IN THE realm of politics and political discussion, there is the meme of “first principles” or politics as a belief in a particular ideology.
I used to believe in this meme as well, but as I grew up I learned that politics didn’t work like that at all. Self-interest, not principles, dictated politics. That is to say, politics is ultimately negotiating about what people want, as opposed to what they say they believe in. Any system or ideology that denies this is concealing what it intends for PR purposes.
Reading the writings of Ibn Khaldun, Machiavelli and Shang Yang, I have since abandoned the notion of associating politics with principles. Politics is ultimately who is in your group and who is out of it.
The problem comes, however, when powerful interests want to expand their power and influence, and thereby claiming other groups as part of their own. Common examples of this include Civic Nationalism, Liberal Democracy and various types of ‘inclusive’ ideologies.
Why am I talking about this?
It’s because throughout the 19th and 20th century, people conceptualized politics as being about ideology, as opposed to what it was: People arguing for their interests without being direct about it. Even the Cold War was ultimately about the USA and Russia (through the USSR), dissimulating their geopolitical interests through capitalism/liberal democracy and Communism/Socialism respectively.
However, the rise of so-called identity politics (e.g. LGBT+. Critical Race Theory, Black Lives Matter and various other Victim-Based ideas) in the Western World (the originators of political principles) is a sign to me that we are done with political principles, and that we are going back to the politics of who is your group and what it wants.
The days where politics involved telling others that we only want what’s good for everybody was an interlude, and judging by its results, ultimately, a lie./PN
