Politics and Freedom

Notes for Speech to the Cheshire Pitt Club, Chester, 2002-01-25

I begin with a quotation from William Pitt in a speech he made to the House of Commons on 18 November 1783.

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom: it is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."

So now - as then. We saw the argument used - rightly or wrongly - only a few weeks ago to justify measures against terrorism. It is used constantly to condone the effects of social and economic change brought about by market forces. With it comes the slogan "There Is No Alternative" (or TINA) whereby governments pretend that their nostrums are the only solutions to almost any kind of problem. With it also come limitations on our power to reject, our ability to look elsewhere, our fundamental freedom of choice.

Such issues rarely come up at election time. Most politicians of whatever party subscribe to the conventional wisdom, with variations between them like the twirls of icing of a very solid cake. Of course the conventional wisdom may be right; necessity may be the driver; there may indeed be no alternative. But in every case we need to examine, to scrutinize, to look at alternatives (and there usually are alternatives), to suggest compromises, and above all to cherish our freedom to do so.

A good example of current pleas of necessity is the process known as globalization. Of course this means different things to different people, and is used by different people to advance different causes. In broad terms it means the coming together of all human society, and the adoption of increasingly similar standards, similar modes of thinking and behaviour, and similar ways of living world wide. William Pitt could see some of the process for himself in the form of the expansion of sea going transport, and with it the spread of European empire; the industrial revolution which began in these islands, and provided, then as now, the most powerful engines of change; and new ways of thinking and communicating which are developing still.

Globalization in these terms is a fact. The problem is what we make of it, whether the direction in which it may go are necessary or inevitable, whether it is for good or evil, and where the choices really lie. So far many of our leaders seem benumbed by the sheer scale of the process and its implications, which seem far out of anyone's control.

The upside is the growth of such international institutions as the United Nations in its many aspects, universal conventions such as those governing human rights, and an extraordinary increase in economic wealth. Current definitions are defective in many ways, but by any measure wealth, and expectations of wealth, have risen beyond the imagination of previous generations. Much of this wealth is unevenly distributed, both within and between societies, and is apparently getting more so. But most people are living longer and enjoy better health, living standards are rising, and there are widespread expectations of a better quality of life for humanity as a whole.

There is a downside. First must come degradation of the environment and the natural services upon which we all rely. All change has been at a price. We have created what future generations will surely find a peculiar society, hooked like a fish on use of fossil fuels, and pulled by a rampant consumerist philosophy out of synchrony with the natural world, both animate and inanimate. While we have been increasing output of goods of all kinds, we have been running down, despoiling and often wasting the resources from which they are derived.

Even in countries which have most profited from the industrial revolution and thereby achieved unimaginable standards of material wealth, there are growing problems of sustainability across the whole field of economic activity, including prospects for employment at a time when computers can do more and more work. Before the industrial revolution, societies might break down and leave a mess behind them. But none had effects on the Earth as a whole. I suspect that we are the first generation to realise that the industrial way of life is endangering planetary health in the widest sense.

What then are the threats to planetary health?

• human population increase
• degradation of land/disposal of waste/generation of energy
• water pollution and increasing shortages
• changes in the chemistry of the atmosphere
• destruction of natural biological diversity.

Together these changes amount to an acceleration of environmental change unprecedented since humans became an identifiable animal species. In their different ways they amount to an infringement of the freedom of action of this and future generations.

There are other disorienting effects of globalization. As in the field of genetics, there are dominant and recessive cultures, and although nothing is for ever, Western culture, often in its least attractive aspects, exercises clear predominance. No wonder there is resentment in some, and a measure of disintegration in others. Whether it produces the rhetoric of Osama bin Laden, or the incoherent movement of people into shanty towns round the world's mega cities, the story is the same. The division between the rich and sophisticated on one hand and the poor and unsophisticated on the other is wider and deeper than ever before. In a thousand different ways the majority of the world's population is at present enduring a traumatic shock with no early prospect of recovery. In such circumstances it becomes more important than ever to challenge how globalization it is applied and above all any philosophy which maintains that current trends are inevitable, if not necessary. As the Chancellor of the Exchequer said in a recent speech:

"The issue is whether we manage globalization well or badly, fairly or unfairly…Managed badly, globalization would leave whole economies and millions of people in the developing world marginalized. Managed wisely, globalization can and will lift millions out of poverty, and become the high road to a just and inclusive global economy."

That sounds good. But we went on virtually to ignore the environmental aspects, and indeed the science on which environment concerns are based.

The key word in his speech is management. Are we equipped to manage? How does that affect freedom whether of governments or of individuals?

William Pitt lived in an era which saw the rise of the nation state as the model of political cohesion. Some have proved more robust than others, with passports, flags, postage stamps and the rest. But it is clear enough that many problems, above all those associated with globalization, are well out of the control of any country however rich and powerful: financial flows, drugs, arms proliferation, the spread of new and old diseases, human health, the activities of multinational companies, and flows of political and environmental refugees. Some politicians recognize that power may now be moving away from them, even if they are unwilling to admit this to their electorates. Yet it should be no surprise that citizens everywhere have diminishing faith in the nation state which in one sense is too small and in another too big.

Where is power moving?

• It is moving upwards towards global institutions. The United Nations, now more that 50 years old, is a family of institutions which do their best to cover war and peace, law, currency exchanges, trade, development, food supplies, weather, refugees, famine relief and the like. But so far the institutions have not been able to exercise the responsibility which should be theirs.
• It is moving downwards to regions, local communities and people who want to run more of their own affairs and achieve - or recover - a more distinct identity. In many cases the glue that holds nations together is being eroded or dissolved. Impersonal government from far away is increasingly resented. Dissident groups can no longer be coerced, and are often unready for even reasonable compromise.
• Then it is moving sideways, from individual to individual without mediation. The transistor radio was perhaps the first product of information technology to bring people together. It is heard even in the Amazonian jungle. Television, email and the internet, for those who have them, have followed. The ever strengthening web of citizen to citizen relationships is changing the complexion of politics by bypassing the old channels of communication through the nation state. Non government organizations can now take up issues and press them effectively with governments and international institutions alike.

The world is being transformed as a result. Whether it can be managed is another matter. There are hundreds of ways of doing so. But what actually happens will depend critically on the shake-out of the elements I described at the beginning as the upside and the downside.

Those who go for the upside have one set of values. Their assumptions are that:

• Greater prosperity and material welfare are good in themselves and therefore all embracing human targets. Higher standards of living are assumed to mean higher quality of life.
• It follows that economic growth on the traditional definition is good: from this also follows an apparatus of thinking about free markets, free trade and consumption.
• Problems can always be dealt with by technological fixes, and substitutes for diminishing resources can always be found.
• Industrialization is the indispensable means of raising living standards, reducing poverty, and becoming "developed".

Their priority is wealth generation, and they see globalization in those terms. It is worth adding that most politicians are of this view.

Those who go for the downside have another set of values. They believe that we are gravely damaging the life systems of the planet, that our species has already exceeded the carrying capacity of the Earth. Stock market indices may have risen, but the world's natural wealth, measured by the health of its ecosystems, fell by no less than 30% between 1970 and 1995. The WWF Index shows that the development on which so many countries are still bent is in many ways an impossibility. As was pointed out by more than a thousand scientists from the four international global change programmes at Amsterdam last July:

"The accelerating human transformation of the Earth's environment is not sustainable. Therefore the business-as-usual way of dealing with the Earth's system is not an option. It has to be replaced - as soon as possible - by deliberate strategies of management that sustain the Earth's environment while meeting social and economic development objectives."

So their priority is sustainability, and they see globalization in those terms.

I suspect that any reconciliation of these approaches, if there be one, lies in economics. Classical economics is much closer to the upside than the downside, and is conspicuous for what it does not include. I do not think that anyone will disagree with the statement by a somewhat unconventional economist that "the economy is a wholly owned subsidiary of the environment." In short without a healthy environment, there can by no healthy economy.

But there is a real difficulty on how to assess health. The ideologues of free trade like to suggest the price mechanism. But as another distinguished American once remarked: "Markets are superb at setting prices, but incapable of recognizing costs." Prices are indicators. But we have to make sure that they tell the truth about costs. A pricing system should include not only the traditional costs, but also those involved in replacing the resource, and those of the damage that use of the resource may do.

There are glimmers of hope. Within the World Bank new methods of environmental accounting have been used to take account of the depreciation of resources or so called natural capital. Any losses would be offset by gains in other environmental and human resources such as the stock of services, knowledge and social capital. The aim is to maintain an overall balance. As this is similar to normal business accounting it fits well with current economic thinking. But our ability to substitute environmental capital with human capital must be limited. Technology often creates as many problems as it solves. Some environmental values cannot be converted into money or economic values. How can we value the loss of an animal or plant species, or such free services as the air we breathe?

In short we need to do that most painful thing, and think again if globalization is to do more good than harm. There is no necessity about it, no binding compulsion to continue on our present tracks. We need no tyrants, nor need we behave as slaves. But thinking again means going back to the fundamentals of the ways in which we conduct our society and way of life.

The power of inertia is immensely strong, especially in the functioning engine-room of society - the middle ranks - whether in government, business or elsewhere. It is all too easy to get lost in the sheer mechanics of making things work. You may wonder how changes happen al all. Such changes usually occur at a slow and stately pace as new generations come of age. But this time the combination of the environmental and political agendas has urgency. It also carries wide implications for human freedom.

Change usually takes place for three main reasons. First we need leadership by individuals from above. Margaret Thatcher gave clear leadership on climate change. She was always ready to challenge the conventional wisdom. Other have done so on other issues. The dangers of leadership in the wrong direction driven by ignorance or vested interest are much before us today.

Secondly we need public pressure from below. For example, many thought that Greenpeace's opposition to the dumping of the oil-platform Brent Spar was exaggerated. But the results were positive. They created a greater public awareness of our common global inheritance, and the need to protect it. They demonstrated consumer power, especially in Germany. They induced a greater sense of corporate responsibility in disposing of waste and greater awareness of the need to build disposal into the original design of products.

I am sorry to say that lastly we often need some useful catastrophes to jerk us out of our normal inertia: big but not too big; small enough but not too small; quick but not too quick; slow but not too slow. In each case enough to demonstrate the point. Such catastrophes could include drought or flood, sea level rise, refugees on the march, some new genetically modified organism getting out of control, and most likely creeping social and economic breakdown such as can already be seen in parts of Africa.

There seem to me to be two fundamental questions. First do we know where we are going? Or put differently: do we recognize an ultimate target of a society with population, resources and environment in broad balance? My answer is, not yet. The juggernaut of the conventional wisdom rolls on. Secondly can we cope with the problems raised by the unstable and unsustainable society we have created for ourselves? My answer is also not yet.

As we think about managing globalization, we could do a lot worse than heed the words of Mahatma Gandhi who warned of the seven deadly sins in today's world:

• Wealth without work
• Enjoyment without conscience
• Knowledge without character
• Business without morality
• Science without humanity
• Religion without sacrifice
• Politics without principles

It is strange to think that William Pitt could have been in sympathy with the man whom Winston Churchill once described as that "half naked fakir". It takes all sorts to make our curious world. William Pitt was a beacon of his times. It is my pleasure as well as my duty to propose the toast of the Immortal Memory of William Pitt the Younger.