In the previous series of blog posts we explored the question of why unemployment is so high, which led to the ways in which Consumerism is coming to the end of its usefulness as an economic engine. That in turn led us to evaluate War as alternative manufacturer of employment. Although War initially seemed to us like an ideal employer, we soon discovered a dark side which not only forced a reevaluation of War’s economic strengths, it further led us to the conclusion that War needs to be eliminated as soon as possible if humanity is to survive.
If you recall, we said that Employment-Creation Systems (ECS) need three characteristics in order to be viable. They need to (1) create jobs, (2) distribute jobs and (3) make jobs meaningful. But in order for our new ECS to additionally serve as a viable replacement for War, we need to expand on those criteria a bit. A War-replacing ECS needs to:
- Create jobs that challenge nations and individuals to their absolute limits.
- Match people with those jobs.
- Make jobs meaningful by placing them in a larger context that
- Serves as a test of competing ideologies
- Offers a definitive answer.
The new part of criteria one is important, because people and nations both need continue continual challenges in order to stay at their best. It’s no coincidence that Wars often come at times of peace and plenitude when things seem almost to be going too smoothly and too well. Criteria two is no different from any ECS, and we’ve already discussed subclause “a” in criteria three.
Subclause “b,” however, turns out to be the real sticking point, the secret to why War has kept its position of primacy in human affairs over the millennia. War is definitive. It has clear winners and losers at the end of contests in which nothing has been held back, and both sides are literally fighting for their lives. War is physical, and immediate, and its results are self-evident. For any substitute for War to not devolve into an actual War, therefore, it must offer results equally as incontestable and final.
NEXT WEEK: Play ball!
2 thoughts on “I grew up in a generation that vowed never again to go to war. And yet here we are, in it up to our eyeballs all over again. It doesn’t seem to matter who’s in office, or how many protests there are. When will it ever stop? *”