We see the need for change in many aspects of human life. The most critical and pressing are the environment and inequality. We seem to be incapable of seeing ourselves as citizens of a planet with common interests and objectives. The world is broken up into separate and competing pockets of self-interested nations and tribes with their exclusive political and social agendas. The elites who control the rules of the game are more interested in preserving the status quo than in moving forward in the best interest of their citizens. In democracies where we can change the political leadership, we ultimately find that one party mirrors another in an endless procession of new faces lacking any meaningful long-term vision.
Drastic changes in social conditions and fight against environmental deterioration are ultimately watered down to cater to the ignorance and gullibility of the targeted centrist, leftist or conservative voters. The autocracies, theocracies, kleptocracies are even worse because they deny the most basic human rights to their citizens. All of this leads to doing next to nothing and the politicians play their never-ending games of musical chairs.
The Sclerotic Approach to Climate Change
We have only to look at the most recent cases of failure. The Paris agreement and its repeat COP gatherings of world leaders supposedly dedicated to serious climate change abatement end up pushing their commitments into the distant future. They count on somebody else to actually implement the carbon relief policies that are urgently needed now. Their proposed action plans fall far short of some of the urgent goals like keeping the planet’s temperature at 1.5˚ above those at the start of the industrial era. We are well aware of the dire repercussions of a 2.0˚- 3.0˚ rise in this century but yet are clearly heading in that direction. Somehow, we have become inured to the implications of floods, draughts, cyclones, fresh water shortages that will severely affect every aspect of life around the globe.
What we are witnessing is the unwillingness and inability of the political and corporate class to act in a united way to bring about the changes that are urgently required. The corporate elites may be already planning their escape to settlements on mars as witnessed by the feverish aerospace activities in the private sector. They are counting on future generations to clean up the mess There are sacrifices to be made in changing from dependence on fossil fuels to renewable and non-polluting energy. But climate change is a relatively slow-moving process. From our short-term viewpoint it is easier to keep postponing the necessary decisions and urgent actions. Unfortunately, this is not the path to climate redemption and we have to search for different solutions.
Making Drastic Changes to Inequality
Justice and equality are other key issues requiring coordinated and urgent change on a global scale. This is related to climate change in the sense that it is the impoverished parts and inhabitants of the globe that will be the most gravely affected. We churn out mountains of data on the economic realities of inequality and how they favor those at the top 1%. But nobody seems to be able to challenge this and implement a viable plan for change. When one of the wealthiest nations in the world, the United State, has a child poverty rate that is three times higher than that of Poland there is something very wrong. Upward mobility, which formed the foundation of the American Dream is in tatters.
The millennials can no longer expect to earn more than their parents when they grow up. The prejudicial aspect of inequality on minorities is evidenced by the fact that one in five black Americans are destined to remain permanently in the bottom 20% of income distribution. The one-percenters in America held more wealth than the middle 60%. We know what the practical solutions are to these skewered statistics. It involves investment in early-childhood care, a welfare system that can reduce the income poverty of children, and provide better-suited educational and training programs. But the political class continue to be paralyzed by conflicting goals within and between parties. Some more socially-minded nations of the world do better but still have much room for improvement when it come to equitable distribution of wealth.
The effects of inequality in advanced nations pale in comparison to those of developing ones in places like Africa and India. Globalization has helped some countries to improve the mobility of their impoverished class due to more widely dispersed supply chain distribution. Hundreds of millions of people in China have been able to move into the middle class with impressive increases in GDP per capita rates. But a lot of these gains came at the expense of liberty and basic human rights. Inequality cannot be judged solely by financial statistics. Happiness, freedom, opportunity also have value. As too does ethically-driven environmental, social and governance improvements in both the political and corporate spheres.
When parts of the globe continue to be heavily polluted because they continue to use dirty fuels with heavy CO₂ emissions, then the whole planet suffers the consequences. Equality requires that richer nations help poorer ones more to overcome their environmental pollution issues. This is what love-driven morality means and where we fall far short. Unless we arrive at the understanding that we are all in this together and that morality forms the core purpose of life, then we are destined to make the same mistakes over and over again.
Fundamental Change from Bottom to Top
If our elites are not capable of initiating changes than the agenda needs to be driven from the bottom up. Ordinary citizens around the globe united around a moral approach to the key problems plaguing us and our planetary home could be the answer. Morality used to be dominated by the religious classes who pontificated on the topic from their pulpits. Unfortunately, they themselves failed when it came to providing solid models of morality. They succumbed to corruption and self-interested preservation of power. The myths and legends that upheld their system were brashly upended by the rise of empirical science. This has resulted in almost a complete rejection and move towards secularism in more advanced and liberal nations. However, secularism has led to toxic materialism without a moral compass and huge discrepancies in equality.
It is evident that we cannot count on the ruling classes to set the course towards a more equitable and just society. They are too indebted to the moneyed class who are almost exclusively motivated by profits. We need a bloodless revolution that is initiated from the bottom of the social pyramid. Historically, totally obscure individuals and small organizations led to some of the greatest changes. They arrived like black swans from nowhere and made huge contributions. This is true for both religious and secular movements.
The EL concept is fundamentally based on love-driven morality. It means that all our thoughts and actions should be solely motivated by a loving mindset where all biases are removed. This is the only viable path to genuine change in inequality and justice. We need to establish new models to demonstrate the benefits of this path. And perhaps within we will discover our true nature, purpose and destiny.