Dr Abena Dadze-Arthur

Originally published on the Agora blog

A slippery foundation

Without a question, decolonisation is a slippery concept already! Decolonising democratic innovations (DI) is even more slippery because of its inherently normative foundation. Here, Temidayo Eseounu’s argument in her blog, which forms part of the Political Studies Association’s Participatory and Deliberative Democracy Specialist Group’s blog series on Decolonising Democratic Innovations, could not be more to the point: ‘Eurocentric normative values such as inclusion, equity, representation and equality are intrinsic to the theories of participatory and deliberative democracies, which underpin democratic innovations’. Indeed, the fact that a citizen jury or mini public, where groups of citizens meet to reflect on problems and assess policy proposals, is firmly rooted in a set of Eurocentric norms makes it a productive democratic innovation in a Western context, where people value above all individual rights and personal expression and are used to openly criticizing their leaders. Such an approach to public participation is in harmony with the social contracts found in Western civilizations, which typically construct mankind as free and equal by nature, and base political authority on the individual self-interests of members of society. Typically, under a Western vantage point, a well facilitated citizen jury or mini public would be praised for offering a ‘platform for exchange’, ‘giving a voice to marginalised members of the community’, ‘deepening democracy’ and ‘improving governance’.

‘Equality’ or ‘inclusion’ are not universal concepts

Such normative framing, which indeed constitutes the very foundation of the concept of democratic innovation, disregards the vastly different realities of most non-Western societies, their underpinning Weltanschauung, core values, beliefs, ethics, and their historical social contracts that help to structure the relationship between the people and their government. In many societies, the universalism of normative values and motivations, such as inclusion, equity, representation and equality, is fallacious – they are inherently Eurocentric! Irrespective of how expertly designed a citizen panel or mini public might be, it would not work well in many collectivist societies in non-Western contexts, where people do not prioritise values such as equality, individualism and personal freedom. For example, participatory activities in non-Western governance settings, such as the United Arab Emirates or Singapore, are not aiming to tackle a democratic deficit, accomplish egalitarian objectives or wholly enhance governmental accountability. In those contexts, while the purpose of a mini public might very well be public service improvements for all, however they are not intended to provide a platform for collectively debating political questions behind services and policies, nor to strengthen inclusion, equality or equity beyond particular segments of the population – as it might be in the West.

Different strokes for different folks

Being clear about the normative foundation of participatory and deliberative events in non-Western settings requires a holistic understanding of the respective local context, or life world, which is a state of affairs in which the everyday world is experienced by the people, who simultaneously create social reality while being constrained by it. For instance, the Balinese life world is based on viewing the cosmos as a grand hierarchy, wherein animals and demons are at the bottom, gods and god-kings are at the top, and ordinary mortals are distributed throughout an elaborate assortment of fixed status ranks in between. The often cantankerous nature of Western-type citizen panels that assume every human being is equal and has a right to pursue his or her self-interest could be viewed as an incomprehensible and disrespectful exercise that causes more damage than good to the community and established hierarchies. Similarly, the press in Arabic Bedouin societies often portrays Western-style democratic innovations with their explicit advocacy and public naming and shaming as ‘uncivilized’. The Bedouin culture of ‘saving face’, loyalty to the leader and respect for his ‘God-given’ mandate, safeguarding family honour and tribal traditions is not compatible with the reform-seeking debates and critical tirades that can typify Western-style citizen juries. Under the vantage point of bedoucrats (those who believe in Bedoucracy, which proffers a model of Arab public management that originates in the Bedouin tribal culture and joins traditional bureaucratic design with tribal power culture), many Western-type democratic innovations amount to little more than a ‘narcissist circus’. However, the Bedouin culture of mediating by means of patience and forgiveness and seeking compromise, which signifies some synergy with Western-style citizen juries, has ensured that there are a number of age-old traditional institutions in Arab Bedouin societies that can be built upon for the purpose of engaging members of the public in participatory and deliberative exercises.

This was done in a Taiwan Buddhist village. Aware of the foreign (Eurocentric) norms that underpin the theory and design of democratic innovations, a team of facilitators who were tasked with conceiving and facilitating a citizen assembly to explore public service challenges and policy solutions in a Taiwanese Buddhist village, had no other choice but to construct and formulate from scratch not a democratic but a culturally appropriate innovation by building on traditional institutions. Given that the citizens’ life world was particularly characterised by a collective emphasis on ‘belonging to one large family’ and ‘respecting social hierarchy’, the facilitators knew that those agreeing to participate in the citizen assembly would not be willing to raise problems for fear of being seen as disrespecting the family and its established hierarchy. Hence, the facilitators framed the act of problem exploration as a co-operative endeavour along Buddhist concepts, such as the ‘eightfold noble path’ and ‘cause-condition-effect’ and developed a buddhicratic approach to delivering and facilitating a citizen assembly with a normative foundation that was in harmony with local worldviews, values, ethics and social contracts.

What now?

Having unmasked the Eurocentricity of DI’s normative foundation, how do we then begin the process of radical renewal with a view to construct a new, broader, postcolonial normative foundation that allows for an increasingly pluralistic approach? Is it even possible to reconsider the legitimacy and comprehensiveness of the established knowledge on democratic innovations by applying the hermeneutic resources and referencing the precepts of the very theories we criticise? As with all wicked and intractable issues, we may have to accept that there is no one panacea. Instead, theorists and practitioners will need to undergo a paradigm shift and prepare themselves to accept and engage with a rich variety of truths, and their underpinning values, social contracts and hierarchies of power. Given the current dearth of non-Western theories and practical templates on public participation and deliberation, we will need to work on a case-by-case basis in constructing locally sensitive and culturally appropriate innovations that are not necessarily and inevitably aspiring to be democratic, but depending on the case perhaps buddhicratic, bedoucratic or othercratic. Importantly, by capturing the empirical observations from each case and theorising the insights gained on platforms such as this blog, or in special issues such as the one on ‘Decolonising the Public Administration Curriculum’ (link to Call for Abstracts here), or in journals that explicitly focus on promoting knowledge exchange across vastly different contexts and episteme such as Public Administration & Development, in time, we might be able to consolidate empirical regularities and develop new, postcolonial theoretical models.

Abena Dadze-Arthur is Assistant Professor at the School of Government (INLOGOV), University of Birmingham, and Associate Editor of the Wiley journal Public Administration & Development. Combining the experience of an international policy practitioner with the robust theoretical approach of an academic, Abena’s research and teaching focus on decolonizing and transforming approaches to public management and governance, and contributing to the development of indigenous solutions and sustainable change.