What Is To Be Done

The contents here have been rolling around in my head since the first wave of GE hype. Never got round to posting because there was always a nagging feeling accompanying the thought whenever it came to the forefront again.

Well recently I punched in the teeth of the nagging feeling so I guess I can pen it properly now.

One of the most common, fashionable, popular and easily-evidenced accusations against the PAP is of its alleged ‘groupthink’ practices. Now, to clear up any definition difficulties, let me just point out to to truly qualify the destructive behaviour known as groupthink, several characteristics are necessary:

1) The group in question exerts a form of mutual peer pressure on its constituent members to be in agreement with each other or, in the case of an alpha, be in agreement with the acknowledged leader.

2) The group’s perspectives and considerations rest on an accepted set of premises and/or assumptions, which no one within the group is willing to question for the sake of preserving team dynamics.

3) The group suffers from a significant level of insulation, paranoia and siege mentality, to the extent that uninvited external opinions are generally treated as hostile in a kneejerk reaction.

4) The group members feel a strong sense of attachment both to the group and to its other members, and are collectively unwilling to undertake any actions which may undermine the espirit de corps as it is.

5) The group’s discussions tend to be dominated by specific personalities for each individual topic; these individuals are not necessarily the same for each subject area, and tend to be the recognised internal ‘specialists’ of the relevant areas.

The main consequence of such a structure is loss of independent thinking. Each member is highly likely to be aware of everyone else’s opinions, perhaps due to degrees of familiarity, and actively seeks to establish consensus as early as possible on the belief that this constitutes decisiveness. All are proactive in preserving the pattern of collective discussion and decision-making; members have a tendency to slide into familiar tracks of thought because that is where they are most comfortable as a group.

It’s not difficult to see why the PAP can easily be perceived as a bunch of groupthinkers. One hardly ever hears of dissent within the party, it’s as though no minister ever disagrees with another and mutually accept opinions without contest.

It is my understanding that this is untrue. As far as I can tell and know, the PAP partial applies the concept of what Lenin termed “centralised democracy.”

In summarise history into a line, Lenin imposed this doctrine in early Soviet Russia to prevent loss of focus, and what he considered to be petty distractions from the ultimate goals of a socialist state and spreading the revolution.

There are two parts to his doctrine, but the first bit regarding bureaucracy is not relevant today. The second portion regarding policymaking however, describes quite perfectly how the PAP appears to operate.

In centralised democracy, policymakers may freely express their opinions and debate prior to the taking of the decision. Dissent is allowed, even encouraged, to improve the vigour of the mutual scrutiny and intellectual rigour behind the proposed policy measure.

There are however, two caveats.

First, the debate is to be closed-door. The policymakers are encouraged to invite relevant subject experts for consultation, but the contents and minutes of the sessions are otherwise confidential. The rationale is intuitively simple: leaders will find it incredibly difficult to speak frankly they if they are mindful of being indiscriminately quoted, perhaps even out of context. The lack of transparency further prevents external parties, even the common people, from trying to influence the end decision in any way, as no one else will understand its dynamics.

Second, once the decision has been made, by consensus where possible, by compromise or vote when not, all whom had participated in the discussions are expected to fall in line. Now dissent is disallowed; each has had his chance during the internal debate. Those who still dissent are allowed to keep to their consciences; they need not speak out in the defence of the new policy, but they are expected to maintain silence in the public. If they are required to discharge duties in the implementation of the new policy, they should do so without bias.

It is akin to the ruling from a court of law. You may argue and butcher semantics as you like during the actual case proceedings, but once the verdict is laid down it is absolute. In the courts the public is allowed in the gallery, but the judge has sufficient authority and control to reliably prevent their interruption. That is unfortunately beyond the means of any politician, and thus Lenin chose to cut the public entirely, until the decision is made.

In rare instances of massive public discontent, decisions by centralised democracy may be reversed. That is very much the odd exception rather than the rule.

From what I can understand, the PAP practices centralised democracy. The party and the Cabinet internally debate their plans, and once the Cabinet has decided, the point men are assigned the task of bringing it into the open in Parliament. They thus do not expect having to debate again, this time against dissatisfied members of the public. It also very well explains why the PAP distrusts any legislative opposition; why bother, when they are confident about having examined every perspective in their own deliberations? Even if they get quantitative projections wrong every now and then, the case that qualitatively every angle has been investigated is quite easy to make.

In principle, there is little wrong with centralised democracy. Given that policymakers are elected representatives, it is in good standing with traditions of democracy. In practice however, when dealing with a literate (as opposed to educated) population, not offering access to the debate which has taken place leads to the perception that a debate hasn’t.

Needless to say, if all policies were actually trashed out to detail in Parliament rather than in Cabinet, legislative sessions would be massively unproductive in comparison. Worse, if the public insists on being involved every step of the way. Yet the point of a responsive government is one of the vertebrae in the spine of democracy.

Fact of the matter is, people like being involved. It feels important, feels like they’re in control of their own lives. It’s the other end of the pendulum from the PAP-heyday arrangement of “You voted us in, now let us do our jobs and you can reassess in five years.”

My personal opinion would be that we, not just Singaporeans but all over the developed world, have become too much of control freaks and information junkies. We are like little Hitlers, seeking to in a godlike manner twiddle with every little detail from or seats, our keyboards, our rooms and our homes.

And when we come up against the hardheaded, stubborn, vanguard, top-down Leninist leadership style of the PAP. Someone is going to have to give.

Obviously, both of us. Or at least the PAP if it wishes to stay in power will require far better PR, and we shall have to learn to be less discontented with the less-than-ideal-but-realistically-satisfactory.

As the opposition leader, I strongly doubt that the WP is not at some level aware of this concept of centralised democracy. The formation of its own political positions and strategies is obviously far from transparent, although as merely a party and not the government of the day it has been held to a lower standard. Quite rightly as well.

The worst that can come of the current situation is not that the PAP falls from Lenin to Stalin (that is impossible), but that it becomes so painfully aware of the need to show a public a debate that ‘wayang’ sessions are scripted for Parliament. Verbal jousting that leads nowhere, but down carefully manicured lawns where every thrust and parry has already been predicted and accounted for.

We now have an upsurging opposition party. For the benefit of the state, each and every party is merely a tool, and while the WP is in Parliament we should make good use of it. A ‘wayang’ Parliament will not accomplish that (although given the PAP’s torrid PR any ‘wayang’ they do try to pull will look like kindergarten playacting, and I’m not obliged to clap and smile).

Given that the PAP is unlikely to change its ways of centralised democracy in any way other than cosmetically, the best-case scenario will see more soliciting of external views by the Cabinet in its deliberations. Whether it be from the opposition, academics, journalists, commentators or the humble public. If that is where the decision is to be made, then that is where the information needs to be, especially when it’s going to be so much harder to run it vice versa.

I certainly hope that by now the PAP leadership has realised that for all its internal rigour, it has run up against the biggest blind spot of centralised democracy, that of ‘unknown unknowns’. With the right information though, and with drastic reduction of ‘unknown unknowns’ via consultation be it direct (preferred ) or delegated (needs gutsy civil servants), I still retain sufficient confidence in the PAP to say they will arrive at a adequately accurate approximation of the right decision.

Piaroh-Cze:

If democracy can only be realised when the intellectual development of all people allow it, democracy would not exist.

Advertisement