The Global Pact

Via my recently invented time machine, here is an extract from a short essay written a thousand years hence by an anonymous scribe of the Second Enlightenment. Titled The Rise and Fall of The Global Pact , it is dated September 3014.

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As most of us know, the Global Pact was founded in the late twentieth century although its roots had been growing for decades, possibly as far back as the late nineteenth century.

However, what many people do not realise is that in those far off days it was not known as the Global Pact. The name did not become common until about 2100 when the United Nations formally announced that nations no longer existed and changed its name to The Global Pact.

So what exactly was The Global Pact, why did it arise and why did it collapse with such devastating consequences?

Firstly it is important to recognise that The Global Pact was a technical religion, truly global and designed for everyone but the administrative elite. It was many things to many people, but primarily it was a system of belief supported by incredibly detailed doctrines, laws, regulations and ultimately enforcement.

PactPol was the global policy function, the key top level directorate.

PactBank was the global bank. There were no others.

PactTech provided global technical support.

PactFarm grew the food.

PactTruth provided publicity, languages and iKid - or infant induction.

PactHealth looked after euthanasia and abortion.

PactGuide was the global paramilitary police force.

PactFun provided all global entertainment.

PactRole slotted everyone into a suitable career.

And so on.

There were many other directorates and sub-directorates, but these main directorates give a flavour of the overall picture.

During the preceding century leading up to The Global Pact, many changes took place. Too many to list in this brief review. For example, science disappeared into PactTech. Religion was absorbed into an advisory sub-directorate of PactTruth although it took another two centuries for things to settle down here. PactTruth and the formidable might of PactGuide were tested to the full.

By the early twenty-first century the trend towards The Global Pact had become obvious. A large number of mostly middle class people saw the advantages of discarding their opinions in favour of a host of official doctrines. Almost as if they knew The Global Pact was coming, even if not in their lifetime.

In those days there were early Pact-type doctrines with a variety of names such as political correctness, environmentalism, equality, science and so on. They encapsulated not ideas, but doctrines to which one might safely and even stridently adhere. Many adherents seem to have known, or rather sensed that The Global Pact would one day demonstrate their sagacity in dumping their individuality with such abandon.

Eventually, about five centuries ago, The Global Pact embraced everything. Every person on the planet knew nothing, did nothing and said nothing which did not conform to The Global Pact. Generations lived and died within the same Pact as moving from one Pact to another was discouraged unless demographic change had made it necessary.

For example many generations of the same family might live their entire lived within PactFarm or PactFun. They never knew anything else and thanks to PactTruth and the iKid infant induction scheme they never wanted anything else.

In 2120 the achievement of a permanent global utopia was officially declared by PactPol. An entire year of celebrations was organised by PactFun with mandatory attendance enforced by PactGuide.

So why did such a comprehensive and benign system fail so suddenly and so drastically? Why did PactPol not foresee the problems? Why did PactGuide fail to keep order as cities ground to a halt and endless warfare and riots sent us back to the Dark Ages?

There have been many theories and no doubt there will be many more. My inclination is to go for the simplest. I think the fundamental problem lay in PactTruth.

Nobody actually knew what was going on.