As a systems theory person I like to look for what is lost when complex systems are reduced to their parts to supposedly help us to understand them. Politics is replete with examples of this. The irony is that so is science. When you reduce a complex system to its parts you necessarily lose information about its processes and the interactions among the parts.
In politics this is especially true because anyone making such an analysis is necessarily a part of the system being analyzed. It gets worse because we have the parties and other entities that are also part of the system. It is hard for us as democrats to accept the fact that we are part of the same system our opponents are and that we help stabilize the system that they are part of. The fact that we struggle against them within the system obscures the unconscious collusive nature of the relationship. It is hard to imagine not doing this. It seems like it is the only way it can be.
This sounds strange I know, yet if you think about it you will see that it has to be so. Read on below and I'll explain myself more. I think that those who are able to negotiate this exercise in systems thinking will be in a far better position to make political decisions.
Let us ponder a seemingly simple question. Given that there are things about the state of our political reality that we want to change, how do we propose to change them? My guess is that your answer lies within the confines of the existing political system. This is a very interesting way to think. It assumes that the existing system provides the means for achieving our goals. That is astounding if you think about it! Certainly we must have evidence for this or we would be total fools for using our time, energy, and resources working to get where we want to go using the existing system. I, for one, do not understand what that evidence is.
This leads us to a number of hefty paradoxes. We say that the government is the people. Then we say so many things that indicate that the government is an agent apart from the people and often acting on behalf of entities other than the people and often against the interests of the people, what ever we think they may be.
Common arguments for stronger or weaker government are based on the idea that government can provide freedom or take away freedom. In particular, progressives often say that the reason the right wants less government is to allow the oligarchs to control in its place. The implication here seems to be that stronger government will put control back in the hands of the people. Of course in our system that is clearly not true. It puts control into the hands of our elected "representatives" and the bureaucracy they have built around themselves which includes the Supreme Court.
Having come this far simply restating the obvious but in the context of my systems argument you should begin to see my point. This situation is very stable. Yet we act like it is the vehicle to obtain needed changes. My question is for someone to suggest a realistic way in which the changes can be made to happen in this system.
I am anxious to see if anyone will attempt to answer this. I am always willing to learn. Meanwhile I think others might have some learning to do as well. It has been said that genuine discourse is built on the necessity that all parties participating are as willing to be changed by the exchange as they are anxious to change others. Let us then begin a discourse.