Published on Jan 21, 2018 in The Independent  by  Marilyn Reid
 
If there is one good thing that came out of the federal government’s electoral reform fiasco, it’s that it invited Canadians to envision what kind of parliamentary democracy we would like to have.

Most people know from media reports that the overwhelming majority of respondents recommended the implementation of some sort of proportional representation (PR) system. In other words, they wanted a parliamentary system in which the percentage of seats a party held in the House matched the percentage of votes the party received in the election.

What is less known is that several contributors to the Electoral Reform Committee, including three from our province, went as far as to design and submit their own version of what they thought a good proportional representation system should look like. This was an important breakthrough, because up until that point, discussions about proportional representation had almost exclusively focused on systems developed in countries with much denser populations than Canada.

Mixed Member Proportional may work well in Germany with its population density of 231 inhabitants per square kilometre. Single Transferable Vote may suit Ireland where there are 67 people per square kilometre. However, these systems have serious limitations when applied to sparsely populated regions of our country — regions like Newfoundland and Labrador with its population of only 1.4 people per square kilometre. We need a PR system that suits our unique demographics.

Fortunately, we now have some good, made-in-Canada models to choose from. But, here’s something to consider. Why does government have to make a decision about which PR system we’ll have before a referendum is held?

A new referendum concept

Three local groups, Democracy Alert, the Council of Canadians and the Social Justice Cooperative are advocating a two-step approach to electoral reform in our province.

Step 1 is a referendum attached to a provincial election with a simple choice:

      ______ I would like to continue with our current system for electing MHAs.
      ______ I would like to change to a proportional representation system.
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Step 2 comes later. If voters select proportional representation it would be the responsibility of the incoming government to strike an all-party committee coupled with some sort of Citizens’ Assembly. Their responsibility would be to research, deliberate, consult with the public, and then select the PR system that best suits the demographics of our province. That system would be put in place for the following election.

Why this different approach to a referendum?

This simplified referendum doesn’t just avoid rushing into a decision about the kind of proportional representation system that would best suit our needs. It would also enable Newfoundlanders and Labradorians to argue for or against proportional representation on its general merits, rather than getting bogged down in explanations of exactly how the system would work.

That can be a significant issue. In the 2007 Ontario referendum lack of knowledge was repeatedly acknowledged as a reason for why Ontarians were voting against the initiative. Not all of that should be blamed on inadequate information being available to the public, although that was certainly the case.

Understanding the fundamental concept of balancing seats and voting share is reasonably easy. Unfortunately, understanding the mechanics of how proportional representation is achieved – and this is true of virtually all PR systems – is complicated. People’s eyes invariably glaze over when we start explaining the implementation steps related to a particular system.

Yet, concerns about the mechanics of PR implementation don’t seem to have been an issue for New Zealanders, nor for the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish, all who have switched over the last 25 years to proportional representation systems. Why not?

Success in New Zealand: What was different?

In contrast to here in Canada, proportional representation was given enthusiastic support from respected high profile groups in the above jurisdictions. In New Zealand it was the Royal Commission on the Electoral System that was a game changer. The Commission recommended that the country change to MMP, arguing that this would lead to better government. The mainstream media, in stark contrast to the Ontario referendum, also came out in favour of change.

Voters trusted what they heard, even though many didn’t understand the mechanics of MMP. And they wanted change. They were disillusioned with the performance of their two major parties, which had been lurching interchangeably from one majority government to another, never cooperating with each other.

Why the push for proportional representation in our province now?

Our Muskrat Falls crisis has led to an unprecedented breakdown of public trust and confidence in the decision making capabilities of political leadership in this province. Like New Zealanders thirty years ago, we know government needs to change the way it operates. But will that happen? What are our chances of getting a referendum on proportional representation in this province if it’s left entirely up to volunteer civil society groups to mobilize the public?

What’s badly needed is support and leadership from groups with status equivalent to the New Zealand Royal Commission. A stand taken by the NL Law Society would be an important start. There’s even a precedent for such action. In 2004, the Law Commission of Canada issued a report recommending that the federal electoral system be changed to a proportional representation system. Like New Zealand they chose MMP.

Support from Municipalities Newfoundland and Labrador also makes sense. And, who knows? Maybe even leadership at Memorial University might see the merits of electoral reform.

The time is now right to push for a paradigm shift in politics. Even the staunchest defenders of the political status quo will have a hard time denying the extraordinary failure of the political process to assess and correct the group think that led to our Muskrat Falls disaster.

Addressing the arguments of the nay-sayers

But, will potential allies accept proportional representation as a viable alternative? Or are they biased by misconceptions often repeated in corporate media. Proportional representation, we’re told, produces minority governments and minority governments are weak. Very little gets accomplished.

Wrong! We Canadians got both our health care system and Canada Pension Plan under “minority governments”. Proportional representation produces coalition governments where major parties work in collaboration with smaller parties to serve the greater good.

As for Europe, coalitions have given EU citizens a lot of things that Canadians would really like to have – affordable Day Care, national Pharmacare, stronger environmental regulations. There is also less inequality in most European countries than here, and a much higher voter turnout at elections.

Let’s think strategy!

So how do we get that positive message out to those who are in a position to influence decision making?

We need lobbyists. More precisely, we, the people, need to become lobbyists. We need people across the province prepared to contact and engage with potential allies in government, in the business community, in the legal profession, in academia and elsewhere around the province.

The message would be straightforward.

We are a province in the midst of an enormous economic crisis caused by a political system that has malfunctioned. Now is the right time to consider the benefits that changing to proportional representation might bring too Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. There are many.

Let’s offer the people of our province a referendum on the concept of proportional representation. If voters choose change, let’s then take the time to decide on the very best system for our province.

Care to become a lobbyist?

Marilyn Reid is a member of Democracy Alert and the Council of Canadians. For information on how to become involved in electoral reform, contact democracyalert.nl@gmail.com

                “The House is a parody of democracy. All substantial decisions on  bills                 and budgets are  made elsewhere and party discipline drives all real                                                                     debate behind closed doors.”
                                                  
No, this quote is not referring to politics in Newfoundland and Labrador. But the rationale behind it does make it easier to understand how and why our Muskrat Falls fiasco evolved the way it did.

Graham Steele, the author of the above statement, was a member of the Nova Scotia legislature from 2001 to 2013. He wrote a book about his experience called “What I learned about politics”.

“The House is a parody of democracy.”

Steele opens the book with a description of the first time, as a newly elected Member of the Nova Scotia Legislative Assembly (MLA), he stood up in the House to give a speech. “No one in the room, absolutely no one, was listening.” Some were chatting with their neighbours, some were reading newspapers or a book, some were tapping on their computers or smart phones. “Our elected members mostly ignore each other in the House.” he concludes. 

And why wouldn’t they? If the ruling party has a majority government, which is the dominant reality in our first-past-the-post system, they have no need to listen to the opposition. As for opposition parties, they know they have no power to influence government. The final vote on any legislation is a foregone conclusion under majority governments.

The reality is that the House is mere theatre. When our elected representatives do pay attention to what someone opposite is saying “it is usually to heckle, interrupt, even insult.” This is not just a Nova Scotia experience.  We see the same level of disrespect and disinterest in political debate in our province.  In all probability it’s not that different across the country.

“All substantial decisions on bills and budgets are made elsewhere.”

According to Steele, the real decision making in government happens, not in the House, but behind closed doors in the Premier’s office or elsewhere in the civil service. By the time a bill or a budget is tabled in the House, there is little chance of an amendment. In fact, most politicians have only a superficial understanding of pending legislation. Much of it is written up by in-house lawyers and economists in language that is legalistic, arcane and barely understandable. The result, according to Steele is that most politicians don’t even bother to read the bills. They simply do what they are told to do by party leadership.

“Party discipline drives all real debate behind closed doors.”

Steele makes the point that politicians do what they are told because politics is, above all, a team sport. Party unity must be maintained and any politician who differs from party policy risks being punished. The punishment can be harsh, as Mount Pearl-Southlands MHA Paul Lane found out when he was booted out of the Liberal party after declaring he could not support the unpopular 2016 budget.

Newly elected politicians are very quickly socialized into the culture of acquiescence to decisions on high. They learn that if they are to get ahead they must do what they are told, preferably with panache.

Politics, Steele believes, has degenerated into “a permanent marketing campaign” designed to push through decisions, policies and strategies that are made in back rooms elsewhere. “Everything – the invention of differences, the attention-grabbing rhetoric, the focus on scandal and personality, the refusal to deal with the real issues, the devaluing of legislative work in favour of constituency work, the election of candidates, everything is aimed at winning your vote.”

The end result for politicians is demeaning.  “Being in politics makes you dumber and the longer you are in politics the dumber you get.” says Steele.

How do we correct all of the above?

Has democracy really become as dysfunctional as Graham Steele suggests? Certainly, the disrespect for politicians is at an all-time high in our province.  Voter turnout is at an all-time low.

The real danger is that we will focus on blaming people rather than the process itself. As Steele points out, “It’s too easy to say we need better politicians. The fact is that our politicians are us. There isn’t a better, more perfect, angelic version of us.”

What we really need to do is change the way our political system works.

Steele, himself, would like to see more independently elected politicians, who, freed from the shackles of party discipline, would be able more easily to vote with their conscience or according to what their constituents want. He recognizes, however, that that is not practical. Independent candidates rarely get elected.

We agree. It’s one of the reasons why Democracy Alert is in favour of proportional representation (PR). While proportional representation will not solve all the problems that Steel alludes to, it will end the dominance of our two major parties and endless majority governments where differing perspectives have no effective influence. To that end, we have finally chosen a PR system that we think would best suit the needs of our province. But that’s a subject for another blog posting.

So how do we end this blog? We’ve chosen to quote “The Rules of the Game”, Steele’s tongue in cheek advice to new politicians aspiring to be successful.

 “The rules of the game"

• Get yourself re-elected. Like the sex drive among primates, the drive to be re-elected drives everything a politician does.
• Spend as little time as possible at the legislature. There are no voters there, so any time spent there is wasted. Go where the voters are. Go home.
• Perception is reality. Since people vote based on what they believe to be true, it doesn’t matter what is actually true. This is at the root of all the dark political arts.

• Keep it simple. Policy debates are for losers. Focus on what is most likely to sink in with a distracted electorate: slogans, scandals, personalities, pictures, image. Find whatever works, then repeat it relentlessly.
• Put yourself in the spotlight. People are more likely to vote for someone they’ve met or feel they know or at least have heard of. If it’s not in the news, it didn’t happen.
• Politics is a team sport, part 1: Loyalty: You can’t accomplish anything as an individual. No matter what, stick with your team.
• Politics is a team sport part 2: Always be attacking. There are other teams that want to take away your job at the next election. You have to beat them, and if you can, destroy them.
• Don’t leave a paper trail. You don’t want to leave any evidence that runs against your own story. If you’re explaining, you’re losing.
• Fight hard to take credit. Fight harder to avoid blame.
• Deny that these are the rules of the game.”

(Graham Steele  was a senior cabinet member in the 2009-2013 Nova Scotia NDP government. He chose  not to run for re-election in 2013 and is now an assistant professor in the Rowe School of Business at Dalhousie University.

Submitted by Marilyn Reid

                                                        Our Question of the Month

Which of these countries has not seen the recent rise of right-wing populism?


                 (a)     The Netherlands      (b) Hungary      (c) Germany       (d) Norway        (e) Spain   

In recent elections in Holland, Germany, Hungary and Norway, far-right populist parties gained seats. The answer to the quiz is Spain. Grass roots populism does exist in Spain. However, unlike the trend towards right-wing populism that many other countries are experiencing, Spanish populists have veered to the left over the last decade. While Spain’s current governing party is still centrist-right, the Spanish left-wing populist party Podemos won 20% of the votes in the 2016 election.
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Why have so many people in so many developed countries turned to populist parties or leaders in the last decade? 

Harvard economist Dani Rodrik argues that populism is a backlash to  our 40 year experiment with intense globalization -  an experiment that is perceived by many as undermining  employment opportunities  and cultural  and social cohesion.

A growing number of people feel unfairly treated by globalization.  Moreover, they are increasingly disenchanted  with mainstream political parties who they accuse of being  oblivious to their concerns. 

That’s the genius of populist parties. They speak to the frustrations and fears of ordinary people and represent themselves as the only real source willing to push back against the powerful forces that have caused the problems. 

Populist  rhetoric is a return to the emotions of confrontational politics. The adversaries are “Us, the good people” against “Them, the selfish elites” who now control mainstream political parties. 

Who are these selfish elites?  That answer depends on whether you are a left-wing or right-wing populist.

Left-wing Populism

Left-wing populism is rooted in economic and class distinctions. For many, perhaps the most familiar example is the Occupy Movement with its identification of Wall Street, the international corporations, and the “one percent” as the villains.

Left-wing populist leaders like Bernie Sanders in the US and Podemos’s Pablo Iglesias are avowedly socialistic in that they want a more equitable redistribution of wealth and income. They seek to re-politicize democracy by emphasizing class struggle (big against little, rich against poor). They want to introduce a passion for politics among the people and a vigilant citizenry continuously on guard against elites who would take more than their fair share.

The link between left-wing populism and high inequality

Historically, left-wing populism has been strongest in countries with high inequality. In Latin America, perhaps the most unequal region of the world, left-wing populist parties or leaders have consistently polled between fifteen and thirty percent of votes over the last few decades. In Europe, the hotbeds of left-wing populism have been Spain and Greece, countries in which inequality and unemployment are substantially higher than in northern Europe, and where governments have (on the insistence of the European Commission) imposed oppressive austerity measures.

You might think that left-wing populist movements would be thriving given that inequality is growing pretty well everywhere.  They are not.  In fact, support for leftish parties (both centrist and extremist) is at its lowest level in seventy years – and falling.   Why is that? 

Why is right-wing populism now the preferred choice for so many people?

Right-wing populism

Right-wing populists are less grounded in class conflicts than their left wing cousins. Instead,  their  frustrations are often rooted in forces  external to the nation state.    

In Trump’s United States, that manifests itself, not just as opposition to trade agreements, but to countries like Mexico that exploit these agreements to “unfairly” benefit their own people. In Europe, the identified enemy is  the EU bureaucracy itself, which is accused of serving the needs of international capitalism and financial elites at the expense of nation states. 
 
Right-wing populists, unlike their left-wing cousins, object also to  the increased  flow of labour across borders under globalization. Contrary to what you might expect, given ever increasing employment uncertainty, right-wing populists' primary objection to immigration, at least in Europe, appears to be cultural rather than economic. Populists fear that the rising diversity caused by increased immigration threatens national culture and the unity of national community. Citizens, they argue, are losing their sense of who they are.

All of this tends to make right-wing populists more nationalistic than their left wing cousins. They are also more likely to be attracted to strong authoritarian leaders who will strengthen the nation and return to the conservative values of the past.

In its most exaggerated form, right-wing populism encourages xenophobia. It is unjust, however, to tar all right-wing populists as racists.
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The link between migration patterns and right-wing populism

         











To put this BBC chart in perspective, in 2015 Hungary had, per capita, 30 times as many asylum applicants as Great Britain and 56 times as many as Spain.  The great majority of applicants have been from Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.

In spite of having strong socialist traditions, all six of the countries highlighted  in the above chart have experienced surges in far-right  parties in recent elections.  They are not alone.

The sudden surge in right-wing populism  across the developed world has reached historic proportions. 
Back in the late 1980s voter support for populist parties or candidates averaged under five percent. By 2015 it had risen to over twenty percent of the vote. That increase has been driven overwhelmingly by the growth of far-right nationalist parties.

The Outlier   -   Regional Separatist Populism

Regional separatist populism is a different kind of populism – one that sets secessionist regions (e.g., Catalonia, Scotland) against their respective national centres. It’s not a new phenomenon but in Europe it has bubbled up to boiling points in the last decade. 

Secessionist populists are primarily ethnic in character and cannot be pigeon-holed into right or left wing positions.  They want the independence and control of their own destiny that nationhood would give them.

And then there is Brexit, another cross-party phenomenon.   According to exit polls after the referendum, the biggest reason respondents gave for voting for Brexit was a desire for greater national autonomy than the EU allowed.

A lot of people just don’t like handing over control to supranational institutions and agreements.

Where do young people stand on populism?

According to a 2016 analysis of the World Values Survey by Foa and Mounk, support for political radicalism in North America and Western Europe is higher among the young than other generations. Perhaps that is the reason why voter turnout among millennials is so much lower than other age groups in our country. Young people simply can’t find a Canadian party that interests them enough to vote. Canadians have not yet gone populist in the 21st century.

So which way are young populists swinging?

It would be misleading to imply that there is not support among young people for authoritarian leaders and right-wing populism. However, it’s also true that:

• In Great Britain 63% of voters under 35 voted for the labour party led by avowed populist Jeremy Corbyn.
•  In the United States populist presidential candidate Bernie Sanders received the bulk of his support from young people.
•  In Spain, the Indignados protests which led to the formation of the left-wing populist party Podemos were led by young people.

If there is a resurgence of left-wing populism, it looks as though it will be young people who will lead the movement.

To conclude:

Here are some questions that those trying to understand the rise of 21st century populism are grappling with:   

• Should healthy democracies create more space for parties that emphasize “Them” and “Us” antagonisms?
• Are populist parties the only productive form that allows the "politically incorrect"  demands of the people to be considered in the political arena?  And if so why?
• Could populism force a transition to a new and better socio-political transformation?
• Do we need a resurgence of left-wing populism?

Our centrist parties (both on the left and the right) would, no doubt, respond with a resounding NO to all these questions. So too would the corporate controlled media that invariably portray all populists as simplistic thinkers, while at the same time frequently giving simplistic analyses of their appeal.

It’s arguable that populism is the defining political phenomenon of the 21st century. It’s not going to go away – or at least not as long as people feel their concerns and problems are being ignored by those who hold the power.

We need to start talking about populism. It’s a huge and complicated topic with many dimensions. So, expect more blog postings by Democracy Alert on this topic.
 
Submitted by Marilyn Reid.

Back in the old days, 50 years ago, free trade agreements were about trade and tariffs. Today, trade Agreements have morphed into foreign investment promotion and protection agreements (FIPAS).  At the heart of these agreements is the investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) provision that allows foreign corporations to sue national governments in offshore tribunals where national law counts for nothing. 

We  thought it fitting to focus on ISDS lawsuits for our quiz this month, given that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) between Mexico, the US and Canada is currently being renegotiated.  

                                                         Our Quiz of the Month

Below are eight countries and eight questions.  Can you match them?
                                    Argentina,  Canada, Ecuador, Egypt, Germany, Libya, 
                                                                Russia, the United States,

 What country

1. is facing a $5.6 billion ISDS claim for deciding to phase out nuclear energy after the Fukushima nuclear disaster?
2. is facing a lawsuit by a waste-water management company for increasing the country’s minimum wage?
3. has never lost an ISDS challenge?
4. was originally ordered to pay over $2 billion (including interest) for terminating  an oil concession after the company sold 40 percent of its production rights without the required government approval.
5. has been ordered to pay the highest compensation ever ($50 billion)?
6. was ordered to pay $900 million to an investor after backing out of a tourism project even though the investor had only invested US $5 million in the project?
7. has been the recipient of the most ISDS lawsuits?
8. is facing a $1.3 billion lawsuit  for allegedly  failing to create a fair regulatory environment for new investors in the telecommunications sector?

 
Here are the answers to the above  quiz:  1. Germany,  2. Egypt,  The United States,  4. Ecuador, 
5. Russia,   6.  Libya,  7. Argentina , 8. Canada            

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The original justification for including ISDS provisions in trade and investment agreements was to protect investors from expropriation or nationalization of their assets in countries with weak rule of law. 
The reality, unfortunately, has been quite different.

Between 1993 and 2015 only 17% of ISDS claims were actually filed because of direct expropriation. Instead, the ISDS system is primarily being used to challenge government regulations, particularly with respect to the environment. Around 63% of claims against Canada so far have involved challenges to environmental protection or resource management programmes that allegedly interfered with the rights of foreign investors.    

Corporations are demanding ever larger damage awards. According to UNCTAD since the year 2000 there have been 88 ISDS disputes in which the claimants demanded more than a billion dollars in compensation.

Canada's ISDS record

According to UNCTAD, out of the 137 countries for which it has data, only five countries (Argentina, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Venezuela and Spain) have been sued more often than Canada.    

That is startling, but just as startling is the other side of the coin.  Canadian corporations rank fourth, after those in the US, Germany, and the Netherlands, in launching lawsuits under the umbrella of their home country’s FIPA agreements.

Corporations within Canada have used Canada’s FIPA treaties to initiate 45 lawsuits.  Twenty-two have been directed towards third world countries, almost all of them by mining companies.   Ten lawsuits have targeted the United States. No lawsuit against the US has to date been successful. 

The NAFTA renegotiation:  What is the future of ISDS?

NAFTA renegotiations are taking place in Ottawa this weekend and ISDS will be part of the discussions. Although the US has no official policy yet, the US trade representative has, somewhat surprisingly, drafted a proposal that would give individual countries to opt out of ISDS.

 A decision by Canada to opt out of ISDS would be very much in the interests of Newfoundland and Labrador. We’ve already experienced two NAFTA lawsuits that have set potential precedents over water and judicial sovereignty.  As for Muskrat Falls, any scaling back or retreat from the project would in all probability provoke NAFTA lawsuits from participating corporations like Emera that have affiliates in the United States.

Unfortunately, our federal government does not appear to be interested in seizing the opportunity presented by NAFTA renegotiations to return judicial control over corporate lawsuits to our national court system.  Trade Minister Freeland prefers, instead, to talk about strengthening “the right to regulate” within NAFTA. The model for this will be the Investor Court System (ICS) that is about to be implemented in the Canada-EU CETA trade and investment agreement.

 But the Investor Court System also has many strong critics.  Last month Belgium asked the European Court of Justice to rule on whether the ICS was compatible with European law.  Both the largest German federation of judges and prosecutors  and the the European Association of Judges have stated their opposition not only to ISDS but to the ICS.

Why is the federal government so keen on ISDS?

The constant threat of lSDS lawsuits puts a potentially huge price tag on any law or regulation that government might want to introduce in the future.  In this sense, ISDS in any form is a back door, long term assault on Canadian sovereignty.  Yet, in spite of Canada being the most sued developed country in the world, our government is determined to keep ISDS in NAFTA?   Why is that?

It seems pretty clear that the big ISDS winner is the corporate sector.   Could it be that we have a federal government that places the interests of international corporations above that of protecting the public good and the environment, both at home and abroad? 

……….
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Submitted by Marilyn Reid

​As part of our educational mandate Democracy Alert has  developed a series of multiple choice questions  on societal  issues, designed to provoke discussion in  senior high social studies classes.

We thought it might be of interest to our readers if we extended this format to our blog each month. Here is this month's question which  focuses on the economy.      

A generation ago the top managers in large corporations were paid straightforward salaries like everybody else.  Today, CEOs are increasingly paid a portion of their salary in stocks or shares.  Our question of the month  is:  In Fortune 500 companies  (the largest American corporations) what percentage of what CEOs are paid  is now, on average,  issued as stocks?  Is it:

a)       20%                        b)  40%                 c)  60%                  d)  80%

                                                                     ............................................

One of the principal tenets of neoliberalism is that  individuals will and should try to maximize their own wealth.  That includes CEOs. The average Fortune 500 CEO now takes 80% of their pay in the form of stocks or stock options. The result is that  their natural inclination or priority will be to increase the price of these stocks as quickly as possible.  One of the ways of doing that is to get the corporation to use its own money to buy back stock, thereby decreasing the supply of its stocks available for others to buy.  The effect will be, in the short term, to increase the price of the stock.  This has become so popular that buybacks now consume on average over 50% of the profits of S&P firms.

Can you see a problem here?  Money that should be going into paying workers their fair share, strengthening production, and investing in research and development is being diverted so that stock holders and their CEO can make quick, easy money.   In this way neoliberalism favours those who already have money over those who are trying to earn it. It has also created a stock market where the rise and fall of share values no longer accurately reflect corporate strengths and weaknesses.
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This statistic came from The Corporate Contradictions of Neoliberalism, a paper published over summer in the American journal  American Affairs.  While last month’s blog focused on the illusions neoliberal ideology  perpetrates about how money and debt are used, this month’s review looks specifically at how large corporations function in the neoliberal economy.

Why have we chosen this article to review?
 
Precarious employment, lower wages, decreased benefits, and mounting stress are features of 21st century society. Most analyses of the growing economic pain and uncertainty felt by an ever expanding number of people focus on globalization or automation. We are subtly told that there is nothing we can do about their impact.  Globalization and automation are part of progress and unstoppable.

But, what if the big culprit behind growing inequality is the modern corporation? Under neoliberalism, the corporation has become the world’s dominant institution, with many of the largest corporations eclipsing nation states in revenues and global presence.

Fortunately, there is growing criticism of the neoliberal interpretation and idealization of the corporate world. We particularly like David Ciepley's analysis.

Ciepley asserts that there is a huge contradiction between the idealized picture neoliberal economists paint of how a healthy economy should work and the economy neoliberalism is actually sponsoring . The neoliberal corporation is at the heart of this misconception.

Misconceptions about corporate ownership

Originally, the corporation was modeled on the incorporated city, first Rome and then medieval towns. Just as the citizens of a city do not own the assets of the city, stockholders do not own the assets of the corporation. The corporation, which is an abstract legal entity created by government charter, is the sole proprietor.

In other words, contrary to what we believe, stockholders do not share ownership of a corporation. Stock is just a financial instrument - a special form of investment that a corporation is privileged to sell, in the same way that a corporation can sell shoes or cars. Stockholders can resell their investment if they can find others investor to buy their share, but they do not have any legal claim over the corporation’s assets, except at bankruptcy, “when they are last in line as heirs, not first in line as owners”.

​To continue reading this article click here.

,One of the things we try to do at Democracy Alert is highlight interesting books and reports that address growing inequality and the lack of democratic push-back. If you check out our resource section you will see Coles Notes type summaries, in point form, of Thomas Piketty’s Capitalism in the 21st Century, Wendy Brown’s Undoing the Demos, Colin Crouch’s Post Democracy and Guy Standing’s The Precariat, the new emerging class. 

These authors convincingly document the negative impact of the neoliberal policies of the last 40 years. What has been missing so far, however, is an analysis of the flawed thinking behind neoliberal economics. Two recently published books fill that gap.

J is for Junk Economics, by American economist Michael Hudson, demonstrates how modern economists deliberately put meaning into economic words that actually mean the opposite of their historical roots. The parallels with the Doublethink of Orwell’s 1984 are obvious.

This is a great book for unravelling the gobbledygook of economic terminology and showing how it has artificially fettered and distorted economic debate and discussion. Because it’s written in the form of an A to Z dictionary of prevailing economic terminology, we haven’t yet figured out how to summarize the book.  However, you can learn more about Michael Hudson’s ideas at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZM0_7PVuVVg

The second book, Can we avoid another financial crisis?, is by Australian economist, Steve Keen. Keen was one of the very few economists worldwide to anticipate the Great Financial Crisis of 2008. He argues that another financial crisis is inevitable, given the instability of our current economic system and identifies the five countries that will probably be the hardest hit. Canada is one of them.
​
Can we avoid another financial crisis? is an excellent start for anyone who wants to understand the true nature of the global economic system. For a brief overview of Steve Keen’s analysis click here.

  We put a letter in the Telegram today, expressing our disappointment with the Trudeau government's use of the whip in a House vote on May 31st.  That vote asked MPs to  accept the recommendations of the Electoral Reform Committee and hold a referendum on proportional representation.    Only two brave Liberal MPs, one in Toronto and one in PEI chose to defy the whip. 

​Here's what we said in our letter.
.................

We need a different proportional representation strategy.

Back in 2015, Justin Trudeau repeatedly promised voters that if the Liberals became the next government, 2015 would be the last first-past-the-post election. He also promised that the party whip would only be used by a Liberal government to deal with confidence matters and implementing campaign promises.

Two weeks ago, the Liberal Party of Canada used the whip to defeat a motion in the House of Commons to accept the recommendations of the parliamentary electoral reform committee and hold a referendum on proportional representation. This effectively put an end to attempts to keep electoral reform alive federally.

This was disturbing, not just because of the broken promises, but because the thwarting of the electoral reform committee’s recommendation was done by a party that has been elected as a majority government by only 39.5 per cent of voters.

That couldn’t happen under a proportional representation system, where the percentage of seats each party gets matches the percentage of votes they receive. Designed to prevent any government with less than 50 per cent of the votes from acting with absolute power, proportional representation leads to more coalition governments and the potential for small parties to wrestle concessions and compromises from government.

That’s precisely what the Liberal party doesn’t want. They argue that proportional representation will lead to frequent elections, uncooperative parliaments where nothing gets done, and the rise of extremist parties.

None of this is valid. Over the last 50 years, Canada has actually held more elections than most European countries where proportional representation is the norm. In mainland Europe, unlike here, Pharmacare and government-subsidized daycare programs are also the norm. Workers’ benefits and rights are stronger and there are better environmental regulations. The result is that there is less inequality in Europe than in Canada.

As to the risk of political extremism, my European friends point out that Donald Trump would never have been elected under a proportional representation system because he didn’t win the popular vote. Nor would the Harper government have been able to pass all its unpopular legislation.
If we are going to develop a momentum for change, it will only happen if ordinary people step forward to promote it.

The Liberal government’s defeat of the electoral reform motion last month now transfers any hopes for implementing proportional representation back to the provinces, with British Columbia being the province to watch.

But what about here in Newfoundland and Labrador? In the 2015 provincial election, in spite of being in the midst of a gigantic economic crisis, voter turnout was apparently the lowest of any province since Confederation. That’s a huge comment on people’s dissatisfaction with our political choices.

We need transformative change. Three local groups — Democracy Alert, the Council of Canadians and the Social Justice Co-operative — believe electoral reform is a good place to start. We would like to see a thorough debate on the merits of proportional representation, followed by a referendum, ideally attached to an election.

Our referendum question is simple. Let voters decide whether or not they want to change to an electoral system that follows the principles of proportional representation. If a majority of voters choose change, it would be the responsibility of our elected representatives, through an all-party committee, to select a specific proportional representation system. This would then be implemented for the following election.

Notice that our referendum question is not tied to a specific proportional representation system. Why? There are actually more than 40 different proportional representation options to choose from. In our opinion, it’s a mistake to precipitously commit to a particular system simply because other provinces have favoured them in their referendums. Let’s take our time and choose the best system for our province and let’s do it in a deliberative, unbiased and collaborative way.

Proportional representation is not a radical option, in spite of what the Liberal party would like us to believe. More than 90 countries now use some form of proportional representation. Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales have also gone that route. Why, then, not us?

If you want to learn more about proportional representation, N.L. style, there’s information at DemocracyAlert.ca. And please consider joining us. If we are going to develop a momentum for change, it will only happen if ordinary people step forward to promote it. Where better place to look for support than with Telegram readers?

Democracy Alert is transitioning.

For three years we directed our attention to education based initiatives.  Our primary focus was on the Newfoundland and Labrador senior high school social studies curriculum, which for almost 20 years was devoid of any courses that gave students the opportunity to talk about governance, democracy, world problems and political economy. The consequence, not surprisingly, was the lowest voter turnout of any of the 10 provinces both at the federal and provincial level. 

There is good news however. Our understanding is that the NL Department of Education has agreed with our concerns and there will be changes. We look forward to seeing them.

Why are we are now choosing to focus on electoral reform?

We’ve concluded that our current electoral system is incapable of addressing three alarming trends  -  growing inequality, growing corporate dominance of government decision making, and growing public disinterest in democratic participation. One way of addressing this is by changing the way we elect governments.

We would like to see a transition to a proportional representation (PR) system -  an electoral system that achieves two important outcomes. Proportional representation gives small parties and the diverse opinions they represent fairer representation in government. It also prevents any party with less than 50% of the popular vote from forming a single party majority government. Check out our five part video series for an explanation of how that can benefit ordinary citizens.

Our approach differs from that of other groups advocating for proportional representation in two significant ways. We have a different referendum question. We also believe that, if we are to interest the public in proportional representation, we need to focus more on the achievements of proportional representation countries rather than the disadvantages of our first-past-the-post system.

Our Referendum Question

We want a referendum question attached to our provincial election (ideally the next one) that would present voters with the following choice:

       ________  I would like to continue with our current system for electing MHAs to the House of Assembly
       ________  I would like to change to a proportional representation system for electing MHAs.

Alternatively the referendum question might be stated as:

     I want to change to a proportional representation system for electing MHAs to the House of Assembly.

      __________  Yes
      __________   No

Should voters choose proportional representation, the incoming government would use their term in office to research and select the proportional representation system best suited to Newfoundland and Labrador’s unique demography.  We recommend that that process be done through an all-party committee commissioned to seek input from civil society.

Why do we prefer this referendum question to one tied to a specific PR system like Mixed Member Proportional or Single Transferable Vote?   We believe that proportional representation gets defeated, or gets lukewarm acceptance, not based on its intent but on its mechanics. Understanding the concept of matching the number of seats a party receives in the House with the votes the party receives is easy.  People like that idea. But what is complicated and confusing is trying to understand how that proportionality is achieved.  People don’t like being confused and so they vote for the status quo.  

Simplifying the referendum questions would allow citizens to vote for or against proportional representation according to its merits rather than it mechanics.  But, there is another reason for not immediately choosing a particular proportional representation system.  Did you know that there are more than 40 different PR systems in the world?  We need to take our time and select the system that best suits our needs  and values from all the choices out there.

Spreading the proportional representation message

We  believe that if voters saw the benefits that proportional representation has brought to European countries there would be a drive to change our electoral system. Our challenge is to get that message out to people  across our province. 

How do we do that? We are not sure. We are looking for ideas and we are looking for volunteers. So, if proportional representation is something that you, too, believe in, please consider joining us. 

We can be reached at democracyalert.nl@gmail.com.
 
 
 

On May 10th (7 p.m.) Democracy Alert, along  with the Social Justice Cooperative and the St. John's chapter of the Council of Canadians will be launching our ideas for electoral reform at a public session at St. Augustine's Church on Westerland Rd. in St. John's.  

For a preview of our novel referendum concept, read the article below published in the Hill Times today.  The author is Helen Forsey, author of  "A People's Senate for Canada – Not a Pipe Dream."

This is good news as it means that many MPs across the country will now learn of, and hopefully consider, "a realistic way forward" for electoral reform.

​Our thanks go to Helen!
 

                               Electoral Reform – A Realistic Way Forward
                                       published in the Hill Times, May 1st, 2017
   
 
            In the three months since Prime Minister Trudeau's about-face on electoral reform, real change in our voting system has begun to feel like a lost cause. A vigorous and high-profile public discussion got pushed back into the shadows, and now, even with Nathan Cullen's upcoming motion in the Commons, the prospects for breathing life back into the issue seem dim. The hitherto fluid and hopeful "how-to" discourse has morphed into a battle where the various players – organizations and political parties alike – are dug into their own particular positions and unwilling to lose face. There might appear to be no way out.
 
            Ah, but there is. Led by Democracy Alert in St. John's, Newfoundland, several groups are putting forward an idea that has benefits for all sides. Their proposal? Attach a referendum question to the 2019 election posing a simple choice between a) keeping the present system, or, b) moving to a more proportional one. Then, if the referendum favours proportional representation, the incoming government would complete the process of selecting the best system and putting it in place for the following election.
 
            One of the recurring problems of electoral reform efforts to date has been the complex mechanics of the different systems of proportional representation being considered. As Democracy Alert's Marilyn Reid explains, that complexity can confuse the issue and discourage people. A simplified referendum asking voters to choose or reject PR based on its merits rather than its mechanics would enable citizens to argue the real pros and cons of change versus the status quo before deciding to adopt a particular system.
 
            A quick recap of where we're at right now. After spectacularly reversing their commitment to ending the distortions and false majorities of first-past-the-post elections, Mr. Trudeau and his ministers trotted out every possible excuse to justify keeping the very system they had formerly denounced. Electoral reform has since been fading from the headlines, in accordance with the government's efforts to consign it to oblivion. But the grassroots citizens' movement is not about to give up. After months of tangible progress towards their goal of proportional representation, the most vocal reform organizations continue to demand that the Liberals' fulfil their original promise – a new system in place for the 2019 trip to the polls.
 
            Unfortunately, that 2019 deadline now constitutes an obstacle to its own goal. In order to jump through all the procedural hoops required to implement such a change in time for the next election, legislation would have to be developed and passed in double-quick time. But hasty legislation has an alarming record of being counter-productive, especially on complex and controversial issues. Moreover, as the official Opposition has pointed out, changing the system without explicitly asking Canadian voters whether or not they want change suggests a lack of respect for democratic principles.
 
            At this point, then, the 2019 implementation deadline is simply not a good idea for either supporters or opponents of proportional representation, or for the undecided. The timeline should be adjusted.
 
            But that's adjusted, not abandoned. Contrary to the government's assertions, the Special Committee on Electoral Reform last year did find broad consensus across the country for a move to greater proportionality – that is, election results that reflect approximately the popular vote. What they did not find in the short time available was a specific system that they could unreservedly recommend.
 
            There are many potentially viable forms such a system could take, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. Given the complexities and the time involved, the next step is not to decide on a particular model, but to have voters make the crucial choice between keeping first-past-the-post or moving to a more proportional system.
 
            For those who like the prospect of electoral reform, this proposal would provide the opportunity to move the matter forward. For those who favour the status quo, it would give them a definitive chance to defend it. For the various opposition parties, it would break the current deadlock and enable them to work co-operatively again, implementing the agreement they reached late last year in the multi-party Electoral Reform Committee. And for a government facing burgeoning cynicism and disillusionment, it would offer a way to address the problems they now see with their own ambitious campaign promise, and a chance to try and restore a degree of public trust around this issue.
 
            We must not let the government’s abandonment of this major commitment become just one more bit of old news. With more Canadians aware of the issue than ever before, now is the critical time to take the next step forward.
 
            The Democracy Alert proposal gives us a way to do that which is both principled and practical. Their modified referendum plan provides the time that will be needed to pursue the work the multi-party Electoral Reform Committee began, examining the many possible systems and selecting the best one for Canadians.
 
            This essential process should not be rushed, but nor should it be delayed any longer. One of the beauties of this plan is that attaching the referendum to the next general election will both minimize expenses and maximize public involvement. It will require an amendment to the Referendum Act, but the benefits would make it well worthwhile.
 
            Coming out of Newfoundland and Labrador, this proposal has already sparked the interest of some parliamentarians, and once it is more widely known, it should win broad support from the public across the country. It could be a workable and productive compromise in the best Canadian tradition.
 
            This is not a pipe dream. Like the positive changes now happening in the Senate, a fairer, workable, made-in-Canada electoral system is a totally achievable work in progress. It has been temporarily halted by a misguided decision, but it is propelled by the will of millions of citizens. Now we all just have to get out of our own way, listen to each other, and use our collective energy, creativity and experience to make it happen.
 
 
Helen Forsey is a writer based in Ontario and Newfoundland. Her latest book is "A People's Senate for Canada – Not a Pipe Dream."

Check out our Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1838899483043488/

Why did so many good, conscientious Americans vote for Trump?  And why do we continue to be obsessed by him?

Why are anti-democratic political parties and their populist leaders on the rise in Europe?  


Could the way we use the Internet be contributing to the rise of authoritarian solutions for society's problems?  

This article from a former St. John's NL Occupier explores  how our attachment to Cyberworld is changing the way we value not just democratic activism but democracy itself.  

A version of this  letter, written by one of our members, was published in the Telegram on Monday, the 12th of December.  


Sometimes a cartoon just says it all.   

That’s how I felt about the De Adder cartoon published in the Telegram last week. It showed a mask of Justin Trudeau stripped away to reveal a chipper, prancing Steven Harper. It’s good to see our media subtly acknowledging that the last election changed very little. We still have Steven Harper policies. It’s just that the face and style of delivery have changed.

Four recent federal government decisions stand out to me.

​One is the approval of the Kinder Morgan pipeline extension, a decision that accrues all the benefits of increased revenues to one province, Alberta, while residents of another province, BC, get the environmental risks. Not only is this politically unacceptable, but Canada’s continuing blinkered commitment to oil and gas extraction above all else is leading us nowhere economically. Over the last 15 years of this obsession, our export performance has been the second lowest among OECD “rich” countries. Expect the statistics to worsen, given the global community’s commitment to a lower carbon future.

There’s also the Trudeau government’s insistence that CETA, their “gold standard of trade agreements”, should be ratified as quickly as possible. The protests of 455 different civil society organizations across Europe and Canada, the millions of signature garnered through petitions, and the concerns of so many European parliamentarians are simply ignored. CETA must be passed, especially now that it looks as though the two other corporate engineered trade agreements, the Trans Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, have been killed off by public opposition in the US and Europe.

Then, last week, the Liberals backtracked on the election promise that 2015 would be the last election held under our first past the post electoral system. Why? I suspect it’s because neither the Canadian public nor the Electoral Reform Committee are interested in Prime Minister Trudeau’s preference, a weighted voting system that would massively favour the election of Liberals.

Most worrying, however, is something that has been underreported - the Liberal government’s new infrastructure initiative. Like many others, I think investing in infrastructure is a very good idea. However, it’s the way it’s going to be done that should be sending out warning bells.

Government has proposed the development of an infrastructure bank largely funded by the private sector. For every dollar that government spends on a project, the bank would attempt to leverage four dollars from private pools of capital. Money raised in this way would be used to finance Public-Private partnerships. The Advisory Council to government has recommended that Ottawa should privatize – in full or in part – some of its existing assets to raise money for the initiative.

I have two concerns. First, the concept makes little economic sense. Why would government seek private investors who will expect a return of seven to nine percent when the government can float 30 year bonds to finance infrastructure at two per cent? Secondly, this initiative will slide us into greater privatization and control of traditional public sectors by international corporations.

Of course, I believe that that is exactly what this government wants. I think it’s time to consider that our elected leaders have been seduced into believing that only the corporate sector knows what’s best for the Canadian economy. It’s Bay Street corporations and financiers that seem to be running the Liberal party. Perhaps they’ve been doing so for a long time and we simply didn’t notice.

There are parallels here with our province. We’re in a massive financial mess because past Conservative governments took their advice exclusively from powerful business groups. It was monumentally bad advice, undoubtedly driven by the vision of quick profits that could be made. Yet my fear is that, in looking for expertise on how to revive our broken economy, our politicians will continue to turn to the very same groups that encouraged so many of those original disastrous decisions and policies.

Like Edsel Bonnell, in his letters to the Telegram, I believe we need more public involvement in long term decision making and much greater cooperation and collaboration among the political parties. Until that happens, expect public anger, pessimism and disrespect to grow in our province.

Marilyn Reid
​Conception Bay South

Check out this comprehensive article on electoral reform by Robin Whitaker in The Independent

Democracy Alert is in the process of developing a "Question of the Day" package that could be used in a variety of ways to pique students' interest on issues that are not currently covered in the curriculum.  ​

Our group has met several times over the last year and a half (2014/2015) with either the Deputy Minister or personnel in the Department of Education.   Conversation has focused on  a possible connection between the falling youth voter  (only 29.5%  of young Newfoundlanders and Labradorians  under 25 voted in the 2011 federal election) and the  removal  (almost 20 years ago) of courses like Democracy, World Problems, Global Issues, etc. from the social studies curriculum.  We are particularly concerned that these courses were not replaced by courses that promoted discussion and debate around societal and citizenship issues.  Instead, the focus over the last two decades, has been, in our opinion, on educating students to be good workers and good consumers.  

We have suggested that students graduating from high school should be required to take 

• at least one course that focuses on an analysis and discussion around the important ethical, social, democratic and ideological questions of the 21st century.  (Courses like Democracy, Social Justice and Ethics, Political Science or Philosophy)
• at least one course that examines and analyzes the major economic and political global issues of the 21st century (courses like Global Issues, World Problems or Modern History)

We also suggest that the Career Education course could be downsized into a single credit course and no longer be required as a graduation requirement. ​