Utopia Governance & the Commons by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

Both Proudhon and George are making a distinction between property and possession. Property takes on the attributes of something owned outright — with no necessary responsibilities of stewardship and custodianship that are discussed above. Possession, however, is ownership with social responsibility. The quotes from Paine and Locke are introducing a further point to the question of ownership of land, and that is the argument about ‘improvement’. It is again tempting to interpret this — as is so often done — as just a direct argument for ownership, pure and simple, and

 

75

Utopia Governance and the Commons

indeed an argument for the ‘property’ kind of ownership discussed above. But it’s clear, from Paine at least, that he is suggesting possession, and the resultant responsibilities that this entails. Improvement does not therefore necessarily lead to inalienable rights on the owner, and this is a point we will be looking at again in the next chapter.

In The Mystery of Capital, Hernando de Soto presents the very simple argument that security of land and property makes an enormous difference to developing nations. Property rights took sometimes hundreds of years to emerge in the developed nations. Somehow these nations are so used to the idea of owning land and property that they often completely overlook the problems that lack of secure tenure causes in developing nations. Ownership, therefore, is not something to be automatically challenged. Secure tenure — hopefully with the understanding that this implies care, responsibility and custodianship — is enormously important. (We can also note that forced re-distribution of land has been practised, arguably quite successfully, by capitalist,

democratic nations as well as by communism, as explored by Andro Linklater in Owning the Earth.)

We can conclude that the wealth without work issue, concerning this form of economic rent, is more about the inappropriate exploitation of land and property than about ownership direct.

 

Money and Usury

Trade, of course, existed long before there was

 

76

Utopia Governance and the Commons

money. The ‘coincidence of wants’ allows bartering to take place, such that if you happen to have something I need, and vice versa, we can make an exchange that benefits us both. Money was initially a useful intermediary for this process. Money’s first definition then is as a means of exchange. It is a veil, so to speak, for what we are really doing when we buy and sell things. A purchase is just an exchange, usually of our work, for something that we really want or need, like food or holidays. ‘Owning’ money is pointless by itself, since money is only the intermediary for goods. Money’s further definition is as a way of defining value, a shorthand for what we consider useful, or scarce or desirable in its own right. In the meantime, what is used as money — that is, currency — has changed from something that held value in itself (‘commodity money’) to something that represented that value (‘representative money’) to just an abstract concept that no longer links directly to physical things (‘fiat money’).

Borrowing money came along as another intermediate step for when there was too much money, or too little, for an exchange of goods to take place directly. Banks give some guarantee of the legitimacy of currency and they also allow the saver and the borrower to ‘find’ each other. A modest charge for this service (and for creating the currency, the ‘seigniorage’) is arguably justified, but an excess charge is usually termed as ‘usury’. Aristotle (The Politics) for instance, said: ‘The trade of the petty usurer is hated the most with reason: it makes a profit from currency itself, instead of making it from the process that currency was meant to serve.’ Usury, in turn, leads us to our

 

77

Utopia Governance and the Commons

third type of wealth without work — money from money itself.

As we’ve seen, there are many discussions about when capitalism, as a system, really got going. One suggestion is that it was when money was first lent at interest that capitalism truly began. It’s the interest payable on loans, the argument goes, that keeps the capitalist system in business, as more and more resources go towards paying off the ever-increasing indebtedness. Again we can ask, would it still be capitalism if there were no debts? I think it’s less important to decide on how capitalism began, and more important to address that question of whether debt is its inevitable consequence. We will be taking that question up later in the book.

When we deposit money with a bank, invest in an insurance policy or a pension scheme, or buy shares in a company, we are in a way participating in the process of accumulating money without work, or, more accurately, money via the labour of others, since everything eventually leads back to someone’s labour. The banks even have a habit of describing their services as ‘products’, as if they wish to suggest that what they have to offer us is something material and tangible. But what they offer is, on the contrary, increasingly abstract. Lending money with interest has escalated over the centuries into all types of financial transactions. As with the other forms of economic rent, there is no clear-cut division for what is reasonable and what is exploitation here. I hope we’ve seen that ‘ownership’, has a bit of flexibility. I hope we’ve seen too, that making money from

 

78

Utopia Governance and the Commons

another’s labour — owning the means of production — hides a deeper concern over the social relations involved in our economies. There might be some flexibility with money as well. Borrowing and selling stock in a company are arguably beneficial to society, but when financial transactions such as hedge funds and derivatives proliferate, the situation is increasingly complex.

 

What do the Utopias have to say

about Ownership?

Privatopia loves ownership, and it is arguably progressing towards a ‘rentier’ society, where not just the rich and powerful are the owners extracting economic rent, everyone will be in on the act. The virtual monopoly created by land ownership is not acknowledged, but heavily subsidised and supported as a good and obvious thing to be doing. This can only continue with Cornucopia, and Chapter 13, A Wider Commons, explores possible futures of ownership under this vision. It is only Ecotopia that challenges the notion of ownership. Increasingly, this challenge refers to the commons — both in land, and in the other material resources that we use — and use up — as a society. So the commons, and the question of what should we share, is where we now turn.

 

79

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

80

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

4. Defining the Commons

‘If commoning has any meaning it must be the production of ourselves as a common subject.’

Sylvia Federici — Re-enchanting the World —

Feminism and the Politics of the Commons

 

A Commons Exists for us Now

A commons means different things to different people. In this chapter I am mostly taking it to have the political meaning of shared land and property and shared resources, but we will be looking at wider definitions as well, as the discussion of the book continues.

In much of the developing world a commons is still the norm rather than the odd aberration that it has come to be in developed nations. I’m suggesting though that for the developed world

 

81

Utopia Governance and the Commons

a commons still exists, but in less recognisable forms. For instance, we accept that most roads are publicly owned, there are public buildings, city squares and pavements. Arguably this is public space rather than commons, but it is still a ‘commonised’ resource. Up to a point, wealth is shared by taxation; in the UK we are not forced to pay directly for public services such as education and health care, so the costs of these facilities are commonised.

So, if we were to be more aware of the commons, we’d see that it does not have to be re-invented where there has previously been nothing remotely considered a commons. It is more a question of shifting the boundaries — literally and metaphorically — as to what is described as commons and what is not. In the light of these thoughts, this chapter asks: What should we share? Are there changes to the way a commons is defined in society that would make us all happier and also protect nature and maintain her and us in ecological stability?

 

The Tragedy of the Commons

Anyone who has heard the term commons at all is likely to immediately think of the so-called ‘Tragedy of the Commons’. In its modern form, the name comes from an essay by Garrett Hardin, although there are echoes of a similar story in Rousseau. Traditionally, a commons was land available for ordinary people to do such things as graze cattle, collect firewood, forage and plant crops. Over time however, pressure from wealthy landowners resulted in ‘enclosures’, whereby the commoners, starting in England, were increasingly shut out from the

 

82

Utopia Governance and the Commons

land that had previously provided for their sustenance. Hardin, in his essay, takes up the traditional view of the commons and asks us to imagine individuals with cattle that they wish to graze on a particular piece of common land. Each such person, in their own self-interest, would be motivated to increase the number of cattle they graze so as to maximise the benefit derived from the land in the short-term. However, if everyone acts this way, then the land will be over-grazed and everyone will lose out. Hence, the tragedy. Hardin was not simply referring us back to something that might have happened in the past. His essay was really suggesting that we are doing the same thing on a much grander scale in today’s world. Whilst, in the developed world at least, there is little or no common land remaining, nonetheless there are ‘commons’ of fossil fuels, forests, clean water, fish, minerals and ores. In the interests of short-term gain, we burn our way through these and risk our long-term tragedy. (Critics of the Tragedy of the Commons theory point out that societies with common land for grazing or crops never have individuals acting in their own self-interest — there is always a community. But this, whilst true, rather misses the point of Hardin’s argument. The developed world is essentially a world of private interests — a Privatopia — so the Tragedy of the Commons is a very real possibility, indeed an increasing reality.)

In a book, Filters Against Folly, Hardin goes on to explain a bit more about dealing with the potential tragedy identified in his commons essay. Here, he makes the crucial distinction between a managed and an unmanaged

 

83

Utopia Governance and the Commons

commons. Hardin asks, Who benefits? Who pays? He suggests three alternatives — privatise, commonise or socialise. To privatise is to accrue the benefits of what we are doing, and to take responsibility for any losses. (This would be something like a business, acting responsibly, cleaning up any pollution, recycling, avoiding contributing to climate change and not using up resources that cannot be replaced.) To commonise, in Hardin’s terms, is essentially the Tragedy of the Commons scenario. Individuals or businesses privatise profits — so keep them to themselves, and thereby benefit in the short-term — but commonise losses. So, everyone pays for clearing up pollution, adapting to climate change, etc. This is a ‘commons’ of sorts, but it is a blind commons that is forced on us because of the selfishness and irresponsibility of others. To socialise, by contrast, is a ‘managed commons’. The gains and losses are shared out in a conscious and purposeful way.

We can see echoes of the same mindset in Adam Smith’s notion that if everyone is working blindly towards their own self-interest this creates — by way of an ‘invisible hand’ — a better society. But this idea is also the very idea that leads to the Tragedy of the Commons.

The important thing to grasp here is that a managed commons offers us the best hope of avoiding disaster in the future and a managed commons relies on community and good governance. So, it’s not that there is no commons right now. It’s that there is a commons of the worst possible kind. All the profit is extracted by a few. All the mess and waste is a shared cost borne by everyone. In

 

84

Utopia Governance and the Commons

summary, we are privatising profits and commonising losses when we could be sharing profits and privatising loss. (Some might have preferred if Hardin had exchanged what he meant by socialise and commonise in his explanations, but hopefully his meaning is still clear. It is a managed commons that Hardin is promoting. In fact, later in life, Hardin reflected that it might have been better for him to have called his essay, ‘The Tragedy of the Unmanaged Commons’.) We might add here, as is often said, that there is no commons without community; indeed no commons without a suitable economic model to regulate it. Authors Maria Mies and Veronika Benholdt-Thomsen (The Subsistence Perspective) say:

‘In our view, we cannot simply say, “no commons without community”, we must also say, “no commons without economy”, in the sense of oikonomia, ie. the production of human beings within the social and natural household. Hence, reinventing the commons is linked to the reinvention of the communal and the commons-based economy.’

 

Natural Commons as Resource

and Wild Nature

As we’ve seen above, the usual conception of the commons is about land that provides shared grazing for animals or shared space for growing food. And then we hear about ‘enclosures’, where the land becomes private property. Land is taken by those with power and then rented back to those who once used it for free. The idea of enclosure vividly describes the process whereby features of the world that were once

 

85

Utopia Governance and the Commons

wild and free have become commodified.

It is nature that provides the resources of the commons, and it is clearly nature still that provides the resources, even after enclosures have been devised by humans. We did not make a change to this by enclosing land, but we shifted attention from our reliance on nature over to an emphasis on production, rent and profit. The link back to nature became obscured — and this process has only become worse. I am using the term ‘natural commons’ for what nature provides for us — that is — the natural resources we need in order to survive. There are natural resources that can be replaced or replenished, whist other resources that, so far as the Earth is concerned, will be used up forever.

It should be pointed out though, that common land can be owned by someone, either an individual or the government, yet still remain a commons. As the last chapter tried to show, defining the commons is therefore not necessarily about ownership. The key thing is how the land is cared for and how a ‘managed commons’ is achieved.

The whole world has been at least indirectly affected by human activity. Chemicals in the air and water and changes to the atmosphere are all-pervasive and likely to increase in the foreseeable future. Even so, places that are as much untouched by humanity as possible are, I believe, critically important. The term I’m using in this work for such places is ‘wild nature’. Those places where, as yet, the human footprint is light, need to be preserved and protected at

 

86

Utopia Governance and the Commons

all costs. Wild nature belongs as much to the other fauna and flora with which we share this world as it belongs to us. Wild nature is where the privileges all belong to the animals, birds, insects, trees and plants that live there, instead of to us humans. If we go to such places at all, it is only to visit, or perhaps there are indigenous people living there, so close to nature that their footprint is exceptionally light. Wild nature, then, is not a ‘common wealth’ in the sense of offering us resources for food, energy, minerals or whatever. Its value is not even by way of absorbing Carbon Dioxide and regulating rainfall and its run-off and in preserving and making soil. Its real value is just for itself, and for its beauty and its nourishment to the human soul. Chapter 9 — Nature — considers these matters in more detail. American biologist E. O. Wilson has the idea of ‘half Earth’ — leaving (or, giving back) half the Earth to nature and using only the remaining half for humans. (At the time of writing, humans take up over two thirds of available land area — in the 1960’s it was only around one third. There is currently an attempt to protect one third of the natural world by the year 2030. Meanwhile, economist Partha Dasupta estimates that were we to invest in ‘natural capital’ the return on our investment would be 19% per annum.)

It might be argued that indigenous peoples, and even people who abandon ‘developed’ society and choose to live ‘off-grid’, are not necessarily going to draw the sharp distinction between ‘wild nature’ and ‘natural resources’ that I am suggesting here. It is a fair point, but for one thing, the numbers of such people are very

 

87

Utopia Governance and the Commons

small, so their impact is minimal. For another thing, the belief systems of indigenous people (and even some off-gridders) will often mean they live in a careful balance with nature. Even though that balance may not be as I have defined it here, I think something similar is implicit. Indigenous people often have a relationship and reciprocity with nature that ‘developed’ societies have largely lost and which would be difficult to replicate.

The relationship of nature, place, the natural commons and wild nature are shown in the figure below.

 

Figure 4.1 Nature, Place, Natural Commons,

Wild Nature

 

The Commons, Wealth and Capital

I have chosen to identify nature as partly a

 

88

Utopia Governance and the Commons

resource and partly as wild nature in order to clarify what is going on when we look to her for our sustenance. The resource aspect of nature — what I’m calling the natural commons — is what was traditionally just called ‘Land’ by economists, as we discussed in the previous chapter. I have separated this out from wild nature. Wild nature, as we’ve said above, belongs to the animals, the birds, the fish, the trees and the plants. We humans may find beauty and rest within wild nature, but not ‘resources’ in the traditional sense. Inevitably there is some cross-over. Old growth forests, for instance, sit on the borderline between what might be a resource and what might be preserved as wild nature. The important thing is to be conscious about what we are doing — to have a ‘managed commons’ of resources, in Hardin’s terms — rather than blindly and inadvertently destroying both wild nature and the natural commons. The first act of managing is to make clear this split between what is reasonable to be used and what needs to remain untouched.

Classical economics recognises that for wealth to be wealth, some kind of work needs to be done in order to render natural resources useable. Some of this wealth is then consumed directly whilst some is retained as ‘capital’ for future use. We need then to introduce human work and labour in order to produce wealth and capital. All capital is wealth, but not all wealth is capital. This process was illustrated in Figure 3.1 in the last chapter. The figure below combines Figure 3.1 with Figure 4.1 to show how the two relate.

 

89

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

Figure 4.2 Natural Commons -> Resource +

Work/Labour = Wealth -> Capital +

Consumption

 

90

Utopia Governance and the Commons

An important point to note here — which I will discuss again below — is that our material economy with its capital, wealth and consumption, is not somehow ‘outside’ nature. Everything we do is within nature, even although many of the products of human endeavour — including our waste products and pollution — may seem ‘un-natural’. Environmentalists often balk at this conclusion, and perhaps the reason is that by calling everything ‘nature’ this might mean that those who exploit and/or destroy eco-systems then have an ‘excuse’ for their activities. But, in balance, I think describing everything as nature forces us to consider all of our activities as taking place within eco-systems, and this is a positive move. Some economists try to devise a similar pattern or process for the cultural economy as I have shown for the material economy.

 

91

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

Figure 4.3 The Cultural Economy, showing the

mirror progression from ‘Resource’ to ‘Capital’

 

92

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

So both those two main economies, the material and the cultural, are shown as linear processes. This is rather typical of our Western thought patterns, where things come from ‘nothing’ and are ultimately ‘consumed’ or destroyed. Everything else in the diagram seems to be floating around these linear processes. We could say that the way we try to organise all our economies wants to force us into these same linear arrangements that we ascribe to the material and the cultural. This sets up an awkward tension in the figures. There will be more to say on this in Chapter 8.

The parallels between the material economy and the cultural might suggest that culture is an ‘industry’ and its functioning mirrors very much the behaviour of the material economy. This might not be a problem for many — indeed it might be a welcome reflection, in their view, that there is a natural order in the way human endeavours of all kinds function. However, for others, the commoning that we have spoken of with regard to natural resources above, takes on an even more important role when it comes to culture. As we will see below, there is a desire to group activities into new definitions of commons. These ideas can be grouped under the collective term creative commons, and require some further exploration.

 

Widening the Commons

As I’ve suggested earlier, the terms capital and commons have been expanded to include a variety of different things. Physical capital is sometimes used as an alternative term for the

 

93

Utopia Governance and the Commons

material resources nature provides. Human capital describes our ability to do work, essential, of course, for us to reproduce society through new goods and services. Cultural capital may be a term used to describe the contribution of intelligence, imagination and creativity. Social capital is the value inherent in community that might be realised by way of voluntary work, informal help between neighbours and so on (sometimes referred to as ‘horizontal’ relations, in contrast to more formal work, which is termed ‘vertical’). Financial capital — dealt with more fully in Chapter 8 — recognises how integral money is to the flow of the economy, but also has a life of its own. Perhaps this proliferation of different capitals is a source of confusion. However, authors are perhaps attempting to show that the wealth of a culture owes as much to abstract qualities, such as compassion, imagination and social connections, as it does to physical resources. It might be that this suggests an attempt to quantify the less physical contributions and reduce them to number crunching. So the danger of the ‘capitals’ is that everything gets reduced to economics — or, elevated to economics — depending on your perspective. Along with this, it brings the notions of commodity, scarcity, transactional relationships and cost-benefit analyses. Maybe there is some justification for this with natural and cultural capital, but less so with social capital. But I think the intent of those authors who expand the meaning of capital is to show the richness of human culture and how the economy is actually built off a foundation of social connections. This is the more positive motivation that I have followed here.

 

94

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

To summarise the further definitions of capital:

Physical Capital — What I’ve called Natural Resources, or Material Wealth.

Human Capital — Value innate to people, including labour and work.

Cultural Capital — Intelligence, imagination and creativity.

Social Capital — The value in the connections between people — as described by Robert Putman (Bowling Alone). See Chapter 8.

Financial Capital — Sometimes just used to refer to money, but better if it refers to the flow of money in the economy, as a support for the flow of physical resources, material wealth, consumption and material capital. See Chapter 8.

As with capital, there has also been a recent move to widen the meaning of commons, from the natural commons to the inclusion of human imagination and creativity. For the term natural commons itself — sometimes this is used to refer to all of nature. As discussed above however, I have suggested that we divide off part of nature as the commons part so as to recognise it is not all just a resource. But again, I don’t wish to quibble too much over definitions. The fact that many are describing nature in some way as a commons is to be greatly welcomed. The flexibility of all these terms — the commons and the capitals — is probably annoying to academics, but should remind us that all these things are fluid and waiting for us to resolve them into concrete

 

95

Utopia Governance and the Commons

decisions — indeed, our missions and aims will evolve over time, and the definitions we are discussing here will also evolve — it is always a process and not a destination.

The definitions of the more abstract commons I am taking mostly from Charles Eisenstein (Sacred Economics). Eisenstein identifies a cultural commons of intelligence, inventiveness and technical know-how, a spiritual commons of imagination and creativity and a social commons of compassion and sharing. To summarise the definitions of commons:

Natural Commons — Sometimes referring to all of nature, but preferably referring to that part of nature that humans need for our sustenance, so is used as a material resource.

Cultural Commons — Eisenstein refers to intellectual property and creative copyright here, but I prefer to use the term to refer to the actual wealth produced, as in invention, art, music, literature and celebration, rather than the copyrighting of these. (Perhaps we should also include trademarks, patents and trade secrets, to be concise.)

Spiritual Commons — Imagination and creativity.

Social Commons — Compassion, gifts and sharing.

 

96

Utopia Governance and the Commons

The Creative Commons

The term ‘creative commons’ has started to be used to refer to intellectual property and artistic copyright, so it may safely be regarded as a collective term for the cultural and spiritual commons, following the definitions above — hence, intelligence, creativity, imagination and technical know-how.

In the last chapter, we looked at ideas around the ownership of land and saw that one claim to ownership was on the basis of ‘improvement’. The idea was that if someone spent time and effort clearing a piece of ground of rocks and undergrowth, for instance, and then planted crops, the effort alone was sufficient for the person to claim ownership. (See John Locke.) In Classical economics, a similar argument is made to arrive at a general definition of wealth. Effort must be put in for wealth to be created. (Figure 3.1.)

For imagination and creativity and their concomitant intellectual and creative copyright, we might take that same argument of improvement and apply it to the more abstract ideas of creativity and know-how. Minds need to be trained and the ideas of our imaginations take a lot of effort to bring to fruition as an invention, an artwork or a book. We might conclude therefore that the ‘improvement’ invested to bring something from an idea to an invention or a product mirrors the process of bringing natural resources into material wealth. The wealth that is created is cultural wealth and the capital derived from this is cultural capital.

 

97

Utopia Governance and the Commons

Alternatively — and this is what is often behind the proposal for a creative commons — there is sometimes the wish that all cultural wealth should be a gift. Indeed, the term ‘creative commons’ tends to conflate imagination and creativity with their output — the cultural wealth — and downplays all the effort that goes into bringing the promptings of imagination to birth as actual inventions, artworks, music and so forth. It is an argument therefore against creative copyright and intellectual property rights. Personally, I have no quibble with those who wish to offer their gifts without remuneration. But I feel that the parallels of material wealth and capital with creative wealth and capital are worth making. For artists engaged in social justice for instance, this is a critical issue, so we can appreciate the challenge they have in resolving such questions. They may wish to see the cultural commons as emblematic of a ‘gift economy’, an idea we will be exploring in Chapter 8.

The creative commons sits on the border between the material economy (where most things are commodified) and the social commons (where most things are gifts). In fact, culture is a way that the importance of the social commons can be brought to light. There is a further way to look at things, which might be helpful. The reader may recall that in the previous chapter we considered the difference between ‘property’ and ‘possession’ with regard to land. The first term regarded land simply as commodity. The second recognised a social responsibility that went along with ownership; a responsibility that is expressed well by the notions of stewardship and custodianship. The

 

98

Utopia Governance and the Commons

debates over intellectual property rights and artistic copyright get very complex. The notion of stewardship may be a way that we can cut through these arguments to a sensible balance. As with land ownership, it is not ownership itself that is the real problem, it is how that ownership relates us to society. Social relations feature as much in the cultural economy as in the material — arguably more so. Could we find a way of rewarding the efforts of those who generate cultural wealth that also recognises the social aspect of what they produce? Could we have intellectual and artistic possession, rather than property — and what would this mean? The reader will appreciate, I’m sure, that a lot hinges on what we are like as people and how our societies function. I’m not going to explore this too much further here. However, I think one useful parallel can be drawn between the culture of today and how we treat the culture of the past.

 

Commons and Cultural Heritage

Some material production of past generations starts to be regarded as cultural wealth and of course artworks, literature and music endure beyond the lives of their creators. The cultural wealth feeds back to us as a resource, both in terms of artefacts and also physical places — buildings and landscapes. We often see these as a shared inheritance. This is partly because their creators are no longer around to benefit from what they have produced and also because communities, and sometimes nations, rightly regard such things as part of their culture. In the UK, we have protection for historic buildings by awarding them listed status, whilst whole

 

99

Utopia Governance and the Commons

areas of towns and cities may be protected in Conservation Areas. Landscapes, meanwhile, benefit from a variety of safeguards such as ‘Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty’, National Parks and ownership by the National Trust. Sometimes when historic buildings are under threat in other countries, concerns are raised, indeed there are places that have World Heritage Status to protect them. Likewise, artefacts in museums and art galleries can be the subject of national and international interest when they are bought and sold or moved to new locations.

Historic artefacts, buildings and landscapes can often still be owned by someone and the owners may derive benefit from their ownership. Such owners are not the creators of their property, but they may well be its protectors and custodians. We see items that were once the products of human creativity moving gradually into a kind of common ownership. The more significant those things are considered to be, the wider the pool of people who regard them as somehow a shared inheritance. In this process any current owners seem to have an ever greater degree of trust and responsibility placed upon them for what they ‘possess’.

I hope the parallel with intellectual property and artist copyright is clear. As with cultural heritage, our contemporary cultural wealth could be treated with similar kinds of mutual agreements and shared responsibilities. Indeed, we can refer this right back to our material economy, and recognise the shared responsibilities around the natural commons and wild nature.

 

100

Utopia Governance and the Commons

The Prospects for Common Good

Laws

According to Montesquieu: ‘the state owes all citizens a secure subsistence, food, suitable clothes and a way of life that does not damage their health.’ (The Spirit of the Laws). It is tempting to see our understanding of the commons as fixed, but a look back in history reminds us that laws around land, sea and air have gone through countless changes and there are thousands of variations across the world. The commons is a process rather than a set of fixed laws and our governments are themselves processes. A process is open to change, so a change in our views of ownership and commons is a realistic possibility. I think climate change in particular has alerted us to the unfairness currently integral to the way the natural commons is exploited for the benefit of a few, whilst the rest of us pay for cleaning up the mess.

If the current systems aren’t working, then what system will work? In my own country of Scotland, the terms ‘common land’ and ‘common goods’ (which includes buildings and sometimes furniture and other items) have a specific meaning. All 32 local authorities have a responsibility to keep records of common land and common goods and to hold a common good fund for any revenue that may be raised from their use, such as the rent of buildings. In fact, these laws are amongst the oldest in Scotland and some relatively recent proceedings have served to clarify the law with regard to the commons. England, likewise, had its ‘Charter of

 

101

Utopia Governance and the Commons

the Forest’ that dates back to the Magna Carta, although it was eventually taken into other laws in a much-diluted form. Guy Standing tells us:

‘The Charter of the Forest [1217] asserted the rights of the common man to subsistence and to what were called estovars, the means of subsistence in the commons. In the thirteenth century, every church was required to read out the charter to congregations four times a year. One remarkable feature inserted in the revised Magna Carta was the right granted to widows to “reasonable estovar of the commons”. Every widow had the right to a basic income, in the form of the right to take food, fuel and housing materials from the commons.’

Guy Standing — Basic Income: And How We Can Make It Happen. See also, Discourse on the Common Weal (1507).

Now that we are realising the importance of the atmosphere, the oceans and our reserves of fossil fuels, it would be very welcome to have the law recognise a global commons more explicitly and to set in place legislation that clearly defines what the commons means today and how use of the commons should be managed. (See especially, Guy Standing — The Plunder of the Commons.)

 

Proposals for the Commons

The above discussion leads us inevitably towards the rules and laws surrounding the management of our natural commons and the protection of wild nature. To be a ‘managed commons’ requires regulation, and this in turn requires governance. See, for instance, Elinor

 

102

Utopia Governance and the Commons

Ostrom’s, The Governance of the Commons. For better or worse, it is legislation that shapes our environments. We will be looking at governance in the next three chapters and fitting this together with our understanding of the commons. For now though, here are some ideas to get us underway.

From our discussions, the natural commons of land, sea and air, fossil fuels, fish stocks, minerals, soils and forests is a commons for which we are the custodians and caretakers. If we truly took that on board, then we would be a long way towards taking care of this planet on which we rely, as well as agreeing fair shares amongst ourselves. The authors quoted in the last chapter, especially Henry George and Thomas Paine, have already made one proposal — a ‘ground rent’ payable to the community by land owners. More recent authors such as Adam Lent (Land) have fleshed out how things might work in a modern society. The proposal is now generally known as a Land Value Tax. Variations on this central idea also suggest that the tax may be reflective of the uses to which a particular piece of land is put. If local government were to be strengthened then communities will have a lot more say in how land is used. The social responsibility of land ownership can then be taken up more directly.

We might also see the actions of oil and mining companies brought under new legislation in terms of what they can take from the natural commons, as well as having accountability for the damage done to air, sea and climate. When a global commons is recognised, pollution and climate change take on a slightly different feel,

 

103

Utopia Governance and the Commons

as it is brought home to us that we are all affected. The culprits owe all of us for the damage they have done as we all own the global commons. So, we might see the producers of fossil fuels paying recompense for their share of the damage, and this would be distributed to everyone. This ‘Fee and Dividend’ idea has already been proposed in the USA and other countries. Meanwhile, polluters that affect more local habitats may pay compensation directly to local residents. We might envisage Sovereign Wealth Funds, for income derived from the use of common resources, to be administered and shared out equitably to local residents. Such systems are already in place in Alaska and Norway, amongst a number of other nations.

Peter Barnes (Capitalism 3.0) suggests establishing regulative bodies independent of government, who would make decisions about a nation’s carbon budget, and so on. That way, the problem of governments fearing a backlash from unpopular policies on the use of fossil fuels would be partly overcome, as it would be the regulative body, and not the government, who would be imposing restrictions on the use of the commons. Barnes also suggests putting common good assets under the control of trusteeships, who would then rent the use of those assets back to private business (and, presumably, the government). In a sense, he is suggesting turning around the ‘rentier’ model of capitalism, to work in favour of the commons.

Such systems as sovereign wealth funds, fee and dividend, and the like, are often known collectively as ‘pre-distribution’ — in contrast to ‘re-distribution’. The Earth’s wealth is therefore

 

104

Utopia Governance and the Commons

shared in advance, as it were, rather than waiting for a few people to appropriate it, become rich and then be taxed, so that everyone else will then benefit only indirectly, if at all, from the wealth that arguably belongs to us all. (It should be noted that the term pre-distribution is usually used by economists to refer to more mundane things such as minimum wage agreements, unions, good welfare benefits and easy bankruptcy laws. The extension of pre-distribution to include the benefits of a shared commons is stretching the meaning quite substantially!)

 

Recognising the Commons invites

a new Politics

From the discussions I’ve had with a broad range of people, it’s clear that a great many have never heard of the commons. ‘Commoner’ is a derisory term nowadays, but in truth we are all commoners, and if we saw this to mean participants in a vast commons of nature and culture then we might not think it so bad. What’s more, that status of commoner should afford us rights. Those rights need to be taken out, dusted down and looked at anew, before our common heritage is squandered by those who don’t care. I get the impression that if folks were to learn of the Charter of the Forest, for instance, and all the rights and privileges that were afforded all citizens, by law, in earlier centuries, then they may view our current systems as somewhat paltry and unimaginative by comparison! As I’ve discussed above, it is legislation that is needed to make all this happen. So thinking about governance is our

 

105

Utopia Governance and the Commons

next task — answering the question: Who Decides?

 

106

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

5. Polity

‘If you can’t dance, it’s not my revolution.’

Attributed to Emma Goldman

‘A nation of sheeps will beget a government of wolves.’

Edward R. Murrow

‘Democracy is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequals alike.’

Plato — The Republic

It seems we are still a long way from those ideas around ownership, sharing and the commons that we have explored in the preceding chapters. Big business and the interests of the super-rich seem to take precedence over the voices of the poor and the

 

107

Utopia Governance and the Commons

care of the planet. This is all dressed up as ‘progress’, as if we will all one day benefit, and the problems of climate change and pollution will miraculously be sorted out along the way. So, the ‘principles’ we are presented with; maintaining economic growth, investing in new technology, even job security; are often smoke-screens for a far less palatable agenda. Meanwhile, the poor suffer: Poorer nations suffer from the exploitation and the excesses of the wealthy nations. Poor people in rich nations suffer from the growing inequalities within their societies. And future generations are being made poor already, as they will have to pick up the bill for our negligence and irresponsibility. Rousseau said:

’…when the state is close to ruin and subsists only through empty and deluded forms, when in each man’s heart the social bond is broken, when the crudest self-interest insolently adorns itself with sacred name of the public good, then the general will falls silent; the motives of all are kept secret, their votes are no more the votes of citizens than if the state never existed, and the decrees that are falsely passed, under the name of laws, have private interests as their only aim.’

Jean-Jacques Rousseau — The Social Contract

In this chapter we’re looking at that basic question raised in the Introduction: Who Decides? I’ve called this chapter Polity because it seems to encompass all of the possible descriptions that might be deployed to answering that question. There is a more specific meaning to polity, which we will get to later. But for now, let’s make a start, by asking

 

108

Utopia Governance and the Commons

why there might be a polity or a government at all.

 

State versus Stateless

Any summary of political alternatives cannot fail to mention Thomas Hobbes (Leviathan) and his view that humanity, in its natural state, consists of a life that has: ‘No arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continued fear of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short’. According to Hobbes, only by voluntarily submitting to an authority, such as a monarchy or a government, can people live together in relative peace and harmony. The suggestion is that what we sacrifice by way of freedom is more than compensated by the stability that is gained. It has to be said though, that for most people in most countries, we have never actually been given a choice about whether we take up this offer of government or not. Most monarchies and governments have taken power at some time in the past — often by violent means — and they have not since considered it appropriate to ask their citizens whether or not we really think it’s a good idea! Most governments therefore are not legitimate, and to say that they govern by consent or ‘have a mandate’ is dubious at best.

The counter-argument is that we need our freedom, and that we are sensible and wise enough to look after ourselves. A high level of good will and common sense amongst people is assumed, and this allows life to go on without much in the way of government or institutions. But this raises the question — are we really

 

109

Utopia Governance and the Commons

good and sensible enough for such freedom? The question of whether or not we have sufficient knowledge, skill and co-operation to make society work without authority was posed long ago by Aristotle and he came down firmly on the side that says we cannot make it by ourselves. He said: ‘He who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must either be a beast or a god.’ But there have always been plenty around who think otherwise, and their belief in freedom, independence, self-reliance, good will and common sense is often referred to as anarchism. (The word is derived from the Greek anarkhia — an = without + arkh(os) = ruler/authority.) It is difficult to take in much of the broad sweep of ideas that anarchism includes, especially in more recent times, but a small review will hopefully bring out some salient features that are important for our discussion.

Anarchism, as hinted at above, is very optimistic about people and especially at pains to promote the notion that all that is bad in society is due to culture gone wrong, rather than some intrinsic problem with human nature. By ourselves then, and in our basic nature, we are good — the anarchist would claim. It is government, especially any form of state bureaucracy (that almost inevitably will involve hierarchy) where things go wrong. Proudhon (the reader may remember him from, ‘property is theft’) regarded anarchy as the adult state of a society — in other words, with anarchy we are grown-up enough to take responsibility for our actions. By contrast, he regarded hierarchy as primitive!

Anarchism’s way to organise society is to

 

110

Utopia Governance and the Commons

maximise freedom (especially individual freedom) and to minimise bureaucracy and all else relating to government and state. Nicholas Walter’s pithy quote addresses this:

‘Many people say that government is necessary because some men cannot be trusted to look after themselves, but anarchists say that government is harmful because no man can be trusted to look after anyone else.’

Nicholas Walter — About Anarchism

A further definition, from Alexander Berkman, again stresses freedom:

‘Anarchism teaches that we can live in a society where there is no compulsion of any kind. A life without compulsion naturally means liberty; it means freedom from being forced or coerced, a chance to lead the life that suits you best.’

Alexander Berkman — ABC of Anarchism

And Proudhon gave us this delightful quote:

‘To be governed is to be watched over, inspected, spied on, directed, legislated, regimented, closed in, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, assessed, evaluated, censored, commanded, all by creatures that have neither the right nor wisdom nor virtue…. To be governed means that at every move, operation or transaction, one is noted, registered, entered into a census, taxed, stamped, authorised, recommended, admonished, prevented, reformed, set right, corrected. Government means to be subject to tribute, trained, ransomed, exploited, monopolised, extorted, pressured, mystified, robbed; all in

 

111

Utopia Governance and the Commons

the name of public utility and the general good. Then at first signs of resistance or word of complaint, one is repressed, fined, despised, vexed, pursued, hustled, beaten up, garrotted, imprisoned, shot, machine gunned, judged, sentenced, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed, and to cap it all, ridiculed, mocked, outraged and dishonoured. That is Government. That is its justice and morality!’

As with many of the subjects taken up in this book, there are many names and subtly different meanings that we could use to describe things. This is especially true of anarchism, which seems to have as many subsets as there are anarchist authors. To keep things simple, I’m trying to emphasise just two different categories of anarchism — those that stress the importance of the individual, as we’ve explored above — what I’m describing as individualist anarchism. And those that look at some kind of organisation and shared action in society. For this second category, I am adopting the term ‘collectivist’, although it is sometimes termed ‘communistic’. Whilst individualist anarchism stresses freedom, collectivism stresses equality. We look at each of the two types of anarchism below.

 

Individualism

It is arguably the individualists who promote the freedom aspect of anarchism the most. As earlier quotes have suggested, freedom means ‘freedom from’, that is, freedom from government, laws, institutions and bureaucracy. It also means ‘freedom to’ — freedom to choose one’s own way of living. Later chapters will

 

112

Utopia Governance and the Commons

develop the ‘freedom to’ aspect as freedom to be the author of one’s own story. But, as far as anarchism goes, this ‘freedom to’ idea often refers to freedom to pursue business interests and to own property. So, the individualist is for freedom, therefore ownership. Individualists are very much into the ownership of property as a guarantor of security, whilst collectivists saw property more or less as an evil. Why would we want more collectivism? Collectivism might suggest planned economies — therefore committees and bureaucracies — and therefore the suppression of freedom and the misery of endless meetings.

It might seem, at first strike, that a kind of individualist anarchism is very similar to today’s liberal and libertarian notions. We’ll see below, however, that those who promote individual freedom nevertheless have very strong ideas about how people should co-operate and above all promote the flourishing of everyone, not just themselves. The contrast with today’s neo-liberal societies (and the utopia I’ve named Privatopia) could not be greater.

 

Collectivism

Perhaps even before humans formed settled communities, there was a tendency for some people to do very much more work than others. The success of one person might be down to hard work, or luck, or both. Meanwhile, failure might be the result of laziness, illness, bad luck or just old age. As such, some gathered large swathes of land for cultivating, whilst others ended up with little or nothing and became hired hands — or slaves — of the rich.

 

113

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

Andro Linklater (Owning the Earth) explains that as a younger man he had joined several communities looking to share resources with each other in a fairer way than offered by the dominant culture of consumer capitalism. Sooner or later they all came up against the problems that had been faced by the early settlers in America. Some people are weaker than others, or just plain lazy, so trying to give them an equal share of what the stronger, harder-working members of the community had toiled to produce just did not seem fair.

Because of this issue — sometimes referred to as the ‘free-rider problem’ — all societies have tried to find ways to achieve a fairer distribution of land, property and other goods to address the imbalance. Compassion leads us to wish to share with those who, through injury, bad luck or old age, do not have the means to work and provide for themselves. But fairness demands that we receive a just reward for our efforts and those who work hardest deserve a larger share. Linklater traces how this story has been played out in different times and different places. Whilst the ‘solutions’ have been very different, the reasons for trying are really as described above.

So the issue comes down to a balance between freedom and equality. Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Discourse on the Origin of Inequality) recognised two types of inequality — natural, because of physical differences — and moral, or political, because of the laws and conventions of society. We saw above how society tries to address the ‘natural inequality’ issue through

 

114

Utopia Governance and the Commons

compassion for those who are less able. The ‘political inequality’ is the other aspect that society must address — the issue of fair shares. If we are free then we have the opportunity to better ourselves any way we wish. If society does not restrict this freedom then we have what is known as ‘equality of opportunity’. For some, equality of opportunity is still not enough. They might argue, for instance, that since we are all essentially owners of the land then we all have the right to the proceeds of land use. This approach is seen as favouring a different kind of equality — equality of outcome. ‘To each according to his needs’, is an especially ambiguous phrase — it is not obvious that we should all end up with the same levels of income and consumption. (Karl Marx’s famous quote, originally from the Critique of the Gotha Program, says, ‘From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!’ It may have been taken from Louis Blanc, but also may be based on a quote from Pierre Leroux: ‘From each according to his capacity; to each according to his work’. It dates back to Cicero: ‘Suum quidque cusuque sit’. (‘To each one, that which belongs to him.’) And also, Saint-Simon: ‘To each according to his capacity, to each according to its results.’ And Charles Fourier: ‘To each according to his capital, his labour and his skill.’ But note the somewhat different meanings in all of these.) We might also note that the equality of outcome stance may be seen as unreasonable for other reasons than simply about what is a fair distribution. People are too diverse for fairness to be resolved by these simple equations. But if we favour distribution and fair shares, then at the very least we are saying that people should get what is owing to

 

115

Utopia Governance and the Commons

them for the amount of effort they have put in. This alternative kind of distribution is referred to as ‘proportionality’. ‘Genuine equality means not treating everyone the same, but attending equally to everyone’s different needs’, as Terry Eagleton has it. Ronald Dworken (Taking Rights Seriously) gave the example of putting two people on a diet of 3000 calories. One is an athlete who needs 5000 calories. The other is an elderly lady who requires only 2000. Both have been treated equally, but treated unfairly.

James Hillman also explores the diverse meaning of equality. He says:

‘We are equal because each brings a specific calling into the world. And we are unequal in every other respect – unfairly, unjustly, utterly unequal, except in the fact of each’s unique genius…

‘All are born free. It is the fact of calling that makes us equal, and the act of calling that demands we be free!’

James Hillman — The Soul’s Code

This balance of freedom and equality is one we will return to.

Matthew Crawford (The Case for Working with your Hands) offers us yet another angle on this. He says:

‘… consider the paradoxical truth that equality is an aristocratic ideal. It is the ideal of friendship — of those who stand apart from the collective and recognize one another as piers. As professionals, or journeymen, perhaps. By contrast, the bourgeois principle is not equality

 

116

Utopia Governance and the Commons

but equivalence — a positing of interchangeability that elides human differences of rank.’

(Crawford therefore, rather unexpectedly, seems to support aristocratic values to allow us to speak openly about difference.)

Deciding on fair shares raises the question of how this distribution is organised and administered and who decides what is fair. A community or a nation may have a ‘welfare net’ to distribute resources to those who need them. The welfare net stresses the community aspect of society. As societies become more complex, the various resources that make up a welfare net, especially the massive investments made for infrastructure in transport and telecommunications, likewise become more complex — we cannot simply take resources directly from production and hand them out to those in need. So the usual solution is to achieve the welfare net through taxation. Tax may be recovered from what people own, or it may be from the proceeds of their labour, or both.

But here we run up against the problems inherent in our various ‘rights’ of ownership. The political question that arises is, when does a fair distribution, which allows for life’s unpredictable problems, become an imposition on our rights of ownership and the fruits of our labours? The enjoyment of our property and benefiting from the fruits of our labours are therefore rights that all political systems need to respect, along with trying to provide a welfare net for those who have fallen on hard times.

 

117

Utopia Governance and the Commons

So, from our anarchist perspective, we can see how the two poles of individualist and collectivist try to balance the considerations we have looked at above.

The collectivist end of the anarchism spectrum, therefore, might be seen as favouring the distribution side of this equation. So, the drive towards equality of the collectivists seems to involve a curtailment of the freedom of the individualists. It is hard to see though, given the complexities of modern societies alluded to above, how this could be achieved without bureaucracies and therefore something approaching government.

Proudhon is sometimes identified as an individualist anarchist, but also referred to as a ‘mutualist’. He had a deep concern for equality. In particular, he identified the three forms of economic rent we discussed in the previous chapter, (from ownership and rent, from the labour of others and from money itself) and saw these as an evil to be eradicated so as to benefit the ordinary worker.

Though they may see themselves as radically distinct, collectivist anarchism flows naturally into being more or less pure communism. So, in our brief summary of alternative polities, we will take a look at this next.

 

Communism

Communism is a system of government — or rather, no government — proposed by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. (See, in particular, The Communist Manifesto.) Whilst there are

 

118

Utopia Governance and the Commons

similarities between collectivism and communism there are also differences. Communism distributes all wealth by default. Proudhon took up this problem of excessive sharing in What is Property? He says:

‘Communism is oppression and slavery… Communism is essentially opposed to the free exercise of our faculties, to our noblest desires our deepest feelings…

communism violates the sovereignty of the conscience of equality: the first by restricting spontaneity of mind and heart, and freedom of thought and action; the second, by placing labour and laziness, skill and stupidity, and even vice and virtue on an equality in point of comfort.’

Pierre Joseph Proudhon — What is Property?

Proudhon, then, was picking up on the point above, about the equality of outcome and whether this is truly fair, but also hinting at the further point referred to earlier, that this kind of distribution inevitably involves a structure to make it work — a state — in order to enforce the kind of equality that the communists seem to think could exist naturally.

Communism though, like anarchism, is a belief in no government. If people believe that a fair distribution of resources is required and that a bureaucracy needs to be put in place to achieve it, then this is socialism rather than anarchism or communism. So, whilst there may be ‘socialist’ states, if we are to be true to the original definition of communism then there cannot be communist states. The only ‘state’ in

 

119

Utopia Governance and the Commons

communism is an intermediate stage, known as the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ — which allows for the re-distribution of wealth and the eventual more or less equality of all citizens. The ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ leads to a change in the ‘superstructure’ — in Karl Marx’s terms — meaning culture changes to accept, as a given, a more egalitarian society. This, in turn, leads to full communism, which can be defined as:

1. Distribution of wealth according to need, no longer according to labour performed.

2. No classes.

3. The state withers away.

4. Very high productivity, so there is plenty for all.

5. High socialist consciousness — people work without incentives.

6. More equality, but not absolute equality.

7. No money.

8. A communal economy.

9. The economy managed by a free and equal association of producers.

10. The differences between occupations disappear, so that there is no social distinction between town and country.

11. Each person does about as much physical as intellectual labour.

12. The system is … worldwide.

 

120

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

The countries that have come closest to establishing communism have had, arguably, very bad experiences. But no nation has really come that close to full communism.

Anarchism and communism were, and are, of course, identified as utopias — which some of their advocates accept and others fight to reject.

Communism hoped for those ‘oppressed’ by a powerful elite to regain the ‘means of production’ and therefore be able to take control of their own lives. Ironically, both Marx and, arguably the founder of modern economics, Adam Smith, saw capitalism as a necessary intermediate stage for a better world. Whilst writing about capital and acknowledging the almost magical power by which all kinds of resources are mediated through money, nonetheless Marx seems to have failed to appreciate the lure of money to almost everyone. In large societies, with few social bonds, selfishness becomes a growing problem. Consumption is an addiction. Privatopia reigns. Releasing serfs and peasants from domination only gave room for human nature (at least the more selfish part) to exert its tendency to profit from and exploit people. ‘…to each according to their need’ is open to a lot of hyperbole when it is our own needs that we are considering. The bourgeois capitalist is a caricature that communists, and Marxists generally, just replace with an equally unlikely caricature of ‘the worker’. This presents us with too simplistic a picture — valorising one group over another is divisive and ignores the complexity of real people. As Proudhon seems to be alluding to in

 

121

Utopia Governance and the Commons

the quote above, only a powerful bureaucracy was able to enforce the kind of equality that had been envisioned by communism, and in many ways this became no better than the previous exploitation by the rich elite — perhaps worse.

Communism aims at changing the system, and this will, in turn, change the social relations between people. But, as we explore elsewhere in this work, we could well ask whether change really can come about by changing the structure (capitalism and/or economics) first, such that the ‘superstructure’ — the social relations, the culture and the way people view the world — will likewise change to accommodate the structural change. My conclusion is that people and culture need to change, and that structural change can only follow once this happens. (I have to add here that what has been explained above about base and superstructure is the usual interpretation of Marxism, and has filtered through to economics generally. Marx and Engels themselves were a good deal more ambivalent about what takes precedence — the culture or the economics.)

In passing, it’s worth mentioning here the ‘Rochdale principles’ of Robert Owen, which are often taken as the basis for socialism. (It is interesting to compare the very practical suggestions of Owen’s principles, and how these were enacted in his mill works in Scotland, with the ideas of Charles Fourier, and his ‘phalanesteries’, ideal communities, which he proposed and a few of which were actually built.) It’s also interesting to speculate as to why socialist ideas haven’t taken hold as strongly as might be expected. Take the

 

122

Utopia Governance and the Commons

camaraderie between a group of workers, who just get things done without the need for formal meetings. Such a group usually exists within a larger hierarchy. The merry band of workers is only merry because they are showing ‘the management’ that they know better and can get on without management’s petty interference, thank you very much! But this authentic band of workers will rarely, if ever, stand on its own two feet. The workers don’t form companies, or co-operatives or even charities. They only seem to survive as a kind of semi-hostile, semi-friendly stand-off with their bosses. But why? We are, it seems, just not schooled in a way that would let things be different. We are not natural socialists!

One contemporary activist and author who has brought valuable insights to these matters — and, especially, the class issue — is Michael Albert. Albert points out that between workers and capitalists there is a third group, which he refers to as the co-ordinator class. Such professions as doctors, engineers, architects and lawyers tend to exercise a lot of control within society and their position, Albert argues, is privileged. Albert even suggests that a revolution, supposedly to benefit the working class (as in the initial stage of communism, to establish a dictatorship of the proletariat, described above) would actually benefit the co-ordinator class. It is these people, he suggests, who would take up the administrative roles in the reformed society, giving them extra power, whilst the lot of the workers remains little changed. It may even have been the jealousy of the co-ordinator class for the ruling elite that has been the real source of revolution in the

 

123

Utopia Governance and the Commons

past. The workers did not benefit — they just saw a change in their oppressors. Albert goes on to describe what he considers a just way of arranging work and paying an equitable wage for people’s contribution to society. A similar split into three layers of society occurs in many utopian novels, and indeed in the classic dystopian novel, 1984.

As mentioned above, whilst there may be ‘socialist’ states, there cannot be communist states, if we are to be true to the original definition of communism. Anarchism and communism, in all their forms, mean no government. We will return to anarchism again later in the chapter, but for now, let’s move on to look at the other side of things. If we were to accept the need for government, then what kind of government would we wish for?

 

The Purpose of Government

One of the benefits of looking at anarchism and communism is as a wake-up call. If we were to try to run our lives without government we would at once realise the responsibilities that would be on all of us for getting society to function. If, however, we agreed on the need for a government, it does not mean that we can then shirk all responsibility and just blame the politicians when things go wrong. We still need to take some responsibility for deciding on what kind of government best suits our needs.

John Stuart Mill identified:

 

124

Utopia Governance and the Commons

‘… one very simple principle as entitled to govern absolutely the dealings of society with the individual in the way of compulsion and control… That principle is… [T]hat the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community against his will, is to prevent harm to others.’

John Stuart Mill — On Liberty

Thomas Jefferson said: ‘The care of life and happiness and not their destruction, is the first and only legitimate object of good government.’

It is difficult to think of any government disagreeing with Mill and Jefferson, but, of course, the aims they identified are very broad and general ones. Also, they tend to be focused on preventing things from going wrong, rather than actively making things better.

A more cynical view of government is that it is primarily for the protection of property — and, of course, this invariably means the protection of the rich over the poor. Government’s function of protecting private property comes originally from Cicero. Meanwhile Rousseau said: ‘Property is the true foundation of civil society.’ However, also in his Discourse on Inequality, he argues that property brings discord and conflict. He agrees that government is established to protect the property rights of the rich over the poor. But this strategy, he told us, ‘irretrievably destroyed natural liberty, established for all time the law of property and inequality… and for the benefit of the few ambitious men, subjected the human race thenceforth to labour, servitude and misery.’ From this, and other criticisms, we

 

125

Utopia Governance and the Commons

might say that government is the ‘monopoly of legitimate violence’, that is, the only power that can uphold its rules by force over its citizens.

Apart from preventing harm and protecting property, could we identify some further aims for government that provide more of a vision for a better world? Rousseau gave us a starting point:

‘One of the most important things for a government to do, therefore, is to prevent extreme inequality of wealth, not by depriving the rich of their possessions, but by denying everyone the means of accumulating them; and not by building poor-houses but by ensuring that the citizens do not become poor.’

The Social Contract

Rousseau’s quote takes us back to our discussion of the commons in the previous chapter. We could say that government’s chief purpose, other than preventing harm, is to manage the commons. We saw that, in a sense, governments already do this in an indirect way. Could it be more direct and conscious, so that we really get to grips with how we might use natural resources and protect wild nature? It’s also important to see governemnt as upholding moral principles, such that citizens see that justice in all areas of life is the basis of political action and we can have some trust in the state that justice will be done! This principle, I’m sorry to say, seems seriously undermined by many nations with their threats of extreme force against other nations that might threaten them. There may be a social contract between a state and its people, but so far as nation states go,

 

126

Utopia Governance and the Commons

it’s still the law of the jungle!

So what about a world where the purpose of government is to realise the common good, rather than just to protect whatever goods we might be holding on to at the moment? What about a world that is premised on human flourishing, with an emphasis on compassion, equity, enhancement of the environment, a respect for nature and a sense of responsibility for our shared natural commons? Colin Tudge (The Great Re-think) suggests ‘convivial societies (with personal fulfilment) in a flourishing biosphere’ should be our aim. If we agree that some kind of governance is a good thing, then can we find a way of getting a governance system that focuses on these kinds of aims?

 

Types of Government

What kind of government would deliver such solutions? How do we begin to sort out the various strands of political thought that are on offer?

We have to go back to the ancient Greeks, to Plato and Aristotle, to get our definitions. From them, we have: One ruler is a monarchy or dictatorship. Rule by a few is an aristocracy. Rule by many is a constitution or a polity. The perversion of a monarchy is called a tyranny. The perversion of an aristocracy is called an oligarchy. We are probably fine with these definitions, but then, for the ancient Greeks, the perversion of a constitutional government is, amazingly, a democracy. For instance, from Aristotle, the definitions are described like this:

 

127

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

‘We have thus, as the three subdivisions of the “right” type, kingship, aristocracy and “constitutional government”, or “polity”: as the three subdivisions of the “wrong” type, tyranny, oligarchy and democracy.’

Aristotle — The Politics

The exact meaning of all these terms has evolved somewhat since the ancient Greeks, but it’s true that democracy still presents problems for some as a government system. American satirist HL. Mencken, for instance, said that to believe in democracy is to believe that, ‘collective wisdom will emerge from individual ignorance’. If, like many nations today, we consider democracy to be the ideal form of government, then we will have to dig deeper into the meanings of democracy, to unravel these issues.

Notwithstanding the ancient Greeks, most nations today take pride in describing themselves as democracies. They would normally use the term ‘representative democracy’. This phrase might imply a mixture of the governance forms outlined above: It is rule by the many — because we all decide who will represent us. At the same time though, it is rule by the few — those chosen to represent us. The adoption of representative democracy — often following the British format, the ‘Westminster model’ — occurs, and persists, under the belief that having the correct system in place will result in the best decisions being made — a process known as ‘proceduralism’ — the decisions proceed from the system. (The alternative is known by the term

 

128

Utopia Governance and the Commons

‘instrumentalism’, where decisions are based on circumstances, fitness for purpose and pragmatism. Instrumentalism is probably better described here as ‘consequentialism’ — where governments just respond to the consequences of their situation and of the decisions they make.)

Representative democracy suggests a kind of balance between the desire to get everyone’s opinion, but at the same time having some experts take on the actual business of governing. Our representatives, in theory, listen to their electorate, take a balanced view of what is required, then act on this in the interests of society, as best they can. Our suspicions though, are that this is not really what is happening. The suspicion is that under the guise of representative democracy, we have at least an aristocracy, who make decisions under their own light. And, if we are especially cynical of government, we might conclude that, in fact, we have an oligarchy, the perversion of rule by the few, acting in the interests of big business and others who can pay for their voice in politics. Arguably, it is the financial oligarchy who are the ruling class in our day — the 1%, as they have come to be known since the Occupy movement.

Rule by the few is therefore always fraught with this tension of just whose interests the few are promoting; their own, or the population at large. Furthermore, the aristocracy needs to find a justification for their position of power, and this is usually by way of claiming a greater ability to make judgements. We describe this as a ‘meritocracy’, and those who benefit from it are

 

129

Utopia Governance and the Commons

the first to claim that a meritocracy represents fairness. Those at the top may insist that their position is acquired through competence, but those at the bottom suspect that it is more by money and privilege that the few have acquired their power. A meritocracy based on presumed leadership and managerial skills is as fraught as suggesting that class distinctions should be the basis for deciding leadership. Darren Anderson says:

‘If you acquire enough money identities are accepted and sins forgiven. The only real crime is the absence of money. Due to the variety of ways wealth is accumulated, myths are required, not least the fabulous mirage of meritocracy. The more you own the more you are, and the more deserving of it you’ve been. Those who have nothing are nothing and deserve nothing but contempt.’

Darren Anderson — Imaginary Cities

(The term ‘meritocracy’ itself, comes from a 1958 novel by Michael Young — The Rise of the Meritocracy.)

Could we ever resolve this and perhaps set up intelligence as a genuine criterion for a meritocracy? (Plato’s wish for ‘philosopher kings’, which some take to have been ironic, is the desire for rule based on knowledge and intelligence. It is sometimes known as an ‘epistocracy’.) If we could get to a meritocracy that was genuinely fair, then would that be a good move? At first strike, it might look promising, but some would argue that an ‘equality of merit’ is, in fact, a deeply troubling notion. Whilst it suggests that it’s fair, it

 

130

Utopia Governance and the Commons

implicitly says that there are people who simply are not good enough. If the reader were one of the ones left out as a result, then what crumb of comfort is the state going to offer, as it overlooks your voice, your opinion and your needs? It goes back to the issue of trust — are ordinary people bright enough? Even if it were concluded that they are not, should people be denied the right to decide their own future, based on some (rather difficult to apply) standard of intelligence?

So much then for representative democracy, which we have seen is really ‘rule by the few’. What about rule by the many? Going back to the Greek definitions, the ‘polity’ or ‘constitutional government’ that is taken to be the good form of rule by the many is not something that is too clearly defined. It seems in modern times that we have just taken representative democracy to be the constitutional government that is being referred to. But for this to be true then things would need to be very different. There would need to be a true voice for all citizens. We return to this below, but for now we can ask why democracy is seen as being a corruption by the Greeks? To answer this, imagine for a moment that all decisions in the country were decided by a referendum (known as ‘direct democracy’). The problem immediately arises that — even if a great deal of information is provided about what is being asked — some people will not have the time or inclination to study the question fully, whilst others may make their choice for very dubious reasons. There is no accountability, or mechanism for ensuring that everyone makes responsible choices. (This, it seems, was the

 

131

Utopia Governance and the Commons

chief concern of the ancient Greeks and also one of the problems that representative democracy seeks to address. They were also concerned that people with a particular talent for persuasive and charming speech might lure citizens into bad decisions.) Direct democracy also risks the ‘tyranny of the majority’, where a majority make a really bad or morally suspect decision (sometimes known as ‘ochlocracy’). There is no way to correct for this possibility from within the system. Then again, representative democracy can suffer from its own version of a ‘tyranny of the majority’. Elected leaders may collectively reach very bad decisions and there is no process in place to correct this until they next come round for re-election. It could be argued that, even with these concerns, such a system would be fair. After all, a free vote is a free vote, and why should anyone set themselves up to say that anyone else has not made a ‘responsible’ choice, or has not considered the evidence put before them in a reasonable manner? There is an argument then that ‘direct democracy’ is, at least, a step up from our current system. But it still does not address the question of decision reached by an appropriate level of deliberation. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, for instance, made this distinction; that the people may choose on behalf of what is good for society, rather than what is good for themselves individually.

As mentioned above, we might also question the idea that democracy (or any form of political system) is ‘government by consent’. We have never been asked if we want to be governed, so choosing a candidate for a system already imposed on us does not constitute consent.

 

132

Utopia Governance and the Commons

Likewise, not voting at all does not imply consent, in that, had a citizen preferred something different, they would have voted. The ‘choices’ on offer (if there are any at all) may not be anything the citizen would want, so they are not consenting by refraining from voting.

Let’s assume that we did, at least, consent to the principle of government. The question of consent then moves to us citizens having some knowledge of the policies that governments may be seeking to put in place. We are being asked — through voting, or some other means — to give an informed opinion of our choices. So, what about informed consent? We are not given the facts about decisions the government is trying to make, or given much of an opportunity to even comment on them. No doubt — at least, in theory — this information is available somewhere, and we could access it, given enough time and effort. But is this really enough to say that we are giving informed consent? It seems like too much of a stretch.

Could people then live free of government (since it is imposed on us without our consent)? No. Our only choice would be to live in another country, under a different government that we also have not chosen. International law prevents us living in Antarctica — even if we wanted to. Perhaps there is scope, still, for indigenous peoples and people who choose to go ‘off-grid’. We will be exploring this in later chapters. Maybe, eventually there will be a chance to live on other planets without government. For the moment though, almost everyone in the world is forced to live under a

 

133

Utopia Governance and the Commons

government they have not asked for.

 

Federations and Assemblies

From what has been described above, the impression may have been given that anarchism (and communism, in its idealised form) would have no organisational structures at all. But this is not the case. It is rather the hierarchies of power, the bureaucracies and the institutions that are the problem for those who would advocate no government. The main concern with these types of organisation is that they harden into systems that just continue with their own momentum, getting increasingly out of touch with the people they are intended to serve and often imposing rules and regulations for their own sake with scant regard to the impact all the bureaucracy has on the smooth-running of society. (See Proudhon’s quote above.) By contrast, anarchism generally suggests federations to make decisions at the local level. Federations are much less formal arrangements of people, coming together to make the pragmatic decisions necessary for any given situation. Power, if you like, is ‘radically devolved’. For the larger decisions there are federations of federations that affect regions and nations. (See, for instance, Proudhon.) Peter Kropotkin takes up this idea in his definition of anarchism as:

‘…the name given to a principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government — harmony in such a society being obtained, not by submission to law or by obedience to any authority, but by free agreements concluded

 

134

Utopia Governance and the Commons

between various groups, territorial and professional, freely constituted for the purposes of production and consumption, as also for the satisfaction of the infinite variety of needs and aspirations of a civilised being.’

Peter Kropotkin — Anarchy

Within a system of federations there is a reciprocity between the small-scale, grass-roots levels of communities and neighbourhoods and the wider circles of town, county, region and nation. Some decisions inevitably need to be made at the broader levels (so we may have to reluctantly refer to them as top-down). We can think here of large-scale infrastructure, such as power grids and the road network. We also need to consider international interests such as foreign trade, immigration, defence and efforts to mitigate climate change.

Likewise anarchism speaks of ‘assemblies’ rather than institutions. What does this mean? It means that those concerns that span wider society do not become fossilised in hierarchies. It means that the assemblies that see to things like transport, health care and education will be flexible, open to change and responsive to new circumstances. When it comes to trade, there is an emphasis on contracts, rather than government legislation. These wider forms of governance — the federations of federations — are where the character of a society comes from. Society is not just a collection of individuals — it’s the organisations and the communities that give us the ‘feel’ of the nation, its cities and its lifestyles. So if we are feeling oppressed, it may well be the forms of government and its bureaucracies and

 

135

Utopia Governance and the Commons

institutions that are oppressing us.

I must however introduce a caveat here. It is important to understand that the idea of federalism that I am taking from the anarchists is the grass-roots, bottom-up system and it is this form of federalism that I am advocating here and throughout this book. From Proudhon, it is not altogether clear that this is what he meant — and indeed we see the word federalism used by the American government and by the Liberal Democrats in the UK to mean quite a different thing. Murray Bookchin suggests the word ‘confederalism’ as an alternative, to distinguish the two types. (See Bookchin’s essays in The Next Revolution.) Bookchin further contrasts ‘state’ with ‘polity’ (in contrast to AC Grayling, who valorises ‘statecraft’ over politics). Bookchin saw state as the top-down and hierarchical form of governance (and, he suggested, the way the word federalism is used might still suggest this). Meanwhile, for him, ‘politics’ is ‘of the people’ — polis, polity and politics are all related terms. So, whilst we may dislike the word politics, Bookchin was trying to get us back to its true meaning — to simply the way people choose to govern themselves. (In contrast, Bookchin was slightly cynical of Proudhon, because he was somewhat nationalist whilst others dismiss Bookchin as not truly an anarchist because they regard his federalism/confederalism as still a ‘statist’ idea.)

John Holloway (Change the World without Taking Power) fights desperately against institutions. His argument is that these make ‘doing’ subordinate to ‘being’ — in other words, the institution, once formed, is just accepted as

 

136

Utopia Governance and the Commons

a norm — it just is. Therefore, there is no motivation to create, to do, and by implication to constantly challenge the status quo for different modes of living. Institutions (including governments) are hierarchies frozen in place by ideologies. Assemblies are the more relaxed form of organisation that are flexible to circumstances.

We could also introduce the idea of autarky — meaning a kind of self-sufficient independence.

With these ideas in mind, here is another list of proposals, in some ways rather similar to the definitions of communism given earlier in the chapter, but hopefully a little closer to what may be arrived at in this process of forming federations:

Rules of the Federation of Egalitarian Communities:

1. Holds its land, labour, income and other resources in common.

2. Assumes responsibility for the needs of its members, receiving the produce of their labour and distributing these equally according to need.

3. Practises non-violence.

4. Uses forms of decision-making in which members have an equal opportunity to participate, either through consensus, direct vote, or right of appeal or override.

5. Actively works to establish the equality of all people and does not permit discrimination on the basis of race, class, creed, ethnic origin,

 

137

Utopia Governance and the Commons

age, sex, sexual orientation or gender identity.

6. Acts to conserve natural resources for present and future generations while striving to continually improve ecological awareness and practice.

I would probably quibble only with point number one in the above rules. This book suggests that, at most, only ‘land’ (in other words, the natural commons) is held in common and that labour and income are kept or shared as society and individuals decide. But then, if I am to live by my own lights, it’s not for me to say.

With federalism we come to a different form of rule by the many that can be introduced — a genuine polity, if you will. This is known sometimes as ‘deliberative democracy’, or as ‘participatory politics’. It is to choose from amongst ordinary citizens, those who will make decisions for the general population. And this decision-making process is open to everyone, no matter their education, religion, political views, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation. Whilst a few are chosen out of the general population, and this is representation of a kind, it is not establishing a ruling class elite, who might seek to perpetuate their power. At the same time, it avoids the problems identified above, that just asking everyone to vote on an issue might mean that only a minority will give complex questions the time and effort needed for a good decision. There may be a system for how those in office are chosen and there may be an element of randomness to this — ‘sortition’ — as with a jury. The chapters that follow explore this in more depth and look at the various ways different forms of deliberative democracy might

 

138

Utopia Governance and the Commons

be achieved.

Deliberative democracy means establishing a political system that genuinely listens and responds appropriately — finding a way of achieving a system that serves us better than the ones we have at present. One of the fundamental divides in our country is between those who have a voice and those who do not. If we are to seek positive change then good governance is all about engagement. What are the aims? Number one is that we all have a say. All else follows from this. The more we are willing to participate, the more established and relevant our governance system can become. And there is an element of responsibility on all of us for this to work. Rather than think cynically that our voices will never be heard and those in power will just do whatever they want (usually for their own self-interest or the interests of big business) we can take responsibility and participate. The options raised in this chapter are presented so that we know what choices we might have — if only we were allowed to choose.

 

What do the Utopias make of the

Governance Options?

It has to be remembered that values such as freedom, equality, justice and rights, which we have looked at to some extent in this chapter, are ideals. Like institutions, ideals themselves can get frozen in place, and what was once a lively debate about finding the right path forward for a society, simply fossilises into a set of laws and conventions that may become

 

139

Utopia Governance and the Commons

increasingly out of touch with the people they were designed to serve. We noted in Chapter 2 that ideals can lack pragmatic real-world applications that make them concrete to us as we try to live by them. A utopia, by contrast, has the opposite problem — all the suggestions are concrete. As Chapter 2 suggested, we need a balance of the two. This, I think, is why anarchism stresses so much the need to organise ourselves in different ways. As John Holloway suggests above, it avoids being stifled. Radical devolution allows the problems of power to be dissolved, by seeking out our voices at the grass-roots.

It might seem at first that our current world of Privatopia and future world of Cornucopia would value freedom and lack of interference from bureaucracy above anything else. As such, they might prefer the anarchist views expressed earlier in this chapter. Indeed, we noted that the individualist anarchism quest for freedom is sometimes likened to neo-liberalism. However, I hope I’ve shown in this chapter that this would be a mistaken view, and as we look at neo-liberalism in more depth in a later chapter, we will see just how different they really are. Anarchism takes the responsibility that goes along with freedom very seriously. Privatopia and Cornucopia may be more complacent about government, or, as we will explore in later chapters, they may offer the impression that they are for freedom, but all the while they are seeking substantial legislation that protects private interests.

Ecotopians, by contrast, would probably fall in with what we have discussed under collectivism

 

140

Utopia Governance and the Commons

above — indeed those not sympathetic to the Ecotopians’ concerns often accuse them of using climate change as a cover for a radical left-wing political agenda. There are exceptions however. I am thinking especially of philosopher Roger Scruton’s conservatism, described in his book, A View from Somewhere. Perhaps a conservatism not immediately recognisable to the UK political party. Nevertheless, it shows, I think, that Ecotopia can cover a broad range of political opinion.

When we look back at the three concerns raised in the Introduction I hope it’s clear that even in politics there are still utopian visions on offer, and as we focus in on more details of a viable polity, I hope this will become clearer. We have not touched so much on what constitutes a ‘good life’ here — that must wait for future chapters. Also, with regard to the third concern — trust — I think we see this coming through with the discussion on anarchism. Anarchism puts a lot of trust in the good will of ordinary people and our ability to make good and pragmatic decisions. That’s why anarchist ideas have been such a focus for us here. Rousseau told us: ‘Man is born free and everywhere is in chains.’ Note that he said, ‘and everywhere’, not, ‘but everywhere’. There is always a balance of freedom and restraint, licence and responsibility, involved in any polity and we’ve already seen something of how this might work with regard to ownership and sharing in the last two chapters. If then, as Rousseau seems to have suggested, freedom requires responsibility, are we responsible enough to cope with decision-making — whatever form it might take?

 

141

Utopia Governance and the Commons

Conclusion

The problem with politics is that we can be complacent. When there is a crisis, we notice things, and see how strange and broken the system really is. But for the most part, we are all busy making a living and caring for our families, and don’t often stop to examine the insidious march of changes that are being rolled out under our noses, for which no-one has asked and no-one has been given the opportunity to discuss. I can’t remember anyone asking us recently; what kind of government would you like? Not: What political party should be in power, or: Who would you like as an MP, but: Would you like a monarchy, or to be ruled by an elite, or should rule be by the many — and if so, how should this be organised? Most governments are illegitimate. Meanwhile, in our name, and without our express consent, governments see fit to build weapons of mass destruction deemed illegal by the international community: See fit to start wars with other nations despite mass protest against war by their own people: See fit to allow the destruction of the Earth’s eco-systems and bio-diversity: See fit to allow the warming of the planet and change to climate and weather patterns that could bring flooding and devastation to millions. The list goes on. Why is it that we are never asked?

But then, sometimes, the need for choice — to assert ourselves, to make decisions, to look at things differently — might present itself. At this point, I suggest, there is a little of the spirit of the anarchist in us. We are all on the anarchism spectrum.

 

142

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

Speaking of anarchism, Cindy Milstein says:

‘It implies a lavish boundless sense of generosity, in which people support each other and each other’s projects. It expresses an open-handed spirit of abundance, in which kindness is never in short supply. It points to new relations of sharing and helping, mentoring and giving back, as the very basis of social organization’.

Cindy Milstein — Anarchism and its Aspirations

Milstein touches on some concerns that are often neglected by politics. Along with her, this book suggests it is social relations (indeed, pleasure) that are the true base of a society and to realise a vision for a better world, we must wake up to their importance. But most politics automatically assumes the material economy — production and consumption — as the real base of society: an economy just of transactions rather than compassion and equity. Combating this blindness to social relations is where a more genuine political arrangement may serve us.

Is it time then for a revolution? As I’ve said elsewhere in this work — be careful what you wish for. A developed society depends on stability — almost on a minute by minute basis — for its continued functioning. Any break in the smooth workings of society is likely to lead to trouble very quickly. Let’s face it, in most developed nations, a revolution is just not going to happen. But as we’ve noted earlier, there are more gradual forms of change and so reform may be the better option, for whatever we may feel is needed for a better world. I have left

 

143

Utopia Governance and the Commons

things open in this chapter and just explored the many options for government that are available to us. Now it’s time to get more specific. And it is to community that, I feel, we need to look to find further answers. We start, in the next chapter, at the smallest of scales, and follow the journey from there.

 

144

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

6. Community on a Small Scale

‘Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world, indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.’

Margaret Mead

‘I pin my hopes to quiet processes and small circles, in which vital and transforming events take place.’

Rufus Jones

‘Whenever something is wrong, something is too big.’

Leopold Kohr — The Breakdown of Nations

At this point in the book we have visions of utopia, views on ownership, ideas about the

 

145

Utopia Governance and the Commons

commons and how the natural commons may be more fairly shared and more sustainably managed. In the last chapter, we looked at the question of whether government is necessary, and then we looked at various forms of government that have been proposed. When we considered government by the many, we discussed the need for everyone to have a voice, but also the need to ensure that issues are considered carefully by all those who will be affected by the matters under debate. This chapter and the next look at how this might be achieved in more detail. It is an approach that starts from the very smallest of scales and then builds gradually to take up the bigger solutions of political and economic systems.

Charles Eisenstein (Sacred Economics) points out that today’s communities are only really about shared interests and hobbies. We ‘outsource’ almost all our immediate needs to strangers — be it for food, clothing, housing, child-minding, education or health-care. If one person does not provide the goods or services we need, then we just go somewhere else. As he points out, it does not really matter who provides these things — they are all paid for by money, so they all become equivalent. There is no relationship in such transactions — except the most superficial of acquaintances. By contrast, community, for Eisenstein, is inevitably local. Without a reliance on our neighbours for our everyday sustenance, there is, for him, no real community. If we are to challenge the current story of Privatopia and propose a new story, then this issue of community — especially small-scale, local community — is especially important.

 

146

Utopia Governance and the Commons

The Issue of Scale

Small-scale organisations — whether they be neighbourhoods, businesses or institutions — have the enormous advantage that the participants will be known to each other personally. We have evolved as a social species and can relate to a circle of around 150 individuals at most. That is why, I believe, small groups are the key to larger organisations, and hence to our politics and our economy. People who disrupt meetings or communities are thereby exposed to the possibility of being made to feel guilty and perhaps even excluded; almost the worst fate that can befall us humans.

In Nowtopia, Chris Carlsson looks at specific types of community activity that he sees as emblematic of the coming change to a different social and economic world. His focus is on community garden projects, cycling, DIY fuel sources and festivals. Carlson identifies scale as a potential problem for the types of projects he explores. He observes that, as projects flourish and grow in scale, they seemingly inevitably take on the features of the consumer capitalist corporations that they have initially tried to replace. They become bureaucracies. Perhaps this is not inevitable, and there are examples of businesses that have maintained their style and ethic whilst growing larger (often by breaking up into smaller autonomous units, only tenuously connected). Nonetheless, it shows the power of our current mindset, such that few of us are able to envisage society-wide alternatives, let alone find ways to realise them. Garrett Hardin (him of the Tragedy of the Commons) warned us of the dangers of scaling up. He said:

 

147

Utopia Governance and the Commons

 

‘Perhaps no shortcoming of utopian thinkers is as striking as their apparent blindness to scale and its implications. A politico-economic system that works well with small numbers may fail utterly with large. This is one of the most important factors accounting for the ultimate failure of Utopian communities.’

Garrett Hardin — Filters Against Folly

So we have to be mindful of this warning as the argument progresses in this chapter and the next.

Notwithstanding Hardin’s warnings, I think small is where we ought to start. We noted above that we relate best in smaller groups. Small-scale is also invariably local and place-based, and I feel this is essential for maintaining the care and respect we need to show to both wild nature and to our own human settlements. Small-scale is personal. It gives the opportunity for people to deepen as individuals — to gain some wisdom. It allows for small failures, that the local community can forgive and also embrace and learn from. It allows a wider vision to be built up through many smaller visions, even whilst acknowledging that there sometimes need to be larger organisations and bigger plans.

 

Starting with Ourselves

We might then look to start at the smallest scale of all; that is, just with ourselves. As people, we are both a natural commons and wild nature. We are natural commons because of our

 

148

Utopia Governance and the Commons

physical and intellectual labour. We are also wild nature in that we are wild in mind, body and soul. We can describe ourselves as a commons because the commons is about more than natural resources, but also about the social relations around these resources, and about individual acts of commoning. It is our deep connection with wild nature and consequently our deep connection with others that is the real basis for compassion — and the real basis of successful societies.

We are not therefore a Privatopia within ourselves. If we are instead a commons, then we can let go of so much baggage. We can give up the defensiveness that so often causes us such stress, even whilst we are trying to protect ourselves. Stepping back from all the petty concerns of life lets us have a broader vision for what our lives are about and what our society might be about. Do we have that view of ourselves at the moment? I’d suggest that often we do not, as we are led to believe that we must earn the respect of society, earn our place in the economy, earn our right to be heard as citizens through education, and so forth. We have become cut off from who we are as persons. To change society means changing people at a deep level and not just changing the politics, or the economics. But arguably the change in ourselves is more about realising who we already are, rather than becoming someone new.

As such, wider society needs to recognise that every person has integrity, dignity and intrinsic worth. There is nothing to be proven or earned. Society also needs to take responsibility for

 

149

Utopia Governance and the Commons

ensuring that we are reasonably rewarded for our work and help will be there if we fall on hard times. We examined these key factors in relation to governance in the previous chapter. This is a reciprocal arrangement — freedom with responsibility. The wider community owes us as individuals respect and care. Individually and collectively, we owe respect and care to the natural commons, to wild nature and to human society as a whole.

 

Personal Change leading to Vision

Such matters as climate change, bio-diversity and defence are broad issues for nations and societies where current governments are failing badly. I suggest that the first thing that is needed is for us as individuals to recognise these and other concerns as being as much about ourselves as it is about people ‘out there’ who perhaps we feel should take responsibility. As we touched on towards the end of the last chapter, it is the social relations within society that really make towards its best functioning. It is social relations that drive our economics and should drive our governance — not the other way around. I think we can aim high and work with the minority of dissenting voices who seek such a profound change.

When we think of ourselves as part of a commons, then we take on board the need to share a common responsibility for contributing to society. Much of this is simply about ‘re-making’ human culture, through food, clothing, housing and families. (All of which is usually referred to as ‘maintenance’ or ‘reproduction’ in economics.) But we can do even these basic

 

150

Utopia Governance and the Commons

things either well or badly. Beyond this, there may be specific missions to be realised. As well as realising the ‘freedom from’ that good governance offers us, we can realise the ‘freedom to’. It is a freedom to make, above all else, and a freedom to ‘re-make’. Industrial economies have divided us from our ‘making’, as John Holloway has described, and leave us alienated and dependent. Likewise, our re-making has been ignored and diminished, and yet this is also integral to who we are. When we are with friends they re-make us. In conversation, we are re-made. With our partners and children we are re-made. When we take up some satisfying work then we make and we re-make and are re-made in return. In all of this we can be giving pleasure and creating beauty. I think any vision for a new story needs to start from these simple objectives. Re-making then covers a broad spectrum of ideas, from the daily chores of keeping house, feeding and clothing, (‘maintenance’ or ‘reproduction’) through to work, relationships, family and love.

In short, the vision can be summarised as: ‘Fall in love with the world.’ Then it is down to our hard work and co-operation that this vision is first explored and described and then brought into reality. We need both the inspiration and the perspiration.

 

New Missions are formed by

Working Together

The vision is what we wish the world to be like. The mission is how we set about achieving this.

 

151

Utopia Governance and the Commons

The aims are the smaller tasks that go towards the mission. A governance system known as Sociocracy, which we will discuss later in the chapter, summarises vision, mission and aims by saying: ‘We are dreaming of a world where it is true that… (vision). We work to… (mission), by… (aims).’ (From Ted J. Rau and Jerry Koch-Gonzalez — Many Voices, One Song.) If we can get things right amongst a small group of people then the hope is that we will get things right on a larger scale. Provided the big-scale structures do not become anonymous bureaucracies, it is possible. Big politics can instead be discussions between the right people for whatever task is in hand. Big politics still comes down to a few people in a room together, talking things through. As such, all that applies in this chapter to small communities can remain relevant as we scale up.

To realise a vision for a new story we inevitably have to work together. It relies on people being fully engaged, affirming towards one another and the communities and places where we live. Those who share our pleasures and our passions are likely to be those with whom we strike up a bond. We work best with people who affirm us. In turn, we can aim to be the kind of people who affirm others. A willingness to fail and the ability to forgive the failures in ourselves and others is a good place to be. Only then will our utopias be ones that can evolve and adapt to new circumstances and to changes in people and communities.

In working together though, we immediately come up against questions of power and hierarchy. As we saw in the previous chapter, it

 

152

Utopia Governance and the Commons

was often the anarchist reformers who had — and still have — a particular aversion to the problems that power structures can create. To have a successful means of working together, we therefore have to have a think about how these issues might play out.

 

Power and Hierarchy

‘Starhawk’ (The Spiral Dance, Truth or Dare) suggests that our default story is one of ‘power over’ and as such, we often unconsciously adopt a position of feeling ‘dis-empowered’. The default story suggests that we have only extrinsic value, derived from our usefulness, financial status or such like. Such extrinsic values are only relevant to an atomised, individualistic world and only really achievable by some people, some of the time. We need to change the story, she suggests, to one of ‘power within’ and ‘power with’. As people, we have intrinsic worth (hence ‘power within’). Furthermore, we are connected to others, and hence, ‘power with’. (Starhawk also reminds us that genuine worth — intrinsic or imminent worth — is always embodied.) Other authors contrast Logos power (that seeks to dominate) with Eros power (which seeks to unite and cohere).

We might also usefully look at what’s described as ‘power-under’. Here’s three meanings.

Firstly, there’s power-under in the sado-masochistic sense. I don’t mean in the sexual sense – but the sexual gives us an indication of what’s going on here. Part of us likes someone else to take control — to wield power. It

 

153

Utopia Governance and the Commons

absolves us of responsibility. It becomes a comfortable routine. At the same time though, we resent those that hold power over us. In a milder form, we might despise our leaders but be unwilling to challenge their leadership. They’re all corrupt and in it for the money, we might think. But at the same time we’re hoping for someone else to shoulder the responsibilities — and the blame.

The second meaning of power-under is a bit more pro-active. It is to challenge power — often by way of being cleverer or more subtle than the powerful. It’s a technique sometimes used by artists and poets. They will produce work that has a different take on the world, but one that resonates with people — often on an emotional, even visceral, level. Thus, those in power are challenged, but often not in any obvious or direct way. Authoritarian governments of all stripes are, by their nature, paranoid. Authoritarian governments have a particular fear of artists and poets. The artist and the poet may well be on the losing side of this dynamic, but they hold a great deal of freedom. They understand the world in a much deeper and more profound way than their power-hungry leaders. This knowledge might not give them power, but it certainly gives them freedom. Their leaders know this and hate them for it.

The third meaning of power-under I want to offer is, if anything, even more subtle. Our previous meanings were, we might say, just playing with the power dynamic. Someone has the power and someone else wants to drag them down — one way or another — and grab the