1. The Power of the Written Word

Bethlehem - a graveyard of industrial capitalism.


Chatted today with Peter and Jason about my thesis ("The Third Great Transition - Peak Oil and Post-Industrial Political Economy").

Underlying theme: the transformative power of ideas and discussion.

Discussion can change lives dramatically, and empower individuals and communities to take amazing changes that had previously been ruled out as impossible.

During the 1960s, the mere introduction of the discussion of the problems facing poor, "hopeless" black communities led to empowerment, organization, activism and ultimately rebellion when their neighborhoods were threatened by development.

Today all three of us felt empowered simply by talking about peak oil and the impending collapse of the global industrial capitalist system. Simply by sitting around and chatting, with a political topic on the mind, we scanned the problems, posed solutions, and began to feel hopeful, that there are all kinds of potential positive outcomes in the fallout of capitalism's demise, and that we could do something to foster those outcomes.

Tonight, reading Sartre's "Marxism and Existentialism," I was again struck with the importance of ideas. While recognizing the necessary imposition of economic and social relations upon the "superstructure" of ideas, Sartre points out that even this "determinism" of Marx contains tremendous emphasis on the power of human consciousness, and in particular, class consciousness. Without ideas, humans could not be human. The ability to shape and form our own thoughts and feelings is in essence the most human power that we possess.

Without acknowledgement and awareness, there can be no change. Thus the revolution cannot occur until we recognize ourselves as workers, wage-slaves, the oppressed, but once we begin to do so, anything is possible.

What Sartre was interested in was how to reconcile Marxism and Existentialism, a dilemma I sometimes find difficult. It is more properly stated as the contradiction between understanding objective reality or history, and understanding concrete subjective reality or life. The external vs. the internal. The universe vs. the individual. Whereas one appears as an immense otherly force with no goal or intention, just cold deadly cause-and-effect and/or random chaotic noise, the other is experienced through freedom and meaning.

Any philosopher is struck by this jarring discrepancy between the objective and subjective, and either ignores the dilemma and focuses on only one of these arenas (Kierkegaard), or tries to fit the one with the characteristics of the other (Ayn Rand). But Sartre finds that "the truth is that subjectivity is neither everything nor nothing; it represents a moment in the objective process, that in which externality is internalized, and this moment is perpetually eliminated only to be perpetually reborn."

In other words, there is an inseperable relationship between objects in-themselves and consciousness-of those objects. As in quantum mechanics, it is impossible to observe an unaltered process because every observation changes the observed.

Simply by speaking the truth, or not, reality is altered. Words have power, and the most powerful weapon of the capitalist-imperialist system is its ability to dominate and manipulate our thinking, to maintain hegemony over our very ideas and keep them within a safe, mainstream, impotent, obedient framework.

As such I was led to form this blog, and we'll see if it fulfills its worth. If in any way it can further the raising of consciousness and aid in the construction of a new society, then it will have proved time well spent. Even if it only serves to further my own understanding of this immense crossroads at which humanity finds itself, that may be good enough.

Peter, Jason and I agreed that the most important thing is that discussions like ours happen with much greater frequency, and involving many more people. Discussion, as a social activity, introduces a much more powerful element into the exploration of ideas, which is essentially a social element. Through discussing with others, we not only gain understanding, we also gain mutual trust and social efficacy - the ability to make changes beyond our own individual lives. In communicating our own beliefs and observations, and having those validated by others, we begin to recognize the social and political aspects of our oppression, perhaps for the first time, and we therefore also begin the process of social and political change.

When people begin discussing the end of capitalism, we can start building our new world.