DemocracyThe God That Failed (38 page)

First, almost by definition it follows that with the establishment of a city government interracial, tribal, ethnic, and clannish-familial tensions will increase because the monopolist, whoever he is, must be of one ethnic background rather than another; hence, his being the monopolist will be considered by the citizens of other ethnic backgrounds as an insulting setback, i.e., as an act of arbitrary discrimination against the people of another race, tribe, or clan. The delicate balance of peaceful interracial, interethnic, and interfamilial cooperation, achieved through an intricate system of spatial and functional integration (association) and separation (segregation), will be upset. Second, this insight leads directly to the answer as to how a single judge can possibly outmaneuver all others. In brief, to overcome the resistance by competing judges, an aspiring monopolist must shore up added support in public opinion. In an ethnically mixed milieu this typically means playing the "race card." The prospective monopolist must raise the racial, tribal, or clanish consciousness among citizens of his own race, tribe, clan, etc., and promise, in return for their support, to be
more
than an impartial judge in matters relating to one's own race, tribe, or clan (that is, exactly what citizens of other ethnic backgrounds are afraid of, i.e., of being treated with
less
than impartiality).
¹²

At this stage in this sociological reconstruction let us, without further explanation, briefly introduce a few additional steps required to arrive at a realistic contemporary scenario regarding race, sex, society, and state. Naturally, a monopolist will try to maintain his position and possibly even turn it into an hereditary title (i.e., become a king). However, accomplishing this within an ethnically or tribally mixed city is a far more difficult task than within a homogeneous rural community. Instead, in big cities governments are far more likely to take on the form of a democratic republic—with "open entry" into the position of supreme ruler, competing political parties, and popular elections.
¹³
In the
course of the political centralization process
¹⁴
—the territorial expansion of one government at the expense of another—this big city model of government, then, will become essentially its only form: that of a democratic state exercising a judicial monopoly over a territory with racially and /or ethnically widely diverse populations.

¹²
For a sociological treatment of the first (predemocratic) stage in the development of city states, characterized by aristocratic-patrician government founded on and riven by families (clans) and family conflicts, see Max Weber,
The
City
(New York: Free Press, 1958), chap. 3. See also note 16 below.

¹³
This statement regarding the characteristically democratic-republican —rather than monarchical—form of government in large commercial cities should not be misinterpreted as a simple empirical-historical proposition. Indeed, historically the formation of governments predates the development of large commercial centers. Most governments had been monarchical or princely governments, and when large commercial cities first arose the power of kings and princes typically also extended initially to these newly developing urban areas. Instead, the above
statement should be interpreted as a
sociological
proposition concerning the unlikeliness of the
endogenous
origin of royal or princely rule over large commercial centers with ethnically mixed populations, i.e., as an answer to an essentially hypothetical and counterfactual question. See on this Max Weber,
Soziologie,
Weltgeschichtliche
Analysen,
Politik
(Stuttgart: Kroener, 1964), pp. 41-42, who notes that kings and nobles, even if they resided in cities, were nonetheless decidedly
not
city-kings and
city-nobles.
The centers of their power rested outside of cities, in the countryside, and the grip that they held on the great commercial centers was only tenuous. Hence, the first experiments with democratic-republican forms of government occurred characteristically in cities which broke off and gained independence from their predominantly monarchical and rural surroundings.

Ill

While the judicial monopoly of governments extends nowadays typically far beyond a single city and in some cases over almost an entire continent, the consequences for the relations between the races and sexes and spatial approximation and segregation of government (monopoly) can still be best observed in the great cities and their decline from centers of civilization to centers of degeneration and decay.

With a central government extending over cities and the countryside, countries, inlanders, and foreigners are created. This has no immediate effect on the countryside, where there are no foreigners (members of different ethnicities, races, etc.). But in the great trading centers, where there are mixed populations, the legal distinction between inlander and foreigner (rather than ethnically or racially distinct private property owners) will almost invariably lead to some form of forced exclusion and a reduced level of interethnic cooperation. Moreover, with a central state in place, the physical segregation and separation of city and countryside will be systematically reduced. In order to exercise its judicial monopoly, the central government must be able to access every inlander's private property, and to do so it must take control of all existing roads and even expand the existing system of roadways. Different households and villages are thus brought into closer contact than they might have preferred, and the physical distance and separation of city
and countryside will be significantly diminished. Thus, internally, forced integration will be promoted.

¹⁴
On the eliminative competition and inherent tendency of states toward centralization and territorial expansion—ultimately to the point of the establishment of a world government—see chaps. 5,11, and 12.

Naturally, this tendency toward forced integration due to the monopolization of roads and streets will be most pronounced in the cities. This tendency will be further stimulated if, as is typical, the government takes its seat in a city. A popularly elected government cannot help using its judicial monopoly to engage in redistributive policies in favor of its ethnic or racial constituency, which will invariably attract even more of its own tribe's members, and with changes in the government more members of even more and different tribes will be drawn from the countryside to the capital city to receive either government jobs or handouts. As a result, not only will the capital become relatively "oversized" (as other cities shrink). At the same time, due to the monopolization of "public" streets—whereon everyone may proceed wherever he wants—all forms of ethnic, tribal, or racial tensions and animosities will be stimulated.

Moreover, while interracial, tribal, and ethnic marriages were formerly rare and restricted to the upper strata of the merchant class, with the arrival of bureaucrats and bums from various racial, tribal, and ethnic backgrounds in the capital city, the frequency of interethnic marriage will increase, and the focus of interethnic sex—even without marriage—will increasingly shift from the upper class of merchants to the lower classes—even to the lowest class of welfare recipients. Rather than genetic luxuration, the consequence is increased genetic pauperization, a tendency furthered by the fact that government welfare support will naturally lead to an increase in the birthrate of welfare recipients relative to the birthrate of other members, in particular of members of the upper class of their tribe or race. As a result of this overproportional growth of low and even underclass people and an increasing number of ethnically, tribally, racially mixed offspring especially in the lower and lowest social strata, the character of democratic (popular) government will gradually change as well. Rather than the "race card" being essentially the only instrument of politics, politics becomes increasingly "class politics." The government rulers can and will no longer rely exclusively on their ethnic, tribal, or racial appeal and support, but increasingly they must try to find support across tribal or racial lines by appealing to the universal (not tribe or race specific) feeling of envy and egalitarianism, i.e., to social class (the untouchables or the slaves versus the masters, the workers versus the capitalists, the poor versus the rich, etc.).
^15,16

¹⁵
See on this Helmut Schoeck,
Envy:
A
Theory
of
Social
Behavior
(New York: Harcourt, Brace and World, 1970); Rothbard,
Egalitarianism
as
a
Revolt
Against
Nature
and

The increasing admixture of egalitarian class politics to the preexisting tribal policies leads to even more—racial and social—tension and hostility and to an even greater proliferation of the low and under-class population. In addition to certain ethnic or tribal groups being driven out of the cities as a result of tribal policies, increasingly also members of the upper classes of all ethnic or tribal groups will leave the city for the suburbs (only to be followed—by means of public (government) transportation
—by those very people whose behaviors they had tried to escape).
¹⁷
With the upper class and the merchants leaving in larger numbers, however, one of the last remaining civilizing forces will be weakened, and what is left behind in the cities will represent an increasingly negative selection of the population: of government bureaucrats who work but no longer live there, and of the lowlifes and the social outcasts of all tribes and races who live there yet who increasingly do not work but survive on welfare. (Just think of Washington, D.C.)

Other
Essays;
and esp. "Freedom, Inequality, Primitivism, and the Division of Labor," in ibid.

¹⁶
For a sociological treatment of this second—democratic or "plebeian"—stage in the development of city government, based on and riven by classes and "class conflicts" (rather than clans and family conflicts, as during the preceding development stage of patrician government), see Max Weber,
The
City,
chap. 4. In contrast to patrician city government, plebeian government, Weber observes importantly, is characterized by

a changed concept of the nature of law The beginning of legislation paralleled the abolition of patrician rule. Legislation initially took the form of charismatic statutes by the
aesymnetes
[governors possessing supreme power for a limited time]. But soon the new creation of permanent laws was accepted. In fact new legislation by the ecclesia became so usual as to produce a state of continuous flux. Soon a purely secular administration of justice applied to the laws or, in Rome, to the instructions of the magistrate. The creation of laws reached such a fluid state that eventually in Athens the question was directed yearly to the people whether existing laws should be maintained or amended. Thus it became an accepted premise that the law is artificially created and that it should be based upon the approval of those to whom it will apply, (pp. 170-71)

Likewise, in the medieval city states of Europe the "establishment of rule by the
popolo
had similar consequences. ... It, too, ground out enormous editions of city laws and codified the common law and court rules (trial law) producing a surplus of statutes of all kinds and an excess of officials" (p. 172). Hand in hand with the changed concept of law goes a different political conduct.

The political justice of the
popolo
system with its system of official espionage, its preference for anonymous accusations, accelerated inquisitorial procedures against magnates, and simplified proof (by "notoriety") was the democratic counterpart of the Venetian trials of the [aristocratic-patrician] Council of Ten. Objectively the
popolo
system was identified by: the exclusion of all members of families with a knightly style of life from office; obligating the notables by pledges of good conduct; placing the notables' family under bail for all members; the establishment of a special criminal law for the political offenses of the
magnates,
especially insulting the honor of a member of the populace; the prohibition of a noble's acquiring property bordering on that of a member of the populace without the latter's agreement Since noble families could be expressly accepted as part of the populace, [however,] even the offices of the
popolo
were nearly always occupied by noblemen, (pp. 160-61)

When one would think that matters could not possibly become worse, they do. After the race and the class card have been played and done their devastating work, the government turns to the sex and gender card, and "racial justice" and "social justice" are complemented by "gender justice."
¹⁸
The establishment of a government—a judicial monopoly—not only implies that formerly separated jurisdictions (as within ethnically or racially segregated districts, for instance) are forcibly integrated; it implies at the same time that formerly fully integrated jurisdictions (as within households and families) will be forcibly broken down or even dissolved. Rather than regarding intra-family or household matters (including subjects such as abortion, for instance) as no one else's business to be judged and arbitrated within the family by the head of the household or family members,
¹⁹
once a judicial monopoly has been established, its agents—the government—also become and will naturally strive to expand their role as judge and arbitrator of last resort in all family matters. To gain popular support for its role the government (besides playing one tribe, race, or social class against another) will likewise promote divisiveness within the family: between the sexes—husbands and wives—and the generations—parents and children.
²⁰
Once again, this will be particularly noticeable in the big cities.

Every form of government welfare—the
compulsory wealth or
income transfer from "haves" to "havenots"
lowers the value of a person's
membership in an extended family-household system as a social system of mutual cooperation and help and assistance. Marriage loses value. For parents the value and importance of a "good" upbringing (education) of their own children is reduced. Correspondingly, for children less value will be attached and less respect paid to their own parents. Owing to the high concentration of welfare recipients, in the big cities family disintegration is already well advanced. In appealing to gender and generation (age) as a source of political support and promoting and enacting sex (gender) and family legislation, invariably the authority of heads of families and households and the "natural" intergenerational hierarchy within families is weakened and the value of a multi-generational family as the basic unit of human society diminished. Indeed, as should be clear, as soon as the government's law and legislation supersedes family law and legislation (including inter-family arrangements in conjunction with marriages, joint-family offspring, inheritance, etc.), the value and importance of the institution of a family can only be systematically eroded. For what is a family if it cannot even find and provide for its own internal law and order! At the same time, as should be clear as well but has not been sufficiently noted, from the point of view of the government's rulers, their ability to interfere in internal family matters must be regarded as the ultimate prize and the pinnacle of their own power. To exploit tribal or racial resentments or class envy to one's personal advantage is one thing. It is quite another accomplishment to use the quarrels arising within families to break up the entire—generally harmonious—system of autonomous families: to uproot individuals from their families to isolate and atomize them, thereby increasing the state's power over them. Accordingly, as the government's family policy is implemented, divorce, singledom, single parenting, and illegitimacy, incidents of parent, spouse, and child-neglect or abuse, and the variety and frequency of "nontraditional" lifestyles (homosexuality, lesbianism, communism, and occultism) increase as well.
²¹

¹⁷
See on this tendency Edward Banfield,
The
Unheavenly
City
Revisited
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1974).

¹⁸
See on this Murray N. Rothbard, "The Great Women's Lib Issue: Setting it Stra ight," in
Egalitarianism
as
a
Revolt
Against
Nature
and
Other
Essays;
Michael Levin,
Feminism
and
Liberty
(New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1987).

¹⁹
See Robert Nisbet,
Prejudices:
A
Philosophical
Dictionary
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1982), pp. 1-8,110-17.

²⁰
See on this Murray N. Rothbard, "Kid Lib," in
Egalitarianism
as
a
Revolt
Against
Nature
and
Other
Essays.