:!: CHAPTER 1
:STAR: “A theory of policy politics must start with a model of political society, that is, a model of the simplest version of society that retains the essential elements of politics.”
A market can be defined as a social system in which individuals pursue their own welfare by exchanging things with others whenever trades are mutually beneficial. Participants in the market are in competition with each other for scarce resources; each person tries to acquire things at the least possible cost, and to convert raw materials into valuable things that can be sold at the highest possible price. In the market model, individuals act only to maximize their own self-interest (which might include the well-being of their friends and family). Maximizing one’s own welfare stimulates people to be resourceful, creative, clever and productive, and ultimately raises the level of economic well-being of the society as a whole. With this description of the market model, an alternative model of the polis can be constructed by contrasting more detailed features of the market model and a political community.
:star: Community
- politics and policy can only happen in a community so this must be the starting point. Public policy is about communities trying to achieve something as a community. This is true despite potential conflicts about who is part of that community.
Communities must have some form of membership to define is and is not part of that community. Membership is in some sense the primary, political issue, for membership definitions and rules determine who is allowed to participate in community activities and who is governed by community rules and authority. There is a clear difference between residence and citizenship.
There is a difference between political and cultural community. A political community is a group of people under the same political rules and structure of governance and share status as citizens. Cultural community is a group of people who share a culture and draw identities from language, history or traditions. -- similar to ethnic and civic nationalism?????????? Political community can include many diverse cultural communities and policy is faced with integrating these
these communities into a single political community without destroying or sacrificing their identity or integrity
Membership defines social and economic rights as well as political. Stone recognises that there is a component of mutual aid among members. Mutual aid is a good in itself that people create in order to foster and protect a community. Sharing burdens brings people together. This community spirit is a motivator of human behaviour as competition, separation and promotion of one's separate self -interests
:star: PUBLIC INTEREST
Public interest can be individual interests held in common or individual goals for the community. Public interests for the community may go against personal interests so what people want usually changes over time. communities have a general interest in having some governing process and means of resolving disputes.
what is the public interest? this is hard to determine. the concept is to the polis and self-interest is to the market. We simply assume that people behave as if they were trying to realize the public interest or maximize their self-interest.
:star: COMMON PROBLEMS
common problems = self-interest against public interest.
two types of common problems
- actions with private benefits entailing a social cost
- social benefits require private losses
all situations can be explained in this way, depending on your point of view of the cost-benefit analysis
Common problems are also called collective action problems because it is hard to motivate people to be on either side of the analysis for collective good
In market theory, common problems are thought to be the exception rather than the rule. In the polic, common problems are everything. Most significant policy problems are common problems. The major dilemma of policy is how to get people to give primacy to these broader consequences in their private calculus of choices.
:star: INFLUENCE
the gap between self-interest and public interest is bridged in the polis by forces of influence, cooperation and loyalty. Actions, no less than ideas are influenced by others, through the choices others have made and the ones we expect them to make, by what they want us to do, and by what we think they expect us to do. Our choices are conditional
Influence leads to interesting collective behaviour, such as 'bandwagon effects' in elections when a candidate's initial lead causes more people to support him because they want to support the winner.
:star: COOPERATION
Cooperation is as important as competition because politics involves having allies and organisation to compete with opponents. Conflicts unite and divide people and politics has as much to do with how alliances are made and held together.
Cooperation is essential to power and more effective than coercion.
In the market, cooperation is described negatively but in polis it is positive
:star: LOYALTY
Cooperations entails allies which bind people over time, people are enemies and friends, history counts for a lot in polis. In the market relationships are fluid and history means nothing.
Political alliances are not perfectly stable but there is a presumption of loyalty. It takes major events to get loyalties to switch. There is too much risk with breaking old alliances so people do not do it lightly.
:star: GROUPS
Groups are the building blocks rather than individuals. They are important because people belong to institutions and organisations which shape their opinions. They give decisions collectively.
:star: INFORMATION
market : information is perfect - accurate, completely and available.
polis : information is interpretive, incomplete and withheld strategically.
Correct information does exist but importance lies with what people make of the report. Interpretations are more important than facts and political activity is an effort to control such interpretations. Information is never complete, crucial info is deliberately kept secret to stop behaviour changing once the information is released. Secrecy is a tool of political strategy and information is therefore valuable.
:star: PASSION
passion feeds upon itself. Political resources are often enlarged or enhanced through use. Channels of influence and political connections grow with use and so do skills and authority. The more one makes certain types of decisions, the easier it is to continue the same path because repetition requires no new thought and in part because people are likely to resist or question orders any requests that they have obeyed before. This phenomenon is ignored in the market model.
'the whole is greater than the sum of its parts'. Actions change their meaning and impact when done in concert or in quantity.
'things can mean more than one thing at once'. symbolic meanings have no point in the market model
:star: POWER
power is the primary defining characteristic of a political society and is derived from all the other elements. It is a phenomenon of communities. Its purpose is to subordinate individual self-interest to other interests, can be individual, group or public interest.It operates through influence, cooperation and loyalty and is based on the control of information. It obeys the laws of passion rather than the laws of matter.
Any model of society must specify its source of energy and what drives change. In the market model, change is driven by exchange, which is in turn motivates by self-interest. Through exchanged, the use and distribution of resources is changed. In the polis, change occurs through the interaction of mutually defining ideas and alliances. Ideas about politics shape political alliances, and strategic considerations of building and maintaining alliances in turn shape the ideas people seek to implement.
the polis is
- a community or multiple communities with ideas and effort apart from individual goals and behaviour
- members are motivated by altruism and self-interest
- it has public interest which people act upon
- policy problems are common problems
- influence is pervasive and boundary between coercion and influence is contested
- cooperation is as important as competition
- loyalty is the norm
- groups and organisations form the building blocks
- information is interpretive, incomplete and strategic
- governed by the laws of passion and matter