Accountability in the Governing Class

We continued with the government/authority/politics angle, branching off from the Leader's insistence on what government is for if not to have the people under control.  In order to have good governance, people in power need to be accountable for what they do.  Transparency is a fundamental feature of trustworthy and desirable administration.  Of course, we are not speaking only about governments, elected or otherwise, but the governing class, which includes social and economic elites who can be openly controlling or be power behind the power.  It might seem as if this idea is easiest to enforce in democracy, where the whole idea of the government is that it receives its power and legitimacy from the people, but in practice elected officials are more beholden to the elites who organize elections than the voters who ostensibly decide them.  Furthermore, since the government is working with private individuals, they can appeal to personal privacy to avoid giving details about their decisions and actions, since a donor or friend of a politician is not a public figure and therefore entitled to privacy.  How can we draw a line that clearly defines when we have the right to know and those in power have the duty to tell us, and when everyone is allowed the comfort of the shadows?

Our Doctor was happy with this topic as well, saying that we need to discuss more often in life.  Too many things go by without discussion.  He commented on the changes of the past 20 years, not only in Spain, but worldwide, that have allowed personal opinions to become bigger and louder than we ever dreamed in the past.  Opinions used to be individual and isolated, but now we can find out what anyone with access to a computer thinks, and even some people without access whose words are taken down by others.  To some extent, this should make things like accountability easier to maintain, since news arrives everywhere almost instantaneously, and accountability is necessary.  As humans we have a tendency to avoid personal responsibility, which is part of the reason for a governing class in the first place.  We delegate power to "professionals", trusting they will do their job and let us do ours.  Harkening back to the week before, though, the information we receive about our leaders comes to us oriented to what we are supposed to think.  Nothing is truly objective.  Still, he reminded us, if one looks at history it appears that we have never lived better than we do now.  Democracy might be a disaster, but we do not know anything better.  Our normal state is one of perplexity, our Doctor informed us, and while we try to keep tabs on people who do important jobs, anyone can lie.  We are experiencing something new, he said, and we just do not know what will happen next.  Instead of becoming keener on observing what is going on, we retreat and let our leaders do what they want more than ever.

An Occasional Participant insisted that the law should enforce transparency and freedom of information, for the benefit of the people.  Democracy itself should be a guarantee of transparency, which in turn would allow for accountability in leaders.  The separation of powers, also mentioned by the Leader, is a key feature of democracy which allows each branch to be held accountable, not just to the people but to the other branches, which ought to have some real power.  She wondered later if good government was the creation of a good society, or if government was necessary to improve a society.  She also admitted that we can gather enormous amounts of information, both on private citizens and on public figures, but the real question is if people are interested in that information.

The Leader, also the Source in this case, also reminded us of the past week's discussion with regard to information and control or manipulation of it.  For true accountability to exist, there must be neutral reporting, not just self-reporting by the authorities.  He also specified that accountability is really only necessary when things go wrong.  In his writing, he spoke quite a bit about Thatcher, which caused some agitation in other participants, but his explanation was that she, along with Reagan, was the primary source for individualism in modern politics.  The importance of information for everybody is so that we can all make better decisions, hopefully learning from others' mistakes as well as our own.  We cannot all be part of the governing class, but nobody can do whatever they want.  In modern society the individual counts, not the institution so much, but who is the individual accountable to?  All of society, answered the Leader.  Democratic elections are not a direct show of preference, and the power of each voter varies based on the type of constituency.  Still, politicians are supposed to be professional leaders and we should trust professionals.  His final thought was about the contributions made by individuals to society, saying that everybody contributes and receives the contributions of others, emphasizing the mutual accountability we accept as members of a society.

The True Philosopher led some examination of the make-up of the governing class, especially those who are not in the spotlight of public authority.  He also reminded us that "democracy" can mean or be made to mean many things, not all of which are desirable.  Much of the problem with accountability, he implied, was a problem with democracy itself.  If we accept that a country or society evolves into democracy as a more advanced form of public organization, we can criticize countries which have democracy in name but not in deed for lagging behind.  Voting might exist, as well as political parties, even opposition.  However, the governing class really has no accountability to the people, especially those who remain in a sort of shadow government, supporting the public faces but sharing in no public responsibility for their decisions, which are actually acted out by those public faces.

The Actress complained about the complexity of the current structure, saying it was easier when you knew who you were against.  Today we do not have clear enemies, nor do our leaders.  In some cases it might be better to have fewer leaders, as that would lead to quicker decisions, and less influence from different background supporters besides.

The Seeker of Happiness saw a clear balance between haves and have-nots in society, and said accountability is the tool that would lessen the differences between the two parts.  For this reason, we get as little of it as possible.  He practically ranted about the tricks the powerful play to keep others from accessing power, but also wisely warned against using extremes to try to get what we want.  He said at first that anybody can be a politician, since there is no exam to take, but almost immediately disabused us of the practical truth in that idea, saying that people on the bottom do not understand enough to be effective leaders.  This is an intentional, cultivated ignorance, in his opinion, since the lower strata of society tend to be kept from education the upper strata.  The elite can hide their self-interest behind complicated topics and induce the less-informed voters to vote against their own self-interest.  His analysis of modern society gave him the view that most of our interpersonal conflicts are also tricks pulled on us by the elite to keep us occupied and unable to see what they do behind the smoke and mirrors.  Still, we cannot simply escape from society, for we are social animals by nature, and incomplete without a community around us.