The major political quarrels in Guyana are reflective of a fundamental structural distributive difficulty: our society, founded as it is in an entrenched racial division that frustrates regime change, does not and will not allow any single political party to be perceived as fairly distributing the results of our collective national endeavours.
In every society there are various ideas, institutions, policies, etc that determine how the national wealth should be distributed, and there is usually much disagreement about and within these arrangements. However, in societies such as ours there is another quite pernicious layer of disputes that require special arrangements if they are not to be deleterious to the national development effort. These have to do with who does the actual distribution. This would be a matter of importance in any society in which regime change is so infrequent, but it is seminal where the latter is combined with ethnic divisions.
The majority of distributive theories is rooted in a belief that people are morally equal and should be treated equitably. Societies vary in what factors are considered relevant (income, wealth, opportunities, jobs, welfare, etc), on the basis of the distribution (strict equality, equitability, individual characteristics, etc) and on the nature of the recipients (individuals, groups, classes, etc) (“Distributive Justice,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2013).
Some theories are strictly egalitarianism on the basis that all people are equal and are deserving of an equal distribution of what is available, while welfare-based theories place more importance upon the actual outcome of distribution. For the latter, what is of primary importance is improvement in the actual level of welfare of people.
There are also feminist approaches to distribution that could well be a template if ever we decide to pay more attention to how the national wealth is distributed among groups. Here feminism is not a theory of distributive justice but seeks to infuse a concern for gender in all the various theories. “One way of thinking about what unifies many feminist theorists is an interest in what difference, if any, the practical experience of gender makes to the subject matter or study of justice; how different feminists answer this question distinguishes them from each other and from those alternative distributive principles that most inspire their thinking” (Ibid).
Nonetheless, it is the theory of justice with its “difference principle” developed by John Rawls that has been the most widely discussed in recent times. This approach claims that our natural endowments – family, talents, history, etc are accidentally bestowed upon us in some sort of a genetic lottery and that this requires that social arrangements be structured to ensure that those disadvantaged by this lottery are not made to live worse lives. “The difference principle represents, in effect, an agreement to regard the distribution of natural talents as a common asset and to share in the benefits of this distribution whatever it turns out to be” (1971- “A Theory of Justice,” Harvard University Press). Thus, a society is just if, and only if, it is engaged in redressing social inequalities in a manner that serves to benefit the least advantaged.
An interesting twist to this Rawlsian conceptualization comes from some who agree with him that people should not end up worse off because of a genetic lottery but are of the view that once arrangements are in place to give such persons an equal start in life, they should have to live with the consequences of their individual choices.
Awareness of these kinds of orientation is useful for they filter down to political activists in one form or another, and the distribution of national resources is usually at the base of national political disputes everywhere. Indeed, given that we are in budget season, it may be useful to note that one of the most important areas of policy dispute between the government and the opposition over the last few years has to do with the prioritization of the distribution of public resources: how and in what circumstances public funds should be utilized to subsidize private investment in such projects as an international hotel, the specialty hospital and the hydro and airport projects. While the government insists that these projects are economically viable and essential to national development, the opposition claims that private sector projects should be economically viable and best left to the private sector and that public resources should be focused upon the immediate eradication of poverty.
However, it is to that other level of dispute that is unique and so destructive to Guyana that we need to pay more attention. Regime (political party) change has occurred only once in Guyana in the last fifty years (another reason why the government should be extremely cautious of equating itself with our Caribbean Community neighbours). The consequences are that even if we were to accept the political longevity of our governments as a reality (and we should not) we must come to realize that, in so far as it may be possible, the governance arrangements necessary for managing Guyana as a democratic polity must be vastly different from those of our Caricom partners: our situation requires many more checks and balances.
But we need to add to (or at least should not subtract from) the difficulties caused by longevity in government the fact that it is rooted in a bi-communal ethnicity and the distrust that usually stems therefrom. Given our Westminster-type political socialization, the mode of political distributive disputes, such as that indicated above, camouflages the intense political/ethnic distrust by dressing such discussions in the garb of normal politics.
Of course, it is nonsensical to believe that such distrust can be eliminated and its opposite could be developed under the tutelage of any one ethnicity; that is, that ethnic trust and cooperation will grow where one ethnic group dominates the process of distribution in what is a general political context of distrust! Real ethnic cooperation will only be gradually built when a perceived environment of fairness is established and that will only materialize when all stakeholders are involved in a transparent process of distribution.
We are poor enough but even so, living decently is not simply about the level of material poverty. More importantly, it is about the existence of a feeling that one is going about one’s business in a safe, peaceful, caring and developing place. In this regard, not even the present government, which has the mandate to create and sustain such a national environment, would venture to claim that many of us feel this way about Guyana. What it has been doing and will continue to do for some considerable time, is to renege on this responsibility and blame others for the absence of this essential national quietude.
