Scotland’s referendum: Yes equals faith in politics, No means faith in management

Scotland’s referendum, whatever its outcome, won’t tell us much about Scotland’s future. A little more independence won’t much matter. The forces beating down on northern Europe won’t abate. The outcome, however, will reward business as usual or test the proposition that we can still innovate politically without blowing things up.

Personally, I’m a republican federalist who believes my piece of North America could be more influential and interesting within a wider American federation, but I don’t feel trapped to cheer for the No side tomorrow.

Federalism is the mechanism that allowed for the emergence of America as a great power. Europe warned it couldn’t work but; then, along with American postwar relief, they progressively adopted federalism to restore general prosperity and peace. Federalism allows for powerful government, while leaving us less fearful of one another and the world outside.

Yet, the No voices in the Scottish referendum debate decided to dwell on a nostalgic, extreme vision of national independence. This is a litmus test they imposed on Scottish voters but not on themselves.

Two Canadians famous in London — historian Margaret MacMillan and central banker Mark Carney — have vividly made their case: Scotland cannot be “sovereign” and use the pound as Scotland’s currency. And England and the rest of the EU countries will be too annoyed and nervous to let Scotland into either NATO or the European Common Market.

In effect, the Scots will pay terribly for humiliating Labour and Tory politicians in Westminster. Scotland can’t become another successful interdependent 21st-century nation-state because that would set a dangerous precedent.

In rejecting the leap of faith of the Scottish independence movement, MacMillan and Carney ask us to make a different leap of faith, not about what we cannot know, but against what we do.

In fact, today, the Bank of England has only a modest degree of independence to support an independent UK economic policy. Neither Scotland alone nor the UK whole can defend themselves, cope with the next big recession, fight terrorists, or save the planet. In the event of a Yes vote tomorrow, the Bank and the British Government, before dawn on Friday, will be phoning all over London, Berlin, Brussels, and Washington assuring investors and allies that British commonsense and pragmatism with keep both the pound, London’s market, and everyone’s assets in Scotland afloat.

MacMillan’s mastery of the motives of the men and women that made European history seems to have been set aside or stopped with the launch of the European Union and the Eurozone. She understands why they came together, not how their federation will progress.

The No side's campaign has chosen to appeal to fear but little is said about what it fears. My hunch is, they are afraid to ever go back to first principles. They fear that if they had to make real changes, everything would unravel. 

Westminster surely can acknowledge, after two centuries of disdain, that numerous genuine federal arrangements, including forms of sovereignty-association, are working on both sides of the Atlantic.

Federalism and our mixed economies were never designed merely to manage the status quo. They beat authoritarian systems not because they run smoothly but because they’re built to cope with change constructively. That will atrophy if we keep rewarding politicians, public servants, and intellectuals who can’t say Yes.

“Balance” and talking clearly about North American politics

Along with the word “iconic” we should be wary of the promiscuous use of the word “balance.” Both convey feelings of perfection or authority that discourage light-hearted conversation and reasoned debate. Their use, in this listless time in Western politics, is unhelpful.

The hint of gravitas which accompanies the use of “balance”, of course, is exactly why it’s sexy in political discourse. It is intended consciously to calm unruly passions.

However, having the word beside your idea is valuable.  A “balanced” idea likely won’t offend. It feels as if it takes far more into account than an idea that’s merely clear. Indeed, it invites you to believe that only what can work is left in the proposal—that the proposal is not merely a proposal but the only workable outcome.  Democrats, policy professionals and dreamers, there is your problem.

The process of weighing and judging—balancing—the evidence before taking action is the essence of enlightened behavior. However, the best answer and necessary answer is not always balanced or a balanced package of half-measures heading off in opposing directions.

The virtue of balance has clouded several policy areas. Indeed, it has been used effectively to kill coherent reform. Electricity reform in Ontario is a classic example. The oxymoron, the “commercial crown corporation” exists to balance public accountability and market discipline. “Balanced” federalism has become a euphemism that allows each level of government to do bits of the other level’s job while spreading the blame.

In the “Art of War” Sun Tzu advised those who live by their wits that defence is usually the best way to deploy your resources. But, when it is to your advantage to turn to the offense you must be ferocious.

If you’re an activist and your government is nearly broke, it’s tempting to go for numerous little measures and say they represent a “balanced” approach. However, if you’re a serious reformer or even a serious conservative when the status quo is untenable, than whole-hearted reform should be undertaken. And balance left for sunnier times and lesser players.

Fellow speech writer and old friend, Senator Hugh Segal is wedded to the word. He also takes delight in thinking of politics as a heroic adventure. Segal concludes his most ambitious book, however, by straining balance and boldness to the breaking point.

“The time is ripe for a White Paper that discusses what a North American Assembly would look like, how its members could be elected within three founding countries, and what initial advisor, consultative and auditing role it might play, as the European Parliament did in its early days.”

Hugh Segal, The Right Balance: Canada’s Conservative Tradition, Douglas & McIntyre, Toronto, 2011, p. 224

He insists Canadian sovereignty would be enhanced in his North American Community. His North American Assembly would “not be unlike” the early European Parliament. It operated for some 30 years without direct elections; its members were assigned by member parliaments. Everything from income distribution to drug safety and continental security would be on the assembly’s agenda.

Political integration—jointly legislating the people’s business—is not an affectation or habit you acquire incrementally hanging around auditing and advising and consulting fellow North Americans. There is no slippery slope that will eventually take down the border and create a true North American—or,  realistically, a Canada-US—political community. To make a difference, Segal’s White Paper would have to challenge the national sovereignty of the constituent parts. Otherwise, his North American Assembly would be only another “constructive conversation” largely attended by political staffers.

The first expression of a big idea is less a matter of calculation than of conviction. Quebec’s Rene Levesque and France’s Jean Monnet were candid and effective. One spent most of his career trying to create a separate Quebec, and the other worked even longer to unite Europe. Both were self-described gradualists and probably liked the word balance.  Yet, early in their public utterances they were clear about how far they’d like to go. In 1950, in negotiating the European Coal and Steel Union (initially between France and West Germany), Monnet wanted it publicly understood that its binding joint authority was only a first step toward European federation.  His idea was a union of peoples, not merely co-operation between states.

Let’s not get started in North America by going back 60 years without a roadmap. This century, like the last, demands far more than balanced responses.

Hard times and European solidarity

Has the European Union’s evolution as a federation reached its limits? Will nationalism increasingly limit power-sharing with Brussels? Can we assume on this side of the Atlantic that future political challenges will all be on the Pacific? Recent events suggest otherwise. Indeed, it looks like European federalism may be outsmarting us.

Canada was defeated for a temporary seat on the Security Council of the United Nations because individual members of the European Union decided it was in their interests to support one of their own, rather than a valued friend. The idea that Angela Merkel and Nicolas Zarkozy were out to teach Stephen Harper, an upstart Canadian conservative, a lesson in humility and political correctness is silly. Clearly, European leadership has decided that European political solidarity comes first. Protecting the Union—its common market and its common currency—trumps its individual external ambitions, including the credibility of the NATO alliance.

There are numerous other indications that the recession is not undoing existing arrangements, but rather leading to further cooperation in sensitive areas. Across Europe, social tensions are rising; the outsider, whether a Muslim or someone from somewhere else who is looking for a job, is feeling less welcome. However, the Schengen Agreement that now holds twenty-five countries—400 million Europeans—together in one borderless security zone is firmly intact. France and Britain are actively negotiating a defence agreement that could lead to pooling resources and cooperation on everything from procurement to sharing France’s nuclear-warhead-simulation-testing facilities. Last weekend, the European members of the G-20 were finally able to agree among themselves to reduce their over-representation on the board of the International Monetary Fund.

There is more muscle behind these concerted actions than bureaucratic inertia and a swelling feeling of being European. Germany and France and the other more affluent northern partners have an immense stake in maintaining the Euro currency and an open market of some 500 million people. When unity will be served, we shouldn’t be surprised if they undertake further restraints on their freedom to act as sovereign states. If we do nothing to alter the status quo on this continent, we’ll likely fall further behind as an integrated economic competitor.