By Max Bound
This paper suggests the positives in Kevin Rudd’s “The Monthly” October “Faith in Politics essay and November Brutopia article could provide an important backdrop to developing new directions for Australia. And that Labor-Green dialogue which takes into account the general policy thrust of Senator Christine Milne’s May 2006 Green Budget Reply speech would be important to making the policy changes necessary to a decent human future. I argue that a carbon tax, other taxation policies, legislative measures and government actions to influence market decisions are essential to resolving the problems Global Warming are confronting us with, and that emission trading schemes, or reliance on market forces and “selling the environment”, are fraught with problems and even serious dangers.
In his, in several respects, commendable, October Essay and November article (2006) in The Monthly new Labor Leader Kevin Rudd argues that: “… liberal capitalism, left unfettered, is capable of destroying any social institution that inhibits the maximisation of individual self-interest. That includes the family itself.” And then goes on to show how Howard’s labour market reforms attack rights for family time. And in discussing “the church” that “The purpose of the church is not to be socially agreeable, it is to speak robustly to the state on behalf of those who cannot speak effectively for themselves.”
The Essay, in particular, pays tribute to a German cleric who apparently opposed Hitler and in the process gave readers sound reasons to ponder similarities between Germany in the 1930’s and Australia under Howard. With good reason Rudd writes: “Mr. Howard’s politics are in the main about concealing the substantive truth of his policy program — because as with his new industrial laws — when fully exposed to the light of public debate, their essential truth is revealed: a redistribution of power from the weak to the strong.” He then goes on to write: “That is why some of the Churches … have set about the task of exposing the truth of what the industrial relations changes mean for working families.”
This interpretation of faith and religion stands in sharp contrast to the right-wing religiosity favored by John Howard. As Rudd reveals in the above quotes Howard’s policies and actions stand in sharp contradiction to some of his sermons. Family values being a prime example.
Howard’s idol and model for so called ‘leadership’ is very obviously George Bush. The ‘faith’ of Bush was recently the subject of some discussions on SBS TV program News Hour. Prominent American commentators suggested that Bush bases his policy decisions on what he believes, or would like to believe, the current reality is — rather than on an objective review and grasp of what is actually happening. Iraq being an example. In other words a form of twisted faith, rather than reason, governs whatever it is that goes on in the head of this increasingly unpopular US President
Rudd’s statements, to the press, after his election, as Labor leader, included an assertion of his commitment to the USA … and on the other hand an assertion that his policy approach would be “an alternative not an echo.”
In his Essay Rudd suggests that in modern times Christianity in the West might be beginning to see itself and be seen as a counter culture. As an interested observer from outside religion I see it as fortunate that there is evidence to support this claim. But tragically there is also very strong evidence that there are trends in religion and religious groups, which are currently involved with quite another and far more divisive and less commendable approach.
There is a well based and expressed concern about indications of this latter development which extends to the threat this brand of faith poses for Australia’s future, in Rudd’s contributions. He did, however, fail to critique the role his own Party, in power, played in undoing of legislation and practices which hitherto placed some fetters on the power of liberal capitalism to crush the rights and blight the lives of ordinary people. Nonetheless Rudd’s remarks about capitalism’s negative potential could indicate a rather different and much more socially responsible approach. The problem the Labor Opposition needs to address is — how to translate the commendable aspects of Rudd’s rhetoric into clear policies for change of direction.
Labor in Office did pay lip service and partly practiced leaving some small protections for people with little but potential for organisation and collective action in the way of economic or social power. But their overall, economic-rationalist policy approach, practice and political legislative actions helped set the scene for and helped enable Howard’s full-scale attack on the rights of ordinary people to protect either their own social and economic interests, or our physical environment
Rudd’s rhetoric could provide a basis for a shift away from negative economic rationalist policy positions on the part of the Labor Party. Add to this the fact that Senator Christine Milne’s down-to-earth Green Budget reply speech in May 2006 provided material — on Parliamentary record — for a serious dialogue between Labor and Green should such a shift in Labor Party policy priorities take place. However continuing to accept large donations from the corporations that both inspire and benefit from economic rationalist policies, suggest a barrier to the Labor Party’s ability to address the pressing economic social and environmental problems Australia faces.
To elaborate this point, Senator Milne’s speech, was essentially about how we need to build genuinely equitable approaches, as well as ecological sustainability, into economic and social policy development if we are to meet the challenges Global Warming poses. Her speech opposes the position of both major parties and pours scorn on their idea of reduced taxes on the rich ploys. It does not deny but does go well beyond the largesse, or hand out approach, which is often called Christian Charity and suggests the concept of human dignity and quality of life as a right of all people. She called for action to tackle the problems in our health and education systems and investment in rail and public transport systems for example.
In his November article Rudd mentions both “Galbraith and in Australia’s case Nugget Coombs” as sources of the “philosophical inheritance” of the social democrats. Unfortunately, rather than indicating what J.K.Galbraith and H.C or Nugget Coombs had to say in their latest and last comments on current economic policy directions he uses considerable space with quotes from recent writings of a much less qualified and much less well reputed commentator than either Galbraith or Coombs
To put these comments in some perspective it is worth noting that on page 39 of his 1996 book Galbraith wrote: “Also, a disturbing part of the support for tax reduction, as an antidote to economic stagnation and unemployment comes from those whose tax burden would be thus eased. From personal advantage, it is said, will come public gain. The opposite effect of taxation in the upper income bracket, is in fact true: there, taxes may compel the expenditure of funds that would otherwise go unspent or uninvested”.
Readers who have read the last page of H. C. (Nugget) Coombs’ last book “The Return of Scarcity” will be aware of his very clear advice to the effect that our survival depends on our capacity to reject the consumerism — so necessary to our current economic system. There is a little more detail on the positions of both of these giants in economic thought in my piece ( Global warming …. and quality of life )
One of several causes of our current unstable economic, and dangerous ecological situation, is that governments have deliberately handed to private corporations very substantial overall control of how, and in what, the surpluses created in production are invested. In the above quote the highly regarded economist J. K. Galbraith is clearly arguing the advantage of increasing taxation on the rich. And that this is particularly so in situations where there is extreme need to direct investment. The current extreme need is to direct investment into industries and economic activities that are socially beneficial and ecologically sustainable.
Senator Milne essentially steps outside of the faith in the market syndrome which, has had considerable influence in the environmental movement,and Labor Party alike. However she did call for “an emissions trading scheme and/or a carbon tax as a matter of urgency”. A carbon tax is certainly a vital and urgent need. The trading, or, to use a phrase written by Stuart Rosewarne in 1993, ‘selling the environment’, scheme could however well lead to the drive for short-term profit taking precedence over environmental protection.
Some recent utterances of people in Howard’s Government certainly give rise to fears that emissions trading could be manipulated to the purpose of strengthening the possibility of the slowest most expensive and most environmentally, economically and socially dangerous option of those now on the table, namely the nuclear option.
Howard and his fellow travelers adhere strongly to faith in the market and the rightness of corporation controlled markets called Globalism. And as recorded above, Rudd indicates, that left unfettered liberal capitalism — in other words a free market economy — is capable of destroying “any social institution that inhibits maximisation of individual self interest”.
The most widely acclaimed American economist of last century, J.K.Galbraith wrote in 1996: (p84) “As earlier indicated, environmental concerns, both those which are contemporary and those affecting future generations, especially the latter, are inherently in conflict with the motivating force of the market economy. Another North American economist — this time the Canadian John Ralston Saul in his 2005 book “The Collapse of Globalism” — expresses alarm as to where current economic and social policies are leading.
This leads me to refer to other writings concerning the role of Faith in politics and in economic, political and social theory and practice. In his book “Main Currents in Western Environmental Thought”. Dr Pete Hay writes “At its extreme, faith in the market can take the form of defence of capitalism as ‘ecological’ or ‘ordained by nature’ a view that removes it from the realm of artifact and renders it organic.”
Hay then refers readers to writers who discuss the proposition that “the social Darwinist position that the individualism, greed and competition of capitalism replicates nature and hence is ‘natural”. He informs readers of some writings which question and or refute this ‘faith’ view of capitalism and of the world we live in. ( Hay 2002 p220) Overall Hay sees much that is positive in environmental economic theory but he also suggests some serious weaknesses and that it largely remains within the parameters of neo-classical economic theory. For example in examining some positions taken by well known environmental commentator, Clive Hamilton, Hay writes: “This is an emphasis within environmental economics that points away from environmental imperatives and back towards the vision of the market as prior and supreme”.
Another Australian economist, writer and long standing environmental activist, Stuart Rosewarne, in his 1993 Essay “Selling The Environment: A critique of Market Ecology”, examines in some detail the problems of environmental solutions based on reliance on market forces. The above and further references to economists and other scholars opposed to economic rationalism underline the point that — governmental legislation and public awareness that results in the introduction of market mechanisms to protect the environment is essential — but is quite a different proposition to reliance on market forces.
Realistically future scenario possibilities include — Australia-wide droughts, parts of coastal towns and cities permanently flooded, with salt water, at least at high-tide periods and certainly increases in major storm incidents. Plus, among other things, pressure from possible immigrants from Florida in the USA China and many other countries with heavily populated low-lying areas.
In World War Two, in the face of the threat of invasion, rationing of various foods and of fuel were accepted as a necessity. Given the likely Global Warming scenarios mentioned above this can happen again along, with polluted air and acute freshwater shortages. These are but some of the things our children and grandchildren will be confronted with if we do not act now and act quickly and decisively
We can go on for a short period with a minority of the world’s populace continuing to pursue lifestyles that are beyond the capacity of our planet to sustain. But the consequences for current younger generations and even more so their children will be a planet incapable of providing a decent quality of life.
As Al Gore has rightly asserted in his film An Inconvenient Truth Global Warming is very much a moral issue for us all. It is an issue that transcends political cultural and other differences and requires intelligent and cooperative collusion across these differences. A core and dangerous fault in the free-market system, exposed in above quotes from Rudd’s Essay and Galbraith’s writings, is confronted in policy terms in Senator Milne’s speech.
Leaving aside the emissions-trading scheme, I read her speech as a call for elected government and publicly controlled regulations; rather than the current regulation of our lives imposed by short-term profit seekers with enormous levels of power and no responsibility to the public interest
Does growing public concern and actions, plus a new Labor leadership, indicate reason for hope that a new national government concerned to take a responsible and more cooperative approach to current acute problems could result from the next election? My opinion is that a high level of public enlightenment and action plus the responsible dialogue at a parliamentary level, suggested above, are essential to increasing the possibility for such a highly desirable but, difficult to achieve out come.
References
Coombs H.C. ‘The return of Scarcity” Pub Cambridge University Press 1990
Galbraith J.K. “THE GOOD SOCIETY The Human Agenda” pub.1996 by Houghton Mifflin Company Boston New York
Gore Al Film “An Inconvenient Truth” Shown widely in Australia (for example in Village Cinemas) and in other countries
Hay Peter Main Currents in Western Environmental Thought Pub University of NSW press Sydney 2002 ( particularly pp 220-223)
Milne Christine Australian Greens Budget Reply Speech May11th 2006
Rosewarne Stuart An Essay on “Selling the Environment: A Critique of Market Ecology. In “Beyond The Market” Edited by Stuart Rees, Gordon Rodley and Frank Stilwell and pub by Pluto Press 1993
Rudd Kevin “Faith In Politics” an Essay published in “The Monthly” October 2006
Saul John Ralston “the Collapse of Globalism and the reinvention of the World Pub Viking Penguin Books 2005
TV Programs for example News hour on SBS
Max Bound is an octogenarian with life-long experience as a social and political activist including over 30 years as an environmental activist. He is retired from a working life as a labourer, coal miner, tram conductor, organiser, building worker — and after mature-age tertiary studies and receiving a BA in Environmental Design and Graduate Diploma in Urban planning — work as a planner, Research Officer and Coordinator.
