{"id":232,"date":"2010-08-09T07:58:28","date_gmt":"2010-08-09T07:58:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leedscd.wordpress.com\/?p=232"},"modified":"2010-08-09T07:58:28","modified_gmt":"2010-08-09T07:58:28","slug":"does-big-society-foretell-the-demise-of-confrontational-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2010\/08\/09\/does-big-society-foretell-the-demise-of-confrontational-government\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Big Society Foretell the Demise of Confrontational Government?"},"content":{"rendered":"
Kevin Harris has written a fascinating post<\/a> about the possibility of the transition to Big Society foretelling the demise of confrontational we\/you type government.<\/div>\n
I too can see a way in which Big Society foretells the demise of command and control. However I can also see dozens of ways in which it doesn’t. \u00a0The recent Marsh Farm decision<\/a> provides an example.<\/div>\n
Government has a long track record of maintaining the status quo while providing the illusion of radical change. \u00a0Left\/Right, Centralise\/Decentralise, National\/Local. \u00a0They all look like major change, but in fact politicians and civil servants collude to ensure that nothing REALLY happens. \u00a0It is \u00a0as if the pendulum of change is allowed to swing through an arc of only a very few degrees.<\/div>\n
Kevin makes a good point about the nature of \u00a0you\/me thinking. \u00a0A shift to ‘we’ would do no harm at all. \u00a0But I am not holding my breathe. \u00a0The very nature of democracy means that we elect a ‘you’.<\/div>\n
In my mind the real shift needs to from a perspective where government seeks to engage us in the delivery of their agenda to one where it learns to engage itself in the development of our agendas. \u00a0A government focussed on enabling citizens in pursuit of their interests rather than recruiting them to do the work of the state.<\/div>\n
But I will not hold my breathe for that swing of the pendulum either.<\/div>\n
Perhaps it is time we learned to wean ourselves off the teat of the state and learn to make progress without them?<\/div>\n