[lg policy] Australia: Let ideas be free of babble and ideology

[Harold Schiffman]

Let ideas be free of babble and ideology
Michael Short
February 17, 2012

Opinion

''Left' and 'right' may once have carried some meaning, but they have
become so opaque as to be worse than misleading.'

Clarity and precision in language can help make the world a better place.

Language must surely be humanity's greatest achievement. Without the
ability to communicate sophisticated and complex notions, we would
have been unable to accomplish so much that makes life decent and
interesting, and which underpins civilisation.

The free market for ideas should be a natural realm of precision and
clarity. And yet so much of our political and policy discourse is
mired in babble; public debate is littered with language that misleads
and conceals in its hackneyed harking to, for example, various
ideologies.

I would argue particular damage is being done by shackling political
discussion to a linear ideological scale. ''Left'' and ''right'' may
once have carried some meaning, but they have become so opaque as to
be worse than misleading; they actually limit understanding. These
terms fail, too, to allow for an entire other axis; that from anarchy
to authority.
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They signify different things to different people, and even their
general meaning varies depending on where you are. In Russia and
eastern Europe, for example, ''left'' suggests communism. In western
Europe it is associated with state capitalism.

In France, the word ''liberal'' is used as an epithet against market
capitalists. In the US, ''liberal'' is used by market capitalists and
Christian fundamentalists as a slur against advocates for government
intervention in the economy and society generally.

But even if they convey a direction of thought, they still, at the
same time, undermine the potential for acute, precise discussion in
pursuit of solutions and change.

Rather than woolly exchanges based on ideology - socialism,
capitalism, communism et al - would it perhaps not be better to at
least start our debates with an explicit recognition of those concepts
that most people, wherever they might be thought to be on that linear
scale, share. These include justice, fairness, human rights, freedom,
efficiency, accountability and transparency.

These are the things that can unite most people - and we can see their
importance in the Arab Spring sweeping North Africa and the Middle
East as people rise up against oppression that defies placement along
a left-right continuum.

Here in Australia, so much space seems dedicated to tribal
machinations involving bizarre beasts like ''the NSW Right of the
ALP'' or the ''Left faction of Victorian Labor'', or of ''wets'' and
''dries'' in the Liberal Party, which might or might not have
something to do with being a ''big L'' or a ''small l'' member of that
party.

Not only is it cloudy, it gives the unfortunate, lamentable impression
that people involved in politics and policy are motivated more by
achieving power and prominence than actually delivering principled
change.

Modern political history suggests that these groupings actually share
more beliefs than it might appear. Most people involved in politics
and policy in the past 30 years seem to believe that fair, free
markets with legislated rules are generally involved in the most just,
effective outcomes.

There seems to be agreement that government has an important role -
neither of the two major forces that have controlled government here
has run fundamentally different economic policies. Both groupings have
worked towards decent social change.

No political or other group in our society has a monopoly on morality.

And yet some presume they are ethically superior on the basis of a tag.

The ''left'' seems to think it has good on its side, while
free-marketeers often give the impression they believe in a free
market for everything except ideas; they condescendingly see those who
demur as, at best, well-meaning but misguided.

Jargon, while necessary in some specialised fields such as medicine,
is a mechanism often used to hide ignorance, or that blurs the real
thoughts intended to be promulgated. I would say that explaining an
idea, championing a cause, winning an argument, requires logic and
evidence, which in turn require precision.

In a 1946 essay titled Politics and the English Language, George
Orwell, that crusader against cant, provided some powerful advice to
those who would seek to communicate effectively:

''(i) Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which
you are used to seeing in print.

(ii) Never use a long word where a short one will do.

(iii) If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

(iv) Never use the passive where you can use the active.

(v) Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if
you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

(vi) Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.''

We have a robust and respectable democracy. Those we elect are, in the
main, motivated by making the world a better place. Those efforts
might well be helped were better use made of language, that
pre-eminent accomplishment.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/let-ideas-be-free-of-babble-and-ideology-20120216-1tbrm.html#ixzz1merUemTf


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