Reflections on Sinic Korea & Vietnam, Indic Thailand, the dilemmas of Xi, the politics of activist bureaucratisation, and traditions of Chinese statecraft.
The more I read about lineages of various social structures in these essays the clearer to my mind why the Anglo-Saxon model of commerce and democracy has turned out to be so dominant. The base building block of it is built upon freeman farmers who got to keep the proceeds of their own work, and on a collective scale managed their own local affairs. Particularly stemming from the principle that those who pay taxes will decide how they are disposed. Which is the actual true origin of modern democracy as we know it, since it enforced good decision making processes and scrutiny of public officials.
Its actually a principle under threat. Most of modern politics is basically fighting over money - and there is a famous quote by Tytler: “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury".
Lorenzo (and the hbdchick) have mentioned several times the Anglo-Saxon and European development of restricting tribal/kin relationships due to the Church rules on consanguineous marriages. This probably also played a part in the commerce/ democracy orientation you mention.
"... those who pay taxes will decide how they are disposed..." is another equivalent statement that "economics" is really and truly "political economics" and not the sterile math enhanced discipline it had become in the 50's or thereafter.
I tried to find the date of the presumed Tytler statement and could not after a brief search, although there was also a comment it might not be originally attributed to him? In any case, I presume the US founders and framers knew about this problem and still failed to incorporate any equivalent to a balanced budget amendment in the Constitution. I struggle to understand why.
Would it then also be fair to say those parliaments were not truly democratic representations, given rotten boroughs or whatever? The people actually being represented were not the type who would need or demand excess from the public treasury, so balancing budgets was more tenable? And even for the colonial legislatures, their public funding was still "guided" by British rules, etc.?
Lorenzo, this was the highlight of my morning. Brilliant!
Your ability to tie cultural evolution examples to current events in the US and the world was spot-on. I’ve had debates about this on several occasions. There (and here as well), it’s expected that the drones add TDS comments claiming that Orange Man is bad, essentially not even human, and aims to destroy the US and the world order. Granted, the president has his flaws, but no one else would dare to even speak about, let alone attempt, what he’s doing. The reality seems more about exposing and shaking up the entrenched, bureaucratic, self-destructing world order—not in the utopian, destructive leftist way, but in a way that aims to improve it, hence MAGA. This is particularly timely as China flexes its muscles and Russia ramps up its aggression—challenges that require significant improvements to withstand, especially the reindustrialization of the West and achieving energy independence through nuclear power (whether fission or fusion), alongside an increase in fossil fuel extraction. You articulated it so clearly that it crystallized the entire picture an order of magnitude better in my mind.
An interesting note on CCP 'police' operating in other countries, including Western ones, assuming they are entitled to control anyone of Chinese descent. To a lesser extent, the same applies to Russia and Russian speakers anywhere, or any kind of tribal affiliation. It seems every country, including Western ones, has this tribal ownership inclination to some degree.
Also interesting to reflect on various articles pro and con the the US or other Western military (and financial/ economic) level of preparedness vs. the growing CCP militarization. "They won't dare attack Taiwan because ... !!!" vs. "we are starting to fall behind the CCP capabilities in x,y,z, etc." A layman has little basis for real judgement except to pick an "expert" he believes in and follow along.
Another tour do force! Thank you! Very clarifying, but probably deserving of another careful reread.
I noticed that you seem to use the work "ironic" or "ironically" more frequently in this essay than most of your other ones. :-) But there is a lot of irony to go around, even in the Western oriented programs and pogroms.
"This professional-managerial class progressive politics of transnational connections and networks naturally converges towards the digital Legalist-Maoism of Xi’s China. It is quite obvious that transnational networks in the West want their own version of China’s Social Credit system, using “inclusion” and climate alarmism as their justificatory goals."
This near-the-end-phrase is a valuable reminder that even with the advent of Trump's efforts to turn that putrid tide away (and perhaps aided by some of the populists in Europe?), we are far from achieving total rejection of wokeness, arrogance, ignorance, et al., and thus need to avoid complacency in this on-going battle for hearts and minds.
Are there any aspects of the Australian relationship to its Chinese communities that can and should be applied to the Chinese heritage groups in other nations to better protect them from CCP transgressions, etc.?
"The very strong tendency is that the more official discretions matter, the more corruption one is likely to have. Both Latin America and command economies display this pattern very strongly."
Excellent and informative post, but may I suggest the following small revision:
"Both Latin America and command economies display this pattern very strongly, but Brazil IS JUST TOO FUCKING AMAZINGLY CORRUPT FOR WORDS!"
Very nice, and relevant, but I am dubious of the parallel CCP <> professional managerial class. The Tech Feodal lords aka Peter Thiel / Musk tribe, and beyond them all GAFAM with their rapacious attitude and total disregard towards their own users, seem in essence quite similar to the Chinese tech-driven surveillance apparatus. Keywords here are private data collection and centralization, monopoly of information, state<>capitalism coordination - and some. Pretty much what the CCP has been over doing over the past 40 years.
There are a couple of layers here. First, corporations employ quite a lot of the professional managerial class. Musk firing perhaps 80% of the Twitter workforce was, revealing. Vivek Ramaswamy has talked about walking away from his own company because of the tension with the culture of his employees.
Companies doing things which clearly hurt their bottom line because they appeal to the professional-managerial class has definitely been a thing. (“Go woke, go broke” is overstated, but there is a pattern there.)
That having been said, there is a huge issue about privacy and corporate information use. That is subject to potential regulatory solutions. The activist-invasion issues are harder.
The WEF strategy is clearly about trying to interweave the interest of corporate heads with professional-managerial politics.
For a discussion of marrying corporate cartelisation with activism see this post.
I do understand, and I agree, but I still do consider non transparent, arbitrary, profit-maximizing, or even hidden-agendas algorithms controlling our flow of information on social media platforms (natural monopolies), soon empowered by AI (personal coaches / psychologists that know more about you than...yourself) as a much more serious threats. And I think we all should. Much less visible than ESG, even more pervasive, and getting more and more sophisticated by the day. Not to mention the 2 can be combined (as they somehow were during the Biden term (e.g. Facebook))
I have been puzzling about Thailand since I moved here in 2012.
I read a few books...but nothing really sticks.
Yes, Buddhism (and violent Muslims in the south).
Modernity replacing a rural society. Like everywhere, economies of scale render small farming unprofitable (I live in rural Thailand). Two generations ago, a man might live on a plot of land marry and raise a family, as the reason for living. No more.
At one time, Thailand was richer than China, prompting migration from north to south. The Chinese, like everywhere in SE Asia, became prominent in business and commercial classes.
The Thai government eventually took steps to reduce the trend (forcing many Chinese to marry Thai wives) and then China became richer anyway.
The Lieberman book in the references is very good.
Victor Lieberman, ‘Strange Parallels, Southeast Asia in Global Context, c.800–1830: Part I, Integration on the Mainland,’ Cambridge University Press, [2003] 2010.
The French anthropologist Emmanuel Todd also makes the point that riverine SE Asia has a particularly anarchic family system. It is the only non-Christian region without significant kin groups (no local pastoralists is a factor).
The more I read about lineages of various social structures in these essays the clearer to my mind why the Anglo-Saxon model of commerce and democracy has turned out to be so dominant. The base building block of it is built upon freeman farmers who got to keep the proceeds of their own work, and on a collective scale managed their own local affairs. Particularly stemming from the principle that those who pay taxes will decide how they are disposed. Which is the actual true origin of modern democracy as we know it, since it enforced good decision making processes and scrutiny of public officials.
Its actually a principle under threat. Most of modern politics is basically fighting over money - and there is a famous quote by Tytler: “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury".
In Western Europe they have managed something even more bizarre: ways in which non-voting non-citizens get to loot the treasury.
Lorenzo (and the hbdchick) have mentioned several times the Anglo-Saxon and European development of restricting tribal/kin relationships due to the Church rules on consanguineous marriages. This probably also played a part in the commerce/ democracy orientation you mention.
"... those who pay taxes will decide how they are disposed..." is another equivalent statement that "economics" is really and truly "political economics" and not the sterile math enhanced discipline it had become in the 50's or thereafter.
I tried to find the date of the presumed Tytler statement and could not after a brief search, although there was also a comment it might not be originally attributed to him? In any case, I presume the US founders and framers knew about this problem and still failed to incorporate any equivalent to a balanced budget amendment in the Constitution. I struggle to understand why.
Because Parliamentary states could manage debt was the experience of centuries up to that point.
Would it then also be fair to say those parliaments were not truly democratic representations, given rotten boroughs or whatever? The people actually being represented were not the type who would need or demand excess from the public treasury, so balancing budgets was more tenable? And even for the colonial legislatures, their public funding was still "guided" by British rules, etc.?
The bond-holding class was the voting class. This meant a congruence in incentives.
Autocratic monarchies were way more likely to default, partly because few of their own subjects would take the risk, so foreign debtors was the issue.
Lorenzo, this was the highlight of my morning. Brilliant!
Your ability to tie cultural evolution examples to current events in the US and the world was spot-on. I’ve had debates about this on several occasions. There (and here as well), it’s expected that the drones add TDS comments claiming that Orange Man is bad, essentially not even human, and aims to destroy the US and the world order. Granted, the president has his flaws, but no one else would dare to even speak about, let alone attempt, what he’s doing. The reality seems more about exposing and shaking up the entrenched, bureaucratic, self-destructing world order—not in the utopian, destructive leftist way, but in a way that aims to improve it, hence MAGA. This is particularly timely as China flexes its muscles and Russia ramps up its aggression—challenges that require significant improvements to withstand, especially the reindustrialization of the West and achieving energy independence through nuclear power (whether fission or fusion), alongside an increase in fossil fuel extraction. You articulated it so clearly that it crystallized the entire picture an order of magnitude better in my mind.
An interesting note on CCP 'police' operating in other countries, including Western ones, assuming they are entitled to control anyone of Chinese descent. To a lesser extent, the same applies to Russia and Russian speakers anywhere, or any kind of tribal affiliation. It seems every country, including Western ones, has this tribal ownership inclination to some degree.
Also interesting to reflect on various articles pro and con the the US or other Western military (and financial/ economic) level of preparedness vs. the growing CCP militarization. "They won't dare attack Taiwan because ... !!!" vs. "we are starting to fall behind the CCP capabilities in x,y,z, etc." A layman has little basis for real judgement except to pick an "expert" he believes in and follow along.
Another tour do force! Thank you! Very clarifying, but probably deserving of another careful reread.
I noticed that you seem to use the work "ironic" or "ironically" more frequently in this essay than most of your other ones. :-) But there is a lot of irony to go around, even in the Western oriented programs and pogroms.
"This professional-managerial class progressive politics of transnational connections and networks naturally converges towards the digital Legalist-Maoism of Xi’s China. It is quite obvious that transnational networks in the West want their own version of China’s Social Credit system, using “inclusion” and climate alarmism as their justificatory goals."
This near-the-end-phrase is a valuable reminder that even with the advent of Trump's efforts to turn that putrid tide away (and perhaps aided by some of the populists in Europe?), we are far from achieving total rejection of wokeness, arrogance, ignorance, et al., and thus need to avoid complacency in this on-going battle for hearts and minds.
Are there any aspects of the Australian relationship to its Chinese communities that can and should be applied to the Chinese heritage groups in other nations to better protect them from CCP transgressions, etc.?
A lot of it is due to being a pre CCP diaspora. Having a political class and security services taking these issues seriously clearly helps.
Brilliantly clarifying, thanks. Good to hear that Australia is fighting back with some success.
"The very strong tendency is that the more official discretions matter, the more corruption one is likely to have. Both Latin America and command economies display this pattern very strongly."
Excellent and informative post, but may I suggest the following small revision:
"Both Latin America and command economies display this pattern very strongly, but Brazil IS JUST TOO FUCKING AMAZINGLY CORRUPT FOR WORDS!"
ROFL
Very nice, and relevant, but I am dubious of the parallel CCP <> professional managerial class. The Tech Feodal lords aka Peter Thiel / Musk tribe, and beyond them all GAFAM with their rapacious attitude and total disregard towards their own users, seem in essence quite similar to the Chinese tech-driven surveillance apparatus. Keywords here are private data collection and centralization, monopoly of information, state<>capitalism coordination - and some. Pretty much what the CCP has been over doing over the past 40 years.
There are a couple of layers here. First, corporations employ quite a lot of the professional managerial class. Musk firing perhaps 80% of the Twitter workforce was, revealing. Vivek Ramaswamy has talked about walking away from his own company because of the tension with the culture of his employees.
Companies doing things which clearly hurt their bottom line because they appeal to the professional-managerial class has definitely been a thing. (“Go woke, go broke” is overstated, but there is a pattern there.)
That having been said, there is a huge issue about privacy and corporate information use. That is subject to potential regulatory solutions. The activist-invasion issues are harder.
The WEF strategy is clearly about trying to interweave the interest of corporate heads with professional-managerial politics.
For a discussion of marrying corporate cartelisation with activism see this post.
https://www.lorenzofromoz.net/p/which-esg-practical-cartelising-or
I do understand, and I agree, but I still do consider non transparent, arbitrary, profit-maximizing, or even hidden-agendas algorithms controlling our flow of information on social media platforms (natural monopolies), soon empowered by AI (personal coaches / psychologists that know more about you than...yourself) as a much more serious threats. And I think we all should. Much less visible than ESG, even more pervasive, and getting more and more sophisticated by the day. Not to mention the 2 can be combined (as they somehow were during the Biden term (e.g. Facebook))
I have been puzzling about Thailand since I moved here in 2012.
I read a few books...but nothing really sticks.
Yes, Buddhism (and violent Muslims in the south).
Modernity replacing a rural society. Like everywhere, economies of scale render small farming unprofitable (I live in rural Thailand). Two generations ago, a man might live on a plot of land marry and raise a family, as the reason for living. No more.
At one time, Thailand was richer than China, prompting migration from north to south. The Chinese, like everywhere in SE Asia, became prominent in business and commercial classes.
The Thai government eventually took steps to reduce the trend (forcing many Chinese to marry Thai wives) and then China became richer anyway.
For me, Thailand remains largely opaque.
The Lieberman book in the references is very good.
Victor Lieberman, ‘Strange Parallels, Southeast Asia in Global Context, c.800–1830: Part I, Integration on the Mainland,’ Cambridge University Press, [2003] 2010.
The French anthropologist Emmanuel Todd also makes the point that riverine SE Asia has a particularly anarchic family system. It is the only non-Christian region without significant kin groups (no local pastoralists is a factor).
"For me, Thailand remains largely opaque."
I suspect that opacity can apply to many situations, even our attempts to understand the progressive/woke/liberal/commie mindset.
Why is it that there are so many people who just can't seem to "let us alone, already!!"
Really good stuff.
Brilliant