Does terrorism/oppression work?
No thats why they had to become more sophisticated
So if you listen to say Noam Chomsky he would explain it in the following terms....
He would say that under a dictatorship the government must rule its people through force and the fear of force. This is like holding a big club over their head.
But in a 'democracy' the government is not supposed to do that. However does that mean democracys are representative of the peoples wishes? Well lets examine that idea...
In our society there are 'classes' of people. In the UK the normans and flemish came in and displaced the anglo saxon ruling class and their knights became barons who carved up the land amongst themselves. They formed a 'class' of people who passed on their wealth and positions to their offspring maintaining a social hierarchy.
This system of social hierarchy has continued to the modern day with the ruling class forming a cohesive society within society by going to the same schools, the same universities, the same social events and clubs and the same sercet societies. They also help each other into the same kind of influential jobs such as: military, media, government, finance, banking and intelligence (this is known as 'old school ties' or nepotism).
These classes exist in the US as well.
So does the ruling class stand aside and let democracy function and the will of the people shape our society? No of course not...they control the game and they jelously guard their power, wealth and privilege.
So as chomksy would say they decided that force didn't work (see the barons being challenged by the rising merchant class for example leading to civil war) so they decided that they would need a new system through which they could control the masses.
'Democracy' allowed them to create a system whereby the people thought that they had power when they didn't. The people vote every 5 years for one of two parties, both of which are controlled by the ruling class. This is the same in both the US and the UK.
This is why no matter who the people vote for the ruling class keep getting richer and everyone else gets poorer
So the system we are in is far more insidious than a system of force. If someone is forcing you to do something then the threat is clear and imminant. If however you are being subtly manipulated then you might not even realise that you are being steered.
''None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.
'' Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 
