There is some concern that in petitioning governments that we should avoid strong-intellectual language. The contrary argument is as follows:
Masking political realism in the community has been the way governments have put it over us when they wish to resist the community’s desires. Such, that in actually delivering in strong-intellectual language, I make a statement that we are not going to be fooled.
Our community proposals will continue to fail until the day we say to governments that we understand their tactics and we will not be fooled, and such behaviour will have electoral consequences.
In the American context, we find the larger scoped issues which demonstrate that smart thinking from the community is required, and not to be naïve to the strategies of governments and the administrative bureaucracy. Maggie McKinney (2016, 2018) outlines the American legal issues, and concludes, “The petition process performed an important democratic function in that it afforded a mechanism of representation for the politically powerless, including the unenfranchised,” but, [the legal matters to political problems] “solutions offered thus far, however, have yet to provide a deeper understanding of the meaning and function of the administrative state within our constitutional framework.” (2018: 1538).
The Australian context maybe different in law but there is a historical pattern. By way of a few examples in the historical literature, consider the following. Philip Loft (2016) in speaking to the history of British politics 1688-1720 stated:
“The intervention of the language of ‘interest’ from the mid-seventeenth century helped to legitimize and control public involvement in politics in the eyes of elites, and offered an alternative to political mobilization based on party allegiances and conceptions of society organized by ranks or sorts. The participation of the public through a regulated process of petitioning ensured that the whig oligarchy was porous and open to negotiation, despite the passage of the Septennial Act and declining party and electoral strife after 1716.” (2016: 1).
Henry Miller (2012) demonstrated the same pattern of politics for the history of the popular petitioning with the Corn Laws 1833-1846. Daniel Carpenter and Colin Moore’s argument (2014) is more complex, but it also strengthened the point about being frank in the language of political realism. Their argument is that the political influence of American women in the canvassing in the anti-slavery movement (1833-1845) was more effective. They state, “For American women, petition canvassing—with its patterns of persuasion and networking—shaped legacies in political argument, network formation, and organizing.” (2014: 479; my emphasis).
My thinking that the community needs to offer up greater frankness in political realism toward governance comes from the recent work of András Bozóki in his book, Rolling Transition and the Role of Intellectuals: The Case of Hungary (2022). Bozóki points out that it was “Napoleon [who] used the term “ideologue” in a derogatory sense for those educated public people who commented on and interpreted political events but did not take an active political role” (2022: 19). Remember that next time the Queensland Premier dismisses the community voices as “ideological”. It is true that the framework here is inspired by György Lukács, a neo-Marxist thinker (2022: 91), however, the only thinkers who see that point as a dismissive are militant right-wing thinkers who, in today’s climate, have gone to an utter intolerant extreme in their thoughts.
So, what are we left with for community members who are undereducated. The solution comes from the ethicists of politics in their article on protest petitions. Avishai Margalit and Edna Ullmann-Margalit (1984: 205):
“This paper is concerned with the question of whether an individual has a moral obligation to sign a protest petition which has been initiated on moral grounds. It is argued that there is such an obligation when the petition represents a viewpoint with which one broadly agrees.
This is a general dury which may lapse with changed circumstances or which may be redeemed by some alternative action. It is argued that the duty to initiate a protest petition is, on the other hand, supererogatory as far as an individual is concerned, but may be a duty for a community or group. Finally it is argued that protest petitions are essentially protests, not against evil deeds as such, but against evil deeds done in one’s own name, and are therefore a vital aspect of democracy.”
REFERENCES
Bozóki, A. (2022). Dissident Intellectuals: The Culture of Critical Discourse. Rolling Transition and the Role of Intellectuals: The Case of Hungary (pp. 91–173). Central European University Press. https://doi.org/10.7829/j.ctv2cw0s5j.10
Bozóki, A. (2022). Interpreting Democracy: The New Movement Intellectuals. Rolling Transition and the Role of Intellectuals: The Case of Hungary (pp. 406–475). Central European University Press. https://doi.org/10.7829/j.ctv2cw0s5j.15
Bozóki, A. (2022). The Role of Intellectuals: Theories and Interpretive Frameworks. Rolling Transition and the Role of Intellectuals: The Case of Hungary (pp. 19–63). Central European University Press. https://doi.org/10.7829/j.ctv2cw0s5j.8
Carpenter, D., & Moore, C. D. (2014). When Canvassers Became Activists: Antislavery Petitioning and the Political Mobilization of American Women. The American Political Science Review, 108(3), 479–498. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43654388
Loft, P. (2016). Involving the Public: Parliament, Petitioning, and the Language of Interest, 1688–1720. Journal of British Studies, 55(1), 1–23. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24702231
Margalit, A., & Ullmann-Margalit, E. (1984). Protest Petitions. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 1(2), 205–212. http://www.jstor.org/stable/24353295
McKinley, M. (2016). Lobbying and the Petition Clause. Stanford Law Review, 68(5), 1131–1205. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43921018
McKinley, M. (2018). Petitioning and the Making of the Administrative State. The Yale Law Journal, 127(6), 1538–1637. http://www.jstor.org/stable/45222579
Miller, H. (2012). Popular Petitioning and the Corn Laws, 1833—46. The English Historical Review, 127(527), 882–919. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23272690
Image: One person is answering question about politics. He knows about gaslighting.
Photo 253407011 / Democracy Petition © Yee Xin Tan | Dreamstime.com
Neville Buch
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