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Sydney Morning Herald
August 7,
2003
Summary: Candidate for
presidency of the Australian Labor Party presents a manifesto
stating her beliefs about Australian politics and democracy. She
believes that full representation (proportional representation)
leads to higher turnout and fewer wasted votes.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/08/07/1060145791873.html
Sydney Morning Herald, Australia
Ideas to
save our withering democracy
By Carmen Lawrence
August 7, 2003
"Individualism ... disposes each member of the community to sever
himself from the mass of his fellows and to draw apart with his
family and his friends, so that after he has thus formed a little
circle of his own, he willingly leaves society at large to itself.
... Individualism, at first, only saps the virtues of public life;
but, in the long-run, it attacks and destroys all others, and is at
length absorbed in downright selfishness." Alexis de Tocqueville,
Democracy in America, 1835, Second Book, Chapter II. As the attack
on Iraq was launched we were nightly exposed to earnest,
brow-furrowing admonitions from Bush, Blair and Howard to endorse
the war because we were obliged to bring democracy and freedom to
Iraq and, in time, to the whole of the Middle East. We were told it
was imperative - at least once it became clear that the weapons of
mass destruction argument had lost credibility - that we destroy the
oppressive, autocratic and brutal regime of Saddam Hussein and
replace it by a democratic system of government. Some had the
temerity to ask why we'd been so slow to recognise the plight of the
Iraqi people, why the West had backed Hussein and supplied him with
the finance and the means to wage war and why we punished those who
fled in terror from Saddam Hussein's brutality and locked them away
in remote camps? These questions remain unanswered. But some of us
also asked what sort of democracy the allies might be thinking of
exporting, like instant food, to the people of Iraq. What exactly do
we mean by democracy? What are the key values and characteristics of
modern democracies? How do we judge the success of the democracies
currently in operation and which forms should we be recommending to
the newly emerging democracies? Just how democratic is the
Australian - and for that matter - the United States political
system? Does our performance measure up to the rhetoric? Ian
McAllister describes a "surge" in democracy in the late 20th
century, so that by its end, 120 of the world's 192 countries - many
of them former communist regimes - had embraced some form of
democracy as their system of government with varying degrees of
success. (1) In thinking about democracy most of us would point to
the minimum requirement of popular control and political equality
(see International Institute for Democracy and Electoral
Assistance). In judging any democracy, most of us would want to go
beyond these two simple features to include the protection of civil
liberties and human rights, particularly against crude
majoritarianism and sectional interests. A recently established
Australian National University research project, The Democratic
Audit of Australia, also includes the quality of public debate and
discussion, assessing "the degree to which debate and discussion can
be distorted by manipulation, strategising, deception and
restrictions on allowable communication". Many, myself included,
would add the extent to which citizens actively participate (beyond
the simple act of voting) in the political life of the country.
When people at large are questioned about the key values of
democracy, the vast majority agree about the need for free and fair
elections, freedom of speech, equality before the law, active
citizen participation and the protection of minority rights. These
are the desiderata of modern democracies. When measured against
these objectives, I believe we are falling short. Ours is a
withering democracy. Representative Democracy As we contemplate
the health of our democracies, we should be reminded that the
evolution of modern representative democracies was accompanied by a
"powerful distrust of the people", of the poor, the poorly educated
and women, who were initially excluded altogether and had to fight
to gain suffrage. This distrust - and the practical difficulties of
operating direct democracies in large populations and territories -
was one of the reasons that representative government gained favour
over more direct, Athenian forms of democracy. Even Madison, one of
the founding fathers of the U.S. system of government, argued that
citizens could not be trusted to identify the "permanent and
aggregate interests of the community", a task best left to elected
representatives chosen by the people, not the people themselves.
Echoes of this view are evident in the nervousness with which the
U.S. government has approached the possibility of control by the
Shi-ite religious majority in Iraq. It also underlies some of the
contemporary reluctance of political parties to allow their members
to have a say in forming policy. Initially this representative form
of government, which keeps the people at arm's length from the
actual work of government, was not even considered a true democracy.
In such systems, the work of government is conducted by the
"elective aristocracy", to use Jefferson's term, and is mediated by
political parties. This classical form of representative democracy
is often considered non-participatory and elitist - a "thin
democracy", as Barber describes it. In such democracies, citizens
are relatively passive. At best, they are monitors - experts and
elites do the actual work of government. Political parties are
central to the functioning of modern democracies. Indeed, in 1941
the political scientist E.E. Schnattschneider asserted that "modern
democracy is unthinkable save in terms of political parties", a view
which is reflected in most of the academic literature and reinforced
by the evidence that no representative democracies appear to operate
without them. The received wisdom is that political parties are key
institutions for linking the various elements of the democratic
process to ensure efficient and effective government. As Dalton and
Wattenberg put it: "Political parties have created political
identities, framed electoral choices, recruited candidates,
organised elections, defined the structure of legislative politics
and determined the outputs of government." For better or worse,
they are firmly embedded in the political landscape and any
assessment of the health of democracies must include an assessment
of the health of the political parties, especially of the extent to
which they mediate the relationship between the community and their
elected representatives. The State of Democracy: Healthy or
Diseased? It is fair to say that democracy has generally functioned
reasonably well when assessed against competing forms of government
and methods for organising society. Democracy has characteristically
produced societies that have been relatively "humane, flexible,
productive, and vigorous". However, democracy is also characterised
by "unsightly and factionalised squabbling by self-interested,
short-sighted people and groups". Furthermore, the policy outcomes
often result from "special pleading" from those best placed to
"adroitly pressure and manipulate the system". Many commentators,
here and elsewhere, observe that many citizens do not display the
deliberative qualities theorists held to be central to the effective
functioning of a democracy. Indeed, many display an almost
monumental lack of political interest and knowledge. On the other
hand, as Arendt has argued, politics as it practiced infantilises
citizens who act as though power can only be gained by begging for
it from a reluctant state. There is a palpable cynicism routinely
expressed by the public in democracies here and elsewhere,
especially about political parties. A large number of studies
indicate deterioration on this front. There is some evidence that
cynicism, discontent, frustration, and a sense of disempowerment and
helplessness have markedly increased in recent years in most mature
democracies. Various explanations are offered for these changes and
remedies proffered. One recent assessment of trends in attitudes
toward political institutions and democratic government confirms
that "citizens have grown more distant from political parties, more
critical of political elites and political institutions and less
positive toward government". The authors describe these as
"fundamental changes" in the political orientation over the past
generation. International comparisons show that these trends are
characteristic of almost all the established democracies - and even
some of the emerging ones. In particular, there is substantial
evidence which points to a pattern of what has been called "partisan
decline", characterised by a declining role for the members of
political parties in shaping policies and a reduction in the
identification of voters with the major political parties. A recent
comprehensive assessment of the advanced industrial democracies
found a general decline between the 60s and the 90s in the
percentage of people who identified strongly with any particular
party, a pattern also evident in Australia, which showed a 15%
decline. These trends were more pronounced among the well-educated
and the young, many of whom remain intensely interested in political
issues, although not necessarily in participation. In fact, overall
interest in politics appears to be increasing at the same time as
participation in campaigns and volunteer work for political parties
is decreasing. The same research project traced the consequences
for political behaviour of these changes. They reported bigger
swings in election results on average, increasing fragmentation of
political parties, a greater tendency of people to shift their votes
between elections and to delay making decisions about their voting
intentions until the last minute. More strategic voting is evident
and where voting is not compulsory, voter turnout is in sharp
decline. Paradoxically, as parties are declining at the electorate
level and party members have less influence on policy and strategy,
the influence and control of central party organisations on
campaigns and at the parliamentary level is stronger than ever. The
responses of the political parties to these changes are likely to
exacerbate both the cynicism and the disengagement. More campaigns
are candidate and leadership focused and opinion polling, rather
than party ideology, is more likely to inform policy decisions. One
contributor to an Internet discussion group reflected a commonly
held sentiment when he wrote?: "The 'business of government' is
very sick indeed. If it were a real business it would have gone
bankrupt long ago. It has lost most of its clients' loyalty that's
for sure. The only reason they keep buying is that it is a monopoly
and they have nowhere else to go." It may be tempting for
politicians to dismiss such criticisms as the predictable whinging
of malcontents, but it would be folly to do so. The growing clamour
of such voices suggests there is more at stake. It is not simply the
decline in political trust that has been noted in many evaluations
of politicians and political elites, nor is it simply that the
deference to authority once common in many Western democracies has
been replaced by public scepticism of elites. Of greater concern for
the future health of our democracy is that these feelings of
mistrust have broadened to include the political regime and
political institutions. To date, this scepticism appears not to
have significantly affected support for the democratic creed itself,
although the risk is that failure to participate will eventually
corrode commitment. While people are not yet abandoning democratic
principles, they are critical of how these principles are
functioning in our system of representative democracy. Citizens are
frustrated with how contemporary democratic systems work - or how
they do not work. The solution, then, would appear to be to improve
the democratic process and democratic institutions, not to accept
non-democratic alternatives. People want democracy to work.
Democracy in Australia In Australia too there appears to be a
growing conviction that our political system needs to change; that
the fundamentals of the democratic contract have been corrupted.
Many Australians are disgruntled by a system which does not appear
to respond to their needs and seems, increasingly, to be in the
hands of elites more interested in their own advancement than the
general good. As a result, our political system has less and less
legitimacy. Others have characterised this as a crisis which ranges
across many of our democratic institutions and processes: our
outdated constitution; the Byzantine, power-focused behaviour of our
major political parties; the disquieting alliance of our political
parties with corporations and large organisations; the control of
our political parties by privileged minorities; the seeming
irrelevance of much parliamentary debate and political discourse in
the media; the pervasive use of propaganda to influence public
opinion; the steady erosion of civil rights and minority interests;
the increasingly blatant politicisation of the public service; the
permanent state of vitriolic antagonism between the major parties;
the elevation of executive secrecy above public disclosure; the
readiness of government to mislead both the people and the
parliament; the winner takes all outcomes of elections which
preclude the input of minority opinion; and the failure to enunciate
and plan for the long term challenges we face as a community. To
nominate just a few! Amongst the pessimists, this disenchantment
spills over into disparagement of government action and a retreat
into individual solutions to social and economic problems. This, of
course, suits the neoliberal agenda, but is anathema to effective
joint action necessary to reduce inequality, improve broad social
outcomes and to protect the environment. Fortunately, there are
optimists who believe it is possible to redesign our institutions.
However, it is ironic that in an era which glorifies the novel and
worships change, the same politicians who advocate flexibility and
reform cling to conventions and practices which always had design
flaws and which have ossified into caricatures of themselves.
Whatever the ascribed causes of these problems, it is clear that
changes in our political system are needed. Representation:
Equality of Influence The minimum requirement of any representative
democracy is that governments should be elected and that all adults
should have an equal right to vote. This minimum is indeed very
little. As Rousseau acerbically observed: "The English people
believes itself to be free; it is gravely mistaken; it is free only
during the election of members of Parliament; as soon as the members
are elected, the people is enslaved; it is nothing." We might well
ask what kind of accountability it is that operates only once every
three or four years and which depends on assessments of performance
which are inevitably based on information which the government of
the day chooses to make available. That said, it is fundamental
even with our circumscribed democracy that all votes should be of
equal value. In broad terms this has been achieved in Australia,
with universal suffrage, electorates of roughly equal size and
independent electoral commissions to determine electoral boundaries
and prevent gerrymandering. Here in W.A. the entrenched conservative
opposition in the Upper House over the past century made it
impossible to achieve one vote one value and a High Court case to
force the issue constitutionally did not succeed. The election of
the Gallop government and the success of the Greens in gaining the
balance of power in the Upper House gave hope that the principle of
"one vote, one value" would finally prevail. But shockingly - and
against their stated values - the Greens are blocking reform. The
coming appeal to the Full Bench of the High Court is the last hope.
Despite the otherwise general equality in voting power, many are
suspicious that not all citizens are equally able to influence their
representatives. This breeds cynicism and a belief that the ordinary
voter's needs and views are ignored, while preference is given to
the interests of the wealthy, to big business and to political
cronies. Several features of our political system contribute to
these attitudes. Substantial campaign donations to the major parties
by corporations and large organisations such as unions and business
foundations foster the perception (and perhaps the reality) that it
is possible to buy privileged access to MPs and ministers and that
this influence is in proportion to the amount of money donated. The
disclosure that business leaders paid $10,000 per head for dinner at
the Lodge indicates that not even the Prime Minister's office is
free of this practice. Reports on the extraordinary level of -
secret - access to the Prime Minister afforded to the CEO of the
Manildra Group, Dick Honan, and the favourable treatment of his
ethanol producing company (over $20 million in taxpayer funded
subsidies since October) has again sparked controversy. Like many
Australians, I am perturbed at these tendencies. We run the risk of
becoming a "corporate democracy" - a "donocracy" - in which the
number of shares you have purchased in the party of your choice
determines your effective voting power. While there has been
extensive debate about big money in politics in the U.S., there is
still a conspicuous silence on the issue among Australian
politicians. Public funding of elections was supposed to reduce the
parties' reliance on private corporate and union donations: all that
has happened is a blow-out in both public (doubled since 1993) and
private funding as parties engage in an increasingly expensive
bidding war at elections. Corporate contributions have become an
accepted part of the election landscape. Figures collated by the
Parliamentary Library show that in the 1998-99 financial year, the
latest figures to which I have access, $37 million was paid to the
parties by corporations and $3.7 million by unions. The substantive
problem is the possibility that such donations can purchase
influence. Recent controversy surrounding the exercise of
Ministerial discretion in the issue of visas has given credence to
this concern. Like those Australians who follow politics, I am still
waiting to hear a credible explanation for the donation by a
Buddhist monastery in Sydney of $100,000, the largest ever donation
to an individual candidate, to Minister Ruddock's last election
campaign. While I know of no comparable Australian data, surveys of
major corporate donors in the U.S. show that they donate not out of
charitable impulses or civic duty; they expect a return for their
money principally in gaining access, ensuring consideration of their
interests and receiving "preferential consideration on regulations
or legislation benefiting our business". Many of these
multinationals operate in Australia and donate to the major parties.
There is no reason to suppose their motivation changes as they fly
across the Pacific. Retired U.S. Senator Paul Simon observed that
"anyone who has been a candidate for major public office and says,
'Campaign contributions don't affect you' is simply not telling the
truth", and that "the financially articulate have inordinate access
to policy makers". There is no reason to believe the same
observations do not apply to Australian MPs. Reliance on donations
may also create a strong inducement for political parties to bias
their policies toward business and high income earners who provide
the bulk of the funding, thus conspicuously undermining the promise
of democracy that we all share equally in political power. The
threat by the mining industry earlier this week that they would
withdraw campaign contributions to both major parties unless they
made changes to native title and other policies indicates just how
blatant the exercise of such influence has become. As I have said
elsewhere, I believe it is time to reign in the exponential growth
of corporate donations and to curtail the proliferation of content
free, coercive media advertising that passes for policy debate
during elections. The retention of public funding of elections
should be accompanied by measures to limit the size of individual
private donations to $1500, or thereabouts, and to proscribe any
donations from corporations and large organisations. An extension of
free-to-air radio and television could accompany these changes.
There are other reasons to scale down paid political advertising,
particularly given the increasing tendency of Australian parties to
emulate the negative tactics of our American cousins. As many have
suggested, such advertising is one of the corrosive influences in
our political system. To paraphrase an analogy used by Paul Simon:
"If Qantas ran regular 30 second commercials saying 'Don't fly
Virgin Blue and showed a plane crashing into Mt Kosiosko and Virgin
Blue ran a similar commercial showing a plane blowing up and urging
travellers not to fly Qantas, it would not be very long before fear
of flying became endemic." Politicians shouldn't be surprised when
their negative campaigns succeed, not only in diminishing their
opponents, but in undermining confidence in all politicians. Tony
Abbott's "don't trust politicians to elect the President" campaign
was a case in point. I think we should be greatly concerned that
negative campaign advertising will increase voters' cynicism about
the electoral process and be taken by some voters as "a signal of
the dysfunctional and unresponsive nature of the political process
itself", causing them to lose interest in how they vote. If free
time on radio and television were to replace such paid advertising
and candidates themselves were required to speak, they might spend
more time advancing their own agendas and less time abusing their
opponents. It might just encourage the media to focus more on the
real issues and less on the trivial and combative characteristics of
campaigns. Mirror or descriptive representation Part of the
growing sense of disenfranchisement about politics amongst
Australians may lie in the obvious differences between party members
and MPs and the wider community. This failure of "mirror" or
"descriptive" representation is, of course, most noticeable in the
relative absence of women in the senior echelons of the major
parties and in the Parliament. What kind of representation is it
where the candidates are not even remotely typical of the wider
society, even using crude indicators such as age, gender, income and
occupation. Voters need to feel that their representatives - at
least in aggregate - can understand their circumstances and have
sufficient identity with them to press their interests. The greater
the distance of representatives from electors, the greater the
mistrust. These weaknesses begin with the political parties who
determine who will be presented to the community for election and
who govern the behaviour of their members in law making. It is not
generally appreciated that none of Australia's parties is a mass
party with a substantial membership base: at last count only 1.5% of
Australians were members of a political party. Nor are the
influential party members necessarily typical of the wider
community. Too many candidates come from the party organisations and
from MP's staff. Many have little experience with anything other
than back-room operations and are not active in their communities.
In Australia, it is apparent that many people have formed the view
that the major parties are in the thrall of special interest groups.
They reject involvement in party politics because they are not
prepared to be used as factional pawns and campaign volunteers when
elections are on and ignored when policy is being developed. Party
members and supporters are often asked to fall in behind policy
positions that they had no hand in developing and about which they
have not been consulted. As a contributor to a website discussion
forum put it: "If we as a party are serious about rebuilding our
membership base, we need to rethink the way we as a party govern. A
rather large slice of the cynicism that is evident in the general
population has come about from the perception that we are governed
from the top. Australians as a rule dislike being told what to do
unless it is for very good reason, doesn't damage their pride and is
explained long enough for them to be comfortable with the change."
Parliament The most visible symbols of our democracy, where
decisions are theoretically made, are our parliaments. Once elected,
MPs may find that their contribution and that of the parliament as a
whole is much more limited than the theories of representative
government suggest. It is fair to say that, even with the expanding
contribution made by the Senate Committee system, executive
domination remains a hallmark of Australian politics. This too may
have contributed to the alienation of voters. The author of a
Parliamentary Library report compiled as part of the Centenary of
Federation celebrations concluded that "the domination of the
Parliament by a disciplined bipolar party system meant that the
House of Representatives came to be seen at worst as a theatre of
meaningless ritual and at best as an institution under the foot of
the Executive". (2) Although she politely places her observations
beyond contemporary politics, the view is one that is often repeated
today. There are many, myself included, who believe that the
Parliament is long overdue for substantial reform to enable it to
take greater responsibility for its own affairs and to act
independently of the government of the day. Our current system is
increasingly based on the "rubber stamp" model of government
criticised by the Clerk of the Senate, Harry Evans in his commentary
on Howard's proposal to water down the role of the Senate: "The
electors elect a party (or a party leader) to govern. The government
governs with total power to change the law and virtually do what it
likes between elections." In this scenario, the MPs are there for
no other purpose than to register the voters' choice. What then is
the purpose of having a Parliament at all? If this is the way
government is to operate, then there appears to be little
justification for all the effort and expense entailed. One of the
more disquieting experiences in the Federal Parliament is that most
speeches are delivered without an audience, into the void. Speech
after carefully prepared speech disappears without a trace having no
impact on the fate of the legislation. This, in the House of
Representatives, is determined in advance by the simple arithmetic
of majority. Even in the Senate, where outcomes are more fluid,
deals are done behind closed doors rather than fleshed out in
public. This is particularly true of the House of Representatives,
where there is almost no opportunity for individual members (or even
the opposition en bloc) to introduce or modify legislation. Scrutiny
of the Executive is limited to the charade that is Question Time,
when no questions are answered. Committees in the Lower House, while
they often inquire into matters of great significance, have no
capacity to quiz ministers and bureaucrats about budgets and
legislation. Some of our brightest and best are effectively excluded
from the tasks they were elected to perform. Question time is often
mentioned by voters as one of the most irritating of Parliamentary
procedures with its aggressive and insulting language, accusations
instead of questions, replies that contain no information and evade
the question, and gratuitous attacks on political opponents - all in
the atmosphere of an unruly locker room complete with "sin bin". I
agree with Coghill's assertion that "the rules for Question Time are
so ridiculous it is no surprise that they generate the type of
behaviour we see on the nightly news", and his contention that it
has "degenerated almost to a farce". As a result, Question Time
rarely functions as it was intended - as a means of ensuring
accountability of the executive, exposing abuses of power and
corruption and challenging the arbitrary exercise of power by the
government. While most MPs I have met are conscientious, they are
largely unable to influence the legislative or policy agenda except
behind the closed doors of the party rooms. Even then, there is
often little room to manoeuvre because decisions have already been
made by the Executive. Matters which deserve free and open
consideration are often submerged because of anxiety about dissent.
The media feeds this paranoia by portraying even the most minor
disagreements as tests of leadership or signs of party
disintegration. The absence of any dissent from the entire Coalition
back bench about the attack on Iraq is mute testimony to this
stranglehold. Indeed, it is fair to say that the opportunities to
speak open openly are becoming more and more constrained. I think
the community wants its political leaders to stand for something and
to be prepared to publicly stand on the issues. Too often we are
driven by the polls or what the media tells us matters and not by
conviction. We have a political culture of pandering, of telling
people what they want to hear. It is by definition a grey and
cautious culture because it removes all the contentious issues and
seeks to offend no one. Confected personality politics and
theatrical "biff" then substitutes for genuine debate on the values
and solutions which are our responsibility to propose. While the
Parliament often seeks the views of the community and of experts in
various fields, most of this contribution occurs in committees whose
deliberations and conclusions are ignored. A treasure trove of
thoughtful and meticulously prepared submissions and reports
languish in countless bottom drawers. On a broader front, members
of the wider community are pressing for greater involvement in
decision making while their representatives, especially in
government appear to be moving in the opposite direction, involving
fewer and fewer people, with less and less public scrutiny of the
development of public policy. Idiots? Political Knowledge and
Participation Having laid much of the blame for the problems with
our democracy at the feet of political parties and politicians, I
think it only fair to reflect on the role that citizens - and voters
- play in our democracy. Citizens themselves must share some of the
blame for declining interest and participation. It's always easier
to leave the work of democracy to others. Perhaps it would pay us
to reflect on the etymology of the word idiot - Greek "idios" -
"one's own", someone who does not participate in public affairs.
Only later did the word acquire the connotation of someone incapable
of participating in public affairs. If we do not pay attention to
the state of our democracy, we could become idiots in both senses
and end up, as we were before the development of democracy, as
"subjects" again. I think we all assume that, as a minimum, a
competent voter should be a knowledgeable one, that "democratic
citizens should have a minimum understanding of the political system
in which they express preferences and elect representatives".
Governments almost certainly operate more democratically when people
have a greater range and depth of information about politics and
when the distribution of knowledge is more equitable. People in
developed democracies are now better educated than at any time in
the past, but surprisingly, at the same time as general levels of
education are rising, knowledge of the political system has not
improved - as far as we can tell - here or elsewhere. McAllister
has argued that any assessment of political knowledge should include
both knowledge of events, personalities and institutions as well as
political concepts and the procedures by which political
institutions operate. (3) McAllister's research in Australia has
revealed a high level of political ignorance - typical of other
developed democracies. Of those questioned here, 55% did not know
that the Senate was based on proportional representation and only 5%
were able to answer correctly all of the questions put. There is a
great deal of evidence of a large and apparently growing uninformed
segment of the population, a group that is also less likely to
participate in political activity of any kind. Research shows that
political participation and knowledge affect each other
reciprocally. Knowledge is a prerequisite to effective political
engagement and in turn participation informs citizens about politics
and increases their attentiveness to political events. This is one
of the apparent benefits of compulsory voting, although the degree
of "participation" reflected in voting is perhaps the bare minimum.
Around the world, the decline in political participation -
particularly in voting - is greatest among those with less
education, less money and fewer connections and is most pronounced
amongst the young. In the United States, today's young adults are
less politically interested and informed than any cohort of young
people on record. The weakening of political parties and the
replacement of policy focused with personality based campaigning has
been cited as one of the factors contributing to this decline. The
dearth of information about values and policies and the way they
affect various groups in the community also reduces the motivation
of people to get involved. Marginal seat campaigning which responds
to the ephemeral moods of the most undecided effectively says to
half the population, 'Your needs and interests are irrelevant -
you're just spectators'. The narrowing divide between major parties
of the left and right also makes it harder for voters to distinguish
among political alternatives, leaving them effectively less
politically informed. "Citizen competence is largely a function of
the political environment, which often gives the citizen difficult
tasks and little support for reforming them." (4) In this respect,
it is instructive to contrast the millions of young people who vote
in "Big Brother" elections at some monetary cost with the level of
enthusiasm amongst the same young people for general elections, in
which they often say they're not interested and can't be bothered to
vote. Many people of good will are worried about the direction in
which Australia is headed but uncertain about where to turn for an
analysis and understanding of what may be done. They are confused by
the apparent convergence of the two parties, wanting at least to
hear a debate on issues such as the role of government, population
and immigration, rising inequality, reconciliation with our
indigenous people, simultaneous underemployment and overwork, human
rights and international citizenship, models of economic growth,
balancing work and life and the priority which should be given to
environmental improvement and protection. In the past, the major
political parties, here and elsewhere, were differentiated by their
economic and social philosophies. As parties have converged and
become less clearly defined, candidate and leadership centered
campaigning has become more pronounced. As a result elections are
reduced to a competition between individuals rather than ideas and
campaign coverage becomes just another from of infotainment,
focusing on personality and appeal. Who is more popular or likeable
is more important than what they have to say about policy and the
contests themselves become more "personal" and negative. For many
people this is so offensive that they simply turn off. In response
to this apparent lack on interest and knowledge among many voters,
some political activists fall back on democratic elitism. Rather
than encouraging participation, they are content to accept this
passivity and to circumscribe the voters' task to choosing between
competing elites who will then make all the important decisions on
behalf of all the electorate. This seems increasingly to be the view
of the cadre of professional politicians who control the development
of policy and the conduct of elections. They see no benefit in
getting the citizenry involved. The Role of the Media in
Representing Politics and Politicians No assessment of the state of
our democracies would be complete without examining the role the
media play in shaping political debates and personalities. There is
a widespread belief that the mass media have played a significant
role in eroding trust and interest in politics. Whatever the truth
of this assertion, most voters devote only a tiny proportion of
their time to the analysis of personalities and issues and often use
shortcuts to help them make reasonable choices with imperfect
information. They combine, as Popkin observes, "learning and
information from past experiences, daily life, the media and
political campaigns". (5) The media have considerable power to frame
our understanding of public life, to set the agenda on key issues
and to influence the political process. The treatment by the media
of the attack on Iraq is the most recent vivid illustration of this
effect. What is certain is that most people do not experience
politics at first hand. Voters' perceptions of the political figures
and issues are shaped principally through the news media: this is
even more likely in large scale, national and state based
constituencies where personal contact with the candidates is made
difficult by the sheer weight of numbers and distances. Such
coverage is necessarily selective. It may be said that, in this
sense, the news media shape rather than mirror the political
landscape. In general, political activities are portrayed in the
media as fiercely competitive. Debates are frequently described in
adversarial terms and those elements of political life which most
resemble combat are most likely to be reported. There is, in all the
media, a highly selective reading of issues, a tendency that is
cultivated by many in politics. Serving politicians come to
appreciate that coverage is more likely if their statements and
images are provocative and controversial. Reasoned and moderate
argument delivered without vitriol is given a wide berth.
Television, in particular, seems unable to cover complex stories in
which the image is secondary to the facts. It is fair to say that
the coverage of politics - and current affairs generally - has
increasingly come to resemble entertainment. Confrontational media
images give the impression that politics is only about argument and
conflict, "that all parties are constantly locked in permanent and
irreconcilable conflict". The choice, for example, to restrict most
images of parliamentary proceedings to Question Time with the
constant shouting, heckling and interjections reinforces the view of
politics as a blood sport unworthy of all but the crude, rude and
unattractive. In addition, debate about politics via current
affairs programs is often combative, with the interviewers setting
up political opposites for confrontation or adopting an aggressive
posture, regardless of whether is contributes to a better
understanding of the issues. Interviewer's reputations are made by
their success in unsettling or demolishing interviewees. It appears
not to matter that little light has been shed on the subject under
discussion. In fairness, the same criteria are often used by
politicians to judge their own performance in the media. There is
fairly general consensus among politicians, regardless of political
affiliation, that there has been an increasing trend toward
"tabloidisation" of both print and electronic media. Political and
current affairs coverage is characterised by increasingly brief
"grabs", trivialisation and sensationalism - all inimical to
sustained and complex debate. There is also and increasing trend for
reporters and presenters' views to be more intrusive, often ignoring
what the interviewee has to say in favour of the media personality's
"authoritative" assertions. The descriptive style of journalism
which focused on the views and behaviour of newsmakers has been
replaced by reporting which places the reporter at the centre of the
action. In the United States, this has reached the point where
during the 2000 campaign, for every minute that the candidates
spoke, the network correspondents spoke for six. And their tone was
"skeptical, negative and strategic", a disposition which appears to
have contributed to distrust of politicians. (6) This distrust then
feeds into reduced involvement including in watching news about
politics and campaigns. News organisations then cut back on their
coverage or make it softer, producing further declines in
involvement. It's perhaps not surprising that television has been
identified as one of the major causes of declining civic engagement.
As one researcher put it, this is primarily a "knowledge reducing
effect" as newspapers and public service radio and TV announcements
are replaced by commercial TV as the primary source of political
information. (7) The commercial media, in particular, devote less
time to current political events and when they do, it is often in
sensationalist and strategic terms. Candidates are ignored or
portrayed as boring if they run issues based campaigns. Attacking
sound bites get airtime, positive problem solving statements get the
delete button. In general, we have yet to fully calculate the
effects of the transition from word to image on our democracy. As
Barber encapsulates the problem: "A succession of fast-moving
images is not conducive to thinking, but it does accommodate
advertising, manipulation and propaganda, and these are the
hallmarks of modern consumer culture and its privatizing political
ideology that displaces governments with markets." (8) Media
Manipulation The media are also the principal means by which
governments attempt to manipulate public opinion. Propaganda - now
called "spin" in an attempt to render it innocuous- is the
antithesis of democratic discourse. We sometimes forget that the
restriction of information and the manipulation of public opinion
are not solely the prerogatives of totalitarian Governments. Indeed
the use of propaganda techniques has been, and is, commonplace in
Australia as in many other societies. These appeals persuade not
through give-and-take of argument and debate, but through the
manipulation of symbols and of our most basic human emotions. Some
of us are old enough to recall the vivid and terrifying images of
the yellow peril and the "reds under your beds" drummed into us by
conservative governments in the 1950s. More recent examples include
Peter Reith's "construction" of reality in the lead up to the
waterfront dispute, the government's sustained campaign to
dehumanise asylum seekers, and the continuing attempts to justify
the attack on Iraq. In the lead up to the sacking of waterfront
workers, Reith employed classic propaganda techniques: creating the
stereotype of the greedy wharfie by grossly exaggerating their rates
of pay and conditions, misrepresenting productivity levels and
engaging in continuous name calling and repetition of negative
phrases (e.g. rorts) and simplistic slogans. The goal was clearly
to destroy collective action and to ensure that the workers were
segregated and alone in bargaining with their employers. There was
considerable irony in the alternative labour force later banding
together to sue the Minister and the Government for misleading and
manipulating them. The Reith tactics were part of a long-standing
propaganda war perpetrated largely by major corporations to portray
unions as disruptive, greedy and harmful to the public interest as
defined by the business community and its allies. By virtue of their
strategic position, docks have long been the crucibles of struggles
for improved wages and conditions in most countries, including
Australia. Since it is at the heart of the union movement it is
attacked - and defended- with considerable vigour. This was
obviously just a practice run for the concerted campaign of
vilification which has been conducted against asylum seekers who've
arrived on our shores in leaky boats. It was Reith too who managed
the "children overboard" scandal and repeated with Ruddock and
Howard the many calumnies perpetrated against these people. For
political advancement they still continue to denigrate their
victims, many of whom remain hopelessly strung between their fear of
returning to face persecution and their despair at indefinite
detention. It is no accident that in both the cases I have cited,
the sell job followed market research and opinion polling. While
such polling has some uses, it is also one of the starting points
for propaganda and media manipulation designed to convince an
unsuspecting public that what is being proposed, while it might
appear damaging, is actually benign - "Toxic Sludge Is Good For
You". (9) Implicit in these strategies is the desire to control
public access to information on the grounds that the political elite
is best placed to understand what is in the public interest. The
strategies rest on the assumption that open and informed public
debate is either impossible or undesirable. This is also clearly the
view of some in the media - the so-called elite opinion. Law and
order campaigns designed to frighten the population and distract
from hard questions of causation provide another illustration of the
operation of privileged interests. The fact is that analyses of the
causes of crime invariably point to inequality of wealth and power
as critical factors. The necessary remedies, including the
redistribution of both wealth and power, are not likely to be
advocated by the likes of Packer and Murdoch or the political
players who protect their privileged allies. They prefer to feed
people on a steady diet of alarming images which generate fear and
outrage, but not much else. This is important because the steady
diet of bad news can simply bolster the status quo and bad news can,
and does, convince people that the world is much more dangerous than
it is. Gerbner found that people who watch a lot of television see
the world as much more threatening and filled with menace than those
who watch less. Fears about crime, often exploited by politicians,
have less to do with actual crime rates than with the perception we
get from the news. Bad news can create panic and distort the policy
agenda. It's anyone's guess how fearful people have become after the
declaration of the so-called "War on Terror" and the constant
bombardment with threat assessments and warnings of imminent
disaster It is generally the case that those who "engineer consent"
are those with the resources and the power to do so - principally
the business community and some in the political class. It may be
said that the well-connected and the well-protected can work the
system, but the interests of the ordinary citizen are often left
out. The major political parties in Australia are becoming more and
more dependent on the PR industry - the consultants, marketers and
social scientists who manage and promote causes and candidates. The
current government routinely undertakes market research and polling
at taxpayer's expense to "test messages" and spin the most
acceptable lines. The insistence by the Prime Minister that to do
anything other than support out troops as they were sent off to
attack Iraq was, almost certainly, a market research driven line.
Nothing else really worked. Protection of citizen's rights and
minority interests One of the consequences of this sustained
manipulation of the media is that many Australians have stood by
uncomplaining - even cheering - as their own rights, as well as
those of minorities such as indigenous people and refugees, have
been eroded. Had it not been for the Senate, many were apparently
untroubled by the original ASIO Bill which would have seen children
as young as ten detained and searched. The government knew that
there was little opposition to detention without trial because they
had already left citizens to rot for months in Guantanamo Bay,
without lifting a finger to insist on their minimum legal rights.
And they had already successfully trampled on Indigenous property
rights and disrespectfully denied them recognition and compensation
for dispossession and suffering under separation policies. They also
knew that they enjoyed widespread community support for locking up
refugees indefinitely, in defiance of every international human
rights convention. On this front our democracy is in a parlous
state. We need a Bill of Rights. Reforms to increase participation
Popular dissatisfaction with present democratic structures is
fuelling calls for reform all over the world. Recent data from the
U.K. indicates that the politically dissatisfied are more likely to
favour constitutional reforms, such as changes in the role of the
House of Lords, judicial protection of human rights, and greater
public access to government information. Recent electoral reforms
in Italy, Japan, and New Zealand resulted from public
dissatisfaction with the electoral process. Interestingly, as one
nation moves towards Proportional Representation (PR) as a solution,
another moves in the opposite direction. This makes me sceptical
that reforms to political parties and electoral systems are
sufficient to address the present malaise. Widespread declines in
political support, and growing alienation from various institutions
and forms of the democratic process suggest that the sources of
dissatisfaction go deeper than what can be addressed by modest
electoral reforms. However, it is worth noting that there is a
well-established turnout boost associated with electoral systems
based on proportional representation. It has been argued that this
is due to otherwise excluded citizens seeking representation from
small parties incapable of breaking through in winner-takes all
contests. Every vote then does count, as it does with Senate voting
in Australia. Under PR, parties have an incentive to inform all
voters of their programs rather than just targeting the marginal
seat voter. It is possible that PR based multi-party systems may
inhibit precipitous changes in a pa rties' principles and identity
with the result that the political map is more stable and clearly
drawn. People are also expressing a more fundamental
dissatisfaction with the system of representative democracy itself.
Many express the desire to move toward greater participatory
democracy. The potential for citizen participation is limited in
traditional forms of representative democracy. The opportunities for
electoral input are scandalously low in most democracies, limited to
the chance to cast a few votes during a multiyear electoral cycle.
The declining voter turnout in advanced industrial societies
suggests growing disenchantment with this form of democratic
participation. Barber's alternative to this "thin" democracy, a
"strong" democracy, incorporates muscular participatory and
deliberative elements, something that many citizens are urging for
Australia. In such democracies, citizens are engaged in political
action and are prepared to engage in debate and deliberation in
order to reach agreement about solutions to shared problems. In
other words, citizens take a greater role in governing themselves.
Strengthened commitments to the democratic ideal and increased
skills and resources in contemporary societies can lead to increased
political participation beyond the present forms of representative
democracy. A growing body of international research has documented a
steady growth of protest and direct-action methods. It also shows
that while participation in elections may be declining, direct
contact with government officials and politicians and work with
community groups has been increasing. Participation in new social
movements, such as the environmental movement, has also increased
substantially over the past generation. These new participation
patterns are creating pressure on governments to develop forms of
more direct, participatory democracy. For example, surveys of the
German public indicate that democratic norms are broadening to
embrace more participatory forms of democracy. The use of
referendums and initiatives is generally increasing in democratic
nations. Younger generations and the better educated are more likely
to favour referendums, greater participation by the citizenry, and
other forms of direct democracy. The Internet shows promise as a
means of broadening the scale and scope of political discussion. A
recent review of the social movement literature describes other ways
that institutional reforms can increase direct citizen participation
in policy making. In Germany, for example, local citizen action
groups have won changes in administrative law to allow for citizen
participation in local administrative processes. Italian
environmental legislation now grants individuals legal standing in
the courts when they seek to protect the environment from the
actions of municipalities or government administrative agencies.
These institutional changes are difficult to accomplish and
therefore are likely to proceed at a slow pace; but once implemented
they restructure the whole process of making policy that extends
beyond a single issue or a single policy agenda. Similar reforms
need to be debated in Australia. It is possible to do much better,
to open up decision making, to involve more MPs and engage the wider
community, to actually thrash out the issues in real debates.
Australia was once considered the "democratic laboratory" of the
world. It's time to conduct a few new experiments to revive our body
politic and embrace the principles of openness, accessibility and
accountability. As a start we could: - As in the new Scottish
Parliament, establish an all party Business Committee to determine
the business of the Parliament including the allocation of business
to committees. The Committee would require regular endorsement of
the Parliament for its plans, - Amend standing orders to require
that a greater proportion of parliamentary time is devoted to
non-government business, - Ensure that legislation introduced by
the Executive undergoes a substantial period of pre-legislative
development and consultation through the relevant committees,
interest groups and the general public, - Give committees the power
to initiate legislation arising from their inquiries, especially if
the government has failed to respond to major recommendations, -
Establish joint estimates and legislation committees with the power
to question public servants and ministers from either House and to
take submissions and commission independent research, - Limit the
number of speakers on legislation and change the standing orders to
ensure that a real debate occurs with members from both sides to
provide a quorum, - Restrict Question Time to genuine questions
without notice, with a majority going to the Opposition, - Devote
the second chamber to a more extensive deliberation of the bills in
committee, - Provide for private bills which allow private citizens
or groups (with sufficient backing) to bring certain matters before
the Parliament, probably through sponsoring MPs, - Require that all
petitions be investigated, if necessary by special hearings, of a
dedicated petitions' committee, - Commission citizens' juries or
deliberative polls on contentious and complex issues, - Invite
expert and community representatives to address the chamber in
session and engage in debate with members, - Promote and sponsor
the establishment of groups such as civic and youth forums to enable
more regular and efficient consultation with the public, and -
Strengthen freedom of information legislation to reduce the number
of exemptions from disclosure. As well as engaging the general
public and their representatives more fully in the democratic
process, I believe such initiatives could transform politics in the
way that many have dreamed about; into a more engaged and active
democracy. The goals of greater participation, more civil and
co-operative parliamentary conduct and an informed public debate are
worth striving for. Slow Politics In preparing for this lecture I
read quite a lot of speculative material about the likely effect of
the Internet on the operation of modern democracy. It struck me, as
I thought about the Internet with its impressive speed, that a
strong democracy actually needs a speed limit sign. We need a
political equivalent of the "slow food" movement to enable people to
stop and think about the nature of the problems they confront, to
assemble all the best ingredients for solutions to these problems
and to debate the respective merits of various proposals. In a
speech to the Wesley College Foundation, John Menadue asserted that:
"Politics is too serious a matter to be left to politicians.
Unaided, they will not reform our political outlook." At one level
this might be taken as yet another blow in the national sport of
bashing politicians, but Menadue was, in fact, making the more
serious point that the health of our democracy requires greater
involvement and participation from party members and the community
at large. It's a view I share.
We
need to take politics beyond the politicians.
--- Carmen Lawrence delivered this manifesto to
protect and enhance our democracy at a public lecture at the
University of Western Australia on August 7. She is standing for the
ALP presidency in the first direct election of a president by the
rank and file since the ALP changed party rules to encourage greater
participation by party members after its 2001 federal election
defeat. Footnotes 1. McAllister, Ian, A crisis of democracy -
again, in 'Policy Review', Summer 2000-2001, 47-49 2. Thompson,
Elaine, Australian parliamentary democracy after a century: What
gains, what losses? 'Vision in hindsight: Parliament and the
Constitution,' Paper No. 4, p6, 2000 3. McAllister, I, Civic
education and political knowledge in Australia, Australian Senate
Occasional Lecture Series, Canberra, 2001 4. Kuklinski, J.H. and
Quirk, J.J., Citizen competence revisited, presented at the 2001
annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, San
Francisco 5. Popkin, Samuel I, The reasoning voter: Communication
and persuasion in presidential campaigns, Chicago University Press,
1991 6. Patterson, T.E., The vanishing voter: Civic involvement in
the Age of Uncertainty, Alfred A. Knoph, 2002 7. Milner, H.,
Political participation and the political knowledge of adults and
adolescents, paper presented at the 30th ACPR Joint Session
Workshops, University of Turin, 1998 8. Barber, B.B., Which
technology and which democracy? MIT Communications Forum, 2003 9.
Stauber, J. & Rampton, S., Toxic sludge is good for you: Lies,
damn lies and the public relations industry, Monroe, Maine, Common
courage press, 1995 |
