The EU referendum is now done and the UK has voted to leave the EU. It was anything but a glorious advert for British democracy.
On one hand, we had a campaign that was willing and determined to set people against one another by their ethnicity, their class, and whether they were ‘experts’ or ‘elites’. The other campaign, when it wasn’t in melodrama mode, deployed the modern organisational technology of political narrowcasting. In so doing, it ignored a huge part of the country, on the basis of its probability of supporting its campaign. As a consequence, whole areas – including many traditional Labour areas in the north crucial to the outcome - heard only the discordant voice of Faragism.
Much has been made about the fact that this referendum was a choice about the types of values that our country epitomises. The referendum was indeed that but more besides. It was also a choice about the type of democracy we want to be. There are deeper democratic and social forces at play – how they are resolved will be one of the critical decisions we as a society make in the coming years.
For many decades now trust in representative democracy has been in decline. Interestingly, many of the advocates of leave framed their argument in terms of defending parliamentary democracy. But it was no such thing. Representative liberal democracy relies not only on the consent of people but on a set of institutional arrangements that can meet their needs and protect their rights – from independent legal institutions to international cooperation. ‘Take back control’ ultimately rejects this web of relationships in favour of some general ‘will of the people’. But how is this ‘will’ formed?
The answer is by substituting individual instincts and emotion for expertise, representation and institutional structures that put a break on populist impulses – if only to force us to pause for thought. Not only in politics but in education, health, business, local governance, and policing too, we are ever more willing to put our personal judgement ahead of ‘experts’ or ‘so-called experts’ as they have come to be known. The experts failed to convince their fellow countrymen and if their post-Brexit prophecies do not come to pass then the schism will become deeper.
Scrutiny and a degree of scepticism is not in itself a bad thing of course – the high-trust society had major drawbacks as Hillsborough, the increasing share of national wealth taken by the top, figures of trust preying on children, and the scandal of Mid-Staffordshire NHS Trust all show. Healthy scepticism is just that – healthy. Too often, however, we are replacing scrutiny and scepticism with a trust in our own instinct and cynicism. It is ‘me the people’ rather than ‘we the people’.
So the legitimacy of hierarchy is threatened but then replaced with a notion of democracy centred around populist individualism – whether it’s ‘take back control’ or ‘make America great again’. The foolish aspect of the decision to hold this referendum was the notion that it would resolve anything. Instead, it has released the forces of populist individualism. Far from being a political alternative, populism is actually an alternative form of democracy. The aim is not simply to replace parties and powers within representative democracy, it seeks to replace representative democracy itself. These forces may be difficult to contain now. Labour is seen to have deserted whole swathes of its traditional support; Conservatives are seen as vacillating and untrustworthy. The mainstream is brittle.
This was all predictable. In a paper on populism, extremism and democracy back in 2013, I wrote of the referendum pledge:
“As a strategy to minimise the space for the UK’s populist radical right party (UKIP), David Cameron’s EU referendum pledge is likely to be a misguided one. It may split away a portion of his party, threaten his own leadership, give profile to a populist party that he cannot or will not match, boost the brand image of UKIP in the eurosceptic media, and fail to address the real underlying anxieties of voters who are attracted to UKIP. It is a considerable opportunity for UKIP as they are given the spotlight in a way they have not been able to secure in their entire history.”
This feels like a scenario that is closer to the current reality than a ‘lancing of the boil’ that the Prime Minister was hoping for. The same paper recommended a process of ‘contact democracy’ where the political mainstream engaged in a process of democratic engagement in a discursive rather than campaigning fashion. A discursive democracy is a very different approach to individualist populism and tired, narrowcasting, hierarchical representative democracy. Discursive democracy breaks down the barriers between experts and the people, the governing and the governed, policy and politics. In other words, it flattens democratic engagement and eschews false divides, opening out and making democracy more solidaristic as a consequence.
Next week, the RSA will launch the Citizens’ Economic Council which is in an experiment in discursive, solidaristic, contact democracy. Essentially, a demographically diverse group of 50 - 60 citizens selected using stratified random sampling methodology will, over the course of a year, deliberate on the big economic questions of the time and make their own recommendations for future economic priorities – including the fundamental objectives on which economic policy is based. Economists have had a tough ride of late – justifiably some might argue – but this opens up the black box of economic thinking to the laity. We are intrigued to see the outcome.
This is but one experiment and others have been successfully run previously as tracked by Claudia Chwalisz in The Populist Signal. An unstated conviction at the heart of this experiment has to be that if representative democracy is to face continuing pressures then there has to be an alternative that is not akin to the referendum campaign we have just endured.
Democracy is hard; it requires work. Representative democracy was a hard won battle. The historian E.P.Thompson has described the two centuries-long making of the English working class. World War II contributed an accelerated politicisation. An exclusively class-centric politics doesn’t feel right for these more plural times. Class is important but just one component of political consciousness. However, we can’t just allow democracy to be a battle between an untrusted ‘elite’ and an impulsive political discourse. Democracy works best when it challenges all of us to think, discuss, and reflect. That’s where models such as the Citizens’ Economic Council come in.
There’s lots of unfinished business post-referendum: the presence in our midst of far-right violent extremism, how we can find the right relationship with the post-Eurozone/post-crash EU from which we intend to depart, and the future of political parties that are split in quite fundamental ways. But we desperately need to take time to understand the democratic mess that we have created. In reality, democratic forms co-exist. We might want to reflect on how we can bring people into the process of making better informed decisions about the national future. That means a bigger role for people in our democracy.
WATCH LIVE (29 June, 6pm BST): Can citizens be economists?
Find out more about the RSA Citizens' Economic Council
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The way to engage the people who feel disenfranchised by both major parties is to introduce Proportional Representation. But that’s anathema to the political elite of both the major political parties that are in disarray, because the people did not do as they were told. As for the city of London declaring itself a city state! Are they that mindless of the country they live in? Are we to build a border around the M25 <chuckle> We have a long journey ahead, on a road no one has travelled before, ever. It is our leadership that can make a lasting legacy to the rest of Europe in true democracy. But to do that we have to bring together all factions and stand against the unelected bureaucrats of the EU.
Re the London City State. Does anyone think that our newly elected Mayor of London is blind to the fact that this would possibly hand a weapon of immense value to the far right? There could be a massive backlash that would make the poll tax riots look like a Sunday picnic if the capital was to break away. A very ill thought out concept indeed.
There is one path we must NOT go down - one that either disenfranchises or mutes any part of our people. Both Dr Dawkins and Roger Scruton have questioned the ability of 'ordinary' people to understand the complexity of issues involved, and the appalling reaction of many bien-pensant commentators on Friday can be summarised as "The wrong people are using Democracy!".
Representative democracy was developed at a time when communications were poor, travel-time separation between constituencies and parliament great and it was the only possible way to implement the demands of the Charter. Equally, Direct democracy at national level for every decision is absurd - why ask a voter in Rutland to vote on the Harwich Harbour (dredging) bill? The answer has to be more extensive, more direct and more local democracy, with power devolved to the lowest level at which it is most efficiently exercised. This requires the established parties to relinquish their tight grip on political power - something they are most reluctant to do. However, their reluctance may well be fragmenting the nation and putting in peril those things we value most.
If this referendum, which has divided the nation between a successful dominant class and those losing out from globalisation, also serves to fracture the blue-red duopoly in favour not of a third national force but of local solutions and the empowering of Burke's 'little platoons' then it will be worth it.
I know things look ugly at the moment, uglier than I think most of us thought they would look. But there will be better news if democracy feels more relevant to all people. My belief is that 'ordinary' people (here's a thought - maybe all people are extraordinary in some way) are often grossly underestimated in the thought they have given to decisions. The notion that they can be told which seems to be at the heart of the current debates about various Remain campaign 'failures' seems to completely miss the point. I had mixed feelings on what result to hope for, but the arrogance and remoteness of institutions such as the European Commission, expressed in such childish tones following an 'unacceptable' result seems to underline the anti-democratic nature of the ''democracy' that was the status quo.
I actually do think it was a glorious advert for British Democracy. What is not glorious, is this epistle of sour grapes. Democracy does work, and the people have spoken. Have you considered that the people that have spoken, have had concerns that have not been addressed by the current ruling party? The point of Democracy is to give a voice to all; not just those who think they know what's best for all. The second last sentence "We might want to reflect on how we can bring people into the process of making better-informed decisions about the national future." rather comes across as "Well that bloody well didn't work, how can we control the minds of the people to bring about our desired outcomes?".
The people have spoken. What remains to be seen is what will happen next. Will the ruling party handle the concerns of the people? Will the "remain" side be graceful in defeat? Will you listen?
Lee, agreed - I think there is much optimism to be taken from the willingness of individuals to go out and vote in such high numbers and to choose democracy. I only hope that in time there will be much critical self-reflection by the "elites" - not least those who are already calling for a re-run of the referendum after, presumably, some "re-education" of the "ignorant" or "prejudiced".
Thank you for your comment. The article was written yesterday when the expected outcome was 'remain' (I added one or two things today to ensure it was relevant) so it's a reaction to the whole referendum process itself rather than the outcome. Hope that clears things up.
No Anthony. It does not. What Lee is saying is that what you wrote was a perfectly valid and justified analysis of your piece of writing and the particular bias it revealed in your point of view. That bias would appear to be very reasonably consistent with those norms and values which Adam Smith, another RSA Fellow, exposed in his two most famous volumes. A position which we began to move away from in 1948, though many remain in denial of that and some remain unaware of where we are supposed to be going, when Eleanor Roosevelt succeeded in embedding the Declaration of Human Rights into the very fabric of then new UN Organisation. Sadly the international finance, trade and labour controlling institutions remained, or were formed, outside of that 'principled' domain.
The economic mainstream views remain 'unprincipled' and were declared by the UN Brundtland Commission to be illegitimate back in 1987, for all the good that did. My fear, and I suspect Lee's - reinforced by your article - is that the 'meat' of the 'citizen education' in economics that is contemplated will be based upon that discredited intellectual base without informing the committee of that fact. Consequently, Lee perhaps prophetically, expresses a suspicion that the CEC may be intended to be a not very subtle exercise in individual mind-control followed by a big PR jamboree to convince and educate the wider public into accepting a further tweaking of a tired and wasted belief system when they have proven their gullibility by coming up with what you would judge to be the 'right' answers. After a year of pantomime.
I know this sounds harsh but it is not my viewpoint. Every economist is well aware of what I am saying. The debate in academic circles between a tame 'mainstream' and the 'heterodoxy' which is actively and successfully moving in diaspora towards an intellectual basis for our political economy which is consistent with our aspirant norms and values is real, alive and well and it lives right across the Internet in every serious forum.
The RSA will be making a fool of itself through the CEC if it does not show itself to be seriously examining and contributing to a replacement for the bankrupt foundations of the economic system of institutions and policy making which you are all so concerned about. Intellectual integrity and reputation will be the victim. This is not a debate between Left and Right politics. They are both derivative positions of the same bankrupt neoclassical foundation. They share a wrong human behavioural model and a set of cadestral institutions as 'givens' which are toxic mix of the palaeontological, monarchic and Ardrey's Romantic Illusion.
We are only 60 years into a new aspirational vision for all of mankind. One that is of a sustainable, durable, resilient and constantly evolving institutions that include norms and values as well as of organisational forms which deliver to every individual, in every context and culture and metaphysical practice lifetime assurance of consistent well-being for themselves and for their offspring. This well-being is not measured by consumption of stuff or delivery of a universal package of utilities. That way just reinforces the simplistic mistakes of Adam Smith and tries to preserve the failed cadestral baggage it lead to.
If the CEC is to credible in its endeavours it will need to set itself up for a centuries long role based upon evolving Moral Precepts, just we and our technology and our environment and hence our needs and our norms and values do and must evolve.
It is time for us to stop playing at consultation and planning without asking the real axiomatic questions. It is those tough questions, and only them, which can bring into question what it is we actually are as life forms, what we want here on this planet and how we can somehow arrange ourselves so that, as far as is possible, we come to understand what those institutions are which together will form systems which induce us to do those things that will cause us to deliver the lives we want as far into the future as we can imagine ... and survive.
I would hope that this is what Ben is seeking, not another plaster cast for a broken status quo.