One might tell Alexander, Patton, Sunzi, and the CIA, Mcdonald's conquers too. They conquer by enticing people, meeting their needs and shaping their needs through propaganda/marketing.
The phenomena of a fast food company achieving such global eminence is not at all extraordinary, but one might compare it to the East India trading company or the merchants of the dutch empire. Domination is still tied in with nationalism and military power, but today, everywhere, those in power are ever more in the thrall of public opinion.
Very few rulers can claim divine right or succession. Everyone, especially the dictators and butcherers claim the betterment of the people, the racial, national or social interest. (the big exception is in sharia based countries)
The present trend of the world, or one trend, is to attain power based on the will of the people. Here in Red Communist China, the government also placates the public through fear and impressing everyone with their mighty economic achievemnts and glorious spectacles, like the the three gorges dam and the olympics.
We can say that the state of freedom, in asia, europe, america and south america, is all jacked up because there is no real democracy and people are still dominated inevitably by the twin tyrannies of state and market.
Bakunin said, long ago, that though Europe was progressing to an era of republics instead of monarchies, the people would be no less enslaved, for they would now be children guided along by the enlightened supervision of our parliamentarian leaders. If we replace the 'republics' with the modern usage 'democracies' we can see the relevance.
Most people in democracies and people considering democracies see government as a sstem of management, like a company you hire to take care of your landscaping.
This is not the exclusive content of the term as it is thought of now. There is still sufficient admixture of the nasty ideas of the government as an extension of the nation, but these are preexisting notions. What is new is the idea of government as manager, without any justification superseding it's responsibility of carrying out the betterment and protection of the people.
Justification of rule through the doctrine of will of the people is not too far the good of the commonwealth. The doctrine of the kin's sovereignty being necessary for the good of the realm or commonwealth was key in undermining the kings dvine right and divine succession.
Just as the good of the people superseded the divine status of kingship, so too might the management of the nation supersede the will of the people, and the will of the people supersede the management of the nation.
Contrasting countries like America, China, Burma, the case can be made for efficient management versus explicit democracy. Most people, at the current stage of historical development, can be satisfied with an adequate income, a chance for progression of social status, a chance to better their kids, and a chance watch tv and get online
Any dictator could get a long way on this basis. The problem is that most dictators cant do this, because to make a lot of people work together, you need at least the illusion of consent.
Now that we exist in a attitude that emphasizes the role of the state as manager on behalf of the people, adn expression of the will of the people, we can perhaps see that progress has been made in many countries.
For China, the end of the Qing Dynasty could have brought about a democratic, rule of law society, or a succession of petty militaristic dictatorships. Now we have a party dictatorship that has tried to use stability and economic growth to placate the masses. And, to a great extent its working. But the point is that they base their will on deomocracy, appeal to the masses, not the landed class, no the wealthy, but the popular sentiment and the common people.
This is unprecedented in Chinese History. Instead of complaining of the fact that real freedom has not arrived here, we should not the significance of the fact that now we have entered a period where democracy is the standard.
Mcdonalds depends on placating and manipulating its masses, so do the governments of most advanced nations.
For those of us enamored of a non-authoritarian future, where we can run things without starvation, coercion, acontextual authority, and mistrust, we might see this as a potentially positive change.
In the argument for greater cooperation and consent based interaction, the will of the people is much better point from which to start to justify anarchism than the spirit of the nation or the divine right of kings as granted by Adam.
Slippery slope arguments are not logically compelling, not because they are impossible, but because they are not inevitable.
Using pot is not likely to lead to other drugs. I haven't seen it do that to many people.
But, if you wanted a slippery slope, if you were trying to get someone hooked on heroin, than you might try a lot of things, and getting them high might be a good start.
So too if you want to make a fascist state, you might scare people with terrorism and then keep things getting freakier and freakier. But, this might also make people more interested in diplomacy and protecting freedom, and it might make them dislike your anti terrorist agenda.
But, if we want to promote freedom, we can point to the effectiveness in corporations and governments that have tailored their pitch to the masses and not just to some abstract authority (god race) and argue that this shows a greater expansions of the doctrine of consent.
If we see this as an historical trend, it may be a good sign.
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