Trump. Blood is in the water. Dem's have full control over social media, legacy media, all three branches of government, and McConnel and all establishment Republicans. Thus there is really no way it won't pass the Senate. Establishment Republicans want to remove any possibility of Trump 2024 or a third party split. Thus, impeachment with the disbarment from public office option is all but inevitable.

I can't believe how much that underestimates the sentiment on the ground. Half of the population have blood fever. They blame Trump for everything. I suspect he's actually de-energized a lot of revolutionary energy on the right even if he has crystallized self-organization. On the left there's no doubt he's been a tumour, but hey Mitt Romney was literally Hitler, so I think most anyone on the right would have energized left angst.

The inescapableness of impeachment due to system momentum makes US Civil War highly likely. Heck, I can imagine myself in different contexts heading down to fight. As I've suspected before, I think you'll see a targeted assassination vector into Civil War on the right. I don't give Pelosi much of a lifespan. I also think Google and Twitter offices better harden up real fast. With Covid you have a lot of suicidal people. Once the realization comes that a certain type of martyrdom comes with lots of fanfare, Pandora's box will be opened.

For a variety of reasons, there just is no way for these systems to escape some nasty level of civil conflict. It is much bigger than Trump, just as it is much bigger than Pelosi's "righteous" anger.  The level of technocratic detachment from reality is too large to believe. One sided justice and loss of faith in the rule of law has ensure no system solution out of this is really possible.

Kaboom.

Woke is the new Roman Christianity

 There's a lot of political upheaval down south right now.  The rationalization that it's better to ignore election fraud than to risk legitimizing Trumpish bullishness will have major ramifications. There was just no way out of the US' quagmire. You either got Trump and establishment tears or you got Biden and populist tears. That the establishment would back itself should be unsurprising. And yet, many people seem genuinely shocked that the judiciary would largely ignore rule of law by choosing Robert's fairly rational stance that "whatever happens when votes are count is what stays happened". Legitimate illegality be dammed.  Nothing is significant enough to overturn the ousting of a destroyer and usurper.

The energizer in all this is Wokeism.

As I've been saying for a few years, Wokeism is a new modular, guerrilla, religion. It's removal of supernaturalism, eschewment of brick-and-mortar organization, intertwinement with governance, and growing enforcement by force of law (and mob based tar-and-feathering) reflect an evolutionary step as significant as the emergence of the "World" religions.

From a Structural Demographic view (see Peter Turchin), Wokeism affords a perfect tool for elite classes to lock out aspirant elites.  Realistically, it doesn't so much lock them out as control the means of their migration.  Only certain vectors, like 

    Media -> politics 

    Hollywood -> politics

    Activist -> politics

    Establishment family -> politics

will soon be legitimized.

When you get to a high-enough level view, it's hard not to see this as an entrenchment of caste. Caste entrenchment is a hard to resist human cultural well. The evolutionary transition literature sees it (role specialization) as one of three of four key criteria for an evolutionary change. It's hard not to see its cultural change equivalent as something other than a landscape "trap".

Thus, I tend to see the whole Woke equality thing as something of a motte and bailey. It's designed to make all us commoners more equal. Heaven knows society needs something here. But it does not make society at large more equal. It, like communism and Christianity before it, make society more caste based.

The political upheaval Wokeism affords is analagous to what ancient Christianity afforded power hungry Roman elites. It is a high cost commitment display that enables a broad, competitor purge. Communism enabled much the same thing. These socialist movements all tend to resonate with progressive proximate causes. I'd wager that since the age of empires (10kya) there has been selection for governing preferences which include some level of "give-back" or "equality". The idea that leaders would, on balance want real liberty and power sharing is a-biological. What gets selected is an appearance of equality with a heart of imbalance. You need the plebes to really believe things are equal and fair. You just can't have those rules apply in any meaningful way (other than symbolically) to you.

The hypocrisy of one-sided racism and gain-power to destroy power are pretty obvious. But, they're being sold hook line and sinker to people. "This time the revolution will be different!". But what scares me, is that communist revolutions, while similar to today's moral political hysteria, missed the religious elements that enabled Christian and Islamic domination. If you read 1984, the Party needed a way, not just to cajole people into belief, but a way to really get them to believe. But this belief required support for hypocrisy. Communism was too utopian. Leaders were still theoretically required to play by the same rules as the commoners. While animals have different needs, 20th century Marxism made no allowance for difference. It just accepted that corruption was inevitable and revolution would have to be continual.

Today's Wokeism turns this around in a very pernicious way. Continual revolution between castes and within the control caste is not needed. Flipping the "patriarchy" is a feature not a bug.  What could go wrong with a governing population with this mindset. It's not like they would think of deplatforming inconvenient voices - say like disbarring Sydney Powell and other people who won't shut up about things that have already been decided....

Choice - If it just saves one life...

 Here's a good one for the "if it just saves one life" crowd.  

Suicide rates drop after school choice laws get adopted....