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Protection against the storm

Written by Pablo González and Pedro Nonay, trying to find what we can do in our adaptation to changes in world order.

Entry 7

Change of elites

January 24, 2025

After the recent news of Donald Trump’s inauguration, we are getting an idea of what is going to happen.

In this entry I will try to analyze the situation, as well as to advance in the knowledge of what is going to happen in our world. It is about deepening what I exposed in the previous entry 5.

Historic change.

In previous entries, I have said many times that the current moment does not correspond to a big crisis of the kind that happens every 50-80 years, but to something much more relevant. Something that happens every 500 or thousands of years.

These kinds of changes are related to the way information moves. I have been saying that the previous comparable change had its cause in the invention of the printing press by Gutenberg in 1453. At that time, the feudal system ended and the Renaissance began.

I argue that the current change has its cause in the invention of the Internet. Changes in the social structure will have the same impact as the transition from the feudal system to the Renaissance.

Let’s look at a little history of what the previous change was like. Then I’ll try to get to what the current one is going to be like.

A bit of history. The uprising of the Comuneros.

This will sound very unfamiliar to the reader who is not Spanish, but perhaps he will find it interesting. For those who are Spanish, it will sound familiar because they have studied it at school, although it is likely he will have a simplistic and biased view (caused by the manipulation of the media and education, which I will talk about later).

Ejecución de los comuneros de Castilla, by the romantic Antonio Gisbert (1860, Palacio de las Cortes).^(1).

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Before describing the matter, I would like to say that it is no coincidence that this happened shortly after Gutenberg invented the printing press. Nor is it a coincidence that it happened in Spain, which at that time was the largest empire in what we now call the West. It was the time of the king known as Charles V (First in Spain). By the way, it is also no coincidence that in those times the most advanced Civilization, and equivalent to the Spanish one, was that of China, which was at the height of the Ming dynasty (although, because of the distance and the technology of the time, there were no major conflicts between the two empires).

The Comunero uprising occurred in Spain in 1520 and lasted until 1522. Wikipedia tells it like this.

I want to tell it in my own way, oriented to the objective of explaining what is happening now. I do it remembering Mark Twain when he said that history does not repeat itself, but “rhymes”.

It was only a short time since Spain had been united (it wasn’t even called that yet). It was the union of the kingdoms of Aragon and Castile with the Catholic Monarchs, and the conquest of Granada (1492). And not long after the discovery of America by Columbus (also in 1492), lands that still did not have the name “America”. It is curious that neither Spain nor America were so called at that time.

Although America had been discovered, it was not yet time to consider that it had been “dominated”. In fact, the first relevant conquest was that of Hernán Cortés in Mexico, and that occurred in 1521, as reported here. It happened in the midst of the Comunero uprising, when it was being decided whether Spain would move into the future or stay in the past.

At that time, the feudal system of government was still in force in Spain, although already very deteriorated compared to what it was. The power of the nobles was still very important, and it was convenient for the kings to have their support.

It is important to realize the cause of the power of the nobles. It was based on the fact that they were the ones who controlled the territory of their city. They did it in a way that today we would call “police violence”. The fact is that they were the ones who knew everything that happened in their city, who controlled its economy, and who decided whether to support the king (or not) with troops and money. Above all, this decision was made when there were doubts about who was the heir king.

It can be said that the nobles were the ones who controlled the local masses. They were the ones who could organize revolutions.

Charles V was named king of Castile in 1517. This did not happen peacefully, because his mother was alive (the so-called Juana la Loca) and there were those who thought that she should be the queen, so they gave her that title, but only nominally, and she was confined in Tordesillas alleging illness. 

Charles V was very young (17 years old); he was a foreigner; and he did not speak Spanish. When he arrived, he established a government without the local nobles. They were upset (with some logic), because they lost influence and power. That is why the Comuneros uprising was organized. The excuse was that the king had brought in a foreign government that did not respect the fueros (which were the laws of the time in Castile). The reality is that the Comuneros, who believed they had local control, saw that they were losing power, and wanted to avoid it.

The truth is that the printing press had only recently been invented. Now, information circulated in a different way, much more agile. And Charles V (or his advisors) handled these “modern means” better than the way the old nobles did.

The result is that the comuneros lost the “war” and Carlos V consolidated his reign. In this reign, the strength of the nobles began to lose a lot of importance (always gradually).

The current situation.

Even if we do not like to accept it, and even if we have to write about this matter very carefully in order not to hurt susceptibilities, it is a fact that the “deep state” do not consider democracy as an objective, but as an instrument. I will try to explain it below.

The intention of those “deep state” has always been to keep the majority of the population happy enough not to organize a rebellion in that city/country. Thus they are free to do their business there.

The instruments to obtain this support from the population are: a) to give them some freedom, with the laws; b) to encourage them to have “bread and shelter”, with their activity; c) to “punish” those who do not comply with the objectives, through the police and the judges; and, very important, d) to “indoctrinate” the population so that their way of thinking is in accordance with what these “deep state” want.

In feudal times, it was the nobles who were in charge of controlling and satisfying the majorities of their duchy or county. Indoctrination was exercised by the Church. Thus, the rules of coexistence of the fueros (the laws of the time) were added to those required by religion. You can see how the organization was at that time here.

After the printing press came the era of nation-states and early capitalism. The indoctrination of the masses came to be based on the control of printed materials, with censorship being very important (you can see how book banning worked here). Religion also continued to be important in this regard. The Church was the only organization that could guarantee that the same message reached everywhere every Sunday through the sermons of the mass. And that message reached even those who could not read, who were in the majority. In reality, the church has always been a great communication enterprise, regardless of whether one is a believer or not.

When democracies began (and in the era that is now ending), “indoctrination” was based on controlling the media (press, radio, television, …). At that time (and now), the church still existed, and maintained its power of communication, but it became little more than a somewhat uncomfortable factor for those “deep states” who controlled the media (except in the Islamic world, where the power of the church is still very strong).

Therefore, in this era that is ending now, once the “indoctrination” is controlled, it is already known what the majorities are going to think. And the decision was made to implement democracies. Thus, the population believed that it chose its rulers, and was less predisposed to rebellions. However, what the population chose was what they were led to believe by the media. That media was controlled by the “deep state”. And those “deep states” also controlled the political parties. They did so, both by financing them (often without ever collecting the debt), and by giving them visibility through the media.

In other words, democracy has never been anything more than one of the instruments to control the population. The important thing was the previous indoctrination, as well as creating the legal framework that would allow the population to obtain “bread and a roof” (by their own means).

The problem that these “deep states” have now is that the new social networks have made the conventional media lose a lot of “indoctrination” power. And, those social networks are not controlled by those old “deep states”. Nor will they be in the future, because the control of “high finance” is also changing.

To put it very simply, when there was no means of communication other than the Church and word of mouth, the nobility controlled their city by imprisoning anyone who was using the word of mouth system to transmit a “dangerous” message to the nobleman, as well as by getting along with the Church. It was the nobles who chose the kings and the laws, even if there was the appearance that the king was in charge. But when the means of communication changed with the printing press, the nobility lost its power, albeit gradually.

Now the same thing is happening (also gradually). Conventional media are losing their power to social networks. Although this issue depends a lot on demographics, because older people still use conventional media (and are indoctrinated by them), while young people are indoctrinated by social networks.

Therefore, whether democracies will continue to exist or not is something almost secondary, to be decided by the new “deep states”. If they continue to exist, they will be what they have always been: a fantasy theater for people to believe that they have chosen them. However, the truth will be the same as always: those who choose what the people think are those who control indoctrination and finance. Thus, the elections are won by whoever they want (with few exceptions, which are corrected).

What’s going to happen.

For what has been said above, it is no coincidence that at this moment there is talk in many countries of what they call “hoaxes” or “fake news”. Attempts are made to discredit social networks, because they are not controlled by the former “deep state”, which are the ones that used to control governments and society in general.

In the comparison, these “deep states” are acting as the Comuneros did in 1520. They are trying to rebel against their loss of power. They want the old order (the feudal system, in the case of the Comuneros) to continue.

And the same thing will happen to them as to the Communeros: they will lose their position.

It is an example of this that Trump has won the elections supported by social networks (especially by Musk), and against conventional media. It is also an example that social networks are doing a lot of damage to the UK and German governments. Or that the Romanian elections have been annulled on the grounds that social networks had manipulated them. 

These social networks are accused of manipulation. But it is not recognized that those conventional media also manipulated and concealed. An example of this is the recent news in the UK about the concealment, for political convenience, of sexual violence organized by certain ethnic groups.

The fact is that the fight is between who manipulates better, not between if some do it and others don’t. And it is clear that social networks do it better. Then, it is clear that they are going to win (they are already doing it), even if it takes them some time to finish doing it.

An ironic variant of the matter is that the power struggles between different social networks are already beginning. This is the example of the attempt to ban Tik Tok in the USA. It is alleged that it is manipulation by foreign powers, but it is not said that they also manipulate.

Therefore, the most likely thing that will happen now is that there will be conflict in the West between these “deep states” (the old and the new). We will have internal revolutions in each country, (like that of the Communeros). And the old powers will lose.

In the meantime, as the West will be “entertained” in these internal power struggles, it will not be able to focus its efforts on the fight with China and its allies. This is something that suits China very well, because its economy is not at its best, but it does not have the internal control problems that the West has. In other words, China is facing a possible “normal” economic crisis, and the West is facing a very exceptional social crisis.

This leads me to think that there will be many internal conflicts in the West, but there will be no WWIII.

What will happen (and is happening) is that the “signing” of countries or regions for each bloc will deepen. That is what Trump has already started with his claims to Greenland, Canada, or the Panama Canal. It is also what may happen in Venezuela, or what is happening in South Korea, in addition to the latent risk in Taiwan. Or what has already happened in Syria, and what is to being closed in the “Ukraine deal”.

Perhaps the novelty suggested by Trump is that the idea he is promoting is not to seek agreements with other countries, but to annex them to his own. It seems that, instead of negotiating new rules of coexistence between countries, he prefers that theirs be accepted directly, at least in the bloc of his allies.

All these “country signings” are based on the importance of that country for the economy of each bloc, either because of its raw materials, its demographics, or its need to ensure the movement of goods at sea. Always thinking of the new circumstances that technology allows, or that climate change generates.

In short, this is not a fight of right versus left. It is about adapting to another form of “opium of the people”, and to new conditions. It will be a change of bosses and a change of rules.

Conclusions.

After the above said, I believe that:

• The power of conventional media will be transferred to social networks (and their ability to indoctrinate the masses).
• This will imply a change of elites. The elites that used to control the conventional media (governments, finance and the press) will be overwhelmed by those who control the social networks (technology companies).
• There will be many internal conflicts in the West, but there will be no WWIII.
• The “signing of countries” for each bloc will be further developed.
  
  

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Tips for our adaptation.

As I have been saying in previous entries, I do not write this because I consider myself to be a holder of the truth, nor to convince anyone. I do it in my internal process of creating my opinion, in order to make my future decisions.

Therefore, I don’t think it would be honest not to share my conclusions. This is what I do below, but remember that they may be wrong.

Regarding the issue of the change of elites due to the loss of power of the conventional media and the rise of social networks, what I believe is that we must abandon our “submissions” to those who are losing power, and approach those who are gaining it. This is something that everyone will have to do to the extent of their possibilities. And this advice is equally valid for individuals, governments, or companies. 

Many people may not like this, but it has worked for Trump to get closer to Musk, and in general to social media, Bitcoin, apparently China, …; as well as to get away from the mainstream press and television, and the financial power of Wall Street, …

Of course, we will have to make our decision when we know for sure in which of the bloc of countries will be the one in which we live now, or the one to which we want to emigrate. And that is not so clear yet.

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As always, I welcome comments on my email: pgonzalez@ie3.org