Dopamine in Toronto Politics

Our blanket fear of missing out is an integral element of the Ford vortex, a socially enforced, insecurity-driven need to stay on top of all things at all times.  It's the closest I'll ever come to understanding celebrity culture.

Unless, of course, Glodsbie feels compelled to follow the Ford fiascos, politics in general, sports, comments or perhaps his smartphone.

If he does, he can empathize entirely with the Fordian addiction.

Rob Ford, Political Addiction and the Open Data Cure

Addicts are, by definition, self-destructive, but they're also destructive, period.  The pain and complication they inflict on those around them becomes a central fact of life.  Everything in a household - or a family, a group of friends, or a workplace - comes to revolve around managing an addict's abuse: anticipating the next episode, living through relapses, processing the apologies and promises, and then starting all over again.

Not gonna lie - I keep an eye out for stories framed this way.

Addicts.  Destructive.  Communities revolving around behaviour of an individual. 

We have a poor understanding of what addiction is and what it does.  Largely, this is because we like to think of ourselves as rational actors, in control of the choices we make.  Addiction is therefore a weakness of character, not a reflection of something more hard-wired than that.

Here are a couple points on addiction from HelpGuide.Org:

- Addiction involves craving for something intensely, loss of control over its use, and continuing involvement with it despite adverse consequences.

- Addiction changes the brain, first by subverting the way it registers pleasure and then by corrupting other normal drives such as learning and motivation.

The title of the article these points come from is How Addiction Hijacks the Brain.  As in, shifts control to an external party.

It's not the best frame, because it's not actually what happens.  Addiction is more a rewiring of the brain, like a cognitive cancer.  Addiction harnesses your brain against you.  Just as an allergen causes increased histamine (which is why anti-histamines reduce allergy symptoms), substances like booze or crack cocaine increase dopamine production.

Some people are more allergic to some substances than others.  Some people are more prone to addiction than others.  Environment play a role, as does personal history.

The more exposure you have to an addictive substance, for example, the greater an impact it has on your cognition.  This is why people who are addicted to a substance over a prolonged period of time will see behaviour changes.

Also from the HelpGuide.Org article: The reward circuit in the brain includes areas involved with motivation and memory as well as with pleasure.  Addictive substances and behaviors stimulate the same circuit - and then overload it.

Has Rob Ford engaged in socially-damaging behaviour?  Yes he has.  Is he fixated on getting his fixes? That's clearly the case.  But is Ford also in an environment detrimental to his overall mental state?  

This is obviously the case - he's constantly combating someone, wading into issues that are over his head and getting stuck looking foolish on an increasingly global stage.  

Addicts become dependent on the reward trigger, but there's evidence that suggests relying on the reward trigger is also a form of escapism from a negative environment.  If you've ever wanted to have a drink after a tough day at the office, you'll know what that's like - just imagine you were living in a slum, surrounded by violence and saw no way out.  Reward hits become a form of escapism.

Let's go back to those points from earlier:

 - craving, control, dismissing negative consequences.

 - changes your brain, corrupts normal drives

Tell me if you've heard this one before - power corrupts.

Does power feel good?  Of course it does - being in charge boosts your confidence, makes you feel special, puts a smile on your face.  It's easier to make snap decisions when you feel empowered; it's easier to stay the course when you hold the reigns.

That feeling you get from power, from being the boss, from holding sway, being history's actor?

Think dopamine has anything to do with it?

Power isn't a substance, but it's a state that equally impacts dopamine production.  Dopamine, remember, is a reward system - it exists to catalyze action.  When you're in a competitive situation, dopamine (or a craving for dopamine) helps you focus, push harder, beat your opponent, score a win - and get that yummy fix again.

The longer you're in power, the longer dopamine has to structurally impact how you think.  The longer you're in a competitive situation - say, partisan politics - the more dopamine you get over long periods of time.  

Your thought process is affected - you gain focus on what you feel gets you the win, but lose focus about everything else.

How many political leaders can you think of that "lost their way" the longer they were in power?  Did exposure to high-pressure, competitive minority situations have anything to do with a major shift in ideological gears?

Power corrupts - absolute power corrupts absolutely.  When you've had it, but feel it slipping away, but you know you can get there again, you just feel it - you tend to do what it takes to get that hit, don't you?

Our partisan political system is becoming increasingly competitive, increasingly disengaged from the social body it governs.  Partisans, especially those boys in short pants, are starting off more aggressive and narrow-minded, getting worse over time.

And those campaign fighters - well, they are always up for an election, aren't they?

The reward circuit in the brain includes areas involved with motivation and memory as well as with pleasure.  Addictive substances and behaviors stimulate the same circuit - and then overload it.

Power increases dopamine production, changes the way people think and changes their resulting behaviour.  The win (hit) becomes more important than anything else - the body is left to starve, relationships are allowed to rot so long as victory is in hand or at least, on the horizon.

How do you know if you're an addict?

Well, you might be abusing the thing you're addicted to for selfish gains.

You might get testy when your access to the thing you're addicted to is challenged.

Oh - and you might find yourself lying about your behaviour.

Here's a theory - partisan politics is an addiction-driving environment that attracts people with predilections for addiction (like Rob Ford) because they already want that hit.  Even those who get into politics for other reasons face a greater risk of getting hooked on access to power than people in other environments.

The scandals, lies, self-serving tactic, completely insane posturing and overall democratic deficit we're facing is because our governance is literally addicted to power and losing its was.  The people grow weary of living with an addict.  

We're in a downward spiral, the lot of us, but there is hope - addiction can be cured.

It is not enough to "just say no" - as the 1980s slogan suggested.  Instead, you can protect (and heal) yourself from addiction by saying "yes" to other things.  Cultivate diverse interests that provide meaning to your life.  Understand that your problems usually are transient, and perhaps most importantly, acknowledged that life is not always supposed to be pleasurable.

The Peaceable Revolution is, at its core, an intervention.  While Open Government might not always be a euphoric experience, it does provide diversity, meaning, engagement, the ability to think big - and a path towards a healthy society.

The Wolf of Toronto and Margaret Wente: Look Closer

So it's no wonder the Temporary Foreign Worker Program got out of control.  Everybody benefits - as long as you don't look too closely.

To voters, it illustrates the bad side of capitalism - a violation of the basic rules of fairness.  The government will do whatever is necessary to control the damage, damn the consequences.

What does the TFW program have to do with Rob Ford's substance abuse problems?

Quite a lot, when you get down to it.  

Temporary Foreign Workers (TFW) are the path to least resistance; between a choice of a more demanding, higher-costing employee who might feel working for you is a necessary burden versus a cheaper foreign worker who sees working for you as a ticket to a better life, it's really not a hard choice to make.

Spend less, get more for it.  Have lower responsibility costs.  What's not to like?  That way, you have more money for other things.  That surplus cash could go to strengthening your business through R&D, or expanding your operations.  At the same time, it could go to a nicer car or a more expensive Scotch.  

Or maybe you want to get on the golf course and hobknob with the truly wealthy, upping your social status.  

Does it make a difference whether your interest is growing your company or raising your own profile?  

Absolutely it does.

If you're goal is to maximize your contribution to something larger than yourself, like your company, you're activating a differing set of priorities than if you're seeing company growth as a way to aggrandize yourself.  It's the difference between, say, having a trophy wife vs investing in a family.

In the first case, you want that which makes you look and feel good; in the second, you want to empower something that carries on after you.

As it stands right now, capitalism is designed around mathematical economics; it assumes that all players in the game are rational actors with a suitable level of self-interest, yet interested in achieving balance.  Markets are supposed to find balance between supply and demand, promote dynamism and the rest of it.

But that's not how it works, does it?

Some people are more aggressive than others.  Some are more likely to make impulsive choices than others.  None of us are truly rational, whatever we like to tell ourselves, and as such aren't good at balancing our own short-term interests vs our long-term interests, which are largely invested in the societal whole.

This brings us to the FTW program.  What was a good idea on paper has actually resulted in a variant on the Tragedy of the Commons (also a book by the amazing Alison Loat and Michael MacMillan). 

Employers looking to maximize their gain and minimize their expense are abusing the system, because why not?  After all, potential Canadian employees are looking at the low-wage, low-respect jobs available in sectors like Fast Food and deciding that the effort and embarrassment potential of working such jobs isn't worth the pay it brings, especially if there's a welfare-state floor beneath them to ensure they avoid poverty.

So the solution, you might say, is to scrap the welfare state entirely - take that floor out from under a laissez-faire labour market and force them to choose between poverty and working undesirable jobs.  I mean, what's the alternative?  Either the welfare state bankrupts us or imported poverty leads to all kinds of social decay.  Close the doors to foreign labour, force Canadians to embrace their Right to Work.

But that's only part of the problem.  The reason why employers are importing lower-cost FTW in the first place is that they don't want to invest any more in labour costs than they have to.  If you take away unions and labour regulations, these same employers will look for ways to reduce their labour costs further - less breaks and benefits, amalgamating positions without increasing wages, etc.

That's fine, you might say - this forces employees to become more desirable as labour, more competitive in how they sell themselves and demand more from their employers.  Except not everyone is capable of being competitive, any more than everyone is capable of winning a marathon or curing cancer.

The people that tend to get ahead in competitive markets are the ones who are good at being competitive, to the exclusion of all else.  That means elbows-up, step-on-throat tactics and a functionally fixed approach to problems.   

People like Rob Ford or Jordan Belfort are the embodiment of this approach.  These are two guys who aren't afraid to get what they want.  They are the epitome of laissez-faire capitalism; they live life to the fullest, spend freely and have no qualms about doing what it takes to win.  

Even if it means breaking some rules to get there.

What else do these two gents have in common?  They've both made terribly short-sighted choices that have worked well for them in the short term, but been negative to many of those around them.  They've both suffered in the long term, too.  

Oh yeah - and both have addictive personalities.

It's telling that Belfort, as portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio in The Wolf of Wall Street refers to money as a drug.  That's exactly what it is.  

This isn't me saying that money is the root of all evil - that's mythic crap that over-values money as a concept.  Money is power - if you have it, you can accumulate stuff, build brand, make yourself feel and look big.  It's hardly unique in these traits - lots of drugs make people feel more powerful than nature has made them.  Cocaine does the same thing, as does its low-brow derivative, crack cocaine.

These addictive drugs increase the flow of a neurotransmitter called dopamine in your brain. 

Dopamine makes you feel powerful, in control, "high" - as in higher than everyone else.  It's a good feeling, one that's awfully hard to come down from.  Which is where the addictive factor comes in.

Rob Ford denies his problems, lives life like he's king of the world, feels that only he can help the poor black kids on his football teams, thinks only he gets how simple the solutions to our problems are (Subways, people!  Subways, subways, subways!) and gets annoyed by this notion that you have to weigh consequences before you act.

He's an extreme case, as is Jordan Belfort, but they are fairly representative of all dopamaniacs; want more, want to spend less, self-interested and as a result, socially irresponsible.  Having money, owning a team or owning a gun are all dopamine-inducers.  They make you feel like you're king of the world, or at least your own castle.

Let's go back to the words of Margaret Wente - we're hooked on foreign workers.  Hooked, as in addicted to.  Why would that be?  

Foreign workers are the labour equivalent to crack cocaine - they get the job done quicker, cost less and still give you that dopamine fix.  Whether they're temporary or end up sticking around, though, what they don't encourage you to do is invest more time and effort in your labour, building out your company in a sustainable way.

Maybe if you're working in a strictly transactional service industry, that's fine, though even then a focus on doing things cheap tends to result in shoddy infrastructure across the board.  If sustainable growth is your goal, though, you really have no choice but to invest more in your labour.

This reality was brought home to North America during the Labour Revolution and is slowly coming to light as countries like Bangladesh, who've swallowed up much of our old Traditional Manufacturing industry, suffer their own consequences of inadequate labour and infrastructure investment.

They're going through the same physical labour pangs we did a century ago as we try and re-position ourselves, through foreign labour, to go through the same turbulence a second time.

This fundamentally isn't about mathematical economics or the pros and cons of capitalism vs communism; as we have seen throughout history, both systems still lead to dopamaniacs seizing power at the expense of the majority.

What these series of interlocking challenges, like a Seldon Crisis, are fundamentally about is behavioural economics - the science behind why people behave the way we do.  

A system like Capitalism promotes addiction - to money and the power it brings.  A system like Communism promotes addiction - to power and information and the power they bring.  Both are self-serving, not by design, but by a lack of design-thinking.

Adam Smith and Karl Marx both meant well; the problem was that neither of them understood neurochemistry.

We've seen how communism falters and we're both hearing and seeing how capitalism isn't up to the challenges of our modern context, either.  Any system that promotes and rewards dopamine fixes, by its very nature, is doomed to result in structural challenges.

So where does this leave us?

Fortunately, there's another neurotransmitter out there that provides a better foundation for sustainable socio-economic infrastructure.  It's called oxytocin (not to be confused with oxycodone) and in many ways, it is the anti-dopamine.

Oxytocin does wonders for the body - it reduces emotional stress, negates fear, improves health and most importantly, it also provides a positive feeling - not power, as is the case with dopamine, but of personal value.  

When you score a point or make a buck, you get a dopamine hit - feels good, helps you focus on getting the next one, whatever the cost.  It leads to competition, which produces winners and losers.

When you donate to charity or give up your seat on the subway, your system floods with oxytocin - you feel good, your environment comes into clarity and you feel even more inclined to help others.  Best of all, when you get an oxytocin hit, so does everyone around you.

Let's break that down a bit further - competition promotes individual wins, which promotes competition, which cataylzes fear, antagonism and a sense of urgency to not fall behind.  It results in short-term thinking and leads to tragedy-of-the-commons scenarios.

Oxytocin promotes engagement, empathy, collaboration and the ability to think further ahead, without the crippling fear often associated with risk-taking.  It results in shared solutions and people moving forward together.

Yes, there are sociopaths, psychopaths and narcissists out there; we do need to be cautious of con artists and terrorists and all those who are hard-wired to prey on the weak.  But to have a system that is entirely designed to encourage predatory, dopamine-fueled behaviour isn't the way to minimize those risks.

Instead, we need to rethink how and why we structure our society so as to optimize our collective opportunities by maximizing individual potentials.

Fortunatley for us, we're already well along this path.  We just don't know it yet.

After all, what is healthcare, if not a way to support the weak?  What is specialization, if not an effort to integrate individuals into a collective whole?  Can a nation or a community survive without shared infrastructure and a genearlly agreed-upon code of conduct?

Society isn't and never has been about trickle down or individual competition, it's been  about developing into a collective organism, a networked intelligence.

We're seeing, at the periphery, the next phase of our social evolution away from individual competition towards collective success right now.  It's coming in the form of Open Government and Open Data, through the connective tissue of social media and a whole new focus on empowerment.

Especially when it comes to labour.  In the post-transactional, knowledge-based economy, customers want experiences, not just products.  They want to feel good about the choices they make, which means they want to know that the people they're interacting with - your front line employers - are happy with their lot in life, too.

Even at a fast food joint.

How fast we move through this transitional period depends on how quickly we come over our collective addiction to money and status and start valuing what we give and how we contribute more.  

As contribution isn't addictive, it doesn't result in the same functional fixedness we see in people like Rob Ford, or the devaluation of others we see playing out through the TFW program.

Political Parties, individual politicians and corporate entities can win big by embracing the concept of the responsible society and investing in corporate social responsibility.  In fact, we see that happening already.

The question for these power-seekers is this: do they have enough self-control to overcome their addiction and start leading by example?

If we look closely enough, we can already see the answer emerging.