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Chapter 1. Basic Principles
of Political Phenomena
A. General Principles of Political
Phenomena
(1) The 0th Principle: Survival
Process Theory
 Political
phenomena are diverse and constantly changing. Wars
with foreign countries, violent revolutions, elections,
political debates, consolidation of support among
like-minded individuals, lawmaking, policymaking,
etc., are all examples of political phenomena. Additionally,
the comparison of political phenomena between the
past and present, as well as between the East and
West, adds to their diversity. In the past, monarchy
was a common form of politics, but today democratic
systems are emphasized. In Korea, scholars gained
political power through serving as officials in the
past, while in Europe, merchants gained political
influence by accumulating wealth and entering parliament.
Can we systematically and consistently
understand the diverse and constantly changing political
phenomena of the past and present, both in the East
and West? Political science has not been able to do
so far. However, I believe it is possible. To demonstrate
this, I will present and explain a systematic law
for political phenomena in this book.
What is the content of the law system
that explains political phenomena? It is a sophisticated
generalization of the obvious facts that we experience
in everyday life. Therefore, we can easily understand
and discover all the laws in natural cases, such as
the examples of the following PKB case.
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[PKB case] Let Peter,
Kevin, and Ben be three people. Each of them has
different power. Peter is brave and has strong
physical power, Kevin is rich and can produce
enough necessary goods, and Ben has honor and
is respected by others. When they are threatened
by beasts, Peter will lead them to help each other,
when they fall into starvation, they will follow
as Kevin leads, and when they need direction in
life, all will listen to what Ben says. |
Let's start with this example. The
order of the explanation is from the most obvious
and general laws to the more specific and special
laws. The most obvious and general law is the survival
process theory, which is expressed in the following
sentence.
The first general law can be described
as follows:
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[Ch.1.1] (Survival
process theory) Political phenomena are a part
of the human activity process and are performed
for the purpose of ensuring survival. |
Why do Peter, Kevin, and Ben (PKB
friends) cooperate with each other and follow the
instructions of others? They do so in order to survive
and live better under the given conditions. This is
the meaning of survival process theory. It can also
be found in Hobbes, who said that "THE right
of nature, which writers commonly call jus naturale,
is the liberty each man hath to use his own power
as he will himself for the preservation of his own
nature; that is to say, of his own life." Many
other people have also mentioned the survival process
theory.
Let us call the attribute of human
activity that pursues one's own survival "survival
directivity." Then, it can be said that all human
activities included in the phenomenon of power are
also regulated by survival directivity. For example,
when a nuclear weapon developed for attacking enemy
nations brought the entire earth, including one's
own country, to the brink of destruction, a treaty
to limit the development of nuclear weapons was concluded.
The cases where both soldiers fighting near the North
Pole helped each other under harsh weather conditions
are direct results from the survival directivity of
political actors and are an implication of the survival
process theory.
According to several studies, human
behavior and chimpanzee behavior are very similar
in political interaction and their social life and
organization can be seen as nothing more than their
biological means of survival. If we do not assume
that there is more to chimpanzee behavior than survival,
we can conclude here that politics is also one of
the biological means of survival, merely a aspect
of the survival process.
However, there is a reason why survival
process theory must be accepted that goes beyond the
similarities between animals and humans, which is
simply the rationality of understanding. To deny the
survival process theory and explain political phenomena,
one must assume that many people do not have to try
to survive and will always survive, and also that
many things in political phenomena do not help survival
but still exist. This is "irrationality."
At this point, social biology defined by Wilson as
"the science that systematically studies the
biological basis of all social behavior" meets
political science and social science. The survival
process theory is based on the same logic that can
be seen in Richard Dawkins' famous book "The
Selfish Gene," which is an explanation of the
phenomena of life. In some ways, the survival process
theory can also be seen as a political continuation
of biological laws.
Don't misunderstand the survival
process theory as the claim that "anything is
acceptable as long as it helps one survive."
Understanding politics through such a theory is a
very limited explanation that is confined to reality.
In other words, the survival process theory is primarily
unrelated to claims about desirable politics. This
is like the fact that cars consume energy while operating
and the claim (objective) that car technology should
be developed to consume less energy are unrelated.
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was deleted from the book>
  
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