Thursday, July 7, 2022
Recently a number of Renew MEP’s (including those of the Dutch left-liberal D66 party) tried to exclude the pro-life lobby from the European Parliament. Of course this went nowhere but it showed a disdain for any other voice than their own. Interestingly the pro-abortion lobby that is pushing such anti-democratic measures is itself funded by foundations that are in the hands of billionaires and other big economic actors. At the same time the communication by the D66 party over the intended nitrogen policy and the subsequent farmers protests in The Netherlands came across as aloof and uncaring. A rather uncompromising stand of their party congress was peppered with statements that deemed the protests against the intended policies ‘provincial grumblings’. This unfortunate type of communication was widely picked up in the Dutch countryside as another example of an elite that does not want to take other voices into account. The massive countryside support for the wave of protests that hit The Netherlands seems for a significant part to be coming from a sense of powerlessness towards ‘the government’ and ‘the media’. While the protests in several occasions clearly crossed the line, it is critically important for all of Europe to deal with that sense of ‘being shut out’ by such large parts of our societies. We saw the same before in France in the ‘yellow jackets’ protests. A recent study in Germany revealed that one third of the population considers Germany a ‘mock democracy’. While it is crucial to take measures to protect our future health and climate, the challenge is not to ‘lose’ whole swaths of our societies in the process. This is why the Christian parties in The Netherlands (in stark contrast to the D66 approach) emphasize the need for communication with farmers and countryside and see how farming can be sustained for the future. The trouble is that those who have most of the economic, governmental and cultural power often fail to see to what degree the system comes across as elitist and exclusive and to what degree the power is flowing between the same type of people who often are left-liberal, urban and well-educated and move between jobs that are part of these structures of power. This creates an (mostly unintended) process in which many structures of power become interlocked and dominated by an individualistic approach to life. Many who are part of this process somehow don’t seem to recognize that this makes them a powerful group of people in a rather one-sided and exclusive system. This is highly problematic for two reasons. The first is that policies are often shaped and influenced heavily before even a Minister or MP have seen a first draft. If this process is happening in an environment of which many voices are not naturally part of or have far less influence at, the policies will unavoidably mostly tilt towards the status quo that mostly benefits the current system and those who have power. The drafters will often not even see that as other voices or very different ideas will often not be part of their own social environment. If that social environment does not recognize the degree of its own influence and power, policies will even more tilt towards maintaining the status quo. It will be very easy for powerful lobbies to wield their influence (which is often the case). The second reason that this is so problematic is that as a result the whole governmental structure and democracy lose support among whole sections in society. This is what we see happening now. This has to change. At the moment there is a direct line that connects appeasing powerful economic interests at home with appeasing dictators abroad such as Iran or Turkey at the expense of those without power such as many average taxpayers at home and ethnic minorities abroad. This whole process is one important reason why we have so many interlocking crises to the degree that it is a system in crisis. That means that we need to turn that process around as we need systemic change. If we do not put a relational understanding of human dignity (that includes the relation with creation!) forward as alternative to the current system, people will continue to flock to nostalgic populism that feeds on this sense of ‘being left out’. The core questions for all policy makers will have to be: ‘whose interest is hurt by this policy?’ and ‘which powerful vested interests do we fear to touch that could give up something as well?’ In essence equal human dignity will have to be implemented in practice in both domestic and foreign affairs. And putting average taxpayers first domestically will often lead to put human rights first in foreign affairs (and vice versa). Putting a relational understanding of human dignity first and put that in practice are the core themes of our two latest publications. We promote a renewal of Christian-democracy in Europe on the basis of relational thinking in our publication ‘A Relational Vision for Europe’. We promote putting equal human dignity in practice in foreign affairs in our publication ‘Engaging Ethnic Minorities’. Both publications are described in this newsletter. We hope that this Summer will create time for all policy makers to reflect on the system crisis that we have in front of us and come back from vacation with a fresh understanding that Europe is a task in which we all are together. With sincere Christian greetings,
Johannes de Jong