We are headed back to a neo-feudal state of affairs characterized by resource shortages, poverty, backwardness, larger spread between rich and poor,
greater struggle for lower rewards, shorter and more brutal lifespans, conflict over basic resources, growth of non-governmental power sources like
criminal networks and ruthless multinational cartels, etc.
Tech will not save us. Finance will not save us. It is regression to the mean: a return from an unnatural condition brought about by a widespread
abundance in resources and fuels over the last 100-200 years. This "long boom" is now ending and we are returning to the natural human state of
affairs: struggle and hardship.
Given this grim unfolding backdrop, the only "ideology" that works is no ideology at all: that is to say, people will act based on "what they can
get away with at the moment" rather than based on an abstract "ism" like communism, capitalism, conservatism, liberalism, etc. The new rules will
be smash and grab, run like hell, hit first, and hit hard.
The long-term trend is thus neo-feudal: medieval feudal societies (be they European or Asiatic) were not structured around lofty political ideals.
They were structured around thumping skulls. The social structures that will develop in such conditions resemble slightly more complex versions of
prison/ghetto gangs on the micro-levels and high-tech mafias on the macro-level. Anything more "dainty," such as our current level of ideological
complexity and rhetoric, will get warped out of all recognition and be consigned to the ashheap of history.
This is the future. This is what we are looking at. We no longer have the luxury of "isms." Brute force, ruthless manipulation, and in-your-face
muscle flexing will characterize the political landscape of the coming millennium.
[edit on 23-11-2008 by silent thunder]
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