Petitions can be a force for good, but representative government remains the best system of accountability yet devised
A large public petition can have huge moral force and has long had an established offstage role in parliamentary politics. Politicians who ignore such petitions are taking a calculated risk, especially when the petition is focused on a local issue. But should petitions have a more integral role in British democracy? The idea has often tempted politicians, always keen to be popular and conscious that the public feels disconnected from the legislative process. Even as its popularity dwindled, the last Labour government set up an e-petition section of the Downing Street website, though few of those ever made much impact in either government or parliament. Now the coalition, ratings also on the slide, wants to relaunch the idea on the Directgov website.
It would be wrong to dismiss this effort as a waste of time. Even in the pre-online era, petitions were a way of insisting to politicians that they must take an issue seriously. The petitions didn't always work, but they invariably concentrated legislators' minds and sometimes they shaped the way politics handled things in future. In the online era, when so much of the public is familiar with web and text voting for reality shows and awards, there is an obvious logic in trying to improve the flow of ideas and concerns between the public and parliament. E-petitions and interactive debates on policy options should therefore be encouraged.
The government's ideas for improving the system make sense too. It was always unattractive that Labour chose a neo-feudal focus on the prime minister for its e-petition system. The coalition's more departmental approach offers a more solid model. And the possibility that popular petitions will be guaranteed a parliamentary debate is not only in line with the traditional place of petitioning in parliament, but also a good way of bolstering public accountability.
The important thing is not to get carried away by the idea that petitions constitute a purer democracy than representative government which, for all its faults, is the best and most sustainable system of accountability yet devised. The government claims to be getting round possible problems such as multiple voting and foreign voting, and also to be devising ways in which petitioners can be empowered to remain engaged with the governmental process in other ways. That a part of the nation feels strongly about something is a reality with which politicians must engage rather than bow the knee. Doubtless there would be many tens of thousands of signatures on a petition to abolish the fox hunting ban. But, as the government's decision to kick that issue into the long grass this week suggests, strong public feeling is rightly not always the end of the matter.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/29/petitions-politics-editorial
Laura Bush George W. Bush George H. W. Bush Jimmy Carter Fidel Castro
No comments:
Post a Comment