作者：华言（中国大陆）
编辑：李聪玲 责任编辑：胡丽莉
“吃饱饭，是最大的政治风险”，这不是一句玩笑，而是极权制度下隐藏的逻辑真相。它揭示了一个残酷的现实：当人民填饱了肚子，极权统治的根基便开始动摇。
极权制度依赖对社会资源的全面掌控和对个体思想的严密控制。饥饿或匮乏状态下的民众更容易被生存压力所驱使，服从权威以换取基本生存保障。这种“匮乏政治”使得极权政权能够通过分配稀缺资源来巩固权力，强化依赖关系。极权统治者深谙此道：饥饿是最好的枷锁，匮乏是最佳的统治工具。试想，在一个连面包都稀缺的社会，人民会为了什么而活？为了那一口救命的粮食，为了那一点微薄的希望。而这希望，正是统治者手中的筹码。他们用配给制、用特权、用恐惧，换取人民的顺从。极权需要的，是一个永远匮乏的社会，因为匮乏让人民低头，让反抗无从萌芽。
然而，一旦“吃饱饭”，即基本生存需求得到满足，根据马斯洛需求层次理论，民众会转向更高层次的需求，如安全、归属感、尊重，甚至自我实现。这些需求往往伴随着对自由、公平和个人权利的渴望。吃饱饭的人民，开始抬头，开始思考，开始质疑。他们不再满足于被喂食的温饱，而是渴望自由的空气、公正的天空。而这些诉求与极权制度的核心——压制异见、统一思想——相冲突，这就是极权最大的政治风险。因为一个觉醒的人民，是任何铁腕都无法锁住的。
面对这一风险，极权统治者从不坐以待毙。他们设计了一套应对之策：制造人为的匮乏，通过控制资源分配，维持民众的生存压力，限制其追求更高层次需求的空间；同时强化思想控制，宣传机器昼夜运转，强化对思想的垄断，审查无处不在，试图让人民相信极权是唯一的救赎；此外，他们还会转移矛盾，炮制外部敌人，利用外部威胁煽动民族主义情绪，转移民众对内部问题的关注，让人民将怒火投向虚构的威胁，而非真正的压迫者。
“吃饱饭是最大的政治风险”揭示了极权制度的一个悖论：经济发展是政权合法性的重要来源，但也可能动摇其控制基础。极权体制的逻辑在于通过控制资源和思想，压制民众的需求层次上升。一旦温饱解决，民众的觉醒和反抗潜力增加，迫使极权政权在开放与高压之间寻求平衡。然而，这种平衡往往是脆弱的，长期来看，压制人性需求的制度难以持续稳定。
真正的力量，不在于掌控资源与恐惧，而在于回应人民合理需求的能力。只有当温饱成为常态，思想得以呼吸，民众开始独立思考，国家才能走向良性。而看似强大的极权统治，如果仍靠人民吃不饱维系，终将不可持续，注定衰亡。
Eating well is the biggest political risk.
Abstract: Totalitarian rule is shackled by scarcity, and hunger is subject to obedience; but when the people are fed, they pursue freedom, fairness and rights, which poses the greatest risk to the regime.
Author: Huayan (Mainland China)
Editor: Li Congling Responsible Editor: Hu Lili Translator：Ming Cheng
“Eating enough is the biggest political risk”, this is not a joke, but the hidden logical truth under the totalitarian system. It reveals a cruel reality: when the people are full, the foundation of totalitarian rule begins to shake.
The totalitarian system relies on the overall control of social resources and the strict control of individual thoughts. People in a state of hunger or poverty are more likely to be driven by the pressure of survival and obey authority in exchange for basic survival guarantees. This “lack of politics” enables totalitarian regimes to consolidate power and strengthen dependence by allocating scarce resources. The politic rulers are well aware of this: hunger is the best shackle, and poverty is the best tool for domination. Imagine, in a society where even bread is scarce, what will people live for? For that life-saving grain, for that meager hope. And this hope is the chip in the hands of the ruler. They use rationing, privilege and fear in exchange for people’s obedience. What the totalitarian power needs is a society that is always scarce, because the lack makes the people bow down and the resistance can’t sprout.
However, once the basic needs of survival are met, according to Maslow’s theory of hierarchy of needs, people will turn to higher needs, such as safety, sense of belonging, respect, and even self-realization. These needs are often accompanied by the desire for freedom, fairness and personal rights. The people who were full began to look up, think and question. They are no longer satisfied with the food and clothing of being fed but yearn for free air and fair sky. And these demands conflict with the core of the totalitarian system – suppressing dissis and unifying ideas, which is the biggest political risk of the totopolitism. Because an awakened people can’t be locked by any iron fist.
In the face of this risk, totalitarian rulers never sit by and wait for death. They designed a set of countermeasures: create man-made scarcity, maintain the people’s survival pressure by controlling the allocation of resources, and limit their space to pursue higher-level needs; at the same time, strengthen thought control, propaganda machines run day and night, strengthen the monopoly of thought, and censorship is ubiquitous, trying to make people believe that totalitarianism is the only Redemption; in addition, they will also divert contradictions, concoct external enemies, use external threats to incite nationalism, divert people’s attention from internal problems, and make people turn their anger into fictional threats rather than real oppressors.
“Eating well is the biggest political risk” reveals a paradox of the totalitarian system: economic development is an important source of legitimacy for the regime, but it may also shake its control. The logic of the totalitarian system is to suppress the rising level of people’s demand by controlling resources and ideas. Once food and clothing are settled, the awakening of the people and the potential for resistance will increase, forcing the totalitarian regime to seek a balance between opening up and high pressure. However, this balance is often fragile. In the long run, the system that suppresses human needs is difficult to be sustainable and stable.
The real power lies not in controlling resources and fear, but in the ability to respond to the reasonable needs of the people. Only when food and clothing become the norm, thoughts can breathe, and people begin to think independently, can the country become benign. The seemingly powerful totalitarian rule, if it is still maintained by the people’s lack of food, will eventually be unsustainable and doomed to decline.
