Stuck in the mud: A question of Sovereignty of Policy Control: Independent vs European Union Control?
The above illustration I think manages to visualize the current state of the EU Referendum Campaign; now that Vote Leave are the designated Leave camp and HM Government is coming out more and more using it's full force of power at it's disposal with HM Treasury reports, The President of the United States, Barrack Obama choosing this side and more besides, such as the "9m Leaflet".
I think the simple idea that drives the EU idea, is "One Big Idea", which I referred to previously in Political Barriers To Entry: An Image Of Power; A Course To Ruin
"There is an inherent assumption that those who take up our air-time or are invited to share their views in the lime-light in front of the broadcasting cameras, have somehow earned such an eminent position. Their achievements are the currency with which they deserve our notice or they are rewarded with others taking notice of them. I've long found it curious that actors often are called upon to take up the cause of "climate change", "world peace", "feminism", "palestine" and all the other idols that were pointed out so long ago by Francis Bacon in how people form bias in their thinking. Phony speakers promoting fake ideas. Why fake? I think there's a reason: One Big Idea is far more effective in drawing attraction from people than a series of interconnected and complex associations that more accurately reflects what we would suggest through scientific method is "objective reality" via independent, repeatable measurement that develop a current (but changeable) theory. When this process is "short-circuited" via such presentational problems as propounding "One Big Idea" we end up with something else too: Orthodoxy. In our politics today, such a process has been delivered."To look at the illustration above, again: We see a tug of war over ownership and indeed money gained from ownership of the above big ideas between the rival camps. I think this enables us to see why Vote Leave recently focused on Migration (Immigration) despite the recent polling survey:-
Economy and immigration key issues for Britons in the EU referendum (Ipsos MORI Political Monitor - April 2016)
It seems to me that Vote Leave is trying to put focus on issues that are clearly "owned" by the their side of the argument in the popular imagination. For example I don't think Fisheries is an argument that can be countered by the Remain side except perhaps some token gestures towards Marine Sanctuaries given the belief that "too many boats and too few fish" was a self-inflicted disaster of Britain's Fisheries without international cooperation when the nothing could actually be further from the truth: The Betrayal of Britain's Fishing to the European Union.
Likewise Migration is generally is within the Leave side of the argument because enough numbers for long enough can't be realistically argued against that the UK no longer has policy control in this area and it generally started around 1995 after John Major's promise of "No more than <50,000 pa" if I remember off hand; which morphed into Labour's Political Correctness stamping down on open debate about the subject. However I suspect given the above polling, that the economy is in fact in the Remain camp's side of the argument because Vote Leave are driven by a campaign without a definitive Brexit plan:-
The reason is simple: Attention on a "Big Idea" eg Migration that is within the Leave camp's argument ensures the idea that there is a problem persists. However, I think it's a defective and eventually as Dr. RAE North suggests defeatist and hence losing tactic: It's a negative, it is a default and conceding the economy to the Remain camp for short-lived coverage of Migration in the popular imagination. And hence we come back to ownership and the cost or savings ie value of ownership that is battled inanely between the two sides per "Big Idea". The Economy is the biggest "Big Idea" and will ensure that as long as it's on the side of the Remain they'll win the Referendum. This was all so clearly put into writing on the internet a couple of years ago in FLEXCIT: The Market Solution.
Previously, we looked at Vote Leave more in terms of perception and the in my opinion obviously supplicant role they play in this wasteful monopoly by the Political Establishment over the entire functioning of this opportunity of Real (direct) Demoracy: Vote Leave: A Lesson In Power
I think this explains the silly, foolish and deeply irresponsible bandying about of economic "magic money": Große Lüge - The Big Lie of Magic Money. There appears to me even more evidence that "Monetary Policy" and the Spending and Government prudence in this area of the UK is in desperate need of reformation, lagging behind the other areas in our still-developing but under-developed democracy.
So, with the starting illustration dominating the picture of what people are voting for on either side of the referendum and the inevitable crassness of our Legacy News-Media and Politicians commentaries on that picture which inevitably leads to the public response: "We don't have enough information to know how to vote", or "they're all as bad as each other" or, "there's no point in voting it changes nothing" or finally, "how can we vote for fewer politicians and hence fewer liars?"
There's a couple of really useful articles that present a Positive Vision of what Brexit can lead towards:-
How global regulators are killing the value of EU membership Stuck in the Middle with EU ~ Roland Smith (Adam Smith Institute)
Both these articles/blogs are incredibly upbeat and postive, they change the above "tug-of-war" nonsense from the ownership of "Big Ideas" into a conceptual paradigm shift in what we are actually supposed to be arguing (in a healthy and functioning democracy) about:-
Globalization: Trade Harmonization via Standardization and Regulation
Policy Areas = blue bubbles. Standards and Regulations Bodies = red bubbles and for finance = yellow (an especially visible example of globalization) and environmental conventions = green
For the purposes of this blog the diagram above is upside down: People know about "The Single Market" (EEA) or indeed in polling "Economy". However these would in fact be at the bottom or be at the end of the final flow of multiple bodies that formulate more and more of the legislative rules for governing standards to improve trade and quality control. As you can see each major policy area is surrounded by many (a few illustrated) specialist bodies that pool expertise in the devising of these regulations and integration with other connected policy areas for example Maritime will involve "Transport" and "Fisheries" and "Food" connecting such as: IMO, Codex Alimentarius, IACO and FAO and UNECE amongst others.
In fact instead of this sliding scale of popularity and ownership contest by our politicians, they are stuck in a small mindset, which needs to be replaced by the positive opportunities that can be a boon to world trade with the UK playing a highly active and connected part in all the multiple bodies, cooperating and sharing expertise in areas at a truly global level.
If we therefore look at the idea of Brexit or the European Union, there is something of an incorrectly framed debate going on which suits the "personality politics" low level of debate that manages to (mis-)characterize the choice as a popularity context between those in office and their prestige vs a bunch of low-grade politicians who make it up as they go along but appear "closer to the people" than the distant British Government which has been a supporter of the EU since the 1960s.
We've already seen more than enough examples of this contrast between the negative and losing arguments and how they manifest in the Legacy News-Media as if they are "the real thing":-
- Defence and Security: Sermonizing on Security
- Environment And Climate Change: Leaving EU would endanger Earth, says Miliband: Former Labour leader issues extraordinary warning that 'our global habitat' will suffer if Britain leaves
‘If Britain leaves Europe, our environment, our wildlife and our global habitat will be starved of investment, bereft of protections and denied the leadership it needs.’There is a realization these "Big Ideas" do need breaking down. And I think this is a really interesting question:-
Pro-Brexit environment minister George Eustice dismissed the claims, saying that the EU offered hampered efforts by Britain to tackle global environmental problems.
Mr Eustice said EU membership had ‘systematically undermined the UK’s place on international wildlife conventions’.
He said Britain had lost its seat on key bodies and was sometimes barred from speaking out without EU permission.
He added: ‘If we vote to leave and take control, the UK would regain its own seat and its voice in vital international wildlife conventions and everything from promoting shark conservation to ending whaling would become much easier.’
Will we get more rational politics if we break things down and realize that the expertise at Global Level and the level of coordination is sufficient to produce better results? Therefore these grand political ideas such as Supranationalism, even when we consider Environmental issues, which can be further investigated in FLEXCIT: The Market Solution: 15.0 Environmental Policy:-
Noticeably in the new framing of our arguments we can see that there is more complexity in this new positive and emerging picture that does not arbitrate according to popularity tactics in the polls but according to the factual nature of the growing body of legislation at global levels that then interacts with the destination nations, eg UK. Environmental legislation particularly interests me, but I don't take arbitrary sides as the opening illustrating showcases.
"More so than perhaps any other policy area, environment is an amalgam of international, EU and domestic measures, to which the EU is a late arrival: a significant omission in the original 1957 Treaty of Rome was any mention of "environment". Legislation on environmental matters remained largely a matter for member states. "
So, instead of this negative argument of the past failures we could be reorientating towards a successful and positive future as we tap into the huge change of Globalization instead of our petty and dysfunctional politically failing systems of bad governance:-
Where there's a will there's a way... but do we the people hold the political will for that change in this upcoming Referendum? Or do we have our will (power) sapped by those in charge?
