Keith Collister, Contributor"JAMAICA IS a failed state" - Is that what Bank of Nova Scotia's (BNS) managing director Bill Clarke really meant in his recent speech?
Some might argue that the subject of 'Jamaica as a failed state' has already been beaten to death in the media, and that whether or not you agreed with Mr. Clarke's statement, was largely determined by your political persuasion. However, this statement is actually one line on page six of a 22-page speech, and after interviewing Mr. Clarke I believe it did not really represent what he was trying to say. In fact, in some ways, without the appropriate context and background, it actually misrepresented a long and wide-ranging speech.
An academic contributor, Robert Buddan noted two weeks ago that "to say that Jamaica is a failed state, as one leading banker has, is a misunderstanding of what a failed state is." Professor William Zartman of John Hopkins, a leading academic in this area, defines a failed state as follows:
"As the decision-making centre of government, the state is paralysed and inoperative; laws are not made, order is not preserved, and societal cohesion is not enhanced ... As a territory, it is no longer assured security by a central sovereign organisation. As the authoritative political institution, it has lost its legitimacy ... As a system of socio-economic organisation, its functional balance of inputs and outputs is destroyed ..."
Professor Zartman goes on to say however that "the distinction between fragile state and failed state is blurred: failure is when fragility intensifies."
PRACTICAL MEN
As Mr. Buddan says, Mr. Clarke is a banker, and bankers are typically practical men, and certainly not academics. From reading his speech, and our follow-up interview, I believe Mr. Clarke is expressing the view that he regards some elements of the Jamaican state to be "fragile". Mr. Clarke was at pains to emphasise that his statement was neither based on any academic definition of failed states, nor was he trying to quantify in any sense Jamaica's degree of failure by using the term.
In my view, his speech is actually about the unfulfilled promise of Jamaican democracy in achieving true development for all Jamaicans, not an academic definition of a failed state. His focus is on the need for excellence in government, to achieve our common goal of government for the people.
THE PROMISE OF DEMOCRACY
Following independence in 1962, Jamaica inherited a form of democracy based on the British parliamentary system, characteristic of modern western democracies. Mr. Clarke's central argument is that the democracy we inherited at independence should have been just what a newly-independent Jamaica needed that it in fact represented 'the promise of democracy'. Mr. Clarke defines the promise of democracy carefully as "government whose aim would be for the benefit, not of a small majority, but for the greater mass of the people."
His clear disappointment is that Jamaica has not fulfilled the extremely bright future that it appeared to have at independence, and it is for our failure to achieve this "promise" that he characterises Jamaica as a "failed state" - failure clearly being meant as a term relative to the promise Jamaica appeared to have had.
He does not believe our democracy has worked for the good of the people, but rather "for the benefit of a small minority who hold the power of kings and their inner circle." In particular, he argues that our parliamentary system has failed Jamaica.
In his opinion, Parliament's functions include:
Representing the electorate. Holding government accountable for its actions. Monitoring appropriation and expenditure of public funds. Being a forum for constructive debate Legislating/making laws Being a forum for expression of grievances that are inimical to the interests of the people And finally, although we seem to have forgotten, making or breaking governments.Mr. Clarke essentially argues that the two watchdogs, Parliament and the people, have not performed their fundamental role of acting as a check on the executive branch. In his view, rather than being simply a rubber stamp for the policies of the executive, Parliament needs to be like an auditor of a corporation, independent and impartial.
The principal problem in his view is that Parliament does not perform its independent role due to the pre-eminence of political parties, despite their limited constitutional role. The goal of a Member of Parliament (MP) is to become a minister, which gives the Prime Minister too much power - an elective dictatorship if you will. Instead of MPs seeing themselves principally as servants of the people, MPs see themselves as being part of one huge government executive, particularly due to the relatively small number of backbenchers for example, MPs not in the Cabinet in Jamaica compared with the major parliamentary democracies. As Mr. Clarke puts it succinctly, if MPs do not play their independent role, the country suffers.
CIVIL SERVICE
He is also clearly concerned as to what he says is the erosion of the independence of the civil service over the last 40 years. He argues there is a need for an independent and efficient civil service that is not overtaken by ministerial edicts. In particular, he deplores the over use of "special advisers" by ministers, which he believes undermines the traditional authority of permanent secretaries.
One of his biggest concerns is the neglect of the judiciary, which he describes as the last bastion of civilisation. In his opinion, the huge delays in court cases, up to seven to 10 years in some cases, mean that justice delayed is effectively justice denied. In his opinion, the courts are under-funded, our judges and other staff underpaid and suffer from the lack of relevant reference and court material to do their jobs.
He also echoes recent concerns about the failure of our educational system and poor state of the rule of law, particularly on the issue of crime. One controversial suggestion of his is to merge the police and army to deal with what he describes as our current "security crisis". This is part of one of his themes that Jamaica needs to prioritise resources to achieve "centres of excellence", in this case raising the standards of the police rather than diluting those of the army. It is clearly his perception that we are "failing" on this key issue of security which appears to be the principal reason for his use of the strong term "failed state", although I might argue the word "fragile" may still be more appropriate at this time.
In any case, Mr. Clarke is clearly only expressing the very high concerns of local and overseas Jamaicans, and our foreign allies, over our current crime situation. For example, in a recent speech at the Jamaica British Businessman's Association, newly-arrived British policeman Mark Shields, argued that Jamaica needs a massive investment in information technology and management, because as he put it, "if we don't get security right, everything else will fail."
GOVERNING ELITE
Finally, Mr. Clarke believes that the people of Jamaica need to differentiate between those who aspire to be statesmen, and those who merely wish to be part of the governing elite. He uses a cricketing analogy. "The Government is fighting to stay out, while the Opposition is fighting to get in," so that neither side has advanced the issue of constitutional reform. As he starkly puts it, "the people of this country, and their elected representatives must take responsibility for the failure of our governments since independence." In his view, Jamaicans need to stop complaining about corruption, get off their verandahs and take back Government.
In summary, Mr. Clarke appears to be arguing that there has been an overall erosion of the traditional checks and balances on the Jamaican state, and making a timely "call to action" for an improvement in our overall governance. In my view, while Jamaica cannot currently be characterised as a failed state using an academic definition, it is reasonable to argue that we are "failing" as a society in critical areas such as crime and education. My observation is that while our problems are certainly not unique to Jamaica as a developing country, it is an interesting question to debate why we did not achieve what appeared to be an extremely bright future at independence in 1962.
Email Keith Collister at keithcollister@cwjamaica.com or send comments to infocus@gleanerjm.com
