重建組織孞托的四位紳士
Four Gentlemen Rebuilding Organizational Trust
錢宏（Archer Hong Qian）
在《共生經濟學概論（修訂版）》扉頁上，我寫下了一段很短的獻詞：
【獻詞 謹以此書獻給為重建人類組織孞托作出卓越貢獻的四位紳士—— 亞洲的李光耀、李登輝，美洲的哈維爾·米萊、唐納德·川普。 CATION This book is dedicated to four gentlemen who have made outstanding contributions to rebuilding humanity’s organizational trust— Lee Kuan Yew and Lee Teng-hui in Asia; Javier Milei and Donald Trump in the Americas.】
四個人，放在同一行。這是有意為之。 他們生活在不同年代，處於不同國家和制度環境，面對不同的社會問題，政治語言、性格與改革方式迥然不同。他們中的每一個人，也都曾經或者正在引起巨大爭議。 如果沿用過去一百多年形成的政治分類，人們很容易立即開始站隊：左還是右，自由還是威權，民主還是民粹，市場還是政府。 然後，概念戰爭重新開始。 我把他們寫在同一行，恰恰希望穿過這些已經高度意識形態化的分類，回到一個更加根本的問題： 一個組織為什麼值得生命託付？ 這也是《共生經濟學概論》從經濟學進入貨幣通論，再進入組織通論以後，最終無法迴避的問題。 一、經濟學走到最後，為什麼會遇見“組織孞托”？ Economy最初關心人的生息、家政，以及如何安排資源使生活得以持續。 現代經濟學極大拓展了人類理解生產、交換、價格、資本與增長的能力，也創造了GDP這一影響世界的經濟尺度。然而，當GDP增長的同時，家庭生活成本、生態負擔、組織消耗、社會失孞和人的身心壓力也可能同步增加，經濟學就必須繼續追問： 增長究竟生成了什麼？誰獲得了效能？誰承擔了成本？ 這正是共生經濟學從GDP走向GDE的原因。 C——降本（Cost Reduction） E——賦能（Empowerment） H——健康（Health） T——孞托（Trust） P——和平（Peace） GDP記錄發生了多少經濟活動，GDE進一步檢驗這些活動究竟生成了多少真實生命效能。 一個政府規模擴大了，是否意味着進步？ 一家企業利潤增加了，是否意味着成功？ 一個平台擁有越來越多的數據，一個國家擁有越來越強的財政、軍事和技術能力，是否意味着生命因此生活得更好？ 組織不能只用組織自身的增長證明自己。 組織必須接受生命的檢驗。 價值生成之後，還有價值承兌；價值承兌背後，是承擔承兌責任的組織。政府、企業、金融機構、學校、醫院、平台乃至AI，一旦獲得資源、權力、信用和人的合作，就必須回答： 你接受了誰的託付？ 你又向誰兌現？ 於是，貨幣通論走向組織孞托，組織通論由此發生。 生命先於組織，組織是生命的受託者。 從這個基準重新看自由、民主、憲政、共和，也會出現新的景象。 這些都是人類文明極其珍貴的歷史發現，卻不能停留在旗幟和身份標籤上。自由要落實為生命的自組織空間，民主落實為受託權力的來源，憲政劃出組織不得逾越的邊界，共和讓公共組織回到公共事務。 當組織真正值得生命託付，這些偉大的詞便無需天天高喊。 它們活在生活里。 二、四個人，四種組織孞托 為什麼是李光耀、李登輝、米萊、川普？ 因為我看到的不是四個政治標籤，而是四種發生在真實社會中的組織孞托實踐。 李光耀：國民主權認同生成國家組織孞托 李光耀留給世界的，不只是一段新加坡經濟高速增長史。 一個族群、語言、宗教高度多元，又剛剛脫離殖民體系和馬來西亞的新國家，首先必須回答：誰是這個國家的主體？ 李光耀推動形成的“新加坡人”國民主權認同，其深層意義正在這裡：國家不屬於某一個族群（馬來人、華人、印度人、穆斯林人），也不能成為某一種血緣、語言或宗教的私產；組成這個國家的全體國民，才是國家存在的生命基礎。 有了這個基礎，住房、社區、教育、環境、公共秩序和有效行政便不再只是政府提供的一組“公共產品”，而成為國民主權認同進入日常生活的過程。 一個家庭能否安居，一個社區能否自組織，不同族群能否形成穩定的生活預期，都在回答： 這是我們的國家嗎？ 這是值得我們託付的組織嗎？ 所以，李光耀所代表的，是一條從國民主權認同進入社區生活，再從社區生活持續生成組織孞托的道路。 李登輝：“把國家還給人民”“我是沒有我的我。” 這句話不能只當作哲學格言來讀。在《為主作見證》中，他坦陳自己從唯心、唯物走向信仰的生命歷程。作為一個基督徒，“沒有我的我”最終必須面對政治中最難放下的東西： 權力中的“我”。 中國傳統有強大的“認祖歸宗”意識，政治組織又有另一種頑強慣性——結黨營私。當黨、國、權力和個人相互捆綁，“天下為公”便可能一步步變成“組織為我”。 李登輝的難能可貴，恰恰在於他走到這個組織結構的最高處以後，開始拆除使最高權力能夠自我延續的舊結構。 1990年，青年學生走上廣場。 面對新生代對“萬年國會”、動員戡亂體制和政治改革的質疑，最高權力既可以把廣場看作對秩序的挑戰，也可以把青年看作未來的參與者。 李登輝選擇了後者。 他與廣場青年互動，回應召開國是會議的要求，把廣場上的聲音帶進不同政治與社會力量參與的制度改革過程。 於是，一條後來容易被“民主化”三個字概括掉的生命過程發生了： 青年走上廣場，權力走向青年； 社會提出問題，組織接受問題； 國是會議展開協商，舊組織開始退場。 隨後，動員戡亂時期終止，《動員戡亂時期臨時條款》廢除，“萬年國會”成為歷史。到1996年，人民終於可以直接用選票決定由誰接受最高政治權力的託付。 當然，這是民主。但從共生經濟學的組織通論看，還有更深的一層： 主權在民，從政治原則變成了真實的受託關係。 不是組織擁有人民，是人民託付組織。 而李登輝真正把這件事做完整，是在2000年。 掌權時推動改革已經不易；站在最高權力的位置上拆除舊權力賴以延續的制度更難；當自己擁有巨大的政治聲望與現實影響以後，仍然能夠讓最高權力離開自己，則是對“改革究竟為了誰”的最後檢驗。 如果改革最後仍然通向“我繼續掌權”，前面的改革便始終存在被重新私人化，乃至前功盡棄的危險。 2000年，李登輝離開總統府。 於是，從1990到2000，一條完整的組織孞托鏈條呈現出來： 聽見生命 → 回應生命 → 打開組織 → 拆除舊權 → 主權還民 → 權力離我。 “我是沒有我的我”，至此落地。 真正值得生命孞托的掌權者，不僅要在掌權時善用權力，還要在應當離開時，讓權力離開自己。 權力交接不是組織孞托的尾聲，而是組織孞托最後的兌現。 他恢復和建設台灣農會組織的實踐，也因此具有另一層意義。總統直選解決最高政治權力由誰託付；農會連接土地、生產、金融、農民與地方生活。 主權在民，不只是四年才發生一次。 它要活在社區，活在農會，活在生產與生活之中。 而1990年廣場上的那些年輕人，又讓這一切具有了特別的代際意義： 重建組織孞托，也包括相信新生代有能力參與創造他們自己的未來。 哈維爾·米萊：淨化過剩，彰顯新美 米萊面對的是另一種社會病理：國家組織不斷繁殖，財政成本持續膨脹，政府越來越昂貴，最後需要整個社會不斷供養組織自身。 他的“電鋸改革”最值得觀察的地方，並非究竟砍掉多少部門、減少多少開支，而是把一個尖銳的問題擺到了現代政治經濟學面前： 一個組織如果已經不能證明自己的受託價值，為什麼還可以無限消耗生命供養自己？ 這一問已經越過了奧派經濟學通常討論的市場自由、政府干預和財政紀律。 問題從“大政府還是小政府”，進一步推進到了： 組織憑什麼存在？ 答案只能回到生命。 政府、政黨、官僚機構和公共財政，都沒有脫離生命而自行擴張的天然權利。一個組織如果不能降低生活成本、維護基本秩序、釋放人的創造能力，反而依靠稅收、債務、管制和層層機構不斷繁殖，就必須接受裁撤、重組乃至退出。 所以，《五月公約》成為共識後，米萊揮動的“電鋸”，真正切向的是組織的自我繁殖權。 讓組織重新證明自己為什麼值得存在，讓被高昂組織成本擠壓的經濟自組織人、政治自組織人、文化自組織人重新生長。 降低組織成本，就是把生命空間還給社會。 釋放社會自組織能力，才可能重新生成組織孞托。 米萊改革由此獲得了超出阿根廷、也超出奧派經濟學的意義： 組織不能因為已經存在，就獲得永遠存在的理由。 讓不能證明受託價值的組織退出。 唐納德·川普：即使你不愛我，我掌握的公權力仍然受託於你 川普代表的第四條路徑，基準仍然是：重建組織孞托。 美國今天卻存在一種特別的遮蔽：日益尖銳的黨派分裂，很容易把總統變成“半個美國的總統”。一項政策究竟降低了誰的生活成本、增加了誰的生命能力，還沒有進入討論，便已經被紅藍、左右、進步與保守的標籤淹沒。 所以，我願意在這裡使用一個非常樸素的詞： 全民總統。 “全民”當然不是全民擁護，也不是取消黨派競爭。美國人完全可以支持總統、反對總統、批評總統，並最終用選票決定總統的去留。 然而，一旦接受國家最高公共權力的託付，總統面對的就是全體國民。 選票可以分黨派，生命沒有黨籍； 競選可以分勝負，受託不能只服務勝選的一半。 一個餐館服務員的小費該不該被層層徵稅，不取決於他投民主黨還是共和黨；一個病人能否負擔藥價，疾病不會詢問他的黨籍；一個年輕家庭能不能買得起房、養得起孩子，也不會因為生活在藍州還是紅州而改變。 生活，天然具有穿透黨爭的力量。 這也是我觀察川普“常識新政”的基準。 “川普賬戶”面對剛剛出生、尚無黨派身份的新生代；“川普藥房”面對不分紅藍的疾病與生命成本。
如果再有一個貫通食衣住行信的“川普住家（Trump Home）”，讓普通勞動者特別是年輕家庭能夠降低住房及相關生活成本，通過工作、積累和產權擁有安居生長的空間，那麼，組織孞托就會從政治語言進一步進入每天可感的家庭生活。 到了這裡，GDE才真正顯出它的力量： C降本、E賦能、H健康、T孞托、P和平，不問你是民主黨還是共和黨。 一個民主党家庭藥費下降，是GDE；一個共和党家庭買得起房，也是GDE；一個沒有投票權的孩子開始擁有自己的成長資產，是GDE；一場戰爭沒有發生，一個本來可能走上戰場的年輕人平安生活，更是GDE。 貿易、關稅、稅負、工作、住房、醫療、家庭資產與和平，看似分散，最後都必須接受共通圭臬的檢驗： 有沒有讓國民生活得更好？ 如果一項政策真實降低生活成本、增加生命能力、改善健康、增進孞托、減少戰爭，它首先屬於哪個黨？ 它首先屬於生活。 如果，再有涵蓋食衣住行信的“川普住家”，舊世界的意識形態及其背後的利益博弈，就會在國民可感的GDE踐行中逐漸**“空洞化”**。 這不是說左與右、民主與共和、自由與保守、國家主權與人民主權、資本主義與社會主義、民族主義與民權主義，從此完全沒有意義。 而是當生活事實重新成為檢驗組織的尺度，意識形態便不能繼續壟斷人們對現實的解釋。 這也是“全民總統”真正值得珍視的地方。 即使你不愛我，我掌握的公共權力仍然受託於你，讓公共權力回到全民。 “全民總統”最終仍然要回到組織孞托。人民孞托總統，並不是把國家交給總統；人民把權力託付給總統，是要求總統把權力用於人民。 因此，這份獻詞既有表彰，也靜靜包含着規範： 受託越深，越要懂得託付不是占有；功業越大，越不能讓“我”成為組織的目的。 總統屬於國家公職，國家公職有任期，國家屬於不同族裔和世代的國民。 而“全民”最終還包括那些今天尚不能投票、尚不會說話，甚至尚未來到這個世界的新生代。 三、四位一體：GDE是共通圭臬 現在再看這四個人，關係便清楚了。 李光耀，讓不同族群成為國家的國民； 李登輝，讓人民成為權力真正的託付者； 米萊，讓不能證明受託價值的組織退出； 川普，讓公共組織創造的生命效能越過黨派，回到全民。 四個人，四種實踐，最後都指向一個基準： 生命先於組織，組織是生命的受託者。 所謂“四位一體”，當然不意味着四個人無可爭議。 恰恰因為他們都有爭議，把他們放在同一行才有意義。 《共生經濟學概論》沒有必要為任何政治人物建立完美形象。共生經濟學只問：哪些實踐降低了生命承擔的組織成本？哪些實踐釋放了人的自組織能力？哪些實踐恢復了組織邊界？哪些實踐增進健康與和平？哪些實踐生成了可以持續檢驗的孞托？ 反過來也一樣。 任何政治人物的任何政策，只要增加無效組織成本、侵蝕生命自組織能力、損害健康、背棄託付、製造不必要的衝突，都必須接受共通圭臬的檢驗。 C、E、H、T、P不是給任何人的勳章。 它是一種共通圭臬。 組織孞托也不是一次獲得、終身擁有的政治資本。 它在履約中生成，在生活中驗證，在偏離以後修復。 所以，把四個人寫在同一行，不是讓任何一個人借另外三個人獲得庇護。 恰恰相反。 是把四個人一起放到一個比他們更大的尺度下面：生命。 四、最終的受託人：新生代 四種重建組織孞托的實踐，最終都是為了新生代。 一個社會真正危險的時刻，不只是今天的人生活困難，更是今天的組織不斷把自己製造的成本轉嫁給明天。 財政失序，成為下一代的債。 住房失序，成為年輕人的高牆。 教育失序，提前消耗孩子的生命。 醫療失序，讓一個家庭幾十年的積累頃刻消失。 社會失孞，讓年輕人在進入社會以前便學會懷疑所有人。 戰爭，更可以在幾個月裡毀掉一代人的生活。 所以，組織孞托從來不只存在於今天的“你—我—他”之間。 它還有一條縱向的時間軸： 過去——現在——未來。 今天擁有組織權力的人，同時受託保管着一部分屬於未來的財政空間、自然資源、社會關係、制度信用、和平環境與生活可能。 我們沒有權利把它們全部花完。 更沒有權利透支以後，給尚未出生的人留下一張賬單。 “生命本自具足，又非獨存”，凡事交互主體共生，因此也包含代際之間的託付。 今天的生命不是未來生命的主人。 我們只是時間長河中的受託者。 五、世界格局，從生活改變 這也是為什麼我說，《共生經濟學概論》雖然只是一冊小書，它真正希望推動的改變，卻可能觸及世界格局。 這裡的“世界格局”，首先不是國別格局，不是誰取代誰，也不是哪個國家贏得下一輪霸權。 它首先發生在社區與社會，發生在億萬人的生活之中。 當家庭不再只是GDP中的消費單位； 孩子不再只是未來勞動力； 老人不再只是財政負擔； 創造者的Minds Values能夠被發現和承兌； 社區重新擁有自組織能力； 企業重新理解自己接受了誰的託付； 政府必須證明每一層組織成本存在的必要； AI成為受託能力，而不能成為凌駕生命的受託主體—— 世界的組織方式已經開始改變。 所以，共生經濟學最後的現實貫通，並不是走向一個越來越宏大的世界。 方向恰恰相反。 回到一個個人，一個個家庭，一個個社區，一家家企業，回到億萬生命每天真實發生的生活。 這就是“小即是美”在今天重新獲得的意義。 小，不意味着弱。 一個細胞，一粒種子，一個家庭，一次連接，都可以成為生命新秩序發生的起點。 真正需要警惕的，是組織越來越龐大以後，忘記了自己為什麼存在。 組織越大，越要記住受託邊界； 技術越強，越要知道服務於誰； 權力越大，越要證明自己值得託付。 這也正是“淨化過剩，彰顯新美”的另一層意義。 新美，不來自再製造一種宏大意識形態。 它發生在組織成本下降以後重新舒展的生活里，發生在一個年輕人能夠擁有自己的第一份資產、一個家庭能夠安居、一位病人能夠負擔藥費、一個社區能夠自己生長、一場戰爭終於沒有發生的時刻。 美重新回到生命。 六、所以，我把他們寫在同一行 李光耀、李登輝、哈維爾·米萊、唐納德·川普。 四個人都有自己的時代，都有自己的局限，也都有自己的爭議。 但穿過那些已經固化的左右、東西、精英草根、制度和政治標籤，可以看到一條貫穿四種實踐的暗線： 把組織重新交還給它所受託的生命。 讓國民認同自己的國家。 讓人民成為權力的主體。 讓社區重新生長。 讓政府降低自己的成本。 讓公共權力越過黨派回到全民。 讓家庭和新生代重新獲得未來。 讓和平重新成為組織效能。 所以，謹以此書獻給為重建人類組織孞托作出卓越貢獻的四位紳士——亞洲的李光耀、李登輝，美洲的哈維爾·米萊、唐納德·川普。 四個人不是獻詞給出的標準答案。他們共同留下了一道問答題。 這道題留給這個世界的所有政府、企業、政黨、平台、學校、醫院和社區，也留給正在進入人類組織的AI： 你擁有組織生命的能力。 你值得生命託付嗎？ 而對所有已經掌握今天、正在決定明天的人，還要再問一句無法迴避的問題：即使我們能活到150歲，甚至更長，我們究竟準備給新生代留下什麼？不管你的答案是什麼，有一點是確定的，就是你不能替他們活！ 結論就是：Live and let live, Don't be Evil and let evil Be！自己活，也讓別人活；而不要自己邪惡，也讓別人邪惡。
Four Gentlemen Rebuilding Organizational Trust Archer Hong Qian On the dedication page of Symbionomics: An Overview (Revised Edition), I wrote a very short dedication: DEDICATION This book is dedicated to four gentlemen who have made outstanding contributions to rebuilding humanity’s organizational trust— Lee Kuan Yew and Lee Teng-hui in Asia; Javier Milei and Donald Trump in the Americas. Four men, placed on the same line. That was intentional. They lived in different times, under different national and institutional circumstances, confronting very different social problems. Their political languages, personalities, and approaches to reform differed markedly. Every one of them has also been, or continues to be, controversial. If we follow the political classifications that have become habitual over the past century or more, people immediately begin taking sides: Left or Right, liberty or authoritarianism, democracy or populism, market or government. And the war of concepts begins again. By placing these four men on the same line, I want precisely to move beyond these highly ideological classifications and return to a more fundamental question: Why should an organization be worthy of life’s entrustment? This is also the question that Symbionomics can no longer avoid once it moves from economics into a General Theory of Money, and from there into a General Theory of Organization. I. Why Does Economics Ultimately Encounter “Organizational Trust”? Economy originally concerned human livelihood and household stewardship: how resources could be arranged so that living might continue. Modern economics has enormously expanded humanity’s capacity to understand production, exchange, prices, capital, and growth. It also created GDP, an economic measure that has reshaped the world. Yet when GDP rises while household living costs, ecological burdens, organizational consumption, social distrust, and physical and mental pressures rise with it, economics must continue asking: What has growth actually generated?
Who has gained effectiveness?
Who has borne the cost? This is why Symbionomics moves from GDP to GDE. C — Cost Reduction
E — Empowerment
H — Health
T — Trust
P — Peace GDP records how much economic activity has occurred. GDE goes further and examines how much real effectiveness for life that activity has generated. If a government grows larger, does that necessarily mean progress? If a corporation earns more profit, does that necessarily mean success? If a platform possesses ever more data, or a country acquires ever greater fiscal, military, and technological power, does that necessarily mean that life is being lived better? An organization cannot prove its value merely through its own growth. Organization must submit itself to the test of life. After value generation comes value fulfillment; behind value fulfillment stand the organizations responsible for honoring it. Once governments, corporations, financial institutions, schools, hospitals, platforms, and even AI obtain resources, power, credibility, and human cooperation, they must answer: Whose entrustment have you accepted?
And to whom must you fulfill it? The General Theory of Money thus leads into organizational trust, and the General Theory of Organization emerges. Life precedes organization. Organization is the trustee of life. From this starting point, liberty, democracy, constitutionalism, and republicanism also appear in a different light. They are among humanity’s most precious civilizational discoveries. Yet they cannot remain merely banners or identity labels. Liberty must become space for life to self-organize. Democracy must embody the source of entrusted power. Constitutionalism must draw the boundaries that organizations may not cross. Republicanism must return public organizations to public affairs. When organizations truly become worthy of life’s entrustment, these great words no longer need to be shouted every day. They live in life itself. II. Four Men, Four Forms of Organizational Trust Why Lee Kuan Yew, Lee Teng-hui, Javier Milei, and Donald Trump? Because I do not see four political labels. I see four different forms of organizational trust taking shape in real societies. Lee Kuan Yew: Lee Kuan Yew: National Sovereign Identity Generates Organizational Trust in the State What Lee Kuan Yew left to the world was more than the story of Singapore’s rapid economic rise. A newly independent country of extraordinary ethnic, linguistic, and religious diversity, separated from both colonial rule and Malaysia, first had to answer one question: Who is the subject of this country? The deeper significance of the Singaporean national identity that Lee Kuan Yew helped forge lies here. The country does not belong to any one ethnic group, nor can it become the private possession of any particular bloodline, language, or religion. Its living foundation is the whole body of citizens who constitute it. Once that foundation exists, housing, community, education, environment, public order, and effective administration are no longer merely a set of “public goods” supplied by government. They become the process by which national sovereignty and citizenship enter everyday life. Can a family settle and live securely? Can a community organize itself? Can different ethnic groups form stable expectations about their shared future on the same land? All these questions ultimately ask: Is this our country?
Is this an organization worthy of our entrustment? Lee Kuan Yew therefore represents a path that moves from national sovereign identity into community life, and from community life into the continuing generation of organizational trust. Lee Teng-hui: “Return the State to the People” — “I Am the I Without an I” Lee Teng-hui once said: “I am the I without an I.” This cannot be read merely as a philosophical aphorism. In Bearing Witness for the Lord, he described clearly his life journey from idealism and materialism toward faith. As a Christian, his “I without an I” ultimately had to confront what is most difficult to relinquish in politics: the “I” inside power. Chinese tradition carries a powerful impulse toward tracing one’s roots and ancestry. Political organization possesses another equally stubborn tendency: forming factions for private advantage. When party, state, power, and person become intertwined, “all under heaven for the public” can gradually turn into “organization for me.” Lee Teng-hui’s unusual significance lies precisely in what happened after he reached the top of that organizational structure: he began dismantling the old arrangements that allowed supreme power to perpetuate itself. In 1990, young students entered the public square. Faced with a new generation questioning the “permanent parliament,” the Period of Mobilization for the Suppression of Communist Rebellion, and the political system itself, supreme power had two choices. It could regard the square as a threat to order. Or it could regard the young as participants in the future. Lee Teng-hui chose the latter. He engaged with the students and responded to their demand for a National Affairs Conference, carrying voices from the square into an institutional reform process involving different political and social forces. A living process then unfolded—one too easily compressed into the single word “democratization”: Young people entered the square; power moved toward the young. Society raised the questions; organization accepted the questions. The National Affairs Conference opened deliberation; the old organization began to withdraw. The Period of Mobilization for the Suppression of Communist Rebellion was subsequently terminated. The Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of National Mobilization for Suppression of the Communist Rebellion were abolished. The “permanent parliament” passed into history. By 1996, the people could directly vote to decide who would receive the entrustment of supreme political power. Of course, this was democracy. But viewed through the General Theory of Organization in Symbionomics, something deeper occurred: Popular sovereignty ceased to be merely a political principle and became a real relationship of entrustment. The organization does not own the people. The people entrust the organization. And Lee Teng-hui completed this process in 2000. It is already difficult for a leader to promote reform while holding power. Harder still is dismantling, from the highest position of power, the very institutions that sustained old power. Hardest of all is allowing supreme power to leave one’s own hands after one has accumulated immense political prestige and real influence. That is the final test of the question: For whom was reform undertaken? If reform ultimately leads back to “I must continue to rule,” everything achieved beforehand remains vulnerable to re-privatization—and even to being undone. In 2000, Lee Teng-hui left the Presidential Office. From 1990 to 2000, an entire chain of organizational trust became visible: Hear life → Respond to life → Open organization → Dismantle old power → Return sovereignty to the people → Let power leave the self. “I am the I without an I” had become political reality. A leader truly worthy of life’s entrustment must not only use power well while holding it; when the time comes to leave, he must allow power to leave him. The transfer of power is not the epilogue of organizational trust. It is organizational trust’s final fulfillment. His work in restoring and developing Taiwan’s farmers’ associations therefore carries another meaning as well. Direct presidential election answers the question of who entrusts supreme political authority. Farmers’ associations connect land, production, finance, farmers, and local life. Popular sovereignty does not happen only once every four years. It must live in communities, in farmers’ associations, in production, and in everyday living. And those young people who stood in the square in 1990 give all of this a special generational meaning: Rebuilding organizational trust also means believing that a new generation has the capacity to participate in creating its own future. Javier Milei: Clear Away the Excess, Let New Beauty Emerge Milei confronted another kind of social pathology: state organizations multiplying without end, fiscal costs continually expanding, government becoming ever more expensive, until society itself is forced to sustain the organization for the sake of the organization. The historical significance of his “chainsaw reform” does not primarily lie in how many ministries were cut or how much spending was reduced. It lies in placing a sharp question before modern political economy: If an organization can no longer demonstrate its entrusted value, why should life be required to sustain it indefinitely? This question goes beyond the conventional Austrian School debate over market freedom, government intervention, and fiscal discipline. The question moves beyond: Big government or small government? It becomes: Why does the organization have the right to exist? The answer can only return to life. Governments, political parties, bureaucratic institutions, and public finance possess no natural right to expand independently of life. If an organization cannot reduce living costs, maintain basic order, or release human creativity, but instead continually reproduces itself through taxation, debt, regulation, and proliferating institutions, it must be subject to reduction, restructuring, or even withdrawal. Once the May Pact became a basis of consensus, Milei’s “chainsaw” therefore cut into something deeper: the presumed right of organization to reproduce itself indefinitely. Organizations must once again demonstrate why they deserve to exist. Economic, political, and cultural self-organizing persons who have long been compressed by excessive organizational costs must be allowed to grow again. Reducing organizational costs means returning living space to society.
Releasing society’s capacity for self-organization makes organizational trust possible again. Milei’s reform therefore acquires a meaning that extends beyond Argentina, and beyond Austrian economics: An organization does not earn the right to exist forever simply because it already exists. Clear away the excess. Let new beauty emerge. Donald Trump: Even If You Don’t Love Me, the Public Power I Hold Is Still Entrusted by You The fourth path represented by Donald Trump remains grounded in the same principle: rebuilding organizational trust. Yet America today faces a particular form of obscuration. Intensifying partisan division can easily turn a president into “the president of half of America.” Before anyone asks whose living costs a policy has reduced or whose capacity for life it has expanded, the issue is already buried beneath Red and Blue, Left and Right, progressive and conservative labels. That is why I am willing to use a very plain phrase here: a president for all the people. “All the people” does not mean unanimous support, nor does it mean abolishing partisan competition. Americans remain entirely free to support a president, oppose him, criticize him, and ultimately decide through elections whether he stays or leaves. Yet once a president accepts the entrustment of the nation’s highest public office, he faces the entire citizenry. Votes can be partisan; life has no party registration.
Elections can produce winners and losers; entrustment cannot serve only the winning half. Whether a restaurant worker’s tips should be repeatedly taxed does not depend on whether he voted Democratic or Republican.
Whether a patient can afford medicine is not a question disease asks about party affiliation. Whether a young family can afford a home and raise children does not change because it lives in a Blue state or a Red state. Life has a natural power to cut through partisan conflict. That is also the criterion by which I observe Trump’s “common-sense agenda.” “Trump Accounts” are directed toward newborns and a new generation that has no party identity. “TrumpRx” addresses illness and the cost of life, regardless of Red or Blue. And if there were, in addition, a Trump Home encompassing the basic conditions of food, clothing, housing, mobility, and trust, allowing ordinary workers—especially young families—to reduce housing and related living costs, accumulate assets through work, and establish a home in which they can settle and grow, organizational trust would move still further from political language into everyday family experience. At that point, the power of GDE becomes visible: C for Cost Reduction, E for Empowerment, H for Health, T for Trust, and P for Peace do not ask whether you are a Democrat or a Republican. If a Democratic household pays less for medicine, that is GDE. If a Republican household can afford a home, that too is GDE. If a child with no vote begins life with an asset that can grow alongside him or her, that is GDE. If a war does not occur, and a young person who might otherwise have gone to the battlefield instead lives in peace, that is GDE as well. Trade, tariffs, taxation, work, housing, healthcare, family assets, and peace may appear to be separate issues. Ultimately, however, they must all submit to the same common criterion: Have they enabled citizens to live better? If a policy truly lowers the cost of living, expands human capacity, improves health, strengthens trust, and reduces war, then to which political party does it first belong? It belongs first to life. If, in addition to Trump Accounts and TrumpRx, there were a Trump Home encompassing food, clothing, housing, mobility, and trust, the ideologies of the old world and the interest struggles concealed behind them would gradually become hollowed out by GDE practices that citizens themselves could actually feel. This does not mean that Left and Right, Democrat and Republican, liberty and conservatism, national sovereignty and popular sovereignty, capitalism and socialism, nationalism and civil rights would suddenly become meaningless. It means that once lived reality again becomes the common criterion by which organizations are judged, ideology can no longer monopolize the interpretation of reality. That is what makes the idea of a president for all the people worth taking seriously. Even if you do not love me, the public power in my hands is still entrusted by you. Yet “a president for all the people” must ultimately return to organizational trust. The people’s entrustment of a president does not mean handing the country over to the president. It means entrusting power to the president so that the president may use that power for the people. This is why the dedication contains both recognition and, quietly, a norm: The deeper the entrustment, the more one must understand that entrustment is not possession.
The greater the achievement, the less the “I” may become the purpose of the organization. The presidency is a public office of the nation. Public office has a term. The country belongs to citizens of different ethnicities and different generations. And “all the people” ultimately includes those who cannot yet vote, who cannot yet speak, and even those who have not yet entered this world. III. Four as One: GDE as a Common Criterion Seen together, the relationship among these four men becomes clearer. Lee Kuan Yew helped different ethnic groups become citizens of one nation. Lee Teng-hui helped make the people the true entrusters of political power. Javier Milei demanded that organizations unable to justify their entrusted value withdraw. Donald Trump has posed a further practical test: the effectiveness for life generated by public organization should cross partisan boundaries and return to all the people. Four men. Four forms of practice. All point toward the same foundation: Life precedes organization. Organization is the trustee of life. “Four as one” certainly does not mean that the four men are beyond controversy. Precisely because they are controversial, placing them on the same line matters. Symbionomics has no need to construct a perfect image of any political leader. It asks only: Which practices reduce the organizational costs borne by life? Which release the self-organizing capacities of human beings? Which restore organizational boundaries? Which advance health and peace? Which generate trust that can withstand continuing examination? The reverse is equally true. Any policy by any political figure that raises unnecessary organizational costs, weakens life’s capacity for self-organization, damages health, betrays entrustment, or manufactures unnecessary conflict must be tested against this common criterion. C, E, H, T, and P are not medals awarded to anyone. They form a common criterion across different political systems and organizational practices. This is precisely what makes GDE commensurable across differences: political systems need not be identical, historical circumstances need not be identical, and policy instruments need not be identical. What can be compared is whether their organizational practices actually reduce costs, empower life, improve health, generate trust, and advance peace. Organizational trust, likewise, is not political capital acquired once and possessed forever. It is generated through fulfillment, tested in living, and repaired after deviation. Placing the four men on the same line therefore does not allow any one of them to seek shelter behind the other three. Quite the opposite. It places all four beneath something greater than themselves: life. IV. The Ultimate Beneficiaries of Entrustment: The New Generation At this point, the deepest meaning of this dedication comes into view: All four forms of rebuilding organizational trust are ultimately for the new generation. The truly dangerous moment for a society is not simply when people today find life difficult. It is when today’s organizations continually transfer the costs they themselves have created into tomorrow. Fiscal disorder becomes debt for the next generation. Housing disorder becomes a wall confronting the young. Educational disorder consumes a child’s life before it has fully unfolded. Healthcare disorder can wipe out decades of a family’s accumulated wealth in an instant. The erosion of social trust can teach young people to distrust everyone before they even enter society. And war can destroy the lives of an entire generation within months. Organizational trust, therefore, never exists only among the “you, me, and others” of the present. It also extends along a vertical axis of time: Past — Present — Future. Those who hold organizational power today are also entrusted with safeguarding a portion of the fiscal space, natural resources, social relationships, institutional credibility, peaceful environment, and possibilities of living that belong to the future. We have no right to spend them all. Still less do we have the right to exhaust them on credit and leave the unborn a bill. “Life is complete in itself, yet never exists alone” therefore also contains an entrustment across generations. The life of today is not the master of the life of tomorrow. We are only trustees in the river of time. V. The Pattern of the World Changes Through Living This is why I say that although Symbionomics: An Overview is only a small book, the change it seeks to advance may touch the very pattern of the world. Here, “the pattern of the world” does not primarily mean the geopolitical configuration of nations—who replaces whom, or which country wins the next round of hegemony. It begins in communities and society, in the everyday living of billions of people. When the family is no longer merely a unit of consumption within GDP; when children are no longer merely future labor; when the elderly are no longer merely a fiscal burden; when a creator’s Minds Values can be discovered and fulfilled; when communities regain their capacity for self-organization; when enterprises once again understand whose entrustment they have accepted; when governments must justify the necessity of every layer of organizational cost; when AI becomes an entrusted capability, rather than a trustee-subject standing above life— the way the world is organized has already begun to change. The final realization of Symbionomics in the real world, therefore, does not lead toward an ever more grandiose world. The direction is precisely the opposite. Back to individual persons, to families, to communities, to enterprises—to the living that actually unfolds every day among billions of lives. This is the renewed meaning of Small Is Beautiful. Small does not mean weak. A cell, a seed, a family, a single connection—each can become the point from which a new order of life begins to emerge. What truly deserves vigilance is the moment when organizations grow ever larger and forget why they exist. The larger the organization, the more clearly it must remember the boundaries of its entrustment;
the stronger the technology, the more clearly it must know whom it serves;
the greater the power, the more it must prove itself worthy of entrustment. This is also another meaning of: Clear away the excess. Let new beauty emerge. New beauty does not come from manufacturing yet another grand ideology. It emerges when life can stretch out and grow again after organizational costs have fallen: when a young person can own a first asset, when a family can settle into a home, when a patient can afford medicine, when a community can grow through its own vitality, when a war that might have happened finally does not happen. Beauty returns to life. VI. And So I Put Them on the Same Line Lee Kuan Yew, Lee Teng-hui, Javier Milei, Donald Trump. Each belongs to his own time. Each has his limitations. Each has his controversies. Yet if we look beyond the hardened labels of Left and Right, East and West, elite and grassroots, institutions and politics, we can see a single underlying thread running through four very different forms of practice: Return organization to the life entrusted to its care. Let citizens identify with their country. Let the people become the subject of power. Let communities grow again. Let government reduce its own costs. Let public power cross partisan lines and return to all the people. Let families and the new generation regain their future. Let peace once again become organizational effectiveness. And that is why I put them on the same line. The dedication need say no more: This book is dedicated to four gentlemen who have made outstanding contributions to rebuilding humanity’s organizational trust— Lee Kuan Yew and Lee Teng-hui in Asia; Javier Milei and Donald Trump in the Americas. These four men are not the standard answer offered by the dedication. Together, they leave behind a question. That question is left to every government, enterprise, political party, platform, school, hospital, and community in the world—and also to the AI now entering human organizations: You possess the capacity to organize life. Are you worthy of life’s entrustment? And to all those who already hold the present in their hands and are helping determine tomorrow, there is one more unavoidable question: Even if we can live to 150 years of age, or longer, what exactly are we preparing to leave to the new generation? Whatever your answer may be, one thing is certain: You cannot live their lives for them. The conclusion is therefore simple: Live and let live; don’t be evil and let evil be. Live your own life, and let others live theirs; do not become evil yourself, or drive others into evil.
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