While excellent newsletters on specific themes within public policy already exist, this thought letter is about frameworks, mental models, and key ideas that will hopefully help you think about any public policy problem in imaginative ways.
Audio narration by Ad-Auris.
India Policy Watch: Radically Networked Succour
Insights on burning policy issues in India
— Pranay Kotasthane
When the going gets tough, we become desperate for signs of hope. Unfortunately, the union government has inspired no such thing. It has instead opted for image management over accepting responsibility, complacency over taking charge, and whataboutery over offering succour.
Hope, then, springs from the stories of ordinary people pitching in to plug government failures in their own unique ways. A big portion of this effort is invisible to us from our immobile locked-in existences. The part that’s visible is what is happening over digital media. Over the past few weeks, all of us have seen relief efforts of various types, sizes, and success rates unfolding over the internet. Arranging for oxygen cylinders and hospital beds, verifying these requirements, administering advice, and contributing money — all this and more are happening at high speeds in a society densely connected with each other. In other words, radically networked succour.
Often, the term radically networked societies (RNS) conjures up the image of a mob. Admittedly, most examples we’ve cited earlier have depicted the darker side of RNS. However, the term itself is value-neutral and applies to any group meeting these three conditions:
a web of densely connected individuals, possessing an identity (imagined or real) and motivated by a common immediate cause.
Visualising the online relief efforts through a RNS framework, we see that:
The complete inadequacy of the Indian State became the immediate cause that mobilised community action. As the second wave started hitting near-and-dear ones while our governments continued to be in a parallel reality, people felt that the government’s effectively saying “Apna Apna dekh lo (Fend for yourselves)”. Then came the realisation that the problem has grown too big for our governments to solve.
The speed and scale was provided by the internet, specifically digital media platforms. The hierarchical nature of the State is an impediment in emergencies. That’s where flattened networks excel, spreading information to various nodes at a speed States cannot match. Our social media feeds transformed into emergency response management systems.
The identity dimension is not so clear in the sense that people providing radically networked succour do not define themselves as being a part of any one imagined identity. In some cases, pre-existing identities such as religion have inspired a community response. In others, the sinking feeling that we are all in this together has produced new bridging social capital.
One identity that’s been conspicuous by its absence is the electoral and social media apparatus of the governing political party. Being one of the largest political organisations in the world that understands how to harness the power of digital media like few others do, it’s surprising to see it missing in action. One can only guess what came in the way —the arrogance of power, a refusal to acknowledge the problem, or a pre-programmed plan to focus on attacking the opposition?
The Impact
The past few weeks have also made clear the strengths and limits of relying on civil society action alone.
The most encouraging lesson is to see that in difficult times, people have contributed in their own little, unique ways that governments can’t. Whether it’s by delivering food to a patient in the neighbourhood, by helping those in need of financial assistance, or by delivering critical medical supplies, the RNS has saved many lives.
At the same time, it has also exposed the limits of what a civil society can do. People actively involved in such efforts themselves couldn’t shake off the feeling that they were boiling the ocean — regardless of the growing monetary contributions or the number of hands on deck, the problem seemed to be growing at a much faster rate. The scarcity of life-saving equipment meant that for every one person you could help, another equally — or perhaps more — needy patient was dying.
The tragedy has also made it clear that a civil society cannot, by itself, summon newer hospital beds, healthcare staff, and life-saving medical supplies. For increasing capacity on these counts, the role of the State and markets is indispensable. We need the State to do what it should and get out of the way where it must for markets to play their magic. Whichever political ideology we may hold dear, the pandemic should make us realise the need of all three — State, Society, and Markets. Of which, it’s the omniabsent State that should worry us most. The Indian State is small where it really matters and simultaneously, overbearing in areas where it shouldn’t have a role.
Until we get the balance between the State, Society, and Markets right, my deep gratitude to everyone who has been providing succour to India and Indians.
Global Policy Watch: Three Truths Of Ideology
Bringing an Indian perspective to burning global issues
- RSJ
It must be a sign of times when the apparently honorable and normal act of someone taking a stand for her ideology and paying the price for it becomes global news. It happened last week. The Republicans in the US House of Representatives voted to remove Liz Cheney as the chair of House Republican Conference for her persistent criticism of Donald Trump and his persistent claims of a stolen election.
Liz Cheney is no ordinary Republican. She comes from a dynasty that’s long been a pillar of the Republican establishment. Her father, Dick, a former VP, needs no introduction to the Republican base. That she is no longer considered ideologically pure by the GOP is quite remarkable.
Now the cynic in me doesn’t for a moment believe what Liz Cheney did was all about her principles. Political ambitions aren’t realised by playing it safe. You must roll the dice when the time is right. She did just that. She staked her future knowing well what the short-term repercussions could be. It is how political careers are made.
Truth #1: The Mortal Enemy
What interests me about the episode is the use of ideology by both sides in justifying their decisions. There’s something to learn about ideology here. This is what Liz Cheney wrote in her op-ed in the Washington Post:
“Finally, we Republicans need to stand for genuinely conservative principles, and steer away from the dangerous and anti-democratic Trump cult of personality. In our hearts, we are devoted to the American miracle. We believe in the rule of law, in limited government, in a strong national defense, and in prosperity and opportunity brought by low taxes and fiscally conservative policies.”
That last line sums up the Reagan conservative ideology that’s been the guiding light of the party till it was upended it by what can only be called Trumpism in 2015.
The reactions against Cheney weren’t about the principles. It involved the first truth about ideology. An ideology needs a mortal enemy, an anti-Christ, to survive.
As a prominent Republican, Mike Gallagher, responded:
“House Democrats under Speaker Pelosi have been ruthless in advancing their radical progressive agenda, and Representative Cheney can no longer unify the House Republican conference in opposition to that agenda.”
It doesn’t matter what we stand for so long as we know what we stand against. Ideological cohesion is easier to achieve in knowing your enemy than knowing your friends.
In a famous speech delivered in January, 1962, Barry Goldwater laid down the seven principles of American conservatism. There’s no better articulation of a political philosophy in modern times. It is clear, concise and it helps translate these principles into specific policy proposals. Yet, Goldwater lost in a landslide in the 1964 presidential race. About 16 years later, Reagan used the Goldwater template but with one big difference. He located the enemy in his election campaign.
Big government.
Reagan would govern based on Goldwater’s principles but he never forgot what builds cohesion in his base. Late in his second term with no further elections to fight and his ideological dominance complete, he continued to fight the enemy with this famous quote (Aug, 1986):
I think you all know that I've always felt the nine most terrifying words in the English language are: "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help."
Truth #2: The Seed Of Destruction Within
Ideology is the prism through which we view politics. And conversely, it is a collection of values that guide politics to achieve the social or economic ends it believes are right for us. A clear articulation of ideology eases decision making for citizens and lawmakers alike. This is good. But running a state on ideology isn’t easy. The modern state extends itself far and deep into the lives of its citizens. And the demands on ideology to provide answers in every human realm imaginable continues unabated.
This stretches any ideology thin. It is impossible to have an ideology that can be consistent and convincing across every aspect of governance - economics, social, legal, foreign policy, science, religion et al. This over-extension is the seed for future destruction of the ideology. And this is the second truth about it. This is the opposite of what Marxists refer to as ‘false consciousness’. Here the extension of ideology across social institutions and over the masses is overt and in a direct sense, the reality.
It creates two problems. One, it splinters the ideologically cohesive unit. You could be against gay marriage but you believe in climate change. Since the conservative ideology in the US has extended itself to both these domains with clear views, you cannot hold your positions without a strong sense of dissonance. These faultlines increase in count and deepen over time as ideology permeates the lives of people. Two, as the ideology extends itself too thin, it loses the strength of its core that made it popular. Others then move in to appropriate the core identity. This is what Clinton or Blair did in the 90s by sidling their communitarian-minded parties into the free market positions that Reagan and Thatcher had made mainstream.
Truth #3: Finding The Sacred
The skill in maintaining ideological dominance over long time therefore lies in understanding the two great threats. First, your adversary is able to paint your core principle as its big enemy by using the changing patterns in the society or the environment. This is what has happened in the US after the global financial crisis (2009) where institutions representing the dominance of free markets and globalisation came under attack first from extreme left and as the notion became mainstream, from the extreme right too. Second, the inevitable loosening of the compact that brought your side together as your ideology stretches itself thin over a wide array of issues.
The way to hold off these threats is by finding that one core principle that can be made so sacred that it cannot be desecrated. And then envelope or extend every argument against your ideology into that sacred domain. This is the third truth about ideology. This is what Make America Great Again was about. The ‘American way of life’ exalted to a status so sacred that you can use it to argue against wearing masks, owning guns, pulling out of Paris agreement or proposing to build a mythical wall on the Mexican border.
This has been done successfully elsewhere too. In the erstwhile USSR or today’s China, the sacred maxim is that the Party is supreme and the only truth. In countries too numerous to name here, it was nationalism or ‘nation first’. You can draw your own conclusions about India in recent years. Nothing can make the sacred profane. Anything can be justified in its name. Once you have sanctified a principle among the majority of the masses, all you need to do is to manoeuvre any ideological battle to those grounds and you win. This is never permanent as history has shown. But it lasts way longer than any real ideology.
Liz Cheney might be fighting for conservative principles of the Republican Party. But the party knows those principles are stretched thin and only the empty yet hallowed slogan of the ‘American way of life’ that Trump has come to represent to its base gives them a fighting chance in elections against the woke progressive agenda they so hate.
For all its pretensions, ideology reduces itself to these three functional truths. Find something to hate viscerally, over-extend the shadow of your ideology to all realms of a citizen’s life and protect yourself by sanctifying a core principle within the ideology that cannot be made profane.
Enjoy the fruits of power.
PolicyWTF: Price Controlling the Pandemic
This section looks at egregious public policies. Policies that make you go: WTF, Did that really happen?
— Pranay Kotasthane
The term PolicyWTF is too frivolous to apply to the horrendous events of this week such as over 2000 bodies being found along the banks of Ganga or the undercounting of nearly 60,000 COVID-19 deaths in Gujarat.
So, this week’s policyWTF award goes to the Kerala government for price capping everything from triple layer masks to surgical gowns.
Please note the precision. Inspection gloves are to be priced at ₹5.75, not ₹6 and triple layer masks are decreed to be priced ₹3.9 and not ₹4. While you are at it, have a look at the replies to the tweet as well. Nearly everyone is lauding the Kerala CM and tagging their own CMs to implement similar price controls.
It’s easy to anticipate the unintended:
The better quality masks, gloves, and PPE kits will disappear from the shops in Kerala.
Given the continuing high demand for these items, producers from Kerala will try to sell these items in neighbouring states that don’t have such price controls.
Producers from other states will not sell these items in Kerala.
An underground market will develop for these goods. The government will catch a few people and blame rapacious profiteers but where demand exists, supply will find a way.
A basic lesson in public policy is that good intentions don’t imply good policies. But we reward activity rather than consequences.
HomeWork
Reading and listening recommendations on public policy matters
[Video] Slavoj Žižek in conversation with Barbara Bleisch on Ideology. English subtitles available. Žižek is his usual maverick and brilliant self and Bleisch is an outstanding interviewer. Must watch.
[Article] A constitution bench of the Supreme Court turned down the Maharashtra government’s move for Maratha reservation. In a convoluted judgment, it upheld the union government’s law of reserving seats for economically weaker sections, even if the total reservation exceeds 50%. Gautam Bhatia has a clear-eyed take on the issue. For our views, check edition #120.
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