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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
COAT OF ARMS OF THE COMMONWEALTH |
TOWARDS A NEW BRITISH CIVIC REPUBLICANISM |
 ANNIE BESANT Radical Orator 1847-1933 BRITISH REPUBLICAN |
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"If your liberty be not a root that grows, it will be a branch that withers" James Harrington, 1656 |
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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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LIBERALISM
Liberalism is a term that has been applied and is applied to a great number of things. An incomplete list is: individual liberties, freedom of speech, private property, universal human rights, limitations on government power, free market economy, religious tolerance, tolerance of ethnic minorities, rule of law, government responsibility for public services, government responsibility for alleviating poverty, transparency of government, popular sovereignty, equality, right to demonstrate, universal suffrage, good quality of health care and education for all, help for the handicapped, the sick, the disabled, and the aged, fair taxation, national self-determination and free trade.
If Liberalism means so many things we may wonder does it actually mean anything at all? The problem is confounded by the fact that Liberalism means different things on different sides of the Atlantic Ocean. And we have a party in Britain that calls itself the Liberal Democrat Party, but whose character and policies tell us little about Liberalism.
Liberalism here is defined as one of the Five Ideals of a Modern Republican State. This narrows down the meaning somewhat for if Liberalism is an Ideal and so free of the need to mean specific political arrangements or goals, it can stand for something altogether purer than if it has to engage directly with the messiness of the real political world.
It then becomes like the other Ideals: something to strive for but not necessarily to attain. In fact, we must recognise that the Ideals may militate against each other and so compromises and trade offs between them are going to happen.
Liberalism has always been an impossible Ideal. But, nevertheless, it is part of our political mindset. It embodies certain key Humanist principles. And we cannot do without it.
Of the twenty-four concepts mentioned above, that are sometimes called Liberal, only the first eight can be classified under the Ideal of Liberalism to be adopted here. The other sixteen are, described under other headings. The definition here of what comes under Liberalism will include those items that can only be called Liberal and nothing else.
The core idea in Liberalism is of a neutral state, that is to say, a state that only has a negative function. And so the individual or group of individuals when they go about their lives, it is as if the state were not there. Or rather, they do not feel its presence, not because it is not there (it is there all right) but because its laws and practices are so well formulated that it does not appear in any way intrusive.
An immediate difficulty with the idea of the entirely neutral state is that we all know that the state has to be there and has to be doing a lot of things for anybody to be able to carry on their normal civilised life in the personal or business spheres. Without it we would live a primitive existence, where, although the presence of the state would not be felt, its absence certainly would be.
Liberal political philosophers (since John Locke) have answered this point with a bold claim. They have argued that humans have "natural rights" which once understood can be incorporated into the laws of the state. These rights are not "natural" in the sense of belonging to nature, but "natural' in the sense of being intrinsic to the human condition.
Thus, if humans operate under circumstances which embody their "natural rights", that is, "natural law", the effect will be exactly the kind of state that Liberals desire - one which will have a neutral effect on their lives.
The laws that we live under thus become rather like the air we breathe. We do not notice the air very much in our normal lives. We inhale it constantly and usually only notice if there is something peculiar about it (a bad smell) or we have trouble ourselves with our breathing. As long as there is a balance between our body and its environment, we do not give it much thought. If we do, it is just to be thankful for the harmonious bounties that life can bring.
So would be the laws of the perfect liberal state. Ever present and vital to our existence and survival but so well in tune with our own natures and our "natural rights" that they are never an issue. The perfect "neutral" state. This describes the Ideal of Liberalism that is the second of the Five Ideals we wish to incorporate into the Modern Republic.
* * * Ever since the word "Liberalism" entered the western political vocabulary in the eighteenth century the idea has had its detractors - usually labeled "conservative" or "reactionary". In fact, the concept of Liberalism can be traced back to the ancient world - not so much the ancient Classical world of Greece and Rome but of the Jewish and later the Christian traditions.
Jesus' Sermon on the Mount is a statement of many of the concerns about the importance of the individual that were to figure in later Liberal ideas. In this sense the incorporation of Liberal ideas into Republican thinking in the eighteenth century represents a merging of Classical and Judaic-Christian traditions 1. The gains represented by this synthesis are fundamental to Modern Republican thought.
If John Locke's neat and tidy idea of Natural Law were watertight then the difficulties in defining Liberalism would disappear. But sadly for those who like "neat and tidy' this is not so.
For example, we can presumably all agree that Natural Law might tell us that killing and stealing is wrong, but what about press incursions into public life or, even more thorny, the question of abortion. We quickly start to disagree about what our instincts towards some inbuilt sense of Natural Law might be telling us.
* * * Current discussions concerning the definition of Liberalism and liberty have often focused on an essay written by Sir Isaiah Berlin in 1958 called "Two Concepts of Liberty". The two concepts are of negative and positive liberty
Berlin defined negative liberty as the absence of constraints on, or interference with, a person's possible action. Greater "negative freedom" meant fewer restrictions on possible action. Berlin associated positive liberty with the idea of self-mastery, or the capacity to determine oneself, to be in control of one's destiny.
Whereas the idea of negative liberty corresponds pretty well to the idea of the neutral state that has been associated here with the Ideal of Liberalism, positive liberty seems less easy to define.
We might think of an example of positive liberty as being free to drive my car to any destination on the roads. But quickly we might counter that this is simply stating that this is the negative liberty of my being unconstrained about where I drive. So, what is it - negative or positive liberty?
The problem with this discussion lies in the terms in which Berlin couched the argument in the beginning. He wants to discuss liberty in isolation. But it does not exist in isolation. Liberty has to be discussed in relation to the society within which it is located and in particular in relation to an opposing concept - "power" (or in current usage "empowerment").
If I enjoy, what Berlin wants to call, negative liberty then this means that I am relatively free of outside external power constraining me. But this in itself gets me nowhere. I need to have some power myself to exercise the freedom I have. And so in practical terms "negative" freedom is bound up totally with "positive" freedom. Negative freedom (the absence of restraining power) is useless without positive freedom (the ability to exercise power, to be empowered).
To return to the example of the car, if I have the freedom to drive anywhere, this is not of much use if no petrol is available to put in the car. I need the corresponding power, that petrol gives me, to exercise my freedom of the road.
So where does this argument get us? It reminds us that Liberalism, if it is to mean anything different from quite a few other terms, really has just to mean negative freedom. Positive freedom is not Liberalism, it is to do with what we can achieve, it is to do with power and control.
* * *
In our daily lives, for instance, we know that one thing that immediately gives us a positive freedom that most of us value is money.
And money is power. It is power to help us choose the goods and the life we want. But in the arcane world of political philosophy there is a tendency to overlook such a primal sense of positive liberty.
Money is economic power, but there is also the power of authority, political or managerial, or power by virtue of reputation or ability. All these types of power give us choice and, yes, freedom - freedom in its positive sense. The myriad ways in which a person can exercise control (as opposed to being controlled) are all forms of positive liberty, if that is what you want to call them.
For instance, economic power is equatable with the Ideal of Economic Enfranchisement. Political power comes under the Ideals of either Democracy or Republicanism.
Liberalism here is seen as encompassing the altogether limited idea of negative liberty. This is deliberate for if Liberalism means too much it ends up meaning nothing at all and we should loose the sense of the importance of the Ideal that it stands for.
The problems that most discussions of Liberalism have is that it is treated not as an Ideal but as a practical idea that can be applied and can stand up on its own. In fact, none of the Five Ideals of a Modern Republican State described here can stand up on their own. They have to be balanced against each other. In this Liberalism is no exception.
* * *
This refers us again to a foundation stone of the approach to political philosophy taken here 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.
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 may be difficult to accept for a culture like ours that predominantly seeks linear defined solutions to problems, that wants to "nail" them once and for all, and see the "end of history".
The great advantage of the indeterminate approach is that it is true - in the deepest, broadest meaning of that word.
* * *
If the distinction between negative and positive liberty is to be settled with the acceptance that Liberalism embodies only the negative kind, there is a further division of Liberal ideas that is valid and necessary - that between Political Liberalism and Economic Liberalism.
Both types refer to long standing robust Liberal theories and both are fundamental to the debate about Liberalism now. What is curious about them is that the former tends to lie almost exclusively on the left side of the political spectrum whereas the latter is invariably associated with the right.
This is of no importance to Republicanism which embraces arguments from both the left and the right. However, it does tend to fracture the debate about Liberalism, and can lead to a confusion of goals. Here, both Political and Economic Liberalism are essential to achieving Liberalism and in no way conflict with each other.
The way in which the two branches of Liberalism interact will come out in the following discussion of the Political Aspects of Liberalism.
Liberalism is regarded here as one of the Five Ideals and as with all of the Ideals it is defined by Five Political or Practical Aspects. These Aspects bring the Ideal down to earth and indicate the parameters we can use in our attempt to realise it.
The Five Political Aspects of Liberalism are: 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
The first three of these concern Political Liberalism and the fourth and fifth concern Economic Liberalism. The five will now be dealt with in turn.
* * *
1. Judicial rights for Individuals (Bill of Rights)
If the state is to commit itself to Liberalism as we understand it, that is, if it is to attempt to fashion itself so that it has the least impact on the ability of individuals to go about their normal lives, something is going to have to be enshrined in either its Constitution or its Laws. The term "bill of rights" originates from Britain, and it refers to the fact that the first Bill of Rights was literally a bill or statute, which was passed by Parliament in 1689.
In order that it be more difficult for an Executive (who only holds office only temporarily) to tamper with the Rights of Citizens (which should aim at permanency), there is a strong argument for these Rights to be enshrined in the Constitution. This gives them a more fundamental basis in the fabric of the nation than a Bill or Statute would.
In creating the new Republican Constitution for Great Britain it would seem prudent to reassure citizens of the inviolability of their Rights by giving these Rights a Constitutional basis*. This is the case, for example, in the United States.
John Locke may have considered the Rights of Citizens to be "natural", but in writing them down in a Constitution, inevitably the problematic nature of some Rights comes up. The fundamental problem with many "Rights" is that one person's Rights can all too easily conflict with those of another (for instance, my right to speak my mind may offend the rights of others). This is just one reason why the Liberal Ideal is impossible to completely achieve in practice.
Individuals rights in respect of the state, that do not have any obvious impact on other individuals, are usually less controversial and easier to decide. An early example of a document that enshrined these sorts of Rights was the Magna Carta of 1268. It bestowed on people individuals rights before the law (a right to a fair trial, and so on) and also, in a radical move, made these rights the same for all regardless of social rank. The proposal that even the Monarch was, at least in theory, not above the law had ramifications down the centuries, not only in Britain.
Under the definition of Liberalism adopted here, rights to education and healthcare and the like are not considered Liberal rights. These are really "positive liberties" and so do not come under the Ideal of Liberalism but under that of Economic Enfranchisement.
Rights of individuals to parliamentary representation and to stand for democratic election come under the Ideal of Democracy. Liberal rights simply establish the negative right of not being interfered with by the state or by another individual, without due reason.
* * *
Before leaving the question of Political Liberal rights for individuals we should pause to consider a criticism that is often leveled at Liberalism - that it is morally neutral. Liberals in advocating as little as possible restraint on individuals are saying by implication that no judgment should be made on the actions of individuals. Whatever you want to do, that is fine, as long as it does not go against basic laws such as those that make stealing or killing illegal.
Liberalism, it was argued in the nineteenth century, can lead to degeneracy and decadence for it deprives society of any moral rudder to rely upon, giving full vent to base needs. In the twentieth century the same argument was made, but using different language, to argue that Liberalism produces rampant consumerism whereby people seek gratification without concern for any deeper, longer term, social values.
The reply to this criticism from within the Liberal camp is that it is necessary to have faith in the "essential goodness and responsibility" of people and, in a deeper sense, of their collective humanity, and that this goodness or virtue will finally act as the brake on excess and direct individual desire in a direction that is beneficial to all.
This Liberal argument is perhaps starting to wear a little thin now, as, although we might not like to admit it, the nineteenth century arguments about Liberalism leading to degeneracy are starting to look percipient. Many would argue that the degradation of the culture is already fully upon us and that the offerings on our media and computer networks fully demonstrate this.
A stronger argument for correction of this woeful tendency has to come from outside the Liberal camp, for there is not much evidence to suggest that giving people a free rein is going to, in itself, solve society's ills.
Having said that, the freedom that Liberalism has brought often enough in the forms of creativity and cultural development is a vital aspect of Modern society. The popular culture of the twentieth century, of film, popular music and fashion, we could include in this, and this is surely something that few would regret.
Also the more live-and-let-live attitude to sexual mores, sexual preferences and other lifestyle choices, that Liberal attitudes have encouraged, is not something many would want to turn the clock back on.
But the real answer to any perceived tendency to decadence (and we certainly do have decadence as well as creative energy) has to come from outside the Liberal agenda and for this we should to refer to the other Ideals and principally the first one of Republicanism.
Of all the Five Ideals it is Republicanism with its emphasis on the development of benign Institutions that develop virtue as an underlying goal is the one that can balance any perceived amorality of Liberalism.
The moral neutrality of Liberalism is a theme that will recur in the discussion of Economic Liberalism under the fourth Political Aspect of Liberalism, the right to create private companies.
* * *
2. Freedom of Speech
Freedom of speech means also a free press. We can say what we want. We can publish what we want.
Freedom of speech is a Political or Practical Aspect of the Ideal of Liberalism, and like its parent Ideal, in application it has sometimes to be compromised. An obvious example in Britain is the Race Relations laws which make it illegal to use language that can be interpreted as incitement to race or ethnic hatred. There are also limitations on pornographic material.
Freedom of speech is fundamental to our polity and our way of life and the example of nations that do not have it does not encourage us to change this freedom.
An important point to bring out here is the way in which Freedom of Speech validates other Ideals in this Republican programme.
For example, quite simply, the democratic Ideal would mean nothing without Freedom of Speech. If democratic candidates cannot say whatever they wish then we do not know what they think and so we do not know how to vote.
Also, freedom of Speech is vital to the concept of Civil Institutions embodied in the Ideal of Republicanism. If we are not free to criticise these Institutions then there is no corresponding obligation for them to respond to criticism. Responsiveness and adaptation is fundamental to Republican Civil Institutions.
In a way, freedom to criticise Civil Institutions is even more important than freedom to criticise Democratic Institutions. Because their members are selected by appointment, it is only through criticism and comment that they can be aware of any shortcomings they may have and so prompt a response.
Wherever Freedom of Speech is an asset it has to go hand in hand with its partner - openness. Freedom to question, comment and criticise means little without the availability of information to enable this freedom to be used in an intelligent way.
Freedom of Speech, together with Openness, forms the lubricant for the whole structure of Ideals and Constitutionalism being here expounded. Without it we are dead. The people would defend these rights to the death and, indeed, in the past have done so.
* * *
3. Protection of minorities
The Democratic Ideal tends to be equated with a notional popular sovereignty, whereby an elected Democratic Institution is seen as reflecting the people as a whole.
Of course, we all know that this is a myth. We are ruled by the party that gets a majority or the largest minority of votes (invariably the latter under the Westminster system). This leaves a large part of the population unrepresented in Government. This is inherent, not just in the current United Kingdom system, but in any democratic system.
Particularly vulnerable under Democracy are minorities of any kind: ethnic, gay, disabled, racial, for example. These groups, through no fault of their own, may have specific issues to confront that are not typical of the majority or larger minorities. Because they lack numbers they cannot make much impact on the Democratic machine.
To counter this lack of democratic influence, the Civil Society has to put in place special measures to protect the interests of minorities. These are part of the Liberal agenda for we are talking here about protection of "negative" freedom. For a Government to be neutral in its effect on the people it cannot be "equally neutral" to all.
This is why we have laws to protect identified minorities, and why the Public Services may treat them differently. Concern for the disadvantaged and the different was there in the Christian message from the start and it has always been part of Liberal agenda which inherited this message.
In the latter part of the last century, the question of minorities took on a new twist with the coming of the idea usually referred to as Political Correctness (PC). PC aimed to take the principle of Protection of Minorities to greater lengths than previously, giving more (some would say too much more) emphasis on the rights of minorities.
Whereas Liberals had always sought to establish equivalent negative freedoms for minorities, PC sought to endow them with positive freedoms purely on account of being minorities. This involved what became known as "affirmative action". And so, for instance, in applying for a job, the law should seek not just to equalise the opportunities for a member of a minority but give them a "positive" advantage in certain cases.
In addition, PC has encouraged sensitivity with regard to language and it is probably fair to say that certain words now are not used in civil company thanks to the persuasive influence of PC. The exclusion of certain words is surely a good effect of PC (notwithstanding some laughable cases of organisations banning certain word usage).
Where PC has meant respect and protection of minorities it is by and large difficult to object to. Where Republicans might wish to question its influence is where it has lead to "identity politics".
In a Modern Republic, people establish their social identity through merit, qualification and achievement. When we talk about an individual belonging to a minority we are essentially talking about an individual's background. Background is about where you have come from, not about where you are going to. You cannot change your background. Your background is inevitably part of your identity but it is not the one that should count towards or make any difference to the merit, qualification or achievement that you are capable of making your own.
Less still, should background form a basis for political belief or opinion. Holding to views on the basis that this is what you must believe because of your background and your associated given identity is an admission of failure of imagination. Ultimately, people can believe what they want to believe. But the politics of identity has nothing to contribute to the Republican debate.
* * *
4. Right to create private companies
In the United States the word Liberal is almost synonymous with "leftie". This is strange to us, for Liberal on this side of the Atlantic can also apply to belief in free market, or laissez faire economics, and this is traditionally associated with right wing beliefs.
Political and Cultural Liberalism is embodied in the first Political Aspect of the Liberal Ideal and this fourth Aspect deals with Economic Liberalism. Economic Liberalism is based on exactly the same fundamental idea as Political Liberalism, that of a government whose operation has a neutral effect, but instead of looking for a neutral effect in respect of the personal, political and cultural actions of an individual we are looking for this in respect of their economic actions. The implications of looking only at economic actions without the others are great.
But why should economic actions be any different? Are not economic actions a type of personal action in any case? Why do we not lump the two together?
In a sense we do tend to lump them together for in the Liberal Democracies we see economic rights as really part and parcel of personal rights. This is not, however, the view of non-Liberal Democracies.
The example of Nazi Germany stands out for whilst the economic rights of individuals and companies (provided they were not Jewish) went virtually untouched with the Nazis taking power, Liberal rights were effectively extinguished. A less extreme, but salient, case is present day China where economic liberalism is growing at a pace whilst many political liberal rights are very weak. Democratic rights are virtually non-existent.
Dictatorial regimes (and China is certainly this) do not fear Economic Liberalism in the way they fear Political Liberalism. One reason for this is that the neutralism of the former does not lead to political consequences (at least, not directly) whereas the neutralism of the latter is loaded with political consequences.
There is a further element that marks out Economic from Political Liberalism. Both Economic and Political Liberalism can lead to concentrations of enormous independent power within the nation: in the one case to economic power (large companies) and in the other to political power (political parties, for instance). What is quite different about these two types of power is what happens to them once they have been created.
Economic power that has been created by Liberalism tends to side with the entrenched power of the Executive, whereas political or cultural power created by Liberalism tends to be against the Executive and may veer towards radicalism whereby the very Institutions of state are called into question.
Economic power sees its interest in siding with the Executive provided that Executive is committed to Economic Liberalism and the Executive likewise sees its own security as wrapped up with the power of money and business which can then become a bolster against rival political factions.
The mutual attraction of economic power and the Executive is well displayed in the government of President Bush and in the cosy relation that successive Executives in the Kingdom have had with the City of London powerful financial interests.
It was noted that a feature of Political Liberalism is a moral neutrality and that it has been criticised for this. Moral neutrality is similarly a danger for Economic Liberalism and there is certainly a tendency for economic power to be wielded in an immoral way with scant regard for any consequences it might have for the personal lives of citizens. Every day lives are wrecked by irresponsible but legal financial practices.
In spite of this, money is seldom the only motive for the best businessmen and women and much good can and does flow from all round well motivated companies. In any case, private businesses remain the primary engines of wealth creation and innovation and nothing will ever change that. This is why Republicanism is committed to Economic Liberalism as an aspect of the Liberal Ideal.
* * *
It is often said that with the collapse of the Soviet Union, capitalism won over communism. But this is not so. It was the Mixed Economies that "beat" the communist ones. In most western economies, about forty percent of their economic activity is of the state. A purely capitalism economy if ever such a thing could be created would not last five minutes. Capitalism economies rely heavily on the state sector and the Public Services to survive.
This fact gives the lie to the theory attributed to Adam Smith that we can rely on the workings of economic self interest to generate economic good for our society, the myriad small and not so small acts of unbridled selfishness somehow accumulating into something noble and of value to all.
In fact, Adam Smith, as a broad Enlightenment thinker, never believed in such a narrow view of how societies worked. He well understood that, although there is a place for the profit motive, society still needs the binding effect of solidly constructed principled Institutions. He knew that you cannot build a society on amorality.
Smith understood that in any case companies and their directors are seldom motivated only by money. For many people, even most people, whilst they would like to have money, the relentless pursuit of it alone is just too dull. The real creators of the business life of the nature have a flare and imagination that goes way beyond the simple determination to accumulate money.
Where money is the only or prime motivator it is all too easy for activity to spill over into illegality and malpractice and the frequent financial scandals of the last decade witness the fact that in this nothing has changed.
It was Prime Minister Thatcher who did an enormous amount to place the profit motive as the central economic motivator, making greed the primary human emotion and distrust the first instinct of the politician. Unfortunately New Labour has hardly moved the agenda forward since Thatcher and has repeated her follies of undermining industry and work, of trying to discredit the Civil Society. It has also emulated her policy of trying to building an economy on private debt.
The best form of Economic Liberalism is one that seeks to favour the consolidating and developing of enduring industries and the flowering of new truly creative industries. If Economic Liberalism is just about giving vent to short term profiteering, in the end, we shall all be the poorer.
* * *
5. Right to own property
The fundamental right we have to own property is something we perhaps do not give much thought to. It is something we take for granted, and, indeed, it is something we should be able to take for granted.
Property here means strictly all types of property, not just land and buildings. But it is land and buildings that we tend to think of first in terms of fundamental rights, for few states have ever seriously challenged ownership of, what we now call, consumer goods.
Whereas the right to own our own property, is not something we think about very much, property ownership, itself, has become a national obsession. This feature of the nation has been with us for a number of years but under New Labour it has been taken to new heights. British thinking about property has now gone beyond a concern for simple yeomanry rights. We might argue that our thinking about property has produced a deep distortion of values and that the obsession has become malign.
But before considering this aspect of property ownership, we should consider for a moment some fundamental points.
Firstly, property ownership is not the same as owning a business for it does not have to mean anything to do with work or business. It usually means just owning the roof over our heads, plus perhaps a small parcel of land. It is thus fundamental to our personal and family lives.
Secondly, if you pause to think about it for a moment, this right is a very big privilege. The nation in one sense is the land it holds as territory. A people can become detached from the lands they associate themselves with, but a nation without a land is a fanciful concept, even if from time to time it is one that has been entertained.
With property ownership the nation confers on its people, and increasingly people from foreign lands, partial jurisdiction over a portion of its land, that is to say, one individual or a collection of individuals, has rights over a portion of land that no one else has, not even the state, or especially not the state.
Thirdly, this is a Liberal right, that is to say, you own the land and/or buildings without state interference, and you enjoy partial jurisdiction over it (partial because, for instance, you can prevent another from entering the land, but you cannot assault someone on it). Property ownership is often called a "democratic" right, but this is wrong, for property ownership is nothing to do with individuals having a say in government.
Fourthly, property ownership confers no special rights beyond the enjoyment of the property. This may seem obvious, but it was historically a hard won battle that decoupled property ownership from, for instance, voting rights. Going back further, to feudal times, when property ownership was very restricted, lay ownership of property conferred title and membership of the aristocracy.
The point here is that the elimination of special status conferred by property ownership must be a cast iron principle of a Modern state.
Fifthly, property ownership makes you liable to taxation that you otherwise would not have. As a general rule only economic activity attracts a tax burden, but property ownership is an exception*.
These five are the fundamentals of property ownership which should always apply. But as mentioned above, property ownership has over the last few years taken on a whole new dimension. And this is for one simple reason: property values have risen enormously, endowing many owners with wealth they might not have dared dream about previously. Nor has this phenomenon been confined to the Kingdom for most western European countries have experienced property inflation on an unheard of scale.
Of course, for every person who has benefited from this movement, there are many more who have lost out, either because they have been "out of the market" or because they came in late so buying at the "top of the cycle". The amounts of money are so extreme that a division has occurred across society between property owners of long or longish standing and the rest. This division corresponds closely to the division between older people and younger. It is primarily a generational split.
The harm this does to the integrity of society must be immense even if as yet it has not manifested itself to much. We see the young "binge drinking" at the weekends in our towns. We do not know for sure if this is because of the poor future they see for themselves. But we do know that being excluded from the property market is not the only economic disadvantage they suffer from.
But the fundamental bad effect, which ever inflating property values has on our society, is to devalue work. If you or someone you know makes 30000 in one year, tax free, just by owning a house, does that not make you reflect on how hard you had to work to gain a similar amount of money? It makes you feel a fool for working. But then over-inflating house prices make fools of us all, winners and losers, because they detach us from reality.
In fact, it is loss of the sense of reality that has motivated ever upwards house prices, not so much on the behalf of the owners but on behalf of the banks that lend. The inflation has been sustained by a flooding of the market with credit, placing more and more people in the position of being able to borrow more and more money with the banks making little or no checks to see if the borrowers can finance the repayment.
Meanwhile everyone takes encouragement from the continuing upwards drift of values to persuade them that whatever is suspect about the lending will never be found out. And a spate of nightly TV programmes give an impetus to the market fantasy.
The result of all this is that what started out as a sound Liberal principle of the right of property ownership has been turned into a crazy social casino, producing bonanzas for some and hardship for others.
Before leaving this distressing story, one thing must be clear. What we have seen in rising property values, particular since New Labour came to power, is practically nothing to do with market forces. Banks have been allowed to print money willy-nilly to fuel their own profits whilst loading the people with record indebtedness. Some increase in house prices might have been justified for legitimate economic reasons but not at the level we have had.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Brown could have called a halt to the party and got the Financial Services Authority he created in 1997 to do its job in regulating lending. This he failed to do, because the general economic growth he oversaw depended on the money creation produced by the all the new lending.
A Republican government will take very seriously the right of all to own their own property. But this right should remain just that: a right not a compulsion. The distortions in the market engineered by New Labour have make it almost de rigor to own your own house if you possibly can.
Of course, the whole plan of financing an economy off a credit bubble is not sustainable, and a return to sanity in the housing market will ultimately be helpful to some if not all. But we can only capitalise long term on this change if the lending for property is properly controlled.
* * *
On a different note there is a further aspect to the right to own property that desperately needs addressing. This is an aspect of Liberal rights that is not sufficiently strong in the Kingdom.
We have the right to own a property, but what if the land that that property sits on is required for Public Works or perhaps sanctioned private works?
If this arises, the property owner's rights are in theory taken account of in as much as the owner has to be consulted before the decision on proceeding with the works is made. The emphasis here is on the word "consultation". So if your house is required to be demolished for road widening, let's say, you have to be "consulted'.
This is a nonsense. If the Public Works are for the public good, what is the point of consulting a person who is going to be disadvantaged by them for their opinion which inevitably going to be biased.
The way this situation should be dealt with is not to hold endless enquiries to justify the unjustifiable, namely an individual citizen's rights are going to sacrificed for the general good. (There are too many cases in our so-called civilised society where people's lives have been devastated in order that the good of the public should be served.)
The emphasis should be on compensation not consultation. (This is the case in France which is one reason why Public Works can be agreed so much more quickly.) The right to own and stay in a particular property cannot always be absolute, but the right to fair (and that means more than fair) compensation can be.
* * *
To conclude this account of Liberalism it is necessary to look at Liberalism's darker side.
The approach taken here in creating a basis for a Republican Constitution is to identify the ideals which we wish to strive to achieve. We recognise that these Ideals individually cannot each be fully achieved but this is not the aim. The aim is find the right balance between them.
The tendency to recognise the need for this kind of compromise in fashioning human affairs has been a part of Republican thinking since Aristotle, and in this sense Republicanism has always been closely associated with Humanism.
The great advantage of this approach is that it allows us to look at each of the Five Ideals quite objectively for we are not wedded to one of them at the expense of the others. It means also that each of the Ideals can be conceived in a pure way, itself uncontaminated by having to accommodate too much reality.
It is the Republican framers balancing the Ideals that have to grapple with the problems of the intractable reality of society. If they are up to the task, the country will forever be grateful to them.
Many Liberal thinkers in the past have not allowed themselves to benefit from this flexibility. They have put themselves in the position of having to make Liberalism do all the jobs necessary to determine how we should arrange our affairs. Liberalism is just not up to this task. This is one of the reasons why the concept of Liberalism, having been asked to cover so many different ideas, ends up not meaning anything very precise.
As we saw before, Liberalism has no real defense against the criticism that it is amoral, for as long as you believe that people should be free to do whatever they want you cannot them object to any choices they make. Liberals, with their permissive attitude to the actions of everybody, sidestep any commitment to moral values and so they make no contribution to the debate about how we might generate cohesiveness in society through common values. They are saying: just let everyone do what they want and it will all turn out fine.
This absence of any guidelines for behaviour really is the weak underbelly of Liberalism and as time goes on the "it will all turn out fine" attitude is not receiving much new support from experience. You do not have to be a cynic to see that the Liberal freedoms we enjoy are having a destructive effect that, even if we now do not seem to be too affected by it, future generations will be.
The early lofty advocates of the Liberal ideal thought, more than anything, in terms of liberty to think what you wanted and say what you wanted and to live your life with your family unmolested by an intrusive government. However, with the rise of living standards Liberalism has come to mean more than anything having whatever you want in the way of lifestyle, consumer goods and housing.
* * *
Liberalism is a modern invention. In this sense it is a partner with the democratic ideal of universal suffrage. Neither Liberalism as we conceive it (nor Democracy as we conceive it) would have made any sense to the ancients, and not much even to anyone at the start of the eighteenth century. It was the Enlightenment that took place in that century that produced our notion of Liberalism.
John Locke writing earlier in the seventeenth century wrote of the human right to "life, liberty and property" and in this he was starting lay the foundations for the Liberal creed. An original draft of some of the American Declaration of Independence repeated Locke's works verbatim. Jefferson however decided that property could be taken as a given and changed the wording to the more resounding "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness".
Happiness? Happiness to be mentioned in a state's foundational document? This was a turning point in viewing how nations should be conceived. Happiness is something we can only talk about in relation to an individual or a family. Jefferson's phrase brings a prime objective of state right down to the level of something that matters to each one of us on a personal level. We can each identify with the desire for happiness. Blessed we should feel to live under a Constitution that enshrines this as a goal.
The "pursuit of happiness" might seem an innocent enough idea. Indeed, innocent it is. Aristotle, Machiavelli and even Locke would have considered it all too innocent. It is not that they would not have understand the appeal of happiness as a goal, but that they would see all too clearly a very significant danger that the very idea implies. The stressing of the comfort and interests of an individual, free of any sense of responsibility, inevitably produces an atomisation of society.
For better or for worse, our society is now more atomised than ever, and this is a direct result of the Liberal inheritance. Interests are more than ever private interests and this applies equally to individuals as to private companies. The idea of the "common good" has even acquired a slightly ridiculous slant, as if people somehow have a genuine difficulty in coping the idea, and recognising it as a legitimate motivator.
But if Liberalism has lead to a development of rather base motives it is worth reminding ourselves of the lofty sense in which it was conceived. For this a speech by Benjamin Constant made in 1819 is admirably clear:
"First ask yourselves, Gentlemen, what an Englishman, a Frenchman, and a citizen of the United States of America understand today by the word 'liberty'.
"For each one of them it is the right to be subjected only to the laws, and to be neither arrested, detained, put to death or maltreated in any way by the arbitrary will of one or more individual. It is the right of everyone to express their opinion, choose a profession and practise it, to dispose of property, and even abuse it, to come and go without permission, and without having to account for their motives or undertakings. It is everyone's right to associate with other individuals, either to discuss their interests, or to profess their religion which they and their associates prefer, or even to simply occupy their days or hours in a way which is most compatible with their inclinations or whims."
Why does Liberalism have such appeal? It is surely because it is capable of appealing to each one of us separately as something we want in our lives.
But the idea that by each person acting selfishly will produce the "common good" as Adam Smith is quoted as saying (rather out of context) is a sleight. Atomisation of interests is a feature of Modern life, but so too are cooperation and common interests. Only those pleading for a particular special ideological interest would try to argue it is one and not the other that we solely benefit from.
* * *
Populist politicians usually adopt Liberalism as part of their platform and they like it for one very good reason. Saying that people should be able to decide their own lives is only a short step way from saying that they will jolly well have to.
We give you freedom. Now you are on your own.
And the preoccupation with individual wants can all too easily become a distraction from the need to engage with the society at large and a substitute for any such engagement.
Liberalism has a lofty aspect and a base aspect. We have to learn to live with both.
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SECOND REPUBLIC
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1 Eastern Orthodox situation
2 We may question whether the triumph of Rome was desirable or not but one thing is certain. A great deal of what we are comes from Rome. We always give Ancient Greece credit for "inventing" our civilisation, but this is not right. So much of our law, commerce, education, politics, philosophy, architecture and literature comes from Rome and these things were original to Rome. We also derive a lot from the Arab world and our own pagan traditions, but these are other big stories 3. In ancient Rome such was the bond between citizenship and the military that many jobs that we might think of as respectable and professional, such as teacher or scribe were often performed by slaves, i.e. non-citizens. The vision of all slaves breaking up rocks or as galley oarsmen is not correct.
6.The growth of Quangos is a symptom of an Executive extending its tentacles into as many corners as possible. The growth of Quangos (rechristened "non-departmental public bodies") under New Labour has been formidable.
7. It is a question as to whether this obligation to register without any reciprocal benefit is an infringement of basic Human Rights. The aim of outlawing secondary picketing and closed shop associated with the Thatcher legislation could be achieved by applying to individuals legally discounting the existence of trades unions. Registration of unions simply makes them subject to additional laws that do not apply to anyone else.
8. Membership of some Civil Institutions may be according to an internal election within the Institution or a committee, but this is not a democratic election.
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