Articles on PR for People

“Survival of the Fittest”: Herbert Spencer (and Friends) Got It Wrong

 
The term “survival of the fittest” was coined by the famed 19th century British social theorist Herbert Spencer as a way of characterizing Darwin’s natural selection theory.  Darwin himself soon started using the expression, but it was also embraced by what came to be known as the “Social Darwinists” – various apologists for the free-wheeling, laissez-faire capitalism of that era that featured ruthless economic competition, the brutal exploitation of workers, and extreme inequalities of wealth and poverty.   

Can Our Institutions Meet the Challenge of the Environmental Crisis?

At the very time when our rapidly-growing environmental crisis is becoming an urgent, multi-dimensional threat, many of the world’s governments are corrupt, dysfunctional and/or the captives of retrograde vested interests.  Does this pose an insurmountable obstacle, or are there workarounds and solutions that can be used to deal with this existential challenge?


How to Save Our Small Cities

A recent article in The New York Times on how our expanding “megacities” seem to have less and less need for small cities prompted a thoughtful analysis by the Times’ economics columnist Paul Krugman. 


A “Living Wage” is Long Overdue: Let’s Try Using the Mafia Approach

A “Living Wage” is Long Overdue:  Let’s Try Using the Mafia Approach....Desperate people have no respect for property rights.  But, when there’s a revolution against economic injustice, it has a way of ending badly.  Maybe the mafia have a better idea.  Let’s try using a shakedown with the super-rich.  Call it a protection racket.   You can have your property rights in return for a “basic needs guarantee for the rest of us.”  Otherwise…


Why the “Fair Society” is the Way Forward

The New Narrative: Why the “Fair Society” is the Way Forward


The “Centrist Reform Program”: An Agenda for the 21st Century

"The basic needs of all of our citizens are provided for -- all of the people, all of the time...." --Abraham Lincoln.


The “Right to Life”: It’s Much More Than You Think

The “right to life” is a venerable moral and legal principle that is regularly invoked in debates about abortion, capital punishment, euthanasia, and more.   The philosopher John Locke in his Two Treatises of Government (1690) was the first “modern” theorist to assert the idea of self-evident human rights, including “life, liberty and estate” [i.e., property], while the first public/political assertion of a right to life was in the American Declaration of Independence (1776).


Lies, Damned Lies… and Political Lies

The famed British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli is reputed to have said "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics." His wry comment (later quoted by Mark Twain) was intended to call attention to how easily we can be misled by spurious precision.  Perhaps this is what inspired Darrell Huff’s classic small book, How to Lie with Statistics.


Ayn Rand Versus Plato

Plato’s great dialogue, the Republic, written more than 2000 years ago, remains one of the most influential works about social justice ever written.  The twentieth century novelist and social philosopher Ayn Rand, perhaps the most influential conservative/ libertarian voice of the present day, had a radically different vision.  So, it might be useful to do a brief comparison between Plato and Ayn Rand.


The Biosocial Contract, Part 2: Some Policy Implications

 
An ideology without a concrete, programmatic plan for how to realize its objectives is merely rhetoric, or fantasy, or perhaps even sophistry.  It’s only when you spell out the social, economic and political implications of your vision that you allow its merits, and practicality (and political viability) to be tested in the real world.  Marxism was extremely vague and permitted the likes of Lenin, Stalin, and Mao to fashion their own political agendas.  Modern libertarianism, likewise, comes in a bewildering array of sometimes contradictory views.  Some libertarians seem to take a piecemeal approach (in this country at least), focusing on such specific political issues as legalizing marijuana, gay/lesbian/transgender rights, Obamacare, etc.