{"id":1293,"date":"2023-08-12T15:36:28","date_gmt":"2023-08-12T15:36:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2023\/08\/12\/the-china-convergence\/"},"modified":"2023-08-12T15:36:28","modified_gmt":"2023-08-12T15:36:28","slug":"the-china-convergence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2023\/08\/12\/the-china-convergence\/","title":{"rendered":"The China Convergence"},"content":{"rendered":"

This Substack piece<\/a> by N. S. Lyons is very long but very<\/em> good. I invite my top commenters — I won't name names lest I inadvertently omit someone — to weigh  in on it or parts of it. The drift of the piece is announced early on:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

. . .when it comes to the most fundamental political questions, China and the United States are not diverging but converging to become more alike.<\/span><\/p>\n

In fact, I can already predict and describe the winner set to prevail in this epochal competition between these two fiercely opposed national systems. In this soon-to-be triumphant system\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n

Despite a rhetorical commitment to egalitarianism and \u201cdemocracy,\u201d the elite class deeply distrusts and fears the people over whom it rules. These elites have concentrated themselves into a separate oligarchic political body focused on prioritizing and preserving their rule and their own overlapping set of shared interests. Wracked by anxiety, they strive constantly to maximize their control over the masses, rationalizing a need to forcefully maintain stability in the face of dangerous threats, foreign and domestic. Everything is treated as an emergency. \u201cSafety\u201d and \u201csecurity\u201d have become be the watchwords of the state, and of society generally.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Who can deny that given the events of the last few days?<\/span><\/p>\n

Deeper in, the following passage caught my attention due to my interest in Carl Schmitt:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Across the West, the managerial elite therefore immediately went into a frenzy over the danger allegedly presented by \u201cpopulism\u201d and launched their own revolt, declaring a Schmittian state of exception<\/a> in which all the standard rules and norms of democratic politics could be suspended in order to respond to this existential \u201ccrisis.\u201d In fact, some began to question whether democracy itself might have to be suspended in order to save it.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s Time for the Elites to Rise Up Against the Ignorant Masses,\u201d New York Time Magazine<\/em> journalist James Traub thundered with an iconic 2016 piece<\/a> in Foreign Policy <\/em>magazine. This quickly became a view openly and proudly embraced among the managerial elite, who no longer hesitated to express their frustration with democracy and its voters. (\u201cDid I say \u2018ignorant\u2019? Yes, I did. It is necessary to say that people are deluded and that the task of leadership is to un-delude them,\u201d Traub declared.) \u201cToo Much Democracy is Killing Democracy,\u201d is how a 2019 article<\/a> published by neocon rag The Bulwark<\/em> put it, arguing for Western nations to take their \u201cbitter technocratic medicine\u201d and establish \u201ca political, social, and cultural compact that makes participation by many unnecessary.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

My posts on Carl Schmitt are collected here<\/a>. Most relevant is perhaps A Good Summary of the Political Thinking of Carl Schmitt. <\/a><\/span>(Written 17 February 2019)<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This Substack piece by N. S. Lyons is very long but very good. I invite my top commenters — I won't name names lest I inadvertently omit someone — to weigh  in on it or parts of it. The drift of the piece is announced early on: . . .when it comes to the most … Continue reading “The China Convergence”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1293"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1293\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}