Dispersing power is a first step towards justice

Before we can address the inequities of our society, we have to build a democracy that breaks up the fatal centres of concentrated power

Power corrupts. The fewer people it is held by, the easier it is to misuse and abuse. Wars have been waged over it. Revolutions have been roused by it. Yet still it remains concentrated in the hands of a tiny group of people, out of reach.

Power is held by governments and by corporations — it is both public and private. Power comes from authority and from wealth — it is both political and financial. Governments can directly control the economy and make and enforce laws within their own borders, while corporations can indirectly wield influence over the economies and laws of multiple nations. Both, given undue power, can be highly dangerous to people and planet.

Aside from the general misuse of power and the direct negative effects of this corruption, when power is distant and centralised it leads to disillusionment and frustration, feelings that can be easily taken advantage of by those with nefarious motives.

So why does power remain so concentrated? And how do we begin to disperse it in a way that empowers all parts of the population, not just a tiny few?

The last century saw two competing ideologies battle it out for supremacy, but the disagreement at the heart of this ideological fight was over who should wield concentrated power, not over whether it should be wielded. Now, after hundreds of millions of unnecessary deaths and a planet that’s well on the way to being cooked, perhaps it’s about time we had that debate.

Whether it’s the oil firms covering up and discrediting climate science, the governments abusing human rights and civil liberties, the financial institutions dodging tax and driving poverty, or the authoritarians fixing elections and controlling media, it is clear that we must change not just who wields power, but how many people wield it.

Put simply, concentrated power kills.

It kills because, somewhere along the path of human development, we lost sight of why any type of organisation — public or private, large or small — should exist in the first place. Corporations should exist to create products or services that benefit society. Governments should exist to protect and educate their populations. If corporations are instead set up to make money for their owners by any means necessary, and if governments are instead run to keep a particular group of people in political office by any means necessary, is it really a surprise that society gets fucked over as a result?

We have got our priorities wrong, and we’ve been getting them wrong for a very, very long time. Improving the health and happiness of people must be the only aim of any organisation — public, private or otherwise.

Different organisations will of course work in different industries and sectors and have different ideas and strategies, but no organisation should be exploiting people or planet. To ensure this doesn’t happen, safeguards must be in place. This is the role of government — setting laws, enforcing laws, and providing its population with a standard of care that allows everyone the same freedom of opportunity to learn, to earn, and to live.

But it was of course the corporations that won the great ideological battle of the last century and began this one reigning supreme, lauding their power not just over the people they exploit but over the governments that stand in their way — using an unjust legal system to sue any states denying them further opportunities to squeeze money out of misery.

Economic growth achieves nothing if that growth comes at the expense of the planet, or at the expense of human lives made miserable by the corporations that exploit them. Profit can be a useful driver for technological and societal progress, but it should only ever be a means to an end — that end being human health and happiness.

After decades of death and destruction, the need to curb corporate power is obvious. But in doing so, it is not enough to say simply that governments must be enlarged and emboldened. Because history also tells us that unchecked state power is incredibly dangerous. A government should exist to protect the people under its jurisdiction, but what happens when a government not only fails in this role but actively pursues an agenda to harm its own population?

A failure of government is a failure of democracy. The demos — the people — must be the final arbiters of power. If democracy in a nation is weak, poor governance is the inevitable result.

Too often, good motives have been misdirected. In trying to fix the problem of exploitative corporations, we have sought to transfer their concentrated power straight back to state governments, forgetting or ignoring the need to disperse that power and ensure that people themselves are empowered to decide their own fate.

Many nations today that claim to be “great democracies” belie the assertion by continuing to hold and concentrate their power — often with disastrous results. Corporate money still influences decision-making. Elections are still unfair and demoralising for voters. Politicians are still corrupt and able to shield themselves from consequences even after they are exposed. And the media are still controlled and directed by billionaire owners.

There are very few examples in the world today of states that have true, participatory democracies, where people do not simply turn up to vote once every few years but actively engage in the process of decision-making. Voters are too often talked down to, denied fair representation, and told to wait to have their say at the next election. Governance remains remote and unaccountable; decentralisation and devolution are essential for ensuring that decisions are taken as close as possible to the people affected by them.

Until we empower all people, and give everyone a voice, the vicious cycle will continue. The problems of the world today are the result of a failure to recognise that power must be shared and dispersed, that democracies must be strengthened, and that an educated and informed population can and should be the ultimate enablers of progress.