Alternative Editorial: Institutions for the Future
As we emerge out of lockdown in the UK – or so it seems – the public space is a strange mix of febrile and determined.
The challenge of the new variants of the Covid virus arriving by plane and boat is compounded by mixed thoughts about the vaccine. Plus the latest bulletin from Dominic Cummins - the PM’s recently relocated right-hand man – which claims that ‘herd immunity’ was only ever the goal of this government. That may be true or false or it could be more complicated, with a number of approaches in the political mix offered during Covid.
Not knowing whether or not the government cares about the most vulnerable is part of what makes our public spaces stressful. We are always looking for official advice on how to deal with the ongoing global pandemic. Yet we have to keep the bigger picture, who’s framing this, in our minds all the time.
Is this source of advice entirely interested in my flourishing, or only partially? Is it more important to the politician now speaking that the economy grows back stronger than ever - more than my physical safety? Or is it precisely because of our health and resilience that we need to get ourselves collectively on a better footing than before?
These are not easy questions to answer through the medium of a political system that wants simple binary solutions – choose left or right, choose pro or anti-vaccine and so on.
This week it has not only been the government in the spotlight as if continuously on trial. They were joined this week by two other pillars of the establishment – the Royal Family and the BBC.
The first is under fire from its own favourite son who has escaped the nest to set up his own soft-power base in the USA. Being suddenly released from behind the iron gates of Buckingham Palace, Prince Harry seems to be waking from a dream – suddenly understanding how ordinarily human he is, subject to the same psychological traumas as anyone. It’s quite something to observe unfolding, including how the media quickly polarises around how to respond. Do we care about the traumas of the privileged? Or who do we blame for this dysfunctional culture we are all part of?
Obliquely related is the challenge to the BBC who are accused of harbouring the same toxic journalistic culture as the tabloid newspapers they triumphed over in 2011. But whether or not Martin Bashir did intentionally manipulate Princess Diana into an interview she would not otherwise have done - this has become the portal through which the much bigger questions about power can be brought. However, this may not do much to alter the power balance since those bringing the charges are not the victims.
Again, as observers of this drama about the credibility of the BBC’s journalism unfolds, there seems to be a lack of awareness on the part of the government. Do they realize how much they themselves depend upon the BBC to deliver their own message? While Downing Street seems motivated by the idea that they are attacking the Corporation as a vehicle for the political Left, they ignore a much broader critique that comes from the wider public. Which is that the BBC maintains the dominance of the whole of the political establishment, including those on the political Left.
For example, the criticisms for a lack of diversity in the top ranks of the BBC only echoes the culture throughout party politics. We could also mount a critique of their ‘war office’ mentality when reporting conflict: this points at the whole of the political elite still in bed with the military industrial complex. Without their consistent framing around the ‘dangers of rogue states and leaders’, would we still be putting our economy and physical safety at risk by renewing Trident?
At the same time the nation’s love affair with both of these endangered institutional species – the military and Royals - is not entirely unfounded. Both provide a sense of a nation loosely but comfortably held together by common British values – although increasingly, many of us would find it difficult to name them. Here is how Jeremy Paxman might describe this marriage of convenience, one that helps most of the electorate to stay in their comfort zone, not required to take action.
According to Yougov, more people dislike capitalism (39%) than the Royal Family (25%). So why waste your time taking them down when you could be radically changing the context within which they have power? An economically fairer society would be more confident and less likely to be in thrall to the elites of all kinds.
Citizens see their children as representatives of a better future
Part of the process of that participatory shift is to create new exemplars of cultures and actors we could get behind and trust (although very little changes if we are just swapping one hero for another). Maybe the very language of ‘we should create’ betrays an old idea of agency. We should be picking up on the growing possibility of alternatives emerging from the shadows. And by shadows we don’t mean unenlightened, but arenas of activity the mainstream media rarely sheds a light on.
It’s hard to break the habit of appointing one’s own successors. In a panel we took part in this week to launch Graham Smith’s book Can Democracy Save the Future? (see our blog) much of our deliberation focused on the new institutions that might challenge the myopia and short termism of government, particularly with regard to the climate.
Smith does the public a great service by chasing through why initiatives such as the Office for Future Generations (OFGs), designed to be part of the legislature, inevitably remain under the control of the dominant system, able to reject any recommendations they make. Turkeys never vote for Christmas.
Smith backs more participation from citizens and the use of what he describes as ‘deliberative mini-publics’ (DMPs) such as citizens assemblies. Yet these are also likely to fall short of fully renewing democracy, as long as the government remains in charge of the agendas they’re set. To rescue democracy we need new institutions – amongst them the many forms of CANs - that arise spontaneously from the grassroots, bringing with them genuinely new insights and perspectives that go on to frame the questions to be discussed.
When that happens more substantively, those with the power and resources will still have to listen very hard to what is being recommended from the grassroots, if a shift towards something responsive and active is to arise.
If A/UK’s engagement at the local level is anything to go by, the climate debate is very live but not always at the centre of concerns, which actually range from material issues to educational or even cultural opportunities. However, the future for their children – particularly during the pandemic – is a subject people come back to again and again.
The top-down perspective is not enough
At this week’s Integral European Conference much of the political discussion rested on what kind of political response was possible in the age of polarisation. How could we bring those on the Left back into relationship with those on the right? We took time exploring how that current divide could be ameliorated - until we started talking about whether that divide is an authentic way of describing citizens in their daily lives.
A conflict resolution approach would only entrench a divide that may not even be correctly framed. For example, is it indeed a culture war if members of the same family turned against each other, as they did during the Brexit debate? Is it fair to measure the disconnection in economic terms, if most of the campaigns were built on emotional triggers that can impact sections of close-knit communities but not the whole?
Maybe the divide was more along lines of personal than collective agency: for example, even amongst friends there are some more concerned with “taking back control” of events than others.
If that is the case, what profit our democracy to keep moving along the party-political lines that have failed to bring us together until now? More important, perhaps, is to move away from a top-down perspective - where the most professional (those being paid to opine on the people) find it all too easy to bring their long-term habits and biases into the task of imagining the future.
Instead, they could use the community resources to build spaces, on and offline for people to move into better relationships with each other and self-organise. No doubt such spaces will need good – but local – facilitation so that the pre-fabricated divisions don’t sabotage any possibility of trust arising.
In addition, those traditionally responsible for community organising – civil society actors - will need help from music and the arts arising from within the community to allow emotions and imagination to play their part in the deliberation.
These kinds of containers – much more than the offices in Whitehall or the desks of academics – are where the new institutions capable of developing our democracy meaningfully, will develop.
