Metademocracy

Metademocracy; This is Not a Cause

By John Taylor; 2006 July 29

"This is not a Cause which may be made a plaything for your idle fancies, nor is it a field for the foolish and faint of heart. By God, this is the arena of insight and detachment, of vision and upliftment, where none may spur on their chargers save the valiant horsemen of the Merciful, who have severed all attachment to the world of being. These, truly, are they that render God victorious on earth, and are the dawning-places of His sovereign might amidst mankind." (Kitab-i-Aqdas, para 178, p. 84)

This passage I picked out of the Aqdas to memorize when I witnessed a friend and scholar of the Faith, Joe Woods, using it (and many other such passages) to good effect in both formal talks and casual conversation. So from time to time I return and re-memorize it ... long ago I gave up feeling frustrated when a memorization bounces out of my head; easy go, easy come back in, I say now. It is true, now it only takes a few readings and a little practice to glue in what I call the "horseman" quote.

I am reading a fat biography of William Osler right now, by most accounts the greatest physician in history. It is so long a book that I have not even got to his life yet, just his father's, who had an interesting life too. As an Anglican clergyman, it is startling to read how the elder Ostler also promoted massive memorization of scripture among the backwoodsmen of Canada's frontier in the 1840's and 50's -- amusingly, the place now swallowed by Toronto's sprawl, Newmarket, south of Barrie. Ostler had plowmen turning away from driving their teams and spinsters from their spinning to study selected passages from the Bible for memorization. Ostler handed out large numbers of scriptural knowledge prizes at the Church's annual picnic. His own saintly character rubbed off on his son -- curing people seems to be as much a spiritual as a scientific talent. Though not trained as a doctor he saved enough lives by observation and common sense that it became the practice among his parishioners to come to him before following doctor's orders.

Anyway, as I did my rememorizing of the horseman passage this morning it seemed almost unfamiliar this time around. Reason being, for the past few days I have been wading through "Introducing Kant" -- a non-fiction comic book about Kant's philosophy. It is by far the toughest comic I have ever cracked, I must say. Unlike many prose books on Kant this does not flinch, it explains in exquisite theoretical detail what Kant was after in his decade-long "critical" project, the Critique of Pure Reason, the Critique of Judgment, and so forth.

My mind stretched to the breaking point by what can only be called an "extreme philosopher" I get insight into what a believer in Baha'u'llah is about. He does not play around, he becomes a mounted knight determinedly entering a life or death contest. Since he is mounted, we can assume that this is a jousting arena, a medieval tournament. In order to get there he must be completely "severed of all attachment to the world of being." What is "world of being" but the abstruse subject of metaphysics?

Victory in the tournament of the Cause confers the right to act as a "dawning-place" of God's Might, to identify relative freedom with absolute Might, which releases brighter emanations of the divine Will. Faith is ability to act as a "dawning place" or sunrise point. This is an inherently A Priori contest, it takes place before the formation of heart or mind. Faith is a critical project, then, like Kant's. It divides heart and mind from outer causes and events, as by the horseman's sword. Severance cuts these faculties off from "attaching" to how outer events play themselves out.

To get into the divine field the "horseman" must prove himself "valiant," that is, he suffers testing. He suffers the assaults of changes and chances, of coincidence that is not coincidence, as Myrtle did in her adventures. A knight was chivalric, he stood for a set of ruling values fighting back the forgetfulness of the dark ages. Such mounted soldiers were always nobles, picked fighters; in modern military terms they are called, depending on what army you are in, commandos, paratroopers, seals, storm or shock troops. In modern armies such elite troops play a central role and they are chosen for intelligence as well as physical strength and courage. When the army is God's army, you can bet that the leader will chosen out of merit, not for noble birth alone, though that is part of leadership too. Here is what the Master has to say about this total meritocracy.

"So also, when the head of the army is unrivaled in the art of war, in what he says and commands he does what he wishes. When the captain of a ship is proficient in the art of navigation, in whatever he says and commands he does what he wishes. And as the real educator is the Perfect Man, in whatever He says and commands He does what He wishes. "In short, the meaning of `He doeth whatsoever He willeth' is that if the Manifestation says something, or gives a command, or performs an action, and believers do not understand its wisdom, they still ought not to oppose it by a single thought, seeking to know why He spoke so, or why He did such a thing." (Abdu'l-Baha, Some Answered Questions, 174)

In this passage too there is more than meets the eye. Here I see the next step in the evolution of democracy. The Master is more or less commenting on certain passages in Plato that deal with the captain of the ship, that is, the expert in command. Like an army, a ship's captain makes life and death decisions for everybody on board, and it is suicidal to question his authority, especially during a storm, the crisis period when lives are most in danger. Very few philosophers understand what Plato was after by his ship's captain comparisons, they say he was a philosopher and naturally he was all for the leadership of a philosopher king. They make that mistake because they have not factored in the above commentary by the Master.

In any case, the next step in democratic evolution is what I am going to call multi-tiered meritocratic elections. This is modeled by the administration of the Baha'i Faith. Basic is the belief that no longer can power rest in one expert, that many heads are better, and most to the point, more incorruptible, than one. And even so, day to day operations are still put in the hands of a general secretary, who is like a CEO is to the board of directors (the UHJ's comparison, not mine). The philosopher king in this age must work on, through, and obey a committee, for only a Divine Manifestation can take power into the hands of one individual, and look how much He suffers! Other derived principles come out of that. You know the drill. Instead of nominations, we have multi-level elections. On a national level, we vote in delegates and they vote in the National Spiritual Assembly; they in turn elect the UHJ. Elections are silent, free of campaigning or electioneering, and open to any member of the Faith in the jurisdiction. Electing electors is a startlingly original innovation! Call it "meta-democracy."

As a sort of scientific addendum to this faith model, compare the discoveries reported in Surowiecki's "Wisdom of Crowds" of how large numbers of people, voting freely and openly, always make the best possible guess about partial unknowns. I guess enough people have read that book for journalists to start reporting the popular guesses about who will win upcoming sports events. Although I do not follow sports normally, in early spring I read that the popular choice to win the World Cup of Soccer this summer was Italy. Following events sporadically and being around soccer fans now that my kids are playing it, I could have easily won some bets as to who would win the tournament based upon that astonishingly dependable popular prediction alone. Surowiecki's is a revolutionary finding about how human intelligence is amplified in a free, unbiased election.

Combined with the above Baha'i-Platonic model, a meta-democracy that takes advantage of crowd wisdom will surely make decisive changes to future governance. I see the day coming when highly technical decisions will be decided "multi-tier democratically," completely independently of bureaucratic setups, simply by taking guess votes, by setting opinion "stock exchanges" where those concerned bet on certain outcomes, and at a certain stage by having all the experts in the area vote in committees of experts who in turn appoint the executives and trustees who carry out the daily operations of the project.

Let us say that our town wants to know whether to build a wind tower or a solar collector in a given location. That is a perfect job for local decision making. The usual questions that come up are: who is to decide? Who is to pay? What is lost? What long term effects will this have on the environment? Who benefits? How much should we allocate for this task? If you want to know the answer to these confusing and mutually contradictory questions, read Jane Jacob's chapter in Dark Age Ahead on "Dumbed Down Taxes." Here is a work of genius if ever I saw one. Her thesis is simple but powerful. Europe recovered from the Dark Ages that set in after the fall of the Roman Empire by instituting local fiscal principles of subsidiarity and fiscal accountability.

"Subsidiarity is the principle that government works best -- most responsibly and responsively -- when it is closest to the people it serves and the needs it addresses. Fiscal accountability is the principle that institutions collecting and disbursing taxes work most responsibly when they are transparent to those providing the money." (Dark Age, 103)

She carries this forward in the chapter to a climactic interview with then Prime Minister Paul Martin, himself a known financial (though not necessarily political or moral) genius. The way she demolishes his arguments and sees behind his motives is a tour de force to behold, her finest hour. A while back I spent a great deal of time studying the Canadian constitution, but I never noticed what she points out is *not* in there, the above two basic fiscal principles of responsible, responsive government. Amazing. These twin principles should and must be put into every constitution; after all, they got the world out of the Dark Ages, they are part of the chivalric code that those knights in shining armor were standing up for. Mount your chargers, O heroes of humankind!

Let me close with a prayer to the God of local government. It is found, not coincidentally, at the end of Plato's great work on metaphysics, the Pheadrus.

 

Phaedr. I will; and now as the heat is abated let us depart.
Soc. Should we not offer up a prayer first of all to the local deities?
Phaedr. By all means.
Soc. Beloved Pan, and all ye other gods who haunt this place, give me beauty in the inward soul; and may the outward and inward man be at one. May I reckon the wise to be the wealthy, and may I have such a quantity of gold as a temperate man and he only can bear and carry. -- Anything more? The prayer, I think, is enough for me.
Phaedr. Ask the same for me, for friends should have all things in common.
Soc. Let us go.