Live in Truth

Every Saturday morning a message pops up on my desktop computer: “Live in Truth”.  It comes from The Power of the Powerless, by Vaclav Havel. [i]

I first learnt about Havel when I was collecting material for a seminar, and came across his talk at Philadelphia’s Independence Hall,  back in July 1994.  Havel had been awarded the Philadelphia Independence Medal, and his acceptance speech was ‘The Need for Transcendence in the Postmodern World’.  Only four pages long, but was a deep, challenging address, wide ranging in some ways, an extraordinary set of reflections from a man who had been a playwright, a philosopher, the first President of the Czech Republic for 1993-2003, and an unrelenting critic of communist regimes.  More than 25 years old, it is as fresh and relevant now as it was then.

He opened his remarks by commenting on the change he saw around him: “I think there are good reasons for suggesting that the modern age has ended. Today, many things indicate that we are going through a transitional period, when it seems that something is on the way out and something else is painfully being born. It is as if something were crumbling, decaying, and exhausting itself, while something else, still indistinct, were arising from the rubble.”  [ii]

Still indistinct and arising from the rubble?  The challenge he saw then has yet to be resolved:

We live in the postmodern world, where everything is possible and almost nothing is certain.… Politicians are rightly worried by the problem of finding the key to ensure the survival of a civilization that is global and multicultural:  how respected mechanisms of peaceful coexistence can be set up and on what set of principles they are to be established…  The central political task of the final years of this century, then, is the creation of a new model of coexistence among the various cultures, peoples, races, and religious spheres within a single interconnected civilization. … In searching for the most natural source for the creation of a new world order, we usually look to an area that is the traditional foundation of modern justice and a great achievement of the modern age: to a set of values that were first declared in this building.  I am referring to respect for the unique human being and his or her liberties and inalienable rights, and the principle that all power derives from the people.  I am referring to the fundamental ideas of modern democracy.  Even these ideas are not enough.  We must go farther and deeper.  Today, we are in a different place and facing a different situation, one to which classically modern solutions do not give a satisfactory response.  [iii]

I believe Winston Churchill said, on 11 November 1947, that “Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…”.  I assume he meant representative democracy in that pithy and pertinent remark.  He was correct.  It’s not a great system.  Can we go beyond what we have, go deeper, as Havel was asking? We haven’t yet.

Even if we haven’t been able to reach the goal Havel was suggesting, we know there are existing alternatives that should be given greater consideration.  As political scientists have pointed out, different democratic processes are more or less appropriate for different  circumstances, and suggest there are at least four different models on the table:

  • Direct democracy – where the whole community chooses policy, perhaps through a referendum
  • Representative democracy – where we elect representatives, who are our delegates and develop and determine policy on our behalf
  • Deliberative democracy – where participants are engaged in exploring the issues and developing policy: typically this takes place through a sub-group of the constituency, a mini-public as they are sometimes called
  • Participative democracy – where the whole community is involved in both determining and deciding policy

Deliberative or participative democratic systems have much to offer.  In trying to be realistic, I accept it might be better to build deliberative or participative systems within the current framework, as a way to ensure important issues are more fully explored by the community.  But any changes would have to be accompanied by increased civic awareness.

I am aware of the difficulties.  Whenever more referenda are considered, the standard argument is that government may well be ahead of the general population on a key issue.  Such is said to be the case with capital punishment, where it has been claimed the majority would support a return to capital punishment.  So not just civic awareness, but better education is needed, too.

In looking at the difference between these approaches, there are at least two factors to consider: practicality and efficiency.  These have different consequences according to the complexity of the issue under consideration, and the size of the relevant electorate.  What follows focusses on Australia, but the ideas and issues are just as relevant to the US.

Simpler issues might be addressed in one of two ways.  If the matter is consequential but clear cut, then I would suggest we should make use of referenda.  These have been relatively seldom used in Australia, and have often received a ‘No’ vote.  Failed referenda seem to be where the matter is complex and controversial.  It might be better to address such issues in a different manner – perhaps I should have said use referenda where the issues are consequential, clear cut, and where the grounds for choice are relatively simple.  This would preclude addressing such issues as abortion, gay marriage, capital punishment.  With the criteria I am suggesting, it might still be the case that the use of referenda remains relatively infrequent.

Other policy areas that appear clear cut, but where the underlying factors are complex are those where we would expect our delegates to engage in debate before they vote.  In principle, that’s a good ideas, as in a representative democracy, we delegate a representative to act on our behalf.  However, to make this work more effectively in the future, we should expect candidates for parliament to lay out a clear and detailed platform, and, where they vary from the overall party position, make this clear in their material. Otherwise we’re buying a pig in  poke.

Of course, in parliamentary debate, new complications and unanticipated related issues might emerge.  When his happens, we should expect our delegates to come back to the electorate, and explain what has emerged, to seek our feedback.  I accept there will be times when our delegate votes in a way which would not been anticipated from their electoral platform.  While this may happen, every effort should be made to ensure platforms are clear, and ‘town hall’ meetings are held to discuss and understand why our delegate’s perception of an issue has changed.  I like the principle of direct democracy, but with large or and diverse populations the representative model approach may be better suited to ensure the efficiency of the process; only smaller, more homogeneous groups can readily use more direct decision-making processes such as referenda.

However, when we turn to more complex and long-term issues where policy has to be determined, neither delegated representatives nor referenda are adequate.  In a small country like Switzerland (and in small states), a participative approach may be feasible.  The Swiss model is an aggregative one, starting with discussions at the local level with all voters taking part.  The process moves on to review at a higher level, with delegates from the first round involved; such a process might move from local government ward meetings to local government areas, then to regions, to states, and on to a final decision determined by government. Inevitably, discussions at each level could lead to more complexities being unearthed, which may require opening higher-level meetings to all, or even repeating the process.  The key is to ensure the legitimacy of decisions on policy and legislation through full community participation.

That said, participatory democracy, even in a country the size of Australia, is complex, time consuming and expensive.  With a diverse society, there is a risk of adversarial positions being adopted.  Given this, I am a supporter of the role for deliberative democracy, a form of inquiry designed to improve collective decision-making. It emphasizes the right, opportunity, and capacity of anyone who is subject to a collective decision to participate (or have their nominees participate) in the deliberations.  Words are important here, as “deliberations” must have some influence on an important issue, not just window dressing to give the appearance of participation, rather than the reality.

The most common approach to deliberative democracy has been the use of what are often called ‘minipublics’, small sub-samples of the affected population (anywhere between 20 to 2000 participants) who come together to learn about and consider ways through a specific policy issue. The most famous example of these were those held preceding the Republican Referendum in 1999 (I chaired one of these for the Knox City Council in Victoria). Another example was the Citizens Parliament held in 2009, which included 150 randomly selected participants from around Australia on the question of parliamentary reform.

There are other examples of minipublics:  Citizens’ Juries, Consensus Conferences, etc. These forums are not focus groups, which are concerned to express opinions and gather information, but they are conversations aimed at improving both understanding and decision making.  Deliberative democracy is on the agenda for political scientists, and in a worldwide political reform movement, because it offers a way to break public dissatisfaction.  As one commentator has proposed, it should “allow pretty much any kind of communication that is non-coercive, capable of inducing reflection, strives to link personal viewpoints to larger principles, and tries to make sense to others who do not share the speaker’s framework. So in this light we can (conditionally) accept the telling of personal stories, rhetoric, humour, ceremonial speech, even gossip, as well as arguments. Threats, lies, abuse, and command have no place.” [iv]  Makes sense.

Deliberative democracy complements the other ways in which citizens are able to contribute to the political process, alongside elections, letters to local members of parliament, participation in public consultation forums, through to protests.  Deliberative democracy provides a forum for discussion (i.e. deliberation), ideally accessible to all citizens who might want to take part (although practicality limits this, as in the examples given earlier).  It relies on rational, considered and relevant discussion with participants sharing a commitment to the community, or, as some would have it, the common good, not manipulation, with informing and seeking common ground.   Participation in deliberative democracy forums requires participants to engage with an open mind; willing to understand alternative positions, and attempting to understand the merits each argument might have.  Studies have shown, when the process is followed properly, there is a good deal of change to the positions of individuals, as well as an almost a universal increase in participants’ satisfaction, both for the process and the outcome.

These thoughts began with Havel’s words: “live in truth”.  After re-reading his Philadelphia address, I went back to reading that earlier essay, The Power of the Powerless, written in 1978, an examination of how the individual can resist when living in a totalitarian state.  Looking thought it now, I was shocked to see how relevant his words were to our current situation, both in the US and in Australia.  The actual phrase in his essay is ‘living in truth’, which is how he suggested people had to act in order to escape from the enveloping world of the totalitarian state.  I can’t summarise this 80-page essay, not do I have the skills or understanding to do it justice.  However, in the way that an ill-informed reader does, I am going to offer a simple precis of one part of the essay.  It goes to the heart of why, sixteen years later, Havel was stating we have to go farther and deeper than the fundamental ideas of modern democracy.

Back in 1978, Czechoslovakia was a totalitarian communist state.  The state shaped, molded and constrained what people did, every person, from the leaders to the poorest inhabitants.  The possibility of revolution was unrealistic.  What changed, at a personal level, was dissidence, to do something that made sense, whether to sing in a rock band or strive for perfection at work.  By dissident actions, people were challenging the authenticity of the state, and the state had to respond, to quell any behaviour that fell outside what was allowed.  Those tiny acts of resistance eventually created the seeds of revolution, and as it grew, so totalitarianism was overthrown.

We don’t live in a totalitarian environment yet, although we are sliding to a world in which the state and its managers are moving further and further away from the rest of society.  Democracy could become a hollow concept, a meaningless word to paper over a system run by a few for the benefit of the few, an oligarchy (or even a plutocracy).  If we acknowledge that democracy as we see it is no longer ‘democratic’, so the need to go farther and deeper is clear.  For now, we could leave representative democracy as a shell, and introduce deliberative and participative processes to recreate a democratic system where all members of the community take part in governance, developing laws and regulations, monitoring implementation, and reviewing them in terms of relevance, efficacy and ethical justification.  If you needed any evidence, look at the Global Climate Strike: governments are in denial.  It’s time to wake up, and live in truth.

[i] You can find the essay here: https://www.nonviolent-conflict.org/wp-content/uploads/1979/01/the-power-of-the-powerless.pdf

[ii] http://www.worldtrans.org/whole/havelspeech.html

[iii] Ibid

[iv] https://deldem.weblogs.anu.edu.au/2012/02/15/what-is-deliberative-democracy/

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