Equality and Justice in a UCS Democracy
By John Taylor; 2009 Aug 13
The first fruit of a democratic world government is consultative architecture, a worldwide building standard for human shelter. Built into a large hillside superstructure are niches into which fit modular, movable building sub-units. The decision as to where to place each particular unit into the superstructure is arrived at according to an open, public plan. Within the plan's formulae, constants are determined by experts, who agree upon laws and principles, some of which are universal (common to superstructures everywhere) while others are particular (devised by resident experts). Variables are the product of democratic, local planning.
The consultative building system allows individuals and groups to change location easily in modular living units fitted into a larger superstructure. The cosmopolitan condition of citizens in a Universal Civic Society (UCS) requires of them a degree of autonomy. This means that each and all operate their lives and careers according to a compatible plan that fits them into larger groups, and groups into larger organizations.
Last time we discussed Aristotle's idea that there are four strains of government, democracy (rule of all), oligarchy (rule of money), aristocracy (rule of a few) and monarchy (rule of one). Each has its own overweening value: freedom, wealth, merit and security. Let us look at each in turn.
Democratic Freedom
The democratic element of the UCS upholds equal rights, justice and freedom. These principles, Aristotle explained, are expressed in what citizens choose, both alone and together.
"We shall learn the qualities of governments in the same way as we learn the qualities of individuals, since they are revealed in their deliberate acts of choice; and these are determined by the end that inspires them." (Aristotle, Rhetoric, translated by tr. W. Rhys Roberts, Book 8, 206)
A free community depends upon residents who express their ends in a plan that takes responsibility for their own lives and families, but also for the world. The prime goal and first choice of every citizen of a UCS, therefore, is to optimize autonomy, equality, justice and freedom themselves, and not just locally but on a world level first of all.
Equality is optimized by eliminating extremes of wealth and poverty, and by distributing wealth as equitably as possible. The end of equality, then, is to optimize the division of labour by eliminating drudgery. This is why every household in a UCS is a full service house, that provides every service to residents, from meals to cleaning and laundry. Full service frees residents of the UCS to give their most productive time to the pursuit of their career and family life. As it is now, full service facilities are restricted to a tiny number of super-rich, while the labour of the rest is dissipated in trivialities.
Once drudgery is gone and work is productive and creative, the main attention of the majority can turn to justice.
Justice is optimized by placing first things first. The most important work, farming, must come before all others, since everybody depends completely upon the food that agriculture produces. This means maintaining an agronomy in the UCS wherever possible (we will discuss this in more detail in the next section, on wealth). An agronomy -- an economy where farmers are in the majority and have first dibs on real estate with sunward exposure -- upholds all the virtues necessary for justice in a democracy. Farmers are practical, stoic realists, conservative in the best sense of the word. They understand that freedom means independence, not choosing whatever whim we please. If this come first, everything else falls together.
Architecturally, this will mean that a basic housing space is allocated as a minimum human right for each human in the world. At the same time, maintaining it is a fundamental obligation. Its basic design is standard, common to both rich and poor in consultative housing developments. Each unit is modular and easily transportable from one housing complex to another. It does not contain a bathroom, a kitchen, recreation room or garage; as mentioned, these functions are supplied by the full service facilities in the local household within the cooperative housing complex.
Once the preconditions of autonomy, equality, right and justice are underway, freedom and democracy will be possible.
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