Doesn’t it almost bring tears to one’s eyes when one reads that important legislation is passed by the American Congress and the Senate without the majority of its members having time to (fully) read it? The lame excuse forwarded is that having to read and adequately study the contents would cause unacceptable delays to its passage. Well, those in power do seem to have a rather long list of unpleasant laws to pass this year, it’s true, but why must so many politicians succumb to this type of ridiculous nonsense?
Anyway, if I understand correctly, the secret to getting potentially unpopular legislation passed seems to be to convince a minority of its importance, coerce as many elected representatives as possible to vote yes anyway, make it as long and incomprehensible as possible to bamboozle the rest and set an impossible time limit for its effective study to cover all unforeseen eventualities.
The minority rules; how unconstitutional.
The same thing sort of thing happened with the proposed European Constitution in 2001 and its reincarnation The Treaty of Lisbon in 2007. Most European leaders now acknowledge that the treaty preserves the main substance of the constitution. The treaty defines the limits of jurisdiction of the ruling bodies of the European Union and its member states.
According to Article 6 of the treaty, "this Treaty shall enter into force on 1 January 2009, provided that all the instruments of ratification have been deposited, or, failing that, on the first day of the month following the deposit of the instrument of ratification by the last signatory State to take this step. Currently, 26 Member States have already approved the Treaty and 23 have deposited their ratification instruments in Rome.
Though it was known that its formulation would be largely incomprehensible to most, including politicians, it was decided important enough to allow the European people a voice in its ratification if desired by local government. Unfortunately for some, a majority of people in three countries that held referenda voted against the legislation which even now is still awaiting ratification.
The Czech Republic, Germany and Poland have yet to ratify and a second referendum must take place in Ireland later this year because the people there were so uncooperative in saying No to the treaty the first time. Some concessions have now been made to the Irish voters to bring them into the fold. The fact that the Dutch and the French people also said No in earlier referenda but were later overruled by their governments we officially hear no more about.
For a governing body, unpopular or oppressive legislature is easier to pass if those who may vote on it are left with no choice. To achieve this, politicians must be coerced by whatever means into voting “the right way” and the people must be similarly persuaded using sophisticated propaganda techniques to accept and hopefully welcome any policies as being for their own good. The rest can scream all they like but will inevitably be branded by the majority as radical extremists and so effectively silenced.
At least that’s the theory. The flaw to the latter’s effectiveness lies in an intrinsic uncertainty concerning complex growth patterns of disruption. Oppression is proportional to dissent and as more and more people start waving a fist, whether due to poorer living standards, loss of liberties or a general instinct for survival, many may eventually turn outside the ruling system for help. In this way a minority of dissenters can rapidly grow and become harder and harder to contain within the ruling framework. Society can eventually break down catastrophically as history shows again and again.
Unfortunately, the human race as it has developed over the last few thousand years doesn’t seem able to develop a lasting stable society. There are just fragmented social cycles of destruction and resurrection with varying intervals of relative stability and progress.
Must it always be so?
References:
Lisbon Treaty
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6901353.stm
European Union
http://europa.eu/index_nl.htm
American Constitution
http://www.senate.gov/civics/constitution_item/constitution.htm
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