Culture

Quantity. Quality. Method.

April 12th, 2011 // 6:45 am @ Oliver DeMille

How much?

How well?

How?

These three aspects of success in any endeavor can teach us a lot about government, freedom and prosperity. Most importantly, they can teach us about government for freedom—since most governments in history have had different goals than liberty.

Good government—which maintains freedom and opportunity for all citizens—must meet the tests of quantity, quality and method. We naturally use all three in governmental analysis, often without noticing it. For example, terms such as democracy, aristocracy and monarchy emphasize the quantity of leaders—many, few or one. In contrast, we emphasize the method of governance in terms like communist, capitalist, commercial, and limited governments—these all describe the process which drives their respective societies. Words such as oligarchy, confederation, socialist, mercantile, militarist, federal, national and empire deal with the qualities of a nation’s governance, the attributes that make it what it is.

Quality, quantity and method are different ways to analyze any governmental institution, power, program or proposal. All three are important. Before we tackle how this applies to government, let’s learn a little about these three perspectives using a few examples. In the Great Books, for example, the discussion of quality centers on primary versus secondary qualities: attributes that cannot be separated from a thing are primary qualities, while attributes that can be changed without changing the thing—like color, taste, number or temperature, etc.—are secondary.

As for quantity, a big debate through written history has been the question of why mathematics doesn’t directly apply to the real world. Engineers, inventors and others who use math in the real world have to calculate for various non-mathematical realities in order to apply math to real things. This has caused many arguments among the great thinkers, from Aristotle to Buckminster Fuller. Newton invented calculus in order to bridge the gap between the mathematical and physical universes.

Perhaps the most interesting point about all this is that the discussion of method, as opposed to quality and quantity, runs through the Great Books and great conversation of history at nearly every turn. Almost every topic covered by the great thinkers and leaders from ancient, medieval and early modern (1800s) times deals extensively with competing ideas of method. Amazingly, this significantly slows in modern times, especially after 1900. Somehow the general acceptance of scientific experts as the true authorities on almost everything caused, or at least coincided with, a reduction of the common people asking questions about method.

Consider some examples that most moderns have experienced. Let’s say you decide to lose weight or get in shape. One diet approach, the most frequent in the United States, is to focus on “how much” food you eat. The formula is simple: Cut Calories + Exercise More = Lose Weight. This view attempts to change your body by decreasing how much food you eat and increasing the amount of exercise you get. Quantity is the focus.

Another viewpoint emphasizes the quality of what you eat (e.g. no sweets or fats, more raw vegetables, fewer carbohydrates, etc.). This perspective holds that if you eat the right kinds of foods and cut out the “bad” foods you’ll get your desired result. Likewise, it suggests effective exercise, like certain weight-training routines, interval cardio workouts, or changing your exercise to keep your body constantly adapting. The emphasis here is on “how well” you eat or exercise rather than how much.

A combined perspective emphasizes both how much and how well you eat, exercise, study, sell or whatever you are trying to do. Most modern “how to” literature combines these, and there are many thousands of management, sales, health and other books and programs in many fields of life.

Only a few programs exist from the third perspective: method. This viewpoint cares less about “how much” or “how well” than about “how”. For example, it might recommend eating whatever you want, as much as you want, but chewing each bite 20 times and fully enjoying each mouthful. The fact that those who do this tend to eat a lot less (you get full with less food) and better food (when you really taste them, many junk foods lose their appeal), isn’t the point. The focus is on process or method. Again, this is less common than the quality and quantity approaches.

Another example is provided by college sports. One team might focus on getting the most fans (quantity), and consider this the measure of a successful sports program. More fans often means more money for the school, more donations, better community relations, and so on. Another school might emphasize getting the best, most talented, coaches and players (quality). A third might focus on the process of great practices, training, conditioning and preparation—trusting that doing the right things will bring the desired outcomes (method).

The most successful programs—like the most effective sales techniques, educational systems, and governments, etc.—will encourage all three: quantity, quality and method. If a team becomes the best recruiter in the nation but puts very little work into conditioning or practice, it will likely not win very often. On the other extreme, teams which ignore recruiting probably won’t flourish either. All three perspectives are needed.

Two more quick examples: Imagine a school or church which focuses only on numbers without regard to knowledge or truth, or exclusively on truth while refusing to share it with anyone. Few modern institutions seem to focus on greatness—on the methods and processes of, say, being a great student, a great teacher, or a great believer. The scientific method lends itself to experts, and it seems that in the wake of accepting this reality our society has decided to leave most issues of method to the specialists.

There are many examples of all three perspectives in business, science, art and beyond, and method remains a small minority in most fields. Quality and quantity rule the day. As stated above, this is the opposite of nearly all recorded history.

Let’s consider how these concepts apply to government. One way to measure the effectiveness of a government is how big or small it is (quantity). If it is too small, it is naturally weak, and it if it is too big it is naturally tyrannical—so argue the authors of The Federalist. A second viewpoint asks how “good” our leaders are, or how “effective” a government program is (quality). Both of these are legitimate ways to analyze our government.

A third perspective is to analyze government by process (method). For example, does it have a written constitution? Does this constitution separate the legislative, executive and judicial powers in a way that all three are independent, generally equal with each other in power, and effectively checked and balanced? Does this constitution separate (or fit into a separation of) national, provincial and more local governments—with most sovereign powers left to the lower governments and the people? Was this constitution ratified by the people? Do the regular people deeply understand this constitution today? Does the government always follow the constitution?

Any nation that does not follow these methods will not long maintain widespread freedom or prosperity. Free citizens who expect to remain free must carefully analyze and lead their government utilizing all three of these perspectives.
Unfortunately, nearly all current discussion of government centers around one thing—debates about the quality of our elected leaders and the effectiveness (or not) of various government programs. The quantity and method questions are seldom mentioned by anyone.

There are many examples of how this drastically impacts our freedom and prosperity. Consider taxes. Following the modern trend, most current debate about taxes centers on quantity (e.g. How much is too much?, How can government tax the people more?, or, Don’t we need to raise taxes to pay down our deficit?) or quality (e.g. Should we tax the wealthy or everyone equally?, or, Are income, sales or other kinds of taxes best?).

In contrast, the American founding generation used a method approach to taxes: Many kinds (quality) and levels (quantity) of taxes were constitutional, but the federal government could only assess taxes from the state governments—never from individuals or households. When we changed the method, we saw the rise of government that is too big, too inefficient and increasingly out of control.

This same argument (that we are mostly ignoring the method approach to government and that all three approaches are important) can be applied to many of our most pressing current issues, from education or health care to energy policy, immigration, fiscal and monetary decisions, the national debt and deficits, etc.

Quality government matters, certainly, but the quantity and method questions (especially method) are ultimately more important to the freedom and prosperity of the people. If the regular people want to remain free, they must understand and act on this.

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Oliver DeMille is a co-founder of the Center for Social Leadership, and a co-creator of Thomas Jefferson Education.

He is the co-author of the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and USA Today bestseller LeaderShift, and author of A Thomas Jefferson Education: Teaching a Generation of Leaders for the 21st Century, and The Coming Aristocracy: Education & the Future of Freedom.

Oliver is dedicated to promoting freedom through leadership education. He and his wife Rachel are raising their eight children in Cedar City, Utah.

Category : Aristocracy &Blog &Citizenship &Constitution &Culture &Economics &Education &Entrepreneurship &Government &Politics

A Tale of Two Economies

April 11th, 2011 // 5:56 am @ Oliver DeMille

The United States currently houses two economies, and they are drastically different. The regular people have to deal with the following realities:

Energy costs are still going up, and may skyrocket in the wake of nuclear problems and the impact of the Arab uprisings on oil prices.
The price of crude oil is up 25% since the beginning of 2011, and it is still rising.
Food costs are rising accordingly.
Unemployment remains high and may increase again.
The real estate bubble is not yet over, and many experts are concerned about another major dip.
Many state governments are facing massive shortfalls and/or bankruptcy.

In contrast, millionaires increased their wealth approximately 16% during the Great Recession, and big business has likewise upped its wealth. Ken Kurson wrote in the April 2011 issue of Esquire:

“American corporations are sitting on an unholy pile of cash. About $2 trillion. It’s an all-time record, and as a percentage of total assets, it’s the highest in more than 50 years.”

These two economies do share one thing, however: a widespread fear of the future. Kurson continued:

“I would argue that this wad of dough actually greatly exceeds even the pile-up of the late 1950s, because of the reason it exists. Past cash hoardings were strategic in nature. They funded the expansion of product lines, plant building, technological innovation, and hiring that we witnessed in the mid-’60s, for example, after President Kennedy dramatically lowered the personal income tax. This time is different. The current stockpile isn’t strategic; it’s fearful. Companies are afraid to expand because of uncertainty about costs, and a lack of lending partners.”

Kurson suggests that this choice by the corporations is probably unwise—the government may use it as an excuse to find ways to take this money and spend it. More likely, corporations will invest it abroad.

Dante Chinni and James Gimpel point out that disparity between those with increasing wealth and the rest applies to both individuals and whole communities. In the April 2011 issue of The Atlantic these authors outline the twelve types of communities in the U.S.: Monied Suburbs, Minority Urban Centers, Campus Communities, Industrial Metropolises, Immigrant Communities, Service Worker Tourist Hubs and Midsize Cities, Emptying Nest Communities, Evangelical Epicenters, Mormon Outposts, Military Bastions, Tractor Country, and Boomtowns.

Of these, only four have annual median family incomes over $50,000 a year: Monied Burbs, Campus Communities, Boomtowns and Industrial Metropolises. Interestingly, these four and Military Bastions are the only communities where median family income is higher in 2010 than it was in 1980. As most people in the middle class have seen their standard of living stagnate since 1970 and significantly decrease since 2008, the top 7% of earners have greatly increased their wealth during the major global economic downturn.

Despite all the evidence, there are still those who consider many current government proposals “socialist.” This is at best a myth. At worst, it is a threat to our freedoms because if the regular people misunderstand the problem they are sure to fall short when they try to apply solutions. Yes, one symptom of socialism is massive government spending and taxation of the middle class to pay for state programs. But socialism is, as I have mentioned a number of times, a transfer of money from the middle and upper classes to the lower class. And we have not seen this in recent American administrations—Bush, Clinton, Bush or Obama.

What we have seen, in policy after policy, is a transfer of wealth from the middle classes to the upper class. Bailout money came from the middle class and was largely deposited in upper-class and big corporate bank accounts.
Unfortunately, we are living in a strange era of Orwellian doublethink. Liberals inaccurately call this great transfer of money from the middle to the upper class “conservative” while conservatives incorrectly label it “socialism.”

Let’s cut through the name calling and just call it what it is: Using government power to transfer money and wealth from the middle classes to the upper class is aristocracy, pure and simple. Aristocratic conservatives and aristocratic liberals have greatly benefitted from this trend, and they keep the rest of the nation from doing anything about it by arguing among themselves. Conservative and liberal aristocrats point fingers at each other, accuse and call names, and tell us to send more money to one side or the other.

The rest of the people, the non-elites, foot the bill because they get caught up in the arguments promoted by the two kinds of aristocrats. We are witnessing—and this is not an overstatement—a fundamental shift from our roots as a limited federal democratic republic to an aristocracy where the Commercial Aristocrats battle the Governmental Aristocrats for ascendency and the rest of the people see their freedoms and prosperity dwindle with each passing decade. Aristocrats make up one economy (one that is flourishing at record levels in both wealth and power), while the rest of the people make up the other economy (one that is deeply struggling).

Let’s call a spade a spade. We are moving toward aristocracy, and it is time to stop following or supporting aristocrats—regardless of which party they promote. We need America’s “second” economy, the regular people, to start increasing their leadership.

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Oliver DeMille is a co-founder of the Center for Social Leadership, and a co-creator of Thomas Jefferson Education.

Oliver is dedicated to promoting freedom through leadership education. He and his wife Rachel are raising their eight children in Cedar City, Utah.

Category : Aristocracy &Blog &Culture &Economics &Prosperity

What type of government does America have today?

March 26th, 2011 // 10:17 am @ Oliver DeMille

“It’s a Republic; if you can keep it…”

Property Rights

Free democracies protect the property of all.
Socialist nations protect the property of none.
Monarchies consider all property the estate of the king.
Aristocracies have one set of property and investment laws for the very rich and a different one for the rest.*

Taxation

Free democracies assess tax money fairly from all the people to cover vital, limited government roles.
Socialist societies take money from the rich and redistribute it to the poor.
Dictatorial monarchies take money from everyone and give it to the dictator.
Aristocracies take money from the middle and lower classes and give it to rich bankers, owners of big companies (“too big to fail”), and other powerful and wealthy special interests in bailouts and government contracts.*

Information

In free democracies it is legal for the people to withhold information from the government (e.g. U.S. Fifth Amendment, right to remain silent, etc.) but illegal for the government to withhold information from or lie to the people.
In socialist societies, dictatorial monarchies, and aristocracies, it is legal for the government and government agents to lie to the people but illegal for the people to lie to the same government agents.*

Success

In free democracies, the measure of success and the popular goal of the people is to be good and positively contribute to society.
In socialist societies, the measure of success and the popular goal of the people is to become government officials and receive the perks of office.
In dictatorial monarchies, the measure of success and the popular goal of the people is to please the monarch.
In aristocratic societies, the measure of success and the popular goal of the people is to obtain wealth and/or celebrity.*

Right to Bear Arms

In free democracies all the people hold the right to bear arms.
In socialist nations and monarchies, only government officials are allowed to have weapons.
In aristocratic societies only the wealthy and government officials are allowed to have many kinds of weapons.*

Immigration

Free democracies open their borders to all, especially immigrants in great need.
Socialist and dictatorial monarchies build fences to keep people in.
Aristocracies build fences to keep people out, especially immigrants in great need.*

*The current United States

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Oliver DeMille is a co-founder of the Center for Social Leadership, and a co-creator of Thomas Jefferson Education.

Oliver is dedicated to promoting freedom through leadership education. He and his wife Rachel are raising their eight children in Cedar City, Utah.

Category : Aristocracy &Blog &Citizenship &Constitution &Culture &Economics &Foreign Affairs &Government &History &Liberty

The Most Important Thing

March 17th, 2011 // 1:15 am @ Oliver DeMille

My oldest daughter asked me recently, “What is the most important thing Americans need to know right now about freedom?”

I didn’t even have to think about the answer, it is so clear to me.

My purpose here is to share the single most important thing the people need to know about freedom.

I have shared this idea before, but since it is the most important thing, in my opinion, it bears repeating.

On many occasions I have asked advanced graduate students or executives to diagram the American government model which established unprecedented levels of freedom and prosperity to people from all backgrounds, classes and views.

They always do it in the wrong order, and they get the most important part wrong.

Specifically, they start by diagramming three branches of government, a judicial and an executive and a bicameral legislature, and then they sit down.

They think they’ve done the assignment.

When I ask, “What about the rest?” they are stumped for a few seconds.

Then some of them have an epiphany and quickly return to the white board to diagram the same thing at the state level.

This time they are sure they are done.

“What level of government came first in the American colonies?” I ask. After some debate, they agree that many towns, cities, counties and local governments were established, most with written constitutions, for over two centuries before the U.S. Constitution and many decades before the state governments and constitutions.

“So, diagram the founding model of local government,” I say.

They then set out to diagram a copy of the three-branch U.S. Constitutional model.

Nope.

This sad deficit of knowledge indicates at least one thing: Americans who have learned about our constitutional model have tended to learn it largely by rote, without truly understanding the foundational principles of freedom.

We know about the three branches, the checks and balances, and we consider this the American political legacy.

But few Americans today understand the principles and deeper concepts behind the three branches, checks and balances.

The first constitutions and governments in America were local, and there were hundreds of them.

These documents were the basis of later state constitutions, and they were also the models in which early Americans learned to actively govern themselves.

Without them, the state constitutions could never have been written. Without these local and state constitutions, the U.S. Constitution would have been very, very different.

In short, these local constitutions and governments were, and are, the basis of American freedoms and the whole system.

The surprising thing, at least to many moderns, is that these local constitutions were very different than the state and federal constitutional model. There were some similarities, but the structure was drastically different.

The principles of freedom are applied differently to be effective at local and tribal levels.

A society that doesn’t understand this is unlikely to stay free. Indeed, history is exact on this point.

Another surprise is that nearly all the early townships and cities in the Americas adopted a very similar constitutional structure.

They were amazingly alike. This is because they are designed to apply the best principles of freedom to the local and tribal levels.

And there is more.

This similar model was followed by the Iroquois League as well, and by several other First Nation tribal governments.

Many people have heard this, but few can explain the details of how local free governments were established.

This same model of free local/tribal government shows up in tribes throughout Central and South America, Oceana, Africa, Asia and the historic Germanic tribes including the Anglo Saxons.

Indeed, it is found in the Bible as followed by the Tribes of Israel. This is where the American founders said they found it

The most accurate way, then, to diagram the American governmental system is to diagram the local system correctly, then the state and federal levels with their three branches each, separations of power and checks and balances.

But how exactly does one diagram the local level?

The basics are as follows: The true freedom system includes establishing as the most basic unit of society—above the family—small government councils that are small enough to include all adults in the decision-making meetings for major choices.

This system is clearly described in Tocqueville’s Democracy in America, Volume 1, Chapter 5,[i] and in Liberty Fund’s Colonial Origins of the American Constitutions.

It is also portrayed in the classic television series Little House on the Prairie and in many books like Moody’s Little Britches, Stratton-Porter’s Laddie and James Fenimore Cooper’s Last of the Mohicans.

In fact, if you know to look for it, it shows up throughout much of human history.

These adult town, city or tribal councils truly establish and maintain freedom by including in the most local and foundational decisions the voices and votes of all the adult citizenry.

These councils make decisions by majority vote after open discussion. They also appoint mayors/chiefs, law enforcement leaders, judges and other personnel.

All of these officials report directly to the full council of all adults and can be removed by the council.

Where representative houses and offices are much more effective at the larger state and national levels, the whole system breaks down if the regular citizens aren’t actively involved in governance at the most local levels.

In this model, every adult citizen is officially a government official, with the result that all citizens study the government system, their role in it, the issues and laws and cases, and think like leaders.

They learn leadership by leading.

Without this participatory government system at the local levels, as history has shown, freedom is eventually lost in all societies.

Once again, the most successful tribes, communities and even nations throughout history have adopted this model of local governance which includes all citizens in the basic local decision making.

The result, in every society on record,[ii] has always been increased freedom and prosperity.

No free society in recorded history has maintained its great freedom once this system eroded.

Tocqueville called this system of local citizen governance “the” most important piece of America’s freedom model.[iii]

Indeed, the U.S. Constitution is what it is because of the understanding the American people gained from long participation in local government councils.

These were the basis of state constitutions and the federal Constitution. If we don’t understand the local councils, we don’t understand the Constitution or freedom.

Today we need a citizenship that truly understands freedom, not just patriotic, loyal or highly professional people. This is the most important thing modern Americans can know if we want to maintain our freedom and widespread prosperity.

Endnotes:

[i] Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America (from the Henry Reeve text as revised by Francis Bowen, edited by Phillips Bradley, and published by Alfred A. Knopf).

[ii] See the writings of Arnold Toynbee and the multi-volume writings of Will & Ariel Durant.

[iii] Op cit., Tocqueville.

Category : Community &Culture &Government &Liberty &Tribes

The Declining American Dream

January 31st, 2011 // 9:55 am @ Oliver DeMille

We still hear about the American Dream. But more and more it seems we’re in a Matrix-like dream state where our perceptions are being manipulated. It’s actually a pretty common plot in cinema: The Minority Report, The Sixth Day, Total Recall, Inception, The Adjustment Bureau and others riff on this theme. We’re living in a reality out-of-synch with some truth we’ve lost, and we don’t even realize it. Somehow our collective memory and our assumptions of “normal” are slowly morphing, and our definition of the American Dream at present is so far removed from the original concept as to be a pretty fair Doublespeak[i] idiom.

Back when the Cleavers[ii] and even the Bradys[iii] were the icons of American families, what was the definition of “The American Dream”? What did it mean to be “middle class”? There are some features of it that were fairly well accepted once upon a time:

1. Home Ownership I

Perhaps the most traditional measure of middle class and the American Dream is the ability for every man to be the king of his own castle. In this the U.S. was a beacon to the world, and other countries even began to adopt the value that every person might aspire to own his own dwelling. The historical and sociological significance of home ownership includes the moral and political empowerment of being “landed,” and affiliation with the natural aristocracy. Homeowners were believed to have a deeper sense of responsibility to invest in their property improvement, an elevated pride in and loyalty to their neighborhoods and communities, and a higher commitment to the good of society in general.

2. Home Ownership II

Now we have to dig a little deeper into our genetic memory. Home ownership a generation or three ago meant not only that you weren’t renting from somebody else, but after a maximum of thirty years in your home you weren’t renting it from the bank, either. A 30-year mortgage left the likes of Ward and June Cleaver without a house payment right about when the grandkids started showing up, and they were able to be a boon to their young married children as they were starting out. If the idea of Home Ownership I as a definition of “The American Dream” is still generally accepted (and I believe it is), the Home Ownership II definition has been deleted from our collective memory. Not only do we have a 30-year mortgage that gets refinanced ad infinitum, but we have seconds on our vanishing equity—and our seniors are living on the funds derived from reverse mortgages.

3. One Income

For the Cleavers and the Bradys, Home Ownership I and II were accomplished on one income. Dad had evenings and weekends for leisure; mom could volunteer with the PTA and community service organizations. Both could participate in book clubs, bowling leagues, gardening and other vocations. The Women’s Lib movement sent the modern woman into the workforce by choice; now Home Ownership II is entirely out of reach for the middle class, and Home Ownership I requires a minimum of two incomes—and often multiple jobs for an individual worker—in order to be a reality.

4. Two Cars

The family had a car—and later two. They were American made with pride, and they were built to last. Paid with cash from savings, or with a little help from the local bank, they were paid off long before they were sent to the salvage yard. Some families even scandalized the neighbors by giving each of their teens a car as soon as they were legal to drive.

5. College for Kids

Part of the understanding for middle class families was that they would be able to pay for their kids to get a college education. Now all that’s left of that understanding is the guilt for failing to live up to it. No one seriously expects one-income families to be able to pay off the house and cars and simultaneously send several kids to the University. Scholarships, loans, grants and lingering debt into the career years are now the means for those who want a college education.

6. Discretionary Income

With all of the above, it was still an expectation that a married couple could live within their means and have savings, investment, yearly vacations with the whole family at some destination spot, and still have a few dimes to rub together at the end of the month.

7. Retirement

Ah, and after all this came the golden years. The Cleavers could now spend their expanded leisure time, afforded by an empty nest and the retirement from the company (complete with gold watch honors), in community service and nurturing the rising generation. They had savings, investments and retirement income to fall back on, a house and car paid free and clear, and the greatest resource: Leisure Time. They were elders in their community, and relied upon for wisdom.

The percentage of families enjoying these luxuries shrinks every year. Where did our American Dream go? Somehow, point by point, it has slipped away from us, and taken with it our definition of “middle class.” Would that we could wake up and reclaim the best of that dream; instead, we’ve awakened to a reality where our elusive American Dream is just out of reach; and these seven points that were once considered the legacy of any hard-working family are being deleted from our list of aspirations. If they are middle class expectations, the majority of America is no longer middle class.

[For a follow-up article on the how and why the middle class is shrinking, and how to reverse the trend, read Oliver’s article, “The Rule of Leisure,” featured in the February 2011 monthly newsletter for The Center for Social Leadership.

[i] See Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-four.
[ii] From the 1950 – 60s classic sitcom about the traditional nuclear family of Ward and June Cleaver, “Leave it to Beaver”.
[iii] From the classic 1970s sitcom about the non-traditional nuclear family of Mike and Carol Brady, “The Brady Bunch”.

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