Can we conceive of party politics outside of the framework of ideology? Can party still deliver the former function without the polemics of the later? If there is one thing about partisan politics that makes people become more disenchanted it is likely that of the ideological polemics. Whether it be the economic brinksmanship witnessed this summer in the US congressional debates regarding raising the debt ceiling or our own Prime Minister’s habit of proroguing parliament in the face of non-confidence, partisanship seems to produce futile entrenchment rather than healthy compromise.
Modern politics seems inconceivable without the involvement of parties. They seems the source of which all that is basic about democracy. They act as points of organization for interest groups. They generate ideas which drive forward progressive policies. They are self financing sources of political activism. Perhaps most importantly they act as generators of the ideas which drive public policy. Parties act as an aggregators for the pool of public policy options that are available; as the public lacks the time to sort through policy journals, academic articles other sources of policy options, parties facilitate the selection of ideas to bring into the public eye in the form of party platforms and government agendas. The partisan aspect of this model is that parties cherry picks the ideas which are best suited to their ideological forms. Thus policy selection is ideologically driven. Thus policy x is the best solution because policy x coheres with party x’s assumed ideological footings.
Politics should be about organizations not about ideologies. The politics of today takes for granted the assumption that ideas ought to arise out of ideologies or at the very least parties generate new ideas which sprout from their core ideological tenets. Ideas are expected to guide organizations and bureaucracy, wherein policy informs operations, not the inverted operations inform policy. We look to politicians to generate new public policy options, then when elected to push them from the top down, with the hope that they will not only be efficacious towards their ends but also that they will be productive towards the ends which they claim to yield.
For instance, one might take the conservative’s recent omnibus crime legislation C-100 as an example. The legislative changes, which included stiff minimum sentences and a slew of tough on crime policy changes which where part of the conservative’s election platform. As the conservative’s won a majority they quickly moved to push the legislation through both houses.
The resulting backlash of the bill has been tremendous with a wide-ranging cast of opponents including bureaucrats, academics, and even provincial governments objecting to the potential cost the bill might incur upon their provincially financed corrections ministries.
Thus we see the partisan model in full operation. The partisan body selects a tough on crime policy as a tough on crime policy is at the heart of the conservative ideological mantra. Upon election they move to implement their ideologically based policy, hoping to exert their political mandate onto a reticent bureaucracy.
Lets suppose for one moment that the conservatives had earnestly thought that their tough on crime agenda was a good idea and were completely unaware of the rather large body of empirical evidence to suggest otherwise. Now lets assume that they might be willing to change their minds about the whole affair once coming to office and being informed of the folly of their assumptions. What action could they take to step back on the legislation without angering their core supporters? The reality is there isn’t much to do but to drive forward with the legislation and ignore the technocratic dissent.
This elucidates the fundamental problem with ideologically driven politics. There is little space to step back and survey the utility of policy actions because of your public legitimacy is based on the presumption of the truth of your ideology.
What if we were to conceive of politicians in a different light? No longer cast as soldiers for ideological persuasions, but rather as judges of public policy function. Rather than looking inward to source policy based on tautologically justified truths, why not elect politicians on the basis of their ability to gauge the utility of varying policies?
I am not suggesting the wholesale disposal of ideologies. I do believe they serve a purpose, just not to the extent to which they exercise influence over partisan politics. Ideologies can provide coherent perspective within a field of study. Liberalism is useful to economists insofar as in allows some sense of rational coherence in their ideas across the various caveats of their study. Yet at a partisan level the idea of trying to cohere all ones thoughts into an inert approach to governance disregards the nuances of governmental pursuits and vicissitudes of the world politics seeks to govern.
What I envision for partisanship might not be unlike the way in which corporation choose their leaders. Though not particular knowledgeable in the realm of boardroom politics, I would make the assumption corporations are function driven entities. If in the process of implementing a new strategy, it was discovered that past attempts at similar policy were utter failures, one would assume that the leadership of the corporation would step back and reconsider their previous plans. Alternatively when vying for a leadership position most executives would attempt to propose solutions which find their backing in past successes or at the very least appeal to some kind of rational grounding for their ideas.
My intent here is not to harangue the conservatives about their disappointing responsiveness to technocratic backlash. I think almost all political parties, at least those that find the basis for their identity in ideology, are guilty of ideological tunnel vision. My point is to attempt to consider what partisan politics might look like of we could mutually agree to be functionalists over ideologues. It is admittedly a tall order, not too distant from mutually agreeing to world peace perhaps. But I think its possibility is much brighter than the favorite goal of beauty contestants.
What would happen if the Liberal Party was to say we are no longer about ideologies, we are about what works. We want to decriminalize marijuana because the drug war has failed. We want to lower corporate taxes because it will attract more business into Canadian communities. And they would want to do so not because their centrism ideology permits it but because we can find a whole bunch of really smart people who say it works. And in the chance that it fails they should be open to other options. Can we imagine ourselves as a polity re-electing an incumbent not based on solely on the success of their past policies but rather on their responsiveness to their failures?
I would like to think that politicians have the capacity to become the hearth from which a policy debate is kindled rather than prerecorded messages volleying entrenched ideas at each other with ever increasing volume.
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