I agree that the pattern of administration in high control groups necessarily share similarities but, the Roman Catholic Church is also the archetypal and preeminent religious cult. It has been working on public relations ever since its beginnings with the superstitious Emperor Constantine and his apologist lackey Eusebius back in the fourth century. It was and remains the very model of religious power and propaganda with the lure of heaven and threats of eternal damnation should you slide from its grip.
Eleven years after the 1975 debacle, the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society moved from being nominally a collective of independent congregations regulated by Brooklyn HQ to become an organised or hierarchical religion just like its arch rival the Catholic Church which it formerly castigated for the very reason that it was hierarchical! The reasons for this assertive turn around, was surely to take control of the money and property rights of all congregations world-wide. The resulting boost in confidence I think led to the overarching ambition of the WT for political acceptance among the responsible players in the religious and financial world. The word hubris springs to mind.
One clear example of the new mood at the tail end of the last century was in joining the UN as an NGO (non-governmental organisation). This was to facilitate their expansion into countries where the body politic would naturally have barred cults like the WT. The astonishing hypocrisy of publicly condemning the UN for years and then joining it; is almost without parallel even in WT history. The exposure in the British newspaper the Guardian in October 2001 possibly marks a turning point in constraining their worldly ambition.
Significantly up until this time, the old guard governing body had been in thrall to the religious fantasies of Fred Franz up to the last and 6th president Henschel. At his death in 2003, the power was left in the hands of the governing body which had formerly been a weak force since its beginnings in 1971 but now it had taken hold of the reins of power.
A couple of years previously, their seventy five year long mantra of “the generation of 1914” had fallen off its pedestal and into the rubbish bin. What was left for the governance of the WT? Their fondness for prophetic ineptitude had been reinforced and not at all helped by the risible excuse that Jesus meant to say “overlapping generations” when the scripture unequivocally says “the generation”. The death of the 1914-generation-hope died with its proponents and left the prophetic credibility of the WT in tatters.
To survive as a corporation it needed authority which was not dependent on doctrine or disastrous prophesies. Like any business with a mass following they turned to PR companies for help. Even with professionally advised TV presentation and sassy new logo their authority has no tangible basis. Doomsday cults can never deliver and therefore can never be proved right. The RC Church although also waning in influence, only furnishes its mystical blessings to the believers but is never cursed to be dependent on Armageddon’s imminent arrival.
Also at the turn of the century the demise of printed material due to information technology as well as the prospect of taxing the sales of magazines, began to reduce income which could only force evolution in the business model for the Watchtower. This demanded they get with the revolution and in the last couple of years it has become an electronic religion to the horror of the elderly faithful.
So here we are...the Watchtower lacks authority because it always fails in its prophetic claims, it therefore shows no special evidence of divine appointment. To overcome this it uses its new electronic propaganda machine called in USA “televangelism”. The Watchtower is an unreconstructed doomsday cult and consequently has to perpetuate the imminence of Armageddon at the forefront of all things to give hope to its followers, without this dangling carrot, the Org will die. Very likely the public will also fail to be interested in Watchtower promises.
Mille, you ask what direction the WT will take. Well since they are up against declining religious belief even in the USA, the big Watchtower enemy is free information on the internet; along with the rise of education standards, they form a disaster for a doomsday cult. The internet also exposes the unsound foundations of literal belief in the Bible. The JW org is in the public eye for child abuse and its heartless response to the feelings of the abused. The JW org will increasingly look out of step with progress in the Western world where social concerns are greatly improving and personal responsibility and personal growth is encouraged. The Watchtower by contrast is intellectually bankrupt, it gives nothing to society except its false hopes and it is possibly losing its income and wealthy sponsors and is having to sell its capital assets.
Remembering an illustration from Monty Python, the outline of a sauropod starts off with a small and brainless head at ground level, then rises to a big hump and then declines to a small trailing tail. I think we are now situated just beyond the hips and descending the tail. It’s downhill from here on.