# System: Reform or Revolution? By:: [[Ross Jackson]] 2024-07-11 Systemic injustices are difficult for societies to address. There are a variety of reasons for this. The most immediate reason is that systems exist to benefit and perpetuate a given power regime. The system in operation is always the system of the status quo, which is the system that benefits the dominant class. It is important to note that even within a democracy, the dominant class is not the majority. This reason alone would make addressing systemic injustice difficult. Additionally, fear of the unknown limits the social appetite for radical change. There can be broad agreement that the status quo is unjust but little support for doing something concrete to change it. People may have differing views on what changes are needed and how those changes should be pursued. If one is exhausted from working within the system, and one’s well-being is precarious, there is likely little energy or appetite available for radical activism. Lastly, there is often the human hope that things will get better. Even cynics have faint traces of optimism. If the barriers of power, fear, uncertainty, and energy can be overcome, a fundamental question remains: should an unjust system be reformed or radically restructured? Should there be a modification or a revolution? It is undoubtedly true that an unjust system can be made less unjust. It is unclear that an unjust system can be made just. Maybe no human system can be just. Workers are exploited. Libertarians talk about the freedom of workers to change jobs if they don’t like it. That workers have some selection in which the company exploits them isn’t much of a choice. Faced with the choice between work or death, most people select work, even if that work is exploitative. Having a degree of input into where one goes to be exploited isn’t a real choice. It’s the illusion of choice. This type of choice makes people feel responsible for the outcome and, therefore, unlikely to support a radical change in an unjust system. This illusion of choice is a design feature of the accepted system of oppression. Reforms had been made. Most meaningful changes in labor protections were made sixty to eighty years ago. Those reforms have been chipped away at since the 1980s. There are more workers than managers. There are more workers than capitalists. A representative democracy would enact a policy that benefits workers over capitalists. It doesn’t. Democracy alone won’t fix this. Picking among the handful of candidates for whom capitalists have financed campaigns and provided media coverage is a manifestation of choosing one’s exploiter. The United States Supreme Court was wrong in Citizens United v. FEC. Money is not speech. Money is power. Money is the volume of an amplifier, and the Supreme Court has allowed capitalists to drown out workers by a billion to one. Capitalists should be able to state their claims in public debates. Workers should be able to state their claims as well. We should all listen and discern the relative merits of the stated positions. Through this process, we should all be able to discern what we think and vote for our preferred candidates and policies. Money corrupts this process. The only possible justification for the Supreme Court’s absurdly erroneous interpretation of Citizens United is that it is consistent with what benefits those with money, and evidence is starting to suggest strongly that some of the Justices are bought and paid for. The only question for an informed citizenry is whether they should pursue reform or revolution. #### Related Items [[Systems Thinking]] [[Revolution]] [[Work]] [[Management]] [[Manipulation]] [[American]] [[Capitalism]] [[Freedom]] [[Democracy]] [[Status Quo]] [[Justice]]