Category Archives: Politics

Politics

THE WORLDWIDE STATE CORPORATIST MODEL

We all need to understand State Corporatism. It is the system in politics where the State interlocks with big corporations, or companies, in running the nations. It has been about for a hundred and fifty years, or more if you think of the East India Company. It is as least as important as Socialism in world history, but few are aware of it, or even know of its existence. You could say it is world dominant, but unnamed.

For example, Russia since the USSR, has had Putin working with the oligarchs to ensure his and their position. Similarly, China since Mao has moved on from State Socialism to one where companies have a co-operative relationship with the State and more billionaires than any other country in the world. The United States has long had the idiom of “What is good for GM is good for America.”  Now Trump says it all – what is good for business is good for America. He fuses business and politics, but we ignore what he represents. In the UK, since Thatcher, it has been dominant and Johnson fits the same model. Most dictatorships involve these cosy relationships between big money-making companies and dictators who benefit from them. If it is such a dominant politico-economic model, it requires more thought.

It’s central commitment is simple. It is if I scratch your back, you will scratch mine. Think Thatcher travelling around to sell arms and Mark Thatcher becoming a pathetic arms dealer in on a contract. It is anti-Socialist. The wages of the workers need to be kept down so that company profits stay strong. Broadly speaking, if the major corporations work with Government and vice versa, they are together able by laws and controls to keep the workers under control and wages down. It has a long history.

Companies became big enough to be influential in the early 20th century in oil, arms, automobiles, food, shipping, retail, farming and other manufacturing. They faced pressure from unions. Socialism and the vote were arriving about the same time, and there was a polarisation between socialism and right-wing corporate state models trying to keep the workers in their place. In the USSR the revolution actually took place. In Germany violence suppressed the workers. In the US they had a Red Scare. In Britain Churchill and others defeated the National Strike. In the 1920s in the States big company barons began to have a world-wide impact and ran US politics until the Wall Street Crash. Elsewhere, Fascism became the violent, militaristic edge of State Corporatism. When it was defeated in 1945 a greater degree of egalitarianism opened up and many countries nationalised industries putting them under the supervision of the state, so that they would act in the national interest and not exploit monopoly power for profit. Joan Robinson and other economists had pointed out the economic inefficiencies of corporate monopolies. Railways, postage, utilities and many other industries were more efficient, because they required national systems of operation. Health, education, welfare, transport and other areas of life became public, for the common good, rather than run by monied interests. All had fought in the War and all should benefit. For several decades this ethos was more dominant.

Yet, gradually, the big corporations crept back into the picture. All kinds of new monopolies appeared. They lined up to provide government with services. Many, especially arms, heavy engineering, transport, finance and other areas found links back into government. Banking had always, through national debt, a link into the State. But the real change came in the West with Reagan and Thatcher. Thatcher sold off, usually cheaply and to her mates, a vast array of national assets worth hundreds of billions. They allowed taxes on the rich to be cut and new areas of corporate profitability to emerge. Reagan spent money hand over fist setting up big corporate profitable contracts, especially in the arms industry, and both deregulated banking and other sectors so that they could reap national and international profits. Off shore tax havens guaranteed the world dominance of vast corporate wealth. Sadly, it took the world several decades, and another banking crisis fuelled by greed, to recognize the problems of this great corporate wealth. The oil and transport corporations denied global warming for decades, pushed militarism into a world-wide destabilising industry, and created a world financial system which is now acutely unstable and unfair.  

          Of course, these are judgements which the corporate groups would question in a variety of ways, but they represent evidence on a vast scale – whether it is clearing forests in the Amazon, a trillion dollar Pentagon expenditure on a US fighter plane, or allowing minimum wage infringements. Let us look at two further examples. Reagan as President backed a military programme called Star Wars, based around the idea that thousands of incoming nuclear rockets could be taken out by interceptor missiles and blown up. All serious military experts said it was unworkable – shooting a bullet with a bullet was the quick dismissal – but it became a gravy train for a number of big arms companies. In the UK with Coronavirus a number of big contracts for PPE and virus tracking were handed out to companies with links into Government. Those were state corporatist. But they are just the froth. What is actually happening is that Corporations have moved in to run vast areas of public life – prisons, buildings, the military, care, educational provision, railways, airports, utilities, public buildings and more. The contracts are secret. Corruption may abound. Public money is spent profligately. There is little accountability under the law. When companies fail, it is quickly glossed, and really the corporate system is in charge of the State and the politicians are mere puppets. The corporate system through rubbishing reformers, funding their own parties, and controlling political processes run the show. Johnson and Trump, contrary to what they might think of themselves are mainly puppets, keeping the system in place. The State Corporatist System is so fully in place, it thinks it is unshakeable.

This pattern is replicated, with significant variations, around the world, but it is not named, even at the basic level of public discourse, partly because it has learned to hide. It is time now to understand State Corporatism, see how it plays out in various industries, open up the secret areas of the state, and address its injustices and dominance. Hopefully, this short essay sets you on the path.

Economics, General, Politics

SUNAK’S REAL PROBLEM

Most of us can see a problem emerging for the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Coronavirus has led to the excess expenditure of some £400 billion to keep the normal economy afloat. It is not over yet, and government debts are piling up. It is a bit like punting. There is the guy punting down the river, who gets into a bit of a problem near the bridge, puts one foot on the base of the bridge arch, and, too late, feels the punt and bridge move apart with his weight on both feet. We, and he, know that he will finish in the water. Sunak was not late realising. He, as in other similar economies, decided to do what it takes and supported workers forbidden to work because of the pandemic. It is not a problem of his making. But his feet are moving apart and long legs will not solve the problem.

Most of us, too, think we can see the problem. The punt and bridge are moving part because government expenditure is not matched by income from taxation. We remember “austerity” which followed the 2008 crisis to balance the books, and realise this crisis is Times Ten and do not know when the budgetry problem can be solved. The answer seems to be to kick the ball further down the road. Almost all the commentators see the problem in these terms. Some mention BREXIT and rightly see a crisis coming in the New Year, but the Chancellor’s problem is basically an accounting one – too little income and too much historic expenditure. Plus, there is the normal Keynesian point that recessions require government expenditure stimuli to bring the economy back to normal. Note the assumption of some kind of normal.

Some rightly look further back. They recognize that Gordon Brown as Chancellor did fund the NHS properly and that was followed by cuts under his Tory successor, Osborne, which we are now paying for. The frenetic rush to address having almost no PPE stocks cost £12 billion, much of it wasted. Our NHS underfunding then has cost us tens of billions now. That is certainly true, and other failures in public funding in care homes, benefits, mental health, schools, public health are now biting us. Yet all of this analysis is within a framework of Treasury thinking and established political responses, and it is possible that the thinking does not go deep enough and does not address the problem we really have.

Let us ask an obvious question. The Government owes £1.8 trillion, but to whom does it owe that money? The answer is a bit slippery, but we can get some kind of answers. First, it owes some of it to us through the banks. We put money in the bank and the bans hold government bonds which used to yield interest, but now yield very little. But let us probe this a little more. Some of us put money in the bank, a lot of it. This includes very profitable companies. Other people, the poor and the young, are borrowing money from the banks, often at 20% or more interest. The banks make their profit from the poor, and merely hold a lot of government debt. Second, now the Government is borrowing money from itself through what is called Quantitative Easing, or QE. It is best to think of this as printing money. It costs the Government nothing and allows expenditure to soar. Previously, as with the German inflation of the mark in 1922, printing money leads to inflation. Economists do not explain why QE does not lead to inflation. Third, international finance including oil economies, China, Japan, dictators and the very rich will possibly hold some UK government debt as well as having a well-appointed house in London. Debt is not a problem if people are willing to hold it, but debt also signifies a big discrepancy between those who have it, and those who do not, namely our Government.

But we are merely skirting round the problem. To see it clearly, we must double its size. The Government owes something approaching £2 trillion, but since Margaret Thatcher the State Public Sector has had something like another £1 trillion sold off, often at knockdown prices, to the rich who now support the Tories. Telephones, Gas, Electricity, Water, Trains, Car Companies, Shipyards, Post Office, Bus and Coaches, Defence Companies, Land and all kinds of public sector resources built up over decades were sold off or privatised and the money went into the coffers of the Exchequer, vast amounts. When Thatcher sold off Local Authority Council Houses, through a legal sleight of hand, she claimed the money for the central Exchequer, spent it, but not on building more Council Houses, hence our present housing crisis. When the vast amounts received for North Sea Oil, at zero cost to the Government were sold off, the money was not saved for the long-term as the Norway Government did, but was spent mainly during the long period of Tory dominance. Indeed, we should all be angry that the Tories during this period were claiming economic competence while really they were spending not just the family silver, but all the resources needed for a good functioning public sector. They were worse than the Prodigal Son. Often their rich friends profited, and of course, European companies often bought up the utilities. But it was even worse than that, because the Tories began borrowing to build needed hospitals, local authority facilities and schools, as we now know, often at crippling rates of interest. Worse still, private contracts are now used in the NHS, Defence, the Home Office and elsewhere to run the public sector where there is no competition and the contracts involve vast profits. The corporate state of Fascism is with us, fortunately thus far without the violence. Most economists would agree at all of this adds up to at least £2 trillion, taking the public sector from vast surplus for our good into overdraft and private dependence. If we take the overall public sector loss in more recent times at £3 trillion, that comes out at £40,000 per capita, but because that is redistributed  some have gained hundreds of thousands or millions, while others are paying thousands and tens of thousands for resources they no longer have or now go without.

Where has all this money gone? The taxation take, especially for the rich, has been relatively low, because the public coffers have been raided, indeed, cleaned out. They have accumulated and been relatively lowly taxed. Taxes on wealth have more or less disappeared. Council Tax is based on property values of 1991 when property prices since then have gone up three or four times. The money has gone into investments, property overseas, international capital and into tax havens. How much? There is now an industry intent on hiding how much. It is secret beyond secret. We are all guessing, and there are different figures depending on whether you look at UK citizens who avoid tax offshore or UK trading companies who hide profits there. Aside this disinformation, £100 billion a year of tax avoided would not be outlandish, excuse the pun. It is the kind of money the Treasury needs. So both within the UK, and through international tax avoidance, the rich have soaked up this money. They get the rich contracts, high salaries, big pensions, profits, bonuses, the government spending, low taxes and massive windfall profits on property while the poor struggle. This is reflected in a two tier wage system. The poor get £10 an hour and often pay their own costs, while the rich get a £100 an hour, or even a £1,000 an hour for work which reflects being in the right place, rather than merit.

So, the real divide is private wealth and public squalor, the rich and the poor, and the failure to require the rich both to face proper levels of pay, profit and taxation, and the Tories will not acknowledge or address that this is the problem. They will duck a wealth tax, Council Tax re-evaluation, transactions tax, eliminating off-shore tax holdings, and other such reforms. Indeed, they may even seek to make the UK a bigger tax haven to attract money in to cover the present crisis after Brexit with a sticking plaster. So, the real underlying problem will not be addressed. There will not be the jobs, income, wealth, resources in poor areas to really lift them. The bias to the South East will continue. The sink estates and impoverished areas cut off from good work will stay that way. While Sunak shows goodwill, the real levelling will not take place, just as the idea of “levelling up” to the rich is unreal to start with.

It was clear at the last election that unless Boris had thrown out the promise to “level up” in the North and to create a “Northern Powerhouse” – (what is a Powerhouse?) – the Tories would have lost the election. With that, and the false antisemitic charges against Corbyn, the Tories won. Sunak must channel some funds up north and seek to redress the imbalances which have been going on for decades, but it is a few billions which are announced, when hundreds of billions have gone the other way, especially in the ownership of wealth.  we have discussed this without even mentioning the subsidy to the banking system giving them the funds to build skyscrapers, give ridiculous bonuses and pay out big profits, even when they went through the crisis in 2008.

The accounting problem waits for a solution, but without the rich being held to account, it will be entrenched. But the real underlying problem, the gap that has opened up between rich and poor, made worse by the plundering of the public sector goes on and gets worse. The payments handed to the North will not change it. The gap will remain open. Brexit, falsely trumpeted as a solution, will make it worse. The Tory politics of window dressing will leave millions of casualties because the whole economy is so skewed. That failure has been going on for decades, and the present adjustments do not change it. The gap opens up and the Conservative Government is in terminal failure.

Politics

PRICKING THE TRUMP BALLOON

Let’s state the Christian obvious. God had created everything. Human beings just move stuff about. Those who claim to “create”, to be “big” are just blowing up their own balloons. Thatcher’s “wealth creation” was laying off workers and telling the others to work harder. Trump puts himself at the centre. He will recreate America. He is a self-inflator. His claims are all balloons. His “economic revival” was Obama’s careful return from the Bush warring big spend. “No global warming” he says while California is on fire. Inject with disinfectant he says while coronavirus is rampant. Trump’s make America Great Again (for the second time), is balloony – a Greedy, Bullying, Fat, Stupid, World Gobbling US? We don’t want it. It successes the failures of sin. It is the biblical crash of the mighty. It is an orange painted coating on a sepulcre of lies. It is preaching without practice. It appeals to the poor from Trump Tower. It is a tax avoiding for the rich state careless for the sick. It is a blown-up illusion, the big lie, and people might love darkness rather than light, but not all the time.

In the light all balloons must be pricked. Jesus said, “Beware a wolf in sheep’s clothing” but that is to flatter Trump voters. “Beware a rat posing as an elephant” is more like it. “Many will come in my name,” says Jesus while Trump fumbles to say anything about the Christianity he is supposed to champion. So ALL the Christians had better sort this out. We can see Self-worship and Narcissism inflated by State propaganda, but Christianity insists on false gods being exposed. The balloon must be pricked for the humble poor, the planet, and because we have met and heard the Saviour. If the meek are blessed, this man is a curse, and part of the Good News is his demise.

Politics

Ms. Patel, aid to Israel, Boris, Fallon, Fox, the Arms Industry and the Truth?

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patel

The media have focussed on the sacking of Priti Patel as Secretary of State for International Aid, and breaking the Ministerial Code, but they have said little about what she was doing in all her contacts with the Israeli Government and why she would say things that seemed to be untrue. She said, for example, that Boris knew about the trip. So we ask the questions why did she meet Benjamin Netanjahu and others top Israeli officials and what did other Departments know?

We have been informed that Ms Patel was discussing the use of UK aid to help the Israeli army in their humanitarian activities. This was not a casual process as we see from the frequency of the meetings, and it was also for a purpose. “ Downing Street officials confirmed on Tuesday that the International Development Secretary discussed the idea of giving the Israel Defence Force British foreign aid to help fund a relief effort for Syrian refugees entering the Israeli occupied Golan Heights.” (Jewish Chronicle) This in itself is odd. Largely, the Jewish Government has prevented Syrian refugees from entering the Golan Heights which it controls. Why would it want potential terrorists in its occupied area? Some have come in for medical treatment, but no more. So, this was discussing the potential influx of refugees and aid which might accompany it, channelled through the Israeli Army. So why would Ms Patel, a rational person, channel aid through the Israeli army to potential Syrian refugees when she has millions of actual Syrian refugees in immediate desperate need requiring aid? It does not add up.

We notice that Downing Street put out the denial that the Foreign Secretary, Boris knew about the (holiday) visit before it occurred, not the Foreign Office, probably because they did not trust the FCO to do it properly. We note that although there was a denial that Boris knew about the visit beforehand, it did not mean that he was unaware of the reason for the visit, whatever that was.

So, the question remains, Why would Ms Patel channel aid for Syrian refugees who may not exist in large numbers through the Israeli army? There may be another explanation. At present this is speculative. The aid may have been linked to arms exports from the UK to Israel. There are a wide range of exports, but the current priority export may be drones, made by BAe Systems and others. The Israeli Army could be seen as wanting drones to monitor what is going on in Gaza and elsewhere. The “aid” could be seen as a bribe to get the Israeli Government to take up the deal.

Another bit of the picture may be Sir Michael Fallon’s resignation. It does not quite add up. There was one event when he put his hand on the knee of a reporter who saw it as having no significance, and other “misdemeanours” which fell below the “standards expected in the armed forces”. There were no charges by aggrieved women and no external evidence that Fallon had behaved like this. If Fallon did not resign for the stated reason, then perhaps he resigned for another undisclosed reason. He has long pushed deals for UK arms companies, including BAe Systems, and it may be that escaping from this military story was involved.

Of course, if all of this is not the case, it is not the case. But it should be investigated. Did Boris, Sir Michael Fallon, Priti Patel and Liam Fox know about such a potential arms deal, and was this the rationale for the Patel visit, and its secrecy. If so, it is appalling that aid to help the poor should be so used, and further resignations should follow. If not, I apologise to all involved for such suspicion.

General, Politics

Do you want a Capitalist Run Health Service?

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A Capitalist National Health Service.

The NHS has been discussed in this election in terms of chronic underfunding, but not much in terms of its continuing privatisation. National Health Action, one of the smaller parties, has raised the issue and aims to repeal the 2012 Health and Social Care Bill. It sees the scale of the problem. Labour aim to do something similar, but the issue of the emergence of a capitalist health service deserves more thought from all voters. It is key. The process will soon be irreversible. Capitalism puts those who are selfish in control. For decades the NHS has been marked by service, care and concern for patients. Soon it will be a question of what profit can be made out of patients and sickness. Voters need to think what they are losing. This short paper provides some background and warnings.

Capitalist Privatisation of the NHS.

You are aware that the NHS is being privatised. Nurses are being provided by agencies. Operation systems are set up by private companies. Hospital trusts can and do undertake commercial activities on a large scale. Hinchingbrooke Trust Hospital was taken over by a private company, Circle, in 2012. Private patient care is mixed up in the working of Hospital Trusts. GP Surgeries are being run by private companies; one has 3 million patients in its network. The Private Finance Initiative has been building hospitals through financial corsortia, and vast pharmaceutical companies put acute pressure on the NHS and NICE to use its products. It is difficult, deliberately so, to work out the proportion of the NHS which is now funding private and corporate agencies, but it is approaching 10% on the most limited calculation, and if PFI and other elements are included it could be twice that. Given the weight of ordinary staff wages, that is very high.

Structural Privatisation.

But the situation is worse than this. The structure of the NHS was changed drastically by the 2012 Health and Social Care Act. (Notice the Conservatives had an opportunity to address Care in this Act, but did not.) This Act created a capitalist structure to the NHS which embeds and encourages a private enterprise NHS. Contracts have to be put out to private tender and Foundation Trusts are expected to act like large private companies. There are all kinds of ways in which capitalism is embedded. The NHS logo, for example, covers a lot of private companies acting commercially. There is a company, NHS Property Services, which has shares and a commercial structure to handle NHS property. There are Commissioning Support Units which have a list of “preferred providers” dominated by private multinational companies. In the Budget of March 2017 the Chancellor Phillip Hammond provided £325 million for Sustainability and Transformation Plans, another privatisation move. There are now enough highly paid posts, with executives are in favour of the system that pays them, for privatisation to roll on.

So What?

So the structure for full privatisation is in place and quasi- privatisation has already occurred. But so what? Many people are not worried as long as they get NHS services free at the point of delivery. It is like receiving a free ice cream – Why worry who provided it? But here we must do a little analysis.

Waste and Inefficiency.

First, we look at the waste of money. One example was the contract to put out to CSC and BT to computerize all NHS records. It started in 2011, cost £10.1bn, was axed in 2011 without any records being delivered. Only a few hundred million were recovered from the companies concerned, a vast loss to the NHS. The cost of hospital PFI is similar. The contracts meant that repayments were three to seven times the physical cost of building the hospitals and repayments of £10bn a year are being paid (Guardian estimate) this fiscal year when, with QE, the Bank of England borrows at an almost zero rate. We hear the vast cost of agency nurses, drugs, private contracts and many other NHS contracts emerging month by month.

Quasi-Monopoly Private Control – Why it costs a lot more.

But the examples are merely that, examples. Far more important is the economic weakness in these privatisation contracts. Contracts are put out to competitive tender, but what does this mean? Say a cleaning contract is awarded for several hospitals. Employees, expertise, equipment is gathered by the company concerned and it does the job, well or badly (and remember G4S, that flawed company, “provides services to around 200 hospitals and healthcare centres in the UK alone”). Once these contracts are in place, the firms have an effective monopoly, because the cost of matching a contract in that area is beyond most other bidders. It is wrong to call it an internal-market system within the NHS, because monopolies are not markets; they kill competitors. It is an oligopoly, a club for favoured contractors. These are state favoured corporations. More than this, because if any one of these services stopped, a hospital or service would be in crisis, these firms have a power akin to the old union strike power. Usually, there is not any available way to withdraw from a contract when there is failure. No-one is going to rock the boat.

Firms have an interest in colluding in these kinds of markets. I’ll bid high on this contract if you bid high on that. Further still, bribery is also likely. If doctors have been bribed to prescribe certain drugs through receiving favours, how much more likely are bribes when billion pound contracts are involved. When a commissioning executive moves to one of the companies he has previously given big contracts to, that is bribery in my book, a reward for services given. So these monopolies can, and do, milk the system. Meanwhile the NHS employs 25,000 people to commission and administer these contracts, when they could be directly running the services concerned.

The other key point is that the costs for private companies are costs plus profits, while the direct running of the tasks would involve no profits. Since profits may be 10-20% of operating costs, this pushes up the NHS budget by billions.

But there is another structural problem with these privatisation moves. If the NHS is operating under a tight Budget, as it is, partly because of the privatisation which has already occurred, then private firms are in a stronger position to come in and pick up contracts. So the private companies benefit when the NHS is underfunded. Far from being efficient, this all reeks of waste on a large scale.

Andrew Lansley, the 2012 Health and Social Care Act and Care UK.

My interest is in the strange career of Andrew Lansley, my MP. Just before the 2010 Election the wife of John Nash, founder and then Chairman of Care UK was reported to have donated £21,000 to the private office of Andrew Lansley, then the Shadow Secretary of Health. Aside the issue of whether John Nash and his wife spoke to one another about donations, the £21,000 was effectively a bribe to Lansley, who anyway was planned to change the NHS. However, in the election Lansley said repeatedly that there was to be no “top-down” reorganisation of the NHS. Immediately after it, he opened the door to privatisation and within two months a white paper, undiscussed in the election or manifesto, was published. The Health and Social Care Act was being formulated. I was incensed at the donation. It was immoral, even if it could not be nailed as such. But my moral indignation was partly wrongly directed. Lansley became Secretary of State for Health, gave the green light to Care UK and other private companies who had effectively written the 2012 Health and Social Care Act for themselves and private health care was set to explode. Care UK has NHS Budgets of around £350 million a year. That makes £21,000 look small. Lansley proved an ineffective Secretary of State and has disappeared from politics. Care UK committed a number of gross failures in their contracts, operated off-shore to avoid taxes and were then partly taken over by a bigger capitalist, but is a big NHS private provider. Branson and othe capitalists with no Health expertise are looking to move in on these lucrative contracts..

Continued privatisation.

The privatisation continues. Jeremy Hunt, the present Health Secretary, has declared himself in favour of NHS privatisation. The question is merely when and how fast. Service is gradually being crushed under the capitalist commitment to selfish profit. Of course, within these organisations there are many who serve, care and work hard. There are many more who work hard on low pay so that the owners can reap their profits. Many contracts allow space for profits. A £1.2 bn contract in Staffordshire may well reap a minimum of £100mn “fees” which could have gone to the NHS.

This election.

If the Conservatives are returned this election, this privatisation with its waste, falling levels of care, entrenchment of selfishness, inefficiency and escalating costs will continue. We should be grateful to the National Health Action Party for the stand they have taken, and for the Labour Party’s commitments, and see how dangerous the situation is to Health Care. Underfunding is partly a problem, but it has also been partly caused by the privatisation and profiteering that has already occurred. We should be warned.

Christian Perspectives, Christianity

The Servant Queen and the Whole Earth

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The Bible Society, HOPE and the London Institute have just published a lovely book, entitled “The Servant Queen” as a tribute to the Queen on her 90th birthday. It shows Elizabeth’s clear sense of duty and devotion to God, and her conception of being the servant of the state of the United Kingdom and of the Commonwealth. The book shows through what she has said in Christmas broadcasts, but also through decades of service to the State and to the ordinary people whom she serves, how this has worked out. It is built upon the example of Christ and with Jesus as her focus, as she fully acknowledges. She is, simply, another Christian, learning and living the lessons of the Christian faith.
I’m not the kind of person who believes that Britain is Great, or even great, or a monarchist, but Elizabeth’s understanding and practice seems to me to be one of the defining principles of governance throughout the world. She has taken the words of Christ, and lived them. Jesus said, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. But you are not to be like that. Instead the greatest among you, should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves. For who is greater, the one who is at table, or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at table? But I am among you as the one who serves.” And that is the kingdom service Christ conferred on his disciples. The ruler is the servant. That is not only the personal commitment of Queen Elizabeth, but also a principle of governance that applies everywhere and throughout history, as Moses also was the servant of the Lord. It is the reversal of state control, self-glorification, conquest, empire, using nations in our self-interest, militarism, ethnic superiority and the attitudes which generate wars and international crises which have dominated much of history.
It is also the deep undergirding of democracy, for democracy is the service of the people by the rulers. Slowly the self-service of the monarchy and the government has dropped away under the influence of Christ’s words. They are for us. They are not the lording people. They are not serving themselves by corruption and manipulating the law, by passing the resources of the state to their cronies, by building themselves big houses, by being like Caesar or Herr Examine My Armpit. They are not masters, but servants. We have Civil, or nearly civil, servants. We have ministers who answer to us. When we call, they should come running. For the least of us, whoever is the least, and in Christ’s kingdom there is no least, because the lepers come first, they are our servants. They are not to get uppity. That is democracy, the normative structure of the state, the service of all the people by the stewards of law, justice and the common good – and we know She knows.
Of course, the British monarchy has the trappings of imperial and national self-glory – palaces, servants, crown jewels, a gold coach, titles, soldiers with furry hats who march up and down, an aristocracy who shoot birds and play silly games on horses and Lords dressed in vermin. The Queen was born into this set-up and it is still substantially intact. The British establishment state has a bloody, “send us victorious, happy and glorious” insufferability, and for some inexplicable reason wants to punch above its weight, but She knows differently. She knows we need to renew ourselves in God’s love and become better people. She knows we need to love our neighbours as ourselves and that what the quiet people do moves the world. She knows that you do not have to be rich or powerful to change things for the better, and the unseen and unrewarded often do the best stuff.
She also has a grasp on peace and reconciliation, and understands the Common Wealth of nations, what they can give to one another, like few others, and her international visits and welcoming of foreign visitors, has given that dimension weight in the life of the nations. She understands “healing old wounds”, and does it well whether in Ireland or elsewhere.
Her governments often do not see things the same way. They are often into winning, self-promotion, and putting down the opposition. They, contrary to Christ’s words, are constantly parading themselves as our Benefactors and telling us how good they are for us. They frequently go out and fight other states, and see them as enemies or threats. They have the power. They govern and shape the laws. But they also fail by their failure to serve. The principle of service rules, even when it is ignored or compromised. In Christ, and by obedience in Elizabeth, it does, and should, rule throughout the earth.

Christian Perspectives, Politics

A Biblical Worldview of Government

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(A short summary paper of some key principles for discussion)

Some two billion of the world’s population are Christian. They hold, varyingly, a perspective on politics and government drawn from and shaped by the Bible. It is surprising this perspective is not expressed more systematically, more often, especially in Jesus’ transformation of world politics. This short paper seeks to do it, in a rough fallible way, as a series of notes for your discussion on what seem the generic points.
1. God and humanity. The central, full relationship for all people is with God and not with the state. This rules out totalitarianism, ruler worship and political absolutism.
2. God and creaturehood. People are not self-referencing, autonomous, or merely part of a collective group. They live freely before God, not beholden of the State and are responsible for good living. We are neither individualistic or collectivistic.
3. We are called to good living. Justice, or righteousness, or loving our neighbour as ourselves, is the guiding condition of humankind before God. The law of God expresses this good and right living and we are to seek the law and abide in it, to normatively seek the common good, not just our own.
4. We live in institutions. Areas of life like Marriage, Family, Work and economic stewardship of the creation, Education, Worship, Community, the State and are ordained by God for our good. We live in these plurally, respecting them as areas of life in different spheres.
5. The State is instituted, or constituted, by God for law-abiding justice. It is “constitutional”, involves offices and articulated tasks of government like legislation, judgement, punishment, welfare, common good provision and institutional balance. This has developed since the time of Moses.
6. People are called to submit to the God-ordained state, but on God’s terms, not necessarily those dictated by the ruler. Generally, this leads to a stable state, but democratic and conscientious objection rather than rebellion is the stance taken to unjust rule.
7. Law and justice are the main matters of state formation. They involve just legislation, political understanding, international co-operation, principle, love, fairness, mercy, restitution, impartiality. The State does not own the law, but submits to it and forms it by principle under the rule of law, seeking for the good of the people, with accountability to God.
8. As Jesus taught in the SotM, people are called to be upholders of the law and law-abiding. The attitudes and attitude of ordinary people to the law is crucial for the health of the State.
9. Central to State formation is truthfulness, transparency and honesty. Jesus’ interchange with Pilate staes this centrally. As Jesus said, “There is nothing hidden which will not be revealed.”
10. People and states are sinners. Sin is both personal and corporate. It involves understanding, motivation, action and embedded attitudes. One of the deepest forms is idolatry, where money, military power, control, racial identity or some other human focus dominates life. In the Bible both people and state sins are addressed by the prophets. We should understand sin.
11. Properly understood states are governed through service of the people, as Jesus taught, not by self-promotion, glory or nationalism. The prophets, and Jesus, identified the self-serving ways of the Jewish rulers and the weaknesses of the Jewish state and surrounding empires.
12. The biblical understanding of power is not of control or military conquest, but of the power to do good. Acton: Power seen as control corrupts… Those who take the sword will perish by the sword.
13. The biblical economic understanding is of the goodness of work and stewardship, the lawful distribution of property among families, the wrongness of stealing, fairness and service in exchange – the basis of markets, economic long-sightedness, the absence of predation, of putting righteous living before seeking goods, and generosity to the poor partly through redistribution and forgiveness of debt. These principles have been behind much of the economic development of the west.
14. Political life can be redeemed, centrally through Christ, with peace, truth, justice, forgiveness, reconciliation, redistribution, service, fairness and freedom from state control.
14. Christianity is a faith of peace and peacemaking. Christ is the Lamb on the Throne and the Prince of Peace. Nations can unlearn war and swords become ploughshares. World disarmament is possible. Causing offence can be addressed. Nations can be reconciled in Christ. We can love our enemies.
15. Taxation is for the good of the people, especially for their common good, redistribution and addressing poverty. It is not for the self-aggrandisement of the rulers.
16. Democracy is a combination of Christian principles of the rule of law, impartiality, service of the people, public accountability and the space where truth can be debated. The demos, the people, are not sovereign or necessarily right. It is where truth contends in the market place.
17. Political Parties are expressions of shared faith and the discussion of truth following the calling to state office, not organs of self interest or state control.
18. God’s people are of all races and nations in equal respect. God is no special respecter of states or empires. Nation shall speak peace unto nation.
Alan Storkey October 2015
(Irenaeus, Augustine, Justinian, Wyclif, Erasmus, More, Luther, Melanchthon, Calvin, Knox, Hooker, Althusius, Perkins, Grotius, Cromwell, Putney Debates, Lilburne, Burke, Acton, Papal Encyclicals, Tawney, Kuyper, Dooyeweerd, Maritain, Fogarty, Mouw, Wolterstorff, O’Donovan, Skillen, Chaplin)