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Divergent views on the Vale Royal talks
published: Thursday | January 10, 2008
Martin Henry
A very senior columnist for The Sunday Gleaner has bucked the "drift of public opinion" on the planned resumption of the Vale Royal talks between the Government and Opposition.
Dawn Ritch thinks the overwhelming public opinion support for the Vale Royal talks is "political correctness gone mad". She has a point, though perhaps an overdrawn one as usual.
There is a generalised ache in Jamaica for a government of national unity as the answer to the nation's problems. How this Government will differ from that of a one-party state, for which there are plenty of recent obnoxious examples, no one seems to have worked out with any clarity or credibility.
Very few Jamaicans, in high and low places, really understand the nature and historical origins of democratic governance or of that excellent Westminster model which the British people, who led the world in modern democracy, slowly invented through civil wars and other upheavals and have bequeathed to us. In the long history of human societies, democracy is an exception in governance - and a fragile one.
Not ready for democracy
At the heart of the system is a healthy, regulated competition for political power among persons and institutions, with the voting public having the final word about who rules. Competition taken to extremes wrecks the system à la Kenya. Competition eliminated replaces democracy with some form of autocracy, a system with which the world is far more familiar throughout history.
Democracy is actually a system of governance for a wise, educated, virtuous and self-disciplined people. It doesn't work well when these characteristics are, too, generally absent. And this may be the real dilemma which Jamaican democracy faces. Indeed, the wider world is drifting away from several of these requirements for democracy, leaving a dicey future for this form of governance.
In Westminster style, the Jamaican Constitution establishes an Opposition as a check upon the Government. When the Opposition ceases to 'oppose' it would have abdicated its constitutional responsibility leaving the people at the mercy of the Government. Too many Jamaicans, egged on by too many of the purveyor's of public opinion, now see 'opposition' as the cause of the problem, rather than the tried and tested solution to the age-old problem of the abuse of state power by government.
Room for cooperation
But there has to be room for cooperation and collaboration. And again the Constitution has wisely arranged that certain legislative decisions can only be made by a minimum of two-thirds of both the Lower and the Upper Houses of Parliament, which requires Opposition support at least in the Senate.
Governance is conducted on several fronts, or through several branches of government, which serve as checks and balances upon each other. Consultative talks between Government and Opposition and the parties which form them are perfectly legitimate and can be useful in their proper sphere.
Defining 'proper sphere' is now the thing. In a mature democracy, led by mature people who understand the inevitable cut and thrust of competitive politics such strategic collaboration does not preclude simultaneously thrashing out divergent views in the Judicature, debating and voting on them in the Legislature, and campaigning on them on political platforms. Indeed, Government should also be routinely consulting with non-political sectors of society.
So it makes perfect democratic sense for the Leader of the Opposition to take the Prime Minister to court over the Public Service Commission issue, sit with Government to forge a common crime reduction plan including a dismantling of the crime factory political garrisons, cross swords in Parliament over the regulation o investment schemes and fight the governing party on the campaign trail over its stewardship in executive government.
Competing business entities have long learnt when to combine and collaborate for their common good against a common external threat and when to pull out all the stops in fierce, but legally regulated competition. And political entities in functional democracies have also learnt that lesson.
Martin Henry is a communication specialist.
published: Thursday | January 10, 2008
Martin Henry
A very senior columnist for The Sunday Gleaner has bucked the "drift of public opinion" on the planned resumption of the Vale Royal talks between the Government and Opposition.
Dawn Ritch thinks the overwhelming public opinion support for the Vale Royal talks is "political correctness gone mad". She has a point, though perhaps an overdrawn one as usual.
There is a generalised ache in Jamaica for a government of national unity as the answer to the nation's problems. How this Government will differ from that of a one-party state, for which there are plenty of recent obnoxious examples, no one seems to have worked out with any clarity or credibility.
Very few Jamaicans, in high and low places, really understand the nature and historical origins of democratic governance or of that excellent Westminster model which the British people, who led the world in modern democracy, slowly invented through civil wars and other upheavals and have bequeathed to us. In the long history of human societies, democracy is an exception in governance - and a fragile one.
Not ready for democracy
At the heart of the system is a healthy, regulated competition for political power among persons and institutions, with the voting public having the final word about who rules. Competition taken to extremes wrecks the system à la Kenya. Competition eliminated replaces democracy with some form of autocracy, a system with which the world is far more familiar throughout history.
Democracy is actually a system of governance for a wise, educated, virtuous and self-disciplined people. It doesn't work well when these characteristics are, too, generally absent. And this may be the real dilemma which Jamaican democracy faces. Indeed, the wider world is drifting away from several of these requirements for democracy, leaving a dicey future for this form of governance.
In Westminster style, the Jamaican Constitution establishes an Opposition as a check upon the Government. When the Opposition ceases to 'oppose' it would have abdicated its constitutional responsibility leaving the people at the mercy of the Government. Too many Jamaicans, egged on by too many of the purveyor's of public opinion, now see 'opposition' as the cause of the problem, rather than the tried and tested solution to the age-old problem of the abuse of state power by government.
Room for cooperation
But there has to be room for cooperation and collaboration. And again the Constitution has wisely arranged that certain legislative decisions can only be made by a minimum of two-thirds of both the Lower and the Upper Houses of Parliament, which requires Opposition support at least in the Senate.
Governance is conducted on several fronts, or through several branches of government, which serve as checks and balances upon each other. Consultative talks between Government and Opposition and the parties which form them are perfectly legitimate and can be useful in their proper sphere.
Defining 'proper sphere' is now the thing. In a mature democracy, led by mature people who understand the inevitable cut and thrust of competitive politics such strategic collaboration does not preclude simultaneously thrashing out divergent views in the Judicature, debating and voting on them in the Legislature, and campaigning on them on political platforms. Indeed, Government should also be routinely consulting with non-political sectors of society.
So it makes perfect democratic sense for the Leader of the Opposition to take the Prime Minister to court over the Public Service Commission issue, sit with Government to forge a common crime reduction plan including a dismantling of the crime factory political garrisons, cross swords in Parliament over the regulation o investment schemes and fight the governing party on the campaign trail over its stewardship in executive government.
Competing business entities have long learnt when to combine and collaborate for their common good against a common external threat and when to pull out all the stops in fierce, but legally regulated competition. And political entities in functional democracies have also learnt that lesson.
Martin Henry is a communication specialist.