Preface p. xii-x.
To one who is living one’s life as a democrat,
egalitarianism is a topic that affects not only the head, but the heart. […] the collective voice of the people
continues to be, ultimately powerful. It
is this […] that keeps alive human freedom and human rights […]. […] this type of political stance is quite
ancient.
We participate in this type of political leverage […], we exert
it because we are suspicious of all governance and wish to limit the powers of
those who lead, and may try therefore to rule.
To a democrat the power of centralized government, be it national or
local, is a perpetual threat to the personal autonomy of its citizens, and ultimately
it is the potential for rebellion by the rank and file that keeps our personal
autonomies intact.
Our earliest precursor, in this respect, may well have been
an African ape living some 5 to 7 million years ago. This vanished ancestral hominoid was likely
to have formed political coalitions that enabled the rank and file, those who
otherwise would have been utterly subordinated, to whittle away at the powers
of the alpha individuals whose regular practice was to bully them.
[…] in holding onto their personal autonomies, the
collective weapon of the rank and file has been their ability to define their
own social life in moral terms, and to back up their thoughts about political
parity with pointed actions in the form of collectivized social
sanctioning.
2 comments:
This is probably worth reading! Boehm's "Moral Origins" helped me understand that H. sapiens could indeed pull off an egalitarian society (with effort and constant vigilance of course).
So far so good! Searching for a map away from letting the bully's run things. Might be something to get pointed in the right direction.
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