Equality, Equity & The Great Race Of Life.

Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis: For many – perhaps most – people, the word ‘equity” is a synonym for the word “equality”. And, to be fair, this is very often the way politicians expect the word to be understood. But the assumption that “equity” and “equality” mean roughly the same thing could not be more wrong. The difference between these two words is as important as the difference between “reform” and “revolution”.

THE WORD “EQUITY” is appearing more and more frequently in New Zealand’s political conversations. It is the new “go to” word for activists, journalists and, inevitably, politicians. It peppers political speeches, media releases, newspaper articles, television interviews and, naturally, it’s all over social media.

For many – perhaps most – people, the word ‘equity” is a synonym for the word “equality”. And, to be fair, this is very often the way politicians expect the word to be understood. But the assumption that “equity” and “equality” mean roughly the same thing could not be more wrong. The difference between these two words is as important as the difference between “reform” and “revolution”.

Most New Zealanders believe in and expect to enjoy “equality of opportunity”. They recoil from the idea of people receiving preferential treatment. Everybody is expected to line-up straight behind the start-line before the starter’s pistol sets them off and running in the great race of life. Very few people, however, expect the runners to cross the finish line at the same time. Most accept that in a contest someone comes first and someone last. A race in which everyone crosses the finish-line at exactly the same moment is not a race – it’s a jack-up.

But “jacking-up” the race (also known as “affirmative action”) is precisely what the proponents of “equity” believe in. What they are seeking is not “equality of opportunity”, but “equality of outcome”. If there are people in the race who have had the advantage of professional coaching, then those denied that advantage need to be advanced several metres ahead of the start-line. If there are runners who have enjoyed excellent nutrition all their lives, then those who have been poorly nourished since childhood must be similarly advanced along the track. If there are competitors who, on account of their ethnicity, enjoy a greater measure of confidence in their ability to win the race than those whose ethnicity has accustomed them to coming last, then those so afflicted also deserve advancement. Calculate these handicaps correctly and every runner should cross the finish-line simultaneously. Hey Presto! – Equality of Outcome!

Except, of course, that’s not the way it would go – not unless the people calculating the handicaps had guns. What sort of seasoned runners are going to accept others being positioned so far ahead of themselves? Rather than compete on such terms, many athletes would simply walk away from the contest altogether. Those awarded handicaps in the name of equity would then have to be reassessed and assigned a new handicap. How else could everybody be guaranteed to cross the line together? Not that anyone would be there to applaud them when they did. If the outcome of a contest has already been thoroughly engineered, why would anyone turn up to see it? Life is uncertain. So is sport. That’s why people watch.

The partisans of equity insist that their only goal is “fairness”: all they are seeking is a society in which everyone gets to enjoy life’s bounties; a society without “winners” and “losers”; a society in which the very idea of some people being allowed to “succeed” while others “fail” is regarded as obscene.

“Team Equity” will always get a hearing in New Zealand, where “fairness” is celebrated as the Prince of Virtues. What they will not find so easy to sell, however, is the idea that fairness requires people to be treated differently. That’s because Kiwis understand “fairness” to mean everybody being treated the same. Just watch what happens to someone who tries to jump a queue in New Zealand, or is given more than others are getting. Those responsible will be told in no uncertain terms that while everyone is entitled to a “fair go”, that does not mean they’re entitled to receive special favours from people who don’t know the meaning of the words.

This is where the propensity of New Zealanders to treat equity and equality as synonyms leaves Team Equity facing an enormous problem. In regard to Māori-Pakeha relations particularly, the argument has shifted well beyond the generally accepted notion that the indigenous people and the beneficiaries of colonisation were guaranteed, and continue to receive, equal treatment. But, “equal treatment”, in this context, can only mean that all the advantages accruing to the destroyers of Māori sovereignty must be left untouched, while the tangata whenua, stripped of their autonomy by “the imperial project”, are condemned to play a never-ending game of catch-up. Team Equity is demanding a solution considerably “fairer” than that.

What that fairer solution might look like is set out in the He Puapua Report. Its authors have come up with a twenty-year plan to give effect to what they see as the promises of equity (not equality) embodied in Te Tiriti o Waitangi. Essentially, they see Māori and Non-Māori running in the same race, but on separate tracks, until such time as both sets of runners become genuinely competitive. And the handicap? Well, that will come in the form of a more “equitable” distribution of the New Zealand state’s fiscal resources, achieved by the construction of a more equitable, te Tiriti-based constitution. He Puapua is much more than a blueprint for reform, it’s a road-map to revolution.

An exciting plan, then, but the chances of selling it to Pakeha New Zealand are as slim as the chances selling the idea of some runners being advanced ahead of others on the great racetrack of life. Its only possibility of success lies in selling equity as equality – which was the great achievement of the First Labour Government. How did they do it? Not by saying they were going to advance the interests of exploited working-class New Zealanders ahead of privileged middle-class New Zealanders, but by promising to build a nation in which everybody had the same access to a job, a home, universal public healthcare, and an education system which gave every citizen the best possible start in life. How did they pay for it? By handicapping the rich through progressive taxation. What did they call it? Equality of Opportunity!

This essay was originally posted on The Daily Blog of Thursday, 9 September 2021.

Liberty, Equality, Fraternity: Some Thoughts On The Political Trinity

And The Greatest Of These Is Liberty: As Eugene Delacroix (he's the one holding the musket) graphically illustrated in his famous 1830 painting Liberty Leading The People, the prime mover of all great revolutionary struggles is humanity's determination to be free.

IF IT HAS DONE NOTHING ELSE, the Charlie Hebdo tragedy has reacquainted us with the goals of the first great revolution of the modern era. Over the past painful fortnight the French people and their political representatives have repeatedly invoked the three founding principles of the French Republic: Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. There is no disputing the revolutionary potential of these principles. Individually and collectively, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity define the modern democratic project. Since 1789, every major revolutionary episode has drawn inspiration from at least one of them.

 

It is no accident that the French revolutionary credo is presented as a trinity. Hostile though the French revolutionaries undoubtedly were to the claims of organised religion, they also understood that the French state occupied a special place in the heart of the Catholic Church. This was because the Catholic Church had for centuries occupied a special place in the hearts of the French people. If Church and State were to be separated, as the Enlightenment values of the revolutionaries dictated, then the sacred trio of Father, Son and Holy Spirit would have to be replaced with an equally compelling trinity.

 

The correspondences between the Christian and the revolutionary trinity are interesting.

 

If it is true that “in the beginning” was God the Father, “the maker of Heaven and Earth”, then it is also true that Liberty – Freedom – lies at the very heart, and is the prime mover, of all truly revolutionary movements. Without freedom, all the other revolutionary goals are soon compromised. Indeed, it is precisely the restriction of freedom that allows inequality to flourish and renders human solidarity impractical.

 

But, if Liberty is the first demand of the revolutionary, that is only because the injustices of inequality are so many and so urgent that they cry out for the freedom necessary to address them. Equality thus plays the role of Jesus in the Christian trinity. Theologically speaking, although God precedes Jesus, Jesus is also God – or at least that much of Him as can be rendered intelligible to human-beings. Philosophically speaking, Equality cannot exist without Liberty, and yet it is also the state-of-being for which Liberty is constantly sacrificing itself.

 

Hence the need for Fraternity – the revolutionaries’ answer to the Christians’ Holy Spirit. Without the solidarity and empathy so crucial to fraternity’s historical expression, Liberty and Equality can very easily become empty, potentially contradictory – even deadly – political objectives.

 

The French Revolution itself bears witness to the consequences of abandoning Liberty in the name of Equality. Robespierre’s “Reign of Terror” was intended to coerce the French people into virtue. A surfeit of Liberty, according to Robespierre, had placed the egalitarian fatherland in mortal danger. Accordingly, the newly ratified Rights of Man and of the Citizen were suspended, pending the final destruction of the ancien regime and its aristocratic supporters. Fraternity, not surprisingly, was the first to feel the embrace of Madame Guillotine.

 

The destruction of Fraternity is, therefore, incontrovertible evidence that the revolution is in the process of being, or already has been, betrayed. Just as the concept of Holy Spirit acts as a sort of miraculous glue – binding together God, Jesus and the faithful in an ineffably mysterious unity – so, too, does the principle of Fraternity serve to keep the people’s eyes on the revolutionary prize. One has only to be reminded of Stalin’s order to “eliminate the Kulaks as a class”, or recall Pol Pot’s genocidal determination to empty Cambodia of every human-being who was not a peasant or a party worker, to understand what happens when solidarity and basic human empathy are branded “counter-revolutionary” sentiments.

 

Madame Roland, the French revolutionary leader whose moderation earned her the enmity of Robespierre's Jacobins, and whose own faction, the Girondins, were duly purged as soon as the Jacobins gained political ascendancy, is best remembered for her words addressed to the statue of Liberty in the Place de la Revolution as she awaited execution: “Oh Liberty! What crimes are committed in thy name!”
 



Madame Roland: "Oh Liberty! What crimes are committed in thy name!"
 

But Madame Roland was wrong. It is not Liberty that inspires political extremism, but a perilous ambition to reduce all the dazzling diversity of the human family to a dull and ominously silent uniformity. As if Equality was a purely mathematical concept meaning sameness, instead of a political ideal describing the social condition of human-beings who are free to create rich and productive lives for themselves and their families while protected from chance and adversity by the collective love and support of their fellow citizens.

 

A Left that does not proclaim Liberty as its primary objective; a Socialism that is not of its essence emancipatory and libertarian; a Labour Party not proudly committed to helping their fellow citizens’ pursue happiness; none of these has a future – and, frankly, does not deserve one.

 

In a Christian’s life, St Paul told the Corinthians, only three things truly matter: Faith, Hope and Love – and the greatest of these is Love. When it comes to political salvation, however, the only three things that truly matter are Liberty, Equality and Fraternity – and the greatest of these is Liberty. We must never forget, however, that Liberty, like God, comes as part of a package deal.

 

Being free on your own is the best definition of Hell I can think of.

 

This essay was originally posted on The Daily Blog of Monday, 19 January 2015.

I am NOT a "Trotterite"!

The Joys of Caricature: I am not now - nor have I ever been - a "Trotterite". Drawing by Murray Webb.

IT’S ALWAYS PUZZLED ME that a man of "Idiot Savant’s" dogmatic certitude should be such a wuss.

With the Comments function of his No Right Turn blog safely switched off, Mr Savant hurls down rhetorical thunderbolts upon the heads of his enemies without the slightest fear of contradiction.

Those of us with a little more respect for the rules of open debate leave our Comments function switched on and are thus required to defend our postings mano a mano.

Clearly, being held accountable for his own words is not something Mr Savant relishes – and that’s a pity, because it forces the people he attacks to come back at him directly (and very publicly) on their own blogs.

Right, now that I've got that off my chest, the first thing I’m going to say about this recent, highly tendentious posting by Mr Savant is that, in the fine tradition of Karl Marx disclaiming the title Marxist: "I am NOT a Trotterite!"

By "Trotterite" Mr Savant appears to mean any person who opposes "social engineering" – which he defines as "any moves to ensure equality for anyone who isn’t a white male".

This is, of course, very far from the more usual definition of social engineering as: "The practical application of sociological principles to particular social problems." Or, less benignly: "The manipulation of the social position and function of individuals in order to manage change in a society." (The Free Online Dictionary).

The other defining characteristic of the Trotterite, according to Mr Savant, is that he or she is passionately of the view that the NZ Labour Party should "throw women, Maori, children and gays under a bus in a quest for the votes of its traditional base" which he supposes to be "racist, sexist and bigoted" working-class males.

Obviously, we would be very foolish to take Mr Savant’s definition literally. No one I know (or have ever known) in the Labour Party has ever advocated the murder of women, Maori, children or gays. And I suspect any Labour politician who bowled up to a canteen-full of working-class males and told them how glad he was to meet so many racist, sexist, bigots, would very soon be departing in an ambulance!

So, what is it about the ideas of these so-called Trotterites that Mr Savant really finds so objectionable? Essentially, it is their refusal to regard identity politics as an unequivocally progressive and unproblematic phenomenon.

For Mr Savant the goals of identity politics are indistinguishable from those of classical liberalism.

In his own words: "[W]hen you get down to it, the core idea running through the heart of the left … is a demand for equality for all. That equality has never just been economic, but also political and social … to be who we are, not what some stuck-up ‘lord’ wants us to be … Either you stand for the equality of all, or you’re supporting lords and peasants again. There is no middle ground on fundamental rights."

The first and most obvious riposte I would offer to this curiously naïve statement is that Mr Savant fundamentally misunderstands what the Left is all about.

For the Left, the quest for equality is not an end in itself but the means to achieving its ultimate objective – a just distribution of social and economic power.

Since Mr Savant mentions the Peasants Revolt of 1381 in his posting, let's take a look at its celebrated slogan: "When Adam delved and Eve span – who was then the gentleman?" In this revolutionary challenge to the social relations of the English countryside the rebel priest, John Ball, is asking (in the language of the Bible): How did we get from a world in which men and women worked for themselves, to a world in which they work for a master?

Why is the question revolutionary? Because it implicitly calls for the creation of a new social order in England. Not a social order in which the serf is equal to the lord, but an order in which there are no lords – or peasants.

This is what Mr Savant doesn’t "get" about the Left. That it is not simply about "the equality of all", but about transforming society to the point where power and wealth are so justly distributed that the word "equality" merely describes the way human-beings interact with one another.

What Mr Savant is doing is what the Marxists (whom he also profoundly misunderstands) call "fetishising" equality. It’s why he reacts so vituperatively when the claims of his beloved identity politicians are challenged.

He simply cannot see that it matters not one whit whether the person sacking you is male, female, Maori or gay: what matters is that they are wielding power over you – power which the social and economic system has vested in them in spite of not because of their gender, ethnicity or sexuality.

Mr Savant wrongly believes "identity" to be an entirely unproblematic concept and that anyone who attempts to clarify its relationships with the distribution of social and economic power is some sort of feudal throwback.

What he’s forgetting, of course, is that the over-riding importance assigned to one’s identity - whether you were a "lord" or a "peasant" - pretty much defined the medieval mindset.

Identity and Equality – far from being indistinguishable – are antithetical.

What the Left seeks is justice.