Trump's Approach Present a Threat to Civilization.
The domestic and foreign policies – from the challenge to the democratic process five years ago to current moves and warnings – undermine both national and global law. The implications are broader.
They threaten the fundamental meaning of a civilized world.
A ethical foundation of any advanced culture is to forestall the stronger from attacking and exploiting the weaker. Failing that, we risk being locked in a conflict of all against all where survival of the strongest prevails.
This principle is embedded of America’s founding documents. It is equally the foundation of the global system established after WWII advocated by the United States, built on collective action, popular sovereignty, fundamental freedoms, and the supremacy of law.
Yet, it is a delicate construct, often broken by those who would exploit their influence. Preserving it necessitates that the powerful have enough integrity to abstain from seeking short-term wins, and that the rest of us ensure they answer for their actions if they don't.
Absolute power does not make right. It leads to uncertainty, chaos, and conflict.
Whenever individuals, companies, or nations that are richer and more powerful target and use those that are weaker, the framework of society weakens. If these actions are allowed to continue, the system fails. If not stopped, the world can plunge into chaos and war. It has happened before.
Our current reality is a international landscape with deepening divides. Influence and wealth are increasingly centralized than in recent memory. This encourages the privileged to leverage their position against the disadvantaged because they feel omnipotent.
The wealth of a handful of tycoons is difficult to fathom. The influence of big tech, big oil, and large defense contractors covers numerous countries. AI is could consolidate economic and political clout even more. The offensive capability of the world's largest nations is unmatched in the annals of time.
Enabled by complicit legislators and a sympathetic judicial body, the executive office has been turned into the most dominant and unchecked instrument of state power in the modern era.
Combine these factors and you see the looming crisis.
An unbroken thread connects past transgressions to ongoing threats. Each were founded upon the hubris of omnipotence.
You see much the same in other global contexts: in territorial invasions, in coercive diplomacy, and in the rampant monopolization by massive conglomerates.
But, raw power does not make right. It produces fragility, revolution, and armed conflict.
Historical evidence demonstrates that rules and conventions to constrain the influential also safeguard them. Without such constraints, their endless appetite for more power and wealth eventually lead to their downfall – taking down their enterprises, countries, or domains. And risk global conflict.
Such lawlessness will haunt the nation and the world – and the very idea of civilization – for years to come.
