Until 30 years ago, Malta would probably have been classified as a Third World country or, euphemistically, “a developing country.” Today, its only real claim to Third World status lies in its roads and standard of driving.
Two political economists, Alberto Alesina of Harvard and Enrico Spolaore of Brown University, who explored the optimal size of nation-states (their book, The Size of Nations), came up with the concept of the Second World country.
They defined this as one in which effective government, the national interest and important long-term solutions to pressing problems – even the will of the majority – are invariably subordinated to minority interests, where these hold the balance of electoral power.
Malta is the archetypal Second World country. Relatively small, special-interest groups are able to act in unison to suppress the rights of other citizens.
To put it crudely, this happens when a small bloc of votes by particular interest groups can keep one or other political party in power. Obvious examples are hunters and illegal boat-house owners and the construction development lobby.
Effective and fair governance in Second World countries like Malta can be paralysed by minority, vote-turning, single issue agendas. Governments are subverted into pandering to such groups to win their votes.
It might have been thought that on joining the European Union, Malta would be promoted to the First World. This hope was quickly dashed by the Nationalist administration’s act of institutionalised vandalism in 2006 when it grossly extended the development zones for no good planning reason other than to buy votes.
Not to be out-done, this Labour government’s high-handed and, in the event, cack-handed, efforts at commandeering precious, rural public land at Żonqor Point has shown that Malta still remains an unreconstructed Second World country.
Nevertheless, there may the faintest glimmer of hope for the future. The vote against hunting in last April’s referendum and the protest march by 3,000 people, outside Parliament, in Valletta, on June 20 against the Żonqor Point project have marked a high-water mark – if not yet a turning point – in environmental pressure on the government.
It is encouraging to see how participation by Maltese civil society in the country’s affairs – long stifled by the all-pervading State and an over-bearing Church – has increased by leaps and bounds in the last 15 years. A more sophisticated, educated, questioning and vocal society is leading to a greater readiness to speak out against those who are placed over them. The divorce debate and the current reactions to Żonqor Point are a mark of this change.
Complacency and deference have been replaced by a willingness to express views that the establishment finds uncomfortable. This is greatly to be welcomed, even though Malta still has a long way to go.
There are no solutions to social, economic, environmental and political problems that do not involve an active civil society pursuing the common good.
Complacency and deference have been replaced by a willingness to express views that the establishment finds uncomfortable
Civil society is all about the strength of citizens as individuals or in voluntary associations curbing the power of centralising institutions. It is a partnership between public, private and civic as the best way to overcome social and economic problems. This is the route to First World status.
The growing environmental lobby in Malta has perhaps been the most notable proponent in this field. The Front Ħarsien ODZ epitomised this coalition of environmental groups and civil society and gave voice to the concerns of ordinary people.
Civil society has been noticed not just because of the rising public and political profile of NGOs, but because a body of evidence exists now to justify this profile. It is clear that the planning authority is so distrusted, broken and discredited as a regulator that it is the environmental NGOs even the Parliamentary Select Committee on the Environment resorts to when it seeks objective advice.
Networks of associations act as a counter-weight to vested interests. They promote institutional accountability, channel information to decision-makers on what is happening at the rock face, and act as a catalyst for the social contracts needed between government and citizen.
Civil society is a crucial counterweight to both government and corporate power and is also an essential pillar for transparency, accountability and good governance. It is civil society that provides the channels through which most people are in a position to make their voices heard in government decision-making. Civil society represents the best side of people-power.
But holding state power to account takes both energy and courage. The key is the ability to speak truth to power. It is the power of advocacy – the power of giving active verbal support for a cause. The art and craft of successful advocacy is to provide informed and constructive criticism. It is to harry and hassle those who have the power to make decisions affecting our lives: the government of the day or over-mighty institutions.
Tomorrow is exactly 50 years since the founding of Din l-Art Ħelwa, an association that has battled tenaciously through thick and thin (mostly thin) to save Malta’s environmental and built heritage. It has survived by conducting its advocacy campaigns responsibly and constructively – never criticising without also offering solutions and never making any political distinctions (although, I suspect, despite being statutorily apolitical, some of its members have found it easier to speak up when the government was Labour).
The hallmark and strength of good civil society advocacy is not to have a political axe to grind. However, to be impartial is not to be indifferent. It is never to look the other way. It is to make distinctions between good and bad policies, between environmentally-destructive and enlightened governments, between dysfunctional and comatose administrations and those whose policies are beneficial.
The strength of Din l-Art Ħelwa has been in ensuring that what it said was based accurately on facts backed by good judgement. Credibility has been all-important.
Our politicians and policy-makers now understand that civil society’s lobbying is ignored at their electoral peril. Part of any government’s lot is to shoulder criticism. We vent our criticism because we expect the people we elect to power to deliver efficient administration and good governance.
The role of civil society is to lobby in a forthright manner with all the intellectual arguments it can muster those who have it in their gift to enhance the quality of life of citizens through the strategic decisions they take, and to produce constructive solutions for the greater good.
A healthy civil society should not be silent even though this may sometimes mean dissent, debate and criticism, as well as dialogue and agreement. But the over-riding objective must remain the achievement of a better Malta, not supine and complacent support for any government which is not doing its job as it should – whatever its political complexion.
In a First World country, it is a truism that civil society is what we make it. But it is also true that speaking truth to power is the spark that ignites civil society as a force for positive environmental and social change.
The determination to do something because it is the right thing to do is what makes NGOs like 50-year-old Din l-Art Ħelwa a force for good and motivates people to raise their voices in the public sphere.