The Necessity of Self Deception
One of the most useful skills a politician can learn is how to believe a thing not because of rational conviction but because of expediency. By that I don't mean pretending to believe it - that is lying and may be found out - but actually believing it. This adds the force of sincerity to a political argument. I imagine Tony Blair genuinely expected to find WMD in Iraq. At least he did after he had convinced himself they were there.
This is a basic human ability - to convince ourselves of the truth of something beyond all reasonable evidence, sometimes in direct contradiction to obvious facts. It is one that we all use, not only politicians. (Some might expect me to discuss religous conviction here but I will not. I am, to declare an interest, a believer myself, and I do not see the claims of religion, or of Christianity at least - I will only speak of what I know - as simply falsifiable. That is a discussion for another time.)
A common use of it today is the justification of power, privilege or wealth by those who have it, indicating of course why they should keep it. This has a long history from the divine right of kings through theories of racial superiority through to market outcomes and 'fair' competition.
Believing their position of power and wealth is deserved, whether by parentage, racial status or marketplace success allows the priveleged to ignore the less fortunate as unworthy and to deny part or all of their obligations to society. It was this very attitude held by Charles I that sparked the English civil war and led eventually to the limited monarchy that could only govern with the (at least nominal) consent of the governed however difficult it might have been in practice for that consent to have been withdrawn.
Some of you will object to my deliberate juxtaposition of discredited beilefs such as the hereditary principle (the children of the 'deserving' are 'deserving' and so on forever) and racial classification (I am not myself convinced that 'race' has any useful meaning) with 'free' market outcomes. Surely markets are impartial and select those who are most 'deserving'?
But markets do not exist in a vacuum. They are controlled and defined by society and government. The form of corporate capitalism which is now the undisputed economic paradigm in the West requires a large amount of legal infrastructure and regulation to function even according to the most radical 'free' marketeers. Markets in that sense do not exist in a state of nature.
This is not to say they are necessarily a bad thing. Many things that are desirable do not exist in a state of nature. Civilisation itself can be seen as the exchange of natural behaviour for material benefit. It may not be natural to work in an office, but neither is it natural to be warm in the winter or to live to be seventy. This is why 'back to nature' movements have failed - the benefits of civilisation outwiegh the costs - for most people at least. All too often the 'nature' that we are told to return to is no such thing but a different and usually earlier form of civilisation. It may indeed better, but calling it 'natural' doesn't prove anything.
To return to the main point: Markets are contrained and constructed by society. They therefore produce certain results. But they are not a level playing field. Leaving aside the genetic, some people have monetary and educational advantages confered on them by their parents which mean those without such benefits can rarely compete. The fact that some do and can does not prove that there is not a problem. The fact that some people survive cancer does not mean it is not dangerous.
'Free' markets may allow for such individual anomolies in a way that more obviously prescriptive systems do not but their results on the large scale are clearly to preserve privilige. Even the older systems were not impervious to social climbers and arrivistes. 'Free' markets use them as a justification. But they are the exception and not the rule.
To put it more clearly: People don't succeed because of talent and hard work although these help. So many people succeed without either and so many fail with both that this thesis is clearly untenable and yet is still commonly held. We do not like to believe that our fate is out of our hands. Hubristically we believe we can master destiny. Not only can but must. We see it as a moral failure in the individuals that do not. We refuse to face the facts. Most people aren't rich. Most people don't make miraculous recoveries from illness.
Yet when it comes to ourselves - we all expect to be the exception. We are the hero of our own narrative. The hero always survives the hail of bullets. He always gets the girl. We expect nothing less for ourselves.
The large monetary rewards given to the powerful are often justified in terms of market value. This ignores the fact that these rewards are determined by people - in this case usually the powerful people concerned themselves or their friends and colleagues. The 'impartial' market has very little to do with it. Otherwise CEO's would be paid only as a proportion of the profit/share dividend of their companies. This of course never happens.
If we wanted to create a level playing field for free markets to operate in we should first of all ban all corporations. These massive pools of capital and people distort the market and lead to monopolitic and ologopolistic behaviour. We should also have all children reared communally as in the Israeli Kibbutz or A Brave New World. Then, as long as inheritance of money is also outlawed everyone will begin with an equal chance and market merit will determine their success.
Unfortuantely I do not think many 'free' market disciples would support such a programme. Until they do do not believe what their economic theory tells them. I do not doubt that they believe it. I do doubt that they have thought about it.
This is a basic human ability - to convince ourselves of the truth of something beyond all reasonable evidence, sometimes in direct contradiction to obvious facts. It is one that we all use, not only politicians. (Some might expect me to discuss religous conviction here but I will not. I am, to declare an interest, a believer myself, and I do not see the claims of religion, or of Christianity at least - I will only speak of what I know - as simply falsifiable. That is a discussion for another time.)
A common use of it today is the justification of power, privilege or wealth by those who have it, indicating of course why they should keep it. This has a long history from the divine right of kings through theories of racial superiority through to market outcomes and 'fair' competition.
Believing their position of power and wealth is deserved, whether by parentage, racial status or marketplace success allows the priveleged to ignore the less fortunate as unworthy and to deny part or all of their obligations to society. It was this very attitude held by Charles I that sparked the English civil war and led eventually to the limited monarchy that could only govern with the (at least nominal) consent of the governed however difficult it might have been in practice for that consent to have been withdrawn.
Some of you will object to my deliberate juxtaposition of discredited beilefs such as the hereditary principle (the children of the 'deserving' are 'deserving' and so on forever) and racial classification (I am not myself convinced that 'race' has any useful meaning) with 'free' market outcomes. Surely markets are impartial and select those who are most 'deserving'?
But markets do not exist in a vacuum. They are controlled and defined by society and government. The form of corporate capitalism which is now the undisputed economic paradigm in the West requires a large amount of legal infrastructure and regulation to function even according to the most radical 'free' marketeers. Markets in that sense do not exist in a state of nature.
This is not to say they are necessarily a bad thing. Many things that are desirable do not exist in a state of nature. Civilisation itself can be seen as the exchange of natural behaviour for material benefit. It may not be natural to work in an office, but neither is it natural to be warm in the winter or to live to be seventy. This is why 'back to nature' movements have failed - the benefits of civilisation outwiegh the costs - for most people at least. All too often the 'nature' that we are told to return to is no such thing but a different and usually earlier form of civilisation. It may indeed better, but calling it 'natural' doesn't prove anything.
To return to the main point: Markets are contrained and constructed by society. They therefore produce certain results. But they are not a level playing field. Leaving aside the genetic, some people have monetary and educational advantages confered on them by their parents which mean those without such benefits can rarely compete. The fact that some do and can does not prove that there is not a problem. The fact that some people survive cancer does not mean it is not dangerous.
'Free' markets may allow for such individual anomolies in a way that more obviously prescriptive systems do not but their results on the large scale are clearly to preserve privilige. Even the older systems were not impervious to social climbers and arrivistes. 'Free' markets use them as a justification. But they are the exception and not the rule.
To put it more clearly: People don't succeed because of talent and hard work although these help. So many people succeed without either and so many fail with both that this thesis is clearly untenable and yet is still commonly held. We do not like to believe that our fate is out of our hands. Hubristically we believe we can master destiny. Not only can but must. We see it as a moral failure in the individuals that do not. We refuse to face the facts. Most people aren't rich. Most people don't make miraculous recoveries from illness.
Yet when it comes to ourselves - we all expect to be the exception. We are the hero of our own narrative. The hero always survives the hail of bullets. He always gets the girl. We expect nothing less for ourselves.
The large monetary rewards given to the powerful are often justified in terms of market value. This ignores the fact that these rewards are determined by people - in this case usually the powerful people concerned themselves or their friends and colleagues. The 'impartial' market has very little to do with it. Otherwise CEO's would be paid only as a proportion of the profit/share dividend of their companies. This of course never happens.
If we wanted to create a level playing field for free markets to operate in we should first of all ban all corporations. These massive pools of capital and people distort the market and lead to monopolitic and ologopolistic behaviour. We should also have all children reared communally as in the Israeli Kibbutz or A Brave New World. Then, as long as inheritance of money is also outlawed everyone will begin with an equal chance and market merit will determine their success.
Unfortuantely I do not think many 'free' market disciples would support such a programme. Until they do do not believe what their economic theory tells them. I do not doubt that they believe it. I do doubt that they have thought about it.
posted by David at 10:14 am
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