POLITICS IN THE MAKING
*
Taking the Republican Debate seriously
Adopting a Maximalist Approach
by Dr. Klaas Woldring (Alliance for Democratic Reform - March, 1995)
The Australian Republican Movement and the Keating Government are currently engaged in trying to sell Australians the concept of a Minimalist Republic. The minimal change proposed is the replacement of the Queen by an Australian President with relatively minor powers and elected by a two-thirds majority of the federal Parliament. Not surprisingly this proposal has thus far failed to inspire the people. This is not because the people are inherently conservative as is often alleged. In a recent Herald McNair Opinion Poll, which inspired an ABC-TV Late Line program (23/2/95), 52% favoured a Republic but 88% of this majority wanted a President to be directly elected by the people! Without that clearly radical change only a small minority supported a Republic. The principal reason for the popular preference was shown to be the general distrust of politicians. The people want more direct influence. This reality cannot be reasoned away by ARM's spokespersons countering that most people do not understand the complexities of direct Presidential election and governmental processes, as both Turnbull and, later, even Donald Horne claimed (SMH , 9/3/95). The Minimalist position was originally justified by ARM only on the grounds that the people don't want major changes. "Don't worry", Thomas Keneally said, "nearly everything will remain the same". That sums up the very problem with the Minimalist position.
This Discussion Paper, in contrast, is about a Maximalist Republic, a quite different proposition. The starting point here is that the people do want major changes even though they don't know much about the constitution, the institutions and processes. It is argued here that the Australian people will need to rewrite their entire Constitution and that piecemeal reforms are no longer an option. An earlier, more comprehensive version of it was first presented as a Conference paper at a one-day Special Republican Session of the Annual Conference of the Australasian Political Studies Association (APSA) held at the Australian National University on 26th October, 1992.
This paper aims to stimulate debate amongst students of politics as well as public debate about how Australians could restructure their political system and rewrite their constitution. It is realised at the outset that academics who are looking for a balanced debate in the one paper may have difficulty with the views expressed here. A debate may become "balanced" by the combination of many different points of view however. The position taken here is that the system as a whole is failing and that it is in need of major surgery; that debate should not be about band-aids and piecemeal tinkering. The debate should look at all options. Constitutional change should be a re-engineering job this time starting from scratch.
The deplorable shortage of radical political debate in Australia, excluding the late 1960s, has many causes among them the American influences. Perhaps it is also be a consequence of the long period of preoccupation with the Cold War when "radical" usually meant some extreme variant of the "right" or "left" position of the political spectrum or the pre-occupation with "Green" or feminist issues. In relation of the constitution, the structure of the political institutions and processes conservatism has been the order of the day for a generation at least.
Wells wrote a perceptive text In Defence of the Common Wealth (1990). In the preface Maddox passed judgement on the profession as follows:
"Every discipline suffers a crisis from time to time. In the academic profession of politics crisis may occur when its students attempt too rigorously to separate theory and practice. From the best of motives, those who attempt to establish politics as a science claim that their task can be no more than to describe and analyse the institutions and processes that are before their eyes. Yet they fail to recognise the hidden theory in such an approach, which, in political terms, is deeply conservative".
In terms of activism the profession is in the doldrums. Yet, on account of its expertise it is theoretically well placed to discuss and advocate the conditions for new quality leadership and a strong National Government to emerge. Changes could be proposed in order to make it possible for the National Government to comprise coopted Ministers who are not Members of Parliament, an extra-Parliamentary political executive. This does not necessarily mean a Presidential-style of extra-Parliamentary executive as exists in the United States. Instead continental European collegiate models should be considered as well, perhaps particularly such models.
The domination by two major parties and their executives has led to an erosion of democracy and to a weakening of Government (Cumes, 1988). The electoral system has kept that now sterile two-party system in place for too long. This should be changed in such a way that a greater variety of interests and persons will be represented in the National Parliament. Potentially, the people have the capacity, through their vote, to change that. The existing parties will fiercely resist such changes but their arguments are not convincing. These are based on their self-interest and on notions of stability which not only do not yield solutions but are increasingly counter-productive.
Most Australians can see the urgency to restore and promote Australia's economic sovereignty. Political independence would become meaningless if the country's resources are largely owned by foreigners and Australia's competitive edge is not enhanced. The Australian Owned Companies Association has distributed a series of brochures to all Australians in recent years which provide an indication of the extent of foreign ownership of consumer goods for sale in Australia. Rapid increases in foreign ownership of real estate has been a feature of the 1980s and early 1990s. The relocation of Australian-owned plant to off-shore destinations is equally growing causing concern.
The so-called global integration of the Australian economy could easily lead to an increase in unemployment, further reductions in real wages and a divided nation. A small minority of that nation may end up in comfortable, highly paid jobs in the direct or indirect service of foreign companies, nothing less than a comprador class. The majority would become a new underclass: small business operators struggling on the breadline, efficient farmers unable to make ends meet, poorly paid wage labor, contract labour and continuously high unemployment levels. Australians may end up as tenants in their own country. These trends are already unmistakable. The choice for Australians is to go along with them or to effectively counter undesirable aspects of "globalisation".
Patrick O'Brien, the 1991 Australian Fullbright scholar, believes that "the Westminster system itself is seriously flawed" and that it has produced "a form of executive dictatorship". Writing in Time Magazine (September, 16, 1991) he links the debacles in the late 1980s in Queensland and Western Australia squarely to the Westminster system.
"Those who engineered this state of affairs needed neither a revolution nor a coup d'etat to achieve their ends. They simply grasped the opportunities presented by the WA's Westminster-derived constitution. In Australia this system of rule is labeled "parliamentary democracy" and "responsible government" by its supporters. But it has grave deficiencies as far as democracy is concerned. In theory, parliament is supposed to be master and the executive the servant. The system no longer works that way, and hasn't for a long time".
The deplorable financial failures by the Victorian and South Australian Governments should be added to the list. At present the Victorian Premier Jeff Kennett is busily engaged in dismantling democracy in that state. O'Brien explains, "under the Westminster system the people were never the supreme source of power", so if we are looking for popular sovereignty the Westminster system is not the answer. He also rejects Republicanism as "some sort of final recognition that Australia is a sovereign independent country. This might be so if, at the same time, the people were at last freed from their subject status under the Australian version of the Westminster system". O'Brien minces no words on this score: "the question of whether Australia should or should not be a republic is really a smokescreen to cover the perpetuation of the executive state or, as some might prefer to call it, parliamentary dictatorship". He argues that Australia's political system is
"deeply flawed; politicians everywhere are increasingly held in disrepute; the nations serious problems are not being tackled, and political debate across the nation is more often than not - to paraphrase Shakespeare - full of sound and fury signifying nothing. The need is for real democracy brought about by real constitutional change."
Australia's party system operates in a hybrid framework which, in spite of its stability, never seems to have worked particularly well. It is perhaps surprising that it has worked at all and the myth that it has been good to Australia should be laid to rest. It has been a costly system which has thrown up scores of mediocre politicians, subservient to the party machine. It has also led to endless fruitless talk as the six constitutional conventions between 1973 and 1985 and the Constitutional Commission (1986-88) demonstrate. Opinion polls consistently demonstrate that politicians are held in low esteem in Australia. We should also be mindful of the fact that Australia's average real income, in comparison to other Western Countries, steadily declined during the entire period of federation from a top position in the late-1890s to one in the bottom half of the OECD countries, particularly in the last 40 years.
This is a question often posed by conservatives in support of the status quo and must be answered. Another one, even more important to our argument, is: Could it not be reformed from within its own structures using the existing mechanisms for change?
There are at least three main reasons why the system has not collapsed earlier. The first one is the pluralist nature of Australian society allowing adjustment mechanisms and private enterprise to pragmatically and ingeniously circumvent the inadequacies of the constitution and the political system. The second one is the abundance of opportunity in this large and rich country realised with the help of a large immigrant workforce generally keen to succeed in a new environment. Finally, the dominant influence of the judiciary over the political system, on the one hand reducing its most damaging effects or even collapse, on the other hand moderating conflicts between major interest groups, such as employers' organisations and unions as well as between political units. It is our view however that the system has reached the limits of its in any case minimal capacity for change. Why would this be so?
The combination of the derivative of the Westminster system and the federal structure, inspired by the US constitution, provided the basis for the initial mismatch. The introduction of different electoral systems for the Senate and the House of Representatives, since 1949, compounded the issue. UNSW political scientist Richard Lucy (1985) summed it up quite succinctly:
"The Australian form of Government is characterised by an inconclusive struggle between two systems of government - responsible party government and a system which divides power between a number of governmental institutions....We have a perpetually double-dealing struggle between the identities conferred by the governmental institutions and the identities conferred by the parties. We have a complicated inextricably tangled mess - the full catastrophe called Australian politics"
The federal constitution was supposed to be a flexible and democratic one. If it had been flexible perhaps it may have become a democratic instrument. If the citizens had the power of initiating referendums, especially binding referendums, Australia's constitutional history may have been different. But this constitution never achieved the consent of the governed. The role of the citizens has been absolutely minimal in shaping and changing it. The initiative and timing of referendums lies entirely with the Government of the day. Moreover, given the distrust of the political system and politicians it is small wonder that the outcome is usually stacked against a YES vote at the outset. Almost every referendum turns into a political slanging match regardless of the merits of the proposals. Thus, very few referendums, especially constitutional referendums, were passed. The four NOs in 1988 were a crowning achievement in this respect. Major party politics dominated the campaign and all four proposals were rejected. This is an endemic theme in constitutional change and we need to overcome it.
The answer is therefore to rewrite the entire constitution and to stop piecemeal tinkering. The idea that the constitution cannot be replaced by another one because, supposedly, it can only be amended and then only in terms of the amending clause (section 128), as argued by John Howard and other conservatives, surely is a legal fiction. It suggests that the legal system ultimately rules Australia rather than the people. We have to get away from this idea. That is fundamentally the decision to be made. In a democracy the law issues from the agreements of its citizens, not the other way round. If there are serious problems with a constitution arrived at 94 years ago by a small majority (261 000 in a voluntary referendum poll representing a mere 43 % of the small electorate), in an essentially colonial framework, the time has come for the people to look at construct again and to overhaul it completely. An independent state cannot be a prisoner of its colonial past. Nor can an independent state have a constitution with which a very large percentage of the population do not identify, if they know about its existence at all! The Constitutional Commission found that 70% of the 17 to 24 years age group did not know that Australia had a constitution at all! Such a record is a recipe for disaster and reflects poorly on educational systems and, indirectly, on the academic profession. A new constitution therefore must have substantial input from citizens, especially from young people, it must be a simple, straightforward document using clear and unambiguous language, provide for a simple amending procedure and for effective popular initiative mechanisms for referendums and other such measures. This could be facilitated greatly by the use of electronic means reducing the cost factor which has sometimes been a barrier. This is a political issue which must be resolved in the political arena.
A large percentage of Australians do want major constitutional change but they don't how to go about it. Those who may know how to go about it are generally in the upper strata of the society and are therefore beneficiaries of the existing system. They approach these matters from a conservative perspective and prefer piecemeal reform or none at all!
A number of academics and citizen groups have, from time to time, proposed extensive structural changes and new ideas, e.g. Horne, Thompson, Jaensch, Turner and Stretton. Regrettably, these have remained mere ideas however. Implementation has remained elusive. We need to address that question after stating our proposals some of which were discussed by the above scholars.
a. An end to the domination of Governments by career politicians and party executives of major parties - a very limited group of people!
SOLUTION: Separate Government and Parliament. Members of the Government should be recruited from outside the Parliament. This means that the choice of personnel for the winning party/coalition would be much greater than now.
b. An end to the domination of the National Parliament by two parties.
SOLUTION: Introduce Proportional Representation (Hare-Clark) which would provide scope for the representation of more parties and Independents. This would also end the one-member-per-constituency (district) system, pork barrelling, by- elections, neglected seats (safe seats), electoral boundary changes and the adversarial mode of political debate. PR is the norm in most West and North European countries. With the notable exception of Italy these systems have proved democratic and stable. There would be 30 electoral regions each returning seven or nine MPs, a total of 210 - 270 MPs
In the new Senate the (30) regions should be represented by three Senators each, providing a total of approximately 90 Senators. The Senators should not be members of any political party. They should all be Independents to ensure that they represent regional interests, not party interests, without strings attached.
c. The introduction of a FIXED four-year term for the National Parliament.
SOLUTION: Change the electoral law or write it into the new constitution.
d. Constitutional change should result in the abolition of the states and the introduction of strong local government units. The states should be replaced by 60 smaller regions indirectly elected by groups of local councils. This would reduce direct popular elections to two: at the national and local levels and would reduce the number of politicians also. Already an extensive system of voluntary regions exists which could be a base to start from.
SOLUTION: Rewrite the entire constitution to create a unitary state.
In 1900 a good case could be made for a federal structure. A lot has changed since then, Communications have improved dramatically. How can a country of only 17 million people now still need a federal structure, seven different administrations plus the Northern Territory and ACT? All the reasons for federation have long disappeared!
e. The introduction of a Bill of Rights.
f. The introduction of environmental aims and safeguards together with ways of redress where these are violated.
The key to achieve such reforms lies in the political arena and activism. No doubt public debate by academics and other professionals, as well as a civil education campaign would help, but political action is a prerequisite. Many Australians of different political persuasion would agree with limited radical reforms, especially structural reforms that aim to enlarge the pool of new potential leadership, rather than particular policies which are of later concern.
There are now a growing number of people who at least agree that the Australian constitution has to be "updated" because it is, in David Solomon's words an "obtuse and in some areas misleading document". It doesn't tell "ordinary" readers what it stands for, doesn't explain what the Westminster system is, hardly mentions the party system, contains numerous provisions that "no longer mean anything" and others which "cannot be used today" (CFD Newsletter, September, 1992).
The thesis of this short paper is that "updating" the constitution is not the way to go and that we need a new start in Australia. This task should not be left to constitutional experts, lawyers and politicians as their record in reform and "updating" has been quite abysmal. What basis is there to believe that the "updating" would be any more successful than in the past? None. The contention is that the more the citizens learn about the constitution the more they'll say that the whole thing has to be tackled de novo. This is not to say that elements of the existing constitution or such progress as has been made by judicial review cannot be incorporated into a new constitution. What is needed however is a simple, clear, flexible set of rules that provides Australia with a positive, easy to understand direction in terms of the economy, the environment, its independent status and the new political and administrative organisation of the state.
The case for retention of the status quo, plus piecemeal tinkering is weak. All the evidence is against that route. The conservative argument that change can only be tackled in terms of Section 128 is rejected in this paper as it denies the sovereignty of both the parliament and the citizens. It also would invite failure from the outset. While theoretically an entirely new constitution could be adopted by a simple referendum question, in terms of Section 128, there is no need to follow that route. The National Government of the day could request a special Constitutional Commission (or a Convention representative of a cross section of the population) to draw up a new constitution, based on citizen group submissions, and decide to be guided by a national referendum on the proposal, other than a Section 128 referendum. If approved it can legislate for the replacement of the old constitution. This process may be regarded as unconstitutional by some, thinking in terms of the old order of things, but that view would have to be challenged and such a challenge could be rejected by the new sovereign parliament acting on the majority's wish. This would also at once establish the national parliament as the highest court in the land.
Some have criticised the above proposal and insisted on the need for constitutional continuity. Our first response is that Australians should not allow themselves to be governed from the grave, at great cost, simply because an amendment procedure, agreed to in 1900, doesn't work and cannot be changed in practice. There may be an apparent dilemma in a strictly legal sense however. In order to achieve continuity, the proposed new movement should come up with a new constitution as part of its platform, gain popular support for it, gain the balance of power in the National Parliament and obtain the support of at least one major Party to put it to the people in a special referendum. This referendum could include a simple enabling mechanism that one requirement of Section 128 should be disregarded for the purposes of the New Constitution Question (only). Thus there would be two straightforward questions. First, the enabling question primarily aimed at overcoming the barrier of approval in four of the six states (a completely anachronistic and undemocratic provision anyway) and, secondly, the question for the New Constitution as a whole. A good proposal could then be carried by an ordinary national majority and a majority in three of the states.
Finally, there will always be those who may claim to favour change, such as proposed above, but who demand proof that what is proposed is better than what is to be replaced. Of course, that is an impossible demand because society and the polity are not natural science laboratories! Those who demand such proof should reflect on the theories of people like Pareto, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Bentham, Mill, Marx, the Fabians, Maritain, Cole, Kardelj and Gramsci, to mention a few. Why are we still studying their mostly normative writings, the bread and butter of political philosophy courses? Do we have to wait for the serious crises that motivated these revolutionary thinkers before we are going to fix our own problems? One would hope not! Certainly, the difficulties for the reformer are great and were identified by another classic theorist Nicolo Machiavelli who wrote in 1513 AD:
"It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new order. This lukewarmness arising partly from fear of their adversaries, who have the laws in their favour, and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not truly believe in anything new until they have had actual experiences of it. Thus it arises that on every opportunity for attacking the reformer, his opponents do so with the zeal of partisans, the others only defend him half-heartedly, so that between them he runs great danger".
If we cannot learn from past mistakes or fail to act on the knowledge at our disposal, presumably one major objective of teaching politics, we are bound not only to have to relive the past but to encounter even greater problems. As many constitutional commentators have pointed out already the mere replacement of the Queen by a ceremonial President opens up a can of worms in view of the total inadequacy of the present constitution to accommodate a republican form of government. If we cannot do better than what the Keating Government and the ARM have in mind we may as well forget about it.
Biographical note:
Dr. Klaas Woldring is Senior Lecturer in Management and Politics at the Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW. He is Head of the Centre of Management and Marketing in the Faculty of Business and Computing. Woldring was born in Holland. Before moving to Australia in 1964 lived and worked five years in South Africa. He gained his Ph. D. in Political Science at the UNSW in 1974 and moved to Lismore in 1975.
He was active in the ALP from 1981 to 1989 and twice stood as their candidate in the federal seat of Richmond. He was active in the Anti-Apartheid movement and in Green Labour but resigned from the Labour Party in 1989 over policy differences. He founded the Alliance for Democratic Reform in December, 1992 and is the National Convenor for that organisation.
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For more information and membership inquiries contact:
Sydney contact: Mark James, 02 983 0294
Lismore: Klaas Woldring, 066 25 1177 (fax/phone); 066 20 3851 (bus. hours)