Machiavellians With Double Standards

I posted a while back about David Cameron's comments on Pakistan's (alleged) dual attitude to the problem of violent islamism. As I noted it attracted quite some flack but comparatively little about the accuracy of the comments. It seems, at the very least, I was right about the popular feeling aspect of this.

'on the recent controversy over David Cameron’s comments on Pakistan the public agreed with what Cameron actually said about Pakistan and the export of terror by 66% to 15%. However, they also had negative view about Cameron’s abilities as a statesman – 30% thought he was a good statesman, 43% thought he wasn’t (compare that to his overall approval ratings which remain positive).' - UK Polling Report

What I didn't think about at the time was that the Pakistanis are not the only ones whose double standards are on display in this affair. This can be explained as just simple cognitive polyphasia (a much better term for double standards), a well know phenomenon in political polling and nothing particularly remarkable in this case. What this reflects is only that people's image of Cameron as a statesman is not in fact informed by any of diplomatic activities - this is just how people think about politics.

But in this case there is a way out of the usual indictment of public opinion. Alternatively we can explain this by saying that the public genuinely view diplomacy and statesmanship as an exercise in deception and lying. Tell the truth in the wrong circumstances and you have done the wrong thing, regardless of the facts. Nothing new in that either, that doctrine has been ever present in politics since Machiavelli, and a very mature attitude for the public to take (if that isn't too pejorative). Except that when you put it like that it starts to look like double standards and polyphasia again. Imagine the reaction if a British politician admitted having lied about domestic matters in the same way. I defy anyone to find an example of press or popular criticism of a minister for being excessively truthful about the domestic situation. Could you really see those headlines? 'Minister Admits Crime Is Rising, Should He Have Hushed It Up?' or 'PM Should Have Lied Over Economic Figures'. Lying to johnny foreigner = good, lying to Brits = bad.

The good news is that on balance I don't think this is about racism. It isn't really British people that we object to dishonesty toward, it's to us personally, but it is far easier to express it this way (it gives you a few more allies). Even though we are rarely as patriarchal as to exclaim on a regular basis 'You can't handle the truth!' we all do hold the view (don't we?) that there are at least some truths that some people really can't, or perhaps more to express it more sympathetically - shouldn't be made to, handle. And this is what is really at work, not some mistrust of other collectives, just a simple mistrust of every other person on earth! So what is to be done? If you will excuse the pun. Simple, we just have to stop trusting ourselves and what we can and can't 'handle' so that next time when we are told that there are some things that we can't or shouldn't know, for our own good, we might just believe them and be better off for it.

A Few Good Men, Well.. Just Two Actually

I finally got round to watching Nick Robinson's documentary on the formation of the coalition agreement over five days last may. It's worth reflecting on what a remarkable achievement that really was.As ever it's the biggest events, the ones that define everything that comes after them - if only because they form part of the filter we use to see the world, that we forget were not always going to happen. This is probably because we don't just see the future differently but also the past. It's a worrying thought, the idea that we can't look back with certainty, and it's one of the reasons I decided to start writing a blog (although I'm keenly aware that this only goes some way to alleviating the problem). But anyway, in this case, it seems that we can make a case for the events of those days in may being, if not obvious and inevitable, more likely than many at the time thought (including myself).

The reason for this seems chiefly to be personal rather than political (to use that word 'political' in a sense that means, if we are being honest 'ideological'). Of course this might be a reflection of Nick Robinson's remarkable ability to perceive the human terrain of a political battle, if he has a fault it would be overplaying it's significance from time to time, but on this occasion it really does seem the best, if not only, explanation. It Hopefully also explains the pictures (right and below to the left) because I speak, of course, when I say personal of the extraordinary relationship between David Cameron and Nick Clegg. It would be too much of a stretch to say that they make the coalition work, as it would of any government (single or multi party), but they do seem to have made it happen. The reason is as simple as, and I think Nick Robinson has said as much, trust. Trust is that basis of all other relationships, which are at least partially defined by the level of trust required. As such it is also incredibly hard to build from scratch, the higher the stakes the more this is true.

So how did they do it? How did the eerie premonition on my right (the London 2012 mascots) turn to reality so quickly, allowing adversaries to become friends? The short answer is that they didn't and it didn't, and that is because thinking about it that way it really would have been impossible, if you follow me. This situation wasn't created overnight, election night or otherwise. The truth, if you will take my word for it, is that trust comes from common experience - that's why even adversarial politics works best when those involved have similar spheres of experience. When Thomas Hobbes theorised that free men under no law but nature would inevitably conflict it was becuase there could be no trust, and this was because his epistemological view committed him to the idea that there could be no genuine common experience. I would guess that most people do think that common experience is possible, if not I can offer a little in the way of proof, but I doubt this will be needed. Cameron and Clegg have common experience by the bucket-load, They are both affluent, privately educated young men (born less than a year apart), one studied at Oxford and the other at Cambridge. They entered parliament only 4 years apart and for both the 2010 election was their first as leader. Politically importantly they both won the leadership of their respective parties by being bold, with a mandate for change. Need I go on? Without wanting to overplay the obligatory marriage metaphors the phrase 'made for each other' occurs. Of course this has all been said, better, but it never hurts to labour a good and important point, lest we forget that it might have been otherwise!