No matter how much and how fast our societies are developing, the route to democracy is a slow and painful one, and there are specific problems that nobody ever manages to solve.
- The Auditor General’s Report. No matter how many times these talented people give their opinions at no matter what level of government, everybody always ignores them. It’s like governments get the report, check the “done that” box, and go ahead and spend the money the way they wanted to in the first place. They might as well have a permanent document with a response box at the top for changing the date.
- Government Procurement, Especially Military. No matter what the Auditor General says, every level of government is mired in an oleo of clashing objectives involving financial chicanery, political expediency, conflicts of interest and all the regulations designed to (unsuccessfully) thwart them. With the military, the average time it takes to replace an outmoded piece of equipment like a fighter jet is fifteen years after the need is noticed, meaning at the best of times our armed forces are working with technology that is twenty years past its prime.
- Introducing Democracy Developed countries can’t rush the development of democracy in less advanced countries. It seems there is a set of steps every society must go through to achieve democracy, and nobody can push a country ahead.
We see this in the First Nations of Canada, where each tribe, immersed as they are in a larger democratic society, still has to go through, for example, the Oligarchy stage, where certain families catch onto the advantages of education and government handouts before the rest of their people, take control of the democratic process and fill all the positions with their members. The most egregious example is a tribe of less than a thousand people paying their elected chief more than the mayors of major cities earn.
- Festival Security. No matter how much the security services try, any event that involves large numbers of people gathering freely is a magnet for those who want to take revenge on society for the way they have been treated. A few years ago, it was bombs. At the moment it’s vehicles. Who knows what will come next?
- The Income Gap. The rich continue to get richer while the poor get poorer. The statistics are unbelievable. The top 20% of Americans hold over 70% of the nation’s wealth, while the bottom 50% hold less than 3%. In Canada, the top 20% of people hold 65% of the wealth while the bottom 40% own just over 3%. If you want jaw-dropping stats, the top 1% of Americans hold over 30% of the wealth. Conspiracy theory, anyone?
- Gnawing Away. And talking about stripping a carcass, have you ever noticed that there is no more efficient method of removing the meat from a bone than human incisors, with the bone held firmly in two hands. Preferably anchored firmly by two elbows on the table. Emily Post, you’re fighting evolution.
The Bottom Line.
With the exception of #6, it is unavoidable to conclude that most of the evils that plague modern society stem from humanity’s innate greed. Unfortunately, most of our attempts to fix these problems have involved more control, more regulations, more conflict. It reminds us of a famous quote by Albert Einstein that insanity involves repeating the same action multiple times and expecting the result to change. The only solutions that will ever work involve the long, slow process of fostering humanity’s inborn sense of empathy. We have a long way to go, folks, and I hope our hesitant steps towards saving the environment give us the time to make the change.