The Turntable of Civilization’s essence: true answers come not from elites in comfort, but from those who abandon egoism.

On August 26, 2010, the author explains the true meaning behind his work, “The Turntable of Civilization.” He argues that genuine “solutions” can only come from those who overcome egoism and are fully dedicated to their mission. He criticizes the high-income elite who speak of “the limits of growth-centric ideology” and asserts that because they have never known hardship, they are incapable of offering a true solution. The author maintains that a true elite is someone who looks at global poverty and takes on the duty of passing on prosperity to the next generation and the next civilization.

he Essence of “The Turntable of Civilization”
August 26, 2010

Since launching The Turntable of Civilization over forty days ago, my days have been a cycle of anxiety one day and the sudden birth of words the next.

In one chapter I wrote “NO” to the media’s harsh treatment of Ichirō Ozawa. My wavering feelings were partly because that coincided so closely with political turmoil at the time.

My proposals addressed something vast: the markets—something most people believe to be absolute and unquestionable. Perhaps all politicians thought my ideas were on too grand a scale to be tied to specific policy. In essence, that is true. The real question is: how to do it.

True flashes of insight come only to those who continue to examine and think without end—to those who devote themselves wholly to their mission, waking and sleeping with nothing else in mind. Anyone who has won a Nobel Prize would silently understand what I mean.

The greatest key is this: overcoming egoism is the most important thing for human beings.

History offers countless examples: never have those living in comfort—earning over ten million yen a year, enjoying secure lives—saved a nation or humanity. More often, they have ruined them.

Recently, Asahi Shimbun’s editorial declared, “Endless growth is impossible.” In AERA, Mr. M wrote that “growth-centrism has reached its limit.” I feel deep unease at these voices in unison, and I can only imagine they are speaking from within their safe “salons.”

These are people easily earning over ten million yen a year. I had not realized that at Asahi Shimbun salaries reach that level by age thirty. But if Asahi continues in this way, it will decline like Japan Airlines. Any company that cares only for its own high salaries collapses in the end.

Eighteen years ago, they joined a foolish chorus of righteousness that produced twenty years of tragedy—yet these elites never once suffered hardship themselves. From such people no solution will ever come.

My doubts and concerns about the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management alumni stem from this same issue.

Mr. M, an employee of S Securities, is not entirely wrong in what he says. But he cannot provide answers. Even his analogy of present-day Japan to seventeenth-century Genoa shows his limits.

And yet, they appoint him as chief economist to the government. He is four or five years younger than my generation, but he was never among our best. He likely has never experienced the true hardships of life—the kind that close off even the path of one’s own existence. From him no answer will ever come.

The trials God gives to the truly gifted are never easy. They are unimaginably harsh. Like giving Woody Harrelson a father who was a murderer—such is the cruelty of fate.

Unless these people abandon everything—family, status, honor—and, like the Buddha, go into the wilderness to meditate, they will never reach true answers. As they are now, there is a 100% certainty they cannot.

There are countless others who can speak at their level.

They lack the essential perspective of The Turntable of Civilization: that it is our duty to turn it next to Brazil (South America), and finally to Africa. Why? Because they dwell in egoistic comfort. Because they are not true elites. They have no thought of lifting the billions now in poverty into an age of abundance centuries from now.

For their children and grandchildren, they speak only empty words—environment, greenery, world peace.

The words I point them to are those Sartre spoke when he stopped writing novels: “What can literature do when ten million people are starving?”

If they could only replace this with: “What can economics do when ten million people are starving?”—perhaps they too might finally understand.

Of course, I say all this in the hope that they will ultimately betray my expectations—by proving me wrong, and producing real solutions.