The predictive powers that formally belonged to oracles, divination and later, the Catholic Church, have been replaced with politically weak, but probably much more accurate, scientific predictions. The United States, along with the rest of the world, faces predicted ecological changes unlike any seen since the start of the last Ice Age. Without a significant shift in our moral and intellectual compass, the world faces deadly consequences for us and all life.
The secularization of civil governments has replaced a formal religious unity and morality over a large portion of the world. In response to the lack of a universal religion and a common morality, people have formed fundamentalist structures. Today, religious fundamentalism has a significant influence on civil governments in different ways through out the world. The fundamentalist Wahhabi Islam of SaudiArabia is being forcibly exported along with the Sharia (Islamic law) to Muslim nations in the Middle East and Africa -- with the support of the United States.
The fundamentalist Judaism in Israel is taking over the nonsectarian civil government to reclaim the territories of the first Kingdom of Israel. (1050 to 931 BCE) -- again with the support of the United States.
Hindu, Buddhist, and Islamic fundamentalists in India cause civil unrest and disrupt the legal system, especially in the areas of honor killings, wife dowry killings, and rape.
In the United States, Christian fundamentalists have a strong influence on political platforms, race relations, and educational curricula.
Freedom and Corruption
" Because, just as for the maintenance of good customs, laws are required, so if laws are to be observed, there is need of good customs." Discourse 18
A summary of Discourses 16 -- 18
Freedom is always tentative, even when there is little or no corruption. When people have been subservient to a prince become free, they don't always grasp the full ramifications of "freedom." They don't know how to maintain social unity and thus splinter into hostile factions.
Whereas people who have grown up in freedom take it for granted they look towards achieving their personal goals rather than the overriding goals of the community at large. The significance of freedom in a free society for some people is the chance to advance their personal ambitions, but for most people its importance is in providing security for themselves and their families.
When there is very little corruption and there are good laws that are followed by everyone, including the leaders, freedom and security are not restricted to republics but can be found in kingdoms, principalities (and later in constitutional monarchies), though not in an oligarchy.
In a free society where the nation is relatively free of corruption, tumult and challenges to the system can preserve freedom. The further corruption extends into the culture, the harder it becomes to keep the society free and secure. As long as people feel secure, they tend to elect leaders on the basis of their popularity rather than because of any significant issues or qualifications. Over time, this leads to the election of leaders seeking power while the rest of the population refrains from seeking office. When this happens, an inexorable creeping top-down corruption sets in.
In a state with a bottom-up corruption, every service provided to the people requires a small bribe. A portion of each bribe is passed on to the next administrative level, and so on, until they reach the top. For the leaders, this provides a great amount of money along with the resulting power. Attempts to form and maintain a republic in a culture that has a bottom-up corruption system in place is impossible (or extremely difficult).
As corruption develops in a state, good laws are replaced with bad laws. These changes continue as the corruption grows. In order to counter this corruption, someone in power must recognize what is happening early enough and be able to rouse the population and the law-making bodies to take action. If this doesn't happen, the corruption will continue to grow.
Contemporary Reflections:
Machiavelli believed that corruption was the enemy of a republic's and personal freedom. Our economic corruption drives regime changes in the Middle East with the resulting anarchy and deaths. In the Unites States it is pushing the nation toward becoming an oligarchy.
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