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A NEW CONSTITUTION To End the Excessive Power of Prime Ministers |
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CIVIC REPUBLICAN MANIFESTO 2009 For Great Britain VIRTUE FREEDOM ASPIRATION WEALTH PEACE |
DEBT FREE MONEY
To End the Misery of Debt Based Money |
FIRST REPUBLIC
NATIONAL FLAG OF THE COMMONWEALTH |
REDISCOVERING BRITISH CIVIC REPUBLICANISM |
 JEREMY BENTHAM Philosopher (1748-1832) BRITISH REPUBLICAN |
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"Civic republicanism is a modern tradition with roots that extend deeply into the classical past. The exponents of the early modern tradition hark back to ancient theoretical and practical antecedents in Greece and Rome. Machiavelli, Harrington, Madison all thought themselves as building on ancient foundations" Iseult Honohan(2002) |
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The sections can be read in any order but it is best to start with the three INTRODUCTION sections.(Grayed out pages have not yet been posted) --------------------
Economic Enfranchisement Non-aggressive Foreign Relations
Authority to Create Constitution Lower House Upper House Judiciary Supreme Court Public Services Monetary Policy Regions and Federation (to be completed)
Meritocracy Civil Society Crime and Penal reform Vice Cultural and Intellectual Life Church Disestablished Virtue and Happiness Young Generation
Monetary Policy (to be completed) Existing MPC and FSA Banking Money Flow Currency Industry
First British Republic History of Republicanism
Problems of Current System Advantage Votes Electoral System
National Flag Federal Flag
Republican Theory General History of Republicanism in Britain First Republic Period in Britain British Constitution Economics Enlightenment
The Need for a Republican Party
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IDEALS OF A MODERN REPUBLIC
Republicans seek to govern the nation of what is at present the United Kingdom. But to do that well and properly the present constitution must be changed. And so constitutional change is at the heart of the programme.
A Constitution must be founded upon what is usually referred to as a "Political Philosophy", and so to formulate a revised Constitution we have to first decide what our political philosophy is to be.
In doing this we benefit from the previously formulated Republican Political Philosophies of many great minds of the past, both in Britain and elsewhere, and from the experience of 2500 years of Republican governments in the Ancient and Modern, Old and New Worlds. We also draw conclusions by observing non-Republican states.
The essence of a Political Philosophy must be to describe how the power of government should be balanced against the individual. There is a relationship between government and individual which by its nature tends to be unequal and it is the function of the Constitution to bestow on the individual an appropriate degree of power and influence.
A tendency of government that has always concerned Republican thinkers is what we shall call here "Excessive Executive Power" or "Excessive Executive Control". In the past this has also been referred to as "Tyranny" or "Dictatorship".
To be clear the problem is of Excessive Executive Power, not Executive Power per se. We need the Executive to run the country and it must be allowed to make decisions.
In order to defend against Excessive Executive Power or Control, we describe Five Ideals or Five Pillars for a Modern Republic. Each Ideal individually constitutes a defense but they only work effectively if they are all, to one degree or another, in place.
It is important to understand that these are "Ideals" and like all ideals they are there to strive for even though they may not always be attainable.
It may seem obvious that Excessive Executive Control undesirable, but it is worth stating the reasons for guarding against it:
1. Excessive Executive Control is usually malign. And even if you had one exceptional well-motivated leader there would be no guarantee his or her successor would be the same. 2. There is always a tendency towards even more Executive Control ("control freakery") and the Executive will invariably exploit this unless constitutional safeguards are in place. 3. The Five Ideals create desirable consequences in themselves and they are only realized properly without Excessive Executive Control.
The Five Ideals for a Modern Republic are: I. Republicanism II. Liberalism III. Democracy IV. Economic Enfranchisement V. Non-Aggressive Foreign Relations
To repeat: these are Ideals to strive for. We may not be able to realise all of them, all of the time. They may even sometimes conflict with each other. But the degree to which they are all present is the degree to which we will guard against Excessive Executive Power.
If any one of them is absent (for instance, as II. was more or less absent in the ancient Roman Republic, or as V.is more or less absent in the George W. Bush administration) then the dangers of Excessive Executive Power become extreme.
But we should not believe that the Ideals are fragile. Once established in a nation they are very difficult to reverse, even by a determined Executive. Once the people have tasted any of them, they do not easily let them go.
And as the great 18th century French Republican thinker, Montesquieu, said: Excessive Executive Power means "loss of liberty".
The Five Ideals are each defined for the purposes of a Modern Republic by Five "Practical Aspects". The more each of the Practical Aspects are achieved the more the Ideal will be achieved.
I. Republicanism defined by:
II. Liberalism defined by: 1. Judicial rights for Individuals (Bill of Rights) 2. Freedom of Speech 3. Protection of minorities 4. Right to create private companies 5. Right to own property
III. Democracy defined by:
IV. Economic Enfranchisement defined by:
V. Non-Aggressive Foreign Relations defined by:
These Five Ideals and the Five Practical Aspects that define each Ideal will form the bedrock upon which the revised Constitution of Great Britain will be built. The Constitution will be successful to the extent that it makes the Five Ideals permanent and inviolable.
History tells us (very recent history in the case of the Kingdom) that a determined Executive will always try to extend its power and to do this it will attack any, or all, of the Five Ideals as, or if, they are enshrined in the Constitution.
The constitution of the Kingdom as its stands already enshrines each of the Five Ideals to a greater or lesser degree and recent and current Prime Ministers have been conspicuous in their attacks on the Ideals as a means of increasing and consolidating Executive Power.
To see how this works, consider some examples of how recent Prime Ministers have undermined the Ideals, insofar as they exist in the Kingdom, with the aim of consolidating Executive Power.
I. Republicanism. Thatcher had a well advertised aversion to any Civil Institution of the kind that make up the Civil Society referred to in the First Aspect* of the First Ideal of Republicanism.
Thatcher's comment that "there is no such thing as society" refers as much as anything to the Civil Society. For example, she successfully undermined the status of Universities by abolishing tenure for lecturers, she diluted the role of the Civil Service in government and undermined the role of the BBC. Attempts to reduce the status of the legal profession were less successful.
The desire is always the same: to force Institutions to operate more like private companies thereby undermining their institutional role and turning them into a more pliable constituencies. This is done under the Populist pretexts of "opening up" or combating "elitism" and "restrictive practices".
The effect is always the same: by gnawing away at the Civil Society, the power of the Executive is enhanced. There is also the effect that the richness of life is eroded as more and more activity becomes reduced to the singular pursuit of self-interest.
New Labour continued this trend and a very recent example is set out in the Green Paper that would allow non-solicitors to own solicitors' practice, so renewing the attack on the independence of the legal profession.
And the New Labour proliferation of Quangos is sure sign of the Executive trying gain control over the Institutions that make up the Civil Society.
In respect of the Fourth Aspect* of the First Ideal, Central Government has long sought to undermine the Local Authorities by manipulating their spending and usurping their power.
For instance, New Labour planning legislation tends to sideline elected planning committee members emphasising the role of direct "consultation" with the people that elected them. And New Labour quango, CABE, has been used to bully committee members into accepting an arbitrary "expert" opinion on planning proposals.
II. Liberalism The Ideal of Liberalism is of the government as a neutral institution, with only a negative function - not to restrain the individual. Of course, this is not strictly feasible, for laws will always restrain individuals to an extent. This is why we must talk about Liberalism as an "Ideal".
The first defining Practical Aspect* of Liberalism is probably the one that in recent years has most come under attack from the Executive. Especially with the increased threat, or perceived increased threat, of terrorism the rights of individuals to go about their normal lives unhindered by actions by the State have often been tampered with.
This is not to conclude immediately that such measures are not justified. That is a matter for debate. What is not in doubt, however, is that such measures compromise the Ideal of Liberalism, on the one hand, and, on the other, increase Executive Power.
III. Democracy In current politics, democracy is the most often mentioned of all of the Five Ideals, but it is at the same time little understood. This is partly due to the fact that government and constitution in general are little understood, and the current political establishment has no wish to change this.
In spite of this, many people recognise that the current electoral system is not very "democratic". For one thing, governments can be formed by parties that overall polled fewer votes than another party.
Currently the second Aspect* is being compromised by the Executive's refusal to allow a Referendum on the major Constitutional changes involved in the new EU Treaty.
The Executive knows that the new Treaty will displace some law making overseas to the Brussels, so denying Democracy by denying its fifth Practical Aspect*.
Meanwhile the Conservative opposition has promised a Referendum if elected. This may of course be opportunism, but in any case it is Democracy at work, however imperfectly.
IV. Economic Enfranchisement At the start of the New Labour project, there was much talk of the idea of "stakeholder". A rather unwieldy word: behind it is the idea that everyone should have a stake in society but It was never spelt out whether this meant economic or political stake. The term has long been dropped from the New Labour rhetoric.
Republicans hold the simple view that a "political stake" in society means nothing unless you also have an "economic stake" in it. This theme has run through discussions on Republics for over two thousand years.
Political Enfranchisement means nothing without Economic Enfranchisement. So if you truly value the former you have to strive to give everybody a reasonable income and a good life.
What we have seen in the Kingdom under successive governments is a degradation of the lot of people at the lower end of the social ladder.
This challenges the Ideal of Economic Enfranchisement and disadvantaged people have little resource to control their lives. They can offer less and less restraint on government action and so the power of the Executive is enhanced.
V. Non-Aggressive Foreign Relations Belligerency in foreign affairs has always been used by Executives to enhance their own power and prestige. Although this can have Populist appeal, ultimately the political life of the nation will suffer as liberty will be eroded.
To take an extreme case, Hitler took his country to war in order to tighten his grip on the German people and use the cover of war to hide his odious racial plans.
A rather less extreme but, nevertheless, worrying recent case is the Presidency of George W. Bush which sought to allow him and his coterie to tighten their control* on the American nation through war in Iraq.
The intervention in Iraq is bound up with denial of the second, third and five Aspects of the Fifth Ideal*. For a contradiction of the first, we need only look to the recent decision to renew the Trident nuclear system.
This is a system which is designed purely to obliterate Russia, a country that it is reasonable to believe has no hostile intentions towards us. (This decision has the fingerprints of the White House all over it.)
Putting the country on a war footing in this way, even for a war that only in the most extreme imaginings will ever take place, is a way of preserving and enhancing Executive Power at the expense of individual liberty, prosperity and happiness.
Under the First Aspect of achieving the Ideal of Non-Aggressive Foreign Relations, the military should be geared to a flexible response to unpredictable circumstances with the emphasis on defensive capability.
In this way the functioning of the military is closer to the felt needs of the people and closer to its proud traditions. It has less chance of being manipulated by the Executive in the creation of scares and bogey men.
HUMAN NATURE AND INDETERMINACY
The Five Ideals are the bedrock for the creation of a Republican Constitution. The Aspects of each Ideal indicate the practical means whereby the Ideals can be realised, however imperfectly, within the Constitution.
This approach to political philosophy rests on a view of the world and human affairs that accepts that we can never absolutely know everything and we can never devise the perfect political structures we might wish for.
This is why we talk of "Ideals" as underlying the Constitution - Ideals that can never be perfectly realised and may even contradict each other.
For instance, the demands of Republican Institutions may sometimes contradict the demands of Democracy. Liberalism may come up against Democratic rule. And so on. The point is that judgments will have to be made in devising a Constitution that achieves the best compromise between the Ideals.
If weaknesses occur in the Constitution in resolving between the Republican Ideals, an unprincipled Executive will try to profit by taking control into itself. The Executive always knows what it wants.
Nevertheless, our Republican Constitution must take account of Human Nature as it really is - indeterminate and imperfect, but aspirational and generous.
We live in an age when the successes of science in certain fields have encouraged people to believe that certainty is possible in practically every field. So people too often search for simple linear answers that force a determinacy upon the world.
This leads to a combative attitude of opposing claims upon a supposed single truth. People want to ‘nail’ the answer to everything. My solution is correct, yours in wrong. When mine is implemented the argument will be decided and everything will be set to right (the end of history).
But life isn’t like that. Life is fundamentally indeterminate. That is, there is no set of human made rules or laws that can perfectly model it and be perfectly adapted to deal with life. Any single solution we find will have flaws. The way forward is to accept this but define the different approaches as the Five Ideals do and then seek to balance them.
Thus the indeterminacy of the world and society can be accommodated but never resolved.
This is the Humanist view that was intrinsic to the Enlightenment of the Eighteenth Century that saw the creation of great, original Republican ideas.
The wisdom of this Humanism can help inform our judgment in the 21st century as we devise the Republican Constitution that will release the talent and energy of our people, that is theirs to give, and provide for them the freedom and happiness, that is their right to enjoy.
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FLAG OF LONDON SECOND REPUBLIC Flag of the Metropolitan Region of London of the United Republic of Great Britain
*Regional/Local Government Civil and Democratic Institutions to balance with the center
*Judicial rights for Individuals (Bill of Rights)
*Referendums of the Electorate directly on Constitutional issues
*Minimisation of citizens being subject to legislation enacted overseas
*V. Non-Aggressive Foreign Relations defined by:
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