David Cameron at the RSA – some more thoughts
A couple of snippets following on from the lively debate about politicians and about David Cameron.
On the former, I still hold to the idea in my post last week of doing more to celebrate those times when politicians are inspirational and demonstrably public spirited.
But my bigger concern is that we try to understand the limitations of the view that power simply resides with those in government – politicians whose only motivation is to screw everyone else by lying and conniving. The fundamental problem with this view is that it allows us as citizens to avoid facing up to the fact that progress requires that we think and behave differently. That we can’t have what we tell pollsters we want – Nordic welfare but American tax rates or action on climate change but cheap energy – is not because we have evil or stupid politicians but because the conversation between us and those we elected is immature and inauthentic.
In search of a more interesting and nuanced view of the world I can strongly commend a wonderful piece in this month’s LRB by Slavoj Zizek.
A number of people accused me of being superficial by praising David Cameron’s communication style. But a Fellow who was at yesterday’s event stopped me in the corridor to make what I thought was an interesting observation. The Fellow felt that, for all his polish, the Prime Minister didn’t really grab the audience in the way that a great political orator –like for example Obama on a good day – might. We chatted and came to the conclusion that Cameron’s style is more about making his own case clearly understood and less about trying to win over the room by connecting with his audience.
If this is right, it may be simply the way Cameron is and, let’s face it, some people would prefer a more conversational style to attempts at emotional bonding. Or is it that our Prime Minister knows what is coming and has reconciled himself to unpopularity over the next two or three years? Rather than try – and fail - to win people over he sees his task as explaining what he is doing so at least people understand it even if they don’t agree with it. And this – as I was saying on the Today Programme this morning – is my main concern with the way the NHS reforms are being presented.
Taken together I believe the reforms shift us from a National Health Service to a National Health Franchise. I am not saying whether this is a good or a bad thing – there are arguments on both sides and shades of grey between. But it feels less than direct for the Prime Minister to present reform – as he did here at the RSA – as a pragmatic response to aspects of performance and budget pressures when it is in fact underpinned by a much bolder and more radical reconceptualising of health care.
Anyway, it was an honour to host the Prime Minister making such a big speech and let’s hope the RSA can start to establish itself not just as a venue for great lectures and events but a place people choose when they have something important to announce
Zizek, Hayek – and Cowell
‘Zizek is untwitterable’ was a pithy tweet on last night’s RSA lecture by one of the world’s foremost philosophers. The great man’s lecture was dense, edgy and erudite. Like a good wine its after taste is more affecting than the first impression.
One passage came back to me last night running home (for fitness purposes not because I was being pursued by lust-crazed fans). Zizek was discussing the idea that a viable and orderly social democracy could be based on a deal whereby we give total power and status to a super rich knowledge elite in exchange for all citizens – regardless of merit or effort – being guaranteed a basic income. He dismissed this, in part because he said it took no account of envy. Zizek quoted Frederich Von Hayek who argued – against advocates of social justice – that the poor find it easier to accept the wealthy if they think their fortune is unmerited. For the masses to accept that those at the top deserve their success means the majority have to accept not only that they are poorer but they are less virtuous.
This echoes the point made by Michael Young in his 1956 satire ‘the rise of the meritocracy’ and again in one of his final articles in 2001:
“The business meritocracy is in vogue. If meritocrats believe, as more and more of them are encouraged to, that their advancement comes from their own merits, they can feel they deserve whatever they can get.
They can be insufferably smug, much more so than the people who knew they had achieved advancement not on their own merit but because they were, as somebody’s son or daughter, the beneficiaries of nepotism. The newcomers can actually believe they have morality on their side”.
All this made me think of our attitude to celebrity. We want to think two things about celebrities. Either that they are simply blessed with a talent we don’t have (which is bearable for us as it’s not our fault that we are not gifted), or that they are deranged and damaged (which is bearable because we choose not to live their crazy sad lives). If it is possible to think both things at once all the better.
Much less attractive to us is the idea of people whose specialness comes from simply working hard and sticking at it. We might say simply that this is boring but maybe ours is a defensive reaction to not wanting to be made to feel that it is our own fault that we have not excelled.
So on X Factor we like Leona Lewis for her talent or Jedward for their deranged desire to be famous even while losing their dignity. As for the rest – hard working, not bad but not special singers – well, they leave us cold. And as that’s all that’s left to fight it out, I won’t be watching any more.
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