capitalism’s war against imagination

the only war that matters is the war

against the imagination

the only war that matters is the war

against the imagination

the only war that matters is the war

against the imagination

all other wars are subsumed in it

There is no way out of the spiritual battle

There is no way to avoid taking sides

Rant, Diane di Prima

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“I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of society but the people

themselves, and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control

with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to

inform their discretion by education.“

Thomas Jefferson

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“The world may be going to hell but there’s lots of really neat stuff you can buy.”

Wired magazine 1993

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• Preface:

1. this is a draft so it may be a bit bumpy in places and repetitive throughout,
2. as I note every time I criticize capitalism, I am only seeking a better version of capitalism, which I believe exists, not get rid of capitalism.

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Today I am suggesting capitalism stifles the type of imagination necessary to envision a better version of capitalism. I will also suggest a reinvigorated imagination is the needed weapon to attack the present-day capitalistic system and its issues.

That said. I don’t think it’s a stretch to suggest capitalism is at the root of business’s lack of employee’ engagement’ issue as well as a number of other societal social engagement issues. While wealth has been created, I believe it is useful to step back and consider the dehumanizing effects of the economic system. Beyond the system’s tendency to default to a ‘treat humans like machines’ mentality, the set’s objectives increases apathy, sapping jobs of meaning and mattering, imbue overall ethical decay, all of which lead to an inability to take the right action, in the right situation, at the right time by a person. I imagine the question becomes can we use our imagination to see how we can work as free and responsible human beings and still be enmeshed within a global economic system, i.e., encouraging system objectives that humanize rather than dehumanize. Let’s be clear. The institutions and businesses within the capitalistic system, spanning local communities (financially and attitudinally) to global arenas, dominate to such an all-encompassing complex and embedded level that it may feel like resistance through this imagination I am suggesting seems futile. To many people it feels like our fate is sealed, there is a sense of powerlessness, therefore, since there seems to be no hope for a better way of doing things people become apathetic, escapist or just materialistic – all of which the capitalistic system actually encourages. Today I will suggest that rather than resign ourselves to the apathy, helplessness, and despair, it seems to me that if we were to reengage our imagination, we could easily envision the hope of a better version of a capitalistic system – and make it a reality.

Which leads me to imagination versus innovation.

I would argue, and will, the biggest casualty in a capitalistic zero-sum world, and of a populace accepting of a zero-sum belief, is imagination. We have lots of stuff and we are constantly encouraged to have stuff (and make stuff), but that orientation creates an unhealthy objective blindness in which imagination becomes subservient to the system of infinite growth. To be clear, I am suggesting imagination is different than innovation. Innovation, in capitalism, is mostly an incremental affair. The existing economic system is one in which innovations occur to further the strategies, objectives, and profits of a business; not the to the profit of society. In many cases the innovation – and the R&D investment dollars – a firm wants done is aligned against its own product and process systems, its strategy for getting and staying ahead, and its self-identified needs. this is an extremely pragmatic, competitive, orientation albeit a business will most likely cloak it in ‘possibilities’ terminology. Imagination, on the other hand, creates the great leaps. The ideas and thinking that can reshape systems and the ways things are done. I would suggest that innovations simply increase the velocity of infinite growth (the capitalism ideology) which only increases the speed in which we crash into the finite resource wall. Imagination is what we need to redesign the systems in order to optimize the finite world, not the growth objective. That doesn’t mean there will be no growth, just that the growth is in prosperity and quality of life and not wealth and, well, just growth. Even Schumpeter (Creative Destruction Schumpeter) recognized most innovation was wasteful and that this type of capitalistic competition is inherently wasteful. So why do we agree to waste the imagination which could possibly envision a new better way to generate the prosperity that everybody wants while optimizing the finite resources available to us from the world? I propose the pathway to the better way is a reimagined imagination which will not eliminate capitalism, ** but rather create a better version.

• ** note: capitalism is not an ideology like socialism, therefore, socialism is not an alternative economic system. In addition, a capitalistic society will have social programs, i.e., features of socialism.

Look. I am not attempting to create radicals, but often I attempt to prompt some radical thinking. Why?

I don’t know exactly when it started creeping into the society mindset, but at some point we inched away from a simple social contract and began to think the world was too complex and decided that the social aspects should become financial, capitalistic, and transactions based all measured by money and ‘growth’ measures just like business. It gives us a sense that we had some control in a world where everything seems out of control. The problem with that was we began to believe everything is uncontrollable and it feels like the only people and businesses that DO have any control are the ones focusing on “more” – growth, wealth, profits, etc. As a consequence, the “how” was subservient to ‘more’ and the ‘more people’ felt like they were not only winning, but controlled their own fate in this uncertain world. There was a general sense if we focused on ‘growth is good’, ‘more is better’ and ‘their more means less more for me (so it’s a war over a finite more)’, society would prosper and, in particular, our society would prosper more than ‘theirs.’ That’s, uhm, rationalizing a fairly unhealthy system and mindset, i.e., rationalizing a fairly dystopian view.

Which leads me to the struggle in-between imagination and rational.

As society careens between dystopia and optimism it seems like many people believe our only hope of being saved is found in capitalism. Although today’s capitalists and their relentless pursuit of power and profit seem to set society’s standard for rationality, I would argue most everyday people are driven by dreams, hopes and a desire for some type of, uhm, redemption. What I mean by redemption is that living in a capitalistic society forces many people to compromise a shitload of moral and ethical things. At some point I imagine many people would like the system to offer some redemption, or salvation, for those slippery slope decisions. To that end, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that capitalism and religion have evolved together and that business is permeated with aspects of religious concepts (and vice versa). We routinely expect far more from capitalistic output than convenience and comfort. We demand deliverance. Deliverance for something better as well as deliverance from the problems that we have. That deliverance is grounded in myths forged by the system itself. In fact, this is just one aspect of how the capitalistic system manipulates/controls society. People have always constructed collective myths in order to give a sense of meaning, and rationale, to their shared experience. These capitalistic myths guide us and inspire us and enable us to live in an increasing uncertain, uncontrollable, world. But if myths help us, over time they can harm us by blinding us to real and urgent (if you take into consideration environmental finite challenges) needs. On occasion we should step back in the hope that we might learn to correct ourselves of some of the myths at the core of the capitalistic worldview in order to begin to redirect our imagination toward more world and human ends without sacrificing some of the prosperity we have gained or even desire.

As a consequence, maybe we would stop having to seek redemption for the lives we live.

Maybe a better direction is found within continuous and cumulative progress; not growth.

Maybe we should reflect a bit about how the system has reduced our innate nature as humans. Humans are not natural exploiters of the environments they live within, they are nurterers, yet, industrial capitalism reversed the relation between humans and nature by making humans extractors and exploiters through machines and technology.

Maybe we should reflect a bit on our obsession with reductionism and our increased valuing of the concrete over the abstract.

My guess is that all my ‘maybes’ are driven by my desire to inject imagination in a system increasingly bereft of anything but a “more” objective blindness. My guess is that capitalism actually encourages us to feel powerless to do anything other than what the system propagates.

Yeah. I would argue our sense of powerlessness is actually created by our lack of imagination. To be clear our lack of imagination is encouraged by the institutions themselves. The system is designed for the results it’s getting and the system attempts to design our minds to encourage us to believe that these are the results we should be getting. I say that because if we want to create different results, we will not only have to redesign the system, but we will have to redesign our imaginations. I won’t deny that the task ahead may appear daunting, but if you look ahead, gather your imagination, it doesn’t become difficult to be able to envision a better way of doing things. That doesn’t mean the better way is a radical difference for the sake of radicalness (i.e., disruption), but the only way to redesign the system is to actually break it before it collapses in on itself. Just stating it that way suggests it’s not radical thinking. It’s certainly not radical to head off what is impending; that’s reasonable and logical. Once again, I circle back to imagination. Imagination which is the ultimate power. More than money, more than authority, more than even the existing system, the most powerful thing in the world is imagination. I say that just to remind everybody (1) this is concrete, not abstract, and (2) why the institutions fear it. The struggle isn’t against the rulers. I would even argue it’s not even against authority in the system. I would suggest that the struggle is against ourselves – our despair or lack of hope and our lack of imagination. Those are the things that we are struggling against. Once we win that struggle, we’ve crossed the bridge where we can create the system that is best for us and the planet – a version of capitalism which recognizes it’s not a zero-sum world and progress is not always dependent upon growth. I believe empowered imagination will usurp the original purpose for which the original capitalistic system was created and I would argue even those of us who benefit from the existing system we will cease contributing to the problems of the existing system and simply through envisioning what could be better we’ll begin addressing the underlying flaws of the existing system little by little. If that’s radical, so be it.

Which leads me to control.

Control comes in a variety of forms, but the most pervasive type of control is the capitalism narrative – and myths. Those of us who have become dependent upon the modern capitalistic society, which is offers us goods and services and conveniences, can’t imagine living without them. We can’t imagine a world where all of these amenities, which we no longer see as amenities but as givens, uhm, given to us by capitalism are not only available, but actually have. Of course, there is a partial truth to this, but simply because capitalism was the economic game we played to get here, doesn’t mean it is the only game in town or that another game could have gotten us to this same place – without all the waste and destruction. To that point. The ideology that supports capitalism requires the belief that limitless economic growth is both possible and desirable and will lead to a higher standard of living for everyone (rich and poor). It certainly can, and has a history of doing so (sort of), yet, that claim includes a number of serious flaws. While the tide has certainly risen higher for almost everyone in some form or fashion the wealth and prosperity has not been shared equitably. Indeed, any claim that economic growth brings benefits to everyone can be challenged simply by looking at the actual effects and the increasing gap between the rich and the poor. Yes, a lot of wealth has been created, however, the inequities are extreme. Anyway. I believe we all know that we live on a finite planet with limited resources, what I believe that we struggle to imagine is that the economy can’t grow indefinitely. As Kenneth Lux said:

“We live in a finite planet. Human beings are defined as being made up of infinite wants, and the task of an economic system is to fulfill that infinity, then such a system will go on endlessly churning out goods in an attempt to reach what is from the beginning an impossible goal. When the infinite production of goods meets up with the finite planet there is bound to be a collision.”

This is the illusion of unlimited economic growth. The goal of most national economies is to achieve unlimited growth of GDP through the continuing accumulation of material goods. Since human needs are finite, but human consumption is not, economic growth can usually be maintained through the artificial creation of needs through capitalism, i.e., materialism. The goods that are produced and sold in this way are often unneeded and thus are essentially waste. The continuing illusion of unlimited growth on a finite planet is the fundamental dilemma we need to resolve. Yet. Businesses fed by globalization continue to grow bigger and bigger, and faster and faster, using up resources while pushing governments to gear everything towards economic growth and decrease regulations. The businesses make ever greater profits under the guise of keeping the global economic system growing and growing and going on and on. Our lack of imagination keeps us from seeing where we are headed. Economic globalization is often presented as benign as simply a matter of trade development, complex global interactions (and cooperation) and financial flows. While functionally true, in reality power and control permeates the global system at every level. That isn’t to say that the appeal of this capitalism that promotes consumption as desirable isn’t beneficial because it is beneficial enough to keep the system of corporate globalization going and, people, generally speaking, satisfied. But could it be a better system? It is that question that is at the core of imaginative needs. In the end I imagine the worst thing about all of this is our lack of imagination keeps us from seeing any logical place to make it all stop.

“The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist.”

Thomas Friedman

Which leads me to say capitalism exploits all communications techniques to manipulate emotion and control reason and imagination of any other system (or way of living).

Yeah. In some sense I am suggesting a sly bit of mind control. To be clear, mind control, or ‘brainwashing’ at its worst, has much subtler techniques than the Chinese water torture. In fact, technology has become an increasingly effective tool for mind control and affecting what people think. This is best articulated by Jaron Lanier (Who Owns the Future) and how technology constantly nudges the mind in small degrees every day until it achieves the larger effect. Anyway. My point here is capitalism has a narrative and it uses all tools available to further that narrative. One could argue capitalism’s greatest communication victory has been its ability to define the conditions, and related narratives, of the social realm. Economic activity has increasingly provided the north star desires for people’s fantasies. Capitalism and consumerism have provided the attitudes which frame the questions and answers of grander discussions of human need and desires and paradoxically, as a consequence, also frame a restriction of possibilities. This, I would argue, is the meta narrative of industrial capitalism – a version of social control. I will admit that I am suggesting a coercive power. And it’s not just narratives. Economic power is a control mechanism that encourages everyone to believe pursuing profits at the cost of people’s mental lives and ecological destruction is okay if we are benefiting from the system (note: most people do not recognize the mental harm cause). The ultimate consequence of this narrative is it encourages society, people, to leave the system as is. To be clear, the capitalism narrative is a means of control in and of itself by making clear that those who cannot or will not play by the system’s game, and its rules, are expendable. What do I mean? Part of the insidious aspect of the capitalism narrative is that in order for capitalism to work wealth must be accumulated in economies must grow and if you are not accumulating or growing you are part of the problem. Oh. And it always encourages you to feel like the game is ALWAYS being played so if you are not playing, someone else is. This is a subtle encouragement of a zero-sum baseline mindset, and is the basis for the hamster wheel metaphor and it is also the basis for general apathy and despair – it is an infinite game in which we only have finite resources as humans.

One could argue this unsustainable cognitive warfare (mind control war) creates a general breakdown in society and the social contracts within which people interact. Paradoxically, there’s an underlying encouragement to not put constraints on this capitalistic system because it has convinced us to believe it is the only path to “more” than what we have today.

Which leads me to dissonance.

Beyond the apathy and the despair, I would suggest we actually feel dissonance. What I mean by that is dissonance occurs when everything you have been told crashes into what is reality. The easiest example I can offer is what we are told abut a foreign country, maybe Russia and somewhere in the middle east or even Latin America (if you are American), but then when you actually meet someone from there or maybe visit you see they are actually people just like you, the cities are a lot like the cities in your own country and, well, they really aren’t anymore a shithole than some of the places in your own country.

The story within the story, creates an identity crisis WITH capitalism. Capitalism tells narratives that conflict day in and day out with reality. And while capitalism argues at a meta level, the arc of history, people live in the mesa level and see how capitalism actually works. This dissonance is a version of mental anguish and the story we should be paying attention to is the capitalism attacks on our mental state. I would argue using our imagination will throw off the mental shackles of the existing capitalistic narratives and myths.

Which leads me to the game <a derivative of gamification>.

“A game is a machine that can get into action only if the players consent to become puppets for a time.”

Marshall McLuhan

We need to stop thinking of economics and the system we make money as a game because it is the first step to stop being played by the capitalistic game. Games are contrived and controlled extensions of group awareness. The more seeming /perceived autonomy a player has (context) the less they notice how contrived/controlled the game actually is. This game, materialism (or accumulation of wealth), contains no limiting principles, yet, the resources necessary to maintain, and fulfill, materialism is limited. But the capitalism game invades the private lives of people, communities, and business. It meddles in the politics of life and certainly is wielded as power by those in power to control mindsets, attitudes and behaviors. But the control is clever. The memories of what we are told ‘is best’ are fuzzy at best, yet, the objectives of best are clear. The capitalism control shapes ideas into familiar and meaningful contexts clearly outlining the punishment, threats, and rewards for the e minimum necessities of life which, in a capitalistic society, are the stepping stones to maximum comfort of life. There is no imagination necessary because capitalism has drawn the color by numbers world to success and wealth. But that is the capitalism game. And when we are in the game, we become mentally apathetic and more prone to simplistic capitalism narratives (solutions) in order to navigate the game. What that means is we use capitalism in order to relate to meta problems. This is exactly the wrong direction to go.  The combination of certain social forces grounded in capitalistic thinking ranged against the mind will inevitably lead to the destruction of the democratic way of life and the planet itself.

Our largest most powerful weapon against this is imagination.

Full of hope, we need to use our imagination to attack the system-wide narratives which have corrupted the better angels of business and how we think. We need imagination to bring about the most fundamental and far-reaching changes, in terms of restoring basic honesty and integrity, and dignity to each other and to the world’s resources. As Vaclav Havel said. “We still don’t know how to put morality ahead of politics science and economics. We are still incapable of understanding that the only genuine backbone of our actions if they are to be moral is responsibility. Responsibility to something higher than my family, my country, my firm, my success.” What he is saying is that it is not enough for a nation to liberate itself from a flawed ideology or a theory, but rather if you can liberate yourself from a bad idea, it is necessary to find another good idea. we need imagination to identify that idea.

To be clear. Industrial capitalism is flawed. Innovations have certainly made the existing system more efficient in production, but less so with resources. capitalism is associated with considerable waste. That said. The system is designed for the results it is getting and it is paying off for those for whom it is designed. In order to be able to redesign the system resistance needs to be organized by the people and for the people. And by resistance, I mean something William Stringfellow said:

“Persons live most humanly. To death means yes to life.”

If that is radicalism so be it.

All I can really say is “bring on the imagination.” The system will shout their argument that capitalism “can’t be beat,” but the persons who seek to live most humanly should be imagining ‘what are the alternatives?’ We can all see the wastefulness of capitalism, but currently appear to lack the imaginative strength to envision a better way. Surely there is a better way to enable a healthy system where there is real competition among people with different ideas, where there is widespread access to knowledge in order to develop the smartest possibilities, where there are incentives to meet market needs not just wants, and where we cut losses when it is clear we should.

We should acknowledge the existing system doesn’t actually determine winners and losers in any meaningful or efficient way.

We should acknowledge this engine of progress has generated remarkable results, but also acknowledge those results, and the pursuit of those results, changed the nature of the capitalism engine itself and, therefore, the results objectives may need to be changed.

I imagine we should also acknowledge that in response to the changing nature of the capitalistic system, some in business have attempted to change – with new kinds of organizations, new ways of doing things, new ways of connecting and new ways of thinking about work itself AND we should be paying a bit more attention to this.

We should acknowledge this is more a social process, not just a business capitalistic process, and, inevitably, a cultural evolutionary process.

We should acknowledge that businesses watch other businesses, workers watch other workers, communities watch other communities and, yes, even nations watch other nations – and learn.

We should also acknowledge that the capitalistic system itself will be watching it all and will hold on to its power with ragged claws encouraging everyone to believe that the zero-sum narrative is more important to everyone’s survival, and thriving, than anything they could learn in this new imaginative space.

And with that we should acknowledge the reality is there are few absolute zero-sum economic situations (even though people see them everywhere and it negatively effects economics) and if capitalism is done well, economic growth – not through extracting and exploiting – makes everyone better off.

If that is radicalism, so be it. Bring on the radical imagination.

Ponder.

“In society the trend would seem to be towards the aggregation

of the individual support of millions of uncoordinated citizens, easily within the

reach of magnetic and attractive personalities effectively exploiting the latest

communication techniques to manipulate emotions and control reason.”

Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Advisor

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