The Former President's Policies Constitute a Risk to Civilized Society.
The national and international policies – from the effort to overturn the election previously to current moves and statements – undermine not only domestic and international legal frameworks. However, the issue goes deeper.
These actions endanger the fundamental meaning of civilization itself.
A moral purpose of civilized society is to prevent the stronger from harming and taking advantage of the weaker. Otherwise, we risk being permanently immersed in a state of nature where only the fittest prevails.
This concept lies at the center of the Declaration and Constitution. It’s also the foundation of the global system established after WWII advocated by the United States, which stresses collective action, popular sovereignty, fundamental freedoms, and the supremacy of law.
However, it is a vulnerable construct, frequently ignored by those who would exploit their power. Upholding it requires that the influential have the moral fortitude to refrain from seeking immediate gains, and that society hold them accountable should they falter.
Unfettered might does not equal right. It makes for uncertainty, disruption, and conflict.
Whenever entities that are richer and more powerful attack and exploit those that are not, the structure of civilization frays. If such aggression are not contained, the fabric unravels. If not stopped, the world can fall into disorder and conflict. History provides ample precedent.
Our current reality is a society and world grown vastly more unequal. Political and economic power are increasingly centralized than in recent memory. This creates conditions for the elite to leverage their position against the disadvantaged because they feel omnipotent.
The fortunes of a small group of billionaires is almost beyond comprehension. The power of big tech, big oil, and large defense contractors covers a vast portion of the world. Advanced technology is poised to further concentrate wealth and power even more. The military might of the major powers is unmatched in the annals of time.
Empowered by a compliant faction and a pliant supreme court, the executive office has been transformed into the most dominant and unchecked entity of state power in the modern era.
Combine these factors and you grasp the danger.
An unbroken thread links past breaches of norms to present-day threats. Each were founded upon the hubris of invincibility.
One observes parallel dynamics in other global contexts: in wars of aggression, in strategic threats, and in the global depredation by industrial titans.
But, raw power does not create right. It fosters instability, upended order, and armed conflict.
History shows that laws and norms to constrain the powerful also safeguard them. Without such constraints, their endless appetite for increased control and resources ultimately bring them down – and with them their corporations, nations, or empires. And pave the way for global conflict.
This blatant lawlessness will haunt the nation and the world – and indeed a rules-based order – for years to come.