I found this article by Michael Theodosiadis interesting and thought it worthy of publicising.
The question that emerges is why the passion for political and social life remains the exception rather than the rule? Why do people constantly withdraw in the private realm, allowing public matters to be managed by representatives, “experts” and technocrats? What makes people not fight for emancipation when their most fundamental and vital interests are threatened? Even worse they applaud and consent to authoritarian rules imposed on them. What motivates Wilhelm Reich (1983, p.53) to write that “what has to be explained is not the fact that the man who is hungry steals or the fact that the man who is exploited strikes, but why the majority or those who are hungry don’t steal and why the majority of those who are hungry don’t strike”? This leads to the following conclusion: the main issue is not to give the citizen consciousness of social responsibility – this is understood. The question is what inhibits the realization of such responsibility. What drives millions of people to consider insane leaders as the only ones able to solve their problems and overcome the socio-economic crisis?Read the full article HERE:
The French thinker Etienne de la Boetie (1530-1563), one of the first that dealt with this issue, in his Discourse on Voluntary Servitude (1548) is unable to understand this phenomenon. He vividly and derisively describes how people allow themselves to be governed by kings and princes despite their inner desire to reject such subordination. He also mentions that human beings, choosing to live in authoritarian structures, are neither men – as freedom is the natural state of the species – nor animals, because even animals when their freedom is limited or when they are in captivity resist so strongly to the point of self-harm.
