Courts and Governments

A general stance of those on the right, Christian or otherwise, it seems, is to be anti-Europe, and also in particular, anti-ECHR (European Court of Human Rights). As the right-wing press usually bemoans, it gets in the way of us doing the things we want to. Ten a penny are the Daily Mail stories to this effect.

What I don't quite understand is why this is such a bad thing. If we assume first off that the Court of Human Rights is a court set up to defend the liberties of humans in a fallen world, and does so without bias (but with the odd mistake here and there), then is it a problem if it says to a government that it can't do something that stands in the way of civil liberties?

For example, with this cleric recently released from jail in the UK; the ECHR has stopped his deportation to Jordan because courts there may try him using evidence elicited via torture.

Now what I don't quite understand here is what the problem is exactly. Do right wingers want us to be a country that hands people over to be tried by courts that use torture to elicit evidence? Wash our hands of them and be done of it?

Now I appreciate this man is charged with something pretty nasty, but he is still a man, and still innocent until proven guilty, and what about the precedent of allowing someone to be tried unfairly, regardless of how unpleasant he or she is? The precedent isn't a great one. So thus, I don't really understand what the opprobrium from the right is here.

Governments generally set the rules; usually, I guess (I'm not an expert here by any means since I'm not a lawyer), they are also confined to act within a constitution. So what is wrong if a court is able to point out to a government where it is behaving illegally, domestically or internationally? Are we really happy to live under governments that feel able to do whatever they like, trampling on the civil rights of citizens? Why shouldn't governments be kept in check?

Of course both governments and courts make mistakes, are guilty of terrible things, but resorting to specific examples where courts made nasty decisions and governments were more noble (e.g. slavery) doesn't really answer the more general point I'm making here: Why shouldn't governments be kept in check? Why do we want governments to be unrestricted in what they do? If we do, then I think we are guilty of a contradiction - we are essentially slaves to governments in the latter situation.

Can someone enlighten me please?!

Christians and Kings

Today is the 60th anniversary of the current Queen of England ascending to the Throne, and Christians, particularly on the right, are lauding this.

I think leftie Christians are often slightly uneasy about this, and I've noted right-leaning Christians making a big play about the fact that this is wrong, that the Queen (and any head of state for that matter) is of course only there because God put him or her there.

This is undoubtedly true, and the fact that the Queen, it seems, does communicate the Gospel will is an added bonus - something to praise God about.

But I'm just not sure that the justification I've given here is a reason for right-leaning Christians to beat left-leaning ones (or even centrists ones for that matter). Surely the same reasoning says Gaddafi was the God-ordained leader of Libya for quite a few years, and Assad is currently God ordained for Syria, right?

Or have I got that wrong?

I almost forgot to comment on this trash...

...a blog post entitled "We Need More Tory Bishops". Oh we do, do we? Apparently, the writer is also "is firmly persuaded that the Lord wants Ed Miliband to become Prime Minister of the United Kingdom about as much as He wants Johann Hari to write the Third Testament".  Apparently all Bishops in the Church of England "pore over The Guardian every morning with their mint tea and muesli and intercede fervently for the amelioration of the fortunes of Ed Miliband".

Apparently though, this kind of thing is all humour, because right wingers have a better sense of humour than left wingers (to quote Michael Ehioze-Ediae).

The post, as us usual from this really rather abhorrent imposter of a probably caring, compassionate and non-judging historical member of God's church, descends into a prejudiced and deliberately misleading rant, as perhaps best exemplified by this: "How in the name of St Gemma could an income of £2000 a month be considered poverty?".

Has "His Grace", as this blogger pompously calls himself, considered who might actually get the full amount of benefits?

Has "His Grace" thought about the determinants of this? I guess he probably figures we should shut up such people as his lovely (and totally non-judgementally named) St Gemma in some ghetto areas of town, the slums, rather than have the possibility, shock horror, that they might actually live somewhere near decent, sophisticated people.

Sophisticated people that read the Telegraph and studied A-level economics and thus think they are entitled to judge on exactly how the economy should work, and what governments should and shouldn't do.  But, of course, in writing that, I slip right into the category of "His Grace" in making judgements about people.

The bottom line is this: I'm yet to find a right winger, particularly one who is a Christian, talk about benefits and the poorer in society, without resorting to such vague generalisations about the "kinds of people" who claim benefits - based on no more evidence than what they read in the Daily Mail. The idea that the "kinds of people" that are on benefits are our neighbours, and thus we should love them, as Jesus exhorted, seems very lost on these people.

Go on someone, surprise me.

Sons and the Welfare State; an update

A few days ago I wrote about my tentative thoughts about applying the parable of the prodigal son to our thoughts about the welfare state. My main purpose was to solicit the thoughts of those more theologically learned than I am, and I was very pleased to get the thoughts of one particularly more theologically learned scholar who doesn't nail his political colours to the mast.

The bottom line was that since Jesus is using a story in the first place, then clearly he has in mind the interpretation he wants to that story, and it's to spiritually lost people, rather than materially lost folk in need of some welfare state and perhaps the intervention of a government. So I guess it's applying an application, one level removed than I'd previously thought about, and that was a good thing to ponder on.

I was seeking objections to making the link, and a few have emerged. One is that the younger son only received the father's welfare state when he came to his senses and recognised how broken he was. In that respect he became deserving rather than undeserving. My favourite right-wing vessel is full of horror stories of families seeking to live off benefits rather than do an honest day's work. Lefties I think do down these stories, righties overstate them. Such folk undoubtedly exist, the question is to what extent - but even that is somewhat moot here. But if these folk do that, taking advantage of the system deliberately and manipulatively, they remain undeserving poor, and if we were to apply this parable to the welfare state, then the objections of righties remain. They haven't returned to the father/Father/government.

What's left then? I thus don't think that the parable can be used as I previously thought; it doesn't change the fact that right wingers think there are millions and millions of scroungers, while lefties think these guys are deserving because of the way the market system has manipulated them. One group is sceptical about those out of work, the other about those that put them out of work, and surely both have their faults.

What are we to be as Christian though? Matthew 5:47 and surrounds point out that if we respond, like for like, we're no better than pagans. So should we be harsh on such scroungers, dock them their benefits, throw them to the dogs? Or should we be gracious?

But should we be a doormat? Equally we shouldn't be doing that; I guess if forced as a non-theologian to find the Biblical reference to back that up, I'd point to 1 Timothy 5:20, but even then I think the context is wrong but that's by the by. Those that are having kids just to get benefits, who refuse to take work because being on benefits is easier, should be rebuked.

I'd like to think that reflecting on the lost sons should make us reflect on whether our attitudes towards those less fortunate to ourselves are not cynical, not judgemental, and instead gracious, but not to the point that things become ridiculous. But I suspect everyone I know who leans to the right would say they already are at that point, whereas all those I know that lean to the left, myself included, would probably say the same. I guess this kind of makes this a rather pointless post!

The Prodigal Sons

It's taken me a little while, but at the end of November I was challenged by a set of talks given by Richard Brewster on our church weekend away about the parable of the lost son. Particularly, it was suggested that there were actually two lost sons, as the elder son who gets upset when the younger son returns and is welcomed, is also lost to his father.

The parable points thus to two sinful sons. The younger is foolish, impatient, aberrant and blows his wealth enjoying the world and all it offers. The elder though is self-righteous and also has a substandard relationship with his father because of this, throwing a strop because the younger son is forgiven, and revealing in doing so that he also doesn't have a good relationship with his father either.

What struck me during these talks was the parallel with the welfare state. The elder son essentially rails on about the deserving poor, wondering why generosity is afforded to those who do not deserve it. It sounds quite familier - a lot like what many are saying about benefits recipients at the moment. The elder son is in the same boat as the folk that complain about the level of benefits: They are forced to live in a system that takes from them and redistributes to others who they see as undeserving of that.

But does the parable really mean that we should thus submit to a government that redistributes? Is the role of the father in the parable, and hence the Father that the parable points to, really to be taken up by governments, or should it just be the role of individuals giving voluntarily? After all, God loves a cheerful givers. I'm not a theologian, so I don't want to push the theological links any further and appeal to those who know much more than I.

My only concern with the privatised situation is that charitable giving, by definition, has positive externalities. This means that the free market outcome will yield a level of giving that is socially sub-optimal, even though it is privately optimal, because private individuals don't realise the full benefit of their giving. Of course though, the solution is not necessarily that we totally nationalise the redistribution system - the optimal solution would be some kind of subsidy to the process, in theory. I haven't really thought fully through whether that would work, nor even bothered to look into what people have written on this in the academic literature. But it intrigues me.

Are those that moan about the excessive levels of benefits simply elder sons, and just as estranged from their Father as those who frivolously waste the Father's good gifts?

The Occupy Movement

Naturally, the Occupy movements around the world are generating quite a bit of media attention, and not a little bit of right wing scorn, and some left wing support.

I wouldn't want to make sweeping statements about what one side or the other says, but I can't help noticing that the essential point being made by right wingers, once again, is that you can't be socialist, or have sympathy with non-business owners, and also be Christian.

The man imposing as Archbishop Cranmer is at it once again, with his last of the linked posts somehow comparing what Fraser did at St Pauls inversely to what Jesus did in throwing traders out of the Temple in John 2:12-25.

In the Torygraph, Tim Stanley writes that those who profess support for the protesters are "more socialist than Christian". What about saving souls, he writes? Well, what about the fact that currently there's a whole load of non-Christians camped at St Pauls? What about the fact that St Pauls isn't throwing them out but instead engaging with them? Stanley justifies his attack on Fraser in particular in the same way that "Cranmer" does - that Fraser is a liberal Christian, and of course once again we're into the internal bickering that goes on, rather than focussing on "saving souls" - it may be that Stanley needs to begin practicing a little more of what he preaches.

Nonetheless, the point of this post isn't so much to attack others as to set out my take, and probably along the way justify being slightly left of centre (I'd hesitate to call myself an outright socialist) and also a conservative Christian. My position I believe is based on basic economic theory which I've learnt over the years (and supposedly teach), but also on the Biblical principles also.

Of course, we must start with the Fall, and acknowledge the sinfulness of man. This gives us the context in which to study all human interaction, something which economics also attempts to do. Economics essentially splits up interaction into a spectrum, with what is often called the non-cooperative solution at one end, where we all individually go about out own interests in our own way, and the social planner solution at the other end, where some benevolent social planner decides what will happen. The latter is essentially unachievable since as any Christian knows, the possibility of a benevolent social planner (outside of God) is essentially zero in our sinful world, but nonetheless this possibility does bound the spectrum of possibilities.

Now, right leaning folk, including those of a Christian variety, are rightly suspicious of power concentrated in one person's hands - any dictator. Left leaning folk should also be wary too but for some reason aren't - the Bible tells us we are sinful, hence any system which concentrates power in the hands of one sinful person cannot be good. Hence we have the idea that capitalism, and markets, are good because they do not concentrate power in the hands of one particular individual.

The problem though, is that this conclusion is based on a number of conclusions in a simple theoretical model called perfect competition. The conclusions from perfect competition that we all like are bound up in the first and second theorems of welfare economics, notably that equilibria from such competition are Pareto optimal in that we cannot improve the resulting allocation of resources without reducing someone's welfare.

But moreover, these conclusions are based on a number of conditions holding, notably that there are no barriers to entry for firms, no barriers to trade, and an infinite number of traders hence no one of them can influence the price - not to mention perfect information, and an absence of any missing markets, or what economists sometimes call externalities (things that cost you but for which you aren't compensated - or vice versa).

As a result of one or most or all of these simple assumptions failing, usually the price mechanism fails to do its job, and this often concentrates power into the hands of a small number of individuals, those who can play the system to their advantage. There are plenty of results in economics which tell us about the adverse selection (the market selecting not the best producer of a product) that results, and the consequences of this. Peaches and lemons, anyone?

So, those of us who lean more to the left at this point say: Shouldn't something be done? Shouldn't we protect those that are the victims of abuses of power, misselling, etc?

Those on the right say, rightly, "not necessarily". There are market-based solutions. Car dealers that sell dodgy cars get a bad reputation and hence nobody buys from them in the future - better dealers offer warranties to send a signal to potential customers that says "I'm reputable".

However, there are decisions and markets in which bad reputation in the light of an unfortunate trade is no concolation. In healthcare, if you happen to pitch up to a shoddy disreputable provider (Nick Riviera in the Simpsons, for example), the cost to you could be death, or severely impaired health afterwards.

The principle is this: If the cost of information being provided to all in markets is high (it isn't, for example, in PC markets via PC magazines), if the cost of a bad decision is high and irreversible, then there is a case for intervention, and it is unlikely that the market can provide solutions.

Extreme right wingers at this point say "how do you quantify these costs" and still choose to ignore them at this stage, but we'll ignore them in the interests of getting along.

What we've established is a role for government. Not for a socialist dictatorship, which it would seem is what any right winger thinks all left-of-centre yearn for (see "Cranmer's quote: "The moment you rail against capitalism and economic liberty, you usher in tyranny, despotism, absolutism, totalitarianism and dictatorship." - utter dross when we have already identified here that the market system does not provide liberty for the person duped into the dodgy healthcare procedure that went wrong). Sure, we open up the possibility of cronyism since governments have their own incentives and are highly corruptable - but that cronyism is there anyway when businesses cosy up to governments - what's new here exactly?

What we've also established is that a fully free market system would likely lead to considerable inequality as those who can grab hold of the levers of power (appeal to the legal system is all well and good, but we all know that most people without scruples don't play by the law and get out while they can). Such situations can lead to great levels of social unrest, ordinary folk on the street with depressed incomes noticing those on much higher incomes seemingly benefitting from something unfair.

Now one response is to in a condescending manner tell people they shouldn't envy. I'd have loved to have seen these right wingers wandering around London in August telling the amassed hordes not to envy. Now, of course, we shouldn't - God doesn't permit us to covet our neighbours. But we are sinful and hence we do, and God also makes it clear it is not for us to judge others with haughty eyes.

As "Cranmer" rightly writes, "Caring for widows and orphans, feeding the starving, and clothing the naked, are at the very heart of the Christian vocation", and indeed he is correct. But the bottom line is this: the free market will underprovide charity because it has a positive externality. Should we just wait for Heaven and say "the government shouldn't force me to be charitable"? I believe the Bible is equally as scornful of those waiting for Heaven and doing nothing here as it is of those who lose sight of Heaven and think they can make it here somehow.

So my bottom line is this: The market system is the best system in a fallen world, but it is not perfect. Its imperfections should not be idly observed, they cause genuine pain and grievances and social unrest and most importantly for (Christian) right wingers, deprive people of their liberty, being made in God's image. Our job is not to judge thus those engaged in that, feeling that, but instead to think about what could be done about it. For sure, protest might not be the most effective way, and in particular protest in a church (!), but the bottom line is that those on the right sitting back and judging ("Cranmer" and Stanley amongst others) are just as wrong as the Pharisees were and any of the other many characters in the Bible for which God devotes his distaste.

The Conservatives: The gift that keeps giving...

I try to keep this blog as free from politics as possible, which may be hard to believe given its title refers to the political spectrum, but nonetheless I do try. Again having said that, a motivation to set this up was friends of mine who are Conservative voters suggesting to me it was the "Christian" thing to do, much to my consternation.

I think the main reason I try and keep away from politics and government action is that I don't think that governments should be forcing people to do "Christian" things; so I don't think abortion should be outlawed, and I think all other government actions that discriminate unfairly against people made in God's image is wrong.

I believe Christians vote Conservative because they believe that small governments better enable people to get on in life; bigger governments stifle effort and creativity, crowding out small business and entrepreneurship. But this involves a healthy level of confidence in market mechanisms to deliver, and I believe too high a view of the goodness of man - particularly too high for Christians aware of how sinful man is.

Why do I say this when from Adam Smith onwards, economists have espoused the virtues of the market in mitigating man's own greed and enabling it to contribute towards the greater good? Because there are plenty of situations in which the price mechanism fails. It doesn't need government intervention for the price mechanism to stop doing its job of revealing relative scarcity and relative abundance, it just needs unscrupulous men and women.

I've mentioned in previous posts how a "nice equilibrium" where everyone does a good honest job and hence everyone trusts everyone to do a good honest job - the incentive is there for someone to deviate and do a bad job, and get out while they can (and even if they fail, their actions will succeed in destroying the good equilibrium since now people know with non-zero probability there are some bad people about).

All this by means of an introduction to what I was planning to write about - recent Tory announcements regarding the economy. In particular repeated comments on the 50% tax band, and also recent talk about abolishing all employment protection.  The bottom line of these is a trust that despite bosses being unscrupulous, the end product is a much better, clean, shining functioning economy because of competition - the bad bosses, the nasty ones, will be weeded out and left on the scrapheap if they don't become nice shiny bosses.

If I sound a little sarcastic there, it's because I don't buy it. Those proposing it probably think it has basic economics on side, but it may do: Very classical economics that hasn't considered much recent economic study into areas such as industrial organisation, game theory and behavioural economics. There's no point in me repeating what Chris Dillow writes about much more elegantly, but if you want some demolitions, here are a couple.

Now the question is, as Christians, what should we be doing?  James 1:27 says "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

I seriously wonder how scrapping the 50% tax rate on those earning above £150k (polluted by the world?!), and stripping away all employment rights of workers (usually pretty low paid - widows and orphans in their disress?!), counts here. The hardest of hard Tories would say "Charity should do the hard work", yet this again ignores some basic economics: If there's a positive externality (net social benefits greater than net private ones) the market (charity) will underprovide it. As was evident before the Welfare state.

Of course, I'm proposing little positive in this post, just getting some things off my chest. The main one being this idea that a small government is what we need, and that it's somehow more Christian, if that were possible.