The Laissez Faire Electronic Times

Western civilisation, currently led by the United States, believes itself to be the vanguard of world civilisation. Although this depends on one's perception of what constitutes a civilisation, some questions cannot be avoided: Does Western civilisation have a vision? Does it know where it's heading? And within this civilisation, will Europe blindly follow the United States come bust or doom?

Defining civilisation

Whether we see civilisation as the antipode of 'barbarism' or the actual state of a developed culture, we generally associate Western civilisation with a state of enlightened reason: a rational and objective perception of society enjoying an 'Aristotelian form' of social order that is hopefully capable of distinguishing reality from mythology. It is an order that relies on reason; the same type of reasoning that had culminated in the separation of the State and the Church some centuries ago throughout Europe. But for this civilisation to possess a vision, we first need to define a measure of what constitutes Western civilised order. And here lies a problem - for there is no universally accepted definition of such a measure. Some would place 'law and order' as an intrinsic measure of civilisation. Others maintain that economic (entrepreneurial) productivity yields the highest measure of civilisation. Others see it as a measure of economic intervention in the creation of a welfare State. And laissez faire libertarians would emphasise that "civilisation is the progress towards a society of privacy". One could go on: power and world influence, tolerance levels, moral values...

Ensuring 'enduring freedom'

Under analysis, one notes that the concept of freedom (with all its diverse connotations) is a basic element denoting Western civilisation. Immorality, poverty, lawlessness, foreign aggression, State repression, or intrusion of privacy are all seen as factors that erode freedom, selectively by moralists, left-centre-right Statists, nationalists, civil libertarians and laissez faire libertarians. Freedom is in the eye of the beholding mind. What libertarians may consider to be repressive laws that erode civil liberties or stifle entrepreneurship, authoritarians deem as State-provided protection against a perceived moral, economic or political threat to liberty.

The function of laws

A largely accepted belief is that to safeguard freedom, in all its fluidity of form, the State needs to intervene in society's workings as necessitated democratically over time. But every State intervention requires a law, and every law takes away a liberty from a specific minority. This, in and of itself, is a fundamental contradiction. And it is exacerbated by the fact that, as time progresses, Western civilisation is increasingly backing its laws with punitive measures that involve State coercion and force. Clearly, many new (and old) private conflicts are fast becoming "breaches of the King's peace". In order to control society and impose 'order' the Western States have been raising deterrent forces on all fronts, relying on pervasive surveillance, incarceration, and asset seizure as the main coercive means by which it hopes to sustain the value of deterrence. Can this escalating punitive philosophy be the apex of Western civilisation?

This brings us to a fundamental question: Should Western civilisation, guided by objective and rational reason, necessitate more coercive laws or less? What is the end point of our civilisation? Is it one with a longer list of laws with higher penalties and more intrusive detection and surveillance techniques aimed at maintaining social and economic control (which is thought to bring order)? Or one that would not require such State intervention since, given the chance, society is rational enough to mature and evolve into a truly enlightened and civilised society?

The former, the authoritarian approach to civilisation, implies that humans are innately criminal by nature (in parallel with Christianity and "mankind's original sin"), and that only sufficient State interventionist force can deter social and economic disorganisation and greed. The latter, the libertarian approach, maintains that humans are innately social, rational beings and to collectivise them into a compliant herd by reason of 'fear of consequences' (deterrence) only perpetuates deviance and criminality. Repression hinders the process of social evolution since society would be conditioned to respond only to the 'whip'. Social experiential awareness is diminished and human dignity and integrity are held hostage to coercive State violence.

Perpetuating the escalation of criminality

Increased criminalisation does not invoke the birth of a civilised society. Rather, it derails it into a society of perpetual deviance that continuously degenerates into crime, together with the State's parallel quest for its elusive suppression. The exercise of crime control is fast becoming an exercise of pervasive and hegemonic social control, complete with Gestapo-like, militarised State agents enjoying tremendous elbowroom, resources and legal powers.

Let us venture into this sad alley. The rise of the 'Police State' has taken the course of at least 150-200 years to reach this saturation point, but never have crime rates statistically increased as in the past 35 years or so. Congruently, never has criminalisation, enforcement and incarceration been in such a heightened state. Conventional wisdom - which is the wisdom of the subordinated masses led by elements in the government and the media - concludes that the increase in State authoritarianism has been necessitated by this increase in crime.

In reality, however, State authoritarianism could actually have contributed to (if not caused) this escalation in criminality by essentially criminalising the whole of society. The question begs to be asked: What came first, pervasive crime or the authoritarian 'democratic' State? In essence, it is a chicken-and-egg question involving complex human behaviourisms following the natural Darwinian laws of adaptability, adversity, survival (and evolution!).

Criminality has evolved. It was forced to evolve - through a process of actions and reactions - by a multitude of intrusive and forceful State actions. Certainly, most criminologists still place the blame for escalated criminality on de-industrialisation (just as industrialisation had increased crime in the 18th and 19th centuries). The advent of a market society, the creation of a new underclass, relative depravation, racial tensions, pluralism and multiculturalism are all seen as the prime causes of a rising crime rate. Furthermore, there is little doubt that this rise may also be attributed to more efficient data collection by enforcement agencies. Other, less academic, commentators would blame "eroding moral values" (which is more of a perceptive effect than a cause). But critical criminologists and abolitionists prefer to focus on the consequences of State authoritarianism and criminalisation. Since the late 1960s many have come to the stark realisation that a major component of the rise in criminality is a function of coercive and punitive State interventionism. The more the State criminalises and the more money is poured into police efforts, the more will crime rates rise both statistically and reactively.

Actions and reactions

To delve into the intricate details of this line of thought would require at least a volume. Briefly, it concerns the elements of individual and collective actions and reactions (much in the same vein of Newtonian 'actions and reactions being equal and opposite'). This concept qualifies human behaviourisms as freely interactive, sovereign, social elements. In a pluralistic democracy social control is determined by a low deterrence threshold. Once that threshold is superseded, harsher State action can only result in a reactive state of criminality. State repression and criminalisation increase the perception of injustice, whilst creating more 'criminal opportunity fields', more hardened criminals, more disdain toward the State and its laws, and the ultimate perception of the illegitimacy of government and the State. While the mainstream population remains law-abiding and in fear of both crime and 'the law', the targeted few adapt in adversity, digging ever more deeper into the underground economy that's part of a sub-society which keeps growing. The ancient Chinese philosopher Lao Tsu gives us an insight into the unchanging behaviour of the human mind in its collectivised form:

The more laws and restrictions there are,
The poorer people become.
The sharper men's weapons,
The more trouble in the land.
The more ingenious and clever men are,
The more strange things happen.
The more rules and regulations,
The more thieves and robbers.

(From verse 71 of Tao Te Ching; translation: Jane English)

The self-empowering State

So what comes first: a criminal and violent society or a punitive authoritarian State? The most rational answer is that both entities flourish symbiotically - feeding on each other and shaping one another in the process. The culprit may be traced to social mass- reaction in the form of moral panic and media frenzy, accompanied by the consequential political frenzy for a vote-enhancing 'tough-on-crime' approach.

But from a different perspective, the culprit is the self-empowering State.

Many may still recall the British 'Bobby', pushing and heaving at picketing strikers in an 'intimate' face-to-face riot-control tactic that rarely ended in serious violence. No headgear, no battle shield, no tear gas, no frantic hitting with the truncheon. That was up till around the 1970s. Today, the blue helmets, and the militarised battle gear ensure a reaction that is somehow proportionate to the violence the riot police expect, provoke and invoke. The police hit hard only to receive a proportionate backlash by individuals who are motivated by some metaphysical perception of injustice that fuels the hatred toward those blue helmets symbolising State repression. We have witnessed this attitude toward protestors in Gothenburg and Genoa last year when many were seriously injured and one protester was shot dead by the forces of the State.

Rioting is only one simple example over time. Times change unnoticeably and myths and paradigms evolve gradually enough for them to be accepted by the flow of mainstream generations. Very few people now recall what life had been before the advent of last century's global drug prohibition that still lingers on, even if it is nearing the beginning of its twilight days. Certainly no one today recalls 19th century London's opium dens, the Parisian Club des Hachichins, or the elitist consumption of cocaine. Perhaps no one can recall the actual beginnings of the criminalisation process that happened earlier in the 20th century But many would recall the days before its heightened enforcement and the gradual moral panic and criminalisation that ensued. Of course, lemmings would say the heightened State activity over the ever-failing 'war on drugs' was necessitated by a 'drugs epidemic'. A more reasonable view, however, is that this prohibition, this 'war on drugs' (in a society that drinks alcohol, smokes tobacco and swallows a multitude of legal chemicals), is what caused the escalation of drug use and the lucrative trade that accompanies it. Economists, more than criminologists, have little doubt that such State interventionism in a market where the forces of 'supply and demand' reign supreme has driven the demand to sky-high proportions and aggravated 'the problem'. Ultimately this is a 'war' backed by a moral value that is as fallacious as the one that caused the Inquisitive Church to pursue and burn witches up till around 350 years ago.

So when world governments, led by the US, failed miserably in their 'war on drugs', another fallacy was born: that without the total control of money movements drug traffickers would never be eradicated. Another 'war' was therefore waged, this time against 'dirty' money.

Anti-money laundering legislation involved the criminalisation of the global financial sector — not to control crime (for which it is ineffectual) but for the State (and it corrupt cronies) to seize some of the profits in this lucrative trade — which now stands at US$600 Billion! Further, anti-laundering legislation is also a way for the West to (tentatively) control global financial movements, through a most pervasive and far-reaching set of coercive laws aided by intrusive surveillance technology.

Since these are 'wars' that can never be won (on the contrary, they exacerbate the problem), more repressive and intrusive legal, procedural and technological techniques were necessitated over time. These range from search and arrest procedures, to undercover operations, entrapment, electronic surveillance, and the reversal of some of our civilisation's most cherished principles, such as onus of proof, measures of criminal intent, the right to privacy and freedom of association.

In the end of the day, these 'wars' have solely served the Western governments in their quest for more social control. Their self-perpetuating nature has ensured that the masses themselves clamour for more State control, which comes in the form of 'protection'! This self-empowerment also gave the West an overall global influence and a measure of coercion in the quest for a hegemonised and internationalised criminal justice system based exclusively on the American model.

A "new kind of war": the globalisation of American control mechanisms

The 'war on terrorism' takes on where money laundering had left in the West's quest for global hegemony. Money laundering legislation essentially criminalises bankers and financial employees (and soon also lawyers, accountants, real estate agents, and more) by coercing them into spying on their clients' money sources under the ultimate penalty of incarceration.

Before the advent of the 'war on terror', anti-laundering legislation had already been enacted in most countries through the coercive actions of the West. Enforcement however, was and still is very shaky, even though the bulk of 'dirty' money is still transacted in the West!

With the 'war on terrorism' the same legislation and eavesdropping system that had been introduced to 'protect' us from drug abuse and 'dirty' money required only a few adjustments and additions: namely, increased powers of arrest, more intrusive communications surveillance and wider control over protest, dissent and freedom of expression. The quest is also to enhance police 'cooperation' worldwide — meaning, the unhindered global operability of Western enforcement agents, particularly Uncle Sam's. Those world States that fail to comply are branded as aides to terrorists — and are punished by the chief accuser and the chief arbiter: the US government.

The symptoms of war

'War' has long become a buzzword throughout the Western world — a war on anything that is perceived as evil. But the 'war' against crime has been a war on social elements and minority values (or vices), a war on subcultures, a war on the financial markets. Now it has been extended to cover a war on 'rogue' States that fail to comply with US demands. Rather than strictly a war on society, as is the 'war' on crime, the 'war on terrorism' is a hybrid: a point where metaphorical wars and actual wars co-exist in harmonious repression and aggression. And the escalation spirals without control and with no apparent end. Will the West, in its quest to maintain its civilisation, destroy it by increasing authoritarianism and aggression every time they fail?

For the past three decades the US has been exporting its criminal justice philosophy and coercing the whole globe into fighting these 'wars' on the pretext of "national security" - and in the name of freedom, of course. And now, according to President Bush and his clan, terrorists do what they do because they "hate American values and freedom". But hatred is a subjective abstraction. America is only hated for what its haters perceive it to be: a meddlesome aggressor and a conspirator with Israel in State terrorism. It is hated for its naïve insolence in the face of diverse world cultures; its imposition, and its quest for global hegemony over trade, finance and justice under its 'legal' control.

The Islamic world has a different perception of civilisation, and it is quite alien to the US government's gung-ho cowboy philosophy. A considerable number of radicals (and 'moderates') in the Islamic world view the imposition of Western civilisation and its values as a threat to the continuation of their own civilisation. The Gulf princes and the 'moderate' jacket-and-tie heads of State are not exactly representative of their own people. Moreover, many 'moderates' play lip service, having learned the personal benefits of being 'politically correct'.

The grounds for the rise of Islam have long been laid out. Criminal acts of terrorism are but symptoms of this rise, which has come face to face with a US-led Western civilisation that is high on 'wars' and freakish on control. And just as the 'drug problem' is a symptom of the 'war on drugs', just as pervasive money laundering activity is a direct effect of anti-laundering measures, so will the allurement of jihad and further terrorism be a consequence of the 'war on terrorism'.

The rise and fall of civilisations

So what is the endgame of Western civilisation? Will innate human virtue prevail in a liberated society, or will we witness more tyranny perpetrated by the authoritarian State until it ultimately implodes?

This is the American age. It is a time when 'Mother Europe' apes its immature offshoot in every way imaginable (except for the fact that European States don't execute people, which fact has become Europe's PR banner for Western civilisation). Today, the 'good Europeans' are not only aping the US government in 'refining' and centralising European criminal justice systems, but they are also in the process of creating a monolithic State that supposedly bears no similarity to the American federal system. In reality, we are only a few steps away from an Orwellian Europe and very few are aware of it.

The Americans have refined the 'whip' as if it were the only form of deterrence known to Western civilisation. Whenever sections of the population get hardened and grow immune, and whenever new sub-cultures crop up as a result of new laws concocted by the State, a 'sabre' replaces the 'whip' in the hope that a perception of order is regained. The human virtues of conscience-building, integrity and reputation, comprising primary social deterrents, are hardly ever considered.

In its globalised version, the domestic 'whip' takes the more literal form of an explosive missile. But will militant Islam be deterred by American gunships and military tribunals? Will radical Islam 'disappear' just like the Third Reich did? Will Muslim stateless 'soldiers', known as terrorists, grow to love and respect American values and freedom - even when the US government threatens Arab governments into complying and adopting US policies in their foreign and criminal justice affairs, including financial regulations and 'terrorist' targeting?

Europe's civilisation

Perhaps we have been witnessing a resurgence of Islamic 'nationhood' after its complete collapse earlier last century. Or perhaps this is just a faint echo of past feuds between 'the crescent and the cross'. Or perhaps this Pax Americana will go the way of Pax Romana, as America's own government destroys the freedom and values that Western civilisation claims to be fighting for.

Western Civilisation as conceived by Europeans is central to the 'Debate on the Future of Europe' (and not just the federalist EU-debate). We need to ask ourselves: What European civilisation do we envision?

A future Europe can be a mass of 500 million citizens subordinated to a huge, monolithic, federalised State aggressively pursuing domestic and external wars. It can also mean a Europe aimed at creating a civilised network of diverse European cultures, sovereign not only on a national level, but also as much as possible on an individual level. Today's Europeans need to decide whether they want a political Europe that is bent on going the irreversibly-doomed American way till the very end, or a geographical Europe of liberated nation States that are at peace with one another and with Europe's neighbours.

The banner of Western civilisation is not in European hands. The tune is set in Washington, while the EU provides the chorus and applause.

And yet, not one 'good European' seems to be debating this vital concern... only the dissenting 'bad'.

Kevin Ellul Bonici is co-editor of European MONITOR in Malta. Email: euobserver@onvol.net.

from The Laissez Faire Electronic Times, Vol 1, No 1, February 18, 2002