The demands of globalization have increased the need for fresh thinking on how to organize society for a better job of serving our people not only as Afrikans but as Zimbabweans with a history of colonialism and struggling to unshackle the restraints of neocolonialism. In this situation we have been withheld to go forward and our otherwise well intentioned leaders out of frustration have resorted not only to corruption but also to repression as the pain of failure pull them down. The generality of informed citizens, in this global village as they interact with nationals from other countries, have lost faith in our government, in big business, and other administrative institutions. They have realized our media being “dishonest,” our justice system “engineered and rigged,” our security system “personalized” the dignity of work “derided” and our climate and other policies a “hoax.” Our governments and public sector institutions have been captured by big business and agents of neocolonialism.
Most Afrikan leaders and governments take off on a nationalistic trajectory but with time they lose course and lapse into tyranny. The lives of citizens of the generality of Afrika and the so called third world has become characterised by turmoil, war, terrorism, xenophobia, genocides, abject poverty and a myriad of vices. The time has never been so ripe for a need to think about what principles should shape and guide our society to do a better job of delivering on human needs. This a time for us to swallow our pride, introspect and try to find out where we are going wrong, especially as Afrikans. Is it in our nature to fail to Administer ourselves or we adopted administrative systems alien to us and inapplicable to our situation and in a fast changing world. Should we revert back to the methods used by our ancestors during the days of primitive kingdoms or acephalous societies or we should coin up our own home grown admistrative system applicaple to our social, political, economic, environmental and religious situation?
LEAD enters the Zimbabwean political arena with a strong conviction that our society needs to move closer to the system known as “social democracy.” This admistrative approach should however not to be confused with “socialism” or “communism.” Social democracy as advocated by LEAD should borrow from the Nordic models but have some aspects of Technocracy. There is need to come up with an admistrative system that fuses capitalism with socialist tendencies yet recognizing the fact that the world has become so sophisticated warranting the need for governments to fuse democracy with technocracy. The politicians may be good at the political game but may be found wanting when it comes to the engineering demands of a changing world. Appointments to government positions should respond to the complexities of the technical world.
Social Democracy is an ideology that favours social, political and economic moves by the state for the explicit purpose of promoting social justice within a capitalist economy. It is a government system that favours capitalism over socialism but recognizes the need to fix certain inadequacies of capitalism so that the economic system works better for more people.
LEAD realises that there are many inadequacies in current capitalism as developed by the so called first world countries. Among them are the persistence of poverty, the growing level of income inequality, the likely reduction of jobs as automation and artificial intelligence advance, companies failing to cover their “social costs,” environmental exploitation, the business cycle and economic instability, and others. The growing wealth concentration created by capitalism is leaching into and assassinating our democracy. Instead of serving the masses democracy is advancing and entrenching the needs of the rich leaving the poor sinking deeper into poverty and deprivation. We need to think freshly about what respective jobs we want our government and our private enterprise system to perform for us.
Governments do not have power in themselves but are assigned the same by us the citizens. It’s imperative for us to birth and subscribe a governance system that is best suited for our situation them allocate power to political institutions which resonate with our needs and aspirations. We should pronounce the vision and national goal and then allocate power to a political ensemble which has the best means to attain our vision. Political parties should not dictate but be subject and subservient to the national vision. A society where there are no inferior or superior orders is our goal. This pronouncement should be done explicitly in the national constitution which document should be crafted by the citizens and subsumes all their wishes and aspirations. Now it is upto the political formation to come up with a management or ideological route that makes us without fail arrive at the premised destination. The LEAD political formation is convinced that it can provide such a government.
Social democracy coupled with technocracy requires a commitment to representative and responsive government. Citizens exercise voting rights on the principle of “one person, one vote” and this they do in trust. Citizens can vote for measures to reduce income inequality and to help the poor with food stamps, Social Security, and unemployment benefits. Citizens can vote for any measures that promise to improve the general welfare. It now remains with the voted and mandated to live upto their campaign promises and the demands of the national constitution. Good governance should be as enunciated by and enshrined in the national constitution. It should be an ethical undertaking by those in state authority to deliver in line with definitions and guidelines of the constitution. If a government does not stray from working for the good of the majority without marginalizing the minorities it does well.
Social democracy with technocracy advocates an evolutionary and peaceful transition from free market capitalism. It rejects a revolutionary approach. History has shown us that the revolutionary approach is not only violent but destructive and retrogressive. In most cases it has given rise to authoritarian and repressive governments which are no different from the autocracies of the 18th century. This gradualist approach ensures cooperation, collaboration, conciliatory and concessionary relationship between labour and capital. Such a symbiotic relationship if driven by technocratic rule yields what social democrats term progress. Social democrats accept the predominance of private property and private enterprise to produce most of the goods and services needed by the citizens. Only a small number of essential utilities and public services might be necessary under public ownership.
LEAD seeks adopt policies associated with Keynesian economics. Such an approach holds that the state can intervene in economic downturns to turn on the public spending spigot to prop up the economy. It calls for an independent Federal Reserve Board that tries to kick start a sluggish economy and compress a booming economy in danger of leading to a bust. This Social democratic approach favors a smooth working economy unplugged by the classic business cycle. Keynes thought that enlightened capitalism can get rid of the business cycle and mass unemployment. The idea of an independent central banking system has eluded us and could be the reason for our financial woes. Fiscal responsibility and accountability becomes a problem when there is too much influence and interference by politicians. The Reserve Bank governor should operate independently which gives him/her enough latitude to explore competitive and current fiscal and monetary policies and policy reforms.
LEAD will provide universally accessible public services like education, health care, and care for the elderly, child care, and workers’ compensation. It favors policies aimed at reducing poverty, inequality, and oppression of underprivileged groups. Citizens will get free college tuition, health care for life, long periods of paid maternity leave, and a guaranteed retirement income. LEAD welcomes labor movement and trade unions as tools for supporting the collective bargaining rights for workers and extending wage, benefit and working conditions improvements. It will favor a voice in large companies to share views on the welfare of employees and other company stakeholders.
The LEAD government will have a preference for paying higher taxes and receiving better medical care and lower college cost than paying lower taxes and receiving poorer medical care and higher college cost. It will also have a preference for most of the higher taxes to fall on the rich.
Another governance system which the LEAD approach will infuse with Social Democracy is Technocracy. Technocracy is a proposed system of governance in which decision-makers are selected on the basis of their expertise in a given area of responsibility, particularly with regard to scientific or technical knowledge. This system explicitly contrasts with the notion that elected representatives should be the primary decision-makers in government, though it does not necessarily imply eliminating elected representatives. Leadership skills for decision-makers are selected on the basis of specialized knowledge and performance, rather than political affiliations or parliamentary skills.
The term technocracy was originally used to advocate the application of the scientific method to solving social problems. Concern could be given to sustainability within the resource base, instead of monetary profitability, so as to ensure continued operation of all social-industrial functions. In its most extreme sense technocracy is an entire government running as a technical or engineering problem and is mostly hypothetical. In more practical use, technocracy is any portion of a bureaucracy that is run by technologists.
Mrs Linda Tsungirirai Masarira
LEAD President
