textfiles/politics/SPUNK/sp001294.txt

WEALTH AND THE STATE, AN EXTRACT FROM "THE NATURE OF THE STATE"
by Derrick A Pike
Freely distributable, but please quote source



1 WEALTH (GOODS AND SERVICES)

As a way of organising society, the state fails in every aspect of life.
It is true the privileged have more than enough material wealth, but even
they have no satisfactory purpose in life and little opportunity to
develop as human beings. The power structure inhibits originality,
restricts change, and forces the many to serve the few. As a result, the
physical needs of most people are unsatisfied and many suffer and die. To
understand why humankind is in this pitiful condition, we must understand
how  governments fulfil their purpose. And since their purpose is
intimately connected with wealth, we must know exactly what that is. 

	We are born with a desire to live and to do this we have to eat,
sleep, and protect ourselves from the elements. This means that we cannot
exist unless we help one another. Even in the most friendly environment
where food can be gathered without any effort, people need help, if only
during the years when they are young. We certainly need help if we are to
live in reasonable comfort because then we have to cooperate to produce
our food, clothes, and shelter. All of us must produce more than these
items if we are to live well and with happiness. We need the means to
travel and carry goods over the land and sea and through the air. We need
musical instruments, computers, radio and television equipment, and a
myriad of other articles. And we need more than t he material objects that
we manufacture and grow. Because our bodies sometimes get sick and in
danger, we need assistance from others. We need a service. To have all
things in life, we need the help of other people. 

	The way we organise to help one another decides the nature of our
society. How we organise our work to produce goods and give a service, and
how we distribute both, is our economy. Since there are billions of people
who lack the essentials of life, we know that we are organising our
society very badly. The state is an economic failure. 

	To prove the disadvantages of the state and its economy, it is
unnecessary to define the many technical terms used by the apologists for
our society. Some of my definitions, however, must be given. The goods we
produce and the services we give, I call we wealth. In common parlance, the
word 'wealth' also means money, but here it does not. 

	There are two kinds of wealth, the useful and the useless. The
products of our labour that we need to live and enjoy are useful. Houses,
food, clothes, and cars are useful. The products of our labour that are
harmful and of no use are useless. Atom bombs , cigarettes, gambling
tables, and guns are useless. What we do to help others is useful. It is
useful to create and distribute the wealth we all need, to teach others,
and to cure the sick. What we do to harm others, or to produce no useful
result, is us useless. It is useless to work as bureaucrats, to take part in
government, or to fight in wars. Useful labour produces useful wealth and
service, and useless labour produces useless wealth and service. 

	Wealth can be a necessity or a luxury. Necessities are adequate
water, beverages, food, clothes, and housing. Luxuries are the extra
items, such as televisions, fine clothes, comfortable transport, and
objects of art. Both necessities and luxuries are us useful wealth, although
no one should have the latter until everyone has the former. 

2 HOW OUR KNOWLEDGE ABOUT WEALTH PRODUCTION HAS INCREASED

Most people imagine that it would take an impossible utopia to give
everyone the necessities of life. Recently, however, a factor has been
added to society that makes it possible. The very factor that has got
humans into trouble can now get them out of it . That factor is our great
knowledge that enables us to control our material environment. Humankind
has made three giant steps in the acquisition of knowledge concerning the
production of wealth, and this knowledge has released us from the burden
of labou r. The last step was made only a few decades ago, and it ensures
that the utopian society is within our grasp. 

	Early in our history, when our numbers were few, we could obtain
all our food by gathering it from natural vegetation while living a
nomadic life. We needed to work only about three hours a day to have all
the necessities of life and even some luxuries.  Some people believe that
during this period we also hunted for food. As our numbers increased, more
food was required, and it became necessary for us to be farmers,
cultivating plants and raising domestic animals. During this time, our
workload for each p erson increased. Then, by about 8000 BC, our workload
was greatly reduced by two genetic accidents that transformed the wheat
that was not much more than wild grass into wheat with ears full of grain.
This modern wheat could be propagated only by ourselves, but we knew how
to do it. We made the first step towards the easy production of wealth. 

	The second step was the discovery of machinery. Early in the
eighteenth century the seed drill and other farming machinery were
invented, so fewer people were required to produce food. Then when steam
and electricity were harnessed much of the need to work with our muscles
was gone for ever. 

	The third and final step was made when we invented devices that
would do the work of our brains. We now have computers that will do
calculations, display information and designs in graphical form, store and
sort information, transmit information to any p art of the world, teach,
listen and speak on different subjects, and do much else. More than this,
and perhaps even more vital, we have servomechanisms that enable the
computers to control our mechanical power. We now have robots that
manufacture, or help manufacture, any article from a pin to an aeroplane,
and robots that control the speed and direction of any object or vehicle.
Seeing, feeling, and touching robots operated by computers, can take over
some work completely. Fifth-generation computers will have an artificial
intelligence so that they can do the work of doctors, lawyers, teachers,
journalists, designers, and other professionals. 

	Obviously, if we have machines that will create and handle power
and devices that will think and control them, then the two together will
do nearly all our work for us. Because we have machines that will do the
work of our brains and our muscles there is little left for us to do -
except to organise our society. That's the hard part! 

3 WE CAN NOW PRODUCE WEALTH EASILY

Even now, without a properly organised society, the ease with which we
produce wealth is remarkable. Because we possess a vast technical and
scientific knowledge, all forms of wealth can be manufactured in great
quantities. To give a few examples: In Britain, one blast furnace
produces enough iron for the whole country, and a single manufacturer
produces enough shoes to give everyone a new pair four times a year. In
Japan, one factory makes nearly 30,000 radios a day, and in America
another makes nearly three million ball pens in the same time. In 1986 a
factory was built where only 95 people, working in three shifts, can
produce 300,000 vehicles a year. During the twenties, it took eight men
and seven horses to farm 250 acres of land. Now one man can do it. Less
than four per cent of the American population work on the land and yet
they produce three-quarters of the world's grain. And as with the
necessities of life, so it is with the luxuries. 

	Of all the work done in the world, only half is done to produce
and prepare food. In the industrial countries, only about one person in
ten is so engaged. It has been estimated that even now, when our technical
knowledge is not put to proper use, only about 5 per cent of the
population can provide the rest of us with all the food, clothing,
shelter, and fuel we need. 

	The curse of laborious work has been lifted from us but, as with
all things, this is a blessing that may be used for good or evil. In a
rational society, it will be used for good, but in our present society, it
is used for evil. 

4 WHY WE MUST UNDERSTAND THE STATE SOCIETY

Since it is now possible to produce wealth with hardly any effort, we have
to ask why we do not have plenty of it. Why do we not all live like kings?
There can be only one answer. We do not because we organise our society
ineffectively. Our labour is not used to produce useful wealth
efficiently, and it is wasted producing useless wealth. Even worse, what
is produced is distributed unfairly and is often wasted or destroyed.
Today our economy is capitalism and our social organisation is the state.
Both are ineffectual, dangerous, and irreformable, and we must understand why.

	Obviously, we must understand capitalism if we are to understand
our present way of producing and distributing wealth. Not so obvious is
the fact that we must understand the state in order to understand our
economy. Most standard textbooks explain - or try to explain - our economy
without any reference to the state society. This is like trying to explain
why a car moves along the road without first explaining the petrol engine. 

	We have to understand the states because within them there are
governments, and it is governments who decide how society shall be
organised. The society we have is the result of following their
instructions. If your government says that your economic system must be
capitalism, then capitalism it is. If it says that it must be Fascism or
Communism, then Fascism or Communism it is. The kind of society and
economy we have is always the result of government rule. Governments force
us to use their economic system, but whatever the system they choose, it
always involves the way wealth is created and distributed. Governments
interfere with and control the economy in many ways, and they are also a
part of it. In 1993, 40 per cent of all spending in Britain was by the
Government. Therefore, we must understand how governments control the
economy and why they do it. 

	We want to eliminate not only our economic evils but also all
social evils; not only inflation, slumps and poverty but also crime,
terrorism, and war. Therefore, if we are to eliminate these social evils
we must understand our present society that produces them. If we are to
dismantle our present society and replace it with a better one, we must
first understand its nature and the reason it produces so much poverty and
violence. There is no other social pattern for us to study because the
states cover the world.