Trump's Approach Constitute a Danger to Civilization.
His national and international strategies – ranging from the effort to overturn the election previously to recent actions and warnings – weaken both domestic and international legal frameworks. The implications are broader.
They jeopardize the core idea of civilization itself.
The guiding principle of a functioning society is to forestall the more powerful from preying upon and using the vulnerable. Otherwise, we could find ourselves trapped in a brutish war where might makes right could survive.
This ideal is central of America’s founding documents. It is equally the heart of the postwar international order supported by the America, which stresses multilateralism, popular sovereignty, individual liberties, and the rule of law.
However, it is a delicate principle, easily violated by those who seek to abuse their authority. Preserving it necessitates that the those in charge have the moral fortitude to refrain from seeking short-term wins, and that the rest of us hold them accountable when they fail.
Absolute power is not right. It leads to uncertainty, disruption, and hostilities.
Each instance people or corporations or countries that are advantaged prey upon those that are less so, the fabric of our shared norms frays. If these actions are not contained, the fabric unravels. If not stopped, the world can fall into chaos and war. History provides ample precedent.
We now inhabit a society and world grown vastly more unequal. Influence and wealth are held by fewer hands than ever before. This encourages the privileged to leverage their position against the less fortunate because they feel untouchable.
The fortunes of a handful of ultra-wealthy individuals is staggering. The power of big tech, big oil, and large defense contractors spans numerous countries. Artificial intelligence is likely to further concentrate resources and influence even more. The military might of the leading countries is unprecedented in human history.
Supported by a compliant faction and an accommodating high court, the executive office has been transformed into the most powerful and unaccountable instrument of the state in the modern era.
Consider this confluence and you see the danger.
An unbroken thread links earlier transgressions to ongoing threats. These were based on the overconfidence of invincibility.
There is parallel dynamics in international affairs: in military conflicts, in coercive diplomacy, and in the rampant monopolization by industrial titans.
Yet, unfettered might does not establish right. It makes for fragility, revolution, and armed conflict.
History shows that rules and conventions to constrain the influential also protect them. Absent these limits, their insatiable demands for greater influence and riches eventually bring them down – along with their corporations, nations, or empires. And pave the way for world war.
This blatant contempt for legal order will plague the nation and the world – and indeed civilized conduct – for a long time.
