Ecological Governance

By Dr. Richard Hames

The organising and governing of societies that were deliberately designed to compete with one another is an engrossing enigma facing the evolution of sapiens. The trials and tribulations facing every approach we use in the act of governing are convoluted and multifaceted. Often we’re held hostage to ideological traps that serve a narrow purpose: that of attaining and exercising power. Other than that “common cause” it is impossible to identify one single overriding reason for their failure. In spite of subtle differences between democratic and autocratic systems they are all plagued by similar shortcomings, and hence disappointing outcomes.

Like that which prevails in communitarian states, citizens in democratic countries across the ‘global north’ are increasingly prevented from having a meaningful voice in defining their own prospects and way of life. In every sovereign nation around the world, without exception, women who comprise slightly more than 50% of the populace, still struggle to be heard and taken seriously by a world designed by men for men: a world impeccably incarnated in contemporary politics.

Schools teach our youth that there are no options worth considering other than democracy as currently constituted and practiced (which is inherently ‘good’) or some form of socialism, more frequently labelled communism (which is inherently ‘bad’ or even tyrannical). Any consistent critical thinking applied to the topic seems to have petrified long ago. Confusion is widespread. So, for example, the Chinese believe, with some justification, that their People’s Republic is more egalitarian than systems found in nations where the Westminster model of parlimentary democracy is deployed. But there are other more pragmatic concerns.

Corporate media, feasting on the pranks of ‘bad boy’ politicians and their scheming parties are in no mood to entertain notions of reform. Big business is happy with any status quo that gives them undue influence. Voting every few years between two protagonists has convinced a gullible public that this ritual equates to democracy. The performance of representatives often descends into scenes resembling the most absurd moments at Hogwarts School of Wizardry. Meanwhile the manner in which political parties select people to represent their constituency means that governments are crammed full of career politicians, who have limited real life work experience, and are unfit even to run a raffle.

In this world the mainstream centre has been progressively excavated by populist extremes on both sides of the political aisle, while the encephalon of the political machine has become so ossified that reform of any kind is unlikely, at least without recourse to radical reinvention. Given the role that mainstream media plays in narrative management, curators of a constant stream of propaganda insisting that everything is as it should be, there’s absolutely no desire for reform on the horizon. Besides, politicians are the lawmakers of the land and are unlikely to write themselves out of a job.

Too often immersed in antiquated thinking and rituals inherited from old empires, continuously patching up the present rather than dealing with tomorrow’s impending opportunities, clinging tenaciously to ideological biases and partnerships, with policy settings reminiscent of an earlier era, politics has sacrificed its gravitas for the glitter of a circus. Its main purpose undermined by the faux struggle between left and right (poles that are closer than most politicians care to admit) the function of governing has warped into a suite of political diversions aimed at keeping the ruling party in power and the public distracted.

Setting aside the obscenity of brutal and unwanted military disctatorships, unprejudiced analysis indicates that the machinery of government is no better or worse in Australia or Canada or France than it is in China, Cuba or Vietnam. While it’s arguable that the authoritarian governance methods deployed in more socially inclined countries are progressively delivering better results, particularly in terms of improvements to the overall health and wellbeing of citizens, as one might expect, than in most representative democracies, the freedom of citizens to bring their genuine concerns to the attention of an incumbent power elite locked into their own psychopathic narcissism is severely constrained wherever we look.

And while nobody can claim they have achieved perfection, there’s always room for improvement. A few common issues contribute to perceived failures within all governance systems

  • Crorruption erodes the public’s trust in political institutions. When people start to believe that their representatives are corrupt, and prioritize personal gain over public welfare, it undermines the legitimacy of the entire system.
  • Growing economic disparities can lead to social unrest and a sense of disenfranchisement. Citizens may feel that political parties primarily serve the interests of a wealthy elite, leading to a loss of faith in any form of centralised government.
  • Increasing political polarization can hinder effective management. If political parties are so deeply divided that they’re unwilling to compromise, legislative gridlock occurs, preventing the resolution of the most pressing matters.
  • Biased or sensationalized media coverage can distort public perceptions, contributing to division. In the era of social media, misinformation spreads quickly, making it challenging for citizens to make informed decisions, which is vital in any representative system.
  • Governments that curtail civil liberties, restrict freedom of speech, and engage in heavy policing tactics can lead to a breakdown of democratic values and institutions.
  • Weak mechanisms for holding politicians accountable can result in a culture of impunity. When elected officials face few consequences for unethical or illegal behaviour, public trust is eroded still further.

As for potential solutions, some advocate for alternative forms of governance, such as direct democracy, where citizens have a more direct role in decision-making. I myself co-founded such a method in MiVote. However, direct democracy has its challenges, including the potential for uninformed decisions, the risk of majority tyranny, and logistical integrity when involving large populations in every decision.
Other potential solutions include campaign finance reform, promoting education and media literacy to help citizens critically evaluate information, as well as reducing the impact of misinformation on public opinion, electoral system reform, reinforcing the independence of judicial and oversight institutions can help hold politicians to account for their actions, and encouraging civic participation can help grow an informed and active citizenry, thereby fostering a sense of ownership in the political process.
Ultimately, however, in spite of good intentions, even the most well-meaning solutions fail to address five wicked problems:

  1. Good governance and politics do not mix – they actually obstruct each other. Given our penchant for infotainment, games played in the political arena merely complicate and shelve the intellectual work of forward-looking decision-making and policy formulation that’s then undertaken by public service officials or large consulting firms.
  2. Career politicians are superfluous intermediaries – an obsolete impediment given the complexity of today’s geopolitics and the sophisticated AI-enabled information technologies that can actually do the routine work of government faster and with fewer errors.
  3. The power of incumbency, in both political and commercial spheres, means that all proposals for political reform (reinvention is never seriously considered), however novel or preposterous they might at first appear, are reconfigured and repackaged to fit neatly into the prevailing paradigm: a world-system driven by two obsessive compulsive disorders: (i) the acquisitive and extractionist cycle of desire and consumption generated by the owners of capital and marketed by corporations as if it’s their lifeblood (it is); and (ii) the characterization of “leadership” advanced by both large consulting firms (who routinely capture business from government agencies) and business schools (who benefit from grooming the consultants that join those big firms).
  4. The community has been brainwashed to believe that policy decisions by parliamentarians are made with the public’s best interests in mind. Simultaneously, the political class has been coached to believe that they know better than the individuals and communities they represent; that they are the crème de la crème of society. The blend of these two factor has led to a situation where we’re governed by the least among us, and this is acceptable to the general public who assume there is no better alternative.
  5. Although in theory the principles and processes of direct governance, using smart technologies to convey the wishes of the commmunity in real time, are far superior to all forms of representative governance, the public needs to be better informed and have convenient ways to participate in and engage with the political process, and these are not forthcoming. Most individuals inevitably pay far more attention to putting food on the table and ensuring their children receive a decent education than spending valuable time giving feedback and advice to those paid to make decisions on our behalf. Even if they were inclined to engage more fully in the process of governance, the raw information and strategic intelligence they would need in order to make wise decisions is as equally unavailable to us as it is to the paid political class.

The list of reforms routinely bandied around among political reformers invariably includes keeping the structure of representative democracy intact but introducing new rules as to how it all works. Typically these include notions like requiring politicians to have real work experience, abolishing the prospect of a career in politics, doing away with political parties, handing the job of devising and adminstering policy to the professional public service, prohibiting lobbying and donations by corporate entities, using citizen juries to adjudicate on contentious governance matters, and imposing a lifetime ban on politicians from trading on their knowledge for personal gain. All very worthy in their own right but hardly revolutionary.

Indeed, given the extent of human ingenuityin so many other fields, it’s embarrassing to think that our collective imagination is so constrained that we can only come up with tiny tweaks to our key political dilemmas that, even then, are considered outrageously challenging, inappropriate and unworkable.
But perhaps we’re going about this the wrong way. Perhaps the answer is to be found in reconceiving our source models of governance by choosing a different framing ontology. What would governance feature if it were to be administered from start to finish by artificial intelligence for example? What would it look like if we focused solely on recalibrating the implementation of political power? Or, to dive into the defining mood of our times by looking to ecology and sustainability: what if science, and explicitly nature, already hold the answers to what we see as an unresolvable dilemma?

Science and politics have always depended upon each other. The decisions and actions of politicians affect research funding and research-policy priorities. At the same time, scientific research informs and shapes a spectrum of public policies, from environmental protection to fossil fuel exploration. The judgements of politicians impact higher-education too. They can ensure that academic freedom is upheld, and commit institutions to work harder to protect equality, diversity and inclusion, as well as to give more space to voices from previously marginalized communities. Politicians also have the power to pass laws that do the opposite of course.

But what if we go much deeper than this litany of electoral touchpoints? What if we use the laws of nature in combination with complexity science to formulate a new philosophy of governance where the exercise of political power, directed in favour of the public good, arises from the people rather than political parties constrained by narrow ideologies and unhealthy relationships with big business?

The science of complexity emphasizes the interconnectedness, non-linearity, and emergent properties of such systems – including the fusion of socio-economic and administrative factors within governance. If we view the intricate mechanisms of governance as a whole, through this lens, recognising that each complex system is comprised of numerous interconnected elements (such as institutions, individuals, technologies, and socio-economic factors) that interact in unpredictable ways, policymakers would be compelled to design more adaptive and resilient governance structures.

The importance of administrative flexibility, of adaptive governance processes capable of responding in real time to dynamic and volatile conditions, particularly given the uncertainties surrounding geopolitical nervousness and paranoia, should not be taken lightly. Rather than rigid hierarchical structures, systems designed to be more supple, decentralized, and capable of self-organization and self-renewal, involving mechanisms for community education and feedback, the continuous upgrading of learning, and rapid adaptation in response to unforeseen crises as well as the navigation of shifting conditions, are all vital.

The laws of nature, particularly those related to decentralised systems and interconnectedness, can inspire models of networked governance. Instead of centralised power structures, the distribution of information and ensuing decision-making could be disseminated across interconnected nodes within communities and across networks. This would automatically enrich collaboration, information sharing, and collective problem-solving, while reducing the fragility associated with centralised controls from which we still suffer.

Resilience can be prioritised and enhanced by incorporating redundancy, diversity, and modularity into the design of governance systems. This involves building in safeguards and fallback mechanisms to ensure that the system can withstand shocks and disruptions, and prepare for unforeseen events.
Policymaking, too, need not be exempt from such influences, benefitting by adopting approaches that account for the non-linear dynamics of complex environments. These approaches include a variety of anticipatory foresight tools, critical systems thinking, strategic navigation methods, systemic acupuncture, visualisation platforms and computational modelling – all helping to anticipate the potential consequences of policy interventions across various interconnected domains.

Complexity science also points to the effectiveness of accessing diverse mindsets, polyocular perspectives, and collective intelligence. It follows that governance should be redesigned in ways that give precedence to participatory and deliberative decision-making processes that engage a wide range of stakeholders. This can lead to more informed, legitimate, and contextually appropriate decisions than those put forward by a political party however robust its community consultation processes appear to be.

Ultimately, any governance system following nature’s principles would empower local communities more effectively than today’s centralised and industrialised machinery. Recognizing the principle of autopoiesis in complex systems, governance models can authorise local communities to take more control over their own affairs. This involves devolving power and resources to the grassroots level, allowing communities to tailor solutions to their unique needs and circumstances.

If that looks like a revolution, then so be it. There is simply too much at stake to continue with the default system we have in place today, a legacy from a post-world war period that was quiet, empty, and relatively easy to manage.

Overall, by integrating insights from the laws of nature and complexity science into the design and practice of political governance – a new theory of ecolitics – it’s possible to reimagine political power structures and administrative methods in ways that are more responsive, resilient, inclusive, and sustainable.
In fact this could ultimately lead to governance systems far better equipped to address the multifaceted societal challenges we face in an increasingly interconnected and as yet tentative world.