Many nations have built power and wealth through unequal systems, even while claiming to value justice and equality. All over the world, people continue to fight for equality: they fight for their rights as well as their privileges, not as citizens of a specific country but rather as citizens of the world. Complex societies have been dated back to approximately six thousand years, and with the developments of our world came the developments of inequalities. At this very moment, people are fighting for LGBTQ+ rights, racial justice, gender justice, constitutional rights, digital rights, and more. This fight has persisted over many generations, and even though people attempt to solve these issues through utopian ideals, we have never truly achieved the “perfect” world with “equality for all”.
While any state of inequality is unfair and unjust in society, a certain amount of it is what countries around the world thrive off of. It is clear that any extreme inequalities lead to war and armed conflicts, but minor unjust practices made by the powerful are what set countries apart from the majority. Movements that fight against the inequalities create important social change, but the ideal version of society has never been achieved.
Even though these imbalances of power are global, the success of countries is global as well. The success of a nation (on the national stage) depends on its internal political stability, foreign standings, military power, economic/financial status, respected/effective leadership, and more. Take, for example, the United States during the Gilded Age. The term “gilded” refers to something that is coated with a layer of gold. This time period led to an idea of American success that covered the internal struggles of those in the lower social classes. Wealthy industrialists such as Carnegie and Rockefeller gained enormous fortunes through their specialized industries, but while their work helped the US become a leading economic power, it came at the cost of the working class. Instances such as the Pullman Strike (a significant labor dispute in the United States that unfolded during a severe economic depression) demonstrated the gap in success between the industrialists and their workers. The “Robber barons” of the time reached new levels of financial success, and the working class reached new lows, not only financially but also in their wages, working conditions, and long hours. Overall, though the country was doing well on the global stage, the financial successes portrayed an image of power and peace even while the labor class was struggling to make ends meet.
Many people interpret this time as a representation of internal corruption, and while it is indefinitely an example of that, it is also a representation of how certain levels of inequality allow for a greater public image that focuses on the surface of the situation. Americans gained a lot of foreign power at this time period due to this image, allowing them to intervene in foreign markets and international events. They developed their image as a rising world power and built their industrial wealth, which allowed them to spread into markets and make international changes. But the success helped conceal the hidden lack of equality within the borders. None of this is to say that our country is perfect, or that inequality is good and should be attained. It is rather a reality check, to recognize that the fight for equality is in progress but the final destination has not been reached yet. While we all continue to fight for our rights and our individual power, complete equality remains difficult to achieve as the world thrives on those imbalances of power structures. We all climb up the ladder, fall off, and then do it all over again. This is what makes the rich richer and the poor poorer. There is a cycle to life just as there is a cycle to power, but we as a society must look past the overall illusion of success and identify who truly pays the cost for each win.
