Preface: I'm not totally satisfied with tonight's diary, but I've been banging my head against a wall far too long over it, and this is good enough to get the point across, I think.
This is a far more complex subject than I really have time to delve into, not to mention it's taken me longer to write than I ever intended. But there is one thought I want get out there for later reference. It's not necessarily new, but I don't want to digress in later diaries, so it's somewhat necessary. My apologies in advance.
Often, when I consider a subject, I'm thinking of the purpose of the elements within that subject. What is the purpose of a flower? What is the purpose of an idea? What is the purpose of a painting? It can seem utilitarian, but that doesn't mean we should discount the purpose of beauty or other supposedly non-utilitarian aspects. There is a purpose in everything, even if it is simply to be pleasing to the senses.
Of course, some things can have multiple purposes, but even so, most things have a primary purpose. An intended purpose. No matter how pretty a gun looks, it's purpose is to kill, and no amount of fancy scrollwork will ever change that.
So when I ask myself what the purpose of power is, it seems pretty obvious: to acquire and keep things. Money, on the other hand, seems to have multiple purposes, but I think it's fair to say that one of the primary purposes is to acquire and maintain things.* This is, not surprisingly, similar to the purpose of power.
Power is, in essence, the ability to influence the actions of others to do what you want. Whether it's a gun to the head or asking a friend for advice, power is how we get what we want from others. Money is a token which can be given in exchange for something from someone. In essence, it is a measurable form of power that is accepted and acceptable to a given group of people (usually a nation-state).
The difference between the two is measurement. We cannot directly measure power. Part of the reason is because power is something we grant. It is given by each of us to each other, and so is constantly in flux. But simply put, so long as we do not give someone power over us, that person has none. For example, look to Egypt, where former President Hosni Mubarak had great power until the people (along with the military) of Egypt decided he had none. There were, of course, those who continued to grant him power, but in the end, more denied him that power than granted it.
Money isn't granted. At least not in the same way as power. Rather, it is granted by us to us, as a national community. It's part of a rationalized trade system with rules and penalties for breaking those rules. For money to do its job, it must be accepted and acceptable by all the people using it, regardless of whether they like it or not. Thus the need for laws regulating its use so that it (theoretically) cannot be abused.
There are no rules for how to use power. There are certainly ethical and moral limits we place on ourselves, and communal standards, aka laws, may come into play from time to time, but for the most part, the reality is that the more power you have, the more likely you'll be able to use it to get away with breaking laws (which kinda negates the purpose of laws). Power can only be opposed by power. As I noted in a previous diary, laws are enforced by people. If those enforcing the laws lack the power to oppose the powerful, then laws cannot be enforced against the powerful.
Considering the similarity in purpose of money and power, it is not difficult to understand why we often equate the two and why we often use money as a yard-stick for measuring a person's (or group's) power. The more money they have, the more they can use to get what they want.
So as I mentioned in the beginning, this isn't really a new concept or anything. But I think it's important to understand why we often equate the two, and this will help to (hopefully) clarify later diaries I write.
* Granted, you could also say that money and power can be used to get rid of things. However, a simple rewording allows us to say that power and money can be used to acquire and keep/maintain the absence of things. For those of you who remember algebra, adding a negative is the same as subtraction, just a different way of thinking about it.
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Diary Author
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| Trade Deficits Are Not Born Evil |
maddogg |
| A very interesting argument for turning our trade deficit into something useful. I think a key point to remember in this argument is that it is meant to be taken within a larger context and would likely require a decade or more to see through. |
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