structural violence: an American perspective on the institutions of a downgraded democracy; part 2

I

The Resistance

2-Defend Institutions;

To say the social response to the structural violence and embedded corruption displayed in part 1 has been strong, would be an understatement. There has been a solidifying of public and private frustration and disgust not just with President Donald Trump, but with the Establishment Republican Party leadership as well. Until very recently, few elected Republican officials have come out against President Trump and his actions, and this is noteworthy. However, as an institutional check, they have fallen far short.

The most vocal institution taking a stand for observable facts has been the fourth estate. The media responded first in shock, visibly showing signs of the mental and emotional toll for the first few months, but after President Trump’s near-daily barrage of tweetstorms, the progression of the Mueller investigation, Russia Interference in the election, and his persistent racist and misogynist policies and practices, the media finally shook themselves free and transitioned with a heightened resolve to report the facts of this momentous and devastating moment in American history. The reports have since been exhaustive and consistently thorough in well-respected outlets and newspapers.

Even Fox News has on occasion been forced to debunk conspiracy and lies told from the mouth of the Republican president. In most instances, however, Fox News has simply chosen to not cover or give airtime to the President’s blatant disregard for democratic institutions, his dishonesty, and his outright racist, misogynist, and classist rhetoric. This is less than ideal, as it is the demographics that watch Fox News who are consistently out of touch with the facts their program refuses to cover.

There has also been a rise in conspiracy theory in other conservative news outlets and talk radio shows, such as Breitbart, led by former white house chief of staff, Steve Bannon; who has also been known to support elements of white nationalism. There is also InfoWars, led by Alex Jones who consistently uses the illusory truth effect, and the availability heuristic to base his conspiracy theories upon. Sean Hannitty of Fox News, has also increased his ties with conspiracy, consistently arguing his point from ignorance, and accepting strange explanations that fit his biases. The President follows all of the above programs, falling victim to his own confabulation as demonstrated by his tweets during or after each time slot. The damage done to observable facts, to racial and class minorities, and Fox’s own viewers through ad hominem by these outlets cannot be overstated. They dependably other anyone who doesn’t toe the line with President Trump, and suffuse the collective American conscious with a juvenile’s disregard for facts that consistently encouraging sloppy thinking that’s riddled with fallacies and false assumptions. In fact, the plague of fallacious reasoning hinging on these default heuristics has helped bring the crisis the United State’s electorate currently faces to this crisis point. But on the whole, the fourth estate has done, and continues to do its duty in their journalism. But this pursuit of truth and fact may not matter, as referenced by Tappin, McKay, and Van Der Leer in Part I. The disregard for fact and sound reason in favour of implicit and affirmation bias holds the day as yet, as the battle lines have been drawn and the embattled party politickers dig deeper and deeper into their own trenches.

Beyond the fourth estate, civil society has started showing signs of becoming less civil. As discussed in part 1, there is currently great anger, resentment, and impatience as generations of toxic masculinity, misogyny, classicism, and racism are boiling over the rim of the American melting pot.

In response, there has been an unfortunate rise in the anti-fascist movement, or Antifa. Not because there aren’t clear indicators of a rise in fascism and possible authoritarianism, but because the use of violence in their demonstrations perpetuates the narrative of fascist and authoritarian identities. According to Elise Boulding and Gene Sharp, these methods and the conditions that led to their creation, clearly aren’t effective and even undercut the validity of their stances.

Probably the foremost among the non-violent resistance movements is the nasty women’s coalition. They received their name when in a 2016 presidential debate, Donald Trump called Hillary Clinton a nasty woman. The phrase has been used quite often since within pop culture, and has even been used internationally to show solidarity with women, LGBTQ rights, education, racial equality, reproductive health care, and on. The coalition has founded a facebook webpage and circulates articles while working as a hub of information and political activity in resistance to the above-mentioned issues. Directly connected to this, and what could be considered to be an outgrowth of it, is the 2017 Women’s March. It grew in strength into a mass movement and quickly turned into an international march against the election of Donald Trump. Over 5 million people participated domestically, with at least 653 individual marches within the United States. The totals around the world are estimated to be 307, 275 people, with at least 261 separate marches in solidarity. What gathered so many people were their shared identity and common principles. According to the Women’s March organization, their principles are,

Women’s Rights

We believe that Women’s Rights are Human Rights and Human Rights are Women’s Rights. We must create a society in which women - including Black women, Native women, poor women, immigrant women, disabled women, Muslim women, lesbian queer and trans women - are free and able to care for and nurture their families, however they are formed, in safe and healthy environments free from structural impediments. 

Ending Violence

Women deserve to live full and healthy lives, free of all forms of violence against our bodies. We believe in accountability and justice in cases of police brutality and ending racial profiling and targeting of communities of color. It is our moral imperative to dismantle the gender and racial inequities within the criminal justice system.

Reproductive Rights.

We do not accept any federal, state or local rollbacks, cuts or restrictions on our ability to access quality reproductive healthcare services, birth control, HIV/AIDS care and prevention, or medically accurate sexuality education. This means open access to safe, legal, affordable abortion and birth control for all people, regardless of income, location or education. 

LGBTQIA Rights

We firmly declare that LGBTQIA Rights are Human Rights and that it is our obligation to uplift, expand and protect the rights of our gay, lesbian, bi, queer, trans or gender non-conforming brothers, sisters and siblings. We must have the power to control our bodies and be free from gender norms, expectations and stereotypes.

Worker’s Rights

We believe in an economy powered by transparency, accountability, security and equity. All women should be paid equitably, with access to affordable childcare, sick days, healthcare, paid family leave, and healthy work environments. All workers – including domestic and farm workers, undocumented and migrant workers - must have the right to organize and fight for a living minimum wage.

Civil Rights

We believe Civil Rights are our birthright, including voting rights, freedom to worship without fear of intimidation or harassment, freedom of speech, and protections for all citizens regardless of race, gender, age or disability. We believe it is time for an all-inclusive Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.  

Disability Rights

We believe that all women’s issues are issues faced by women with disabilities and Deaf women. As mothers, sisters, daughters, and contributing members of this great nation, we seek to break barriers to access, inclusion, independence, and the full enjoyment of citizenship at home and around the world. We strive to be fully included in and contribute to all aspects of American life, economy, and culture.

Immigrant Rights

Rooted in the promise of America’s call for huddled masses yearning to breathe free, we believe in immigrant and refugee rights regardless of status or country of origin.  We believe migration is a human right and that no human being is illegal.

Environmental Justice

We believe that every person and every community in our nation has the right to clean water, clean air, and access to and enjoyment of public lands. We believe that our environment and our climate must be protected, and that our land and natural resources cannot be exploited for corporate gain or greed - especially at the risk of public safety and health.

These principles are the self-same principles embodied within PACS research and practicum as outlined by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and due to these movements, a wider appreciation and an increased literacy of these issues are gaining ground.

Another advocate for fact and reason is Robert Reich, Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Centre for Developing Economies. In the last few years, Reich has focused his attention on income inequality and crony capitalism. Within these spheres of study, he has identified six influential parties in the American politíc.

1-Establishment Republicans, consisting of large corporations, Wall Street, and major GOP funders. Goal is to have taxes cut. 

2-Anti-Establishment Republicans, consisting of Tea Partiers, the Freedom Caucus, and libertarians. Goal is to have a smaller government with shrinking deficits and debts. Many also want Big Money out of politics and to end crony capitalism.  

3-Social Conservative Republicans – evangelicals and rural Southern whites. Want America to return to what they call “Christian” values.

4-Establishment Democrats – corporate and Wall Street executives and upper middle-class professionals. Also like a tax cut, but believe in equal rights. 

5-Anti-establishment Democrats – younger, grassroots movement types, and progressives who still call themselves Democrats. Their biggest issues are widening inequality, racism, sexism, and climate change. Also want to get Big Money out of politics and reject crony capitalism.

6-Trump. This party consists of Donald J. Trump and his . . followers. Trump’s goal is to get more money for himself, get more power for himself, get more attention to himself, and get even [and lie about it].

What can be learned from Reich’s outline is why political polarization may indeed be occurring, it is fractionalized into various interest groups. I will be using these references to these parties from here now on in this paper for clarity. According to the Women’s March principles, their coalition stands firmly in the Anti-establishment Democrats, or even possibly operate as [an added seventh party] progressive independents.

7-Progressive Independents – younger, grassroots movement types, and

progressives who refuse a party. Biggest issues are widening inequality, corruption, racism, sexism, peace, and climate change. Want to get Big Money out of politics and reject crony capitalism.

President Trump was elected by Anti-Establishment and Social Conservative Republicans as a way to try and mix up the establishment and what many reported as, ‘Draining the Swamp in Washington.’ It is no secret that while Establishment Republicans were staunchly against electing Donald Trump during the election, they are now remaining relatively quiet, and are toeing the line. They have even used his election to pass ‘tax reform’ for their wealthy donors in the senate, which if made law would add 1.4 trillion dollars to the deficit over the next ten years, while giving major tax breaks to the top 10 percent, while also levying tax increases to the middle and lower classes. The public was blatantly lied about to this, and breaking with tradition, no public hearings were held for debate. What is most tragic about President Trump’s and the Establishment Republican’s deceit is that it was the Anti-Establishment and Social Conservative Republican electorate who elected President Trump and sitting Republicans, and they will be the demographics hurt the most if it passes; right alongside the women, the poor, and the minorities they rallied against. These changes in tax code and health care undermine the basic human rights of security and dignity, while also making the American dreams of health and happiness almost impossible for the typical American worker, while simultaneously making President Trump and GOP donors much richer.

Matters have been made still worse through unaccountable social media practices actively encouraging echo chambers, further isolating already isolated and dysfunctional social groups. Some social media companies have already started to shift their focus on stemming actual fake news from propagating. For example, Facebook and Youtube have started flagging unreliable news sources. But a heavier hand is needed with legally dire consequences to those who are found overstepping, or are caught actively promoting social group isolationism. These need to be institutionalized for long-term social health. A possible path for this can be found in integrating social media and talk radio into the already founded libel and slander laws; with retractions, apologies, and payments, with noticeable loss of face with monetary loss paired together. These also need to be paired with more severe costs and regulations for white-collar crimes. These practices need to move from social norms to policy. Unfortunately, there is no such movement as yet, and with political climates as they are, unlikely to be presented.

Establishment and Anti-Establishment Democrats have been excoriating the party of Trump and President Trump himself, while also running surprisingly successful campaigns in the 2017 November elections. Democrats have been successful in no small part to the fury that was unleashed by the Women’s March, and have been grounding their campaigns to date on a door to door approach; first using active listening to hear what people want in their government, then probing with further questions, sharing stories, and then providing tangible alternatives. Case in point, the down ballot gains in the state of Virginia looked like a diversity postcard against the typical representatives of white male republican leadership.

The United States conflict is still escalating, however, and while these gains speak to a rise in diversity in sex, gender, race and class, the arguments used are generally still framed in an, ‘us versus them,’ schema, particularly in the two Republican parties and the party of Trump. This framing increases othering and conflict while decreases instances of possible third culture building and emotional resonance.

There is hope however in the methodology used by the Anti-Establishment Democrats in active listening and storytelling. These methods search for bridges and fulfilled needs, while grounding the process in vulnerability and emotional resonance. These processes lead to active trust and community building.

II

Trust

12-Make eye contact and small talk;

13-Practice corporeal politics;

10-Believe in truth;

17-Listen for dangerous words

11-Investigate [claims];

From the outset, it is vital a clear understanding and appreciation of facts be established. This must occur before any hope of a productive conversation and reconciliation can occur. And while it is readily understood there are different group narratives and schemas throughout the United States, I believe it has also been well-established that that is not what is being addressed here, but is the absence of the recognition of observable and measurable facts. It was found in part 1, facts don’t seem to matter in changing minds from bad policy, or holding leaders accountable for lies in the public sphere, or yet further in the psychological processes of participants. It was adherence to party and ideology that reinforced this dismissal of facts as people continued to project affirmation biases rooted in preferred talking heads deceived by their collective Dunning Kruger effect as they fell back onto party politicking and straw man fallacies. The negation of facts goes beyond even these, as it requires the selective disregard for scientific thought and research, the active othering and dehumanizing of the perceived other, and even the blatant direct and structural persecution of this other. There is possible hope in an increase in responsive government, however. According to Pui-Huang Wong, in research published in 2016 in the Journal of Peace Research,

'. . . result shows that both government performance and institutions have no direct effect on trust building once government responsiveness is introduced as a mediating factor . . . these findings imply that in post-conflict states, political trust is less likely to be built based on exchange or protection. In contrast, it is more likely to be determined by the level of care that a government demonstrates towards its citizens, the degree to which a government engages its people in the policymaking process, and how responsive a government is to the demands of its citizens.'

In the current state of American politic it is easy to remain in the echo chamber of our choosing due to lack of face to face contact with people of differing opinions. In fact, according to Iris Hui, out of the University of Stanford, more and more people are moving to the regions of their choice to reside in ideological bubbles. Even beyond the social media landscape, this tangibly reinforces othering geographically, which then can result in further tangible hyper-politicized results through gerrymandering, currently under review in the U.S. Supreme Court. This has hindered ties that build trust and community, and made reconciliation even more difficult as voting blocks and whole communities have isolated themselves from other walks of life and those with different opinions.

In Brown versus the board of Education, it was established that different education is unequal education. After this ruling, mass education integration between white’s and blacks occurred, sometimes by force. Many folks in white circles today truly believe that was the end of Jim Crow; that segregation by neighbourhood, by opportunity, by transport, and by schooling ended within a decade or so after this ruling in 1954, and especially after the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It didn’t, but the language and framing did, and is still believed by many. It is believed because it’s comforting. It fits the socially accepted narrative. It’s also convenient to believe the comforts and opportunities they enjoy are earned; and aren’t at the expense of someone else, or to a particularly oppressed group. The belief that people who are on losing end of life must have done something to deserve it is an example of the just world fallacy. White Americans have been sold this narrative by the Establishment Republican Party for over 50 years. In fact, though, the winners in life often do nothing to earn it, and those who behave badly often get away with devastating actions, without consequences. Yet much work and expended energy has been put to this narrative and unresponsive governing, and it’s left scars. For example, Lee Atwater, who worked in the Reagan white house and was lead consultant for the southern strategy in 1988, in an interview in 1981 stated,

'You start out in 1954 by saying, “Nigger, nigger, nigger.” By 1968 you can’t say “nigger”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “Nigger, nigger.”'

Rick Perlstein in 2012 wrote about the Interview in which he stated of Atwater in a follow up interview, “My generation,” he insists, “will be the first generation of Southerners that won’t be prejudiced.” He proceeds to develop the argument that by dropping talk about civil rights gains like the Voting Rights Act and sticking to the now-mainstream tropes of fiscal conservatism and national defence.

These strategies were previously developed by John Ehrlichman, Nixon’s domestic policy chief, and used in the ‘war on drugs’ to criminalize hippies and black people. In a report by Dan Baum in 1994, Ehrlichman said,

'You want to know what this was really all about?" he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. "The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I'm saying? We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.'

These same codifications were adopted and are still currently used by Establishment Republicans, Anti-Establishment Republicans, the Party of Trump, and President Trump himself. The results have been privatized school systems to give more resources and opportunity to the haves, while increasing social distance, giving less resources, and providing less infrastructures of peace and opportunity for the have-nots. This is the definition of structural violence; and it has been meticulously executed by republican institutions.

In a 2012 piece by Andrew Rosenthal of the New York Times, he said of the Atwater Interviews,

'Lee Atwater recognized at the end of his life what a monster he had helped unleash. In a 1991 article for Life he even apologized to Michael Dukakis for the “naked cruelty” of the 1988 campaign. The Republican Party seems worried about its race problem, but it’s not clear that its leaders really get the message. They seem to think they just haven’t done a good enough job talking to ethnic and racial minorities. But the real problem is their policies and history, not their rhetorical choices.'

This is the hard truth behind the comfortable narrative many white Americans believe to their core. But it does a disservice to all parties involved to assume they know it. A new national education policy and processes are desperately needed to rectify this; as social trust and a responsive governing culture have also been severely damaged by racist business practices and politically dubious segregation. This is the only way, I believe, to sustainably address the problems actively lied about or ignored for over 50 years now.

As a first step, the most effective educational path forward for the United States would be to follow the Finnish model, and abolish all private elementary and secondary schools. Next, for equity before the law and equity between citizens, they would need to work on vast redistribution of resources, whose historical assets have had their foundations grounded in the immoral practices and policies of racism and classism.

Unfortunately the reality of the history in the U.S. is still debated, using divergent schemas and false narratives, and will most likely continue to be. What were once considered inherent human rights have been sold as bad policy and as an affront to individual liberty, and these heuristics have been baked into the identity of the Republican Parties.

III

Inherent Human Needs and Rights

12-Make eye contact and small talk

13-Practice corporeal politics

00-Connect

As Part I and the two subsections of Part II have hopefully demonstrated, American institutions are suffering from sloppy thinking, false assumptions, and inherent biases. Some of these are a direct result of limited human cognitions, while others are willfully perpetrated and exploited by elected leaders and other sanctioned and institutionalized norms. Up to this point, in one way or another, I have touched on affirmation/confirmation bias, the affect heuristic, subjective validation, the just world fallacy, ad hominem, straw man fallacies, arguments from ignorance, the Dunning-Kruger effect, the availability heuristic, confabulation, and priming. All of these self-destructive logical modalities are non-conscious, and thus inherently difficult to control for. But also as referenced, The Unites States has failed to stop those who willfully lie and exploit these heuristics because of the lack of social and political will to address these fallacies structurally.

These losses have been compounded by a political democracy often found structurally unable, or organizationally designed, to not meet the needs the of its people. Foundations of this democratic psychosis can be found in Roger MacGinty’s book, ‘No War, Peace,’ which state, “[liberal democracies] tend to reinforce the advantages of the victors and powerholders and shy away from a fundamental revision of social and political relationships.” Here, MacGinty is writing about international neoliberalism, although the foundations for its application are striking when overlaid across the acting hegemon’s institutional behaviour. He continues,

'. . democracy also faced limitations and was as much an agent of conformity and replication of power relations as an agent of change. In most cases, democracy contained considerable conservative components that acted as a barrier to, rather than facilitators of, positive peace.'

These democratic organizational structures appear to be built and designed to perpetuate disequilibrium and reinforce power structures to suppress and disenfranchise out-groups. A possible remedy may be available, if sufficient trust can be built to agree there is a problem.

In the field of behavioural economics, there is a term called ‘libertarian paternalism.’ The founders of this economic stream of thought first published this concept in 2003, in paper aptly entitled, ‘Libertarian Paternalism Is Not an Oxymoron.’ They say,

'The idea of libertarian paternalism might seem to be an oxymoron, but it is both possible and legitimate for private and public institutions to affect behavior while also respecting freedom of choice. Often people’s preferences are ill-formed, and their choices will inevitably be influenced by default rules, framing effects, and starting points. In these circumstances, a form of paternalism cannot be avoided. Equipped with an understanding of behavioral findings of bounded rationality and bounded self-control, libertarian paternalists should attempt to steer people’s choices in welfare-promoting directions without eliminating freedom of choice.'

One of the co-authors, Richard Thaler, has since won a Nobel Prize in economics for his contributions to the behavioural economics field. Ever since its publication, behavioural economic teams and ‘nudge units,’ have been used all over the world to better address social and organizational failings and individual behavioural missteps. While most of these changes have occurred through the private sector, a great deal have emerged within governmental institutions. More than ever before, governments have been actively engaging in practices to nudge citizens in the right direction, according to their own choice architectures. Unfortunately for the United States, these practices, and their ethical use, are now in jeopardy with the election of President Trump, Establishment Republicans, and the rising tide of the alt-right policies and practices first ascribed by Richard Nixon. According to their platforms, voting records, and speeches, they seek to advance a democracy the perpetuates the policies promoted by Lee Atwater, Richard Nixon, and Ronald Reagan; the same policies at the core of the structural violence in the United States, and the same practices preventing the implementation of the infrastructures of positive peace.

Due to this agenda, the institutions of the United States have failed to provide the infrastructures necessary to fulfill even the most basic of human needs for tens of millions of Americans, let alone secure the human rights they’re also afforded. In many instances this agenda has exploited minorities outright and targeted specific social groups to purposefully undermine their cultures and voting rights through legislation and economic militarism. It is no small wonder, then, that trust in these same institutions has eroded. The time for implementation of behavioural economic guides may be on the horizon, but it’s a distant one as long as power relations and the institutions that push them remain as is. Not only has the United States earned its downgrades in the democracy index, it has been argued by Carl T. Rowan, ambassador to the United Nations during the Cuban Missile Crisis, that the democratic republic never truly existed as advertised. Those in power have actively undermined and bled the huddled masses to meet their own ends, using structurally violent means to perpetuate and secure in perpetuity these same exploitative institutions. Due to these massive inherent structural and organizational fissures at the very core of it’s government, socio-cultural, and socio-economic processes, the only intervention likely to work for the United States case study in fostering positive peace is a massive overhaul and restructuring of the systems themselves; a transformational change. I believe this can only occur with a truth and reconciliation commission prefaced by a state by state critical peace assessment, paired with a mirrored nation-state critical peace assessment, then followed by a communally driven implementation of non-violent social charters. These interventions mirror the works of Jean Paul Lederarch’s expanded frameworks model, as well as the imagined futures of Elise Boulding. These processes should be funded by the government itself to foster more institutional trust, while laying the foundations for a possible culture of a more responsive government.

After the first few years of research and elicitive modeling and storytelling, using the positive peace measures as outlined in the forthcoming paper, ‘Measuring Positive Peace,’ the United States would then need to have a Truth and Reconciliation Commission on its treatment and littered histories of oppression and violence with both African and Native Americans, as written on by Imani Michelle Scott in her book, ‘Crimes against Humanity in the Land of the Free.’ The quantitative measures from ‘Measuring Positive Peace,’would be used to inform not only the extent of the mass structural violence, but also the stories attached them. Thus, giving survivors voice and dignity.

Within these frameworks, there would need to be public hearings locally, regionally, and nationally for all Americans to come together and listen, to be heard and to bring to light what was systemically ignored, exploited, and exacted. For the United States to stop its bleeding and bind its wounds, it would need to fully address the intergenerational trauma associated with its endless civil war. Additional measures would need to be taken to guarantee the process by bringing in middle power countries such as Norway, Canada, Germany, Japan, Denmark, Mexico, Argentina, and Bhutan to operate as both facilitators and working panel for international resources and support at the national stage to provide objective weight behind contested histories and narratives that have been convoluted over time.

As referenced in section II, generations of white Americans have been sold false narratives by those in power and will need to be nudged and educated about this false narrative and how its been put into practice. The research measures gathered through collective research in locales across the country would also increase drivers of change by highlighting tangible actionables as outlined for government and civil society, and local ownership of the process and outcomes for a transformative change.

This research and the commission that follows would need to be intimately tied to this actionability, or it would do further damage as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Canada has done for the Indigenous Peoples there. Areas and thoughts on where to direct intents and strategies for change could be as follows:

Elementary and Secondary Education System-no more private schools, all public. Teachers now required to have an MA in subject areas.

Political Institutions-Create more official parties, while initiating an across the board racial, gender, and class demographics requirement so that those civil servants reflect the

diversity of their districts and states. This is to ground representatives in their constituencies by having lived experience as a member of said group. For example, since over half of all persons in the country are female, over half of representatives must be female as well; in addition, if a state has 30 percent hispanics and latinos, 42 percent white, 25 percent african american, with the remaining eight percent from other pacific islander, indigenous, or middle eastern backgrounds, the percentages must reflect this;

making the Unites States a truly representative democracy. This would be applied in all three branches of government. Also, the wages of elected representatives are to be tied to the median income tier earners in their state.

Business Community-Executive pay after taxes can be no more than 20 percent above middle tier employee earnings in their organization after taxes. All businesses where possible are to meet LEED and B Corp ethics and environmental standards and serve as triple bottom-line organizations.

Justice System-structured after the Danish model, American justice should be replaced as restorative justice; involving communities and cultural norms and practices into the rejuvenation of the offender and survivor alike; with no citizen losing the right to vote.

Universal Healthcare-Expansion of Medicare and Medicaid to include the entire U.S. population.

Reparations-self-explanatory; hundreds of years of direct and structural violence and

genocide; not to mention the opportunity cost of efforts and assets now lost.

Conclusion

As the wealthiest country in the world, it is immoral for there to still be pervasive poverty, hunger, both direct and structurally racist violence, institutionalized misogyny, and pervasive income inequality which all currently tear at the fabric of the American social contract. All of these factors and more have dissolved trust and pitted social groups into a lose-lose negotiation to see who can lose the least. Basic human needs and dignity have been brushed aside for economic and status gains for generations while structural power relations have consistently gone to white males; further embedding intergroup competition based on false assumptions, sloppy thinking, and party politicking. And all of this occurred before the election of President Trump, who has since through his runaway lies and juvenile behaviour further eroded international solidarity for human rights, integrity, environmental sustainability, and nuclear war all whilst inciting the kind of racial violence that typically precludes genocide. The thousands of Thomas Boudreau’s social imprints are crippling the American system’s ability to cope, while a third of Americans believe false narratives perpetuated by an unregulated and unaccountable social media. Over a third of Americans have been deceived not only by the Republican Parties and Establishment Democrats for decades, but have fell victim to their own confirmation biases and sloppy thinking. Considerable care must be taken to imbed organizational heuristics to control for these logical defaults of fallacious reasoning and false assumptions. The U.S. should also actively integrate social medias into the already existing libel and slander laws, and then strengthen their effectiveness by increasing the costs to those who break this social contract.

At its core, the United States Civil War never really ended. The oppression has been embedded in its culture and its institutions. It has been carried on through the intergenerational trauma of slavery, jim crow, reconstruction, white supremacy, income inequality, and internal neoliberalism. President Trump’s Election further proves this.

A lack of societal trust is at the core of the United State’s issues. This trust has been worn on and out for generations, and now the floorboards of its democracy are understandably found bending under the weight. For the United States to survive she must address these issues head on, and then be responsive by working methodically and systemically to resolve them. U.S. leadership should first, listen to the stories of those their nation and polices have oppressed; and second, then share power with those whom these policies, practices, and narratives have disenfranchised—only then can they begin to call themselves the United States of America.