The coming era of political violence
We are living in profoundly dangerous times… and it’s not because of Donald Trump. In a world where the ability to persuade others through argument has gone to zero, the only way to maintain our ideas in society is through violent coercion.
I was recently at the INET “Economics of Post-Factual Democracy” Conference Conference in Copenhagen. For a while something has profoundly annoyed me about that term “Post-Factual”. So I decided to see why, and found that it wasn’t so much the irritation at the arrogant hypocrisy with which it is bandied around by many (though not INET itself, as Rob Johnson’s wonderful speech proved). It was the view it betrays that there are certain things we are and aren’t allowed to say according to the rules of this or that group. Certain credentials we have to have verified by this or that group before they will accept there’s any validity to what we have to say.
Now a liberal (a real one), will be irked by that anyway. As a recent Spectator article put it: “many people’s actual attachment to democratic liberal principles are pretty wafer-thin when it comes to people and views they dislike”. But that’s abstract and political.
What is really concerning is that the culture revealed by the bandying of the term “Post-Factual Democracy” will lead to violence. The really bad kind where both sides consist of fanatics driven by a zealous commitment to an idea and a dehumanising hatred of all those who don’t hold to it.
This comes from mathematics. That we are headed for a period of profound danger of vicious political violence comes from an evolutionary model of the competition and evolution of ideas in the public sphere.
This model reveals that the term “Post-Factual Democracy” is indicative of a culture in which the ability to persuade others through argument has gone to zero. When this happens, the only way to maintain our ideas in society is by violent coercion. That is why what Karl Popper called The Open Society, the (properly) liberal society, literally saves lives.
The model: Persuasion in the public sphere is no longer possible
In a recent paper, I make use of a mathematical result called the “Made to Stick” theorem (inspired by the work of the brothers Heath) to characterise the basic transaction by which the competition of ideas is played out. If I tell you an idea, how likely is it that I will persuade you of it? How likely is it that you’ll accept it?
This mathematics provides an understanding of the “flow factor” in population-wide models of the competition of ideas developed by Isabel Almudi, Francesco Fatas-Villafranca and Jason Potts. Five factors affect the likelihood of an idea being accepted:
1. The simpler an idea, the less I have to get you to accept, the more likely it is you’ll accept this idea.
2. The more of an idea already in your mind, the less I have to get you to accept, the more likely it is you’ll accept the idea.
3. The more I express the idea in a way which relates to you, the more it is couched in your experiences and your emotions, the more likely it is you’ll notice the idea (a statistic never happened to anyone by definition), the more likely you’ll accept the idea.
4. Personality psychology tells us that there is resistance to change at the “core” of our personality. The more an idea would change the “core” of your personality, the less likely it is you’ll accept the idea.
5. Cognitive dissonance psychology tells us that there is resistance to accept things which contradict our existing worldview. The more an idea contradicts the ideas you subccribe to, the less likely it is you’ll accept the idea.
This last condition is overwhelmingly important, because it tells us why people tend not to be persuaded by arguments they disagree with. This is of critical importance to understanding our current political situation.
We are rapidly observing the emergence of hyper-rigid demes, as John Hartley and Jason Potts have called them. Demes are groups of people who define themselves by adherence to a particular set of ideas. Their very sense of self is caught up in their views of how the world should be. In fact, they are all but defined by their rejection of alternative views of how the world should be.
On the Alt-Right we now have self-proclaimed guardians of Western tradition against encroaching Islam and the Decadence of Gay Culture. On the progressive not-Alt-Right we have the champions of “fact” (what the progressive movement deem to be fact) and brave defenders of minority against the Straight White Male minority.
Only those ideas divined by the leaders of the tribe are to be even allowed a hearing. And this is true of the progressive movement (“no-platforming”, “safe spaces”, “hate speech will not be tolerated”, where what is “hate” seems rather subject to the whims of the Progressive) as it is of the Alt-Right (who are almost by definition anti free speech). What Orwell called “the smelly little orthodoxies which are now contending for our souls” progress by their own putrid growth, but they do not progress by productive, competitive interaction.
In such a world, the likelihood that an idea espoused by another deme however reasonable will be accepted by the other goes to zero. It is completely dissonant with the ideas that deme holds to. Persuasion between demes is no longer possible.
When persuasion is no longer possible, violence is the sole recourse
This is not merely an arcane mathematical point. It is deeply disturbing. It is indicative not of an adolescent political situation, but an especially dangerous one.
Because each side, Alt-Right and Progressive, are inherently authoritarian. Both hold to a particular utopia (which we ought to remember is derived from the Greek for “no-place”), wish everyone would act in such a way as to realise it, and are willing to coerce them using state power to do so.
The Alt-Right wants to implement Christian States in Europe and America, while the Progressive movement pave the road to their utopia with “for your safety/your own good” or “”for the good of minority ‘x’” signs. They will use state power to implement their vision if they can, at which point not only does the other demes sense of self come under attack from their opponents’ ideas, their very self comes under attack from their opponents’ actions.
The competition of ideas is no longer therefore a stately debate over alternative visions for the future. It becomes a struggle for the survival of one’s ideas, one’s self, one’s life.
But in this struggle it is no longer possible to convince the other deme, the likelihood of doing so has gone to zero. Argument (let alone “facts”) are no longer persuasive.
The sole recourse is to violent coercion.
The sole recourse is to force.
And if this too fails, the sole recourse to maintaining one’s ideological integrity is (literally) murder.
That is what the culture talk of “Post-Factual Democracy” reveals will lead to: the necessity of political murder.
The Open Society saves lives
Sir Karl Popper wrote of The Open Society. A society where the force of one’s argument would persuade, where everyone thought for themselves, where no-one would reject an idea on the first instance that it was proposed by another deme (and we have to be honest that that really is the primary premise to which others are subordinated). There were no demes, this was the sign of a closed society.
Popper was writing at another time when it was obvious what could happen if the smelly little orthodoxies were allowed to stand and pollute through their putrefaction. Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union and Maoist China were responsible for the deaths of nearly one hundred million people. A number we can’t even comprehend. All sacrificed to an idea. All the victims of that peculiarly vicious brand of political violence fuelled by the force of an idea.
The Open Society saves lives because violence is not the sole recourse for those wanting to have their opinions heard and addressed. There is space to persuade and argue, we don’t need to murder.
The Alt-Right welcomes a Closed Society. The Alt-Right revel in militaristic glory and wait in hope to prove themselves worthy warriors for Right against Decadence. The Progressive movement are more insidious. They claim rights to Popper’s legacy, even celebrating him in their pantheon.
But a society which demands credentials of any sort which are to be validated by itself is a society which is by definition closed. Eventually such a society demands closure by force, and at this point we enter not a trial of intellect but a trial of force.
The ballot box in such a world is no longer a stately resolution of differences. The ballot box is the point at which the desperate struggle for survival comes to a head and the smelly little orthodoxy of this or that deme is granted the reigns of state power.
I don’t see this changing any time soon. Ideologies are now too entrenched, too powerful, too present in the minds of people. The hold of the demes is too great and the progressive movement even are “bunkered down” and on the whole unwilling to allow for non-sanctioned alternative points of view. No deme is willing to break from its ideology while the other holds.
So, in all likelihood, we are headed for a worsening of the political violence we are already seeing flare.
