With David Cameron’s recent relaunch of the Big Society, it is timely to re-examine plans from across the political spectrum to reform the relationship between the state and individuals and communities. Ahead of an LSE conference ‘The Big Society and the Good Society’ next week, Tony Travers looks at the growing desire for political localism and finds that it will only thrive if Whitehall is willing to devolve more democratic and financial powers away from the centre.
The Big Society and related policy drivers such as ‘localism’ and ‘community’ have emerged as a response to a perception that public and private institutions have become too big and distant for individual citizens to interact with. It is also argued that many people feel the political class ignores them. Promoters of policies to address the problem of increased alienation within parts of society also point to undesirable indicators such as a decline in social capital, rising anti-social behaviour and community breakdown.
In 2006, the think tank Policy Exchange published Compassionate Conservatism, by Jesse Norman and Janan Ganesh. This pamphlet argued that the state had become sufficiently big to stifle individual and local action and there should be a re-orientation away from central government towards local government and citizens. The size and role of the state, the banks, big corporations and even local councils has more recently been questioned by those who promote smaller, community-based, control of institutions.
The most visible manifestations of thought about the need to reform both government and the private sector currently come from so-called ‘Red Tory’ Phillip Blond and the think-tank Respublica, and also from ‘Blue Labour’ guru Maurice Glasman whose origins lie in London Citizens, the faith and community-based activist group. These thinkers are seen as bringing intellectual rigour to a sprawling debate about the nature of the State, the strength of civil society and the right of individuals to influence the institutions that impact upon them.
There is a surprising similarity between the imperatives that drive Red Tories and Blue Labour. A modern world dominated by global corporations, too-big-to-fail banks and super-sized government has left citizens and local entrepreneurs cut off from any possibility of access to power and decision-making. The new Red/Blue thinkers want to re-empower local communities. They also share a belief that morality and religion should have a greater role to play in the future of society.
But Compassionate Conservatives, Red Tories, Blue Labour and other radical localists face a desperate problem. Rather like the former Soviet bloc after 1991, England has become used to hyper-centralisation, to demand-led dependency on the State and to government-imposed service guarantees. Leading politicians in the major parties attack any idea of a public provision ‘postcode lottery’. Most mainstream Labour politicians see the state as a wholly benign force. Few Conservatives honestly believe in dismantling large private corporations. Liberal Democrats still support traditional, elected, local government as the solution to the problem of centralisation.
Moreover, national politicians and civil servants appear to have little faith in local decision-making. The government has published only the most limited proposals to allow increased local powers over taxation. The Exchequer is responsible for 95 per cent of all UK taxation and is set to remain dominant. Such high levels of central tax-determination inevitably lead to centralised decision-making. All the think-tank localism in the world will come to nothing unless Britain can transfer a significant proportion of tax-raising power away from the Exchequer.
As things stand, the government’s proposals for the Big Society and localism seem likely to shift some powers from councils to neighbourhoods and communities. But there are few proposals to give local neighbourhoods significant democratic powers over the NHS, education, work & pensions or justice. Council services may be decentralised to wards and parishes, but Whitehall powers will remain in the hands of ministers.
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On Tuesday 14 June, British Government @LSE will be hosting a debate between Maurice Glasman and Jesse Norman MP on, ‘The Big Society and the Good Society’: rethinking the role of the state in British society’. More information is available here.
What Tony has identified in his post is the effect of a paradigm shift along the lines of that highlighted by another Tony (Judt) in his rather excellent Ill Fares the Land. Both Tonys suggest the need for change and make similar arguments for why change is so difficult. But ironically, the changes they are calling for pull in opposite directions.
Judt argues that we have for so long lived in an age of self-serving materialism, obsession with growth, glaring inequality and the primacy of the market and the private sector that we have forgotten how to question the validity of all this. Even if we sense that all is not right with the way we live, we no longer have the vocabulary or the imagination needed to make a strong case for an alternative.
As Travers shows, the same goes for centralisation: we have got so used to a dominant, paternalistic state over the past few decades that we have forgotten how to think locally and argue for local power. And it is not just politicians and policy makers who have developed this collective amnesia, it is all of us. Quite apart from cynicism about spending cuts, one reason why it has been so hard to explain and establish the Big Society is that the people who need to be engaged to deliver it – you and me – cannot get beyond the idea that the state ought to be doing it all for them.
So far so similar: in both cases we sense a need for change but are unable to articulate it effectively. But where do we go from here? Judt’s hope is that the banking crisis and other recent events will lead to a resurgence in support for social democracy and social conscience. Travers’ seems to be that the growing, and increasingly politically ecumenical, intellectual weight behind localism will lead to a change of heart and focus in Whitehall.
The trouble is, Judt’s vision is profoundly anti-local, as it involves the emergence of a stronger and more interventionist state. It will be interesting to see which paradigm we shift to next – or if we simply stay as we are.
(My blog, if you’re interested: http://bensviews.wordpress.com)
It’s familiar territory for us too, albeit outside both of these groups as an advocacy for localised economic development which began in 1996 with a paper suggesting that traditional capitalism was an insufficient paradigm. It proposed a people-centered alternative and led to a project in Russia in 1999 following the collapse of their economy and devaluation of the rouble.
it was to become known as the Tomsk Regional Initiative and over 5 years assisted the creation of 10,000 micro enterprises and was replicated in several other cities by USAID.
That places our efforts and practical experience about a decade ahead of Conservative thinking. We introduced the concept to the UK in 2004, with a proposal for development of local economies through social enterprise on a national scale. It was to state that
“Traditional capitalism is an insufficient economic model allowing monetary outcomes as the bottom line with little regard to social needs. Bottom line must be taken one step further… by at least some companies, past profit, to people. How profits are used is equally as important as creation of profits. Where profits can be brought to bear by willing individuals and companies to social benefit, so much the better. Moreover, this activity must be recognized and supported at government policy level as a badly needed, essential, and entirely legitimate enterprise activity”
If as a first stance, the leading thinkers and practitioners are not included, how can this be a reflection of either a Big or Good society, which aim to devolve power to community organisations like ours?
http://forestofdean.socialgo.com/magazine/read/the-case-for-local-sustainable-enterprise_38.html