Continental Empire Solution

[cyborg]

A continental empire of mass culture and mass politic tends to stifle natural individual excellence by imposing egalitarianism, else whole system management becomes impossible. A mass culture and mass politic composed of equals forced into a socially-imposed average always results in a mediocre, stagnant civilization. A mediocre civilization works toward lateral expansion, swallowing up and wasting resources, never seeking ascendancy by way of its natural heroes; those rare unequals greater than the common form but not permitted to stand out. The failures of yesterday's Roman Empire, Soviet Union and today's American globalisation, close cousins in common goal (do not confuse methodology with goal here), serve us with examples.

The path out of this predictable mass entropy is to afford high autonomy to the many thousands of separate, self-sustaining, non-dependent communities within the continental boundary. The continental empire itself is composed of these independent city-state cells, each under different forms of management and holding value systems that best fit the locals. If one cell should fail, there is no noticeable effect upon the whole.

The city-state units could be called upon to contribute expert soldiers toward the continental defense, expert negotiators toward diplomacy and expert consultants toward technological excellence for large R&D projects. The best individuals, as tested and proven local heroes, are given opportunity to aspire toward higher greatness in service to the whole. Beyond this, imperial unity should be minimized.

The absence of contiguous sprawling metropolis helps assure the isolation of biological pathogens and makes impossible the million citizen deaths resulting from just one nuclear attack. Isolated city-states composed of some thousands make large criminal syndicate enterprises much less possible, preventing the rise of wealthy oligarchs who overtake top rulership that always exploits the proletariat by the millions.

The existence of autonomous city-states keeps intact biological heritage and the natural development of unique wholesome cultures. The continental empire itself benefits by having a preserved diversity of bloodlines and cultures rather than an enormous blended monoculture within its boundaries. Each citizen would hold more confidence in knowing that unlike mass economies, success and hope for the future is dependent on local merit and people you know personally rather than the whim of distant impersonal events far removed from one's own control.

[cyborg]

A healthy, abundant garden has a diverse mix of plant species. A garden composed of only a single plant species will find itself overcome by a fungus or insect plague that best favors the one species. The diverse garden is not vulnerable to one predator or parasite. Even if one plant species finds itself ravaged, the other species live on and the whole garden retains its health and beauty.

[Roland]

Development of individual polities seems to be an ideal solution, but what is the feasibility of the implementation of such a system?

To what extent are there polity-sized communities in any western country? To what extent can their autonomy be wrenched from the grip of local and federal liberal representative systems?

[cyborg]

Most of the Communist and National Socialist comrades have solutions that worked in the past for overcoming the existing order. Their methods have worked before, in Russia and in Germany respectively. When these methodologies became overall goals that were expected to last, they each failed.

[Roland]

With regard to my first question, are there actual homogenous communities capable of evolving into polities in America and Europe?

[cyborg]

We could divide our macrostate of 300 million into microstates of no more than 25,000 maximum occupants. That gives us 12,000 units, ideally arcologies that take advantage of vertical space, or at least urbanates.

We need to know how many square kilometers need to be reserved per polity. I would select the least ideal terrain that one could build and sustainably farm upon, making that the minimum set aside for each microstate. We need to know how many square kilometers are available for this type of habitat within the continent. I expect we'll have far more than enough, with vast excess remaining for permanent wilderness preserve.

In my estimation, the existence of other races within the continental borders, housed within their own polities, would impact the whole (crime, EGI, welfare) far less than under the existing design. We're locally sustained and generally agrarian in this model, so unemployment does not exist at all.

To answer your question: there certainly are compatable ethnic collections, 10k to 20k in population, sometimes much more, sometimes less, throughout the continent. The starter groups are out there.

[NKVD]

What is an urbanate?

[cyborg]

5.5.6 What is an "Urbanate?"

Urbanates are what would likely replace today's cities in a Technate. Today's cities are a hodge-podge of randomly thrown together elements that comprise a bulky, inflexible, and entirely inconvenient area of living. On top of this, cities are allowed, even obliged, to continuously grow, thus contributing to such problems as overcrowding, violent crime, traffic congestion, and long travel times between destinations.
Urbanates, on the other hand, would be planned from the top-down to the individual doorknob. In this way, the most convenient and efficient methods of transportation could be employed. The size of Urbanates themselves would be small and controlled, perhaps with populations of around 14,000. Of course, this is speculative, and an optimum sized population could be calculated only with the latest scientific data.
Urbanates would suffer none of the problems that plague our cities today. Pollution, traffic problems, overcrowding, undisposed garbage and waste, flooding, and bad housing would all be things of the past.

5.5.7 It seems pretty far fetched to rebuild so much, is this really feasible?

Most of what Technocracy has proposed revolves around industrial or other types of efficiency. With financial considerations out of the way, our industrial capacity would be released to its maximum potential, for the benefit of the entire population. It was estimated in the earlier part of the century that if Urbanates were built, and the cities abandoned and salvaged for resources, that we could make up for the energy cost of building a new North America in as little as twenty years.


http://www.technocracy.ca/simp/Technocracy_FAQ_1.x.htm#5.5.6

[NKVD]

That looks utopian-communist.

[cyborg]

Paulo Soleri's arcology project is inhabited by a continuous influx of professionals, students and labor volunteers. It strikes me as somewhat of a hippy commune socially.

The overall concept however can support almost any type of management system like Greek polis, communist, spartan, participatory democracy, representative democracy, national socialist, charismatic dictatorship, technocracy, Hindu caste, islam, Catholic/convent/monastery.

The key here is that we are not imposing a one-size-fits-all value system over 7 billion vastly different types of people, which is globalism and liberal democracy's dumb plan for the world. Naturally, the result of this "inevitable" globalization stupidity, as we attempt to cram many diverse value systems into one monoculture template for our "ideal world citizen", is widespread destruction and conflict for the coming centuries.

We can always choose a wiser path.

[Roland]

To answer your question: there certainly are compatable ethnic collections, 10k to 20k in population, sometimes much more, sometimes less, throughout the continent. The starter groups are out there.

Maybe in a few cases, but ethnic homogeneity does not presuppose political homogeneity, and the latter is the essence of a functioning state or polity. Political homogeneity would likely need to be fostered as well.

[NKVD]

Paulo Soleri's arcology project is inhabited by a continuous influx of professionals, students and labor volunteers. It strikes me as somewhat of a hippy commune socially.

The overall concept however can support almost any type of management system like Greek polis, communist, spartan, participatory democracy, representative democracy, national socialist, charismatic dictatorship, technocracy, Hindu caste, islam, Catholic/convent/monastery.

The key here is that we are not imposing a one-size-fits-all value system over 7 billion vastly different types of people, which is globalism and liberal democracy's dumb plan for the world. Naturally, the result of this "inevitable" globalization stupidity, as we attempt to cram many diverse value systems into one monoculture template for our "ideal world citizen", is widespread destruction and conflict for the coming centuries.

We can always choose a wiser path.

Technocracy looks even more liberal than libertarian communism.

[cyborg]

As a social construct, politics never saved us from ourselves because over time it tends to increasingly distance itself from the reality we must each regularly engage with.

Thousands of contained habitats with unique value systems derived from distinct cultures each affecting and accountable only to themselves gives us a model that best reflects our diverse, imaginative tribal species socially and maintains access to our necessary, worthwhile technical progress.

The expanding sprawl of cosmopolitan modernity, a singular society-man cultural template, and abundant material luxuries which we use to conceal our personal shortcomings will come to an end. How it ends is up to us, not our politics.

[NKVD]

I could agree with de-centralisation. But we would still need a FEDERAL FRAMEWORK to defend ourselves.

[cyborg]

An imperial or federal coalition of city states during continental crisis was recommended in the first post. It would operate like a high king in antiquity sending out a call to arms to all the many clan chieftains who would rally fighters under their banner. We would of course maintain our modern warfare capabilities to the extent needed.

Ideally, intercontinental wars would cease and everyone would adopt the new design. In this way only small scale conflicts between individual city-states, without ballistic missiles, navies, fighter aircraft or mechanized armor would happen in the distant future. With a global federal coalition, we would narrow our means of making war down to something resembling a medieval seige or a clash on foot between hundreds in the wilderness.

[NKVD]

Until someone understands that more size and more large-scale production equals more power...

[cyborg]

A warlord upstart intent upon expanding his conquests from one independent city to the next would be crushed by the time his army marched on the second city. We would still retain satellite surveillance along with federal observers on the ground.

Again, large technical ambitions that require industry would be handled federally by volunteers. A destructive rush to completion is symptomatic of excessive ego in the chain of command. This would get identified and rooted out by expulsion so that a careful, even leisurely development pace resumes.

[NKVD]

Volunteers? No capitalism then I guess...

[Roland]

Lupus,

When I speak of politics, I speak of the undeniable dialectic that invariably emerges between groups of people: friends and enemies. Ethnic homogeneity does not eliminate the existence or possible existence of critical friend-enemy groupings within the ethno-group. Such groupings are, I think, lurking under the surface of all liberal societies, making it difficult to simply isolate 25k people and expect them to support a functioning polity.

[cyborg]

Friends and close kin? By all means we'll favor keeping them together. Within two generations new friendly dynamics and families will form.

For trouble with individuals, review the calorie credit economy thread. There we have a basic overview for a behaviour control system under a combined planned and subsistence local economy. If someone chooses to not cooperate for some reason, they are unable to exchange earned credit for nourishment. Hunger sets in quickly. This differs little from what we have now if you think about it, except we would have no state welfare.

We allocate no space or resources to detention areas. Although mediators, our hopeful imperial diplomats, are called upon to settle some disputes, the general rule is to solve your own problems. Normal people have always done so regularly without involving state resources up until our somewhat disfunctional modern times. Our interpersonal laws against slurs or touching are obvious corruption. Justification for more state funding, giving lawyers opportunities for wealth and awarding sheltered academics in social sciences are our likely culprits.

If a score of honor needs settled, a return to a renaissance duel system would keep things tidy. It would also keep the men occupied with martial fitness in their spare time. Gangs of comrades will form intimidating retributive collectives but these can give city administration and security something to solve creatively.

Extreme hard cases who are dangerously mad or who become public enemies simply get thrown out into the wilds. If these people should somehow find one another, cooperate and form primitive parallel societies, the local cities deputize posses to put down the "bandit menace". We don't execute them because we still want our trackers and soldiers to have live field training from time to time.