THE PREREQUISITES FOR ADVANCEMENTS IN SOCIETY
There are certain things that need to be in place for society to advance and move to it’s next phase of development, there is a system that must be in place to engineer this movement of society and that system is definitely not this one.
We all talk about the future, it’s a general aspiration of all, but what is the future exactly and how do we recognize it? How do we know we have gotten to the future? Is the future tomorrow or is it next year, or the next decade? What is the future and how do we get there exactly?
First, the what. The future, we should realize is not measured in terms of the chronological passage of time, as in today, next tomorrow, next week or next month. The future is determined or measured by aspirations and aspirations met ushers us into the future.
So, individually, if you have aspirations of the future, of what and where you want to be, what you want to achieve, that’s your future, the picture of how you want to look like and where you want to be. Conversely, if you don’t have a clear picture of where and what you want to be, you do not have a future so to say. If that picture is created by fear and it is not a pretty picture then you know you have got some problems, because that bad picture is your future.
This is why the first thing that happens to us when we come to God’s kingdom is a change of that picture, “except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” John 3:3. The picture is the first thing that changes and it governs the second part which is the entering part, the how to enter.
That is individually, however, this article is about us at a societal level. What is the future of society? Be it at a sub national, national or at a level higher than that, the future is a collective picture, that every member of a society has of what and where they want to be, a collective aspiration, and achieving this aspiration is the society entering into their future.
Also, to mention something here, except there is a collective picture of the future state of society, then there is no Nationhood. It is the picture of the future (it’s vision), that is the adhesive that holds any society at any level together. The absence of that, there is no society at all. The society must then be broken down to the level where this picture is collectively shared. That is the true level of that society.
Leadership, strong leaders usually do these for societies. That’s the ‘what' of the future.
The more important question however is the ‘how' of the future. How do we get to the future? Let me state it here, the future is forged in the crucible of true liberty and freedom i.e. freedom that is different from lawlessness.
Lawlessness or lasciviosness is the worst fate that can befall any society. It is the worst kind of bondage, which is why people’s initial response to a talk of liberty is to first rebel against their liberators and side with their oppressors. Humans instinctively fear lawlessness, much more than they do oppression. Oppression at least guarantees one of our fundamental needs and that is order.
It is after this is secured that we start talking about greater freedoms. If it is just about freedom alone, then we can just loosen ourselves of all obligations and we all know where that leads; it equates us to animals as, laws make us humans.
The great quest of progress as the case may be is finding ways to increase our degrees of freedom in our society and our lives without unravelling the order that we currently enjoy. It requires a lot of wisdom and balance, and only great leaders are able to manage this. So, an acceptable future is one that guarantees a higher degree of freedom than we currently enjoy, without jeopardizing the current stability we enjoy in society now. Hence, when we figure out how to increase the degree of freedom of the society or humanity, as the case may be, then know we are progressing.
Therefore, the collective aspiration that every member of a society ought to have that, constitutes their future, is a picture of a stable society with higher levels of freedom for them all. This is a very attractive prospect for people and they easily buy into this and when a critical mass of people have this picture, then that society can be said be mobilized. So, if we are able to figure out a state of higher liberty and freedom for society, then that is a good future for society to have. Freedom and liberties are the units we use in measuring progress in society.
We have a picture we call the future of mankind; when we see curves cars, flying cars, certain types of architecture and so on, we instinctively say this is the future. How do we attain to this state, how do we get here? How do you create the future? There are three domains in society, where progress is measured, these are the political, economic and cultural domains of society and the future cannot be created except there is an increase the degrees of freedom in all these domains.
Let’s take a look at the political domain. The politics of a society basically deals with how power is distributed within society. It is important that it is not too centralized in the hands of too few people so it is not abused, as in the case of many societies. Conversely, if power is overly distributed, then there is no control and people descend to chaos and lawlessness. The key is to strike the right balance that increases the rights of people without putting too much power in the hands of people that cannot manage it.
Education is a key tool for increasing people’s ability to manage power if it is given to them. So the goal is to educate people with the right values, and when they are sufficiently enlightened, they will demand and get more right from the leadership. People with better enlightenment should hold power, otherwise, society will be reduced to the level of enlightenment of the ones with power. The best and the brightest should hold political power. Your government should not be less enlightened
Also worthy of note on the political front is the legal system of the society. It is important that the legal system of a society remains incorruptible, otherwise it will be quite difficult and almost impossible to mobilize the people to work on building the future. Only the people can build the future and it is important they have faith in the system.
For economic system, which governs the distribution of resources within the economy, there must also be balance. An economic system where more people are involved in the economy, without jeopardizing the fundamentals of private property and adequate rewards for profitable efforts put into the production of goods and services. Currently, people who currently control resources and the factors of production are often the enemies of meaningful economic progress in this light.
There’s this irrational fear that having more people involved in real production and ownership of factors of production will mean less resources for them. A zero sum paradigm. This cannot be farther from reality as all evidences from the advent of capitalism and the modern economy to today points to the prevalence of a positive sum economic paradigm governing global economic systems. As a matter of fact, evidences have shown that the more people are involved in economic activity, the greater the marginal output. The economy grows at a faster pace with more people involved in production. So, true economic liberty and freedom is a prerequisite to us getting to our future.
And on the business front. Your business should be designed to give people a greater degree of freedom in any domain of their lives. If it is, then that is what your messaging and marketing should be all about, painting the picture of this future state for your customers. If it is not, then that should be what your business is all about.
The last prerequisite is cultural liberty. This the the freedom and liberty of choice or self determination. This is the most important of them all. It is the freedom to acquire information freely and then decide to be whatsoever you want to without restrictions, coercion or fear of persecution. This deals with the freedom of speech, conscience (or religion), association, self determination of a people and so on.
It is impossible for us to enter into our future, if there is no true freedom in the society. We have gotten here through increasing the degrees of freedom gradually and progressively over the years, and that is the only way we can continue. If some people believe that power is theirs to keep and are willing to do anything, even go as far as destroying the very fabric of society to hold power, then there has to be a concerted effort to forge ahead, assuming positions of leadership, crafting a picture of the future and then start building in spite of them. If they come against you, it is impossible to fight a people united for the purpose of fighting for their freedom.