Articles, Etc.

Must We Endure Politicians?

            Politicians' responsiveness to public wishes has increased as a direct result of the                               increase in accurate measurement of those wishes, by polling methods and practices. But                           public expectations and wishes for responsiveness have increased at an even faster rate.                                      This provokes disappointment.          

            And there is frustration at politicians' failure to be sufficiently independent as well as responsive. That is, dislike for some politicians' excessive responsiveness to public opinion. This in part owes to so many citizens' failure to recognize that responsiveness means to be responsive not only to that citizen but to others as well, and they do not all want the same things. So one politician's responsiveness is another's "pandering."                  

            Many citizens are dissatisfied by the level of quality of most contemporary politicians. In part this derives from a mistaken assumption that politicians in an earlier day were better than they in fact were, and that there has been a steep decline in quality. And  another element is a belief that present day politicians are worse than they in fact are.

            But beyond this mistaken measurement is the fact that the average quality lately has been regrettably low. This owes in significant part to the frustrations and liabilities of public office that deters so many people of high merit and aptitude for public leadership from entering it.

             For a couple of centuries, the average level of quality of those entering politics in our country has not been high. Except in the South (where the tradition is waning fast with the cultural homogenization of the country), there is a tradition of second raters going into politics, and that tradition affects the choices of some.

            Like most jobs, the pleasure one takes from work is affected by how much one enjoys one's colleagues. As their quality has declined, for the foregoing causes, this lower level further impairs politicians' working conditions. The reduced quality of those in politics tends to deter others of high quality from entering politics, thus further lowering the standards of  character and ability.

           As we all know, a big impairment of the labor conditions endured by American politicians - not to speak of American society - is the steadily more compelling and pernicious effect of money: Raising, spending, owing. Like an arms race, the measures in themselves are useless to improve our lives, yet every politician has to keep at it to escape being left behind.

            Another new feature is politicians’ compulsory competition with professional entertainers for the audience’s attention. And the professional entertainers (including sport, of course) tend to win. The news media themselves are subject to a like competition. Their shift in emphasis from information to pleasure, from instruction to entertainment, has been a big shift. Some of it harmless though shocking, like the NY Times adopting color. But much does harm. To keep up with the competition  both the organs of the media and the politicians must entertain. The same as the incessant money race. The audience's shortened attention span and the necessity to compete with professional entertainment have degraded the level of political discourse.

            Formerly, political speeches often were poorly reasoned, poorly expressed and ill-informed, but they constituted an effort to examine a question of public policy. They have been replaced by pretty pictures and personal attacks. Campaign finance reform, although difficult, looks possible to carry out. But how to meet the problem of   shifting to significant public issues some of the attention held by the superior professional entertainers is most perplexing.       

            Of course, there never has been a time when public leaders did not put out at least some effort to present themselves in an appealing light. And ever since popular government, democracy, began to be practiced, there have been plenty of bluster and hot air. And slogans always were used, providing little of either information or understanding. But now technology and custom emphasise image-making, sound bites and professional spin. Attention has been shifted from the issues and the candidates' comparative performance at work to coolness of manner and your haircut.

            Curiously, increased tolerance in private life for deviations from the respected norms in style of dress and grooming, divorce, church attendance, sex preference, sex out of marriage and exogamy, has been concurrent with disclosure of such deviations by politicians and their censorship for all but marriage out of the tribe.

            Not only are politicians vilified, but they are subjected to embarassing exposure of aspects of their lives unconnected with their employment qualifications. For all employment, whether private companies or public bureaucracies, all personnel decisions are now required to be made exclusively on job-related matters. But not for elected office. For politicians,  their constituents - their once and future boss - are told, in meticulous detail, matters about which a prospective employer would be forbidden by law even to ask.

            When an official recently declared that he would not consider resigning from the public office for which the American people had "hired" him, a TV figure (Lebowitz) denounced him for what she called his "despicable" use of the word "hire," saying that "hire" applies to private business, not elective office, and that the target of her bile used the word falsely to imply that he could be employed in private business, when she knew he could not. It appears, of course, that the word "hire" was used as a colloquial term for employment

              Envied for the significant office they hold, yet despised for holding it, politicians have become frustrated and discouraged. Many wonder why any one with the talent to be productive and well-rewarded even enters politics these days.

            Their distrust of, and dislike for, politicians leads many citizens to seek to do without them.  One means is to govern by direct democracy - initiative and referendum - bypassing politicians. This tool of government is available, and often used, in Washington, Oregon, California, Minnesota and elsewhere.Proposals are made to carry this process further by use of instant electronic voting. Issues and measures of every kind of public policy would be decided by click of the mouse.The scenes imagined are either re-creation of the New England Town Meeting, neighboring fellow citizens getting together to decide their community's policies for themselves, without intermediary leaders, or the transformation of government into an automatic and obedient object like an ATM machine.          

            However, whether by initiative or internet, direct democracy encourages instant response, with little reflection and fewer second thoughts. For issues to be understood and for their truth to be derived, they must be tested by debate. John Stuart Mill pointed out that an issue cannot be fully understood unless one can observe contending arguments by those who believe them.

                                   He who knows only his own side of the case, knows little of that....The rational position for him would be suspension of judgment, and unless he contents himself with that, he is either led by authority, or adopts, like the generality of the world, the side to which he feels most inclination....He must be able to hear them [arguments of adversaries]  from persons who actually believe them; who defend them in earnest, and do their very utmost for them. He must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form; he must feel the whole force of the difficulty which the true view of the subject has to encounter and dispose of; else he will never really possess himself of the portion of truth which meets and removes that difficulty.

                                                             -- On Liberty, p.97

And debate is needed not only to test and refine a proposition but also to reach sound judgments in contested matters for a government decision. In The Theory and Practice of Modern Government, p.385, Herman Finer pointed out that:

Not until there is a personal confrontation in a small assembly, with systematic procedure, can the detailed expression of policy, which means everything, be considered, nor the full spiritual force of majority and minority be measured and applied.

             Decisions by a yes-no vote for the commonwealth are made without adjustment and compromise. How can a budget be adopted by a yes-or-no vote? Who is to lead?  How hold accountable the contributors, government  by ad agency? Who is to carry out a policy adopted? A bureaucracy. And who appoints the bureaucrats? With no machinery for public leaders to do this, the bureaucracy would become a self-perpetuating body.

                        In The Economist, 12/21/96, Brian Beedham anticipates "the full flowering of the idea of democracy." He strongly advocates the system of governing largely by referendum, asserting that democracy is part time only when people are allowed to express their preferences only at election of their representatives, who they do all the deciding until the next election. Although the Economist acknowledges that allowing direct votes "...does not remove the need for an intelligent parliament," it nonetheless asserts that: "Our children may find direct democracy more efficient as well as more democratic, than the representative sort."

            A direct public vote has great value but narrow scope. Where it works well, better than any other device, is on an issue on which the elected lawmakers have a conflict of interest. The main area for this is the terms of employment of elected lawmakers: redistricting, compensation, eligibility (e.g., term limits).

            What need is there to further restrict the functions of politicians when we not only have in place, on the state and local level, the device of direct vote on issues, but also have, not in law but in fact, the role of public opinion polls, constantly feeding the politicians information of what  is wanted at the moment by each of various segments of the public?

            Those who seek to abolish or at least greatly diminish the function of the politician sometimes raise the proposition that  politics is a science and politicians are required as trained experts who can understand things that are beyond us ordinary people. Then after raising this proposition, they demolish it as a batter may demolish a batting practice pitch. Of course, politicians should not be treated as experts, with arcane knowledge, like dentists or actuaries. However, politics does require certain gifts and characteristics, and these qualities are not shared equally among us all. The role of the politician is more that of an artist than a scientist. A society cannot produce good politicians by putting people through a rigorous training program, as it can for surgeons or point guards. But nonetheless the skills and qualities of a superior politician are among the most rare and socially valuable in all organized society.

            And these skills and qualities are those that most ordinary people, citizens, do have the capacity to discern and evaluate well most of the time. The word "most" is used twice in the preceding sentence a recalling Shaw's remark that one of the chief virtues of democracy is that it insures we will be governed no better than we deserve.

            The Economist: "The heart of democratic politics is the process of finding out which of the various possible solutions to a problem is the one most people think the best." As a ringing generalization, this is true, but it is not the whole truth and it has exceptions. Not only is what "most people" think best often mistaken, especially in failure to look to long range consequences, in basing their choice altogether on their own preferences for today. Also, majority rule extended beyond a point becomes tyranny over the minorities, whose diverse interests and needs should, at least. be recognized in public policy.

            The maxim "one person, one vote" is a sound maxim. It expresses a fundamental of sound government. But it has limits reflecting the inequalities of civic virtue and judgment in humankind. Even within a legislature, full equality of power does not work well. Where there is effective leadership, the dolts in the body do not do mucy harm. But where all have an equal role, dolts do harm.             

            A direct vote decides a yes-or-no question only. It makes no allowance for adjustments between the multitude of needs and interests. The direct vote decision resembles the action of the crowd in the Roman Coliseum, when the standing gladiator seeks direction on what to do with his opponent lying in the sand at his feet: turning thumbs up (to spare) or down (to dispatch).

            To abolish politicians and substitute the initiative for all questions would give us this pattern of government. Basic policy issues would be formulated by interest groups that would employ fund raisers. The raised funds would be paid to advertising agencies for image-making ads. And the outcome would be shaped by the news media and the ads.

            Granted, campaign money is currently the great vice of the election process for politicians. But this evil is subject to reform with less difficulty than to remove money from the major factors in the initiative process. And just because initiative votes are not always won by the biggest spenders does not mean that money does not have a heavy influence.

            Then all those people and groups who were not in the winning plurality would seek adjustments from the courts to correct alleged impairments of their rights. This would include, but not be limited to, all who disagreed with the rate and allocation of each tax, the amount and allocation of each appropriation, and the level of public borrowing or debt reduction.

           After that, the self-perpetuating bureaucracy would execute the policies as its members saw fit. So we would have government by image-makers, judges and bureaucrats. By and by, government by bureaucrats alone.

            An element in the motive of some who seek to do away with politicians is hostility to "elitism" among those who regard as "elitist," and therefore to be disapproved, a recognition of unequal ability in any field but sports.

            The perplexing curse of money plagues both elective and direct vote democracy. But it is nonetheless subject to reform. And such reform might appropriately be carried out by a direct vote measure. In the meantime, in direct democracy only the donors can be identified to help the voters' decision-making, while in elections both donors and recipients can be identified.

            Public opinion polls are so much better as a device to induce responsiveness than direct votes because the response can be so much more flexible than yes-or-no.

            In a straight yes-or-no vote, the losers cannot be dealt with fairly. Usually the losers do not comprise a single minority but a multitude, generally overlapping. They are affected in different ways: A's property tax is increased, B's exemption is removed, C's subsidy is removed, D's penalty for violation is increased.

            Judges cannot help all these interests on the losing side of votes without nullifying the purpose of the winning side and taking over the role of legislator.

            Even though a large proportion of the population now can read and write and know something of current news events, and have leisure time to devote to civic duties, there still is a difference in capacity to perform the politican's function, just as there is a range of capacity for most functions of human activity.

            And the differences are important enough that merely meeting minimum qualifications - such as those required for many jobs - would suffice.

            The fact that many citizens are as bright and well-educated as a political leader and as capable of dumb or dishonest actions does not assure that one is equally well-qualified to shape public policy and to administer it. Merely having equivalent brains and character to political leaders - and many citizens do - does not assure that such a citizen is equally well-qualified to shape public policy and to administer it.

            Citizens admire politicians less than before, but this drop in regard is not attributable solely to increased capacity (education, knowledge, leisure time) of citizens but also to an actual drop in the quality of political leaders, to disappointed rising expectations of responsiveness and to ____.

            Citizens no longer need a party official to interpret public affairs and the merits of candidates for them because they can get some of this kind of help from the news media and some from direct experience of politicians on the air or screen. But the obsolescence of parties , at least during the present period of low ideological content to civic affairs, does not make politicians' functions obsolete.

            It also has been asserted (Economist) that the practice of direct voting will make the citizenry more responsible. But where direct voting has had a century of experience, evidence is lacking to support this claim.

            Proponents of government by direct voting make much of needing to abolish the gulf between rulers and ruled. But reality no longer displays such a gulf.

            In light of the fundamental diversity of ends among us humans (see Is. Berlin), it is hard to see how yes-no voting by the society could avoid endless injustice and tension leading to convulsions.              

            Put all authority in a council of elders, Plato's Guardians, the self-pepetuating board of a mutual insurance company? The movie The Lion King makes an appealing pitch for hereditary monarchy. How many left in the world not currently a dictator or seeking to become one still adheres to such beliefs? Remember when some one recited a litany of democracy's deplorable defects, Churchill growled, "Yes, democracy is the worst form of government...[pause]...except for all the other kinds."

            We may acknowledge that our system is not the best possible, even for our present circumstances. And we may remind ourselves - perhaps happily, perhaps fearfully - that it is sure to change. One day, our knowledge, our technology and our systems of organization and communication will enable us to govern ourselves without politicians. But we can't do it now; because it would not be self government.

            We can do without high quality politicians less readily than we can survive second rate lawyers, televangelists and headwaiters. Democracy and politicians go together. Without politicians we can have government - perhaps, for a while, government better than we deserve - but it would not be democratic government. Democracy is impossible without politicians, and without democracy politicians have no place in government. Would those who revile politicians, whom they identify with their troubles, prefer the critical decisions of their government to be made by any one but politicians? By admirals, aristocrats, bishops, bureaucrats, commissars, courtiers, dictators, dukes, emirs, emperors, owners of major league franchises? Would they prefer their armed forces to be headed by the officers' choice, their police chief to be named by the cops?