Crises and what they reveal to us.

We need a new political philosophy that makes society robust to large-scale existential events.

The Dawn Of Change.

It’s the 18th of March 2020. You’re sitting somewhere, anywhere, probably holding your phone; glossing through twitter to find out anything you can about this virus. You’ve heard about it from the news; from your loved ones; from that boss that lay you off not too long ago. It all feels surreal… this sense of confusion.

You may not know what’s going on, but neither does anyone around you. You can barely leave the house. This cluelessness, it hurts.

But you aren’t alone. Somewhere, there’s a leader of a country, struggling to make decisions. This invisible enemy they had years to prepare for, essentially thrust itself into battle- the leaders were caught napping.

The Covid19 outbreak is in many ways an experiment, a reflection in human and socio-economic existence. There is nothing that equalizes humanity better than the prospect of death. Covid19 pushed death into our faces and said, “You may not know when I’m coming, but I will be there, and you will not like what I have to offer”.

The global economy has come to a stand-still. Finally, people are realizing how fragile their daily lives are. These empty abstractions we live on are being brought to light.

Existential crises serve an alternate purpose: they serve as bombs, reset buttons, and time machines all at once. This time will be no different. What truly matters, is that we should be cognizant of the fact that we are not merely observers in this event, but active participants as well. The coming days, months, or even years, will set into place new global and intra-national socio-political orders. We’re being given a chance to mold the society of our dreams, let’s make use of it.

Society isn’t natural and we forgot that.

When was the last time you thought to yourself, maybe there’s a better way to educate our kids? That perhaps, it isn’t the building that provides learning, but the structure, resources, and guidance that do.

When was the last time you found yourself feeling that government was not this singular entity, but a collection of humans supposed to be making decisions on your behalf?

When was the last time you thought to yourself, “maybe I’m far more disposable to these organizations than I thought.”?

If you haven’t thought about any of these before, there’s an extremely high chance that you just have or will in the coming days.

Your kids are home- probably learning online- in what may be the greatest experiment in long-distance learning we have ever seen.

The incompetence and competence of various governments across the world, is revealing, that the elite we look up to, maybe far more human and many times far less decisive in their actions than we initially thought.

If you’ve lost your job, have no paid leave, and have no unemployment benefits you feel as if the rug has been pulled from under you. The structure you may have had just days ago is all but gone.

What crises reveal to us, in this instance, is that there is in many societies an asymmetric relationship between organizations we “feel” we belong to and ourselves. We were indeed minute in their vastness; in many cases, we merely went along with their effects on us.

The reason for this is that we have no choice but to belong to them. However, unlike the ancient hunter groups of old, there is no communion, there is no fellowship, no kinsmanship, and almost certainly a disproportionate gain in the treasures of a hunt. This isn’t a call for socialism or communism, it is, however, a fact that we have created bureaucratic collective structures so inefficient they benefit a very few. And it is all due to this:

WE HAVE NO LEVERAGE!

Many may have advocated for a strengthening of unions in western society, but let’s be honest, would unions really help in a pandemic? They are themselves heavily reliant on organization, and in this circumstance where we require more decentralization, shown to be archaic.

Instead, we around the world, have come to the consensus that it be far better to actually give people power in the form of cash. A UBI is just one example of the necessity of human-centered, universal but decentralized policy that highlights itself as necessary in these times.

Leverage is defined not by what you are granted, but what you have and your capacity for influence. True leverage reveals itself in individual power, to a collective benefit.

UBI is as such a form of “Human-centered Essentialist” policy. I define Human-centered Essentialist policy as a policy that focuses on the well-being of the individual and their will in regards to a collective whole, that can be exercised- with great impact - in the absence of organization.

This definition is a slight but necessary expansion in the political philosophy championed by Andrew Yang(Human-Centered Capitalism).

I have come to believe that the metric for such policy, is this:

Does it work in a pandemic?

The Covid19 outbreak has revealed to us fundamental truths about most societies:

• We need to separate human value from not merely economic and market value, but also the effect of an inefficient organization(incompetent government, ruthless corporations).

• When stripped of all the illusions that human society provides us, our societies are far more fragile than we think.

• An Ideology arises from complacency about what is truly necessary, due to the fact that it builds itself on the illusions of a perfect society based on an imperfect assessment of the flaws of the current state of society. Hence, there are very few truly socialist/communist principles approaches that seem to be necessary in regard to solving the crisis and the economic turmoil we face. Advocates of Federal Job Guarantees realize that jobs barely help in a global pandemic and yet still push on. Libertarians know that universal testing is necessary and must be deployed by an efficient government. Moderates are finally being confronted with the fact that means-tested programs fall short due to their low, restricted impact.

If your society or economy can’t survive or thrive in an epidemic, it simply means it isn’t robust enough.

We need a framework that pushes policy towards a place in which we— not as workers or citizens but as people as humans— can thrive regardless of the circumstance.

Principles of Human-Centered Essentialism.

Human-centered Essentialism as such is:

• Pragmatic: Policy is measured greatly by its functional utility.

• Foundational: Policy and legislation are developed from the ground up with a First-Principles framework.

• Essential: Focuses on human-needs and the understanding of human wants.

• Data-Oriented: Policy and Legislation are based on trends in data.

• Universal: Means-testing is regressive.

• Democratic: Provides citizens leverage over the affairs of the nation.

• Decentralized: Decentralization in this particular sense does not mean a limitedly functional government. It does, however, mean that we look to far fewer centralized cases. Examples of these include: Detaching healthcare from and income organizational work, detaching centralized government incompetence from the well-being of citizens, etc.

Whereas Human-Centered Capitalism focuses on diverting and fundamentally changing market and economic incentives to benefit human well-being, Human-Centered Essentialism is a framework from which philosophies(like Human-Centered Capitalism) may borrow. In many ways, I believe this to be a metapolitical philosophy.

It isn’t inherently ideological, as the focus isn’t on what is being done or a specific policy. It certainly isn’t Libertarian in that it seeks the diminishing power of government. It does seek competent, efficient government with skin in the game by those in power. It isn’t socialist either in that the focus isn’t on the elimination of private property.

The focus of Human-Centered Essentialism is context, and that the context is focused on these principles. Means and methods are endless, open-ended and conform merely to what the data suggests. It’s transcendental centrism, that defines itself not merely by modesty and “just-enough” that it gets through polarized political processes. Human-Centered Essentialism is far-reaching, hard-hitting essentialism and radical pragmatism that I believe should appeal to the philosophically homeless but intellectually curious; to the independent at heart.