It is one of the odd features of modernity- we appear to find ti very hard to out think fundamentally medieval power structures (this was originally Marx's idea).
At the core of government, but also any oraganization lies the court - and its attendant laws of petioners. That is there is a small inner circle, distinct in all likehood from either any pretense of meritocracy, or from the official poistion. This magic circle controls the access to the monarch - and controls it is both direction. And this access matters as the monarch is the personhead where rules change. to now and to influence the monarch is then power. Away from this charmed person there lies the humdrum of rules imposed so as not to incur either blame or extra work, by endless officials (who as they are a part of its charmed circle have no real interest in their jobs). Officials then enact what they think is royal policy, while the king alone is free to break and rewrite that policy.
The sate becomes about who one knows. The state becomes about the difference between what the centre is doing and what is actually happening on the ground where the rules are actually applied, sometimes in impossible situations). The world of the court and the world of it officials are then distinct -are kept so, for the rulers semi-dive aspect is linked in to their separation from reality.
the age of democracy never then lost this model, it merely exploded it across the state - so that schools, hospitals, dental practices whatever became versions of the court. The Court everywhere promotion is looped into favour, and power and personalities then merge.
The second medieval organ that is everywhere- is of course the free market. That is, the very feudal idea that there existed beyond the normal rules of the king a zone, a square where mammon was king. that is where one could trade and define prices as one saw fit, without hinderance from other powers. Markets were then bound by restriction, and pitched into towns as one of their hubs. A model we have taken of course and transfigured across the globe. we indulge in endless transactonins in the name of this little piece of medieval thought. We still then think of that little market square with ti simple rules and transparent prices. a little piece of cod imagination that of course that blinds us to the illegallities and idioces of the system. Markets are like that we cite as holy law- and always have been since medieval times...
A fact that conviently ignores the fact that we like our ancestors need to impose the market. they built squares, we legal regulation without which no market could or would exist. Markets are then not natural (even when they are historical): they are man made artifices like many others. we have then the power to change them and always to regulate them differently. the fact then they are corrupt is not merely a force f nature a necessary evil of the market place- or it is is then it is an evil which we have created for itself in the oddity of our regulation of those markets, and our imposition of them upon the world.
linked then to the market are its two medieval corolllaries . Firstly market is of course festival - a festival that creates an excess and the gambling that expresses it. Around any market there exists then a welter of gambling joints and casinos - all then the futures market or hedge funds or whatever. more than that we have in recent times bought even these gambling strategies write into everyones home. buy gas has become also a game of pokers, both from the big energy prices (who speculate of the price) and for ourselves (who gamble on the companies, and what our fellow citizens do). gaming then and the free market run together, and confuse each other - on the best traditions of our forefathers.
The second aspect of the market that developed was of course the guilds. Given the court does not control the market- league of traders could or could influence it or perhaps just gain power in supplying it. Merchantisms is then tied to the very independence of the market from the monarchy- an independence that created and creates new possibilities for power.
The third deeply medieval practice of modernity is the romance will still link to soldiers and what they do The process then of killing (for whatever reason) is romanticised,for they are killing , and dying in our names. they must then be our knights in armor, and we there damsels. We must then do our part are they bleed. well maybe (although i can do without the B-movie gloss.. Certainly death on any side in war is always a tragedy. the problem is though that our romance of knights and being the good guys do not at any point avoid this tragedy. on the contrary we modern crusaders go off and look for it- as indeed the knight of the round table had to do. War and knights then go together as does excess militiry spending and modernity.
finally we are clearly in the process in Britain at least of renovating tyrant great medieval institution the church. or in its modern form the Charity- a charity that has its own structure (and court), independent of the state,with it own specialisms and responsibilities. More than that it own very strong ethics, which sweeps up its workers, ensuring they work for less that the market rate, and is then expects to resonate within its would be client. The churc or the charity is never then merely a neutral organization, but rather has its own ethical politics, a politics that of course cuts both ways. i might help and harry the power or the ill in equal measure, but it surely will also look upwards to to the state and critiques actions. The experiment then of expanding charity, and hoping that it can take the place of the state will change the game of state aid. Getting it will certianly be harder, and possibily linked to shame and living of the parish (good old Parish Beagles). - but at the same time, these parishes are unlikely to remain very silent. /they will of the contrary have an ethic and opinion of their own, that will critique the government as well as the power. And the only way the government can limit that critique is to expand and change t meet it. That is to take on the ethics of the charity -which lead us to many places, only so desirable, while others really do start to feel like Oliver Twist (where the problems of this system are mercilessly exposed).
Medieval thought never dies, it merely became transfigured - so that its transubstantiation shines through so much we are and do - let us hoe it is up to the complexity of our times for we sure as hell do not have any other models...... sorry to fail you Marx
No comments:
Post a Comment