Fr Chris Hayden
An old preacher’s story tells of a group of people walking by a rapidly flowing river. They notice a man in the torrent, crying for help. One of them jumps in to save him. Moments later another stricken individual appears, and another member of the group jumps in to help. This happens again, and again, at which point one of the group begins to run on ahead. The others shout after him to inquire where he is going. “I’m heading upstream,” he replies, “to find out why so many people are ending up in the river.”
I was reminded of this story recently, while listening to a radio programme during which politicians and commentators were speaking about crime and policing. There was much talk about resources, and the need to have more police on our streets. The discussion was reasonable, sensible, pragmatic… and desperately limited. The entire focus was on policing and control. There was nothing about the root causes of crime; no attempt to ‘go upstream,’ to ponder the kind of societal and cultural influences that engender crime, and the kind of influences that might help to deal with it. Immediate, on-the-ground reaction seemed to be the only consideration.
Factors
It would be foolish to downplay the importance of policing. For as long as there is crime, it will be necessary to contain it, and to have recourse to legitimate, coercive control of criminals. But at the same time, there are ‘upstream’ issues which it is foolish not to consider. What cultural factors might we address? What kind of society are we seeking to create? Are we seeking to create a society at all, or merely to establish a social context in which individuals can exercise maximum personal freedom with minimal personal consequences?
These are important questions, and they are political questions. It would be no bad thing to ask a political canvasser what he or she thinks society is, and what it is for. So, you want my vote? Tell me, then, what kind of a society would I be voting for? What is your vision for society?
We might, for instance, ask what we are teaching our young people about freedom, and whether that teaching is accompanied by an equal emphasis on responsibility”
Policing is about control, management; it is necessary because of individual and societal failure; it is about picking up the pieces. The human condition being what it is, there will always be pieces to be picked up. But when politicians and would-be politicians seem unable to think beyond picking up the pieces, this should signal to voters that they are unlikely to have the vision to pursue or effect real change. They are more likely to continue on with the profoundly defective notion that the State is both the guarantor of maximum individual freedom, and the body tasked with dealing with the consequences of how such freedom is exercised. Thus, the guarantor of freedom without responsibility, freedom without restraint, gradually morphs into the police state, in which citizens typically clamour for ever-expanded freedoms coupled with ever-expanded policing.
What is the alternative? Contrary to populist claims, there are no procedural or political silver bullets, yet we need to look upstream, to give serious consideration to the source of society’s woes. We might, for instance, ask what we are teaching our young people about freedom, and whether that teaching is accompanied by an equal emphasis on responsibility. The eminent psychiatrist, Viktor Frankl, once suggested that the Statue of Liberty on America’s East Coast be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast. Liberty untethered to responsibility is not liberty – it is licence.
Vision
There are no quick fixes; the lifetime of a government is too short for radical change. But competent government is not just about the pragmatic allocation of resources, it is also about a vision for society. Indeed, a given government must seek to pick up pieces, but it can and should nudge society towards greater cohesiveness and health. In order to do this, it needs a vision, a sense of what a healthy and cohesive society looks like, and of what ideas, attitudes and resources – including moral and cultural resources – may be brought to the task. May the Lord send us visionary politicians, and not merely political pragmatists.