Shared governance confusion

Jan 25, 2009 Features / Columnists, Ravi Dev

With the dawning of the New Year, starting with the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. R.H.O Corbin, there has been a resurgence of calls from several quarters outside of the Government for a change in the present governmental structure. These calls have ranged from several variants of “shared governance” to greater devolution of power to local levels.

A Government spokesperson highlighted their “inclusive governance” position articulated in 2003, emphasising their limit on its expansiveness until greater “trust” is engendered among the political fraternity. It would appear that the political agenda of 2009 might be dominated by the old angst over the marginalisation of some; or, as others may have it, over unrequited political ambitions.

Two decades ago, with the PNC apparently unassailably ensconced in office through rigging of elections, we had pointed out that since our voting pattern (based on empirical research) had not changed from its old cleavage along ethnic lines, a dilemma was created for African Guyanese if the struggle for “free and fair elections” were to be successful.

By the operation of the rules of a majoritorian voting system – even exacerbated by the plurality innovation introduced by the PNC in its 1980 Constitution — the African minority would be shut out from executive office ad infinitum, as surely as Indians had been up to then. We proposed a temporary shared-governance, ending with a federal government, as South Africa was to implement in 1994.

At that time, the major opposition parties, the PPP and the WPA, while recognising the African dilemma, had difficulty in articulating it as the raison d’etre for pursuing changes in the governmental regime, since their “socialist” ideology did not sanction such a dominant position to race/ethnicity in orientating political behaviour.

In 1977, the PPP proposed a “National Front Government” which — by including all socialist parties, roped in the PNC — would include “all races and strata”. In 1979, the WPA offered its “Government of National Reconciliation”, which differed most significantly from the PPP’s proposal in finding no place for the PNC, since, in their estimation, that party “was part of the problem and could not be part of the solution”.

In both proposals, the overt rationale for suggesting the new form of governance was to deal with the economic and social crises that by then had engulfed the society. The PNC had mocked the PPP’s attempt to include racial discrimination in its formulation by enquiring as to “the socialist content of race”.

Even after it had jettisoned its socialist ideology by the nineties, the PNC – which accepted that voting in Guyana was aligned along ethnic lines, and that its support base was overwhelmingly African Guyanese – refused to explicitly articulate the dilemma that the political system posed to the latter group. It posed its challenge to the victorious PPP after the 1997 elections (which descended into violent street protests) on grounds of alleged electoral malfeasance and executive overreach.

It should surprise no one that, in the Constitutional reform process precipitated in 1999, the PNC, as the de facto representative of African Guyanese, refused to place on the agenda a governmental structure that would address the African dilemma. In 2002, when Mr H.D. Hoyte, as leader of the PNC, finally called for “shared governance”, he blithely ignored the contradiction posed by his continued refusal to link his call to the African dilemma.

If one, as the PNC evidently did by then, accepted the liberal premise that a community consists of interchangeable “individuals” who vote on issues, then one has to accept the liberal conclusion that a majority of those voters represent the best agglomeration of the “national will”.

The party that falls short of obtaining a majority simply has to go back to the drawing board, reformulate its policies and strategies, and hit the streets for the next elections. There can be no justification for changing the rules of the game: justice had been served through majoritorianism.

Shared governance, whether successful or not, can only be justified by a “group”, as opposed to an “individual”, conception of political participation in which an identified ascriptive group, with its unique perspective and interests, would be excluded by the operation of the majoritorian system. This is the case whether it has been the Flemish in Belgium, Catholics in Netherlands and Northern Ireland, Indians in Fiji, Luo and Kalenjin in Kenya etc.

Challenged, interestingly enough, by feminist research as much as ethnic nationalists from the standpoint of justice, the majoritorian premise of liberalism has now been altered, even in conservative polities such as the US. There, constituency boundaries have been extensively redrawn to ensure the representation of “minority” opinions in the corridors of power.

Many other polities, including our own Guyana, now recognise that the exclusion of women robs nations of a unique perspective, and they have altered the rules to ensure that there is a representative number in legislatures. Where is the shame in extending the principle to ethnic groups?

The PNC, however, continues to play ducks and drakes with such a strong rationale for justifying shared governance in Guyana. The AFC, which also secured most of its votes from the African Guyanese community – as the latter threshes around in search of effective political representation, much as Indians did with a host of parties in the ‘70s when they saw the PPP as ineffectual – has explicitly rejected the utility of group interests, even as it expresses support for “shared governance”.

In the most recent call, Mr R.H.O Corbin, Leader of the PNCR, has demanded “genuine national unity through shared governance”. However, when asked later to elaborate, he explained its necessity: “Because large sections of the population feel alienated and discriminated against by the administration.”

The report continued: “He used the recent flooding of communities along the East Coast to illustrate the situation, pointing out that feelings of alienation permeate villages like Golden Grove, Nabaclis and Victoria when they can point to differences in the treatment of infrastructural works when their villages are under water and neighbouring ones are not.” Shared governance for that which can’t be named!

As we have pointed out, probably ad nauseam, the PPP can properly respond to these calls for shared governance by paraphrasing Mr Burnham: ‘What is the liberal content of shared governance bereft of an explicit connection to an ascriptive group identity? Where is the benefit? After all, without that nexus, why cannot the PPP represent the “ideas” of all Guyanese – especially when they can point to the cross-section of faces on their platform?’

So, as we said before, it does appear that there will be a “struggle” for shared governance in Guyana. We just hope that it does not turn violent.