Yet I have to remind myself that the reason I am writing this blog is to help people (and myself) sort out in their heads "why we need government?" and "what do we expect government to do?", because if you have those things sorted out in your head, you can hope to make a much more rational choice than just picking the party or Leader that a) looks best, or b) appeals to your particular set of cognitive biases most closely.
So while I am not going to tackle that historical progression of governments to our own (for now). I do want to put forward an essay describing some the structure of government we have, and why it was put there. Even some of the structures some people really hate (like the Senate) were put in place for good reasons. That doesn't mean they are perfect, or even relevant today, but I am a strong believer that, if you want to change something, you should probably know first, why it was put there to begin with. That way you can look at its relevance and successfulness somewhat objectively.
So I will have a go at illustrating some of our political structures. In that context I am going to deliberately focus on the English tradition - since I am focused on the Canadian end product.
In the beginning there was Monarchy...actually there were tribes and chieftains before that, but that's going pretty far back and really, it is Monarchy where we derive most of our current structures. Monarchy, one guy in charge of everything, mandated by God, and typically hereditary. Some forms allowed female succession, some didn't. Marriage could cause political divisions to merge and become larger, but kingdoms and territories could also be split between children. Then there were variations on rules of succession, disagreements, and even fraud. In the end, the whole system started because, as groups got together and cooperated (either by conquest, or marriage, or amicable unions) one person came out at the top of the hierarchical structure. Since the more successful rulers tended to expand, there came a time when that one person could not control everything. And so there came to be, nobility. This just made everything creakier, because although now there were more people working on the ruling thing, there were also more people trying to rise in the hierarchy.
Under the Feudal system, there were nobles who controlled bits of land. They almost owned them really, except that actually the King did, and the nobles controlled them for Him, and that control was hereditary, unless it was taken away. Confused yet?
Peasants worked the land and paid heavy rents to the nobles. So don't feel too sorry for the nobility. In return the nobles provided protection from bandits, invasions etc. Sort of. The armies had to come from somewhere, and had to be paid and fed using the taxes and rents from the peasants (and nobles). Nobles provided the "professional" soldiers, and then sometimes levied (i.e. demanded military service from) a proportion of the peasant population. The King (or Queen) was at the top of the pyramid, and controlled foreign policy, made sure the nobles were doing a good job. The King also had a lot of the money, set the highest rules, and delegated the rest to the nobles. The King (sometimes nobles) would provide dispute resolution - judgement - between parties with disputes, as well as criminal justice.
Well some of the time. Fact is, this system was vulnerable to the same thing as all human systems. It depends on everyone knowing their job, and doing it faithfully and well. Unfortunately, sometimes people are not competent, or they don't care, or they have a high proportion of bad days, etc. Worse, there were no courses in "good government", you were educated by your predecessor if you were lucky. (Well, if the people you ruled were lucky). Besides, as the kingdoms got larger, it got harder and harder for the King to do everything (and live a life fit for a King). So courts were invented. They were appointed by the King, and they tended to keep the King's interest in mind. This didn't always suit the nobility. (Or the peasants)
Along about 1215 there was a war between the King and a group of nobles, largely because the King was abusing the Royal Courts to extort money from said nobility. King John lost, and was forced to sign what we now know as Magna Carta. This "Great Charter" placed the first legal limits on a King. As a result, it was annulled by the Pope at the time, which led to a second round, which was once again won by the Barons. And so it was renegotiated, and signed again. It went back and forth for a while, and there were several versions, which eventually evolved into something more...Parliament. (Yes yes, I am leaving out a LOT, not least the religious aspects - I encourage you to read up on it, it's interesting stuff!)
While it has not always been enforced, obeyed, or even respected, in the end, we in the English parliamentary system trace a lot of the rights and structure we take for granted back to this document, and the revisions, evolution, and improvements in it which have become our Law.
With Magna Carta, we gained a number of rights. Not directly, as most of them did not apply except to nobles and some freemen. Most are no longer applicable at all, but believe it or not, three clauses are still "on the books" (in England and Wales).
Two of them concern the liberty of the Church of England, London and several ports in the UK, but the one that most concerns us in Canada is this:
Due Process of Law:
NO Freeman shall be taken or imprisoned, or be disseised of his Freehold, or Liberties, or free Customs, or be outlawed, or exiled, or any other wise destroyed; nor will We not pass upon him, nor condemn him, but by lawful judgment of his Peers, or by the Law of the land. We will sell to no man, we will not deny or defer to any man either Justice or Right.
(quoted from Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta#Great_Charter_of_1215)
In short, we are protected by law from arbitrary harassment by the powers that be, whichever powers those be. This was originally put in place because King John was ripping off his Barons using his courts. Power may corrupt, but over time it can also lash back. That can sting a bit.
Later writers noted that it was not just Kings who could abuse their authority:
The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections.
In fact this was known in antiquity to the Greeks, but that's a lot more history. Ironically, these days we don't need protection from the King so much as Parliament! Fortunately, we have the right to take our own government to court to prevent them from abusing us. We see this most commonly in legal challenges to law under our Constitution, or Charter or Rights and Freedoms. But it all comes from a time when Government, in the form of a King, abused their authority.(quoted from The History of Freedom in Antiquity, 1877 Lord Acton)
The United States took this to a new level, when, not only did they write a constitution which forbade their government from doing many things (like Infringing on Freedom of Speech) they interpret these restrictions very strictly, which has both advantages and disadvantages. In addition they constructed their governing system very carefully with "checks and balances" designed so that no one could easily override the rights of others. The US has a three way balance between the Executive, Legislative and Judiciary branches of their government.
The Dutch have gone even further, successfully suing the government to obey the environmental laws they have actually passed, and winning.
A citizen in British Columbia (David Stockell) once took things to a spectacular level, attempting to sue a winning politician (Premier Glen Clark) for electoral fraud, for having asserted that the Provincial Government books were "balanced" during an election campaign, only to have numbers come out later showing a deficit. The suit was unsuccessful; apparently the Barons forgot to mandate truthfulness in election campaigning back in 1215.
Canada too has a system of checks and balances. In Canada the Executive is a subset of the Legislature, although it is (in theory) subordinate to the legislature. One of the concerns in Canada today is the gradual concentration of power in the Prime Minister's Office, (the apex of the Executive) which has been occurring throughout the last two or three decades under governments of both parties which have held power.
The Prime Minister is (usually) also the Leader of the party in power. Since the party can control whether or not a candidate is nominated for Parliament (the Leader must sign the nomination papers) as well as controlling funding for staffing, campaigning, etc, the party has a lot of power to exercise in trying to control individual Members of Parliament. The Party leaders can apply a lot of pressure as to how they vote, and in some cases, even what they say in the House of Commons. Thus there is currently concern in Canada about whether or not the Executive (the Prime Ministers' Office and the Cabinet) are truly subordinate to Parliament, or whether it has become the other way around.
This does not mean that Parliament is completely powerless however. It remains the case that the governing party may only do so with the consent of parliament, and in the case of a minority parliament (where the government lacks an absolute majority, but rather governs because it controls the most seats) it is quite common for a government to lose a "vote of confidence" which can send everyone back to the polls. It can also result in a coalition government (two parties who, together have a majority, that agree to share power). In practice though, a majority government is not overly limited by Parliament, since the party can "whip" the members of the caucus into performing as ordered.
And leave us not forget the electorate. Elections must be held within 5 years, (although the PM has the right to call them sooner, this is still the case with our "fixed election date law") and governments ignore the electorate and this timing at their peril.
Other major "checks" in Canada are the Judiciary, which is charged with interpreting the Laws that Parliament passes (and rejecting them if they violate the constitution or Charter of Rights and Freedoms) and the Senate, which is also known as the "Chamber of Sober Second thought". The role of the judiciary is pretty easy to understand in principle, so I won't go into it.
A lot of people think of the Senate as a leftover from an older age, and a place where political actors are rewarded with an easy retirement plan and no work. But the Canadian Senate is an interesting body. Members are appointed by the Crown on the advice of the Prime Minister, and serve until 75 years of age. This means that a long serving PM has a good chance of "stacking" the Senate with people loyal to his party. This then has an interesting effect in the light of Canadian politics. Since the approval of the Senate is required to pass bills, a long standing government has a chance to protect their legislative agenda to some degree. Governments in Canada tend to switch parties every 8 to 11 years (this is not a statutory requirement, it seems that the Canadian electorate only has a tolerance for so much from one leader or party). Even with a majority government it is almost always necessary to contend with a minority in the Senate, at least for a few years. This means that there is some pressure on a new, incoming government, to make smaller changes that are more likely to win Senate approval, rather than large, wholesale changes that would undo the previous government's work. This slow turnover of Senators allows the Senate of Canada to act as a kind of brake on the speed of change in Canada. While this can be frustrating for a newly elected government and their supporters, it does protect the country from rapidly oscillating policies.
Yet another check in Canada is the governor general. Although seen as a figurehead of State by many, the governor general remains an important portion of Canada's democratic structure. No law is valid with their assent, and their involvement is fundamental in our election cycle. A great example of this was the 2008 prorogation of parliament. A minority government was threatened with a vote of non-confidence by the opposition parties. To buy time, the Prime Minister requested the prorogation (end of Parliament until summoned again by the GG) of Parliament, thus heading off the confidence vote, and remaining in power. Governor General Michelle Jean granted the unprecedented request, despite popular disapproval of the decision. It was later revealed that the prorogation was granted on condition that 1) Parliament would be recalled soon, and 2) that a Budget be presented as soon as it was. Since a budget is always a vote of confidence, and since the budget did pass, the seeming constitutional crisis was averted. This was a recent and stark reminder that the governor general remains a constitutional actor, and not merely a figurehead in Canadian politics.
There is a last check and balance that I want to highlight that has evolved in Canada, being brought in in 1982. Canada's has an unusual "Notwithstanding" clause. It works like this, if the Government (federal or provincial) passes a law that is found to be non-conforming with the Constitution, the government may rewrite the law to state "The Constitution Notwithstanding... <insert law here>". It is an escape clause from the constitution itself! It is in fact a check on the check! Of course, the government still has to pass the Senate, and then face the electorate and justify that clause (and no Federal Government has yet tried it), but the Quebec government has used it to maintain the Quebec Language protection law that was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of Canada.
I will leave this blog post here. It wasn't much of a history post, but I did want to examine why we have some of the odd governmental structures we have - it is good to keep in mind why we have a Senate, and Courts, and a Constitution. Especially in a time where some of the discussion is about changing or abolishing them.
One wonders if some of these institutions are victims of their own success? Have they have successfully protected us from abuses for so long that we no longer remember what those structures were put in place to protect us from in the first place? I would argue that this is often the case.
Next time: Economic Security, the Bank of Canada, and does the Government *actually* control the economy?
No comments:
Post a Comment