The Buddha on Just Government

[@xitsox]

Hi, Doug. No just government is ever possible. "In every state, the government is nothing but a permanent conspiracy on the part of the minority against the majority, which it enslaves and fleeces." - Bakunin. The authority itself is an egocentric and always strives for domination and control. Buddha and other spiritual teachers have realized this and have created paths toward liberation. There are a lot of examples throughout the history of egalitarian societies that lived without rulers and hierarchy. Self-governing communities based on freedom, solidarity, mutual aid, consensual decision making ect. Most of them have been destroyed from the outside because of invasions and wars. But such communities do exist today. There is a wonderful book of Peter Gelderloos called Anarchy Works, where you could find such examples - theanarchistlibrary.org/library/peter-gelderloos-anarchy-works I think each of us first have to start liberating oneself from the three poisons, diminishing the unwholesome behavior and then engage in the world because everything is interconnected :) Destroy and Create :) Greetings from Bulgaria!

[@DougsDharma]

Thanks for your thoughts El Freegano. It would certainly be nice if society were constituted by awakened beings. 🙏

[@gyniest]

To answer the last question: *relatively* just governments are entirely possible, but absolutely or perfectly just governments, probably not. If it's conditional, then, well, that's its nature.

[@DougsDharma]

That's right gyniest. Thanks!

[@LucasLafrance]

These videos are awesome, I'm learning so much ! Ever thought about making the audio into a podcast ? Would be cool to be able to listen to it while driving !

[@DougsDharma]

Thanks Lucas! I have enough for now with the videos, so audio is unlikely just now. Awhile back someone suggested ripping the audio from these and releasing audio-only versions, which should generally be pretty OK for listening to. That's something I might do if I got the time and could figure out how to do it ... 😀

[@AbhishekDabhanim]

I read about Mahasamata, the great elect(kind of like social contract theory) in indian history book, but i can't find much about it on the internet. What do you think of Mahasamata?

[@DougsDharma]

I’m not sure I know anything about it Abhishek.

[@AbhishekDabhanim]

@@DougsDharma www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.columbia.edu/itc/religion/f2001/edit/docs/aggannasutta.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwifl_3PnvnnAhWpIbcAHWy6DcMQFjAGegQIAxAB&usg=AOvVaw1reJJ24xuUsQmZRxT7xR2p Here.

[@Britt_575]

I am fairly new to secular Buddhism and have had some difficulty finding resources pertaining specifically to it. I'm so glad to have found your channel. :) Could you perhaps make a future video on dealing with grief from a secular Buddhist perspective? I have recently experienced the loss of a loved one, and would appreciate your insights on the subject.

[@DougsDharma]

Thanks Brittany, I'm sorry to hear you are dealing with loss. Grief and loss are a central part of the Buddhist (and therefore the secular Buddhist) path. You might want to check out a recent video on aspects of the First Noble Truth: kzbin.info/www/bejne/b6isZ4SZedZ7qsU 🙏

[@LucasLafrance]

I'm sorry for your lost Brittany, I hope you are doing ok !

[@ptah4611]

He can turn a mountain into gold means he can turn a mountain into gold

[@MarkPerew]

The question asked here confuses me on at least two levels. First, am I wrong in thinking that Buddhist practice is personal and not collective? While we can gather in the sangha for teaching and support, each person's practice is about their own path. Even the teacher is working on his or her own path, while offering direction to others in working their own personal path. How can that individual practice be applied to a collective body, such as government? If a government is to be fair, is it not because the people empowered to make decisions are doing so with fairness in mind? Does early Buddhism or modern secular Buddhism view this differently? Second, is "fairness" part of Buddhism? A least one writer in Tricycle hold that "Buddhism has remarkably little to say about fairness and justice" (tricycle.org/magazine/a-more-enlightened-way-of-being/). Does the Eight Fold Path and the Bodhisattva vow call for or require fairness? Could relieving suffering actually require some unfairness? Is fairness part of Buddhism or is it a Western thought overlay on top of the dharma? Please note that I am not arguing against fairness. I'm just not sure how firmly that fits into Buddhism.

[@DougsDharma]

Hi Mark, these are great questions. For a route towards answers you might consider looking at the suttas I've linked below the video. I also have another video about Buddhist economics (kzbin.info/www/bejne/j2fJcoqBeNmcn80 ) that deals with similar issues. Vaddhaka Linn's book cited there (The Buddha on Wall Street) goes through a lot of the textual evidence found in the early suttas. So too does Bhikkhu Bodhi's book The Buddha's Teachings on Social and Communal Harmony that I also discussed in a very early video (kzbin.info/www/bejne/hZqTh2aGrsilq5I ). Generally speaking the Buddha's path was personal as you say, but he did have something to say about householder life and how kings should behave. If kindness and generosity are paramount, they should also hold sway in public life.

[@clydebink]

Even though I aspire to be able to behave ethically in every circumstance, I have a lot of difficulty and can easily fail to be ethical in many circumstances. Respecting the capacities that not only I can develop when behaving ethically, but the ones that we all can when behaving ethically... doesn't it make sense to encourage systems of governance that are less likely to put any of us in circumstances that make ethical conduct more difficult? If nothing else, isn't it worthwhile to survey various systems to measure them with this aspiration and to do so in community?

[@myname5425]

For a great example of a large scale directly democratic society that does not use a punitive system checkout Rojava in North and Eastern Syria.

[@dcfreak23]

What would Early Buddhism's perspective be on redistribution of income & wealth, and the welfare state?

[@DougsDharma]

Hi dcfreak, it's hard to say exactly because the Buddha's society was so very different from our own. We can say generally though that he was against great wealth disparities and the greed that causes them. I say a bit more about that in my earlier video on Buddhist economics, and Vaddhaka Linn's book mentioned there goes into the arguments in more detail: kzbin.info/www/bejne/j2fJcoqBeNmcn80

[@myname5425]

Rulers can not be just. Their power will and always has lead to repression. That’s how power works. It will always be used against the powerless.

[@AbhishekDabhanim]

Talking about politics and social justice, You will like BR ambedkar's works. He has written couple of books on buddhism and made a new version of buddhism called Navayana buddhism. I would like you to make a video on Ambedkar one day. It would be interesting. I have recently read his essay named buddha or karl marx where he compares philosophy of them. Its interesting. What do you think about it?

[@DougsDharma]

Hi Abhiskek, thanks for the questions. I've not read the book on the Buddha and Karl Marx, but I have read The Buddha and His Dhamma and might do a video on it eventually. Ambedkar was a great man who did a lot of good work, but his interpretation of the Buddha and the dhamma is very nonstandard. 🙏

[@AbhishekDabhanim]

@@DougsDharma thanks for the reply. You mean non authentic by non standard?

[@DougsDharma]

I mean it is more creative than historically accurate. 🙂

[@AbhishekDabhanim]

@@DougsDharma I see. I think that's why it is considered fourth wheel, navayana.

[@stevevest7206]

While I need to research it further, I have studied some Buddhist texts on this. I do believe there is a possibility of having a much more just government than we have, but the issue is with the binary logic we currently see in the US. Just because something is liberal or conservative does not mean that it is necessarily just. For instance, the conservative view is to encourage competition and that improves everything for everyone. To a large extent, this is true. But take someone like the post office, the phone system, or the internet. Does it make sense to have multiple versions of each. Should I have to have a mailbox for each postal system. Should I only be able to talk to somone that is on my same phone system or subscribes to my same internet service. Clearly there are things that logically are clearly better if there is only one of them. Then you have the more liberal view that everyone is equal so everyone should receive the same. This sounds good at first, but then there is the lack of incentive for people to produce if no matter how hard they work, they receive the same return as everyone else. But there is also a very compelling argument for the liberal view. Suppose I am the richest man in the world. I decide, I think I will buy up all the fresh water. It is now mine. I earned it through my actions and you cannot have any. But simply because of being, isn't everyone inherently an owner of everything. Because I exist, do I naturally not own water, food, shelter, or air? This is where I think there is an answer, and to some degree, I think the answer is in BUddhism. Basically, I think the inherent wealth that everyone has simply because of their existence can be thought of as basically what a Buddhist monk receives. But where does this basic wealth come from? It has to come from those that own the resources. Assuming they have earned the resources through skillful action, they certainly should have those resources simply taken away, but there has to be some portion of them that is still owned by every person. Somehow that portion must be distributed to each person, regardless of their wealth. What if yearly we collected that portion. We could call that taxes. What if we distributed that portion to every humaing being, regardless of income. Lets call that a universal basic income. How much should those taxes be? Enought to provide a universal basic income equaly to what a Buddhist monk would receive. That is as close to fair as I have currently been able to come up with.

[@DougsDharma]

Interesting thoughts Steve, thanks. I think perfect fairness is perhaps theoretically impossible, and certainly impossible in practice. That said, we can certainly do a heck of a lot better than we are doing nowadays, particularly in the US.

[@dawnfm00]

Do you consider Aggana Sutta as a fictional story?

[@DougsDharma]

Hi Abhishek, how do you mean? I think it's a way for the Buddha to get across ideas about society and politics, but as for it being an accurate description of the history of the world, it's a fable much like the Bible's Book of Genesis is a fable.