The Big Nudge: can it accommodate awkwardness?

Yesterday I shuffled from a meeting with someone working on Big Society, to an event about how to get citizens involved in public policy. This latter was the launch of findings from the 'Rediscovering the civic' project run by the universities of Southampton and Manchester, known as 'nudge-nudge, think-think' because of the experiments exploring the effect of policies which 'nudge' people into prosocial behaviour, and those which encourage people to think through the issues in the hope of prosocial consequences.

Inevitably, set in the heart of Whitehall with an array of learned speakers, the debate was at a high level of generality while acknowledging the significance of the political moment. Combined with the preceding meeting, it's helped to clarify for me quite where Big Soc fits and what it might mean.

First, the suspicion that the thinking behind Big Society has been based on a shallow appreciation of the realities of the community sector have been confirmed. That can be remedied, perhaps is being remedied (well, they invited me along for a chat!).

Second, we are all starting to see more clearly where it has come from, historically. Take these two quotes, via former Blair advisers, which are going the rounds:

(i) Matthew Taylor referring I believe to a Norwegian journalist who pointed out that Labour's failure was a failure of public mobilisation, having campaigns like child poverty that should have been public campaigns which they turned into technocratic exercises. Can't argue with that. (You can? Go on then).

(ii) Attributed to David Halpern, something like this - 'we're not trying to do more with less. We're trying to do more with more, and that comes from the social fabric'. I've heard this discussion elsewhere, when people say the Big Soc is just what we were trying to do before... Yes, at local level it can certainly look like that. But wouldn't it have helped if new Labour managerialism, and all the arrogance of previous administrations (not that much different), had been supportive instead of so often obstructive and (to pick up a point made by Sue Goss yesterday) infantilising? To put it another way, did previous administrations culturally stifle public involvement? To me these are little insights which can help measure the change to a new context.

Third, insights from Phillip Blond of ResPublica, revealing the centrality of nudge to Big Society. He said that nudge is a modern way of referring to tradition or tacit knowledge, which has become derided and devalued in recent decades.

'Tradition is already a pre-selection of how we should live. Nudge is about group behaviour.'

For Blond, it seems that the Big Society is about restoring the public value of tradition, of accepted shared forms of collective life. Neither De Tocqueville nor Putnam got mentioned, which I suspect is a good thing: whatever is being invented here, it's more than US-style bowling together, because of the political niceties.

Still, association is key in Blond's view:

'There's almost no context in which association is not part of the determinative answer. And yet we do not have the conceptual architecture to make association desirable, to help it happen.'

Don't we? He spoke about making this happen around the issues that people care about 'in their communities', proceeding to an immaculate if not quite intentional definition of community development, without mentioning 'community development'.

But, fourthly, Michael Saward challenged Blond's 'unitarian' interpretation of good citizenship as uncontroversial and universally accepted. That may be unfair, I can't say, but it gets back to a central problem for the Big Society which Saward himself had raised at the outset of yesterday's discussion:

'Will awkward citizens be welcome in the Big Society?'

I've raised this question here in a different way myself: what does BS mean for the local activist who is moved to confront social injustice, not just for the cakestall mafia? When street reps in Shipley talk to me about the tensions between being a 'good citizen' (reporting disorder, keeping an eye out for drug drops, liaising with agencies etc) and campaigning to become empowered and overcome inequalities (activism in the local political arena), it feels like Big Society is not ready to provide the frameworks for that activism, to accommodate awkwardness.

Yesterday's material helps me visualise Big Society as one big nudge towards prosocial action, and I have no problem with that. But if and when Big Society does recognise the need to engage at the level of social justice, it will need to do so in a way that does not feel to local activists like assimilation or an attempt to neutralise whatever frustration, anger, resentment, bitterness they may be feeling.

Comments

[Hannah Worth]

Whether BS is going to include awkwardness is an extremely important point, and poses a huge challenge to the maturity of local gov to be able to deal with this. One of the reasons that Birmingham Community Empowerment Network was dismantled, was because it supported and helped create a platform for people to speak about their real concerns, and to challenge the status quo. Still a long way to go in most places to a position where such input is valued, rather than seen as a threat.

[David Barrie]

Picking up on Saward's point, in my limited experience, a lot of local activism is based upon social struggle. It is also not particularly interested in consensus, despite the zillions spent trying to make this happen. BS seems to make an assumption that the world is full of militant optimists. Also that a multitude will mobilize - but that multitude will have no anarchic tendencies, or bow to greater/majority mission. It'll be interesting to see how the community organizing investment/element to all of this comes together. Because the extent to which there is a genuine commitment to multiplicity in BS is crucial to credibility and trust.

[Dwight Towers]

Is the clue perhaps in the acronym "BS". They'll be happy to have 'community activists' involved if they can be assimilated/co-opted etc. They make a useful fig-leaf/rubber stamp. But the 'irresponsible ones' who ask 'unreasonable' questions and demand 'unrealistic things' will be the goats, not the sheep. Surely it is ever thus, unless the goats get their stuff together?

[Hilary Burrage]

What exactly is the underlying intention of the BS?

The original proposals suggest that absolutely everyone will be included in the action: http://www.conservatives.com/News/News_stories/2010/03/Plans_announced_to_help_build_a_Big_Society.aspx but it's doubtful that this is going to come about, not least, as you say, because of the 'awkwardness' issue.

Exhortations that everyone should work together (e.g. http://www.thebigsociety.net/?p=154#comments ) are in any case framed in ways perhaps unlikely to ensure this always happens.

The awkward squad are often those who lead positive change, so what's their role in the BS? Somehow, it seems unlikely that they will comprise much of the group of 5,000 BS cheerleaders who we are promised will be trained over the next five years, and then, whilst also having to raise their own salaries, will be left to ensure we are all involved.

At the very least, we need to consider whether the BS can actually co-exist with the ideas of the new localism. As noted above, local activists do not always seek to achieve consensus with those outside their own particular fold.

[Patrick]

Kevin - think this point about how active citizenship can be awkward and disruptive is really important as the debate about the Big Soc hots up. Just today spotted this invite to an event debating Big Soc issues (focussing on localism) where most of the speakers represent central or local government... http://www.insidegovernment.co.uk/economic_dev/localism/

Think the irony is lost on the event's organisers of it's stated aim to address the "increased need to engage local people and give citizens power over the decisions that affect them". Could start by inviting them to speak at the event ;- )

[Kevin Harris]

Patrick - your are right, Inside Government's approach to events is unfortunate. You remind me of one occasion in the past when I was moved to make a similar to point to you:
http://neighbourhoods.typepad.com/neighbourhoods/2008/03/control-over-co.html
Regrettably their approach is consistent with much of Westminster.

[Lorna Prescott]

I am currently reading Nudge so found this post really interesting. I have been pondering along similar lines and recently blogged about citizenship typology and big society (http://lornaprescott.blogspot.com/2010/10/what-kinds-of-citizen-will-big-society.html)

Patrick - you are spot on and your example illustrates how little people actually think about power dynamics while throwing the word around happily. I find it so frustrating and inauthentic when people talk about things without putting what they say in to practice... though suspect that most of us are guilty of it at times.

Hannah, you are so right. I'm pleased that in Dudley our Community Empowerment Network has created the opportunity to work on the culture change needed in public agencies so that they support, encourage and respond to challenging and conflicting community voices (using tools like Voice and echo: http://changesuk.net/resources/axis-of-influence-series-voice-and-echo). There's a long way to go though ....