On Thursday, February 24th, Russia began a full scale military invasion of Ukraine. The stated reasons for this invasion were to bring about the denazification of Ukraine and to prevent genocide from happening to the Russian-speaking people in the contested eastern regions of the country. This absurd pretext convinces no one, especially since President Zelenskyy is a Jewish man who lost relatives in the Holocaust.
The real reason seems to be sourced in Vladimir Putin’s ambition to make Russian great again by taking control of countries to the east that were part of the Soviet Union and even areas that were once in the Russian empire centuries ago. He has said that the collapse of the Soviet Union was “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century.”
Ukraine’s Russian-friendly president was overthrown in a people’s revolt in 2014. Since that time Ukraine has moved to have closer economic ties to the West and the European Union. Here is a country directly to the west of Russia with an emerging liberal democracy making strides to curb corruption and model itself after Western European nations.
One way to see this conflict is as a struggle between the political paradigms of democracy and autocracy. This will be helpful if we also look at this war as an aspect of the growing pains of our civilization.
Humanity is in the midst of an existential crisis. We are now at an inflection point that will determine whether our future will be a thriving world where our full potential as a species can be realized or whether we’re going to have dystopian outcomes where the quality of life for the people of Earth is much less than that of previous generations.
The threat of human-sourced climate change has not been addressed. In the last few days, the possibility of nuclear war has become front page news. Also, we are nowhere near having reached a place of sustainability with respect to the use of the natural resources of our planet.
These are only some of the problems we face.
These challenges also bring up issues of meaning and identity. Who are we? What’s really important? What are we given to do now?
As crisis is both threat and opportunity, some focus on the threat aspect and have a more fear-based approach to the potential for cultural transformation. They seek to slow down the pace of change and restore conditions that were seen as optimal in the past.
Others, while not discounting the dangers, see an opening to have a better world by making improvements over what has been the status quo.
From the more fear-based perspective, there is a temptation to believe that we might be better off if we had some strong central authority that could guarantee us safety, security, and some degree of economic stability. Democracy is messy and often inefficient. Autocracy, on the other hand, is political simplicity. If you feel that people like you are going to be the ones in power, you might feel like this is a chance to maintain previously enjoyed privilege and economic opportunity.
So there has been a trend towards autocracy on the part of some countries. However, there is also movement towards democracy in others, some of which have not had a tradition of democratic institutions. Albania, Tunisia, and Mongolia are examples.
There are many countries that are in between the extremes of authoritarian governments and full democracy. This is called anocracy. In anocractic countries the people have some freedoms but lack others. In Russia, for example, before the invasion of Ukraine led to more authoritarian measures, there were some independent media outlets. Although Putin controlled who could run for president, there were still some contested elections for regional offices.
The goal of a full democracy is to create a free, fair, and just society where the rights and liberties of all people are respected. This will require separation of church and state, elections between competing political parties, separation of powers into different branches of government, an independent judiciary, a market economy and private property, and the rule of law that applies to everyone irrespective of power, status, or privilege.
When people accept this ideal, there is still going to be a lot of disagreement about which policies and strategies are going to result in more freedom, fairness, and justice. Then we have political tensions between the more progressive and conservative elements of our society that we are familiar with.
This competition of ideas helps to bring about what serves the greater good in the long run. When there is spiritual, intellectual, and political freedom, creativity and innovation can flourish as there are no constraints that result from having to conform to a particular ideology that restricts alternative viewpoints.
Whenever societies begin to approximate the ideal of full democracy, cultural pluralism is one result. People of different religious, ethnic, and racial backgrounds are less oppressed and discriminated against and have more opportunity to fully participate in the economic and political life of the social order.
For those who see cultural transformation from the threat perspective, cultural pluralism is often viewed as a dilution of identity. What was true before is no longer so. There is often nostalgia and even political activism to restore past conditions that restrict the empowerment of minority groups.
In addition to cultural pluralism, freer societies also enable and empower cultural diversity in various forms. The issues, concerns, and voices of various people and groups who have been less visible and less represented in the past begin to make their presence felt. These are social and political activists, feminists, environmentalists, LGBTQ+ folks, and neurodiverse people of all kinds. Among them are highly creative and intelligent individuals who are less conformity-minded and more open to questioning and challenging the status quo.
This growing edge of cultural transformation that is less wedded to traditions and customs, Putin sees as moral decline and as a prelude to the disintegration of the social order. Cultural pluralism and cultural diversity are abhorrent for him and so he seeks to undermine the democratic institutions of countries that provide the conditions that make this possible.
This perspective helps us understand why Trump and many of his followers have expressed admiration for Putin and been apologists for his actions. Trumpism has been aligned with Putin’s agenda of doing what he can to stop or even reverse the trend towards cultural variability. To impose their own vision of cultural hegemony, Trump and his allies have no hesitation to make our country less free, less fair, and less just.
The Republicans refused to even give Merrick Garland a hearing for the Supreme Court with a full year left in Obama’s term saying that it was up to the next president to decide. Yet they rushed through Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation to the court. She was sworn in eight days before the 2020 elections.
The voting restriction laws that have been passed in most of the states with Republican legislative control are cynically crafted with unfairness as their objective. They are designed to make it more difficult for minority, poor, and younger people to vote.
36 states have passed laws that restrict what teachers can say about race and US history. For example, Florida passed a law called the Stop WOKE Act. It stands for Stop the Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees Act. It prohibits people from making anyone feel uncomfortable about their race, national origin, or gender. It also makes it illegal to provide training that promotes the idea that “an individual bears responsibility for, or should be discriminated against or receive adverse treatment because of actions committed in the past by other members of the same race, color, sex, or national origin.”
This prohibition about meaningful debate about our history could have come straight out of the George Orwell dystopian novel, 1984. In this world, political doublespeak was used to confuse and control people including the phrase “ignorance is strength.”
Although we may acknowledge that there has been an erosion of democratic values in our country especially since the Trump presidency, there is not much risk that we are going to turn into North Korea. Yet, when we compare where America stands in comparison to other countries on the freedom, fairness, and justice scale, we may be in for some surprises.
Freedom House ranks countries on these scales from 0 to 100. You might think that the United States would be at or near the top of the list. But our score in 2021 was 83. There were 58 countries rated above the United States. Norway, Sweden, and Finland were highest at 100. Mongolia came in at 84!
It seems clear to me that democratic values that promote and empower cultural pluralism and cultural diversity are what we need to meet the challenges of our crisis of civilization. We need new ideas, new inventions, and new strategies.
98% of Americans are either immigrants themselves or descended from people who came here from other countries. The virtues and good facts of America, whatever they may be, are outcomes sourced in both cultural pluralism and cultural diversity.
From the crisis as threat perspective, the fear is that, if you empower everyone to be authentic individuals manifesting their unique potential, people will not be on the same page and chaos will ensue. But to the extent that norms that promote social harmony are observed and laws are in place that prevent infringement on the rights of others, you can have a free and just society where everyone thrives while pursuing their own dreams.
There has been an evolution in our civilization in the direction of morality and spiritual intelligence that has resulted in more freedom, fairness, and justice over time.
By spiritual intelligence I mean the ability to expand our identity beyond the range of ourselves, our families, and other people like us and value our connection with all of humanity. It’s the ability to see things through the perspective of what serves the greater good of everyone.
It’s at the other end of the spectrum from the fortress identity viewpoint which feels the need to defend itself from those perceived as unlike ourselves who are often seen as enemies.
From a spiritual intelligence-deficient perspective, everything is seen in terms of hierarchies of status and position. The gain of someone else not like me must mean my loss. Their empowerment must entail a lessening of my power and control.
In my lifetime I have seen examples of the evolution of spiritual intelligence. One illustration is the issue of segregation. George Wallace was known for his statement, “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.” He won five Southern States in his 1968 presidential run on a third party ticket. In present time, there is no longer any support for segregation from any political party.
It would seem that there has been a critical level of consensus on the part of the collective consciousness of people in our country to the point where segregation is no longer perceived as an acceptable way of social life. Of course, not everyone embraces this view. However most people do and this results in a significant increase in the baseline spiritual intelligence of people in our country, at least on this one point. We could say that a new social norm has come into being.
We would hope that the evolution of spiritual intelligence for the world as a whole would move in the direction of freedom, fairness, and justice. Overall, we do see this happening. One measure is the number of democracies that we see in the countries of the globe over time.
This progress in the evolution of our civilization is not a straight line where for every unit of time there is more progress. It’s a spiral process where gains are followed by setbacks. Eventually there is a return to more progress than before.
We seem to be in one of those moments in the present time. Our optimism that things are going to finally sort themselves out in a more desirable way has to confront the reality that reactionary forces to change are often able to move things backward in the short run.
We hoped that the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of communism in Russia would mean the end of the confrontation between major superpowers armed with nuclear weapons as Russian society became more open and free. Then Putin took control.
Individuals sometimes gain political power who lack a moral compass and who are spiritually deficient to the extent that they have no problem empowering and enriching themselves to the detriment of the greater good of the people in their own country and the world. Like crime bosses, they are out to do whatever they can get away with.
If this happens, it takes cooperative and collective action to put things back on a positive course. It is really encouraging to see how many countries, companies, and individuals have rallied around the cause of defending Ukraine. It would seem that the attempt to take away another country’s sovereignty and right to self-determination is no longer acceptable. Even China has expressed support for this norm.
It now seems apparent that Putin’s army is not going to be able to conquer Ukraine militarily, remove its leaders, and bring this country under Russia’s control. Putin is losing the war. The economic sanctions have staggered his economy.
Now what?
This is my intuitive reading about the war.
The worst case scenarios are not going to happen. There will be no WWIII where NATO becomes involved in a shooting war with Russia, and so, no nuclear exchange.
Putin is going to be replaced as the leader of Russia. My sense is that this is not going to happen immediately, but not more than six months from now.
I see Russia moving towards a free and democratic society after Putin. There will be a new condition of shared world security.
There will be a movement to accelerate the development of alternatives to fossil fuels.
The war with Ukraine will weaken Trump because of his admiration of Putin and friendship with him. My reading is that Trump is not going to be able to run for president in 2024 because of his legal problems.
I see the GOP picking Ron DeSantis for their candidate in 2024. DeSantis is Trump’s twin with respect to his spiritual intelligence deficiency. Trumpism will continue but with its leader’s influence diminished.
You are not alone if you have felt relatively powerless in watching the tragedy of the war in Ukraine unfold. What can we do?
If you have the means, send money to help the refugees and the Ukrainian people still in the country.
It’s imperative that we get into action now to defeat the Trumpist political forces which are trying to take back the Congress in 2022.
We must keep visualizing the goal of having a free, fair, and just world.
Reference the people who are holding a space for the greater good of all people on Earth. Be one of those people yourself.
We must grow our own spiritual intelligence. One step in this direction is to treat everyone we encounter with dignity, respect, and kindness, regardless of how different we perceive them to be and how diverse their views may be from our own.
We are all nodes in the field of collective consciousness. In that field, no one is any more important than anyone else. What we all do in each day in every action and every thought feeds the field. Feed it love and light.
Interdimensional Times 