It would be interesting to study the role of the economics editor. In Australia, at least, those papers and media outlets which employ such a person appear to see the role as enforcing the BCA line on liberal economics, even if sometimes the actually existing BCA companies have their hands well and truly out for the largesse of the state. There’s a bit of a story about ideology here, and the neo-liberal whip gig only really works if one is not too partisan about it – so Paul Kelly’s portentous ponderings fit the bill exactly. At The Australian (and here, the broader tale is one of the trajectory of that paper overall), Michael Stutchbury has taken the commentary in a more openly pro-Coalition direction. Witness, as they say on the op/ed pages, his latest rather unfocused piece – decrying Labor governments (and social democrats, and Rudd advisor Andrew Charlton) for mixing politics with economics. Magically, of course, blatant political fixes by conservative administrations never seem to attract the same opprobrium. It’s as if the “reform test” constantly being applied to Kevin Rudd (despite what he himself has said about his own views on economics, and perhaps it were better had he been taken at his word) were one of complete purity in adherence to the gospel according to the Productivity Commission, or whoever represents the yardstick for this stuff at any particular point in time.
It would be possible to expose any number of non-sequiturs, rhetorical moves, sophistries, and general incoherence in Stutchbury’s article.
But there’s a broader point here.
We live, we’re told sometimes, in an age of story-telling. Therapeutic cultures, cyber-utopian discourses, marketing moves – all encourage us to tell our stories and rearrange the bits of the world as narratives (if not ones entirely of our own making). There’s something here of what Michel Foucault diagnosed as the diffusion of the practice of confession – and an incitement to tell one’s truth – from the Church outwards into the culture. Now, it would be too simplistic to condemn this (or, for that matter, to offer an enconium to it). Sweeping judgements on social trends tend to say more about those doing the judging than the reality – revealing, all too often, the value judgements they attempt to conceal.
One question, though, could be addressed to Stutchbury – what is, in fact, involved in the demand that policy conform to a narrative?
It’s a demand journos, particularly at The Australian, seem to make very frequently. It obscures a heap of ideological baggage. It can’t be just any narrative. It has to be the preferred ‘reform’ narrative.
Let me get one last thing straight. I’m a fan of story-telling. I like to tell stories myself. But a narrative doesn’t have to be coherent, or sustained by evidence. It’s not the same thing as an argument. It might be a good thing if that were realised – that accountability to reason and truth and evidence can be the price of seeing everything in terms of narrative.
Update: On Paul Kelly.
What’s an opprobrium? Is it better or worse than an enconium? Both sound painful.
I think they gave my Auntie Meg an opprobrium AND an enconium when she was diagnosed with colon cancer. She died shortly thereafter. Very sad.
@2, someone told me that he bought a couple of them too, but their wheels fell off…
Setting aside all the Foucalt stuff, which I’m not qualified to understand let alone comment on, what strikes me about Stuchbury’s argument is that it ignores the fundamentally political nature of economic analysis. The discipline was more frequently referred to in previous era as “political economy”. Economics is concerned with resource allocation under conditions of scarcity, as is politics. It’s hardly surprising that the two overlap.
Any attempt to portray a particular economic point-of-view as “apolitical” is really just an attempt to disguise the underlying ideology. I suppose that’s what Mark was trying to say, but it went slightly over my head.
These narratives of the Right tend to be very flexible.
Notice how the “cut and run” admonition regarding Afghanistan has faded away and conservatives are openly calling it a failure (but it’s a failure the post Bush/Blair/Howard administrations should admit).
As regards Iraq, it’s a case of “Don’t mention the war!”.
Seems to be the right wing narrsative is : make the rich richer. Make the poor poorer. But NEVER admit that’s what you’re doing. At the end of all this application of free market thory, more people get hurt than not, but they’re always the voiceless.
I am a regular watcher of Insiders and I am still yet to understand what exactly Paul Kelly is contributing to the debate. After Barry’s intro, Paul starts off by building up a huge head of steam with some fire and brimstone sentences and then…..he says the bleeding obvious. I would love Insiders dump PK and get Michelle Gratten instead. His understanding of economics is worse than his analysis of politics. And that dreadful lip sucking…..
Are we absolutely certain that Sutchbury wrote this ‘Current Account Blog’ post? He is cited as the ‘Oz’s’ economic editor on that page, but his byline isn’t affixed to the piece (or any other pieces there).
Charlton would have an electoral majority backing him up on that, Mr Sutchbury-or-not.
If only the Australian put as much effort into this revisionist argument, instead of bashing the black-armbanders.
Not very committed neoliberals, are they?
I think this article is all about Americanising Australian political debates. For that reason I wonder if Sutchbury actually wrote this. I haven’t noted him for preaching the AEI or Heritage Institute position on things—I thought that was the job of Switzer and Albrechtstatistician.
The reform narrative is what exactly?
Ok free markets … a bit of a religion yeah? The economy … the same thing?
Kind of makes sense, for millenia human societies were religious. IE they had an overarching narrative to explain reality.
Now since the (so called) enlightenment we don’t live in an overtly religious culture. But i have to wonder … is something about humanity, about the way we structure societies, hard wired to be “religious”.
IE to have an overarching narrative to explain reality.
We are supposed to have science, but it doesn’t explain reality, just how stuff works.
Reality (in this context) includes the way humans form meaning. Now science doesn’t really touch on this. if anything it destroys meaning, the overarching narrative of science is randomness and insignificance.
But … economics, the other main driver of our culture (which is ultmately today one of scientific materialism, or materialistic sciencism more accurately) can give meaning.
10 years ago I wouldn’t have thought it possible but there you go…
So economics takes on a religious dimension in our culture.
Hence the reliance on narratives in the pursuit of the utopian economic dream of complete privatisation and an end to all regulation, and I spose by definition government. (Murray Rothbards wet dream.)
“It’s not the same thing as an argument. It might be a good thing if that were realised – that accountability to reason and truth and evidence can be the price of seeing everything in terms of narrative.” – Mark B
Yeah.
But I am sure you are looking at the market or the economy anyway, as a tool that serves society.
The point I’m trying to make is that the free market and its economics are an ideology, and an ideology is effectively a religion, whether it deals in the metaphysical and transcenfdant or not.
So free market economics are not being described in terms of how they serve society by people like Sutchbury. Cos thats not the point. They “believe” in free market economics, and society should serve theose economics, cos obviously, given its 20 years since the end of history and capitalism won thats how things should be. God must have made it so or something…
I’m not saying Sutchbury (or anyone else) actually knows he is being religious, just that he is being religious.
He’s whinging that his favorite priests aren’t being given their due. No wonder I hate newspapers.
Don’t forget the point of all religions is to concentrate power and screw the plebs (often literally if they are children.)
I checked, Nickws. His byline is on the piece in the dead tree edition, where it’s got the most prominent possie on the page.
I have come to the conclusion that Insiders is a total waste of time. You are better off sleeping in. After the shameful, uncritical acceptance of the Newspoll as gospel and thereafter as a premise for the daisy chain that followed (lots of chortling and head nodding from Akkers) it dawned on me that the whole gig was a job creation scheme for Barrie Cassidy after that late night on 10 gig folded, what was it called again? It was very funny whenever David Barnett fronted. (Here’s a thought Barrie, why not have him on your show?)
Sir Henry to Barrie Cassidy: Why doesn’t anyone call Kally’s bluff? I’m available to come on and give him a serve. Why do we have to put up with the more extreme and bizarre personages from the right wing spectrum such as Gerry and Piers? Can’t you line up some rightwingers who are articulate and the full quid as a bonus? Say Paul Comrie-Thomson?
Sir Henry to Mark Scott: Geez, mate, pull the plug. The gig is getting tired and tiresome.
As far as Stutch (fix your spello Mark) is concerned – his position on unfettered free markets has remained consistently Hayek. It is just that the rest of world has now moved just ever so slightly so he seems a bit more exposed.
Typo fixed. Thanks, Sir Henry.
Btw – sure, he might be a Hayek bloke, but some of the other right wing economics pundits are a lot more consistent about it. His stuff is getting pretty close to “opposition line of the day” imho.
@4 -
Yep, Matt, that’s right. And what you said about political economy. For Stutchbury, there would always be a good political reason for Howard and Costello to depart from the nostrums of ideology, but no such tolerance for Labor.
… which is one of the points of the post.
The other, and that’s where Foucault comes in, is my interest in where this obsession with narratives and policy derives, what it does, and how it’s linked up to wider cultural stuff.
Surely every government you can think of has had its narrative disrupted by the global financial crisis? The Rudd government was hardly there before it had to cope – interesting to think how less ambitious it might have been without the GFC? Probably one of the reasons for the government’s consistent poll results is that people see it as fairly consistent.
Stutchbury seems to think the Telstra privatisation was a plus, but what this government aims to do with it seems a more significant reform.
Ah, there’s that highly consistent Newscorp stylz guide for you. This is why Rupert thinks people will want to pay top dollar for online content—it’s not at all confusing to look at.
I actually picked up a copy of the Oz today, though I didn’t flip through. They’ve gone and changed the font.
Yep. Also a lot more white space in the new layout.
“my interest in where this obsession with narratives and policy derives, what it does, and how it’s linked up to wider cultural stuff”
Have you never had to help write a mission statement for your work unit?
Perhaps one of the reasons is to aid accountability. Given there’s so little trust about, people might want a clear statement of intent, to hold a government accountable?
Jazz Creepo @ 7, I’ve been trying to work out what Paul Kelly contributes to the national narrative for about forty fucking years. My interim conclusion is “nothing.”
A blowhard, an empty vessel.
He’s a pretty damn fine songwriter isn’t he David?
This was the editorial to today’s Crikey email:
They can’t strip the spin and bias from their reporting of something as straightforward as Newspoll polling, which suggests to me that we the readers have buckleys expecting that anything else will be analysed free of subjective interpretation.
It’s interesting what this “reform” narrative chooses to ignore.
Sure, according to the neo-libs Hawke/Keating were nice domesticated Labor PMs who opened up the Australian economy and invented sunshine. Apparently, this – and this alone – is responsible for all economic growth in this country. But alongside neo-liberalism things like Medicare Mark 2 and carefully-targeted social wage programs were introduced. Could it be that these programs are also responsible for much of the economic growth since the ’90s? Heresy!
And interestingly, The Australian’s reform narrative is almost the reverse of that of ordinary people. Ordinary people experienced the ’80s and ’90s as an ugly and depressing period of decline, of greed, betrayal by elites even (hence Hansonism). Keating is definitely not seen as an economic maestro by the general public. Even with the inflation of the ’70s, ordinary people look to the post-war pre-neo-liberal period with affection, not as a period of stunted growth.
And apparently breaking up two important private monopolies – AWB and Telstra – doesn’t count in passing the “reform test”.
Spot on, Ginja.
And Howard knew it… which is why he departed so much from neo-liberal orthodoxy with his various targeted tax/welfare transfers, and with his contribution to things like the housing bubble. All in the service of making everyone “relaxed and comfortable” while big biz got lots of corporate welfare and outrageous rorts like the super “reforms” made the rich richer…
Of course, this confidence trick was always going to prove to be a house of cards.
Stripping away the social state and touting the virtues of private everything had a limited shelf life, and WorkChoices exposed the grubbiness of the class agenda that underlay Howard’s politics.
@15 – Russell, Stutchbury seems to imply that Rudd and co. should have eschewed the stimulus (or had a smaller one, lest private borrowing be “crowded out” or whatever the orthodoxy of the media cycle is or was) and got on with micro reform.
I think the whole thing about the COAG stuff is that Ministers like Swan and Tanner actually realised:
(a) all sorts of cans of worms get opened when you try to harmonise state laws, and every vested interest turns up with its hand out;
(b) equalisation often implies problems with some people in some states having better protections than others (eg OHS, compo) and the pressure from the biz elites, the economic editors and all that crew will be for equalisation downwards.
I’m quite happy that the Rudd government has turned into less of a process/bureaucracy/wonk fest than it might have done.
Mark – I’m a bit wary of new bureaucracies to come, it’s just taken some time for all the reviews and committees to come up with their recommendations for expensive new bodies to do this or oversee that.
Still, further ‘reform’ of the type we’ve had is not as easy as Mr Stutchbury thinks. Here we are in W.A. with the country’s only Liberal government, and has the W.A. Industrial Relations Commission been retired and its powers handed over to the feds (that would save some money)?, is the state owned power company up for sale? The government has a strong narrative about reform, but not much has changed.
I’d prefer, Russell, if the Rudd government took a few more political decisions, particularly when the issues are reasonably clear cut. There is a case for inquiries, sometimes, but as with Garnaut, they don’t necessarily mean all that much when they clash with political imperatives. It would be better, imho, if governments were held politically accountable for their actions rather than hiding behind narratives and bureaucrats.
Besides Nick Minchin and a few bureaucrats who reads the Australian?
Can anyone take fox news seriously?
I know this bit of the article was quoted before. But I was really struck by it:
‘Charlton reckons Howard’s Work Choices was all about the Business Council wanting ordinary Australians to be scared of losing their jobs so Howard could strip away the regulations protecting their pay and conditions and kneecap the brave union defenders of vulnerable workers.’
Sutchbury writes this as if it was a self-evidently absurd proposition. That is exactly what WorkChoices was for – there was no point to introducing it otherwise.
I have come to the conclusion that Insiders is a total waste of time. You are better off sleeping in
Took you a while.
Seriously, what are the ratings for Insiders? a couple of hundred, all of them over 60? Oh but the influential people watch it. Yeah right.
Its better than sport on Channel 9 or Hymns on the ABC.
And worse than dealing with a hangover.
Foucauldian discourse analysis may not be the best tool in the box with which to dismantle the problem. A better starting point may well be that put below by … well, guess who?
“The division of labour, which we already saw above as one of the chief forces of history up till now, manifests itself also in the ruling class as the division of mental and material labour, so that inside this class one part appears as the thinkers of the class (its active, conceptive ideologists, who make the perfecting of the illusion of the class about itself their chief source of livelihood), while the others’ attitude to these ideas and illusions is more passive and receptive, because they are in reality the active members of this class and have less time to make up illusions and ideas about themselves.”
Correct, jules @ 20. I should have specified I meant Paul Kelly the poor excuse for a jounalist, not Paul Kelly the great singer-songwrite.
@32 – he’s lurking around in the interstices!
Update: On Paul Kelly.
Yeah I know DI(nr). I was just being a smartarse, cos really Paul kelly the journo … he’s one those people that I just tune out.
Sorry to harp on about Insideres, the so called “left” side seem to be very reluctant to talk up Rudd or Labor. Fran Kelly seems to be very apologetic. Annabel Crabb can just go and die in a ditch. David Marr is the only feisty character. He can get under Bolt or Ackerman’s skin. I quite liked Gerard Henderson, but he seems to be rare in his appearance.
I am dying to hear someone say, “hey – isn’t Rudd just the bees knees”.
Henderson makes my skin crawl, Jazz. He has the charm of Phil Ruddock, the warmth of Bronwyn Bishop, and the wit of John Howard.
‘I am dying to hear someone say, “hey – isn’t Rudd just the bees knees”.’
You’ve got a better chance of winning the lottery. And re Ms Crabb, isn’t it indicative of the state of political journalism in this country that she’s regarded as a star in the firmament.
adrian, Annabelle has nice dimples. She also has a witty turn of phrase occasionally: East Bumcrack Uni, or whatever, was quite good (although not particularly memorable). I think she is probably on the side of the angels, but being young, carries that flea in her ear about “balance”, which means she spends most of her time splashing around on the surface. Generally speaking, I reckon she is an enertaining and attractive lightweight with the potential to be a heavyweight, in a decade or so, if she sticks at the game, gets a life, and develops a few mature convictions. After all, somebody has to bump Michelle Grattan off the senior female journo perch, and it ain’t gonna be Fran Kelly. So I am usually prepared to give Annabelle a break when she is on the Group W bench with the likes of erky Bolt and aaagh Piers. On the other hand, anybody, dimples or not, could shine in that appalling company…
Talking of narratives, truth and narratologies, may I suggest “context”?
When I muddle through different narratives, I often come across this much over-used explanation.
http://www.dnaindia.com/entertainment/report_ben-elton-apologises-for-hurling-insults-at-queen_1313644
When Safran is in blackface and when a Red Faces act is in blackface, its different….because of context. Ben Elton recently got hammered for overthetop insulting of the Royal Family.
Context has been used by all the greats.. Sam Newman, Rush Limbaugh…
Its the new magic bullet for when you cop a dose of double standard hypocricy.
The only ‘context’ that needs discussing with John Safran’s latest ‘show’ is the context of apalling self indulgence with the flimsiest of pretexts of it being about something other than John Safran.
Good luck to him if he can persuade a supposedly cash strapped public broadcaster to fly him around the world a few times (carbon offsets anyone) to indulge his boring obsessions about himself, with a couple of ‘controversial’ stunts thrown in, but to do they have to actually screen the resultant mess?
Brendon, it’s possible that “out-of-context” has a similar meaning to “tired and emotional”, at least some of the time.
safron – one show I never watch. Most of ABC1 on Wednesday night is utter and complete garbage. Even the movie Show can get boring
Leave out the words ‘on Wedenesday night’ in the above sentence and you’d be more on the money, Paul.
It does, David. It gets used a lot defending allies and fellow travellers.
I’ve often said something like “How is it any different then when Fevola did the exact same thing outside a Melbourne nightclub?” ….and then got a lecture about context. LOL