Mr Clegg: Who are you making policy for, exactly?

I believe that party politics should work like this: people come together who share values and ideals. They formulate policy based on these values. These policies are implemented when in power. Compromises are always necessary and so these can be made providing they are based in the values of the members of the party. In practice this means that the leadership of the party will be persuading and arguing with whomever necessary to get these ideas into law. But what we have is the opposite: A leadership, who goes into government, speaks to whoever, comes out and then tries to convince and argue with the party that what is being implemented is the right thing or necessary. It is like the Government is devoid of the Lib Dem party that makes up a large part of the Government.

Take tuition fees. Clegg argued it was right and necessary despite it being the opposite of party policy. Take the Health and Social Care Bill. Clegg argued it was reasonable and necessary at the time despite it being against the party values. Take Cameron’s EU veto. Clegg came out to say why it was necessary the following day despite it being against the party values. Take the recent proposal to extend the intrusive powers of the state. Clegg came out the following day to say why this was reasonable and necessary, despite it being opposite of party policy and values. In all these instances, Clegg has the process the wrong way round. He is in Government facing the party trying to convince us that what the government is going to do it right. What he should be doing is standing in the party facing the Government convincing them that our policy is right. He has it the wrong way round. It is a telling sign that he has had to be kicked into line by the party on these issues.

In all these cases and in many more we have a bizarre situation where we, as a party, seemingly propose policy that is not popular in our own party or with the public. So I ask who are we making policy for, exactly? We should not forget that politics is about popularity, if not for the majority of the public, then at the very least for the minority of those who support your party.

I don’t believe that it is a problem of values within Clegg. I have heard him as an MEP, shadow minister, in the leadership debates, in the election and I have spoken to him and he says all the things I would expect of a man of liberal persuasion. I think the problem lies with how he views his role in Government.

It must be difficult being in his position with so many people coming to you telling you what you should do. Senior civil servants coming with their pet projects, deeply held views and ideas which have been formed over many years under many different ministers. These people know how to handle new ministers. It must be difficult having senior military personnel telling you what they need. Senior secret service or intelligence community members coming with ideas they feel they need to protect the public. I can see how this position could mean you start to form a view that is different from those you may have had when talking within the political party. I can see how it could come about that you feel the need to go back to your party to tell them we need to do something different. But it is when in Government that it is more important to stand firm in where you came from. To say no to the establishment. To tell them what they need to do. This is what it means to be in power or it is not power, it is a nominal role.

So how do you stand firm? First thing is your mindset. We have to see ourselves as outsiders in Government or we start to believe the opinion of the establishment. Secondly you have to feel you have a right to tell the engines of Government to do things differently, even in the face of their well argued cases to continue what they were doing before or in their attempts to gain more control. Thirdly, you need a strong team of advisors who also have this mindset. This team need to not get caught up in the trappings of power and they need to have a strong affinity to the values of the party. This team should be made up of a variety of people who represent all sections of the party and there need to be people who disagree with you.

I think the party would love to hear Clegg come back to the party and say he has been fighting with the ‘powers that be’ to get our policy implemented, rather than coming to conference telling us how hard it is doing things we don’t agree with. We need less of the excuses for bad policy and more argument for why it is bad and why we don’t agree with it. Something Richard Morris stated so eloquently in the recent row between the party and Clegg over extending snooping powers.

Further Evidence of a Need to Change the Status Quo in Public Administration

The New Synthesis project

is an international partnership of institutions and individuals who are dedicated to advancing the study and practice of public administration. While they hail from different countries, different political systems and different historical, economic and cultural contexts, all share the view that public administration as a practice and discipline is not yet aligned with the challenges of serving the public good in the 21st century.

Through their research they have found that to form more effective governance requires an engaged citizenship which will benefit citizens, stakeholders, and public servants alike.

They have been looking at an Integrated Service Delivery, which is a collaboration between citizen, other social players (such as the third sector) and government and its agencies to improve services for individual citizens. They believe that community engagement activity is key which can take the form of partnerships, consultations and contracts. They believe that corporations can support community engagement through administrative structures and processes and through training opportunities and learning tools.

The movement in public management towards Integrated Public Governance and the anticipated increase in the delivery of government services by private and third sector organizations point to the need for collaborative community engagement.

In Praise of the New Zealand Government: Where citizens’ are making the Law

Over in New Zealand there is a new initiative to increase collaboration and participation with citizens. The Government have asked the people to make the new Policing Act with a wiki where people can edit and is part of an ongoing public review of proposed changes to the act. The BBC reported it here and the New Zealand Police report it here.

New Zealanders are not new to a more open and participatory form of government as they launched ParticipatioNZ Wiki in 2007 to engage the people in how to create a more open and collaborative way of the government doing business. In a world where those who are at the forefront of creating a more dynamic government through greater partnership with citizens is key, small steps like this can teach us a lot:

In an age of empowered citizens, governments will be under increasing pressure to find increasing room for the authentic voices of citizens in just about everything they do. Policy-makers are advised to start thinking about how they can do so in way that diminishes the risk of mob rule and promotes fair, inclusive and well-informed debate instead

Obama Administration taking steps towards collaboration and partnership with citizens

Beth Noveck is director of Obama’s open government initiative. In March 2009 the government held a session with various different agencies to see what they could offer the government and she said the following

we invite you to talk about how your organizations can contribute to fostering civic engagement in connection with crafting the recommendations and to supporting the goals of transparency, participation, and collaboration

In a previous essay she has said that

Our institutions of governance are characterized by a longstanding culture of professionalism in which bureaucrats – not citizens – are the experts. Until recently, we have viewed this arrangement as legitimate because we have not practically been able to argue otherwise … groups and communities who, working together, can be more effective at informing decision-making than individuals working alone

Her focus is on using technology to involve people in decision making processes for government and has written a book called Wiki Government: How Technology Can Make Government Better, Democracy Stronger, and Citizens More Powerful. However, the focus is essentially the same as the one I have advocated for. That for a more democratic system and society we need collaboration and partnership with citizens (and other social players).

It is interesting to see the Obama Administration taking this stand considering other solution focused initiatives his administration has taken (see here). So we should look at this initiative with a keen eye on what we can learn.

Partnership and Collaboration with Government: What is your position?

In looking at achieving collaboration between government and the public we have to look at who exactly will want to join leaderships in taking progressive initiatives for the public good?

Vigoda identifies 3 types of people which can help in understanding this:

1. Freeriders – Those who are consumers of public services yet let others do the work of citizenship
2. Watchdogs – Those involved only in key issues that are relevant them personally
3. Activists – Those involved in public life and in citizenship actions for the community

I do not like to classify people so easily as these terms provide a distinct blaming of those who have not found reason to collaborate with the government and public administration bodies with even negative connotations to those who have, with the term watchdog. It implies people are prone to one ‘type’ and so I prefer to see these ‘types’ as ‘positions’ that people take up and can move between depending on that persons circumstances at the time; therefore we have:

1. Those who do not yet see the value in collaborating – Potential partners
2. Those who have found something to collaborate on – Partners
3. Those who find meaning and purpose in collaborating – Partners & Activists

Partners & Activists is the most natural position for collaboration to work with in providing high-quality governing administration. Vigoda states that currently 10% of people take up this position but that “the political and social influence of this relatively small group is immense and must not be underestimated”. However, the partner position still provides a useful base to work with and can provide useful work.

Done well people will find reason to move into a more collaborative position. However, currently our system mostly encourages people to not get involved, or when they do to limit this involvement to that which is personally relevant to them i.e. the freeriders and watchdogs.

Many attempts to get the public involved have been well intentioned but ill thought out and ultimately a negative experience for those who tried to get involved. See Labour’s Big Conversation and the Coalition’s recent attempt neither of which made any real changes to government policy or how things were done. It may not be surprising then to see resistance and skepticism to attempts at moving to collaboration and partnership.

It has to be a change in spirit of government. It has to mean a change in the bureaucratic system to allow for partnership, it has to allow for a voice of the people to make a difference, for them to hold real power and for politicians to fight for this to happen. The people are the strength of a nation and offer its most unique resource. Why do we continue to ignore this?

As Vigoda says, practically and ideologically, this vanguard paves the way for potential social changes, whatever these may be.

Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed people to change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.

- Margaret Mead

Moving to collaborative services: Vigoda’s thoughts

Moving to a different way of running the services that we own and use means we need to know what this means. Vigoda has excellently put together his thoughts on the subject which are worth highlighting. He states that in this new era people have a duty to become engaged in collaborative activities with Government & Public Administration (G&PA) but more importantly that G&PA has the greater duty to create conditions for such involvement by all available means. He has outlined his thoughts on the roles of the different players as follows:

Role of Government & Public Administration:

• Volunteer programs in the fields of health, welfare service, education and security need to receive national support.
• Adequate training programs for volunteers as well as volunteer leadership and management need to be developed and implements by professionals
• Governments will be responsible for coordinating cooperation among different voluntary groups and institutions.
• Governments to establish public volunteers’ committees to coordinate voluntary activity at the local and national levels.
• G&PA to maintain advisory position, providing citizens with sufficient conditions and experience to work out their spontaneous ideas.
• Transform goodwill into effective operations. Investment in the spontaneous behaviour of the people is low cost and economical compared with other reform efforts and thus must be encouraged.
• All programs of citizen’s involvement will benefit from obtaining continuous evaluation by unbiased professionals.
• Educational efforts that emphasise the importance of individual-level and organized entrepreneurialism may start in the very first years of school and create awareness in the very young of the high values of citizenship involvement.

He states that citizens, like other social players, serve as socialization agents of partnership. He has put together a diagram of where we are now and where we should be moving towards by having more formal collaborative and partnership links which can be seen in this diagram:

Role of citizens:

• Active participation in running their lives and managing their communities by individuals, groups or institutions though:
• • Participation in neighbourhood associations or voluntary groups to aid the young, the elderly, or other sections of the population
  • Active involvement in citizens’ committees
  • Involvement in parents’ committees at schools
  • Donating money and time or effort for charity or equivalent social goals
  • Development of community services in various manners
  • Encouraging others to take part in such activities
  • Voice constructive criticism of the public system to encourage a culture of accountability and to provide feedback for politicians and public servants – increasing responsiveness and sense of responsibility
  • Original civic journalism
  • Letters to newspapers, public officials and politicians, radio and television programs
  • Use of computerized media to spread knowledge and attitudes
  • Educational teach youngest to become more involved and to use these methods extensively

He believes that moving to collaborative government/services will be calmer and more effective when the media and academia join in the effort. The positive elements of democracy cannot be achieved without an active, independent and responsible media.

Media role:

• Effective and reliable communication channel between citizens and governments that promotes collaboration and partnership
• Power of media can be used to encourage people’s attitudes and opinions towards citizen involvement and participation in a variety of ways but also to consult on relevant policy decisions
• Encourage public recruitment to collaborative activities by means of educational programs.

Academia:

• Pointing out theoretical considerations, conceptual grounding and practical means for cooperation, managerial science promotes the understanding of mutual social efforts
• Isolating and cultivating the benefits of partnership (and highlighting the advantages over simple state of competition i.e. responsiveness-based interaction)
• Discussion on collaboration takes priority over other issues in social affairs
• Public agenda becomes more sensitive to issues of partnership and their growth value. Managerial and administrative sciences also promote legitimization of cooperation and encourage more individuals to participate in public management enterprises.

Reframing Voter Apathy: People need something to vote for with their ‘fair votes’

There are many who believe that there is no reason why people should vote as the likelihood of their vote counting is less than winning the lottery – see here or Feakonomics.

For me, no matter how small my vote may count to the end result, I still want my vote to count and I still want to make a difference to the country that I live in. The issue for me is that it just feels so difficult to make a difference and voting can seem like little consolation to the pain that I had to go through from the effect of ridiculous reforms and new legislation. So when my workload increased in paperwork, new complex and unnecessary computer systems, and a failure of some government organizations to do what I have felt was necessary, many of my colleagues didn’t feel like voting as they didn’t see anything changing.

Some will call it voter apathy for not being interested in politics , some will call it voter fatigue for having to vote too much, others will look for reasons why they don’t vote.

I would suggest that these terms are not helpful and need to be reframed: People are not apathetic, they are interested in politics, and they do want to make a difference, they just don’t see how this is connected to voting yet. This may be understandable when there is little difference in the parties who position themselves for the same votes.

Giving people more say and more power does not necessarily mean that people will then see the need to vote, unless this say and power is meaningful to them and there is a threat that it will be taken away from them. So the question is how do you make having a say and power meaningful to people?

Equal votes and equal constituencies makes logical sense to anyone interested in fairness. But will it mean that people will feel they have more say and more power? I doubt this will change my colleagues’ minds when they continue to struggle with burdensome bureaucracies which feel like they hinder them in doing their job. So something needs to go along with fair votes. Something which will make people feel fair votes is worth something to them.

So there needs to be a change in the way we look at government to complement fair votes which will make people want a fair vote and then more likely to vote. I believe this is change in the bureaucratic system to allow for a collaboration between government and its bodies and the people, see here, here or here.

Governments need to stimulate the environment to allow for (and generate) spontaneous behaviour by individuals and groups. Programs of involvement and collaboration need to be governed by citizens and administered by practitioners who understand them. Public-service practitioners can become citizens’ honest advisors and helpers rather than controllers of public organizations (see here).

Like all movements to achieve social change, power is placed back where it belongs; this is empowerment. The Liberal Democrats have long advocated for empowerment, but so have other parties. It is time to imagine a different world where the government has a different role with its citizens. It is time to imagine this in specifics. It is time to communicate this difference.

Next Big Development in Politics: Which side will the Lib Dems be on?

We are formal owners of the state by all democratic and business criteria. So ask yourself how involved do you feel in the running of your local police force, school, hospital etc. or national decisions on where tax is spent or even if we go to war. We, as citizens maybe unwilling, and even incapable, of becoming practical owners of the state, yet do we want to continue to be treated as subjects or even as simple voters as is accepted by the current political system?

I do not want the government and its agencies to take on the sole role of managing our lives, even from a businesslike standpoint. We need to make clear that we want a new settlement between the government and the citizens, and one which treats us as equal partners. It is called collaboration. This will be resisted by the old political orthodoxy and embraced by the public.

The leadership of the Coalition government has made some attempts to involve the public but this has not been taken seriously by the ministers who are responsible for utilizing this involvement. After 9500 people gave their opinion on proposed government policy, all voices were ignored. The current administrative-government relationship will lead to growing and serious risks of citizens’ alienation, disaffection, skepticism, and increased cynicism towards governments as this exercise shows. Equally Nick Clegg’s launch of the Your Freedom website poses the same risks.

To turn it into substance will mean being able to show that such a welcome exercise in crowd-sourcing public opinion actually leads to influential input into government policy. This will demand a lot of work, clout, authority and follow-through.

Yet the following quote highlights the difficulty the political class has in seeing public involvement as important:

Although many public administrators view close relationships with citizens as both necessary and desirable most of them do not actively seek public involvement. If they do seek it, they do not use public input in making administrative decisions… and believe that greater citizen participation increases inefficiency… delays and red tape

The Lib Dems have made some headway in the direction towards partnership, as I believe the Liberal philosophy of devolved power fits best with this development and so the movement for people to have some control over schools and police forces are welcome but do not go far enough to develop collaboration and partnership.

There are many challenges facing the development of collaboration and partnership in government and public administration so understanding it is key to being able to change the spirit of government to implement it. Collaboration and partnership is what people will demand once they realise it is a possibility. It is not only key to developing what we as citizens want and need, it will be a valuable political resource for whoever is able to champion and communicate its cause.

In understanding it, questions arise:
1)      What does collaboration and partnership actually mean?
2)      Whose responsibility is it to make partnership possible?
3)      How can this collaboration be achieved?

These will be looked at in further posts…

Collaboration: The Next Big Step in Government and Public Administration

When politicians say things like ‘government would hand people direct control over how they are governed nationally and locally’ (Conservative)  or that they are making ‘government more accountable to the people and strengthen the hand of citizens against the state’ (Labour). Or even ‘creating a new level of transparency, accountability and participation for America’s citizens’ (Barack Obama). It sounds great, but what does it mean?

A good place to start is here. Vigoda has written a great piece on where we are at and what we are facing in terms of government and public administration (G&PA) and their relationship with citizens. He argues that government and public administration has evolved from rulers to managers and that there lies a new frontier in government. It is this new frontier that these statements by our new politicians are trying to grasp but are not quiet able to make the transition to this new way of thinking.

This new frontier is from  G&PA as managers and citizens as customers to a collaboration between citizens and other social players and G&PA. He argues that citizens as clients has worked but a new generation of running public administration is needed.

A better definition of the G&PA relationship must rely on the conception of collaboration and partnership. Such reforms will create a different and more flexible model of governing.

government will continue to govern… but the more authentic the encounters with citizens will be, the less will government be ‘they’ and the more it will be ‘we’

(Postmodern Public Administration. Fox & Miller 1995, 128)

It is interesting therefore to read the Liberal Republic by Demos  which says that

Discussions in political circles about ‘devolving’ power approach the question from the wrong direction. The default assumption should be that individuals have power, unless there is a good reason for consolidating power upwards to communities, local agencies, national government, or international bodies.

They go on to suggest that individuals should control their own health or social care through individual budgets, something which is happening and has been written about on this blog.  Importantly, this is a defining aspect of the distinctive Liberal ethos and they state that:

This will be unappealing to conservatives, who prefer people to live tidily, along carefully signposted paths.

And I would add it will be unappealing to Labour due to their desire for authoritarianism which resulted in sites like this.  In Vigoda’s own words

The new generation of public administration will need a different spirit… one that fosters mutual effort. This movement from a ‘they’ spirit’ to a ‘we’ spirit is perhaps the most important mission of public administration in our era.

The issue for the Liberal Democrats is that they begin to grasp this concept, find a way to communicate it effectively and find ways of implementing it. G&PA must take a step forward and while the Conservatives and Labour may have begun to use the language, it remains to be seen if their philosophy and beliefs would allow them to make this big step. The Liberal Democrats are in the best position to be able to do this in the UK.

So why is this on a solution focused politics site? Well, collaboration is a central aspect to the solution focused approach. It is the relationship where the techniques are used and solutions are found. Solution focused politics offers the best possible way of achieving this collaborative government as argued throughout this site. This will be developed on further posts.

Solution Focused Politics: Child protection as an example

This is part 2 and follows the article on problem focused politics which looked at how the area of child protection practice highlights how the UK government’s culture is to focus on the problem and then provide solutions from there. However, the results show that it does not work. However, not all governments are problem focused which offers us an opportunity to see how it can be done differently.

In the 1990’s in search of a different approach to child protection Andrew Turnell and Steve Edwards were effectively given half of Australia (Western Australia) to experiment with in an attempt to improve the situation. Their starting point was whatever works is in, and whatever does not work is out. They recorded closely what helped in child protection cases and ended up with a system which gives confidence back to professionals, reduced paperwork, and increased safety for children. The result was what they called ‘The Signs of Safety Approach’ and the results are proof that governments can take a different approach safely and improve services. The results were so compelling that authorities around the world started to take it up with Time magazine writing an article on it showing re-referral rates went from 16.1% in 2002 to just 5% in 2004 (meaning a massive saving in time, money and effort, with families managing their own difficulties without harming children).

At a similar time Susie Essex and colleagues were working for the NSPCC in the South West of England on a pioneering project with high risk child protection cases. They started from a similar place that they were trying to see if they could work with families where there was abuse while the child remained at home but there was no more abuse. They outlined the problem like this: “Re-abuse rates range from 25-33%, with rates rising in line with the length of follow up. Several recent studies involved only children placed on child protection registers, of which 30% suffered further abuse (Farmer and Owen 1995). Some of the children in this study, however, were only made safe by their removal or that of their abuser. When only the children who remained at home with the alleged abusing parent were considered, the re-abuse rate was 43%”. Using the approach they had developed, called the Resolutions Approach, they showed a re-abuse rate of between 3% and 7% (depending upon how the calculations are made).

The difference is that the Australian government saw the Signs of Safety approach as a way to improve services while the UK government saw the resolutions approach as too risky and so shut the project down. I can only assume that wanting a 43% re-abuse rate rather than a 7% re-abuse rate makes sense to problem-focused thinking but is irresponsible to anyone looking in believing that preventing abuse of children is important. The additional benefits of these approaches would be a reduction in the number of children in care, less child protection cases, less families to support, a reduced time working with families and better staff retention (a major issue in social work).  This all has 2 further benefits: one being a major saving in money the other being families who have experienced the approach rated it highly (in comparison to what is being used now).

This example outlines how there is already a lot of excellent work being done out there by people, groups, and organisations who show that things can be done differently and better. These people need the support of government. They need a government who believes that people in the country are worth listening to, who have some good ideas, who have tried things and have shown good results. If government wants to make life better for the country and the people it needs to see what its country can offer. A solution focused approach to politics would allow this.