Playing Not to Lose

This post at Instapundit points out the foundation of good strategy and ties nicely to my last post about some people thinking that all struggles—especially wars—are useless. The general rule of strategy is that you have to know what your goals are and, in choosing your ground, have to understand whether the rules of the game allow you to meet your goals. The post describes the current fighting between Israel and Hezbullah as what is known in game theory as a "dollar auction," which is the type of auction where you pay your highest bid whether or not you win. Though you may not realize it when you start, the rules of this type of auction force you to keep bidding just so that you do not lose. Once you are in this type of game, the only way not to lose is to keep playing because, even if you win, the price you pay will not be worth what you are bidding on. The only way to win this type of game is NOT to play. In business, we describe this idea as "sunk costs." You have to put sunk costs behind you or else you get trapped into putting more and more money into something that isn't working in hopes of making those past investments worthwhile. This doesn't ever work. So, if war ALWAYS a dollar game? Is the only way to win not to play? To accept that way of thinking is to believe that there is nothing worth fighting for. To believe that nothing is worth fighting for is to believe that there is no such thing as political or economic progress. This flies in the face of reality. A hundred years ago, there were very only a handful of politically and economically free nations in the world. 99% of the world was once dominated by born aristocrats and controlled by divinely ordained rulers. Today, real dictators are growing generally more rare and more and more people can determine the course of their own lives. Everyone, even those who consider themselves elites, are living longer and better as the result of each person having more individual control over their lives. This spread of democracy has been made possible by wars, both hot and cold. The problem is that too often, people do not recognize success even when they are living it.