3 Domains of the Human Condition
Dec. 15th, 2018 04:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
causticusI compiled this basic re-iteration of the "Threefold Social Order" model from various notes and tidbits I've collected over a long period of time. This model is reminiscent of Rudolf Steiner's Social Threefolding. Here is the basic outline with some brief explanations:
1. Cultural Sphere/Domain (Religion + Ideology)
2. Political Sphere/Domain (State + Military)
3. Economic Sphere/Domain (Trade + Business)
The extreme forms of each, when one particular branch gains disproportionate power over the entire social organism:
1. Theocracy (Priests/Clerics have most of the power)
2. Dictatorship (Military rulers or civil bureaucrats have most of the power)
3. Plutocratic Oligarchy (Business owners and merchants have most of the power)
The basic idea is that for a healthy social order to persist, there needs to be a balance of power between these three spheres/domains. When one of these domains becomes too powerful, it begins to dominate the other domains and eventually the others become subordinate to the dominant domain. The most clear example of this in the current era here in the West is the economic sphere almost totally dominating both the cultural and political spheres. With economic dominance, multi-billionaire capitalists, oligarchs and robber barons effectively control the institutions associated with the other two spheres. Here in the US, mega-corporate lobbyists representing the Oligarchs bribe politicians and make them pawns of the economic elite. Likewise, the oligarchs buy up the cultural institutions and force them to peddle cultural propaganda that serves their interests. In other words, there's clearly a huge balance with our current system. Only a system of independent cultural institutions and fully-sovereign political actors will bring back any semblance of balance to the overall order.
America's founding fathers we're quite right to utilize a "three branches of government" schema to formulate the US government. However, outside of the political domain, the best minds might want to conceptualize society as a whole having a threefold structure.
1. Cultural Sphere/Domain (Religion + Ideology)
2. Political Sphere/Domain (State + Military)
3. Economic Sphere/Domain (Trade + Business)
The extreme forms of each, when one particular branch gains disproportionate power over the entire social organism:
1. Theocracy (Priests/Clerics have most of the power)
2. Dictatorship (Military rulers or civil bureaucrats have most of the power)
3. Plutocratic Oligarchy (Business owners and merchants have most of the power)
The basic idea is that for a healthy social order to persist, there needs to be a balance of power between these three spheres/domains. When one of these domains becomes too powerful, it begins to dominate the other domains and eventually the others become subordinate to the dominant domain. The most clear example of this in the current era here in the West is the economic sphere almost totally dominating both the cultural and political spheres. With economic dominance, multi-billionaire capitalists, oligarchs and robber barons effectively control the institutions associated with the other two spheres. Here in the US, mega-corporate lobbyists representing the Oligarchs bribe politicians and make them pawns of the economic elite. Likewise, the oligarchs buy up the cultural institutions and force them to peddle cultural propaganda that serves their interests. In other words, there's clearly a huge balance with our current system. Only a system of independent cultural institutions and fully-sovereign political actors will bring back any semblance of balance to the overall order.
America's founding fathers we're quite right to utilize a "three branches of government" schema to formulate the US government. However, outside of the political domain, the best minds might want to conceptualize society as a whole having a threefold structure.
