belos

I have been working on designing a new system of governance - an alternative to liberal democracy - for the past half decade, and hope that sharing it will inspire a good conversation. So, epistemic status: I really hope I have it figured out, but only time will tell with something like this. My writing is all posted at my substack, including a Table of Contents to keep the ideas organized. There is something diseased in our democratic system. At least, this is the belief that has been strongly in the zeitgeist for the last few decades. Trust in government hasn’t really been above 60% since the 60s, which is a weird time to think of trust in government as “high”. The exact diagnosis varies widely. Money in politics is a commonly claimed enemy, others might be the Supreme Court, the Imperial Presidency, the “deep state”, aka bureaucracy, etc. To some, the two parties are flip sides of the same coin, indistinguishable save for a different icon stamped onto the same base metal underneath. For others, it’s politicians: they’re just snakes; maybe everyone involved is just bad at their jobs; or the trust prior the 60s was just ignorance and clearly unjustifiable. The rich seem to be doing fine, maybe the whole system is just rigged. I want to live in a society that is well run. One that isn't civilizationally inadequate, that I could even call effective. One that takes care of its people and fairly and equitably makes life better for all of us, while allowing us the freedom to try, fail, grow and otherwise be self-directed. Socialists dream of a fair society that treats us all well, and I share their dream. Libertarians and anarchists answer them with a call to be cautious when handing power over to any other humans lest we lose freedoms that we all deserve. Meanwhile, we argue over capitalism as if it were a goal, rather than a tool we use to pursue our goals. I don’t trust our current system to be able to build a fair society without destroying freedoms, and I don’t