“The system of corporate life is a new power for which our language contains no name. We have no word to express government by moneyed corporations.” -Charles Francis Adams

Equal opportunity is the bedrock of freedom. This nation was established to preserve, protect, and ensure that opportunity.

The United States (and the world) will need to make a very important decision over the next 30 years: whether to choose democracy or capitalism.

Democracy protects equal opportunity while capitalism (as practiced today) stifles it.

Let’s ask some questions to help us see in what ways capitalism and democracy are incongruent. Our first task will be to precisely describe our terms.

What is capitalism and how does it differ from free enterprise?

Capitalism suffers from misused and loose definitions. Capitalism is commonly defined as

“an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market.”

Unfortunately, in our current state of capitalism, this free market doesn’t exist. What we experience is more closely associated with Karl Marx’s definition of a “capitalist.”

It was Marx who first used the term to describe the oppressive and face-grinding economic environment of aristocratic Europe that was buoyed up by legal protection of the few at the expense of the many.

In place of a free market exists a complicated web of laws and regulations that, as one critic suggests, allows the corporate class to

“use free-market rhetoric to justify imposing greater economic risk upon the lower classes, while being insulated from the rigors of the market by the political and economic and legal advantages that such wealth affords.”

Capitalism today is an economic system where the government favors those with capital over those with little or none. It’s a marriage between government and big business.

You don’t see small businesses being “bailed out” right now, do you? There’s a reason for that.

Although capitalism suffers from these weaknesses, we should recognized that it is a much freer system, both economically and politically, than either communism or socialism.

Nevertheless, capitalism is the systems in which those with the capital make the rules. The rules are made to benefit themselves at the expense of new competition. This is accomplished through financially-privileged and unequal access to political influence and power.

For example, a small business owner would have a difficult road competing against a large “box” store, not only because of volume and pricing (which is part of market forces and free enterprise), but because of fewer obstacles (paperwork, fees, etc) the large “box store” would face because of laws and favors granted due to financial influence (which is what makes it capitalism).

This environment results in exclusionary practices and limits opportunity; and this is where our current state of capitalism breaks with democracy.

Free enterprise is the legal framework that allows all with the desire and the idea and the creativity to compete on a level playing field; free enterprise is therefore more democratic because it is based on equal opportunity before the law.

In contrast, capitalism is the legal framework that leads to aristocratic structures by providing advantage to those who have capital via protection and perpetuation of wealth.

What is democracy and why is it currently tightly associated with capitalism?

Democracy is another term with many loose definitions. Historically it denotes that the common people (demos) rule (kratia) in that the population of the society controls the government, and that the government is for, of and by the people.

There are many brands of democracy but they are all distinguished from other forms of government by general population-based input into the political process.

Aristocracy, the rule by “the best” (generally determined by birth or status that almost always rule for life) and plutocracy, rule by the wealthy, are enemies of democracy.

Our current brand of capitalism tends to create and then maintain these other social forms.

Historically, free enterprise was tied to democracy by the American Revolution, as much of the reasoning for war was a push-back against British mercantilistic policies imposed upon colonists accustomed to operating within an essentially free market.

With the advent of communism and socialism in the mid 19th century and their rise at the turn of that century, capitalism stood out as the “more free” of the economic systems and the alliance with democracy was forged.

This bond was fortified during WWI and WWII and the Cold War as the world battled between democracy and totalitarianism.

Why is “a government of the people, by the people, and for the people” inconsistent with mercantilistic capitalism?

1. The increasingly manipulated legal system of capitalism, set up in order to preserve and protect privileged access to the market (try to get a franchise license without incredible personal assets), causes the political process to concurrently become less and less democratic.

Although we are given the impression that the process is becoming more democratic (that we can vote about more things), reality is that those who we choose to represent us are increasingly influenced, and to that degree, controlled by those who fund their political ascendancy. This tends to aristocracy or oligarchy (rule by the few).

2. Thus, only those with legal and political influence are able to manipulate the system to their advantage. At some point (I think we’re getting close) the common man disengages from the political and civil conversation and the wealthy and powerful (whether conservative or liberal) are the only ones involved in the functioning of government, making decisions based on protecting their wealth and power.

3. Even if the political structures don’t change form, the economic and legal systems create a de facto wealth-based aristocracy. The ability of the common people (demos) to influence the political situation diminishes into insignificance and thus capitalism changes the political structure.

4. The laws currently in place give capitalism a decided advantage in the choice between capitalism and democracy. Money purchases political influence and will continue to bring into play laws that perpetuate the capitalist system at the expense of free enterprise and democracy.

5. Remember that we are not talking about overnight change. This is a trend that has progressed for decades. Only now are we able to distinguish the two, and we need to choose before we reach a point of no return.

How are democracy and capitalism perceived internationally?

The United States is currently the self-proclaimed “bastion” of both capitalism and democracy.

However, in international opinion the U.S. government is associated (through sad experience) with rapacious capitalistic policies and oft-times hypocritical democratic interventions that have been claimed have the intention of “spreading democracy and prosperity,” only to have had the opposite effects in multiple countries throughout the world.

Much of U.S. foreign policy has supposedly been to “spread democracy”; however the means chosen seem to indicate that the purpose has been to make the world safe for mercantilistic capitalism at the expense of popular sovereignty and paced and sequenced movements, determined by each country, to improve the freedom in their markets and the prosperity of the people of these lands.

It’s not yet clear whether the incoming executive administration will continue to force on other countries the concepts of free government and free markets through the use of the military and international financial organizations.

Regardless, we must choose, as soon as possible, whether as a people we will continue to align ourselves with mercantilistic capitalism, or if we will trust free government, free markets, and popular sovereignty.

Conclusion

Our rampant commercialism, consumerism, and materialism indicate which way we are leaning.

Our ethics and our legal system to which we sacrifice our morals demonstrate that we value capital and wealth (and especially protecting it) more than we value liberty.

We demonstrate that we would rather have an aristocratic plutocracy govern us than to govern ourselves (if it means we can maintain our current level of luxury).

Mercantilistic capitalism is winning in the U.S. and will continue to do so until appropriate corporate and tax reforms are undertaken and until financial influence of the political system is eliminated.

Will we wait until our own government implements “Intolerable Acts” that protect its mercantilistic desires at the expense of the free market, or until our foreign economic and political policies become so unfair that our security is even more seriously compromised?

Or will we pro-actively choose democracy, free enterprise, and liberty at home and abroad?

We must call our current economic system what it is — mercantilistic capitalism — recognize how distant we are from liberty in our government and our economics, and move forward the overhaul that needs to occur.

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Mike Wilson received his B.S. degree in Chemistry from Brigham Young University and pursued graduate work at the University of California, San Diego, where he earned a M.S. degree in Biomedical Sciences prior to obtaining his M.D. at the UCSD School of Medicine.

He lives in Cedar City, Utah with his wife Jenni and their six children and practices emergency medicine in St. George, Utah while working on a Ph.D. in Constitutional Law at George Wythe University. He is also an Associate Mentor at GWU.

Mike’s passion is promoting idea that the common man has power and capacity to affect grand change in the world through true principles of love, goodness, and virtue. Because of his Jeffersonian trust in the common man, he considers himself a “little d” democrat (an ideal, not a political party).

He believes that the cause of liberty is founded essentially in widespread powerful education, checks on power, and promotion of virtue and goodness. Force is never a real solution to problems for Mike and the statesman’s role is to understand the ideal, see where society is, and then put himself in a position to move society in the direction of the ideal.

While seeking peace and human rights are notable and essential goals, the idea of using force to set up a system claiming to foster true freedom is a farce.

Let me tell you a story…

ONE DAY IN NOVEMBER 2001 I received a phone call from a worried Assyrian friend in Detroit.

He had been talking to his relatives back in Iraq, “My people tell me that Saddam wants to talk with someone in the U.S., but nobody here will talk to him.”

I called the US Department of State and spoke to an official (prefers to remain anonymous) who served in Iraq and told me no one from the US had officially or otherwise communicated with Saddam or his regime since 1997, more than four years ago.

Business as usual, I thought.

The ultimate tool of conventional engagement: a huffy silence. I knew my friend well enough to know that he wasn’t calling simply to complain or to voice his worries. He had something in mind.

That something quickly evolved into two “backdoor” diplomacy efforts, first with Iraq’s ambassador to Jordan and secondly, meetings with Saddam’s top officials in Iraq.

Having traveled to many countries, and having met some of the most despotic leaders of modern times, I drew rather firm inferences from these meetings, which I shared at a congressional debriefing after the trip, and later with the administration.

I presented three main points:

1) While Saddam, two weeks before our trip, pounded a podium insisting there would “never be inspectors in Iraq”, I was convinced he would allow inspectors; without conditions. This was based on conversations with then Iraqi Information Minister Muhammed Saeed al-Sahaf, and Foreign Minister Naji Sabri and others.

2) If there were WMDs in Iraq, by the time either our military or inspectors arrived, they would be gone. After all, we announced our clear intentions to go to war a second time, giving Saddam ample time to move whatever he had.

3) We needed to give careful thought to what would come after Saddam. What type of government, resistance, how to deal with the Bath’ists post Saddam, the Sunni/Shiite schism, etc?

Although I briefed several members of Congress, Cheney’s people and the Administration regarding the trip, my words were not fully received.

No Hard Evidence

“How did I know these things?” asked one Senator. I responded that all the so-called intelligence that we were basing a potential war on was only inferences and intuition.

There were no conclusive facts, nor hard evidence. I was surprised that no direct or “backdoor” diplomacy had been engaged, or for that matter all nonviolent efforts at least attempted, since the stakes for the U.S. were very high.

My perceptions were based on the experience of discussing life and death issues with dozens of despotic leaders over 24 years. While I may be somewhat naïve, it is clear that they tend to lie, give false information, and deceive.

While not empirically founded, my perceptions were no more or less pragmatic than what was presented by the Western intelligence sources.

When discussing my thoughts on Iraq with the Bush Administration, it became clear they were not interested.

What proved to be a fateful decision to go to war had already been set in stone, and I simply stood in that path to war.

Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post pointed out:

“The key judgment was made by the Bush Administration in the spring of 2002—that the political status quo could not and should not be maintained in the Middle East.”

A Warning

I will never forget resting on the couch in my home study answering my cell phone. It was the congressman who had helped my undaunted efforts against the war for several weeks.

He gave me clear and chilling advice. “Stop pushing against the Iraq thing. The decision has already been made and your continued efforts could cause you serious problems.”

In my world that type of veiled threat was unequivocal. I would entertain the full wrath of the administration if I persisted.

Regretfully I surrendered to defeat and went on with my life.

I was later to learn that my “file” with the administration, which undoubtedly includes my varied efforts in Libya, Sudan, Afghanistan and Iraq, would catch up with me and present one of the greatest personal challenges of my life.

The Bush Administration’s actions have led, as we know, to a lengthy war on multiple fronts. It will be some time until we are to determine the long-term viability of the fledgling democracies set up within these contexts.

Some countries with large Muslim populations do enjoy stable democracies, such as Indonesia. But in others, the neoconservative bulwark has seen fit to simply clip the wings of democracies who are not “minding their mother,” shall we say, or electing leaders who do not share the values they feel they must.

This was the case in Algeria, and with Hamas in Palestine. Through these situations, we see that democracy is not the ultimate value we are exporting, but a shell of the democracy we hope for.

Universal Human Longing

Step back for a moment and consider the human heart.

Our essential longings throughout history are not aimed at (or fulfilled) through a form of government such as democracy (or any other), but at a search for universal truth, universal meaning.

The early cave drawings point to human questions about the universe. Our instinctive human passions relate not only to our physical realities, but the spiritual as well.

In our conflicts on this globe, shouldn’t we acknowledge spirituality and the quest for spiritual truth as an essential motivator in the equation?

The neoconservative view that Muslims would welcome a taste of democracy (while at the tip of a gun) is as laughable as Islamic militants offering Islam through the same methods. Force is not the tool that wields true change.

Both attempts ignore the human spirit and respect for each other. If we rather act in such a way to touch a spiritual chord and sound a note of friendship, we have a foundational starting point in engaging each other. For people of faith, faith is infused in everything.

Respect for the primacy of that faith goes a long way in building trust, in laying a roadmap to peace.

Many ask, “But what is this shared spiritual reality? Muslims, Christians and Jews have been diametrically opposed for centuries.”

But we are not so far from each other. When the essence of your religion is caring for the widows and orphans, when you are to love the Lord your God, the Lord who is One; when you preach “if any one slew a person … it would be as if he slew the whole humanity: and if any one saved a person, it would be as if he saved the whole humanity,” we find that we can join together around this rule of compassion for others.

When working as partners and friends in the world, a renewed faith can foster the change of heart necessary in building a foundation that leads to the fruit of peace.

Any hope for sustainable peace must realize the prerequisite of engaging at a spiritual level when human culture and framework is so wrapped in the fabric of the spiritual.

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Mark Siljander is an ex-Congressman and the author of A Deadly Misunderstanding: A Congressman’s Quest To Bridge the Muslim-Christian Divide.

He represented Michigan for fifteen years, which includes three terms as a Member of the United States Congress, where he served on the International Relations Middle East Subcommittee and was Ranking Member of the Africa Subcommittee. He was the primary sponsor of the African Famine Relief Act.

Mark was later appointed by President Reagan as a US Ambassador (Alt. Delegate) to the United Nations in New York, where he served as a member of the Middle East and Africa Strategy Group of permanent representatives.

Ambassador Siljander is a student of several languages, including Chinese, Spanish, Arabic, Aramaic, and Hebrew, and has spent over ten years studying the three Holy Books of the Abrahamic faiths.

With over 26 years serving in the power circles of Washington and semi-official travel to nearly 130 countries, he has generated unique opportunities for frequent access to world leaders.

These experiences have led him to develop a unique paradigm for the peaceful resolution of conflict that has been successfully applied in several challenging areas of the globe.

Mark Siljander reinforces his conflict resolution efforts through regular travel overseas with Congressional and high-level delegations.

America hasn’t yet figured this out. The focus of our leaders — political, corporate, media — seems mostly on problems.

As Fareed Zakaria argues, the current debate in the United States is totally out of touch with the global reality.

The news covers Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran and North Korea, as have weekly talk shows. Americans are “obsessed with issues like terrorism, immigration, homeland security, and economic panics.”

But these all represent a preoccupation with the global losers of the past twenty years. Zakaria argues that the “real challenges that the country faces come from the winners, not the losers, of the new world.” (See his excellent book, The Post-American World.)

Rising — & Falling — Stars

How much are Americans thinking of the real challenges ahead, from China, Brazil, South Africa, Kenya, India and Russia?

These emerging powers are on the rise economically and politically, yet most Americans are alarmingly unaware. The economic growth of these nations is increasing their clout and “producing political confidence and national pride.”

The American people and the U.S. government are unprepared to deal with these new powers and their demands, choices and might. The central role of the United States in the world is about to drastically shrink, right when Washington sees America as the world’s last super power.

American political, economic and psychological letdown is inevitable.

Many of the rising powers have sectors with free economics, less regulation, lower taxes and more opportunity than the U.S. Entrepreneurs are increasingly courted and rewarded in these nations, while they are increasingly regulated and put down in the U.S. and Western Europe.

America’s Critical Choice

The United States has a great choice ahead: increase taxes to protect jobs and benefits or free up the economy in order to really compete in the decades ahead. The first is socialism, the second is free enterprise.

But here is the great challenge: the first is seen as “fixing the economy” and the second as scary, and probably depressionary.

A scarcity mentality is the cause of socialism; abundance is the foundation of free enterprise. Clearly, America today is caught in the grip of scarcity.

Welcome to our current irony. The story most Americans know is of a powerful but fearful great nation that leads the world against dark and sinister forces of jihadism and dictatorship.

What is left out of the story are the two dozen nations who are growing, prospering, and not affiliated with either side.

Washington will be forced to rethink its domestic and global strategy; forced not by its enemies but by its competitors. They are refusing to allow its meddling, and they are starting to attract those who are seeking free markets, opportunity and freedom.

On top of all this, at the same time that Americans are losing faith in their government, the new powers are experiencing a surge of nationalism; they want to be seen as strong and to spread their ways and power like the U.S. has for so long.

As the U.S. mires itself in the worst problems around the world, the new powers are attracting capital, technology and leadership by offering opportunity and freedom.

The Simple Solution

Of course, the U.S. can solve this all in one simple way — become the most inviting nation on earth. Get rid of massive regulation and simply re-establish freedom, free enterprise, free markets, true opportunity.

To do this, it will have to stop interfering in world conflicts and trying to be more socialist than Russia or Sweden.

If it fails in either change, if it doesn’t deregulate and stop policing the world, it will decline and collapse in power as did Rome, Spain, France and Britain — all of whom followed the same sick path to failure. China, Russia and India will be the new super powers.

But America’s biggest problem is that it has lost its purpose. It became the world’s leader by promoting freedom, and it lost its purpose when its major goal became power.

The freedom purpose had enlivened its domestic and international actions, and this made it great. Power as purpose — both at home and abroad — turned Washington into a place hated around the world and by its own citizens.

The United States is powerful in many ways but not in one critical way — legitimacy. Much of the world sees the U.S. as powerful, yes, but only powerful. Not good, or great, or standing for something.

What Do We Stand For?

For America to maintain a leadership role in the decades ahead, it must stand for something.

Thomas Friedman thinks it should stand for global Green. But I’m convinced that freedom is its only path to success. Without a renewed commitment to freedom, free government, deregulation, free enterprise, America doesn’t deserve to lead the world.

America must stop policing the world, and start standing for its greatest export: freedom. Unless this happens, it won’t solve its own problems or be able to help anyone else.

From our sense of modesty, to the democratic experiment resulting in the U.S. Constitution, all of us have our reasons for feeling patriotic. We have much in the United States, both significant and less so, to be proud of. But as the truism goes “Pride goeth before the fall.”

In the case of the American political right, pride is being disguised as “American exceptionalism” — and the fall has already begun.

Some try to attribute the idea of “American exceptionalism” to Alexis de Tocqueville — though he never penned the phrase. The idiom was first created and used by neo-conservative pundits soon after WWII.

It is meant to invoke the idea that America is a blessed nation created by God and (here’s the rub) therefore privileged in what actions it can take around the world. Thus, because of our heritage and unique position in world history, we are above the law of nations.

The conservative-leaning Republican Party — and more particularly the neo-con wing of the party — is particularly susceptible to this so-called patriotic concept, which has infected the party with full force.

For example, this summer Matt Lewis, a conservative political Pundit on MSNBC attacked Barack Obama for saying this, and I quote: “Any world order that elevates one nation above another will fall flat.” In response Lewis stated:

“I think that goes against the idea of American exceptionalism…most Americans believe that America was gifted by God and is a blessed nation and therefore we are better.”

America is a blessed nation, freer and more prosperous than many others, but as a great Nazarene once said, “The first shall be last and the last shall be first.”

If Americans see themselves as “better” or above others then we run the risk of following after Alexander’s Greece and Ceasar’s Rome.

However, that is not to say that American ideals are not great. The idea of America, even the word itself, is synonymous with liberty and freedom.

But the ideal does not make the idealist better than others. To put one nation above any other does not put it under God.

At a recent Republican fundraiser Newt Gingrich said, “I am not a citizen of the world, I think the entire concept is intellectual nonsense and stunningly dangerous!”

This neo-con campaign to put nationality above humanity does not sit well, particularly with America’s younger generations. Like it or not, generations “X” and “Y” have been raised in an increasingly global world.

And though the phrase “global world” seems redundant to some, major international events like the fall of the Berlin Wall, Tienanman Square, the Iraq wars, Balkan wars, September 11th and major disasters like the Tsunami in Indonesia — to name just some — have forced these generations out of a national-centric worldview.

Combine that with the very-American ethic that “all men are created equal” and subsequently the concept of American exceptionalism clashes with the values of these generations.

Consequently, Republican leadership, like Gingrich, Hannity, and Limbaugh, are increasingly losing ground with people who have a world-centric point of view, especially the younger two generations. Even Ronald Reagan famously said, “I come to you not only as a citizen of America but as a citizen of the world”.

To boot, the voting patterns that are being developed now may count the Republican Party out of power for a long time. Some think the recent success of Democrats may be short-lived, but if you look at political trends over the history of the United States these head winds may last for some time.

Let’s look at this historically: After the Federalists (one of the original Political Parties in the U.S.) won the first three presidential elections with George Washington and John Adams, the Democrats won the next ten in a row from 1800 to 1840. Then, after twenty years of elections going back and forth, the Republicans (previously the Federalists and then the Whigs) won the subsequent 9 out of 12 presidential elections from 1860 to 1912.

Again after another period of elections going back and forth from Wilson to Hoover the Democrats began to win again, taking the next 8 out of 10 from 1932 to 1968. And again Republicans took hold of power from 1968 to 2008 taking then next 7 out of 10 presidential elections — and they may have been even more dominant if not for the scandals of Richard Nixon’s presidency.

Each of these party dominant periods shows that the ascendant party wins at least seventy percent of presidential elections for about forty to fifty years, a period of one to two generations being born. If Democrats have started a new trend in their favor, or if Republicans continue to alienate the younger populace, we will likely see the DNC in power for some time; voted in again and again by generation X and Y.

American exceptionalism — the kind that degenerates into arrogant nationalism and similar in practice to the Divine Right of Kings — is un-American and only creates enemies and mockers the world over. Its purpose is at best to justify whatever actions we want to take around the world, and at worst it is dishonoring our heritage and smacks of jingoism.

All Americans, not just the neo-cons, must reject this thinking. We must take the advice of the proxy American founder, Charles de Montesquieu, who said,
“To become truly great, one has to stand with people, not above them.”

Image Credits: Senator Rudolf, Mike Jagendorf & Shizhao

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Adam Hailstone is a graduate of and Associate Mentor with George Wythe University. A popular speaker, Adam has lectured across the United States and Canada on topics from liberal arts to global politics.

He is a small business owner in Cedar City, Utah. He is a hiking, canyoneering and bungee jumping enthusiast and loves reading the great author Victor Hugo. He is married to a beautiful, talented and strong woman; the former Laura Jensen.