Humans success stories are dominated by cooperation between specialists with a shared goal, while human failures are dominated by competition.
Even though this observation is easy to defend, strategic organisation of the UK does not reflect it. The government itself is disabled by the competition inherent in politics. From the start, education teaches us to be competitive at an individual level and rates us on that ability. The emphasis should instead be on reward for cooperation. We should be celebrating and rewarding the ability to work as a specialist member of a team with a shared strategic goal.
Change for the better in the UK should be predicated on this change in emphasis. The current style of government owes much to its competitive animal roots, it does not reflect what we have learned of success as humans.
Success
March 6th, 2010Hungarian expert government
January 21st, 2010It came to my attention, and here, that in Hungary the idea of Expert Government has received some consideration.
Perhaps Hungary can show the world the way forward.
The examples of expert government mentioned in this article were mostly weak transitional arrangements, where political government had broken down. They lacked the vision proposed here. This form of expert government advocates many experts in narrow local and central specialisations, and critically maintains the integrity of expert decisions with a non-hierarchical influence structure.
Better government – the big idea
January 11th, 2010Good visionary ideas are not easy to create. Even when one has created a paradigm shifting idea, it can be difficult for others to see. Most people can only see the value of the idea when more open minded and visionary people have endorsed it.
This idea takes a big step, it abandons politics entirely and so demands more of those prepared to open their minds to new ideas. In doing that it poses a communication challenge. This is more than constitutional change, it is a completely new form of government. Try to be open to looking afresh at the huge problems it solves and how they are endemic to the current systems of government.
Blair – war because he wanted it
December 12th, 2009At long last Blair has admitted what we all suspected about the Iraq war.
He wanted to get rid of Saddam Hussein and would have found another excuse if he had to.
He chose a strange place to admit it, the Guardian reports it was on a TV chat show. That shows the untouchable status he believes he now has. Indeed, very few have the ability to pursue him for war crimes, but probably none of those will.
His outrageous misuse of power, going to war ‘because he wants to’, is indicative of the faults in hierarchical government structures. The old saying haunts that system, ‘power corrupts …’. It is also the reason why even as he admits his reason he feels safe. Those that have sufficient power will not pursue him, because that would undermine their own power and put themselves at risk by setting a precedent.
Perhaps no person is able to safely use that kind of power, and that is why government should not be hierarchical.
The Taxpayers Allliance recognises the need for government reform
November 27th, 2009A useful report by the TaxPayers’ Alliance highlights many failings of UK government and suggests structural reforms.
Interestingly the report states:
“Ministers have little or no knowledge of the areas for which they are responsible. John Reid, for example, when appointed Secretary of State for Health, publicly said “I am a novice in this field”. Yet he was responsible for the health care of the nation and the third largest organisation in the world.”
Referring to the administrative domain for government it also states:
“…management should be contracted out to harness the expertise and innovation of civil society…”
The report clearly recognises a problem we are concerned with; the lack of expertise in government.
However, the report’s solution is a set of recommendation for adjusting the structure of government.
Our solution is more potent because we believe that the current system of government can never be ‘fit for purpose’. It is based on giving power to people that in effect are administrators, not the experts that in fact should be in control.
The slightly adjusted inadequate government initiative
November 25th, 2009A site called The Better Government Initiative should offer the opportunity to participate in the process of government reform. Its only mechanism to engage is an email address, but without any solicitation for contributions. They are tinkering with a system that needs deep changes.
The cost of politics
November 20th, 2009Take a look at this summary of the outrageous costs to the country of the existing system of government and ask yourself honestly, is the current system of government which costs so very much and delivers such poor results not due for change?
Politics cost the taxpayer £485m in 2007 / 2008.
We can be sure it costs a lot more now.
Financial mismanagement
November 20th, 2009This massive public spending binge is not free. The commensurate massive increase in public debt will have to be paid for with future taxation and spending cuts.
The £200bn of extra money being printed also has consequences. It will increase inflation which will make our diminished and stagnating salaries worth much less in real terms.
The current government is demonstrating breathtaking recklessness and incompetence with the financial health of the UK. They are using short-term tactics to try and minimise the financial problems they are complicit in, on the run-up to the general election. They hope that the general publics’ lack of financial acumen to spot this will allow them to keep those coveted well paid jobs with the massive financial gift that they call expenses and so very obviously adore above all else.
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Misdirected Spending
March 1st, 2010It is easy to look successful when one is spending someone else’s money, especially when one can also spend what they have yet to earn. Regardless of the sanity of that government policy, it is misusing the revenue from current and future taxation. Government spending is poorly directed toward encouraging retail spending and funding a bloated, overpaid, and inefficient public sector.
As much of what we purchase comes from other countries, some of that money flows out of the country and so retail spending is not good value for money. The public sector is notoriously bad value for money and some of it is not involved in fulfilling needs and wants. The public sector is funded by the private sector and so it should reflect the ability of the private sector to pay for it. Savings from downscaling the public sector should be redirected to stimulate the private sector. The most direct way would be to reduce costs to operate businesses, especially in employing people. This could include suspending the minimum wage and many other employment rights that discourage companies from employing people. While infrastructure projects improve the short term prospects of some companies, their total value is spread over a long period, so they do not achieve the best immediate effects.
Encouraging already highly indebted people to spend more on products that worsen the balance of payments, and using their future earnings to do so is not a sane policy. It seems the obvious needs to be stated, debt is not good. In broad terms, the reason we have problems now is because of excessive debt being used to inflate asset bubbles and the lack of confidence in the ability to service those debts. We need to deflate those asset bubbles, reduce debt, and diminish the chances of both recurring in the future. Policy needs to recognise the basic human traits of greed and hubris to restrain those that succumb to them. Free markets will always allow some to take advantage of others. They enable high wealth disparity which leads to a range of problems.
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Update 2010-03-09
Confirmation from the Office for National Statistics via the BBC that encouraging spending is not the panacea.
Tags: asset bubbles, employment, greed, hubris, inefficient, minimum wage, panacea, private sector, public sector, recovery, spending, statistics, taxation, value for money
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