Showing posts with label Populism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Populism. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 16, 2025

The Psychology of Revolution | Gustave Le Bon

In his 1913 analysis of The Psychology of Revolution, French physician and polymath Gustave Le Bon (1841-1931) argues that "political revolutions" are abrupt upheavals driven primarily by "affective and mystic elements" rather than "rational discourse," which he attributes to the "erosion of established traditions" and the "contagious spread of discontent."
 
"A revolution is effected from above, that is, by the leaders of the old regime; but when it is victorious it is rapidly vulgarised, because the people interferes and applies the only means in its power—violence. To destroy is within its scope; to reconstruct is beyond it. [...] The instinctive soul of the people is above all remarkable for its extreme mobility. Deceived by its own chimeras, it enthusiastically applauds its idols of a day, to overthrow them the next day in favour of others. No gods ever long survived its favour. This mobility renders the people credulous and ignorant at the same time. 
 
By the mere fact that he forms part of an organised crowd, a man descends several rungs in the ladder of civilisation. Isolated, he may be a cultivated individual; in a crowd, he is a barbarian — that is, a creature acting by instinct. He possesses the spontaneity, the violence, the ferocity, and also the enthusiasm and heroism of primitive beings, whom he further tends to resemble by the facility with which he allows himself to be impressed by words and images — which would be entirely without action on each of the isolated individuals composing the crowd — and to be induced to commit acts contrary to his most obvious interests and his best-known habits. An individual in a crowd is a grain of sand amid other grains of sand, which the wind stirs up at will.
»
 An individual in a crowd is a grain of sand, which the wind stirs up at will. « 
 
Le Bon argues that during political revolutions, individuals are driven more by inherent character traits than by intellect, with certain mentalities rising to prominence amid chaos:
  
[...] We have seen in all times apostles arise who have had an irresistible influence over the popular mind by cultivating its instincts and speaking its language. The people always follows them with enthusiasm, whether they be ignorant fanatics, hard and upright logicians, ferocious maniacs, or eloquent speakers. Whatever their aims, the leaders of the people are obliged to enter into reciprocity with it, to recognise its psychology, even if they do not share its sentiments. They must be in communion with it, or they will not act upon it. 
 
We have seen in all times apostles arise who have had an irresistible influence over the popular mind by cultivating its instincts and speaking its language. The people always follows them with enthusiasm, whether they be ignorant fanatics, hard and upright logicians, ferocious maniacs, or eloquent speakers.
»
The people loves equality, but it respects titles and prestige. «
 
[...] When a political party triumphs, all the forces of interest, ambition, and hatred which parties contain become enlisted in its service, so that the triumph of a political revolution is always accompanied by a complete overthrow of all the institutions of a country. The chief result of a revolution is to sweep away the forces which held together the edifice of government, which was perhaps already tottering, and to substitute for them nothing but the will of the victors, which is for that reason all-powerful. 
 
We have seen in all times apostles arise who have had an irresistible influence over the popular mind by cultivating its instincts and speaking its language. The people always follows them with enthusiasm, whether they be ignorant fanatics, hard and upright logicians, ferocious maniacs, or eloquent speakers.
»
 
Irresistible influence over the popular mind. «
  
[....] A revolution cannot change the soul of a people. This soul commands, and all must obey. It is for this reason that after a revolution the laws and institutions of a people are so often in contradiction with the interests of the new rulers, and also with the prescriptions of pure reason. But presently the laws are modified or abrogated, until they are more or less adapted to necessities. When the dogma which serves as the base of a revolution is victorious, the dissociated social elements which have resulted from the destruction of the old institutions become agglomerated under the action of new ideas."

Le Bon dissects the role of "the people" in such revolutions, distinguishing between the "conservative majority" and a "subversive minority" prone to violence. He argues that the masses are often manipulated and contribute mainly through destructive acts rather than constructive change:
 
"1. The Meaning of the Word 'People:' The term 'people' represents merely the superior portion of a nation. It comprises an elite: the nobility, clergy, magistrates, etc. By extension it was applied to the whole nation, and finally it has come to mean the most inferior elements of the population, the lower populace. We shall examine it in this last sense, and shall show what part the people plays in revolutions. From the political point of view the people may be considered in two aspects—as an army and as a crowd. As an organised army it plays the part of follower. As a crowd it is often revolutionary. 
 
(3) By reason of its mobile soul it personifies all its sentiments in a fetich. To become the master of the people one must know how to dazzle it, be able to make it hope, and if necessary know how to deceive it.
»
To become the master of the people one must know how to dazzle it. « 
 
2. How the People regards Revolutions: The revolutions are sometimes regarded with favour by the people, because they represent the triumph of its claims. But the people quickly becomes indifferent, and seeks only tranquility. It is always the people that suffers in revolutions, for it pays the cost in blood and poverty. It is for this reason that it often acclaims the return of a master. 
 
"A revolution is effected from above, that is, by the leaders of the old regime; but when it is victorious it is rapidly vulgarised, because the people interferes and applies the only means in its power—violence. To destroy is within its scope; to reconstruct is beyond it.
» To destroy is within its scope; to reconstruct is beyond it. «
  
3. The Psychology of Revolutionary Crowds: The revolutionary crowd is formed of transitory elements, recruited from all classes, but chiefly from the instinctive and criminal categories. It is the crowd that acclaims or murders kings, and whose violence has always been the principal factor of revolutions. The psychology of revolutionary crowds shows us that they possess the ordinary mental characteristics of all crowds: contagion, unconsciousness, exaggerated sentiments, intolerance, etc. They are above all remarkable for their credulity and their docility towards their leaders. 
4. The Part of the Leaders in Popular Movements: Although the people in rebellion generally begins by destroying everything, it soon grows weary of anarchy, and instinctively seeks a leader. It loves equality, but it respects titles and prestige. It was thus that all the great popular movements—those of the Reformation, the Revolution, etc.—were effected under the guidance of leaders. 
  
We have seen in all times apostles arise who have had an irresistible influence over the popular mind by cultivating its instincts and speaking its language. The people always follows them with enthusiasm, whether they be ignorant fanatics, hard and upright logicians, ferocious maniacs, or eloquent speakers. Whatever their aims, the leaders of the people are obliged to enter into reciprocity with it, to recognise its psychology, even if they do not share its sentiments. They must be in communion with it, or they will not act upon it.
 » The people always follows apostles with enthusiasm. «

[...] From the preceding considerations we may draw the following conclusions: (1) The people, by reason of its instinctive soul, accepts without discussion the ideas presented to it. (2) By reason of its sentimental soul it incarnates these ideas in leaders, to whom it often delegates the direction of its destinies. (3) By reason of its mobile soul it personifies all its sentiments in a fetich. To become the master of the people one must know how to dazzle it, be able to make it hope, and if necessary know how to deceive it. (4) Finally, the leader must possess prestige, speak in images, incessantly repeat the same ideas in different terms, and know how to act by persuasion and never by reasoning." 
 
Le Bon further elaborates on the role of leaders and contagion in precipitating political revolutions, noting that discontent alone is insufficient without amplification through suggestion: 
 
"The role of the leader in all revolutions is very considerable. He does not create the beliefs which provoke them, but he directs them. Without him they would often remain latent and ineffectual. Although the revolution which overthrew the Bourbon dynasty was ripe, we know from the memoirs of contemporaries that without the prestige of Lafayette it would probably have remained nothing but a local riot. Whenever a revolution breaks out in one point of a territory, we see similar revolutions breaking out in succession in all the countries which surround it, even when communication is difficult. It was thus that in 1848 all Europe was inflamed by the revolutionary conflagration, and was shaken by it in spite of the slowness and difficulty of communication."
 
Le Bon finally examines the outcomes of political revolutions as often involving the establishment of new power structures, persecutions, and limited social transformations:
 
"Contrary to what occurred in religious revolutions, political revolutions show us merely peoples adapting themselves to new conditions of existence. We have already seen that this adaptation is effected by means of slow successive evolutions, which render violent revolutions useless. [...] The results of political revolutions being merely displacements of wealth and the triumph of certain classes, we may conclude, contrary to the general opinion, that they have been without psychological significance. They strike the imagination because they are accompanied by much violence, and blood flows in streams.
 
»
 
Contagion, unconsciousness, exaggerated sentiments, intolerance, etc. «
 
But when we look a little closer we soon find that the economic or social changes which result from them are very slight. The importance of political revolutions must not, however, be exaggerated. They sometimes cost a country very dear, although they change nothing in respect of its natural conditions. It is especially when they involve disastrous wars that their results are most pernicious." 
 
Reference:
 
See also:

Wednesday, October 29, 2025

How Countries Go Broke: The Big Cycle | Ray Dalio

The big cycle is the period from one era of great change and turbulence, in which various systems or orders are transformed, typically through fighting, to the next. Then, through that evolutionary process, we arrive at yet another period of breakdown. The last big cycle began in 1945 at the end of World War II.
 
» This will lead to dramatic changes. «
 
Within that world order, there are shorter-term cycles, like the economic and political cycles. The economic cycles have lasted for about six years from one recession to the next, and they unfold in a way where the economy is weak.  
 
» In considering which spending to cut, when one looks at the possibilities, one quickly notices that about 70% of the non-interest spending is considered “mandatory”—i.e., it is either contractually required or politically nearly impossible to cut. «
 » In considering which spending to cut, when one looks at the possibilities, one quickly notices that about 70% of the non-
interest spending is considered “mandatory”—i.e., it is either contractually required or politically nearly impossible to cut. «
 
Central banks put a lot of money and credit into it. That causes markets to go up. There's a lot of spending; it gets too hot; inflation rises. They tighten monetary policy, and that causes the economy to go down into recession. Since 1945, there have been twelve and a half of those.
 
» It appears clear that, as the gaps in people’s productivity, wealth, and values grow along with levels of dissatisfaction about how their democracies are working, it leads to more populist conflict. « Average global levels of political polarization since 1900.
»
It appears clear that, as the gaps in people’s productivity, wealth, and values grow along with
levels of dissatisfaction about how their democracies are working, it leads to more populist conflict 
and more policies that are like those in the 1905-14 and the 1933-38 periods. «
 
We sometimes don't pay as much attention to the big cycle when it reaches excesses, such as debt excesses. This is because debts rise relative to incomes. If you look at a chart of most countries, their debts keep rising relative to their incomes, but the incomes are needed to pay the debts. So, when you get to a point where the debts are high relative to the incomes, and debt service is very expensive and starts to crowd out other spending, and investors do not want to hold the debt as much because the debt does not provide them good returns and they start to sell that debt, you begin to have a change in that big debt cycle.
 
» For the United States, the big cycles look mostly unfavorable. «  Ray Dalio's “Power Index” for great powers and empires over time.
 » For the United States, the big cycles look mostly unfavorable. «
 Ray Dalio's “Power Index” for great powers and empires over time.
 
That big debt cycle typically corresponds with the big domestic political and social cycle because wealth and well-being matter to people. When there's disruption to people's wealth and well-being, then you have political disruption, such as what we are experiencing now. Consequently, there's more fighting over wealth and power, and so on. These things come together, which then creates the new conflicts, the new big conflicts: the changes and breaking down of the old orders, the old monetary orders, the old domestic political order, the geopolitical order, and such things to cause seismic shifts. These are periods of great risk for the markets and great risk for society. It's very important that they're understood.

Quoted from: 
Ray Dalio (May 28, 2025) - The Big Cycle Explained in 3 Minutes. (video)

Countries are allowing their reserves or assets to decline while acquiring gold. Central banks bought more gold 
in 2025 than in any year in history. They are not telling the public why, but their actions speak volumes.

See also:

Wednesday, November 20, 2024

Germany at the Crossroads: It’s the System, Stupid │ Gerry Nolan

Germany, once Europe’s industrial juggernaut, now stumbles in a state of managed decline. With elections looming, the theatre is set. But let’s be clear: this isn’t about who wins, but whether Germans can reject the system that’s strangling their sovereignty. Because unless they do, these elections are nothing more than a distraction, a masterclass in divide-and-conquer.
 
» Know your enemy. «
  Sun Tzu.
 
Scenario 1: Banning AfD, A Gamble with Fire
Banning AfD wouldn’t be a show of strength but a desperate move to silence over a quarter of the electorate, especially in the former DDR where resentment still burns over decades of economic neglect. Friedrich Merz, obedient globalist and former BlackRock operative, would become Chancellor. The result? More war, deindustrialization, and blind subservience to the US. But silencing AfD won’t kill populism, it’ll fuel it. BSW would emerge as the strongest opposition, carrying the banner for those abandoned by the establishment.

  » Election isn’t about who governs. «

Scenario 2: AfD Grows, But the System Holds
AfD and CDU dominate the elections, but the anti-AfD cordon sanitaire holds. Merz scrambles to cobble together a coalition with Greens and SPD, a circus of contradictions. Meanwhile, AfD becomes the largest opposition party, and with BSW rising in tandem, Germany’s parliament turns into a warzone of populist resistance.
 
But the cracks widen as Germany faces three brutal realities: NATO’s inevitable defeat in Ukraine, an economic crisis fueled by sanctions and energy dependency, and mounting unrest from a population tired of being sacrificed on the altar of vassalage. 
 
Scenario 3: AfD Triumphs – The System Strikes Back
An AfD victory would trigger nothing short of institutional war. Mockingbird media, and globalist puppeteers would unleash chaos: mass protests, endless scandals, “mystery” corruption charges, and lawfare targeting AfD leaders. Color revolution tactics, international condemnation, and Soros-funded street movements would all be in play.
 
»
It’s the System, Stupid. «
 
These scenarios expose a single rigged system. This election isn’t about who governs, it’s about maintaining control while gaslighting the public into thinking change is possible. Divide and conquer, with AfD voters demonized as extremists and BSW supporters dismissed as utopian dreamers, all while the establishment engineers the decline.

Here’s the uncomfortable reality: Germany’s democracy is theatre, scripted to ensure one outcome, continued vassalage to Washington. The Nord Stream sabotage was a declaration of US dominance over Europe. Germany’s leaders didn’t even flinch. Their silence was an endorsement of their own country’s humiliation.

If Germans want real change, it’s not about winning elections within a rigged system, it’s about rejecting the system itself. Imagine a post-SMO world where Germany reclaims sovereignty, realigns with Russia and China, and embraces BRICS. Imagine restoring its industrial base, securing cheap energy, and forging a just peace in Europe. This isn’t a fantasy, it’s a choice. But to make it, Germans must first wake up to the fact that their political elite serves Washington, not Berlin.

» Yankee, Go Home «German cry for sovereignty.
 
The 80’s saw mass protests demanding the removal of US missiles and troops. It’s time for Germans to rediscover that spirit, to say "Yankee, go home" and reclaim their sovereignty. NATO has turned Europe into an American buffer, draining its resources, compromising its security, and hijacking its future.

A sovereign Germany could help lead Europe in a multipolar world, standing with the Global Majority rather than kneeling before the US. The alternative? Continued decline, economic ruin, and an electorate manipulated into fighting itself while the true oppressors profit from the chaos. The real question isn’t about CDU, AfD, or BSW, but whether Germans can see through the charade. The rigged script won’t save them; only rejecting NATO servitude and imagining a future aligned with the Global Majority can.



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Saturday, May 4, 2024

The Great Replacement - Europe has fallen | Eva Vlaardingerbroek

Their message is clear. Our way of life, our Christian religion, our nations, they have to go without exception. Their vision of the future is the neoliberal, unrecognizable Europe, where every city becomes kind of like Brussels. Ugly, dirty, unsafe, zero social cohesion. And what are we left with? A permanent state of isolation, confusion and disorientation. 

» Everyone who has eyes can see it:
The native white Christian European population is being replaced at an ever-accelerating rate.«
 
[...] So what's the antidote? A strong Christian Europe of sovereign nation states. That's why we need to outright reject the lie that nationalism causes war. It's not nationalism or national sovereignty that causes war. It's expansionism. And where in Europe do we find that nowadays? In one place and one place only: Brussels. Isn't it funny how the same people who erode our national sovereignty are now telling us that we need to spend billions and billions of euros on the national sovereignty of Ukraine?

» I am going to draw the forbidden conclusion:
The Great Replacement Theory is no longer a theory.«  

[...] During a recent interview I got asked: "Do you think that you ever go too far? Do you think that you're ever too radical?" I thought about it for a second and said: "No, I don't think I go too far." Truth be told. I think we in Europe do not go far enough. I think that if we really think about the organized structural attack on our civilization, that we don't do enough. Do we do enough to stop the attack on our families, on our continent, on our countries and our religion? When we hear about another murder, another stabbing of a young innocent child, do we do enough? When we know that our national sovereignty has been given up in Brussels, do we do enough? When we hear that Christian kids in Germany are now converting to Islam to fit in, do we do enough? I don't think so. 
 

The totalitarian institution of the European Union needs to come down. Let me be clear: I don't believe in reforms. When the foundation of your institution is rotten, and that is the case in Brussels, you can rebuild the house on top of it all you want, but it's still going to crumble. So the only answer is: The Tower of Babel needs to be destroyed! We are the daughters and sons of the greatest nations on Earth. And we need to ask ourselves, what has happened to us? Where do we come from? And more importantly, where are we going? 
 
Our elites have declared a war on us, and now it is time for us to put on the full armor of God, fight back and win.  
 
 
April 25, 2024
 
"The Islamic New World Order is Here - Europe has fallen."
Speech at the 'Conservative Political Action Conference' in Budapest, Hungary.

Tuesday, February 20, 2024

Javier Milei - Latin America's Prime Golem Zionist | Alexander Markovics

During campaign events, he recites the Torah. At events, he lights Jewish menorah candles instead of extinguishing them like Grzegorz Braun. He stands unwaveringly by Israel’s side and calls Vladimir Zelensky his friend. His name is Javier Milei; he is a self-proclaimed ‘anarcho-capitalist’ and intends to convert to Judaism after his presidency.

Argentina's 'chainsaw messiah,' President Javier Gerardo Milei:
An unleashed libertarian, chosen and promoted by his country's financial oligarchy, the Koch brothers, and George Soros.
 Spiritually counseled by his dead dog, Milton Friedman, and Chabad-Lubavitch. A hero to Wall Street.
 
[...] Milei sees himself, inspired by the zeal of the convert, in the succession of Moses as the great liberator of the Argentine people. In his anarcho-capitalist interpretation of Judaism, God is a libertarian who does not mind if people sell their internal organs or their own children to alleviate their misery. In his view, this represents ‘the natural order of things’. Yet, his first public appearances since taking office suggest that his real loyalty might lie with another state than Argentina. At the public lighting of a menorah, he proclaimed his ‘unwavering commitment to the State of Israel’, which likely refers to Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza. He follows the apocalyptic worldview of many evangelical Christians, who are becoming increasingly numerous in Latin America and see Israel as the ‘bearer of light’ in the fight against darkness.

[...] Both in Latin America and Europe, we can observe a type of right-wing populist politician who declares US and Israeli interests as the raison d’état, sacrificing the geopolitical interests of their own country. Strache, Pazderski, and Gauland now find their tragic counterparts at the other end of the world in Milei and Noboa Azin. The motivation is the desire for recognition by demonised politicians, as well as economic dependencies and/or philosemitism. What increasingly sounds absurd has roots that reach deep into Western occultism: in the Jewish-Kabbalistic mysticism of the early Middle Ages, we find the figure of the Golem. This is a human-like figure created from clay through magic, often with immense powers, serving its Jewish master as a will-less proxy. The theme was processed, among others, by the Austrian writer Gustav Meyrink in his novel 'The Golem'. Today, more and more politicians from Europe and Latin America are made into such golems through blackmail and dubious promises — Strache from Austria is a tragic example of how such politicians ultimately end. The path of the Polish politician Grzegorz Braun shows us that patriotic politics against Zionism is possible.


 Assisted by his rabbi Shimon Axel Wahnish, Milei cries at the Wailing Wall.
February 6, 2024.

Wednesday, August 24, 2022

The Liberal Political Theology | Neema Parvini

From the realist perspective of Carl Schmitt, there is no structural difference between the liberal state, the communist state, and the fascist state — or indeed any other state. The only difference is the extent to which a regime may obscure the nature of its power or else genuinely buy into myths of neutrality. Viewed in this way, a state wedded to liberal democracy is as ‘totalitarian’ as any other since, by its very nature, it will be unable to tolerate any leaders who are not always already liberal democrats. 
 
 
» Liberalism is to freedom as anarchism is to anarchy. « 
Ernst Jünger, 1977.
 
Should such leaders rise, the stalwarts of liberal democracy will perceive them as ‘populists’, ‘fascists’, ‘threats to democracy’, and so on. The extent of free speech, free inquiry, free thought, and so on is a liberal delusion. In fact, the range of ‘allowable opinion’ is always exceedingly narrow and the liberal democratic state is marked by its intolerance and spectacular inability to imagine any worldview that is not its own. The dominance of liberal political theology is total. Schmitt would not have disagreed with Oswald Spengler who wrote in "The Decline of the West:"

"England, too, discovered the ideal of a Free Press, and discovered along with it that the press serves him who owns it. It does not spread ‘free’ opinion — it generates it. […] Without the reader’s observing it, the paper, and himself with it, changes masters. Here also money triumphs and forces the free spirits into its service. No tamer has his animals more under his power. Unleash the people as reader-mass and it will storm through the streets and hurl itself upon the target indicated, terrifying and breaking windows; a hint to the press-staff and it will become quiet and go home. The Press today is an army with carefully organized arms and branches, with journalists as officers, and readers as soldiers. But here, as in every army, the soldier obeys blindly, and war aims and operation-plans change without his knowledge. The reader neither knows, nor is allowed to know, the purposes for which he is used, nor even the role that he is to play. A more appalling caricature of freedom of thought cannot be imagined. Formerly a man did not dare to think freely. Now he dares, but cannot; his will to think is only a willingness to think to order, and this is what he feels as his liberty."

As Edward Bernays would go on to say these "are the invisible rulers who control the destinies of millions. […] In some department of our daily lives, in which we imagine ourselves as free agents, we are ruled by dictators exercising great power." The point is that viewed from the outside, liberal democracy looks just as ‘totalitarian’ as any other regime even if it relies more on subtle persuasion, nudge techniques, and other psychological tricks than coercion to obtain its results.

The Rulers and the Ruled | Gaetano Mosca

Among the constant facts and tendencies that are to be found in all political organisms, one is so obvious that it is apparent to the most casual eye. In all societies — from all societies that are very meagerly developed and have barely attained the dawnings of civilization, down to the most advanced and powerful societies — two classes of people appear — a class that rules and a class that is ruled.
 
[...] In reality the dominion of an organized minority, obeying a single impulse, over the unorganized majority is inevitable. The power of any minority is irresistible as against each single individual in the majority, who stands alone before the totality of the organized minority. A hundred men acting uniformly in concert, with a common understanding, will triumph over a thousand men who are not in accord and can therefore be dealt with one by one. Meanwhile it will be easier for the former to act in concert and have a mutual understanding simply because they are a hundred and not a thousand. It follows that the larger the political community, the smaller will the proportion of the governing minority to the governed majority be, and the more difficult will it be for the majority to organize for reaction against the minority.


"I can certainly call myself an anti-democrat, but I am not an anti-liberal;
indeed I am opposed to pure democracy precisely because I am a liberal.
I believe that the ruling class ought not to be monolithic and homogeneous
but ought to consist of elements which are diverse in regard to origin and
interests; when, instead, political power originates from a single source,
even if this be elections with universal suffrage, I regard it as dangerous
and liable to become oppressive. Democratic Jacobinism is an illiberal
doctrine precisely because it subordinates everything to a single force,
that of the so-called majority, on which it does not set any limits."

[...] What happens in other forms of government — namely, that an organized minority imposes its will on the disorganized majority — happens also and to perfection, whatever the appearances to the contrary, under the representative system. When we say that the voters ‘choose’ their representative, we are using a language that is very inexact. The truth is that the representative has himself elected by the voters, and, if that phrase should seem too inflexible and too harsh to fit some cases, we might qualify it by saying that his friends have him elected. In elections, as in all other manifestations of social life, those who have the will and, especially, the moral, intellectual and material means to force their will upon others take the lead over the others and command them.

[...] From our point of view there can be no antagonism between state and society. The state is to be looked upon merely as that part of society which performs the political function. Considered in this light, all questions touching interference or noninterference by the state come to assume a new aspect. Instead of asking what the limits of state activity ought to be, we try to find out what the best type of political organization is, which type, in other words, enables all the elements that have a political significance in a given society to be best utilized and specialized, best subjected to reciprocal control and to the principle of individual responsibility for the things that are done in the respective domains.

"Who says organization, says oligarchy. [...] Historical evolution mocks all the
prophylactic measures that have been adopted for the prevention of oligarchy."
Robert Michels, 1911

[...] Any political organization is both voluntary and coercive at one and the same time voluntary because it arises from the very nature of man, as was long ago noted by Aristotle, and coercive because it is a necessary fact, the human being finding himself unable to live otherwise. It is natural, therefore, and at the same time indispensable, that where there are men there should automatically be a society, and that when there is a society there should also be a state — that is to say, a minority that rules and a majority that is ruled by the ruling minority.

Tuesday, August 23, 2022

Whoever Sets the Price of Gold and Silver | Stephen Mitford Goodson

There was an increase in trade and Rome became one of the most prosperous cities in the ancient world. Bronze coins represented national money and were paid into circulation by the state and each was only of value in as much as the symbols on which its numbers were recorded, were scarce or otherwise. This money was thus based on law rather than the metallic content. This can be considered as an early example of the successful use of fiat money.


While fiat money is much criticised in some quarters, for example by the followers of Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises, there is nothing wrong with it, as long as it is issued by government, not by private bankers, and is carefully protected against counterfeiters. Non-fiat money, in contrast, has the serious drawback that who ever sets the prices of gold and silver, i.e. private bankers, can control the nation’s economy.

In September 45 BC, Caesar found the streets and cities crowded with homeless people, who had been forced off the land by usurers and land monopolists. 300,000 people had to be fed daily at the public granary. Usury was flourishing with disastrous consequences. Caesar fully understood the evils of usury and how to counter them. He recognized the profound truth that money is a national agent, created by law for a national purpose, and that no classes of men should withhold it from circulation so as to cause panics, in order that speculators could advance the rates of interest, or could buy up property at ruinous prices after such panic.

Caesar introduced the following social reforms:

  1. Restoration of property was done at the much lower valuations which held prior to the civil war (49-45 BC).
  2. Several remissions of rents were granted.
  3. Large numbers of poor citizens and discharged veterans were settled on allotments.
  4. Free housing was provided to 80,000 impoverished families.
  5. Soldiers’ pay was increased from 123 to 225 denarii.
  6. The corn dole was regulated.
  7. Provincial communities were enfranchised.
  8. Confusion in the calendar was removed by fixing it at 365¼ days from 1 January 44 BC.

His monetary reforms were as follows:

  1. State debt levels were immediately reduced by 25%.
  2. Control of the mint was transferred from the patricians (usurers) to government.
  3. Cheap metal coins were issued as the means of exchange.
  4. It was ruled that interest could not be levied at more than 1% per month.
  5. It was decreed that interest could not be charged on interest and that the total interest charged could never exceed the capital loaned (in duplum rule).
  6. Slavery was abolished as a means of settling debt.
  7. Aristocrats were forced to employ their capital and not hoard it. 
These measures enraged the aristocrats and plutocrats whose “livelihood” was now severely restricted. They therefore conspired to murder Caesar, the hero of the people. 
 
The 'Ides of March' Denarius (43/42 BC), a declaration of the Republic's 'liberation' from tyrannical Caesar.
Ironically, Brutus appears on the obverse professing he killed Julius Caesar on the Ides of March.
This is one of the most sought-after coins from the Roman world.

Quoted from:
  
Stephen Mitford Goodson (1948–2018) was a South African economist, author, politician, and former
director of the South African Reserve Bank. He led South Africa’s Abolition of Income Tax and Usury 
Party and was a candidate for the Ubuntu Party in the 2014 General Elections.