Trump is a hurdle to test human civilization — from a Chinese perspective of view.
By: Athena Gong
Tags: Inequality, Donald Trump, Democrats, Electoral System Reform, Chinese Perspective

You must have heard such a joke. We need to elect a leader from three candidates: A, B, and C. Candidate A is dealing with some dishonest politicians and will turn to astrologers for help. He is an old smoker + drunkard and has extramarital affairs.

Candidate B has been fired twice. Not only does he sleep until noon every day, but he also took drugs in college.

Candidate C is an honored war hero, a vegetarian, does not smoke, and has never had an extramarital affair.

As a voter, who would you choose to be the leader?

Yes, you must have guessed it. This candidate C is Hitler, and the other two in the story are Churchill and Roosevelt.

You see, if there are no clear and uniform selection criteria, it will be difficult for us to make judgments. Once a master loses his throne, he will not be able to convince his fans. In the American election, the topic of our video, the information faced by American voters is far noisier than the master of selection at station B. American voters may not choose Hitler, but they will select Trump

I can’t help but sympathize with American voters, especially those who disagree with the two presidential candidates: Is my breakfast bitter gourd juice or chili water? If Trump or Biden becomes president, who will benefit my interest group? It seems to be no good. They’re in a dilemma.

Trump is a hurdle to test the civilization of the American people.

Suppose we compare the countries in the world to different super companies. If each of us is an employee of these super large companies, the country’s prominent leader is equivalent to this super large company’s CEO. You should admit that the leadership required to manage a country is no less than that of a super-large company. Even the difficulty of managing a country far exceeds the problem of managing a company in many ways.

In this super-large company named “America,” every adult, either CFO or CTO, or the head of the sales department, or even the interns, discusses how the CEO’s work competently, making important decisions and distributing the profits.

Faced with this situation, I find it difficult for them.

The emergence of Trump is just a typical epitome of the overall American electoral system. Trump, AKA, the focus of the democratic electoral system in the United States, is a hurdle to test the electoral system’s civilization.

No matter who becomes the CEO, in this super large company, it takes a lot of time to cater to most people’s tastes. But if this CEO, his time is used to cater to others’ preferences, then where does he have time to prepare for his job after taking up the post? If a large number of interest groups restrain this CEO, can he take care of the people’s long-term interests? When the CEO is faced with the choice of competition and cooperation between countries, can he make a decision that everyone wins instead of everyone loses based on the Pareto optimal principle?

Even if American voters choose based on unambiguous criteria, they still face four major dilemmas under the current “democratic” electoral system. Trump, Also Known As a bug detector for the democratic election system, a bottom line probe for people’s IQ and morality, is a hurdle to test the current electoral system in the United States.

The Canadian political scholar Beth Tanning said in his book “The China model political meritocracy and the limits of democracy,” The problems faced by electoral democracy include the following four:

the tyranny of the majority, the tyranny of the minority, the tyranny of the voting community, and the tyranny of competitive individualists.

First, the tyranny of the majority. In an electoral democracy, voting power translates into political power. Perhaps the most common criticism of democracy is that the majority of voters can use their control to oppress the rest. For Plato, the rule of the

“many” meant that simple-minded citizens could easily be swayed by the emotive arguments of demagogues (or Sophists), leading to injustices such as the death penalty for his teacher Socrates In a great court of 500 judges.

I believe that in the early days of school, there must be an excellent classmate in your school who was isolated or even bullied by most students because of things or habits that seemed “weird.” We now call this phenomenon invisible “campus bullying.” This above is a kind of “majority tyranny.”

The Tyranny of the Minority refers to the wealthy minority could find ways of furthering its economic interests at the expense of the majority in democratic political systems where the poor (theoretically) have more political power. Well-funded and organized minority interests can and do get their way against relatively powerless majorities on issues such as environmental regulation, gun control, and the regulation of financial institutions.

In the United States, most ordinary people’s economic income has fallen further and further behind a small number of super-rich groups in the past 30 to 40 years. According to Jacob S. Hacker, professor of political science at Yale University, and Paul Pierson, professor of political science at UC Berkeley, the widening gap between the rich and the poor is due to a series of “Policies are generally beneficial to the rich.” The political lobbying activities of enterprises and financial circles have led government officials to re-enact political and economic regulations. “The political and economic regulations in the United States are developing in a direction that is beneficial to a few wealthy people but undermines the interests of the majority.”

This phenomenon has happened before, has happened now, and will continue to occur in the future.

In contrast to the shared prosperity that defined the decades immediately after World War II, the vast majority of Americans have fallen further and further behind a tiny super-rich segment of society over the past generation. Inequality in the United States has grown consistently more quickly than in other affluent democracies. An important cause, according to Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson, is a long series of policy changes in government that overwhelmingly favored the rich: political lobbying by corporate and financial sectors led public officials to rewrite “the rules of American politics and the American economy in ways that have benefited the few at the expense of the many.” From tax laws to deregulation to corporate governance to safety net issues, business interests pressured the government to enact policies to allow those who were already wealthy to amass an ever-increasing share of the nation’s wealth. Even after the 2008 financial collapse, the most culpable banks were able to exert continued control over the decisions of policymakers and legislators, and the small group of individuals hauling in more than $50 million annually increased fivefold from 2008 to 2009.95

A recent example is, In 2020, affected by the new crown epidemic, Trump printed 16 trillion US dollars in 7 months. Ordinary residents did not get any real benefits. Still, preferably major financial groups, the major wealthy can obtain capital through various forms of the epidemic, subsidies, incentives, and reasonable tax avoidance. Their income and assets are unaffected, but a substantial increase further boosts the gap between rich and poor American society differentiation.

The problem of The Tyranny of the Voting Community is that a government’s policies do not affect just the voting community: they also affect non-voters such as future generations and foreigners. Yet nobody represents the interests of non-voters in a democratic political system. 122 Hence, if there is a severe conflict of interest between voters’ needs and the needs of non-voters, the former will almost always have priority.

Let’s take an example to illustrate that the US voter community has imposed tyranny on countries that hold US debt. In the past few years, the Federal Reserve issued additional currencies, depreciating the US dollar and shrinking the United States’ deficit in trade with other countries. The US dollar’s further currency issuance has reduced the US debt repayment amount relative to the actual price level. The close losses of creditors in various countries have caused the cost of products in other countries to rise, leading to increasing prices in other countries that hold US bonds. Therefore, the United States issues more currency, and the US dollar depreciation will raise prices in other countries. As soon as the United States gave additional money, all countries in the world that held US debt suffered losses. In August of this year, the size of US debt held by governments around the world was US$7083.2 billion. If the Fed continues to print the money at the current rate, by 2028, the Fed’s balance sheet will expand to $21 trillion. In this case, Trump even said, “I like negative interest rates, and I strongly feel that we should implement negative interest rates.” Once the US implemented negative interest rates, US debt investors such as China, Japan, and Germany may have to pay for holding US debt. American payments. I lend you money, but I have to pay you the interest? It is conceivable that the more dollars the international community hold, the greater the risks they face.

Another more extreme but happening voter community tyranny is that electoral democracies seem singularly ill-equipped to make the sacrifices necessary to benefit future generations several decades from now. In the future global warming world, resources are insufficient to meet everyone’s basic needs, and a chaotic climate makes life precarious. And unfortunately, voters tend to the immediate interests and will not consider their children and grandchildren’s long-term interests.

The Tyranny of Competitive Individualists. In a society composed of competitive individualists, the disruption of social harmony is something to be expected: I fight for my interests or my interpretation of the common good, you fight for yours, and let the best person win.

This above is the universally recognized value of American society, which is significantly different from Chinese culture. If Trump is a rich and ultra-egoist, who has not paid a penny for many years, let alone run for president in China. If Trump comes to China, the Chinese can drown him by spitting on him. China is recognized as a country that upholds the values of public interest and collective interest more significant than the individual part.

To sum up, The problems faced by electoral democracy include the following four: the tyranny of the majority (Bullying by majority), the tyranny of the minority(Interference of the powerful), the tyranny of the voting community(Non-voters, including future generations, are victimized), and the tyranny of competitive individualists(Selfishness is taken for granted).

We can see that the above four phenomena have already occurred in the United States. These phenomena are even more vividly reflected in the farce of the 2020 US election. This phenomenon will not be absent in the future. You can say that Trump’s emergence is not an accident, but the inevitable development of the “democracy” to this day.

Is Trump a hurdle to test human civilization? It’s not for me to make the final judge. Huntington, a political science leader and a tenured faculty member at Harvard University, once portrayed such a picture something like this:

Under this scenario, the people have no consensus on their political system. Different social groups are arguing and falling apart, unable to unite into a cohesive community. Although there is a government, the government’s governance and efficiency are deficient, and it has received little recognition from the public. There is no stable procedure regarding the renewal of political leaders, and the government is sometimes controlled by influential figures and implements erratic and disastrous policies. Finally, such a government is incompetent in restraining and resolving political conflicts in the country, often leading to the accumulation of disputes to military coups, social unrest, and even revolutions.

Yes, what Professor Huntington described is a turbulent picture when a country is enveloped by political decline. In his paper, he once pointed out that a country may have a developed economy and a high degree of modernization. Still, the degree of modernization is not directly related to government efficiency. Once the government’s efficiency is low, the legitimacy is reduced due to various reasons, which may lead to political recession.

Looking back on the past four years: the White House’s chaos, the gnashing of the teeth in the US Cabinet, the various gossip disputes surrounding the 2020 US election… Do you feel a little familiar? In the US election four years ago, I remember it was not so violent. Trump used four years to successfully build himself into a hurdle to test the American people’s civilization.

If Trump is a hurdle to test human civilization, then the “one person, one vote” system in the United States is the wood on this hurdle.

Yes, you heard it right, I said, “one person, one vote.”

Maybe you want to ask, why has no one ever loudly questioned the one-person-one-vote system? Conversely, the Western media always criticize other political systems that are not “one person, one vote”?

“One person, one vote” is essentially a belief in the people’s collective common sense and that “all men are created equal,” as others have mentioned. It’s the way it must be in a free society; otherwise, only powerful interest groups would decide who merits more influence (likely themselves).

System and social norms are like the air. Even society has formed a kind of unspoken rules. If we cannot restrain our inner prejudices, if we do not step out of our box and listen to others, it is difficult for us to imagine the existence of a different system.

The most important thing is that the current one person, one vote in the United States, will cause many complicated problems. But once “one person, one vote” starts, it is difficult to return it. Because everyone thinks they have the “right” to participate in an election, and being deprived of “rights” will be elevated to “lost democracy and freedom” in some discourse systems, which is the most unacceptable for people.

However, the democratic electoral system encountered its Waterloo in the United States and suffered many failures when it was copied from the United States to other countries.

For example, in 2019, the Nobel Prize was awarded to Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abi Ahmed Ali. Unfortunately, in just one year, Ethiopia was caught in a civil war. And Ethiopia is exploring the political system route of “democracy and freedom.” In contrast to Asia and the surrounding regions, although the Western media often criticize many countries for their political systems, these countries have been developing in a stable, peaceful, and orderly manner. In November 2020, the world’s largest free trade agreement RECP was signed. The establishment of RECP, a country-to-country reciprocal system, means that 15 member states will get GDP growth from free trade, and 30% of the world’s population will benefit from this. The system should not be limited to just two words. “Freedom” or “democracy” are just two words, and “market economy” is only one word. If we do not use our wisdom and knowledge flexibly to develop a system suitable for our country, or if we are always thinking about how we can benefit ourselves by suppressing others, such too limited worldviews and values ​​will make us rest on our feet.

Because once you think about it carefully, isn’t everyone’s goal in the “super-large company” of the country to live better and earn more? If everyone is continually worrying about how the CEO should work, instead of doing their jobs and doing their best, the company will soon be messed up.

If Trump is a hurdle to test human civilization, then there is an invisible wall behind this hurdle. This wall is the fetters of society, is the cultural differences, is the gap of knowledge, and is the pride of self-esteem. The way to break this wall is to look at oneself objectively and dialectically, listen to others, see, learn, or even give up. Still, the most important thing is global cooperation led by strong virtue and foresight.

In 2006, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to US President Barack Obama, who had just been in office for 200 days. Although Obama’s attitude towards China is entangled, he is at least relatively objective. He admitted in his just-published memoir that “China’s success in getting hundreds of millions of people out of extreme poverty is indeed a major human initiative.” I think he should also agree that controlling the epidemic in China has saved 1.4 billion lives, which is also a remarkable feat of humankind.

In addition to the test of disease disasters, human beings as a whole will face ecological imbalances and resource scarcity caused by global warming shortly. They will also face changes in social rules and moral impacts by machines after the rise of artificial intelligence. These challenges all require the cooperation of the strong to use wisdom to continue the fire of civilization endlessly.

Trump is a hurdle to test human civilization, and behind this hurdle is an invisible wall. And the big data tools that Trump used during his campaign to help him succeed in becoming president were among the long rivers behind this wall. Numbers and calculations integrate multiple disciplines such as physics, chemistry, biology, and medicine. Human beings have just set foot on a ship exploring this long river, just like Columbus is exploring the new world. On the endless river of numbers, a country is a kind of ship, and a giant company with data and algorithms is another kind of craft. In the future world wandering in the long river, we will also experience more explorations and discoveries in the unknown world and witness more ship-to-ship games. People will always cross the hurdle, and they will always find a way to fix the bugs.