[This is a section something I wrote in December 2017, in the aftermath of mass migration of refugees etc., overland into Europe.  I have edited it slightly in the interim.  The rest of it will be addressed via further posts.]

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Separation Anxiety . . .

A society is a combinations of classes existing in a more or less stable form.

Around the seventh century BC Athenian society began to come under pressure due to the growth of a wealthy merchant class that threatened the status of the aristocracy.  The response of the aristocracy was to rack-rent the tenant farmers as a way of keeping up appearances.  The consequence was widespread class struggle, sufficiently bitter to threaten the very survival of the society.

In 594 BC an aristocrat called Solon, who was respected by all sides, was chosen as an honest broker.  His solution included the abolition of all outstanding debts and the abolition of the practice of selling debtors into slavery.  As well, he gave the poorest sections access to a citizen’s assembly, but without the right to speak in it.  He also codified and published a system of laws.

In practice, he abolished the unique right of the aristocracy to rule—explaining to its members that it was in their long-term interests to do so.  The new basis for ruling in Athens was wealth, no matter how it was earned.

‘Everything must change so that everything can stay the same’ is the leitmotif of the main character in The Leopard, by Giuseppe de Lampedusa, a novel (and also a film) set in Sicily in a time of great political and social upheaval.  The meaning of the phrase basically is that it is sometimes necessary to give some ground, in order to protect a greater interest.  In The Leopard this meant allowing the ambitious middle class a share of power in order to stave off the complete collapse of society.

The same description applies to Solon’s settlement in sixth-century BC Athens.  It involved a partial sacrifice by the powerful so that the bulk of their power might remain intact; and even be strengthened by the addition of the wealthier middle-class elements.

But the problem is that once you begin to give ground, no matter how slightly, the chances are that you are setting in train a movement that you are no longer guaranteed to be able to control.

Within 150 years of Solon’s reforms, and via a series of stages, what has been termed a ‘radical democracy’ had come into existence in Athens.  Involved was equality for all citizens before the law and a transfer of power to the population in general by means of one man, one vote.  Also involved was the introduction of pay for public office, so that the poor would not be handicapped from holding office because of their poverty.

Thus, the development of democracy didn’t occur in one fell swoop, but came about through a series of stages, and one stage in particular, involving a series of reforms by an aristocrat called Cleisthenes, proved vital to the whole process.

Now my reason for bringing all this up is the degree to which it would seem to have a certain relevance to aspects of what is going on in our own modern world.  Not a literal relevance; more an abstract understanding of the possible knock-on effects of imposed social and political change

In a recent mailing, I quoted Cormac Lucey, writing in the Sunday Times, with regard to the tendencies and modi operandi of the EU:

‘Consider recent remarks from Peter Sutherland, a former attorney-general, EU commissioner and chairman of AIB and Goldman Sachs International.  He has stated, regarding the current refugee crisis: “The United States, or Australia and New Zealand, are migrant societies and therefore they accommodate more readily those from other backgrounds than we do ourselves, who still nurse a sense of our homogeneity and difference from others.  And that’s precisely what the European Union, in my view, should be doing its best to undermine.”

‘Sutherland suggests the EU should undermine nationality and any sense of nationality.  No wonder the Brits think about leaving.  The wonder is that more aren’t considering joining them.  And the wonder is that we don’t harbour greater resentments against the EU for its authoritarian rejection of democratic referendum results here—see the treaties of Nice and Lisbon.’

Now there is implied social and political change here.  Not the same sort of change as was occurring in Greece; but change in its broadest brushstrokes, nonetheless.

To continue with the story of Cleisthenes: he was a member of one of the most prominent aristocratic families in Athens.  Such families were engaged in a constant struggle among themselves for control of the state.  More than even the matter of self-aggrandisement, this struggle seems to have been driven by an almost biological desire simply to rule.

[Of course, the reason for this was relatively simple.  If you weren’t prepared to fight your corner, no matter how you might have felt about it, then you were likely to lose everything.  There doesn’t seem to have been any room in Greek aristocratic society for retiring into private life and simply enjoying your privileges.  Indeed, the whole thing seems to have been driven by an almost evolutionary logic, like the clash of buffalo in the rutting season.]

And everything went in these intra-aristocratic struggles—murder, war, the use and backing of foreign powers etc. etc.  In terms of the skulduggery of everyday politics, the Athenians—and the Greeks in general—had nothing to learn from modern times.  They wrote the original handbook.  Nor was there any seeming consideration of the wider interest of the state or population.  It was basically just a hunger to rule.  Indeed, Cleisthenes himself was involved in several attempts at the seizure and re-seizure of power, some involving foreign backers, before finally succeeding.

The weapon that Cleisthenes (in 508/7 BC) forged to bring about eventual victory involved gaining the support of the general populace through the promise of further democratic reforms, and later the implementation of those reforms as a way of ensuring that once onside the plebeians stayed onside.

And this is where the matter of imposed social and political change comes in.  The mechanism devised by Cleisthenes to achieve his ends involved undermining the four traditional kinship-based tribes of Athens and creating in their stead ten new artificial tribes, all territorially based, and involving no element of kinship.

One consequence of this—the one this article is most concerned with—is the psychological consequence.  It may not have been so traumatic for the well-off—and there is evidence to suggest that they put up no great resistance to it—but for the mass of the population it was equivalent to being ejected from the womb.  The very thing that had underpinned their sense of identity and allowed them to differentiate themselves from the world at large and enjoy an insider, or at least the illusion of an insider, relationship with the rich and powerful of their own particular tribe—all this had at a stroke been removed.  Instead they found themselves cast into an outer Hell of mere undifferentiated citizenship.

The sociologist Eli Sagan, writing in the context of the Athenian experience, drew as a general rule the conclusion that ‘Any dissolution of kinship forms of social coherence will provoke an anxiety of separation’ (The Honey and the Hemlock, 1991).

To be continued . . .