Greed

Greed

The Primary Motivating Factor

We are often asked, or sometimes ask ourselves, "Why, throughout human history, and even today, have we done the things we have?" As a political science prof, and a lover of history, I have often answered that question and taught my students: "Politics."

After all, Aristotle, usually considered the father of political science, once famously wrote "politics is everything" or depending on the translation from classical Greek, "everything is politics." I annunciated this to my students at the beginning of every "Politics 101" section no matter where I was employed. It was an easy and comforting way to begin, for if that old maxim was true, teachers of poly sci would always have a good measure of job security. Right?

However, during the later stages of my teaching career, and certainly during my few years of retirement, I have gradually reached a separate, if not different conclusion. What motivates everything, including politics?

Greed. At the high point in the movie "Wall Street Never Sleeps," Gordon Gecko, the unscrupulous profiteer,

famously announces "Greed Is Good!" I've thought a good deal about that in recent years and have realized that, throughout history, Greed, in its many manifestations, has been the principal motivating factor HE we homo sapiens, and, perhaps, in the animal kingdom as well.

Archaeological evidence suggests that during our early years of development modern humans lived communally and shared their resources. Those who could hunt, hunted; those who could skin animals and make coats, made coats; etc. The clan was a sharing unit. So, what changed?

In his classic work "Discourse on the Origin of Inequality Among Men, "the Swiss-born French philosopher and oft-times rabble rouser, Jean Jacques Rousseau, speculated: "The first man, who, separated off a piece of communal land and declared 'This is Mine', He was the originator of inequality." Forgive the rough translation. Property, Rousseau opined, was the evil motivating factor for human behavior. The original and simplest form of Greed.

Yes, from that hypothetical time on, property, and the quest for more of it, basic greed, became the principal motivating factor for human behavior. First Community, then City-State and, finally, the Nation-State engaged in the quest for more land, territorial expansion. For sure property had its historical bedfellows: salt, gold, taxes, weapons. All clearly other forms of greed. Wanting more. Sargon the Great, the Egyptian pharaohs, Xerxes, Alexander, Julius Caesar, Napoleon, Adolph Hitler, and Vladimir Putin all wanted more.

Greed, as Rousseau said, is the culprit behind most of societal ills. One could add, in this age of nuclear weapons and our ever-increasing desire for more resources, is also leading to our own self-destruction.

Well, you say, "Human Nature." Wasn't always, and doesn't have to be, does it?

"Does it?"