December 15, 2004
mutual obligation#2
The public debate on mutual obligation as a mode of governing welfare dependency that has construct indigenous people as victim, continues. Some movement in sorting through the issues has been made by Pat Dodson and Noel Pearson. I will spell out what they say on this because they have cleared away some of the rubbish lying around.
They affirm that mutual obligation is a cultural principle of traditional Aboriginal society and say that government has a role in assisting Aboriginal communities to restore responsibility through mutual obligation. They then say:
"The mutual obligation agreement struck with the Aboriginal community at Mulan in Western Australia has been supported by the community's leadership, and should therefore be supported by the wider Australian community."
They qualify this affirmation of the Mulan agreement by asking a question about the detail:
"...what is the logical connection between the obligations that the government wants the community to commit to, and the incentives that it is offering in return? It is hard to see the natural connection between children's hygiene and the more convenient provision of petrol."
Dodson and Pearson then generalize the principle of the Mulan Agreement as the right pathway, and so displace the rights versus duties as the central issue of the debate. They say:
"Government and indigenous communities who no longer wish to sit on their hands while blindness is caused by trachoma, kidney failure is caused by scabies and deafness is caused by unresolved ear infections, should be supported."
A this point we should not forget to add that those indigenous communities who no longer wish to sit on their hands about violence against women by men, caused by alcohol and drugs, should also be supported:
Leak
Dodson and Pearson then address the responsibilities of Aboriginal people and those community leaders who are charged with engagement between the community and governments. These indigenous people:
".... have a responsibility to ensure that in the negotiation of the new relationship between Aboriginal people and governments, they obtain the resources needed to sustain their culture, language, physical wellbeing and other aspects of their lives for the future of our people - but not at the expense of the basic human rights of those whom they represent."
There is the key point. Mutual obligation should be directed at ensuring Aboriginal communities have both the resources and basic rights to enable them to live a flourishing life. We have shifted to thinking about a positive (enabling) conception of power, rather than working within the liberal negative conception of power as a paternalist imposition on individual rights.
What then are the problems/difficulties/roadblocks associated with this new mode of governance? Dodson & Pearson say:
'...the Federal Government's "practical reconciliation" agenda is at present not sufficiently well developed and funded....It is also very important that the notion of "mutual obligation" is not trivialised...The Federal Government must restrain its bureaucrats from playing at social engineering, otherwise the important principle of mutual obligation will be discredited.'
Robert Corr highlights another problem: the difficulties local indigenous communities will have in being able to strike a good deal with the federal government to ensure that can deliver the outcomes they desire. They will need help to strike a good deal for themselves. Where is that help going to come from?
Mark Bahnisch is rightly concerned about the implications in this mode of governance for liberty and racial equality. This provides him with a criteria to make a distinction between good and bad approaches. He says it makes a big difference whether mutual obligation:
"...is a piecemeal approach applied in paternalistic and bureaucratic fashion, or whether it is actually directed towards empowering Indigenous people and creating genuine economic opportunities and recognising cultural dignity and specificity."
He comes down in favour of the empowering pathway because it is more likely to ensure liberty and racial equality.
We have travelled a fair distance in a short amount of time in achieving a tentative policy consensus.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 02:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 14, 2004
mutual obligation
Mutual obligation is back. And we even have a public debate. Things are looking up for our nascent deliberative democracy.
The background context to the current round is described by this editorial in The Age:
"Last week, reports of an undertaking by the remote Aboriginal community of Mulan in the north of Western Australia to meet hygiene standards in return for petrol pumps and health checks revived the issue of mutual obligation in another context. Mutual obligation agreements - contracts in which benefits are exchanged for agreed undertakings - are part of the Government's new approach to Aboriginal affairs. Earlier this month, Mr Howard met Aboriginal leaders Noel Pearson, a champion of mutual obligation, and Pat Dodson, a champion of reconciliation, to talk about how to improve the lot of indigenous people. After the meeting, Mr Dodson said indigenous leaders agreed with Mr Howard on mutual obligation, but he would like to negotiate how it was imposed."
Petty thinks that mutual obligation is an unequal relationship, that it is unfair (lack of choice?) and it is wrong:
More background is provided by Robert Corr over at Kick and Scream.
Mark Bahnisch over at Troppo Armadillo argues that this policy approach sacrifice liberty for benefits, and ought not to be applied only to one part of the community, based on race. Others see it in terms of sternness and paternalism.
However, Noel Pearson and Patrick Dodson think otherwise. Dodson says:
"The mutual obligation stuff has a lot of resonance within Aboriginal culture and within Aboriginal notions of kinship. This concept has a grounding within our culture and society. It is not just a Western concept and this is how we need to see it."
Noel Pearson says:
"There is no argument with the principle of mutual obligation if we are going to get things fixed. The mistake we made in the past was to think indigenous salvation came from legal and political acts. This is part of it. But we must assume responsibility and recognise these things are achieved through social and economic progress. You don't need to tell a parent who works that they need to wash their kid's face or feed their stomach."
Is mutual obligation at Mulan a first step to overcoming passive welfare dependency, by giving communities more freedom to negotiate what they want and need most - including jobs and access to training?
That is what is being debated.
The ALP is unsure and divided over this system, in which welfare benefits are made conditional on the recipients’ satisfying certain obligations and duties to the state.The principle is that indigenous people are not straightforwardly entitled to government benefits; rather, the benefits they recieve are conditional on their fulfilling a range of duties.
Some argue that mutual obligation is philosophically flawed.
Not many are suggesting that there is an implied sense of personal responsibility in the justification for the Scheme, which unfairly blames the indigenous people for their situation. And that is a big shift from that of the earlier round of mutual obligation associated with unemployment, welfare dependency and welfare to work.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 01:41 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
December 01, 2004
the long march
Michael Long is soothing his blistered feet in the Murray River at Albury whilst walking his way to Canberra to see the Prime Minister.
Petty
In Canberra Senator Ridgeway raised the issue of Aboriginal deaths in police custody, the recent race riots in Redfern and on Palm Island, off north Queensland, and the fact that black Australians go to jail at 15 times the rate of white Australians.
Ridgeway mentioned the death of Cameron Doomadgee. on Friday, November 19, at 11.20pm, Cameron, an Aborigine, was found dead in his Palm Island police cell an hour after he was locked up for "causing a public nuisance". Ridgeway said that: "He was walking along the street, drunk and singing, and an hour later he was dead from internal injuries." Doomadgee died, with four broken ribs, a punctured lung and a ruptured liver.
How come?
Two witnesses claimed the man had been "punched and beaten by police". The unreleased autopsy report said his death "was not the direct result of the use of force". I understand a second autopsy report is being done. We sure need one.
Aden Ridgeway puts this event in context. He says that:
"Indigenous people in this country are 15 times more likely to be imprisoned than anyone else in Australian society. Last year 75 per cent of deaths in custody of prisoners who were detained for no more than public order offences were indigenous Australians."
Michael Long has ended his walk from Melbourne to Canberra after the Prime Minister John Howard agreed to meet him to discuss Indigenous issues.
Update
An account of government policy for indigenous people by Senator Kim Carr, Labor's spokesman on indigenous affairs and reconciliation.
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April 18, 2004
ATSIC: end of an era
This was something that was wanted by the one nation conservatives for a long time. They saw their opportunity and took it.
Matt Davidson
The one nation conservatives saw self-determination as a symbol of separatism underpinned by racism. They reject the black Canberra bureaucracy and say nothing is better. Some do replace nothing with something to achieve better outcomes. They advocate that public policy from Canberra should insist on education and work, and letting people jostle up with the market place. "Everybody's got to work if they want to eat" is their principle.
Minister Vanstone's bland press release can be found here. The review of ATSIC can be found here. A brief round up of the debate in the corporate media can be found here.
Aden Ridgeway asks some good questions of both the Howard Government and the ALP.
Noel Pearson has been making some interesting remarks over the last couple of years.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 11:00 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
September 22, 2003
a good step
I meant to mention this story I came across in The Weekend Australian (no link) yesterday, but I got waylaid. The story refers to the Martin Labor Government in the Northern Territory planning to hand over to indigenous traditional owners the title to much of the vast system of national parks, in return for long-term leasebacks and guaranteed free tourist access.
About time.
Aboriginal people do own a large part of the Northern Territory and form more than a quarter of the population. Who better to look after the territory's natural heritage, country, and habitat? The white folk have certainly mismanged the environment, as evidenced by the Murray Darling Basin.
The previous conservative Country Liberal Party regime that had ruled the Northern Territory for decades had always struck me as having all the appearances of a white colonial regime. Under the New Labor regime there is co-operation on native title not hostility.
Returning the national parks is a better way of ensuring aboriginal economic development than an economics based on hunter gathering or welfare. It is a little step in giving the traditional owners control of their affairs and resources.
Maybe the parallel and segregated societies of white and black, which developed in Alice Springs under the Country Liberal Party, are about to change as new links between them are established.
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