Tax Cuts Q&A

[Conservative politicians can’t stop talking about ‘tax cuts’. But rarely are they pressed to explain why it’s the be all and end all of their politics.  Perhaps something like the internal Q&A briefing we have for those seeking to stand as a Tory or Republican candidate may illuminate the matter]

Q: Why must I say ‘tax cuts’ at least three times at every interview?

A: People love hearing ‘tax cuts’. The more you say it, the more you’re liked.

Q: But then I have to explain public service cuts, won’t I?

A: Absolutely not. Don’t say a word about the public service cuts that will come with tax cuts. If people think you’re going to cut the health service, the police, education, housing, and all the rest, you’d be in trouble.

Q: What if someone brings it up? We cut taxes, we have less money to fund public services, public services will end up with more cuts.

A: If an interviewer does bring it up, do this – frown, look disdainful and ask rhetorically “are you yet another leftie sympathiser?”

Q: What if they brush that aside and keep pressing about the public service cuts that would result from tax cuts.

A: Then switch to this ‘full of self-confidence’ look, and say “On the contrary, tax cuts would generate more revenue, and there’d be more money for public services.”

Q: So I can promise tax cuts and more funds for public services.

A: Under no circumstance should you say that. The chance is that we would want to cut public services. Read your background papers, our tax cuts don’t generally help the economy, just our rich supporters. Things don’t trickle down. When it suits us, we would say that public finances are tight, and we must act responsibly and cut wasteful public services.

Q: And ‘wasteful’ is a code for essential public services, while our subsidies to big corporations will continue?

A: That is correct.  Furthermore, as soon as you mention public finances being in a difficult position, it’s your chance to go on about tax cuts again. Tax cuts will revive the economy.

Q: But actually tax cuts won’t revive the economy, will they?

A: Not the tax cuts we have in mind. If we cut taxes for the poorest, and increase taxes for the richest, that might help, but let’s face it, we’re going to do precisely the opposite.

Q: So, when inflation is going up, and many people on low to average income just can’t afford even the basic necessities in the face of rising prices, we will bring in tax cuts in the name of driving up spending power – but wouldn’t that push inflation up even more?

A: Just say something like “our monetarist-fiscal approach will ensure inflation is brought under control”. Nobody will have a clue what that means. We certainly don’t.

Q: Why don’t we increase public sector pay? That would nudge up private sector pay as well, and people won’t be left in such dire circumstances not being able to buy the things they desperately need.

A: First of all, we don’t want to help public sector workers. The worse things get for the public sector, the more excuse we have for cutting it. Second of all, the last thing we want is pressure on the private sector to pay the low earners more. For heaven’s sake, our main donors back us because we’re always poised to help them enrich themselves while keeping their workers’ pay as low as they can get away with.

Q: I probably should just keep going on about tax cuts and not get into any real discussion about our policies?

A: You’ve got it.

Pluralism, Not Relativism

Many people rightly support pluralism, but without due care quite a few have ended up promoting relativism.

And is that bad? Consider this.

Pluralism means that we accept there are different ways to explore problems, experience diverse forms of living, try out options in response to changing circumstances.

Relativism means that any solution put forward, every way we might treat one another, and whatever proposal offered to deal with the issues we face, is as equally valid as any other.

Pluralists believe we cannot dogmatically declare there is only one unquestionable source of information or a single set of customs by which everyone must live their lives.  We need to explore and experiment, criticise and compare, and see what we can learn from the results of diverse pursuits in science, culture, and politics.

Relativists, on the other hand, are adamant that regardless of what have been found, there is nothing to choose between different responses to questions about causal relations, moral requirements, or policy efficacy. However incompatible they are to each other, contrary to the available evidence, or inherently incoherent, every view is correct in its own right.

While pluralism enables people to follow diverse paths – provided they do not harm others – relativism leads us to the dubious position of standing back from criticising, let alone preventing, any behaviour even though it is damaging other people’s lives.  The problem here is that flawed reasoning can take us from embracing all harmless ways to seek answers in life, to passing no judgement on anything regardless of the harm it is causing.

For example, we should test out different scientific hypotheses rather than simply claim we somehow know which is correct; we should let people follow diverse religious practices to connect with their sense of the divine; and we should be open-minded in considering the merits of a variety of policies to improve community relations. However, it makes no sense to pretend that a hypothesis which has failed every test is as valid as one which has been confirmed by nearly all experiments; a practice that calls for taking others’ lives cannot be tolerated in the name of religious freedom; and any policy involving the promotion of hatred and violence against vulnerable groups cannot be regarded as a viable option for increasing social harmony.

Some argue that it comes down to the interpretation of the evidence.  But is there to be no differentiation between sound and untenable interpretations? What if someone maintains that what others see as a failed experiment is a case of them being deceived by the devil, or the apparent suffering of a child is actually a sign of ‘god’ welcoming the child into heaven.  What this tells us is that we must have objective means to assess what we experience.  We must openly test and cross-check our respective records and observations, and arrive at conclusions that stand up to shared scrutiny.  If any experience can just be interpreted in any way that someone wants to, and that is declared valid beyond all criticism, then we would be at the end of all possible discussion.

The ‘Strongmen’ Delusion

There was a time in the 1990s when, following the end of Soviet rule and the South African apartheid regime, there was widespread hope that the authoritarianism personified by the likes of Hitler and Stalin had become a thing of the past.  But that optimism proved short-lived.

In the West, the Watergate experience of holding US President Nixon to account for breaking the law has given way to Republicans backing Trump in undermining the electoral system and instigating the storming of the Capitol. In the East, China’s decision to avoid a repeat of Mao by sharing out the top power positions was nullified by the Communist Party’s acceptance of Xi Jinping’s moves to concentrate power in himself. In Russia, Gorbachev’s attempts to move towards open democratic rule have been firmly reversed by Putin. The collapse of dictatorships in many other parts of the world during the 1990s has been succeeded by a return to power of numerous right-wing authoritarians.

Many indicators point to a resurgence of ‘Strongmen’ politics. A survey in the run-up to the 2016 US presidential elections found that over a third of voters (Democrats as well as Republicans) said that “being a strong leader was the most important quality when picking a president” – doubled the level for the 2012 elections (Easley, 2016). A study by the Hansard Society reported that over half of the British voters questioned wanted "a strong leader willing to break the rules," with 42% of them going so far as to believe that “many of the country's problems could be dealt with more effectively if the government didn't have to worry so much about votes in Parliament” (John, 2019). Significant electoral gains by authoritarian nationalist politicians in Europe, and victories for the likes of Modi, Duterte, Bolsonaro, confirm the trend of a global expansion of illiberal political control (Repucci & Slipowitz, 2022).

Is this trend irreversible? One thing we must remember is that authoritarians are adept at fooling people, but not for long. Their inherent traits of seeking to dominate others for their personal gains irrespective of the harm to others are inevitably exposed. They all divert vast sums of public money to benefit themselves, use state security to intimidate opposition, prefer to keep a small clique of wealthy elite on side while ignoring the plight of the masses, waste public funds on vanity projects, stir up animosity against vulnerable scapegoats, undermine judicial independence, and subvert electoral arrangements to suit their own ambitions.  After they have won power, their callousness and incompetence invariably increase public suffering.  The problem is that after a few decades, later generations forget what happened before, and too many fall for the lies and pseudo-patriotism again.

To halt the spread of authoritarianism, we must constantly remind people of its false promises and calamitous consequences. Furthermore, we should recognise that strong leadership is important when people need assurance that effective actions would be taken, and it ought to be provided in a form that legitimately inspires confidence, rather than through the rhetorical trickery offered by the authoritarian ‘strongmen’ type.

Researchers from London Business School (Hemant Kakkar and Niro Sivanathan) examined the preferences of 140,000 people in 69 countries over the last two decades, and found that loss of job security and increasing economic hardships tend to lead more people to seek out leaders who give the impression that they would do whatever it takes to get things done (Ferris, 2018). With economic problems worsening, it must not be left to bullish charlatans to present themselves as the only ‘strong’ leaders around.  Progressive politicians have to step up and show the public their passion, determination, and focus in getting everyone to a better tomorrow.

After all, the greatest political leaders who have delivered substantial and lasting improvements to people’s lives in the most challenging of times – think of F. D. Roosevelt, Clement Attlee – are far from meek and hesitant. Others threw the wildest accusations against them, denounced them relentlessly, but they were bold in their vision, and formidable in driving through the necessary changes. The strength they showed is the real strength we now need.

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References:

Easley, Cameron (2016) ‘Voters Want a Strong Leader More Than Anything Else, Exit Poll Shows’, Morning Consult (November 8) . https://morningconsult.com/2016/11/08/voters-want-strong-leader-anything-else-exit-poll-shows/

Ferris, Robert (2018) ‘Why voters might be choosing dominant, authoritarian leaders around the world’, CNBC (June 12) . https://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/12/why-voters-might-be-choosing-dominant-authoritarian-leaders-around-the-world.html

John, Tara (2019) ‘More than half of UK voters want 'strong, rule-breaking' leader, says survey’, CNN (April 8) . https://edition.cnn.com/2019/04/08/uk/hansard-strong-leader-brexit-poll-gbr-intl/index.html

Repucci, S. and Slipowitz, A. (2022) ‘The Global Expansion of Authoritarian Rule’, Freedom House. https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2022/global-expansion-authoritarian-rule

Politics & the Need for Belonging

Progressives tend to have a common frustration – policies which on any objective analysis would improve people’s quality of life end up time and time again being sidelined because more voters give their support to politicians who reject those policies. Worst of all, what those anti-progressive politicians offer instead are actions that would cause greater harm and suffering for most people.

Repeatedly we see charlatans elected on the basis of their rhetoric about helping people take back control, regain their freedom, become great again – when in practice they invariably prioritise the use of legislative power and public resources to help corporate collaborators, and undermine services for the common good and cut support for those in need.

Right-leaning media and manipulation of social media play their part in political deception, but the deeper question is why large number of people are so susceptible to such lies.

At the heart of the matter is the need for belonging.

We all want to belong to something larger than ourselves – a set of mutually supportive relationships with family and friends; a group with shared interests, expertise, concerns; or a set of connections derived from common customs, beliefs, nationality. When people find themselves cut off from these, they tend to become more driven than ever to find something else that would include them as “one of their own”.

Since the 1980s, the rise of market individualism – encapsulated by phrases such as “there is no such thing as society” and “greed is good” – has led to large scale disruption of social connections. Actively supported by Thatcher, Reagan and other champions of the New Right, profiteering became the overriding force in takeovers, asset stripping, mass redundancies, with worker unions drastically weakened, and public infrastructure for collective protection privatised or dismantled.

Hit by rapid changes and constant economic uncertainties, more and more families came under mounting strain, schools were turned into training centres for corporate fodder, the workplace seized to be a source of social bonds, and communities were shattered by corporate decisions which served owners who lived far away with no concern for the socio-economic devastation they left behind.

Over the last few decades, as increasing number of people yearn to find substitutes for the connections that have been lost, the New Right has taken their celebration of egoism to the next level – now their mantra is Don’t let anyone get in your way of getting what you want, namely, the GOOD OLD DAYS. The ‘good old days’, it turns out, means a time when every man (yes, man) is free to do whatever it takes to pursue HIS dream, without any government getting in his way with taxes, immigrants taking away his livelihood, unions obstructing his employment choices, women demanding their rights, or ‘deviants’ trampling all over sacred traditions.

This ‘Good Old Days’ shtick – in its MAGA, Brexit, or other guises – has proven to be extremely attractive for a lot of people, making them feel that for all the important things they have lost, they have gained the precious status of belonging to a group who will stand together for a return to the time when a man can freely blame and insult whomever he wants.

The only way to help people get out of this fog of lies and misdirection, is to show them that there is something genuinely meaningful and valuable that they can be a part of – a community wherein they will be respected as they respect others, given a helping hand if they need one as they are ready to lend a hand to those in need, and able to attain a far better quality of life for themselves and their families than if people were left to the mercy of powerful exploiters.

Who Helps Wins

Progressive politicians keep bemoaning the challenges they face. The Right get more money to generate publicity, have no compunction with pumping out fake news, are devious with deploying misleading claims, and can always count on media moguls happy to divert public frustration towards a multitude of scapegoats. In response, progressives struggle to come up with strategies, slogans, narratives, that would win over the electorate.

But what people want is real help with their problems. They are not asking for a political vision to change their world. They are not waiting for a new narrative to reframe public debates. They are certainly not pondering as to which party can come up with a more convincing strategy. They just want help with what is making their lives difficult, and they are desperate to find out if someone will offer it.

In the US, the Democrats are dreading they will lose control of Congress because, among other things, they have not managed to pass the Build Back Better plan with its promise of nearly $2 trillion social spending. In the UK, Labour’s pinning its hope on the Tories imploding over Partygate while its own offer is still barely registered with the public. In France, the Left were not even able to mount a challenge to Macron in the presidential run-off when that was taken up by the far-right instead.

Again and again, progressives find themselves stuck in the shadow, hardly seen as the political force dedicated to solving problems inclusively and democratically, but mostly caricaturised as figures obsessed with issues tangential to people’s everyday concerns. What they must do is focus on giving people the help they really want – help with the setting up of thriving enterprise, obtaining decent jobs, meeting the basic needs for food and energy, securing an affordable home, having access to good healthcare, living in friendly and stable communities, and being well protected from bigotry and criminal behaviour.

Progressive groups should form social enterprise to offer goods and services at the lowest possible prices, organise community support networks to provide for those caught in poverty, and develop advisory and advocacy service to help people get what they need from private and public bodies (e.g., jobs, housing, utilities), especially if any of these prove to be unresponsive or discriminatory. Fund raising, income generation, and volunteer support would be channelled to sustain and where appropriate, expand these provisions.

Instead of asking for donations to run election campaigns which connect with people only once every so many years, this help-focused approach would create a day-to-day relationship for progressives and the communities they work with. As part of this process, they can readily explain that things can improve further provided key obstacles are removed through particular local and central government actions, and these will happen if the people themselves back the progressives in the elections to come.

There is no mystery to how community-based enterprise and support network can be successfully developed.  The book, Tomorrow’s Communities, is full of evidence and examples regarding how it can be done. The challenge is to integrate that into progressive grassroot politics. Make the offer of help an everyday experience for all who seek it.

Who helps wins.

The Case for Communitarian Democracy

It is not uncommon to hear phrases such as ‘we must defend democracy’, ‘that is undemocratic’, or ‘democracy is not good enough’, but how often are people clear about what they mean by ‘democracy’?

‘Democracy’ means many things – a multi-party electoral system; majority rule; power sharing amongst all citizens; accountable government; participatory decision-making; equality of political status; one person, one vote; every vote carrying the same electoral weight.  When some want to promote democracy, and others lament its shortcomings, they might not so much be contradicting each other as talking about quite different forms of governance.

What is distinctive about communitarian democracy is that it addresses the vulnerabilities of relatively superficial forms of electoral politics, and formulates requirements which would maximise the equal and deliberative input of all members of society in shaping how they are governed.

It has three main components, and each of these has three conditions, giving a total of nine requirements to meet to secure effective democratic governance:

[A] TOGETHERNESS: citizens should be connected through a sense of mutual responsibility; they need to recognise each other as interdependent members of society with common concerns.

[1] Shared Mission:

Solidarity should be cultivated by facilitating people in developing a practical understanding of what they seek together – such as the pursuit of security, the improvement of living conditions, or other objectives that matter to everyone.

[2] Mutual Respect:

There can be little trust in any collective decision-making arrangements if certain groups and individuals are discriminated against.  Mutual respect must be taught and safeguarded against exclusionary tactics such as targeted insult and intimidation, or the promotion of racial or cultural divisiveness.

[3] Coherent Membership:

Responsive governance needs those under its jurisdiction to understand and appreciate why they benefit from that common jurisdiction.  Citizenship should be grounded on the awareness of their rights and responsibilities, and the conditions for bringing in new members as well as the criteria for suspending membership terms.

[B] OBJECTIVITY:citizens should be able to reason and judge through cooperative enquiry; their deliberations must be protected by safeguards for impartiality and enforcement against deception.

[4] Collaborative Learning:

To steer clear of both the autocracy imposed by some know-it-all and the anarchy of perpetual disputes, we need cultural and organisational arrangements to advance extensive collaborative learning to build a shared and dependable knowledge base.

[5] Critical Re-examination:

A system of critical re-examination, that will review ideas in the light of the evidence and cogent arguments, is needed to minimise the likelihood of people stepping back from reasoned deliberations with others, or holding their own views as unquestionable for all time.

[6] Responsible Communication:

Reliable governance calls for safeguards against irresponsible communication which might otherwise undermine objective deliberations and cast a shadow over the prospect of citizens attaining a shared understanding of what they should do as a group.

[C] POWER BALANCE:collective decisions should be made on the basis of citizen participation; arrangements and reforms are needed to enable citizens to have an equal say in shaping public policies.

[7] Participatory Decision-Making:

Inclusive governance requires the adoption of tried and tested participatory practices that make it possible for citizens to engage deliberatively in a wider range of pubic decisions, and give everyone a fair share of influence so that none may come to dominate others.

[8] Civic Parity:

There should be no unbridgeable gulf between the influence different groups of citizens can bring to bear on the rules and practices that affect them all, and this necessitates limits on inequalities in wealth, political connections, and social status.

[9] Public Accountability: 

Collective self-governance requires a distribution of power that will enable any given group to hold to account anyone in that group whose actions impact on the lives of others. This needs to be sustained by an effective system of public accountability.

Instead of defending or denigrating ‘democracy’ when it merely refers to some superficial form of electoral system, we should focus our energy on developing the kind of governance that we really need as a society – that of communitarian democracy.

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For a detailed exposition of communitarian democracy, see Time to Save Democracy: https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/time-to-save-democracy

Persuading Al Capone

Whenever someone suggests introducing legal restrictions on a particular type of behaviour, even where it is generally agreed that the behaviour is dangerous and harmful, it may be questioned if we should rely on persuasion rather than regulation to contain it.

We can all accept that if persuasion can by itself stop the undesirable behaviour in question, then it would be preferable not only because it is a less costly option, but also because it is a better moral outcome if people choose to do the right thing in accordance with what they accept as correct, and not just out of fear of punishment for breaking a rule.

However, there is clearly a limit to persuasion. The problem with the mantra of placing total reliance on persuasive approaches alone is that it ignores the consequences of those approaches falling short – taking too long, not reaching enough people, or simply not halting the harmful behaviour.

Some people just would not listen to arguments. Imagine in the name of ‘freedom’, there is no legal rule governing driving.  Anyone can drive if they want, though they are told that it would be safer for everyone if they would pass a driving test first.  Inevitably, there will be those who drive without having taken any lesson, speed along narrow roads, get drunk before their journey, or take dangerous risks as they head towards a zebra crossing.  

From organised crime to callous individual acts of spreading dangerous diseases to vulnerable people, there are countless cases of people engaging in harmful activities even when there are legal restrictions against them.  Only a fantasist could suppose that in the absence of all regulations, such people would suddenly acquire a sense of responsibility, and stop putting their own greed and impulse above the wellbeing of others.

One may wonder why some politicians still insist that persuasion is the limit of what we should do to curtail harmful behaviour. Do they know some secret persuasive technique they have yet to share with the rest of us?  Are they in possession of a style of communication that can change the most self-centred or thoughtless individuals into socially minded citizens?

In truth, there are two reasons why these politicians champion persuasion as the only acceptable policy tool – in very specific cases.  One reason is that they do not actually in the cases in question want the harmful behaviour to stop.  Be it climate change, pollution, threats to health and safety, job insecurity, etc., they directly or indirectly (through links to donors and potential benefactors) have an interest in ensuring there is no legal impediment to corporations maximising their financial gains at the expense of other people.  In short, they want to stick with persuasion when anything with legal force would curtail the activities in question and hence impinge on their own pecuniary interests.

The other reason is that with harmful behaviour such as racist, sexist, bigoted, intimidatory acts, these politicians calculate that siding with the perpetrators of these acts by keeping legal intervention at bay, would help them gain electoral support.  By constantly speaking out against the ‘threat to freedom’ of any legal restriction against these types of harmful behaviour, they present themselves as defenders of the ‘right’ to spew hatred and prejudice.

There is little point in trying to convince these politicians that persuasion may not always be enough.  In those cases where they insist on persuasion as the limit to what any government should do, the task for society is to expose their self-serving interests as the indefensible basis of their position.