Pro-Slavery Stance & Anti-Democracy Tactics

On both sides of the Atlantic, there is a notable overlap of politicians who defend symbols and monuments that endorse a pro-slavery stance, and those who relentlessly deploy anti-democracy tactics.

Take a look at the many statutes erected to commemorate people who profited from the slave trade or built their military career on defending the system of slavery.  There are politicians who, as soon as they hear of any attempt to remove such statutes, summon up the most righteous anger to condemn anyone who dares to disrespect the country’s history.  Note they are not saying that shameful chapters of the past should not be hidden away, but that there is nothing regrettable at all about these individuals who proudly stood on the side of slavery that should make any contemporary commemoration of them unwelcome.

 

These politicians are often found amongst those keenest to use anti-democracy tactics to stop the public from holding them to account.  These tactics include: altering electoral boundaries to reduce the number of winnable seats for their opponents (widely deployed by US Republicans in states they control); the introduction of Photo ID to make it more difficult for the poor and minority groups to vote (a favourite of US Republicans and being introduced by the Conservatives in the UK); taking power from an independent body to determine what is or is not an acceptable political campaign in elections (UK Conservatives); and undermining judicial autonomy in upholding the rule of law (by packing the US Supreme Court with Republican-backed justices, or curtailing the UK Supreme Court’s ability to carry out judicial reviews of government actions).

Anti-democracy politicians often try to hide their affinity with pro-slavery traditions by misrepresenting historical connections. For example, some claim that it was the Tory MP Wilberforce who brought about the abolition of slavery. The truth is that Wilberforce was frustrated for years when his support for the abolition of slavery was repeatedly resisted by the majority of Tory MPs.  It was the Whigs – precursors of the Liberals – who championed the ant-slavery cause. When Britain abolished the slave trade in 1807, it was under a Whig Prime Minister; and it was a Whig Government that put an end to slavery throughout the British Empire in 1833.

 

In the US, contemporary Republicans are ever ready to invoke Lincoln, the Republican President who stood against the pro-slavery states’ armed attempt to break away from the United States. But many Republicans today side with those seditious confederate states in seeking to retain the symbols of their defiance in the American Civil War.  Most pertinently, the Republican Party today shares the political DNA of, not Abraham Lincoln, but Ronald Reagan – the Reagan who opposed the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act; who declared publicly that "if an individual wants to discriminate against Negroes or others in selling or renting his house, he has a right to do so”; and who as president granted tax exemption to schools that put racial segregation in place.

 

It is no coincidence that politicians who are keen to deploy anti-democracy tactics are often the ones who have no trouble backing people with a pro-slavery stance.  They don’t see the enslavement of others as an affront to society.  They believe that it is perfectly fine for them to gain wealth and status by depriving others of power.  They should not be allowed anywhere near public office.

 

--

See: ‘Reagan’s Race Record’, by Matthew Yglesias, The Atlantic November 9, 2007: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2007/11/reagans-race-record/46875/

Cooperative Problem-Solving: its historical significance

There have been many attempts to deal with sceptics and relativists who dismiss objectivity as a basis for grounding beliefs. It has almost become common to assume that no such attempt can ever succeed because some version of the infinite regress argument can always be deployed.

In short, whatever is claimed to be true, it can be asked by what criteria that claim is assessed to be true and why those criteria should be accepted as the correct ones.  To claim that it is true that those criteria are the correct ones would trigger again the question that challenges the basis for making that claim, and so on.  Either this goes on ad infinitum without any ultimate justification, or it ends abruptly at some arbitrary point.  The sceptic would take the former as pointing to the futility of looking for objective validation.  The relativist would take the latter as a reflection of one’s personal or cultural perspective as the definitive point of reference, beyond which there is no scope for settling any difference in claim assessment.

However, if we stick to the real world and recall how agreement is reached after divergent views emerge, we will come to realise that the most relevant criterion for differentiating the credibility of rival proposed solutions is the effectiveness of each in dealing with the problem they are meant to tackle.  

Historically, cooperative problem-solving first emerged through the utilisation of shared intelligence amongst primitive groups who found that bringing people’s ideas and perspectives together led to better outcomes than having one individual trying to work everything out on one’s own. Its development was disrupted, unfortunately, by the rise of rigid hierarchies, the imposition of dogmas, and the spread of superstitions and prejudices.  

The impetus for a resurgence of cooperative problem-solving came in the 16^th/17^th centuries during a period when the tightly knit power dominance of the monarch, the church, and elite scholastics was challenged by thinkers and practitioners who drew attention to the consistently greater effectiveness in finding what would work well – in governing society, guiding ways of living, evaluating claims about the world – when critical deliberations were carried out by people in collaboration, rather than unquestionable pronouncements issued by a few individuals.

From the 18^th century on, cooperative problem-solving became increasingly more sophisticated and extensively applied. It came to characterise scientific research, underpin the organisation of democratic decision-making, shape societal reflections on and shifts in customs, permeate investigative procedures in civil and criminal cases, and steer diverse practices such as teaching, engineering, and reporting. In different spheres, it was discovered that the more people could cooperate in finding ways to deal with the problems they faced, the better chance they had in arriving at workable solutions.

Furthermore, as the approaches were being taken forward and refined, a number of conditions were found to be particularly important. If people were to participate to the best of their ability in cooperative problem-solving, they needed to be accorded respect as fellow participants; freed from deception, intimidation or bribes; and given meaningful opportunities to make informed contributions. These conditions would in time be recognised as essential for people to flourish together as a community.

For much of the 20^th century, cooperative problem-solving was applied to more situations where conflicting views and incompatible assumptions needed to be resolved.  At the same time, it was so taken for granted that hardly attention was given to raising public understanding of its central value. Consequently, people who aspired to the old authoritarian ways were able to mislead large numbers of people into believing that cooperative problem-solving processes such as democratic participation, scientific peer assessment, judicial examination, journalistic verification, were all dispensable when ‘decisive leadership’ was put forward to deal with demonised scapegoats and imaginary threats.

There is an urgent need to explain why cooperative problem-solving approaches and the conditions they have found to be vital for constructive co-existence are essential for the healthy functioning of society.  Without them, we would be pushed back towards an unaccountable few dictating to us what we must believe and how we should act, all to fit in with the whims and self-centred interests of authoritarians who despise consensus and cooperation.

--

For more information on the historical background and contemporary applications of cooperative problem-solving, see:

The Evolution of Communitarian Ideas:  https://www.palgrave.com/gb/book/9783030265571

‘Cooperative problem-solving: the key to a reciprocal society’: https://henry-tam.blogspot.com/2012/10/cooperative-problem-solving-key-to.html

‘Paradigm Lost’: https://henry-tam.blogspot.com/2018/01/paradigm-lost.html

‘Question the Powerful’: quincentenary of the 1514 watershed’:

https://henry-tam.blogspot.com/2014/01/question-powerful-quincentenary-of-1514.html

‘Learning from the Civic Cooperators’: https://henry-tam.blogspot.com/2021/12/learning-from-civic-cooperators.html

 

Reminding Traditionalists of Progressive Traditions

Must communities always be caught between deference to traditions and concern for progress?

Anti-liberal traditionalists and anti-communitarian progressives have this in common – they both assume that communities are bound tightly by their own traditions, and respect for tradition is incompatible with any progressive change.  And they are both mistaken.

 

Let us start with one basic and important fact – traditions evolve over time.  What is taken as the way that has become customary for a community to behave in one period, will transform in the years and decades to come.  Some changes may be small, but others can be drastic.  Practices which may be new at one stage can become traditional later. Attitudes that are prevalent for some time may come to be mocked and discarded as time passes.

 

All such changes can happen as a result of one or more of four types of community interaction. Firstly, it may be part of a prevailing tradition to ask questions, reflect on certain issues, clear up some contradictions so as to enrich that tradition.  Secondly, followers of the tradition may want to refine it or adapt it in the light of new experiences – since what was cited as various beliefs and practices in the context of specific situations in the past, may be confronted by quite different circumstances that are not covered by previous pronouncements.  Thirdly, few communities have just one distinct, monolithic tradition, and many find that as new traditions emerge, conflicts between different traditions drive new thinking to reconcile those differences (e.g., religious sects, customs of diverse villages/clans).  Fourthly, adherence to some aspects of a tradition may simply fade because the latest generation lose interest in it, or feel there are more important things to hold their attention. 

 

Anti-liberal traditionalists are wrong to think traditions are locked in a time capsule, and communities embracing progressive change must lose their social mooring and drift into moral chaos.  Anti-communitarian progressives are mistaken in assuming that progress can never come from prevailing thoughts and practices, and only the invocation of some absolute principles transcending all communities and traditions can possibly support progressive reforms.

 

In every culture, every society today, progressive traditions can be found alongside more static traditional outlooks.  The progressive aspects of these critical improvement-seeking traditions have grown out of community interactions within the framework of a plurality of traditions. Ideas from the past do not imprison communities into an unchanging form.  They contain the germs that lead to new ways of thinking and social arrangements, and new traditions that promote progressive change.

Learning from the Civic Cooperators

Since the turn of the century, the disillusionment with conventional politics has intensified, leaving many people to either give up on democratic processes as irrelevant, or put their faith in irresponsible leaders and policies that turn out to be highly damaging for their country.

Yet as political strategists and commentators ponder what can be done differently, they continue to overlook one of the most important trends unfolding before them. From 2000s on, a growing number of practitioners, theorists, and organisations have been demonstrating how improvements to people’s quality of life can be achieved through the development of cooperative relations in and across social, economic, and political institutions.

These civic cooperators draw from the insights and practices of community development, community learning, cooperative enterprise, time banking, deliberative engagement, participatory budgeting, co-production, restorative justice, community empowerment, etc to advance a holistic approach that enables people to work effectively together to solve the problems they face.  The impact – at different levels (local, national, global) and in different sectors (private, public, voluntary) – has been substantial, both in terms of improved quality of life and a greater sense of efficacy as citizens who matter. 

Too often politicians have neglected the vast potential of communities (based in a neighbourhood, a workplace, or a shared network) to drive positive change.  Some overload them with top-down targets and controls, others leave them to flounder with neither support nor guidance.  By contrast, civic cooperators recognise that substantial evidence has shown that in order to engender the cooperative working to formulate and attain shared objectives, we need to facilitate three kinds of inter-related development.  These are:

[1] The Nurturing of Mutual Responsibility

Civic cooperators are keenly aware that leaving people to do whatever they want could end up with some being free to hurt others.  But merely invoking a list of rights and wrongs is not an adequate solution either.  Instead, through community learning, outreach, familiarisation, perspectives-sharing, the importance of mutual responsibility is to be inculcated.  Those involved may then come to see that the respect and concern they can expect from others are inextricably linked to the respect and concern they show others.  The unacceptability of discrimination and abusiveness is reinforced through relationship-building, while a sense of togetherness is built by the identification of shared interests and common objectives.

[2] The Support for Cooperative Enquiry

In parallel with coming to acquire shared concerns, any group of people seeking to address those concerns will also need to be able to reach agreement as to what are credible facts and ideas to rely on.  Civic cooperators acknowledge that neither imposing some unquestionable authority nor leaving everyone to arbitrarily accept/reject any view they please can provide a way forward.  Their answer is to give sustained support to cooperative enquiry – a much tried and tested mode of objective exploration of claims, evidence, theories, etc through transparent processes of collaborative exchange and learning, structured adjudication with built-in capacity for re-examination, and protection from manipulative distortion and groundless claims.

[3] The Promotion of Citizen Participation

The third development is to help people participate in shaping the decisions that will affect them.  The mechanisms can vary from direct voting, through engaging in deliberations in formulating policy options, to entrusting someone who will make and account for the decision taken.  What civic cooperators focus on is to ensure that the most effective means for obtaining a meaningful input are adopted in different circumstances, and that the conditions necessary for those means to be utilised fully are as well met as possible. This can involve devising participatory arrangements, organising feedback, pressing for accountability, exposing corrupt influence, instigating regulatory safeguards, and curtailing unequal power distribution.

Civic cooperators have in many parts of the world taken forward the development outlined above through the provision of advice, organisational support, and collaboration with private and public sector backers.  Political leaders should view them not as disruptive usurpers or passive agents, but as vital partners who can energise democratic working in society and enable citizens to have a positive role in improving their lives.

--

You can find out more about the ideas and practices of civic cooperators in the book, Tomorrow’s Communities: lessons for community-based transformation in the age of global crises: https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/tomorrows-communities

You may also want to explore the work of Citizen Network: https://citizen-network.org

What is Conservatism?

There is an endless supply of articles and books about the ideas and doctrines that might have shaped the politics of those who embrace Conservatism (in the sense that encompasses Conservatives in the UK and Canada, Republicans in the US, the Liberal Party in Australia, and the National Party in New Zealand). But while the works of Burke, Oakeshott, Hayek, and Scruton may provide some post-hoc rationalisation here and there, Conservative politics has never been about theoretical doctrines, but is above all a strategic agenda for defending and expanding power advantages in society.

If we look closely at what the political leadership of parties aligned with Conservatism has sought over time and in different countries, the one common feature that stands out is the focus on securing public office to help entrench arrangements that will continue to safeguard the greater wealth, status, privileges of those in dominant positions in society.  And so long as a group can gain that dominance, their interests will become paramount for the champions of Conservatism – remember how 18^thcentury Tories looked down on merchants and manufacturers but held them in high esteem in the 20^thcentury.

Correspondingly, what Conservatism stands against is any political idea, campaign, movement, or party that may challenge that dominance.  It does not matter what the reason is behind that challenge – the opposition to inequalities, concern for the environment, liberation from oppressive customs, the fight against poverty, objection to corrupt practices – so long as it poses a threat to the advantages possessed by the dominant ones, it will be a target for Conservatives to discredit and defeat.

Conservatism is not inherently kind or nasty.  Where showing kindness can promote gratitude and contentment amongst those who might otherwise start supporting their political rivals, kindness may be readily bestowed – so long as it does not undermine the overall power structure of society and the ‘have plenty’ can stay well above the ‘have little’.  Nastiness, similarly, could be brought into play if it would help to win political battles.  Stirring up prejudices against foreigners and minorities is one of the oldest tricks.  Blaming the poor for their own predicament is another favourite.  Fuelling ‘culture wars’ is a natural extension of the familiar divide-and-rule tactic.

 

Writers seeking philosophical doctrines or political theories that supposedly define (or ought to define) Conservatism may find it a diverting pastime. But ultimately, while some Conservative politicians may genuinely appreciate the intellectual respectability that such talk may confer, Conservatism is best understood as the relentless manoeuvring to protect and strengthen hierarchies and practices that serve those who have gained the most from them.

Learning to Question

When we have claims or proposals put to us, it matters if we accept them on good grounds or not.  And to establish their acceptability, we need to question them properly.  The problem is that questioning, if done arbitrarily, is no better than blind acceptance or kneejerk rejection.

Our response to a police investigation, a proposed medical treatment, a politician’s claim, or a report on economic trends, can have significant consequences for ourselves and others.  So how should we go about questioning them when no one can possibly possess the expertise to assess the myriad factors involved.

 

One thing that all citizens should learn, beyond the areas they have acquired specialist understanding about, is how to gauge the reliability of assertions when they do not possess the relevant expert knowledge themselves.  This would broadly encompass three areas of general assessment each with three tests to be applied: 

 

Structure of Content

[1] Clarity

Is what is said sufficiently clear?  Do we really know what we are being asked to give our backing to?  Is it actually fully of pseudo-profundity?  What is the substance beneath the rhetoric?

 

[2] Coherence

Does it make sense?  Does it in fact contain contradictory elements which leave it with no coherent assertion?  Can it be rephrased to that what it claims or demands is unambiguously set out?

 

[3] Correctability

Is it a circular statement in disguise?  Does it beg the question by offering, not an answer, but simply an assumption that the question has already been settled?  Is it framed in such a way that no evidence can count as disproving it?

 

These tests can reveal if any claim is ultimately vacuous, or if it has real content that one can consider with the help of other assessments.

 

State of Mind

[4] Deceitful

Are the people making the claim known for their honesty or deceitfulness?  Are they more prone to lie and misdirect to gain advantage for themselves at the expense of others? Are they accusing others with contrary views of being deceitful when past fact-checking would undermine that stance?

 

[5] Delusional

Are there signs that the people in question are susceptible to imagining what is not there? Are they known for sincerely believing what is overwhelmingly contradicted by the evidence?  

 

[6] In Denial

Have the people invested so heavily in a set of beliefs that they cannot bear to face up to the fact that those beliefs are unfounded?  Do they react in frustration and anger if any fact or argument is cited that goes against those beliefs?

 

These tests can reveal if any claim should be taken seriously, or if it should be treated with caution because of its unreliable source.

 

Standard of Reasoning

[7] Expertise in Assessment

What relevant expertise is possessed by the people making the claim? If they do not have the requisite expertise, are they drawing on what is set out by experts with an established record in the field in question?

 

[8] Evaluation System Robustness

Are there evaluation systems in place – peer reviews, watchdog, investigative reporting, audit arrangements, further research, appeal processes, etc – that can check on the robustness of the claims under consideration? Are those systems respected and operating well in the given case?  Or has the claim been made in a free-for-all forum with no independent evaluation at all?

 

[9] Evidential Support 

Is the claim backed by evidence?  How does that compare with the evidence that may support what goes against that claim? Is the evidence subject to examination? Is it open for further evidence to be obtained?

 

These tests can reveal if any claim has a high or low degree of reasonable support based on current levels of expertise and findings.  Together with the other tests mentioned above, they should be applied to claims and assertions that are put to us, especially in politics where our subsequent action (or inaction) can have major consequences for our lives.

Insanity, Terrorism, & Callous Endangerment

Does it make sense to divide people who are disposed to cause callous endangerment to others, into the distinct categories of ‘insane’ and ‘terrorist’?  We are talking about people who are prepared to end other people’s lives regardless of the arguments that go against such a course of action.  They simply shut out any objective information which shows that those they endanger ought not to be so treated.  Their empathy and reasoning have been short-circuited.

 

There is a significant overlap between the those who threaten others as a result of their coming to imagine that the murder of certain innocent people is desirable, and those who threaten others as a result of their embracing some doctrine that declares that the murder of certain innocent people is desirable?  Why should we classify a person as insane if he insists that he must kill because a voice in his head tells him to, but classify a person as a terrorist if he insists that he must kill because his God commands him to? There is no coherent basis for regarding the motive to sacrifice others for the glory of a mighty deity as a terrorist ideology, but the motive to sacrifice others for the sake of appeasing a merciless devil as a mentally disturbing fantasy.  In both cases – unless one accepts the absurd premise as a rational one – any person acting on it has to be considered as dangerously deranged.

 

Subjective intent is not relevant either.  A person acting out some deadly fantasy may think he is saving people from a corrupt world by locking them in a burning building.  Another person may think he is following the teachings of a holy figure by ending the mortal lives of a group of people he has recruited so that they can attain eternal joy more swiftly.  It is the objective harm such people can bring that must be anticipated and prevented. 

 

What about the ‘lone wolf’/‘loyal soldier’ distinction?  If the issue is the scale of operation needed to tackle the threat, then an individual acting on his own with no connection to any wider network might be easier to stop than an organisation with many members involved in multiple plots.  But depending on the weapons and the targets of attacks, one individual could in some situation pose a greater threat than a group of people.  It should also be noted that ideas that feed callous endangerment do not necessarily follow direct command structures.  Ideas that promote blind hatred and remorseless violence can encourage individuals with no formal links to organisations propagating these ideas, to vent their anger and hurt others.

 

The insanity/terrorism demarcation seems to imply that while the former is an illness that should be dealt with through psychiatric treatment, the latter is carried out on the basis of a rational commitment.  In other words, if someone commits an apparent terrorist act because of his insanity, then he is not really a terrorist.  But we understand that many who are manipulated into carrying out terrorist acts are radicalised into embracing notions that they would otherwise have rejected. Indeed, there cannot be many simpler tests of a mind’s soundness than to check its readiness to terminate the lives of innocent people [Note 1].  The extent to which the propensity for callously endangering others can be cured (deradicalised, or de-cultified) will vary in different cases.  What is needed is a unified system to identify, assess, counter, contain, and treat (if that is an option) anyone who exhibits such propensity.

 

--

Note 1: One can legitimately debate if, for example, shutting off one section of a submarine knowing that would lead to ten people being trapped behind and drowning, when it is necessary to save the whole boat from sinking and killing the entire crew of sixty on board.  However, the losing lives/saving lives issue does not apply when the ‘benefit’ invoked to justify the loss of lives only exists in the mind of the killer.