Cuban History: A Historic Microcosm of Most New World Republics?

PART 1: Can the history of Cuba teach us anything about the future of United States? A different way of looking at Cuban history..



INTRODUCTION: Come along reader, on an epic interdisciplinary journey to explore what led a dynamic rapidly growing nation to be fatally looted.

If one accepts the notion that similar societies encounter roughly similar milestones in their development, then one accepts possibility of societal forecasting. Lets see if Cuban past can teach us anything about America's future. A model of societal forecasting is presented which takes into account the physical size of the country as a key factor in the speed of development.


Social, economic, cultural, and political changes can take place rapidly within a geographically small piece of land. This is due to sheer logistics. A small plot of land, like Singapore, can go from a port with peasant farmers supporting it to a 100% urban city state in less than 200 years. We're talking about third world peasants reaching world's 5th highest GDP per capita by just creating an exponential historical burst of activity. Singapore went through the process that Dutch port in lower Manhattan had gone through, only quicker. Since it was a country in itself it became hyper-efficient, the way Manhattan would be if it had to be its own nation.

In a way, same historic pattern can rapidly "speed up" in a tiny country given proper conditions, even if it began later. At some point, the developmental curve of a society becomes more exponential and history rushes with great speed. The physical energies expanded to say, turn a whole country into a city state, are much greater the larger the country is. Physical efforts and developments of travel, logistics, communication, and migrations all require greater raw power to spread through an area the larger it is. Corresponding social symptoms of the physical efforts like these (like changes in political, social, cultural patterns and trains of thought) are thus also slower to spread through an area the wider it is.

Let's use an extreme imaginary example to take this to a logical conclusion. If the world's people decided not to use contraception, we can see the sheer energies needed to turn most of the surface of the planet into a city state of 30-50 billion people (considering their social thinking is against competing continent sized city states). Obviously in this scenario, some/most food would be grown on some other planetary surface even if chunks of the planet become Central Park equivalents. Where would be the exponential turning point in this scenario? Maybe at 10-20 billion, and rapidly rising, there would be global political unification to deal with use of all livable space. There'd need to be central executive to decide what space to use for living, resource extraction, food production, and recreation. However the completion of the world city state would be happening at ridiculous speeds towards the end compared to the humble beginnings of armed men running at each other with sharp objects and dragging salted meats in caravans.

The model presented shows that if two countries, differing in size, share the same physical developmental pattern, the smaller one can complete it earlier even if it started later. In essence, if very general patterns exist one can look into the social future of a society by observing the past of a smaller society that had similar physical development. Social aspects, of the underlying physical arrangement/development of a society, are manifest by country's political structure, economy, cultural views, etc. How does the rate of technology ( that is inching towards exponential by mid 21st century) affect all of these physical developmental patterns that in themselves reach an exponential point? Technology allows one to do a thing with less energy such as communicate, travel, transport, and build. Thus, it allows a physical pattern, such as urbanization towards the city states mentioned above, to a accelerate.

For a mathematical demonstration lets use a clean example for now. Lets say two identical settlements start simultaneously at 10 sq kilometers. They are inside a computer simulation where each has an isolated chunk of identical land (in terms of resources) and no contact with outside. One has enough land to grow into country A (with maximum area of 100 sq kilometers) and one into country B (with maximum area of 2000 sq kilometers). They have access to same technology and grow at a rate of 100% a year utilizing same expansion techniques. In a way, they are just cloned virtual mold. Country A would achieve urban saturation in its 4th year of existence and country B would reach saturation in its 8th year of existence. Even if B started out a year earlier it would still finish earlier. Even if B was given futuristic technology that allowed it to expand 110% faster AND started a year earlier it would still finish later than A.

With this example, we see how a small country (that differs in quality and quantity of natural resources, differs in quantity and quality of technology, and differs in quantity and quality of its people) can still over shoot a larger country in terms of historically reaching the point where its larger neighbor will be. Different physical progressions result in different progressions of culture/politics/economy and perhaps even religion. But obviously the real wold is not a sterile simulation but a world in flux where all societies physically and thus culturally interact with one another. One can convincingly argue that even if there was some very general pattern/s ( like urbanization with rising population and subsequent rise in efficiency in utilization of land for living and resources) then countries following different trajectories always distort each other to the point where seeing any pattern is impossible and absurd? A larger backward society can swallow whole a smaller society that is ahead and reverse its growth. A new technology can be acquired by a larger backward society, due to the larger human pool of talent, and it can skip a stage in the pattern perhaps? What if a country that covers a large area decides that urbanization is immoral and thinks its more prudent to force the whole world to live in small towns, killing off extra people, or sending them to off world colonies? What if the Bolshevik revolution isn't Russia's version of French revolution (just coming later due to being in larger geographic area and thus levels of development)? What if no pattern exists or there are half a dozen pattern clusters just like personality clusters of human beings?

All these are solid points and but ignore the definition of what a pattern is. These points do not touch upon the sheer usefulness of observing physical flux of the world, categorizing it, putting what's observed into groups and clusters, and then finally acting upon these observations. How do we know Sweden is VERY unlikely to go on a murderous jihad against Norway this year? How do we know that a congregation of KKK members will probably not contribute to third world humanitarian aid? After all everything is in flux and motion and maybe Swedish society is far more open to influence from fundamentalist Muslim clerics through watching television than we think. How do we know Somalia is unlikely to become an economic powerhouse in next 20 years even if a few super-geniuses come of age in it to become Somalian political leaders?

Most societies are now stuck in the framework of states with borders that aren't warring too much. It became much easier to categorize, compare, see patterns, and yes even use that to learn from and predict near future flux they will be in. If one thinks that the inside of a country is perhaps too fluid (because people keep moving, trading, learning, fighting, and leaving ) then how can one ever justify categorizing and predicting behavior of a smaller unit of people such as goths, elderly christian fundamentalists, and so on. Those groups have patterns of development even if they are right in the middle of great diversity of social and physical forces. If giving more advanced technology to feudal religious fundamentalists just makes them more technologically advanced and capable zealots, then a pattern of fundamentalist strength and longevity can be established. If giving them advanced technology makes them into kind Social Democrats like those in Sweden, then a pattern of technology making people enlightened and politically progressive can be established.

Ancients talked of basic social forms repeating and manifesting themselves, in similar ways, regardless of technological, ethnic, or temporal differences between people. What were those basic pattern types? The city versus the countryside. One man rule, many men ruling, and a few men with lots of resources ruling. They've talked of those who rely on weaponry and those that don't. Strategic configurations were discussed and very basic formulas created. We now have a more advanced understanding. The obviousness that the physicality of terrain, economic tools/technologies, and demographics give the society its character has long been clear. We now also know that physical structural differences within a person's brain goes a long way in showing what route that person take when interacting with society and how far society can influence this person. We now know some people have a physiological predisposition to aggressiveness, emotionality, intellect, and calmness. Within all the populations of the world, these physiological factions exist and they all partially determine who will be on top, the bottom, and out in the trenches regardless of how much schooling they received.

With enough data, we can connect the dots, and start learning from groups of people who have perhaps taken a route in the past so similar to ours that their past resembles our future. If say, their past resembles our future just 30%, then combined with all of our current knowledge we might even have up to 1/5 shot (taking into account resemblance not discovered and gaps in analysis) at getting the future right and planning for it. 1 in 5 is still very daring for countries but perhaps not as daring as predicting that a marriage will last a certain amount of years, that a business idea will fail, or that suburbia will always be an oasis of American ingenuity, wholesome nuclear families, and parked flying cars.

Now we can look at Cuba since Cuba is small and much older than we think (the way Japan is much older than Chinese think) with a much richer history to teach us.

PART 2: An explanation (utilizing model presented in Part 1) on why Cuba possibly makes for a better case study than Brazil to perhaps learn something about America's future. Also a brief retelling of Cuban development until independence in early 20th century to set up discussion.

In part 1, we've established a model with which it might be possible to predict development of one society by looking into the past of another. Why look at Cuba to potentially learn about future of United States? Why not, say Puerto Rico, where the land area is smaller (thus accomplishing whatever historical pattern rapidly)? Conversely, why not Brazil which is the third largest in the hemisphere and closer to United States in terms of energy levels needed for urbanization and expansion? Wouldn't Brazil ( where settlement started earlier than in US and had its white ruling population dip below 50% much earlier than US) be a better indicator of American future even though historical process didn't burn through it as rapidly as Cuba?

Valid points but some geographical areas were just never independent enough to see behavior of national elites playing in a sovereign box. Puerto Rican elites never shed their lapdog status sufficiently to have enough breathing room to mold a society. It doesn't help that the nation was not only too small to sustain itself without being a trading hub (Singapore, Hong Kong) but that it was the first to be hit by approaching hurricanes being built up in south Atlantic. Dominican Republic was also occupied too many times for their elites to get a sense that their territory is anything other than a plaything for regional powers like the Baltic states are.

Brazil, however, does potentially offer some opportunities for learning when it comes to:

1) Post-racial solidarity of the educated class

2) Urbanization and its effects on the rural poor

3) Authoritarian one party politics emerging as Urban elites acquire dominance over rural ones and concentrate their wealth behind one political faction

4) Amassed urban wealth over generations and its effects on cultural values of each urban generation. Think how urban American grandchildren ( of people that rural slave morality calls "hipsters" these days) will view rural and suburban people in the future.

Think of the sheer sense of privilege and distance that education building upon itself over generations brings. Think of the contempt/pity at the rural poor that it will bring from urban areas as the cultural gap widens. Think of how the egalitarianism (of early settlers as they are united in hardship and in control of non-white natives) gives way to insurmountable rural/urban gaps in views on life, pleasure, and power. Maybe evidence of history speeding up can be seen by the fact that it took the children of 3rd/4th generation Italians/Jews (who moved to suburbia to fit in with ruling ethnic group) very little time to start moving back to urban areas and start building hedonistic wealth generating power centers. Wealthy Brazilians have long considered 25 year olds just teenagers trying to find themselves.

The process is just really beginning in United States and it'll be interesting to see how accelerated it becomes with the aid of evolving technology. Interestingly enough, Brazil is still young and Brazilian elites have not stopped using language of the countryside amongst themselves. Once they start speaking a more fashionable language of a foreign role model society between themselves (many already have good control of English), alienation will be complete. It'll then be in the best interest of the urban rulers to throw efforts behind one party authoritarian rule to strike a balance between enriching themselves as well as modernizing the countryside to prevent redistributive/secessionist rebellion (or out of pity if that still exists in post-Nietzchean world). Russian elites that were recently butchered/exiled show a glimpse of what happens when a cultural break between city and country grows so large that elites are viewed as truly foreign parasitic entities (rather than responsible power centers that mold entire society for the better).

But that's for another day. Lets do a clear cut intellectual exercise and do a simple retelling of Cuban history with a new lens. We'll speed through from the arrival of Spaniard conquerors to right after independence from direct Spanish rule in early 20th century.
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Veterans of fighting and mop up operations in Spain (and butchering of Muslim civilians) arrive in Cuba. Many have no social mobility and further employment in Spain and are escaping poverty or the law. After months of miserable dangerous voyage without women present they proceed to exterminate the native men on the island and enslave their women. A lot of aggressive genetics (manifest as ESTP/ESTJ/ENTJ/ENTP personalities by Myers-Briggs test) are introduced into the women who are then absorbed into Spanish settler population. The island becomes a transit point but many settlers remain and import slaves to grow tobacco and sugar. Higher levels of sugar and nicotine consumption, compared to other colonies, gives an element of agitation to the culture that began in violence and control (a tongue in cheek suggestion). Descendants of individualistic mass murderers become pillars of the community with 18th century equivalent of picket fences (only two slaves in every garage instead of cars).

Since Cuba is a transit hub, there is always traffic going through it and its upper classes are more cosmopolitan than those of English colonies through more contact and migration. They are more heterogeneous ethnically and have more logistical communication with each other than those in other Spanish colonies. Thus we don't necessarily see purely Spaniard ruling class like the purely Anglo ruling class emerging in English speaking United States ( and continuing until the present). That is helped by some absorption of French plantation owners fleeing Haitian slave rebellion. Catholic sexual prudishness is diluted and slaves are impregnated more often than in American south.

Although Cuba started out a century earlier than the first Dutch/English colonies, its economy begins to stagnate under Spanish mercantile rule. However, the elites feel it's still more profitable for them to be

protected from United States and they don't have endless tracts of land to make money off (like those rulers clamoring for independence in other Spanish colonies). Numerous and long established (rather than recently displaced like in American south) slaves pose a danger to Havana if it pushes for independence since non-white population might exploit the chaos. Spain is happy to oblige and rewards Cuban elites for loyalty with more economic autonomy.

With new sugar extraction methods, the entire island is connected and elites make enough money to consider pursuing similar development as in United States. Enough of the wealthy are capitalist liberals now and create an alliance with poor white workers to end slavery so both don't have to compete against free labor. It took them longer to reach this level of development because Spanish imperial regulations prevented structures necessary for capitalism and industry to flourish. Cuba reaches level of social development where Confederate States of America would be in the 1960s if it broke away.

Cuban leadership is now ready to use nationalism to make many black and poor Cubans fight for residents of Havana. The benefits of sovereignty outweighed the resources needed to repay the poor for these services. Cuban upper classes were thoroughly liberal in the American tradition at this point. Like the Baltic elites in the 90s, they utilized offer of American support to push out the influence of a stagnant declining Madrid.

Successful struggle for independence commences and many non-whites rise in the military and social ranks during the common struggle. Lighter mulatto populations have already assimilated significantly into society before slavery was ended and now significant number of blacks are doing the same. Considering the society began with ethnic cleansing of natives and intermixing, elites are comfortable with the assimilation and just continue class and educational discrimination.

Spain is pushed out but US military occupies and allows American oligarchs to buy 10% of best land and majority of exports. Iraqi-nization continues as the occupiers graft an early 19th century US democratic system onto an older racially mixed society. Only educated Cubans with enough property are allowed to vote. US creates a hearts and minds campaign of public works projects to bring health/education for the poorer citizens so they aren't used by independence elites as much (similar to strategy Union emancipating slaves to weaken Confederate elite power). The first and only candidate on the presidential ballot is a Maliki type character who fought against Spanish rule in the past but now acquired substantial connections with American rich. United States pulls out of Cuba and allows them independence on condition they attach favorable export terms to the constitution and allow a US base to operate indefinitely.

Following a few more quirks, the democratic system begins to chug along with independence founders elected for many years. Cuba is sovereign economically but has free trade with US as per constitution. As far as American satellites go, they are between Japan and Puerto Rico ( if one could use that spectrum of US control). However that proves to be an economically beneficial arrangement since lack of protectionist measures create a de facto economic union. Nationalist Cuban elites slowly regain control of the best land and export of resources. Many American oligarchs stay and are assimilated into Cuban ruling class taking part in molding of the new state. This adds and strengthens the leadership of Cuba.

Sugar can be sold freely without inefficiencies and an economic boom commences. What does one of the oldest new world societies do with a flood of money now that it got democracy to play with in a small area?

PART 3 A lot of effort, energy, and force have been spent to modernize the country BEFORE Fidel Castro took over..


We continue an overview of Cuban history started in Part 2 up to Fulgencia Batista's loss of power.

In part 2, we've began to take a general background look at Cuban history up to the moment of its independence.

Founding fathers, heroes of the independence struggle, rule Cuba for the first 30 years. One of these founding fathers, Gerardo Machado, starts out as a liberal and wants to turn Cuba into "Switzerland of the Americas". To achieve this long term vision, he decides to go against the constitution (partly written by Americans), stay in office longer, and become a developmental authoritarian. Communist party supports him since he engages in mass infrastructure construction and social projects that require higher taxes on the rich. He might have gotten away with it too if it wasn't for that dastardly Great Depression. Some modernizing authoritarians just come along at the wrong time to be tolerated. Central Asian presidents for life and Putin wouldn't be where they are today if the world depression we're experiencing hit us 8 years ago. Price of Cuba's equivalent of oil, sugar, dropped even before the international depression.

Regardless of the economic downturn, Machado tries to whip country into shape even if it means machine gunning protesters here and there. People's psychological expectations of continuing growth are thwarted by economic reversal and they take the anger out on the government. A coalition of elites across the entire political spectrum is formed and pressure the senior military to remove the forcefully developmental president since Peter the Great type tendencies don't fly in the 20th century.

Lets look at the people who forced Machado from power and see if they got a better plan compared to his island long highway to improve trade/national integration, new schools/educational reforms, and efforts to diversify the economy from sugar.

The usual suspects emerge.

1) Educated/well off urban liberals who value hands off government and freedom of speech more than rise in average standard of living. They want to preserve integrity of the 20 year old constitution that is often violated anyway. Democracy and term limits for them are more important than social stability.

2) The oligarchs who think he is taxing them too much for a useless thing like "modernizing" and strengthening national power, building things for the poor, and regulating the economy to point it in direction where it's less dependent on American demand.

3) Leftist elites and labor unions who think the government is in cahoots with the oligarchs by not taxing them too much or going further with its reforms. These people think that unless a leader is ideologically leftist, the person is not good enough.

4) Rural conservative elites who think a government supported by communists is unacceptable. The people who feel religious, poor, and Catholic Cuba is better than a strange modern wealthy industrial Cuba that lost its roots.

Well these impatient know it alls got their wish, destabilized the country, and got American support which made senior military ask Machado to leave. Good job guys. The pragmatic tyrant who knows how to compromise and does what works is removed. Orange revolution accomplished. Chaos ensues.

An enormously powerful individual and co-equal to Fidel Castro emerges at this point who orchestrates a coup. His name is Fulgencia Batista, a mulatto from the poorer ranks of the military. He doesn't take power right away, controls the country behind the scenes, and puts up no less than 6 presidential puppets into office from different political backgrounds in just 7 years. Although some puppets are competent, he removes them whenever and shows that each side of the political spectrum fails in its own way. Acting like an archetypical INTJ, he stages free and fair elections for himself at the right time and is popularly elected. He is also supported by the Communist Party who sees in him a multi-racial modernizer truer to form than bourgeois Machado was.

Batista creates one of the most progressive (as in MoveOn.org/Sweden progressive) constitutions in the world. He provides a wider social safety net than in United States. He understands that staying unconstitutionally

will be socially destabilizing and picks a Medvedev type successor who losses (Batista, unlike Putin, didn't have the political capital to make sure his successor is elected which as we will see is Cuba's undoing).

Corruption overflows the government. Batista's work is about to be undone and he stages another coup in 1952. At this point however, Batista is 51 years old and has grown hedonistic and thus weak while out of power. Fidel Castro is 28 years old and at the top of his physical and mental strength. Batista's decadent physiology is incapable of forcefully transforming society and he tries to just ride along till death like Nursultan Nazarbayev. Fidel senses weakness and lack of spirit in his modernizing equal. He learns from Batista's mistakes. He strikes,utilizing support from some usual suspect elites as well as organized criminals. He wins.

The rest is history.

What caused one of the greatest lootings in Western Hemispheric history? What allowed the countryside to violently loot the urban areas and make over a million urban middle class/educated/progressive

people to flee to Florida? How bad did it get that a communist revolution happened? Were they eating each other? Zimbabwe-esque famine? Surely the country was going down the drain that a communist was needed to modernize it? Cuba must have been dirt poor compared to United States? Industrial workers probably had zero safety nets? Unions were forbidden? Probably had Laizze Faire fascist hyenas running the show?

None of the above.

PART 4: Similarly to USA, Cuba was the wealthiest Latin American country IF one averages the richest and poorest. It was better off than most in Latin America

A look at Cuba's socioeconomic situation before Castro's take over and comparison to today's United States.

In part 3 I have summarized the political developments of Cuba until Fidel Castro's take over. Now it's time to see what the socio-economic situation was like for the people at large. I hinted that it wasn't really terrible overall (contrary to what a communist revolution might indicate). This makes it all the more troubling that a redistributive revolution occurred.

From 1903 to 1958 Cuba's GDP grew 1110%. (see Figure 1) Yes, even after drop in price of sugar in 1920s, a couple coups, two modernizing dictators with mass opposition, social unrest, electoral violence, as well as Great Depression. We see a dip from 1925 to 1936 (which coincides with Machado's rule from 25 to 33) but it also coincides with sharp sugar drop before Machado took power and depression that hit only 4 years into his dictatorship. Even during that downturn the government continued to industrialize and increase amount of social services.

Now lets summarize a few points for a feel of economic situation right before Fidel Castro takes power. We can see that it wasn't 5% gilded age oligarchs sitting on top of endless poverty like in 1916 Russia. Old theories, that Cuban pre-revolutionary society was economically stagnant, unfair, and/or neo-colonially exploited by US do not hold water. Lets see how it really was in Cuba in the 1950s:

1) A large advanced middle class compared to most of the world and noted by UN
2) 8th highest industrial salary in the world (higher than Denmark, Belgium, France)

3) The richest and most developed nation in Latin America
4) 1 month paid holiday, 8 hour workday, 9 days sick leave, 6 weeks holiday before and after childbirth
5) Havana fourth most expensive city in the world (Key piece of information) and with more cinemas than New York
6) Third lowest mortality in the world and death rate that fell from 22.4 per 1000 in 1903 to 10.7 per 1000 in 1953
7) Highest rate of education spending in Latin America
8) More doctors per capita than United Kingdom
9) Largest labor union privileges in Latin America with bans on dismissal. Politically powerful labor.
10) GDP per capita equal to Italy and higher than many countries like Japan (admittedly no big achievement since many countries were ruined in the war)
11) 4th highest literacy in the region and higher than in Spain (economy could sometimes not keep up in demand for education ) (Key piece of information)
12) One of the highest ownership rates for radios and cars in the world. 4th highest Latin American consumption of printed media
13) Lowest infant mortality in Latin America.
14) One of five most developed countries in Latin America in terms of agricultural population with only 46% of people living in the countryside (Key piece of information)
15) Key destination country for talented immigrants. Proportionally, a bigger target of emigration than United States
16) Was successfully in the process of diversification from being an export based economy in the 50s. Used high sugar profits to create a stabilization fund to absorb economic shocks and aid in diversification. Tourist industry and non-traditionally exports began to bring substantial money and the economic prospects for growth looked good.
17) Between 1949-1958, Cuba's annual share in average income paid in worker's remuneration (wages, fringe benefits, pensions) was 65% and only behind US, UK, Canada

We see that things on the average national level kept rapidly improving. So why were people of all political stripes so angry? Well, the urban professional class (the industrial workers), still made 1/6 as much as American workers. Cubans oriented themselves on United States. (Key piece of information)

 Even though their society was better off than most Latin countries in many categories, it psychologically seemed that they were falling behind or not advancing fast enough. It is also more difficult for economy to grow once it becomes industrial enough and Cuba's growth slowed to 1% GDP a year before the communist revolution. The above 17 factors and 1% growth a year does not make for catastrophic redistributive conditions. Regulation of business and privilege of labor could have always been lessened by a Cuban Nicolas Sarkozy equivalent without violence.

The psychological reasons of reality clashing with expectations explains the discontent of the urban dwellers but not the severity of the criminal looting that arrived from the rural areas.

At this point we know about the Gini index and that the average GDP of a society can be high while income/social disparities are enormous. When a billionaire walks into a poor bar, the average wealth drastically rises. However, considering Cuba had a large solid middle class, we know this was not the case. Cuba definitely had a fatty middle of people with medium incomes to stabilize the social situation.

URBAN/RURAL SPLIT IN CUBA IN 1950s

What we do see is that the split between the urban areas and the countryside became much sharper in every category. The rural data presented here refers to rural workers working for third parties rather than peasants who worked for themselves. The urban data refers to professional/industrial workers in 6 provincial capitals with Havana bringing the urban average up.

54% of Cuban people lived in urban areas. That compared to 80% in today's US but US urban description includes sub-urban areas where whites escape supposed inner city rot.

(side note: In the next few decades in United States as:
1) whites flee economically dying cities like Detroit
2) inner cities are reversed with suburbs in terms of where the poor people live 3) rent culture takes over from home owning culture, we can expect to see more of stark contrast develop between city and country in US future as suburbia disappears.)

HOUSING:

75% of rural housing in Cuba was classified as either in bad shape or ruinous compared to 30% in urban areas.

24.4% of rural housing was classified as in moderate or acceptable shape compared to 50% in urban areas.

.6% of rural housing was classified as in good shape compared to 20% in urban areas.

Havana and other major cities were noted for high level of land/housing speculation that drove up the prices enormously. Their housing bubble didn't pop before revolution. It was unprofitable for private developers to build in the countryside and government had other more important concerns, like education/healthcare, than building affordable good rural housing.


EDUCATION:

Cuban society 60 years ago was far less complex technologically than US society in 2009. We all know these days that finishing college/grad school in 2009 is like finishing high school/college in 1960. Same thinking must be applied to 1950s Cuba that was lagging behind 1950s US.

of Cubans who never went to school (1.5 million), 67% lived in rural areas
of Cubans who reached middle school (86,000), 95.3% lived in rural areas
of Cubans who reached high school (88,000), 95.7% lived in rural areas
of Cubans who reached college (1,292), 2.4% lived in rural areas (KEY)

23% of Cubans older than 10 years were functionally illiterate and 46% of these people lived in the countryside. Number of illiterate sharply rose in older adults. We see that vast majority of elites were based in urban areas from which political power flowed and decided national destiny.

Efforts to bring development and infrastructure to the countryside were prevented by this low literacy/education as well as rural conservative oligarchs who exploited rural populations for political votes. People in rural areas literally did not know what was in their economic interests and did not have enough consciousness to understand and properly express their socio-economic interests. Many of the rural illiterate poor just served as seasonal labor for either agricultural industry or to serve city dwellers in unskilled tasks.

Agricultural sector of 1950s Cuba could be compared to its modern equivalent of food preparation, packing, and working in McDonalds or supermarkets. Those rural Cubans that got some schooling probably had enough consciousness to realize that its very difficult/expensive to live in Havana so they tried to make something of their life in small towns. Illiterate Cubans thought they might as well make some money in the cities even if it means living in suburban slums if necessary.

It might be safe to say that 2009 American middle school does a better job at bringing an individual to higher level of consciousness than a Cuban high school (if not a rural college) in the 1950s. It is difficult to make accurate comparisons with United States but they become troubling if we start attempting to make them. Only 28% of American population has finished some type of Bachelors degree and only 85% of American population has finished high school. It means roughly 2/3 of American population is in a consciousness/cognitive spectrum that compares to Cuban illiterate-middle school spectrum. That is not sufficient for them to financially make it in rapidly growing urban areas like NYC/Boston or make the best political decisions for their areas (considering the wealth/power of rural American oligarchs).

It is very difficult to think that America has equivalent of peasants but we must understand that technology is progressing at an increasingly exponential rate. The economic/scientific/political complexities of the world increasingly require at least a good modern bachelors as a base. It is very possible that grad school has already or will soon surpass college as the high school equivalent in American 1950s. Obviously most Americans these days do not fall under the category of functional illiteracy but perhaps the definition of what's illiterate needs to be revised or broken into levels.

As American elites increasingly and disproportionately live in urban areas, we can begin to see the political power of urban areas rise dramatically. Serious modernization efforts will then become possible with EU as the role model society. However, as we have seen in Cuba in part 3, even militant rapid modernization efforts can fail to prevent violent redistributive social environment. They might not be fast enough to satisfy the real demand of rural areas or the psychological sense of progress amongst the urban educated. United States also lacks a solid export based way to bring income for modernization.

We see the supply of education not satisfying demand and that is compounded by the illiterate equivalents of modern society having higher birthrates. The birthrate disparity due to modern contraceptive education, provides another difficulty for United States that Cuba did not have (at least to the same degree). Education cannot build upon itself. Even if forceful militant public efforts at providing it (versus the private oligarchic control of supply) are undertaken, it might not be enough. The government is still in only the early stages of assessing the full educational dilemma.

PART 5: Focus on similarities of widening gap between city and country, cultural trends of power elites, and difficulty of modernization.

Conclusion of Cuban analysis to hopefully catch glimpses of socioeconomic future awaiting United States.


Part 4 touched upon rather uncomfortable similarities between pre-revolutionary Cuba and modern United States when it came to educational disparities. Part 1 explored a framework with which  to compare evolution of similar societies based on land area they occupy. It hinted that some of the patterns that are about to occur in United States have already occurred in Cuba. What does that mean?

That means that educational and thus cultural gap in United States has not become as great as it was in Cuba right before the communist looting. The current US gap hints at what's to come rather than serve as an analogy to 1950s Cuba. We're in the early to medium stage of the cultural urbanization process that might sharply speed up as it gains momentum. Only in 1980s and 1990s did American educated start to slowly trickle back to urban areas from suburbia. True urban renewal began. Even then, only a few cities were recipients of the emigrating suburban talent (such as New York City). During that period we still saw some white flight into suburbia from proximity to non-white inner cities. The later suburban arrivals were whites that got accepted into American society late in the game such as Italians, Jews, and Slavs. In a way, they were moving against history since the evolution and improvement of best entertainment for educated professional class of people is primarily found in urban areas.

The American cultural gap between grad school whites and some high school/just high school non-whites is immense. Even if Soviet style mass schooling infrastructure starts to be built in every underdeveloped area, it will be a couple of generations until the gap starts to narrow sufficiently. As we have seen from the Soviet experience, many central Asians did not fully close the developmental gap with their white Siberian counterparts even with such forceful educational initiatives. Efforts in the direction of more forceful education are very difficult since America never fully organically desegregated.

Slavery in United States didn't end on its own after naturally burning out like it did in Brazil and Cuba. In Brazil and Cuba, poor white workers pushed to politically end competition from free labor in their own  country. Some large urban capitalist businesses (that relied on more skilled workers) also wanted to eliminate competition from businesses that utilize free labor. A rural capitalist making same product as his urban competitor can increase profits by utilizing slave labor for janitors and construction workers to cut costs. Urban business, for which utilizing slave labor is more difficult if not illegal, cannot effectively compete and thus joins an alliance of poor whites and liberals to end slavery.

The biggest complicating factor for a smoother comparison of US to Cuba is how slavery ended. The above mentioned process never burned out naturally in United States since slavery was ended by Union bayonets rather than by voluntary adherence to local law. This is not to say that Cuba didn't have post-slavery de-facto Jim Crow and social discrimination for many years. It occurred but was milder like in American northeast in the 70s and was helped by large amounts of interracial marriage. The involuntary end of American slavery retarded conditions where poor whites and non-whites can start developing economic post-racial class solidarity and common political interests. As such, many modern uneducated whites still feel more nationally integrated and "American" than their co-equal non-white "other". This allows elites' appeals to nationalism to work better in southern states from which poor white American soldiers disproportionately come from.

Meanwhile, this allowed the American educational/cultural gap to widen even deeper and prevented society from thinking about the types of modernization efforts needed. If Confederate States of America successfully separated in 1860s then slavery would have naturally burned out in a few decades and the population would have become much more racially intermixed sooner. The military would have been much more intermixed as well and the sheer amount of rising mulatto elites would conspire with urban liberals to push Confederate States on a path to school, health, and infrastructural modernization. Late 19th century southern political resistance to occupation and national integration retarded the process by a century. Jim Crow prevented the artificial term of "American" (which is no different than the term "Soviet" or "Chinese" as far as multi-ethnic empires go) from applying to all sooner.

History caught up. Now Republican Party will have to become multiracial, redistributive, and in cahoots with empathies of urban liberals in order to survive. As it re-organizes (if it ever does), migration of educated to urban areas will be mostly complete. The sheer concentration of masters and doctorates diplomas in urban areas should start to resemble educational breakdown of Cuban 1950s society. The housing bubble collapse, weakening dollar, and greater competition for declining white collar jobs should speed up the process. By 2020s/2030s, the income divide between the countryside and urban areas will become enormous (that is if authorities manage to prolong capitalist world order a while longer). Many cities will not make it and will be abandoned to continuously shrink like Detroit while others will attract the best talent.

Since national elites will get to intermingle more, social cultural polarization amongst them will further alienate them from their rural or suburban roots. Suburbia at this point will lose its appeal as a safe peaceful retreat and many suburbias (not just those by abandoned cities) might become 21st century equivalent of slums. The contrast with new Euro style inner cities will become more shocking than today's contrast between Detroit and Manhattan's lower east side.

In the first half of the 20th century, Havana had more entertainment for an advanced urban aristocracy such as stripclubs, more hedonistic nightlife, and an amazing cosmopolitan cuisine. That's one of the reasons it became a tourist attraction in an era when plane tourism was dangerous and expensive. However wealthy Americans didn't go to Havana because they could indulge in socially liberating hedonistic gratification at the expensive of poor peasants. They went because they saw the sophisticated urban wealthy educated Cubans at the stage of development which will be reached by wealthy educated Americans in 2020s/2030s and so on (using the model of analysis developed in part 1).

In a way, visiting Americans were able to taste futuristic advanced hedonism of their great grandchildren. That's not saying that the general poverty of the rural Cubans did not create appeal of sex workers and such. Cheaper sex workers and wonderful beaches however exist throughout other Latin American countries and were just a garnish on the Havana steak. Cuban nightlife/entertainment was years more advanced than one that existed in the prudish New York City or Las Vegas. Things that are only now appearing to become more publicly popular amongst children of American rich (such as sexual swinging) happened amongst European wealthy and educated as far back as 19th century and beyond. Cuban urban class (living in 20% of the best housing in the country) was already as "spoiled" (in the eye of Puritan morality) and socially conscious/accepting/tolerant as middle class New Yorkers a generation from now.

What do we mean by socially conscious? As we saw in part 4, even though the wealth of urban areas controlled politics, it was in their best interest to spend large amounts of money on modernization. Russian elites know that the best way they can achieve more wealth/power domestically and internationally is to develop the countryside. Government leadership will understand that US will further and further fall behind EU (in sheer power) if drastic modernization efforts are not started. If Republican party reorganizes into a populist force, it'll prod the cities to modernize quicker. If it doesn't then serious modernization efforts should still begin in US once the situation beyond city borders gets desperate enough. We now have mass decentralized electronic media to shame sensitive city dwellers into accepting higher tax burdens more quickly. Numerous white collar workers should begin to organize into politically powerful Cuban industrial union equivalents. Once again this assumes that Barack Obama manages to reform and thus preserve American capitalism for a couple more decades.

As Cuba and Russian Empire have shown, if 5% of population is surrounded by functional illiterates then the illiterates can be swindled out of a lot of money and resources through conspiracy and social construction. Cuba's corruption was unstoppable since those in charge mingled together in the same close urban area and devised new schemes for the country and how to make money. The only thing that allowed a power vacuum to develop is some elites deciding to not share the spoils, having too much power, and the infighting that occurred.

United States might be beyond ability to engineer peaceful decline into the 21s century at this point. That is because modernization efforts on the scale needed require:

1) enormous national resources
2) united political center
3) a lot of political capital
4) popular legitimacy
5) solid economic base

and most importantly

6) time and patience over generations

Even then they are potentially very destabilizing. They can create psychological sense that government is incompetent, not doing enough, corrupt (which it will be, Iraq war and bailouts are just appetizers), and too weak to do what is needed. Elite adherence to tradition and constitutional law (so far done relatively successfully in US) gets strained enormously in such an environment.
If technological stop gap measures for education (like advanced Internet learning) are not found, then we are looking at potentially devastating turn of events. We might even see some violence in future years once some elites find out how to exploit the rural discontent and find allies in urban areas. With fertility rates of the uneducated higher, the task becomes more difficult by the day.

It is doubtful that a great nuclear power will be allowed to be greatly destabilized from within by EU/Russia/China but their cooperation is not guaranteed considering China and Russia are facing similar problems. Hopefully exponential progress in technology will allow us to find solutions to manage the national decline peacefully so United States of 2020s and 2030s meaningfully contributes to European economy. Cuban rural population looting the cities, taking over residences left by those fleeing to Florida, and providing education/healthcare for themselves violently under guidance of urban elites (who betrayed their urban educated neighbors out of desire for power) serves as a lesson. It probably wont get to that point in US any time soon or if it does it'll take on a brand new strange form. However we can learn from how an old, progressive, wealthy, and growing American republic with a lot of potential ended up dying. Now instead of having skyscrapers Havana still has cars driven from its golden age of civilization.

Putin Administration and State Building Patrimonialism

Getting reform, stability, and economic growth in in 2000-2008 period was only possible with Putin's methods

Vladimir Putin has come on the Russian political scene when the country was in a weakened state and not yet fully consolidated. Legalistic reforms to improve state effectiveness and economic grounding have proven difficult until Putin began to build and use client patron networks with Russia's power elites. This allowed him to finally stabilize the new country through centralization and at the same time reinforced the need to continue using and expanding the informal networks of power. The byproduct of this was Russian state's return as key player in domestic industry and emergence of new class of self enriching bureaucrats who rely on interpersonal connections for advancement rather than well defined regulation. Russia began to be seen in the West as a less free country due to increased role of the state but it did not impede business opportunities and its attempts at bringing traditional patrimonial relations into the global scene. The tensions between modernity and ancient ways of getting things done might bring a new wave of destabilization in the near future.

The Russian Federation has just completed its second transfer of power this year, as President Vladimir Putin has stepped down in accordance with the constitutional limit of two terms. At the end of his second term the legislative branch and the judiciary have been subordinated to the Kremlin and amount of elected offices has been dramatically reduced. This concentration of political power in the executive, along with selective assertiveness of the state over private businesses such as television stations, has nudged Russia's assessment from partly-free to not free, as reviewed by Freedom House International in 2005. The change under the Putin administration is illustration of government's inability to work outside of Russia's traditional patrimonial way of conducting effective politics.

Existing literature on the resurgence of the state throughout the 2000-2008 period largely clusters on four broad challenges that the administration faced. One is the complicated center-periphery power struggles between the Kremlin and the numerous localities within the Russian Federation. This is framed within the context of Russia being a new federal country trying to function under strenuous conditions of poverty and war, while trying to balance the needs of Kremlin with regional desires for autonomy. The second challenge consists of an evolving struggle over property, primarily resource-rich national assets such as gas and oil infrastructure. This struggle involves newly empowered private entities and the historically dominant state. The third is one of self-interested bureaucratic factional competition, ending with the security services winning and rapidly expanding their influence over society under the Putin administration. Finally, there is the challenge of Russia being an energy-rich country trying to develop, while trying to avoid the danger of over reliance on energy exports. This is complicated by threat of political stagnation and elite enrichment, much like in other energy exporters such as Saudi Arabia and Venezuela.

A pattern that I saw emerge, from these four problems facing Putin, is the significant role of informal networks of interpersonal relations in accomplishing objectives. Like numerous Russian leaders that preceded him, Putin has built his authority using a system of patronage that leads back to him. This type of system, patrimonialism, is one where the political center is organized around the division of spoils such as jobs, economic aid, access to resources, and legal privileges, and where factions are played against each other with these spoils to prevent real opposition from crystallizing. I will divide this paper into four sections, each dealing with a problem that faced the administration, and see how Putin tried to mitigate each problem using patron client relations. The President has restructured the already existing relations to fit his purposes better. Patrimonialism is the chosen concept because it is the preferred way of doing business in Russia due to the long despotic tradition of the ruler being the supreme land owner. For hundreds of years there were no autonomous groups below the Tsar but classes of people serving as instruments of implementing the Tsar's will. These people had to be dealt with on a personal level in absence of rule of law or feudal contractual obligations.

Structural Framework of Center-Periphery Relations: 2000-2008

Conditions at the Start of Putin's First Term

Upon assumption of office, Vladimir Putin found himself at the head of a rather impotent federal government that followed years of Yeltsin-era policies which devolved substantial amounts of power to all eighty-nine of Russia's regions. This was due primarily to the inability of the Kremlin to properly finance regional projects and services, which prompted the regions to look after themselves any way they could and become more autonomous. The federal government was very weak from a lack of internal cohesiveness, influence from particular external interests, poor delivery of basic goods and services, and a declining ability to coerce compliance. One solid example of a region defying the Kremlin was the resource rich Muslim republic of Tatarstan, which issued its own passports, was able to pardon prisoners, and refused to send its young men to fight in Chechnya. Like many regions, it was run like a fiefdom with the local president, Mintimer Shaimiev blatantly appointing family members to political posts and refusing to privatize local economy in contradiction to Kremlin's wishes.

The Kremlin's paralysis in power projection over the localities had its roots in early Soviet efforts to rapidly consolidate the new Communist state. Soviets created their own local patron client networks of personalities that rewarded each other for ideological loyalty. The Center's capacities have suffered ever since from increased costs of monitoring and enforcing in such a corruption-stimulating environment. The country's fragments were stronger than the receding links holding them. Following the Soviet collapse, the structure of the local governments was not scrapped or reorganized like in Poland, former GDR, and Hungary, and many regional leaders were Brezhnev-era holdovers intent on consolidating devolved power. Yeltsin era federalism did not result in power sharing between Moscow and the regions as intended, but instead led to constant local obstructionism, economic hindrance, and the prevention of the formation of mass national parties focused on issues and not individual personalities. The informal self created norms by which sub-national political units had operated in the 1990's (out of necessity and self-interest) became entrenched and were now impediments to legal national integration. Some regions even erected trade barriers to protect ruling alliances of local politicians and business. It was estimated that up to 75% of federal laws were successfully prevented from being implemented throughout Russia's remote areas.

Putin's Reforms

Immediately after his inauguration, Putin created seven federal districts with seven Kremlin representatives to overlook and reign in the outlaw peripheries. The concept of a strict vertical chain of power began to be used as Putin's appointed district leaders could now, in theory, overrule and punish democratically elected governors and presidents of regions for incompetence and criminal intent. The ongoing Chechen conflict at that time provided an additional justification - and sense of urgency - for Putin's efforts at reasserting central authority in the name of stability, territorial integrity, and suppressing anti-war activists, the media, and NGO's in the overall effort. In August 2001, Putin also set up a commission to reform the civil service with the primary goals of ensuring predictability and order in professional advancement and linking financial incentives to improved system of qualifications. This was a fight against regional units of patrimonial relations that weren't operating in Kremlin's best interest.

The Kremlin had suffered setbacks on nearly all fronts. Fears that Moscow wanted to go beyond normalizing federal power sharing by striving towards a more unitary state proved premature. Almost none of the allegedly corrupt regional leaders were removed from power, even those who were very obstructionist in the past. An example of a punitive measure that was taken was the transference of undeniably corrupt Yevgenny Nazdratenko from the Russian Far East to a relatively comfortable post as head of the Federal Ministry of Fisheries. The Kremlin seemed unable to muster the energy beyond sending a message of recentralization. The commission's work to modernize the civil service also ran into staunch resistance that, as early as 2002, Putin complained of foot dragging, infighting, and creative reinterpretations of the commission's suggestions. Another setback was two constitutional court rulings against regional term limits and powers of federal prosecutors. The Kremlin did not choose to challenge the court's decisions in a sign of retreat from initially ambitious plans. One success was the expulsion of regional leaders from the Federation Council (the upper house of Parliament) on the grounds that, as local executives, these politicians should not have a say in the legislature. They were replaced with nominated representatives. Even in this case, the governors were compensated with membership in a newly created advisory body called the State Council. For the most part, the project of overlaying tighter federal laws over the vast country had failed.

Putin's Patrimonial Solution to Reasserting Control over the Regions

The problem of pulling many heterogeneous cultural and political units into a national framework is one that many new underdeveloped states face around the world. For that reason, bureaucracy guided by patrimonial allocation of rewards at the national level may be very effective as an integrative state-building exercise. Russian history saw fifteenth century Muscovite rulers pursuing this approach to subdue territorial princes through land allocation.

The public outrage over the Beslan school hostage crisis, in which over a hundred school children perished in part due to poor coordination and communication between authorities, allowed the Kremlin to exercise control in a new way, and served as a pretext to completely abolish eighty nine elected regional offices by 2005. They were replaced with Kremlin-appointed posts. Interestingly enough, rather than removing many of the corrupt local politicians and replacing them with his own loyal cadres, Putin chose to re-enlist 22 out of 26 incumbents in 2006. This showed his switch in emphasis from reform to manipulation through control of job appointments.

The post-Beslan opportunism was more about sending a message and seemed to have stemmed from the frustration of the President in having to deal with headstrong and nationally irresponsible local elites. Just like Yeltsin before him, Putin realized that if he wanted to make political progress, his personalized power had to be balanced and shared with the power of the bureaucracy. The post-Beslan change of regional leaders' job security depending on Putin rather than local electorates had the effect of creating a more nationally integrated network of codependence. The results were remarkable with only 3-6% of the federal laws blocked from taking effecting at the regional level.

Evolution of Struggle over National Assets: 2000-2008

Putin's Use of the State for Property Acquisition: The Yukos Affair

The collapse of the Soviet Union unleashed an intense competition by a number of powerful actors over vast natural resources and Soviet-built infrastructure which was made more intense by very weak and constantly changing property rights. Although this competition has gone through a number of stages since the 1980's, my focus is on the later stages under the Putin administration that were made possible by the new bankruptcy law passed in 1998. It was hailed as a step to normalize property rights, but allowed debt to be used as an instrument for asset acquisition.

In 2003, Yukos, a large oil company headed by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, stood as an example of a large, independent private corporation that used increasingly Western norms and practices. Khodorkovsky himself had begun to get involved in politics and private promotion of democracy and political pluralism to create better conditions for his very successful business empire. This set him on collision course with Putin, as the President just finished subordinating unruly business-connected politicians and was not about to allow interference with his vision of stability from powerful private individuals. In October 25, 2003, Khodorovsky's plane was blocked by trucks of armed police and he was arrested in a manner of a dangerous criminal as well as sentenced to a nine year prison term. This development signaled an end to the confident flow of influence from the private to the public sector, or at least influence incongruent with regime's designs. Most of the powerful tycoons in the Russian Federation, the oligarchs, had acquired their empires under dubious means and thus were vulnerable to arbitrary punitive measures by the Kremlin if they fell out of line.

What stood out in the Yukos affair were the extra predatory steps that the Kremlin employed against the company, not just arbitrarily and retroactively enforcing the law but making unreasonable demands concerning debt, preventing Yukos from meeting them, and using courts to approve a major asset grab. This was exemplified by an announcement by the Justice Ministry that Yukos' main productive asset, the oil production complex of Yuganskneftegaz, was be sold off to pay outstanding debts even before the debt repayment deadline arrived. Other less forceful oligarchs with political ambitions got the message and threw their support towards the center much like their 18th century aristocratic predecessors. In return, they were allowed to intertwine and expand their wealth in parallel with government projects. The oligarchs became patrons rather than independent private actors and control over them was through Kremlin's decision on who gets to keep, lose, or expand their business ventures.

Fallout and Implications of Renewed State Assertiveness over Property

What is telling is that Yuganskneftegaz was forcefully sold off not to a private competitor and ally of the Kremlin, but directly to a state company, Rosneft, that paid under the market price for the shares. Re-nationalization was afoot in a rather crude way, and even Putin's economic advisor at the time, Andrei Illarionov, called it the scam of the year. The wedding of political power and financial wealth set Russia on a path to state capitalism and rapid accumulation of wealth by bureaucrats overseeing massive financial transfers. The use of incentives, such as opportunities for participation in state-guided business projects when dealing with powerful actors in society is a classic patrimonial method of breaking and co-opting potential opposition in the absence of the ability to deter all of them physically.

Acquiring a major energy asset was not completely smooth for the Kremlin and constraints on its freedom of action were exposed. Observers expected the number one state energy giant, Gazprom, to acquire Yuganskneftegaz and then merge with fellow state-dominated company Rosneft during the process of renewed nationalization. However, Yukos filed a lawsuit in Houston, Texas, complicating and delaying the Kremlin's acquisition plans. The Kremlin had to rely on murky financing and a different company, the completely state-controlled Rosneft, to make their buy so as to not unnerve Gazprom's shareholders and to prevent an international legal crisis. This demonstrated a key weakness within a patrimonial regime operating in a globalizing world. Unlike the relatively enclosed Soviet Union, the new elites living off the perks of working with the Kremlin have a lot of their fortunes invested abroad in banks, joint ownership in foreign companies, stock markets, and various real estate. They thus can be affected by foreign pressure and aftershocks from actions taken domestically.

The Kremlin exploited mass public resentment of oligarchs' influence and rapid enrichment in the 1990's as cover to eliminate one of the few large companies that was trying to become more transparent and presented an alternative way of doing business. A more open, Western way of running a large, influential enterprise in line with international standards became an unacceptable domestic challenge. The bureaucratic desire to remain in control of the direction of the private sector was successfully covered up by labeling the process as a fight against corruption. One independent patrimonial pyramid of behind-the-scenes influence was consumed by the national one that followed its own logic of expansion under Putin. This is not a new historical development in Russia as in 1900 up to 45% of all large modern enterprises of industrial production were either owned directly by the Tsar or indirectly through licensing.

The Rise to Dominance of Security Services in State Bureaucracy: 2000-2008

Early Reliance on Security Personnel for Reasons of Functionality

The beginning of what came to be a heavy presence of former security officials in the highest level of government began with Yeltsin appointing a former director of F.S.B. (Russian equivalent of F.B.I. that grew out of K.G.B.), Vladimir Putin, to the position of prime minister and hand-picked successor. Putin acquired the post through blind loyalty and dogged defense of Yeltsin when the former president was accused of corruption in 1999 by Parliament and the public prosecutor's office. Putin was a career bureaucrat and his relation to Yeltsin was that of a client to a patron and the rent he received for good work happened to be the highest position in the land. Yeltsin and his clan of supporters were disturbed by rising centrifugal forces of populism, a weakened state, and oligarchic influence and wanted somebody with a security background to safeguard their personal gains after the transition of power. Immediately after becoming the second ever elected leader of Russia, Putin granted Yeltsin and his family total immunity from prosecution.

Max Weber defined non-patrimonial bureaucracy as one with clearly defined spheres of competence subject to impersonal rules and regular system of appointments. The appointments that occurred in the first presidential transition period were complete opposite and that trend continued into the Putin administration. Friendship, trust, loyalty, and assurances of protection mark the reshuffling within Russian ruling networks.

It took a while for Putin to start getting used to his new role as the top power patron. This was demonstrated in his slowness to fully cut interpersonal ties to Yeltsin's former circle. By the end of 2000 however, Putin began to bring his former KGB colleagues from St. Petersburg into his cabinet. Some of them had persecuted political dissidents in the past. These individuals were from secret service and intelligence ministries and were dubbed siloviki (Russian for forceful people). The siloviki faction enjoyed the most trust and access to Putin in his cabinet compared to the other two factions, the technocrats and liberal economists. This was in part because siloviki were tasked with the most important function of the new administration - the consolidation of the president's power and the strategic analysis and resolution of impediments to it. The siloviki organizational hierarchy was a series of concentric circles with core, secondary, and tertiary layers based on control over resources and departments, seniority, and overall influence. The core has the closest contact with the President and thus exercises the most direct influence over national affairs. The enormous amount of spoils available to the core members, in terms of control over major enterprises, bribes, and political power, often lead to bitter friction among them needing the President as interpersonal mediator. In this fluid, precarious dynamic that is primarily dependent on one leader, the state as a concept disappears and is completely replaced by informal network right below the top ruler.

Siloviki Expansion During Putin's Second Term

Putin's reliance on security services to instill hard-fought stability had come at the price of security personnel increasingly marginalizing the liberals within the cabinet and becoming increasingly difficult manage. In classic patrimonial fashion this allowed siloviki to get ever closer to Putin and therefore to greater access in determining policy and control over resources and institutions. The current or former members of the force structures such as FSB, the narcotics agency, and other security networks control more than ten government agencies and have partially exerted influence over a few more. The president's only means of control over his own top officials became implied threat that access to his attention can be cut off for disobedience.

Tight informational control by the Kremlin makes it difficult to gauge the exact size of rents granted for proper behavior. Jobs with the government rather than the private sector are now seen as the quickest way towards personal enrichment. Traditionally this has been the case as one foreign observer in imperial times remarked how Russian nobility stand apart from their Western counterparts in that they had no interest in agriculture and were eager to live in urban areas to enter public service.

The Dynamic of Current Top Government Structure

The combination of the above-mentioned factors creates a unique situation where one of the world's biggest security apparatuses is checked only by itself while it rules over a vast energy rich country in the process of finding itself. The collective body of officials in charge of the Russian state presently do not have their actions constrained by a well-defined ideology and are very pragmatic when defending their interests. In sharp contrast to the recent past, the post-Soviet Russian regime stands as one of the least ideological ones on the planet.

Max Weber failed to appreciate the degree to which bureaucracies struggle for influence, not just internally, but in the roles of political actors when possible as well.

The Russian Federation is a more modern patrimonial system where weak rational-legal tendencies co-exist within the shadow of large informal networks. Rules and regulations are followed as a form of default mode. The Kremlin does not obligate itself to follow the rules it lays for society at large. This leads to a constant flux of informal rules and behind-the-scenes deals that give the regime an arbitrary threatening feel as well as opportunities for massive internal infighting without regulation to channel power struggles. Russia, being a developing and technologically expanding society, exists in a state of tension as friction between modernity and patrimonial arrangement is irreconcilable. The practical need is too great for a system that tries to approximate Weberian bureaucracy of clearly defined spheres of competence subject to impersonal rules, rational ordering of relations of superiority/inferiority, regular system of appointments and promotion on basis of free contract, and fixed salaries paid in money. Putin has been able to contain his own people but not stop their enrichment. This remains a developing problem to be dealt with by the next president.

Energy Resources and their Use to Preserve the Patrimonial State: 2000-2008

The state has made the most consistent attacks on the private sphere when it came to the petroleum industry. In January 2004, the government decided to re-auction ExxonMobil and ChevronTexaco's rights to develop vast oil fields in the Far East and then moved on to prevent majority foreign-owned companies from developing major fields completely. Such moves may have been surprising to some due to continued presence of liberal reformers in Putin's cabinet at this time, but seizure of strategic assets did not go against Putin's character. His vision of a strong Russian state included part of the Soviet period and trappings, but without the collectivist economic system, which he rejected only in that it did not lead to prosperity.

Putin believes that private economic activity is the key to growth but that the state also has a major role to play to help Russia catch up with leading technological countries. Since Russian economic growth and ability to pay back international debts ahead of time was mostly due to high prices of gas and oil, taking direct control of these powerful assets conformed to Putin's idea of long term development and national revival. Perhaps more importantly, the state's control over energy infrastructure allowed Putin to get favorable treatment in international negotiations and use veiled threats of supply disruptions or investment denial to achieve national aims that would not be possible otherwise.

The state as the sole negotiator over key energy treaties, has allowed Putin to develop warm interpersonal relations with key heads of state such as Gerhard Schroeder, Jacques Chirac, and Silvio Berlusconi. That in turn allowed numerous bilateral agreements to be made promoting the interests of major Russian energy companies on a case by case basis. An interesting case study was when Chancellor Schroeder agreed to build a Northern European Gas Pipeline from Russia to Germany that bypassed all the countries in between. Gazprom, which was to provide the gas, then created a subsidiary company where minority German ownership was chaired by Schroeder after he stepped down from office. The subsidiary created an environment in which German interests had a direct financial stake and thus got persuaded to go through with the project. Geopolitically this makes Europe even more dependent on Russian gas exports, and highlights potential conflict of interest on the part of the chancellor. Although Europe is not political opposition to be played against each other, the high demand for energy supplies allows Russian leaders to use old patrimonial techniques on an international level to develop relations of favor exchange with the client states mingling their energies with Kremlin's. Since the Russian state maintains majority share ownership in strategic industries, the rent generation is geographically anchored in Russia forcing the more fluid western companies to deal with Kremlin on its home turf.

Russian investment abroad has followed similar patrimonial patterns and does not conform to liberal norms of integration as practiced by Western non-state affiliated companies. Moscow uses political connections for leverage and makes efforts to prevent international oversight of transactions and to stifle public transparency. This has a logic of its own since the domestic situation is a system of murky corporate statism in which power holders act as if they are the real legal owners and where the real owners are hidden and partaking with the power holders in joint decision making. An environment like that is difficult for western investors and businessmen to understand, operate in, and trust and thus it's best kept hidden. More importantly shining light onto the true functioning of the domestic structures undermines them and risks unraveling the very stability Putin fought so hard to establish. Attempting reform of entrenched client patron relations in Russia to integrate it into the world economy like a free market western state risks stability. Closing the country off poses same risk since further development and national/elite enrichment demands increased contacts with the world economy. That is an inherent contradiction that is also a major national threat.

This quest for political stability may explain the dynamic expansionist nature of the regime. The regime recognizes the risk of over reliance on energy exports and the vulnerability that comes with drops in energy prices, and it created a stabilization fund to mitigate potential shocks. As of today, the Russian state, like a man running downhill is strategically compelled towards finding trading partners that are also unhindered by preconceived values on how to organize society and do business. If it is successful in integrating the interests of its elite networks with those of other countries while maintaining lack of transparency and international accountabilty, then for the first time in history we will see international patrimonialism emerging which will co-exist with the free trading globalizing world. It may replace communism as a new Russian national export as well as preserve the regime indefinitely. Putin has been successful at the close of his term at expanding traditional way of doing business without facing too much international or domestic pressure to reform.

Conclusion

It appears that the ancient way of doing business through power relations within the Russian Federation is very difficult if not impossible to reform in a few short years. It is very possible that Vladimir Putin's energetic legalistic efforts in his first term were genuine attempts at ending the patrimonial inefficiencies and lawless self interested arbitrariness of Russian politics. If that is the case, Putin was up against insurmountable national force of habit and millions of intertwined resisting self interests from every sector of society. To be able to accomplish anything with any degree of success during his term in office, Putin subsumed himself to the very patron client way of doing things he was fighting against. The lasting achievement of the 2000-2008 efforts was to pull together scattered patrimonial regional segments of society into one personalistic pyramid of power which allowed Putin to embark on grand national projects. More research is needed on the types of local regime types that exist within Russia and their level of tolerance for liberalism compared to Kremlin's to see whether things have really become less free.

Serious extralegal abuses of power have occurred once Putin consolidated support and started acquiring strategic real estate for developmental reasons. It is unclear but unlikely that the value of these acquisitions became apparent after massive flow of oil revenue into the country boosted economy year after year during Putin's first term. Considering that the Yukos dismantling occurred right at the cusp of Putin's consolidation of power over the regions, it is more probable that as the administration was growing in confidence it became more likely to engage in statist measures. The lack of coherent long term plan or ideology in Putin's first term, emphasizes the improvisational approach that was adopted. Increasing wealth within the country gave the Kremlin more carrots to offer to political clients and thus get more support for various national projects.

A major and most likely unintended consequence of focus on stabilizing the country and the economy has been the take over of most of the key government ministries by former security personnel. The self enriching siloviki within Putin's administration are a wild card and are operating their own informal patrimonial networks that are better hidden than most. Putin has been able to play his cabinet members against each other but risk of instability exists whenever Russia acquires a weak ruler.

The role of the state in negotiating business deals abroad follows a long tradition of it being a main actor in ownership of national property and this demonstrates reluctance of letting go. Comparison of Russian way of doing businesses abroad to China's would provide a contrast in how traditionally mass land owning governments operate in a globalizing world.

Patrimonial ways of achieving political goals in Russia appear to be very effective and the more the clients are integrated into the patron's plans the quicker things get done. Whether the tension between the personalistic system and an open society in the western mold will slowly resolve itself or create bursts of instability remains to be seen.

Sources:

Barnes, Andrew. "Industrial Property in Russia: The Return of the State and a Focus on Oil" SAIS Review vol. XXVII (summer-fall 2007) 47-62

Blank J.Stephen. "Putin's 12 Step Program" The Washington Quarterly 25.1 (2002) 147-160 JSTOR by The Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Brym J Robert. "The Size, Composition, and Dynamics of the Russian State Bureaucracy in the 1990s" Slavic Review Vol. 63,, No. 1, (Spring, 2004),pp. 90-112 JSTOR The American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies

Bremmer, Ian. & Charap Samuel "The Siloviki in Putin's Russia: Who They Are and What They Want" The Washington Quarterly Winter (Winter 2006-2007) 30:1 pp. 83-92 by The Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Brzezinski, Zbigniew. "Putin's Choice." The Washington Quarterly 31:2 (2008) 95-116

Jack, Andrew. Inside Putin's Russia. New York: Oxford University Press. (2004)

Kasparov, Gary. "Battling KGB, Inc." Journal of Democracy Volume 18, Number 2 (April 2007) by National Endowment for Democracy and The Johns Hopkins University Press

Kuchins, Andrew. "Russia in the Age of Putin" SAIS Review vol. XXVI no. 1 (Winter-Spring 2006)

Nicholson, Martin. "Putin's Russia: Slowing the Pendulum without Slowing the Clock" International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs 1944-)

, Vol. 77, No. 4 (Oct., 2001), pp. 867-884 JSTOR by Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the Royal Institute for International Affairs

Petrov, Nikolai & Slider, Darrell. Edited by Dale R. Herspring. Putin's Russia Rowman & Littlefield Publishers 2003

Rudolph I. Lloyd & Rudolph Hoeber Susanne. "Authority and Power in Bureaucratic and Patrimonial Administration: A Revisionist Interpretation of Weber on Bureaucracy." World Politics, Vol. 31, No. 2, (Jan., 1979), pp. 195-227 by The Johns Hopkins University Press

Shevtsova "The Limits of Bureaucratic Authoritarianism" Journal of Democracy 15.3 (2004) 67-77 by National Endowment for Democracy and the Johns Hopkins University Press

Shevtsova Lilia. Russia: Lost in Transition Carnegie Endowment for Peace, 2007

Shevtsova, Lilia. Putin's Russia Washington D.C. by Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. 2005

Stoner-Weiss, Kathryn. "Russia: Authoritarianism without Authority" Journal of Democracy 17.1 (2006) 104-118 JSTOR Johns Hopkins University Press

Theobald, Robin. "Patrimonialism" World Politics Vol. 34 No. 4 (July. 1982) pp. 548-559 JSTOR. Johns Hopkins University Press

Tompson, William. "Putin's Challenge: The Politics of Structural Reform in Russia" Europe-Asia Studies Vol. 54, No 6 (Sep., 2002), pp. 933-957 JSTOR Taylor &:Francis, Ltd

Trenin V. Dmitry. Getting Russia Right. Washington D.C.: United Book Press, 2007

Trenin, Dmitry. "Russia Redefines Itself and its Relations with the West" The Washington Quarterly 30.2 (2007) 95-105 by The Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

A Wallander, Celeste. "Russian Transimperialism and its Implications" The Washington Quarterly 30.2 (2007) 107-122 by The Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Wittfogel, A. Karl. "Russia and the East: A Comparison and Contrast" Slavic Review, Vol. 22, No. 4, (Dec., 1963), p. 627-643 JSTOR by The American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies

http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=363&year=2005

://www.clubdeparis.org/sections/services/communiques/russie9654/switchLanguage/en

http://www.constitution.ru/en/10003000-05.ht

Northeast United States is the "Real America"

An exploration of irrational Republican claims on what constitutes "real America" as well as a brief hypothetical thought experiment on how Northeast would be as an independent federal union




A curious thing happened during and after the US election of 2008.

We've heard a native of Alaska (which became the 49th state over 170 years after USA was created) and certifiable moron proclaim that she comes from the "real America" and is running on McCain's ticket to fight for "real Americans". Her speeches to elderly sexually frustrated rural gawkers made it seem as if the urban Northeastern citizenry of United States was somehow an alien patch within the national fabric. Considering that Northeast was not a puppet state under any foreign occupation at the time, it was the equivalent of a minor Scottish politician proclaiming Scotland to be a more real UK than UK itself.

Of course it was strategically necessary for the poorly educated charlatan from country's far periphery, the wide eyed gold digger like Sarah Palin, to use terminology like this. After all, many people in the nation's interior and periphery got left behind economically by the country's slow decline of the past few decades. Politics of resentment do have an underlining psychological basis that is very real, based on real grievances, and uncomfortable if one is to dig into it from a class based perspective.

Now of course we hear rural Midwesterners and Southerners cry about wanting "their country back". Considering that the original heartland and tree trunk of United States (New England) voted out the remnants of the congressional GOP, the real historic authoritative soul of the country has spoken. Who can doubt that (in the hypothetical case of US splitting up) that the bulk of the original 13 states would have the best claim to be the successor state to United States? To use the example of United Kingdom again in this scenario, a politician from Utah, Texas, or Alaska claiming his or her region as the most genuine successor would be like Thomas Jefferson claiming US to be the true successor to UK. We can go all day with analogies but the undeniable point is that Northeastern states is what kept and still keeps the whole 200 year long political project functioning and possible.

In all fairness, a claim could be made that Northeast has become too "Old World" for the periphery's "frontier" sensibilities and it is thus a less "real" America. However this claim easily collapses after a minute of thought about the information in the paragraph above. Since more than half of the population is now urban, even the "frontier" as a factor of national definition has been moved out of the discussion.

So the much newer peripheral settlements and tree branches of USA want political control over the trunk/roots back instead of being ruled by them? The potentially fatal and seemingly insurmountable and permanent gridlock going on in Congress all the time allows us an opportunity to examine such thoughts. Neither the regional theocratic/oligarchic faction (that is the GOP) nor the regional England leaning oligarchic faction (that is New England democrats) appears to be able to defeat each other.

Such counterproductive gridlock (in the face of the worst economic depression since the 1930s) is exactly what happens when the fine points about union size in the federalist papers become obsolete due to the growth in scale of the federal union itself. The country loses ability to eventually reach a meaningful compromise acceptable to both sides (by acceptable I don't mean people resorting to calling politicians Nazis over the hyperdiluted nature of compromises we get currently).

A congress of a smaller federal union (say 10-15 states in regional economic and cultural proximity) would create compromises that do not bring the same level of psychological hate and disappointment in the factions that didn't get the details they wanted. Since people would subjectively get more of what they want in a smaller union, their psychological sense of personal power and control is increased. They are thus "freer" by most ways that freedom is measured and defined.

Let's think for a moment of a hypothetical scenario where the Northeast is its own country (thus keeping closer in political scale and dynamic to what James Madison had in mind). Since Virginia is demographically changing (as the Obama election has shown) yet still has a number of southern leaning theocrats, it may or may not be included. I have already written how Texas as an economic hub is vital for United States to function in its current form and how Texas can potentially get wealthier if it was its own country. But how would Northeast (a region less dependent than Texas on feeding and supplying the rest of the country through commodity and food exports as well as crude ethnic exploitation) fare on its own two legs?

Not surprisingly, rather well with strong potential to be better off than it is now. The oldest, most respected, and best funded Ivy League schools are in the region and so is the concentration of intellectual, financial, and political power elites along with their family clans. That is key to successful nation building since elites decide national direction instead of the average citizenry (especially if the new country preserves the current political system without moving more towards proportional representation). A lot of old money and bloodlines create an entrenched and relatively integrated ruling class that would be able to work well together on national projects. The sheer wealth of Northeastern oligarchs is shown by the fact that as of today, most of Northeast states have higher GDP per capita than the national average. Their hands would not be politically tied on the federal level by fellow oligarchs thousands of miles away in places like Texas, California, Florida. The region would be easier to remold into a shape that resembles the fashionable role model society at the time (for Northeastern rich, that appears to be England as it has been for a long time).

The modern day serfs that the rulers of the new country (which as mentioned above has the most right to continue calling itself United States of America if it chooses) will be working with, are also a lot more secular and educated than their Southern and Western brethren. It follows that the oligarchs' right hand men (president, congress, and supreme court of Northeast United States) can now reduce elites' control by splitting them with increasingly democratic means into a balance between the government and the oligarchy.

NUSA is also smaller in size than potential nearby competitors which allows quicker personal communication between all demographics and further economic integration. Northeast is beginning to resemble Germany in terms of population density and will be the first major region on the continent to put quality control on how the land is organized and developed. Proximity to Europe itself would allow NUSA to enjoy greater investment and cooperation with EU. The president of NUSA would not need to stand on pick up trucks or kiss bibles to get elected. The new smaller legislative branch would be made up of people who work better together due to greater closeness of culture. The federal government overall would be closer to the serfs since it would oversee 50 million people instead of 300 million. It would be in charge of a population the size of Spain not one of 3 Germanies.

As for states outside NUSA, one can only speculate. We can just imagine the absurdity and even potential Iran/Yugoslavia type horror show that the deep south would be if it was to form a federal union (not including Texas that is) of its own. Such a situation would show the real meaning of "wanting my country back".

Problem of Defining Self-Interest for Libertarian Society

Perhaps the biggest stumbling block that libertarian ideology faces is that human self-interest may be based more on power rather than happiness


The notion of self interest is altered if we think that the biggest human motivation is gathering more personal power rather than struggling towards constant repetition of joyful moments. Current popular understanding of self-interest goes hand in hand with the classically liberal notion of the right to "pursue happiness". That's the idea libertarians use to justify their maximum allowance of freedom of action for individuals. The pursuit towards something psychically warm and cuddly such as happiness seems so right and wholesome for a human being to undertake that denying it seems cruel and out of the question.

Let's look deeper into the supposed utopia proposed with increasing frequency by ideologues like Ron Paul and youthful college educated people around the world who view themselves as having what it takes to become successful capitalists themselves (regardless of the fact that social mobility is constrained in United States as well as in most countries by a small number of oligarch families gaming the system). I don't have any country in mind in this discussion and will use clean abstract concepts ( haha "clean abstract") for simplicity.

For a moment let's forget all the various assumptions and constructs that are needed for libertarian theoretical defense to work at all such as:

1) Free will or what's left of it after a century of Freud, Nietzsche, Marx and now brain scanning experiments

2) Rationality or some common thought process pretending to be rationality in a diverse population with individuals of vastly differing educational backgrounds and consciousness levels

3) Equality before the law as well as rule of law itself for a contractual society to function (laughable fictions in most societies on the planet right now since the most powerful individuals constantly evolve and change the concept of the rule of law through force and brilliant law technologists)

4) Reality. This is a big one in that applying a "perfect" libertarian construct to say, United States is like applying "perfect" proportional representation democratic construct to Afghanistan. Of course the ideologues insist it can work if the whole world united in this purpose and gradually moved towards this workers paradise

Any one of these by themselves are enough to discredit an ideology that relies on everybody being a utility calculating rational computer. Any one of them is enough to cause people in 20 years to say familiar statements such as, "well libertarianism sounds good on paper but you know, human nature and the inherent contradictions of the system make rapid application of the concept disastrous" (in terms of creating inefficiencies, inequalities, exploitation, suffering, and stagnation).

My focus however is on self-interest as the driving mechanism in a libertarian society. There is still lack of consensus on what is true human motivation but it increasingly looks that it is a mixture of power seeking as well as pleasure seeking with power being a better explanatory human goal. Many of us have seen the famous quote by Adam Smith,


"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest"

At this point many automatically think that being self interested is just wanting to be more happy and that the most important thing to aid our self interest is money. Since desire to make more money is accepted, pursuit of self interest is thus seen as harmless and even sturdy enough to build a radically different socioeconomic system. As mentioned above, there are other takes on what life is all about besides just seeking money fueled happiness. Let's take Nietzsche for example,

"Life itself is essentially appropriation, injury, overpowering of the strange and weaker, suppression, severity, imposition of one's own forms . . "

The mere fact that growing and living may involve more than just joy seeking poses a critical and fundamental problem for free market ideologues. Let's follow them on the road towards a more capitalist society while keeping in mind that it may be more important for people to keep getting stronger as well as trying to be "happy"...

Since happiness can undertake many forms, the individual thus has a strong case to argue for the right to personally negotiate governance with others and reduce as many regulations on modes/fruits of pursuit as possible. Libertarian ideology then seems the most attractive as individuals become their own utility calculating contractual lawmakers. The result is that the legislative branch in a libertarian society finds itself with little to do. By definition, making laws is creation of uniform regulation on human behavior. This type of government sponsored uniformity becomes redundant (since each citizen is now consenting to enter into contractual regulation of his or her own choice) at best and "coercive oppression" (or any number of silly names given at the GOP protests in recent months) at worst. The libertarian society would then rightfully prevent uniformity from arising and applying to all (unless perhaps dealing with matters that cause grievous harm to others and corporate externalities).

However, if we think of real human motivation as pursuit of influence over their environment (and other human beings within it), allowing humans the maximum playing room begins to take on a more sinister dimension.

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The familiar actor of legislative branch and the area covered by it is mostly displaced by a great multitude of smaller actors making contractual agreements with one another and creating a great patchwork of powers and networks throughout society. Without the counterbalancing small actors of local government (assuming libertarian society is libertarian top to bottom), an endless multitude of free market actors would be responsible with creation of regulation for all (for example: road company figures out with local land owner how many tolls to have, dimensions of certain infrastructure, fine limits for jaywalkers on private roads, etc).

This thriving overlapping regulatory complexity with greatly decentralized nodules of influence (assuming the invisible hand goes against all history and human nature so far and prevents monopoly formation) is a double edged sword. Free market is relatively efficient at distribution of capital (at least on sub-national local level when legal conditions are favorable) and the regulatory contractual patchwork is often better able to adapt to pressures of time and social flux. One thing the invisible hand is less good at is redistribution of justice (giving people what they think they deserve).

At the end of the day in the modern world, justice (in all its current forms) is mostly in the monopolistic hands of the legislative branch. The legislative branch makes it uniform and standard for a time. In this branch, all individual free market actors ( the people) have a say about what uniform sort of justice is right for a particular society. There is of course, indirect influence from larger clusters of power and bigger free market actors (ranging from small businesses to billionaires to churches to transnational corporations) that cannot totally be avoided.Their influence is generally somewhat counterbalanced through sheer numbers of lesser powered individuals and their allies in the powerful agent of the legislative.

Since free market libertarian justice is inseparable from wealth (arising from selling one's labor via the most cold blooded meritocracy that doesn't recognize inequality of origin), only the individuals with sufficient wealth form nodules of power necessary to create various relatively wide ranging regulatory norms in society. With wealth comes increased bargaining power and better contractual positioning. Considering the goal of human motivation is personal expansion of influence, the sheer size of some of the power nodules in society is cause for concern as their contractual arrangements affect the lives of millions of less powerful individuals. An ideologically libertarian oriented society would reduce the influence of the biggest guardian of less powerful individuals (legislative branch) by transfering regulation of society to a multitude of powerful players with their own spheres of influence.

A new form of feudalism arises. Whatever people "deserve" in this society is whatever they can wrestle from others through raw financial power (acquired by individuals with personal physiologies that thrive in free market conditions or those who were born into wealth or both). The new creators of standards and norms are thus illegitimate (nobody voted for them unless it is stock owners voting for new company leadership) and they are constrained by nobody but market conditions. Even market conditions can be shaped with strong enough players and enough money. In a legal legislative vacuum, even informed consumers and workers have little bargaining power against the abuses of various cartels, guilds, and land barons (whatever new name they would go under informally or formally). Less powerful individuals would strategically be forced to dedicate substantial amounts of time to collective bargaining. Emergence of powerful unions for service industry is difficult to speculate on but without government protection new forms of protection will have to be devised and vigilantly implemented ( 1> this in turn creates inefficiencies/other abuses as union leaders are as interested in power as CEOs and use up substantial amounts of productive resources on court battles and organization 2> union power receded in part due to rise in service industry and in part because the legislative addressed their concerns through legal regulation)

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In an interconnected world where wealth and influence from powerful players is transferred without regard to borders and the needs of localities, complete deregulation is dangerous.We need rigorous functioning legislative branch not just out of fear about re-emergence of old abuses (ex. blacklisting workers) and rise of new ones. We need a strong legislative branch because the powerful there counterbalance the powerful in the private sector. In libertarian world the powerful (masters of wealth acquisition with wide ranging powers derived from it), would be free to collude or battle each other with stifling consequences for the weak. Denying them some freedom of movement is not a cruel practice of denying somebody their shot at happiness but tempering raw power and reduction of private tyranny at home. Powerful entities providing services to us at our own choosing does not eliminate our reliance on them. Hand that helps for money is hand that controls. We can't imagine the police or the courts being privately owned due to fear of corruption and abuse and it is no less horrifying to think that private individuals will take over from the legislative in a libertarian world.

Sidenote:

This discussion had a medium sized country in mind. If a libertarian country is smaller, one can easily see the whole of society dominated by one or two international corporate actors with the wealth flowing out of the country. A dystopian cyberpunk future in the mold of William Gibson is essentially a libertarian one. The unhealthy corporate influence in America and its corrosive effect on government is due precisely because the strong in the legislative are splintered against each other while the strong in the private sector are gaining through attrition. Having a poorly functioning legislative battling the executive does not stop excesses of power. It just creates dysfunctional weak government. The excesses continue in the private world that permeates the public. Parliamentary government with proportional representation (with constitutional protection) is thus a much better guarantor of decentralization of power within society.

The 21st century cannot afford a disjointed slow self cannibalizing government concocted by 18th century aristocrat intellectuals. Something so out of date is in no position to face a fast paced world or promote freer development of vast majority of individuals against the designs of domestic and foreign elites. It does us disservice to think of power as just residing in government that we should be free from. Better separation of powers would be the strong in private and public spheres balancing each other in a healthy dialogue with the weak being the middlemen between the two.

So emerges perhaps the biggest argument against libertarian designs, that:

1) in a free market world there is insufficient separation of powers and mechanisms to keep them separated

2) this is dangerous in that human motivation is not just about getting happy through making more money (and making trickle down economics work in deranged minds of some propagandists)

3) only democracy through some sort of proportional representation creates enough of a split and balance between power elites by creating a strong legislative branch that can check the feudalistic desires of many oligarchs

The biggest dangers affecting many "civilized" and "developed" nations are thus not too much government but a government that is too weak to stand up against private financial interests. Proportional representation democracy is not perfect of course but it seems like a step forward than backward at the moment for most of the population of any given country.