VOLUME I, CHAPTER 3, SECTION 4
Rein in capital without destroying it. Channel it, do not wall it.
The first three sections of this chapter set down three root understandings. Capital chasing profit is the way of things, an instinct, not evil, and everyone is a capitalist, a single coin in savings makes you one. Capital does not care whether a man lives or dies, but it is not evil, the mechanism itself does not stand in the position of a moral verdict. Capital is only a tool, and the operator is the living person, and the responsibility is the operator's, everyone is an operator, everyone carries responsibility. This section closes the chapter. Rein in capital, do not destroy it. One of the deepest turns of position in the whole of Justice Way. Set it down, and the direction of Volume VI comes out.
One. First gather the chapter's pattern of position into one line. By Marx's prescription, capital is evil, overthrow capital. By the real pattern of position, capital is an instinct, not evil. Capital is a tool, not a person. The capitalist is everyone with savings, not a small band of villains. The responsibility is the operator's, not the tool's. Overthrow capital does not go through. Because to overthrow capital is to overthrow the tool, and the hand that held it is still there and finds a new tool. To overthrow the capitalist is to overthrow everyone, because everyone is a capitalist. To overthrow the operator is to overthrow every living person, because everyone is an operator. A road that does not go through, do not walk. The road that goes through is to rein in the mechanism by which capital turns. How, exactly? The ancestors set the answer down long ago. Channel, do not wall.
Two. Set down a very deep position, the pattern of Yu channeling the flood. Four thousand years ago the great flood covered the land of China. King Yao sent Gun to master the water. Gun used the method of walling, sealing the river channels so the flood could not run. The more he walled it the higher it rose, until in the end it broke the dikes and drowned more people still. Gun was put to death. King Shun sent Yu to master the water. Yu used the method of opening, digging the channels through so the flood ran by the lay of the land to the sea. The flood was led away, and the land of China became ground you could farm, and the civilization stood from then on. Yu channeling the flood set down a pattern of position. The instinct of water cannot be destroyed. It can only be channeled. The instinct of water is to run downhill. That instinct, like capital's instinct to chase profit, is the way of things, and does not stand in the position of a moral verdict. Gun's method, walling, is destroy the instinct of the water, and it failed. Yu's method, opening, is guide the water's direction by the water's instinct, and it succeeded. Marx's prescription, overthrow capital, is Gun's method, walling the instinct of capital. The result was hundreds of millions of the poor down in the twentieth century, and capital's instinct still turning, only in a changed form, state capitalism. The prescription set down here, rein in capital, is Yu's method, channeling capital's direction by capital's instinct.
Three. Once that is set down, you may ask, how, in practice, do you channel it? How do you rein in capital? How do you let capital turn in a fitting direction? The whole of the how is laid out point by point in Volume VI. But this section sets down a few root directions. The first direction. The non-labor share returns to the public, which is to say the people. In the course of capital chasing profit, two kinds of gain arise, labor gain and non-labor gain. Labor gain is the value a living person produces through his own labor. The wage of the worker, the pay of the engineer, the fee of the doctor, the salary of the teacher, the income of the farmer working his field, these are labor gain. Non-labor gain is the value the turning of capital itself produces, not produced directly by a living person's labor. Interest on capital, dividends on stock, rent, the profit that arises after AI replaces the living person, the profit that arises after the robot replaces the living person, these are non-labor gain.
Four. By the position set down here, labor gain goes to the individual. Reward the living person's labor, let the living person do his work by his own instinct. Non-labor gain returns to the public, which is to say the people. This public is not the government. It is the public, the people, every specific living person. The non-labor gain is distributed straight to the whole public through some mechanism. Once that is set down, capital's profit-chasing instinct does not change, capital can go on chasing profit. The reward to the living person's labor does not change, labor gain still goes to the individual. And the non-labor share is channeled into the hands of the public, the floor under the position vacuum is seated, the whole public benefits. This is channeling, not walling. Capital's instinct keeps turning, but part of the fruit of its turning flows back into the hands of the public. The white-cabbage-price of Chinese manufacturing is a working sample of this law in practice, China returning the non-labor share straight to the consuming public of the world through low prices. How it is done, Volume VI.
Five. The second direction. Rein in the operator, do not destroy the tool. By the third section, capital is a tool, the operator is a living person, the responsibility is the operator's. By this law, do not destroy capital, the tool is not destroyed. Rein in the operator, the living person's conduct is reined in. How is it reined in? The ancestors said it. In the use of ritual, harmony is what counts. Ritual is the rule that reins in a living person's conduct, that keeps a living person doing the fitting thing in the fitting position. To master the self and return to ritual is benevolence. To rein in your own instinct and return to the fitting position, that is benevolence. Cultivate the self, order the family, govern the state, bring peace to all under heaven. To cultivate the self is to rein in the self. By this law, to rein in the operator is to have the operator cultivate the self. Let the great capitalist carry a responsibility that matches his power. Let the fund manager write room for a moral choice into the contract. Let the ordinary investor be able to read where his money goes. How it lands, Volume VI.
Six. The third direction. Every person holds their own line. By the third section, everyone is an operator, everyone carries responsibility. By this law, do not rely on the government to rein in capital, the government too is an institution, and an institution too can be captured by capital. Do not rely on the law to rein in capital, the law too is a tool, and behind the tool is still the operator. Rely on every person holding their own line. Every living person carries the responsibility of his own position. The retiree cares where his pension goes. The worker cares where his savings go. The middle-class family cares what market its house takes part in. The great capitalist carries a responsibility that matches his power. And here is the deepest line of the thinking set down in this book, and I want to say it plainly, because everything after it leans on it. No one torments. Do not torment yourself, do not put your own position to death with your own hands. Do not torment others, do not send your capital to torment another's position. Do not torment the public, let the non-labor share return to the public. Every person holding their own line, plus no one torments, is the true rein. This rein needs no outside force. It is the living person's own awake carrying, in his own position. How it lands, Volume VI. And the whole of Volume II, on the cultural order, sets down that root virtue, no one torments, as the ground this every person holds their own line is laid on.
Seven. Here the four sections of the chapter come together. Capital chasing profit is the way of things, an instinct, not evil. Capital does not care whether a man lives or dies, but it is not evil. Capital is only a tool, and the operator is the living person, and the responsibility is the operator's. Rein in capital without destroying it, channel it, do not wall it. The root turn of the whole chapter stands complete. Not overthrow capital. Rein in the pace at which capital turns. How, exactly? Three directions. The non-labor share returns to the public, which is to say the people. Rein in the operator, do not destroy the tool. Every person holds their own line, no one torments. How it lands? Volume VI, Saving People: A Race Against Time Before the Blood Runs, lays it out point by point.
Eight. Three chapters of Volume I are down. Chapter 1 pulled the alarm to the dead end of capital, the collapse of human reproduction, a frozen world. Chapter 2 laid beside it the script the first three industrial revolutions ran, close to a hundred forty million down. Chapter 3 set down the turn on capital, capital is not evil, it is an instinct doing its job, and rein in capital without destroying it. The next chapter, the last of Volume I, sets down the study of position and the mission of the soft landing. Four sections. A position is only a division of labor, the root posture of the study of position. Use the pen, not the knife, the root tool of the thinking in this book. The thing that cannot wait is to adjust the system before the great war, the root mission of the whole book. And then the close, and the way out, all of it laid out point by point in Volume VI. Once the fourth chapter is set down, Volume I, Despair, closes whole, and you turn to Volume II, on the cultural order, or straight to Volume VI, Saving People. I set the picture of despair down across three chapters not to leave you in it, but to bring you to the edge of the door. The door is the next chapter, and then the way out. I will meet you there. Turn to Chapter 4.
Or go straight to the way out. Volume VI, Saving People: A Race Against Time Before the Blood Runs.
Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.
Chapter Four, Tiger Lyon’s Position Studies and the Mission of a Soft Landing