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Local Government and Liberal Democracy J.A. Chandler

Most attempts in liberal democracies and in particular Britain to justify the value of local government within the constitution sees the institution as an expedient for ensuring better governance in the Nation. Consequent on this position is that local government is not to be valued as an institution per se but only in so far as it advances the aims of the political system as a whole and as a result is established and dependent on the interest of central governments. In this paper I attempt to show that a case can be made for the that community focused local government should be valued as the central means to ensure democratic government in liberal democracies ensures a measure of equality in citizens' capacities to determine the freedoms that must be accepted to ensure co-operation that optimises our life chances.

Liberal democracy as a failing concept There is throughout the world a wide acceptance that it is best to be governed through a liberal democratic framework. Exactly what such a framework entails is, however, open to question. Ever since the emergence of the concept of liberal democracy, there have been many version of what the term may mean and constant attacks by elite theorists or socialist writers that it is an idea whose various meanings can never be realised in practice. In terms of the academic rationalisation of the idea, the term liberal-democracy reached perhaps its highest consensus in the second half of the twentieth century but in recent years there appears to be a resurgence of informed opinion that suggests that liberal democracy based on national states is neither particularly liberal and certainly not democratic. Theorists such as Pateman (1970) Barber (1984), Dryzek and Dunleavy 2009), Archen and Bartels (2016) or Bartels (2016) let alone critical realists and Marxist theorists have argued that liberal democracy and its pretence to be representative of popular choice simply does not work. It is argued in this paper that an insistence on what can be termed a strong definition of democracy is incompatible with a strong definition of liberty and, if democracy is to be valued more than liberty, local governments should be valued as the best institutional structure on which to found democratic practice.

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The creeping and eclectic use of language provides no definitive ways of pinning down what the terms 'democracy' and 'liberalism' means to every individual in every society, let alone the term 'liberal democracy'. The suffix 'liberalism' attached to the portmanteau term liberal democracy can be seen as an assertion that within such a system each person should be free to state their opinions, associate with whom they please and have a right to freedom and liberty. Liberal democracy can, however, be seen as a contradiction in terms if it is associated with the claim raised since Locke of a right to own and protect an individuals' property. The position that taxation might be an assault on the freedom to hold property was a potent element in conservative thought in the 18th century and can be implied in the United States Constitution in the fourth amendment. In Britain the assumption of a right to property was undermined in the late 19th century by 'new liberals', for example, T. H. Green or L.T. Hobhouse as inimical to the possibility of ensuring democracy alongside liberalism. However, support for the 'new-liberal' values that underpinned the ideas that formed the basis of welfare states have subsequently been eroded by new right ideologies. Hayek, for example, observes that 'liberty' in the nineteenth century use of the word 'is concerned mainly with limiting the coercive powers of all government, whether democratic or not, whereas the dogmatic democrat knows only one limit to government --- current majority opinion.' (Hayek, 1960, 103). Thus, argues Hayek liberalism and democracy are not necessarily incompatible but signify differing issues as 'Liberalism is a doctrine about what the law ought to be, democracy a doctrine about the manner of determining what will be the law.' (Hayek, 1960, 103). Hayek's view is that ' the task of a policy of freedom must therefore be to minimize coercion or its harmful effects, even if it cannot eliminate it completely' (Hayek, 1960:12). This may be seen as a strong definition of freedom. Democracy according to his view may be a system that is the best means of determining without violence what the law should be but it can, nevertheless, be a means by which a majority can infringe on personal rights for liberty which is a right of all. However, it must be questioned how far individual liberty is an absolute right in that one person's freedom may often impact on another's use of their claim that they have a reciprocal right to freedom. What may be termed a 'strong' definition of liberty or freedom as emphasised by the new-right view makes little ethical sense since, without a measure of co-operation between individuals, life can, from paradoxically a right wing perspective, become 'nasty, brutish and short'. The contradiction between a strong definition of liberalism and democracy is particularly apparent in liberal claims concerning a claim for a right to property ownership. Freedom to gain and hold on to personal property inevitably creates

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inequalities and also any possibility of individuals having equal power to determine decisions for their communities or themselves. The concept of liberalism as minimising constraint and democracy are incompatible in that, if individuals can have freedom to develop their lives as they wish and retain the rewards and resources that they gain from their enterprise or by inheritance, societies become wholly unequal to the extent that a few individuals have a much greater opportunity and capacity to affect collective decisions which effect society as a whole. As many socialist theorists from Rousseau through Marx to critical realists such as Habermas or subjective writers such as Bourdieu observe, those with wealth will, in general, use their largesse to defend their privileged position in society and to bequeath through inheritance this capacity to their children. Thus, they will actively defend their interest by marshalling their superior resources to obtain for themselves or their heirs, not only a sound education and sense of social esteem but the capacity to publicise their views and employ 'experts' to validate their interests. With wealth they can support or own and control much of the media for the education of the under-privileged in society and hence the capacity to persuade many of those uneducated in any form of political or economic knowledge to accept policies that are in the interests of well resourced privileged few rather than the mass of society. From a different angle Frank Fischer (2003: 214) reviews how such well resourced interests can obtain or use professional expertise who may have, in their sphere of interest, a decisive position in policy making. In practice, decision making in liberal democracies is dominated by small coteries of wealthy interests and professional bodies who through their much stronger access to power can dominate decision process. This capacity is further underpinned by the evolution of nation states that have over the centuries become the unquestioned unit of supreme governance and for most populations simply too large in size to allow any but a small well resourced elite to hold the reins of power to make decisions. In contrast, a strong definition of democracy, largely mirroring Barber (1984: 151) is that each individual has the ability to determine decisions that may affect them on the basis that each person has an equal capacity to develop community policy through discourse leading to a consensual decision. A more attenuated insistence on personal liberty is required if strong democracy is to have any substance. Firstly, as argued above, strong democracy is not possible unless there is some equality in the resources in wealth that can be owned by members and organisations within a polity. A second concern if democracy is to be achieved is that individuals must be restrained in pursuing their own objectives if this is contrary to the consensus on policy obtained from an ideal democratic framework. Democracy also requires that

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freedom of the individual must be curtailed on issues that directly affect the lives and well being of others when serious harm may result if an individual does not abide by a majority consensus within a particular society. Democracy cannot be guaranteed unless accompanied by the rule of law. These restrictions on a strong insistence on liberty do not of course eliminate the right of freedom and indeed democracy depends on essential freedoms as well as duties. Democracy cannot be practised without a society accepting that each individual should have freedom of speech and association and a right that their views are seriously understood and given reasoned responses. We should also be free to hold personal beliefs that do not restrain others and as J. S. Mill argued may even offend but not physically or psychologically harm others. Using this 'weaker' construction of the right to be free ensures there can be some compatibility between democracy and liberty. Democracy, is, therefore, a more important ethical construct than the nineteenth century value of liberalism as extolled by the new right and many conservatives. There is very little that can be achieved in society if individuals adopt a strong definition of freedom and liberty given since, as sociable beings, human kind has secured its advanced status among living beings largely because we can act in concert with one another. Living communally inevitably means we cannot accept that we have as individuals a right never to be coerced by others and hence government must have as little bearing on our lives as can be possible. Liberty or freedom must be constrained to a less strong definition to accept the fact that we must live peaceably with others and that creative output requires that we can work co-operatively with others. The stronger value, as opposed to liberalism, is democracy, that is the means and ethical values through which we can ensure that each individual has as much liberty as possible to participate in forging the rights and corresponding duties we must adhere to in order to secure social cooperation. Idealised democracy The question, that is insufficiently analysed today is, therefore, how to secure a democratic system that necessarily must impinge on our freedom so as to secure an equal right to help determine the restraints on our liberty, which may be termed our duties to others. Perhaps the most eloquent imagination of this issue can be found in Rousseau's ideal of governance in small communities.

As long as several men in assembly regard themselves as a single body, they have only a single will which is concerned with their common preservation and

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general well being...When among the happiest people in the world, bands of peasants are seen regulating their affairs of State under an oak, and always acting wisely, can we help scorning the ingenious methods of other nations, which make themselves illustrious and wretched with so much art and mystery. (Rousseau, 1966, 85)

The image of democracy within small sovereign communities citizens meeting together in a forum in which everyone may contribute to a discursive debate on policy that affects the community that, ideally reaches a consensus among the members involved in a debate for the benefit of the community as a whole, is an attractive mirage but as Rousseau observes 'Were there a people of gods, their government would be democratic. So perfect a government is not for men' (1966,56). In the 18th century within some sectors of the founding states of the American Union, the idea that local communities should have extensive freedom and not necessary be regimented into obeying state let alone nationally imposed rules was, for a time, not unusual practice. (Syed, 1966: 21-52). The 1788 Constitutional compromise was that liberty required a complex and large scale federal structure under which local government within the states may be subject to legislation within each state. (Syed, 1966, 7-20). Even though the democratic potential of local government was widely established through the writing of De Tocqueville support for local autonomy remained more in theory than in practice and was not followed up in the newer states as Western immigrants infiltrated the heartland of the American continent. In the 1860s the relationship between the states and local governments was subjected to a ruling by Chief Justice Dillon that:-

Municipal corporations owe their origin to, and derive their powers and right wholly from, the legislature. It breathes into them the breath of life, without which they cannot exist. As it creates, so it may destroy. If it may destroy, it may abridge and control (quoted on Syed, 1966: 68).

A central and never wholly resolved issue of the Constitution has been over the extent to which sovereignty could be shared among differing layers of government or is an indivisible value but by the 20th century through Federal funding and state controls on local governance, particularly following the New Deal and later Johnson's Great Society programmes, local independence was being seriously undermined by both states and the Federal Government.

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The value of community democracy was, similarly, a live issue in the 19th century In Britain. Colonel Torrens MP observed in the debates on the 1834 Poor Law

A good system of local government he looked upon to be the perfection of all government...As he was desirous, therefore, to interfere as little as possible with the influence with which local authorities of the country ought to possess he should propose an amendment. 'That no rules or regulations framed by the Commons should be binding on any parish without the concurrence of rate payers'. (Hansard, 17th April 1834, vol. 23, col. 1340)

Lengthy studies by Joshua Toulmin-Smith (1851, 1857) lamented the incipient marginalising of parish government following centralist imposed restructuring of English municipal government. However, the preferred theorist in Britain reflecting central government reorganisation of local government within the developing constitution was John Stuart Mill (1861). In Representative Government Mill devoted a chapter on local government maintaining that the institution could ensure that matters of local significance were best determined by local citizens who knew the issues relating to their community and that such practice would also ensure that the citizens participating in local government would be more educated in political matters. Nevertheless, a national parliament would attract the most knowledgeable and cultured minds that were capable of setting the rules for a national society. Thus, 'the principle business of the central authority should be to give instruction, of the local authority to apply it' (Mill, 1861: 377). By the twentieth century the more bottom up apologia for local government in the ideas of Toulmin-Smith was almost wholly forgotten with the exception perhaps of Bowen Rees's (1971) critique of the Redcliffe- Maud and Wheatley Reports. J. S. Mill's rather guarded support for local government had been narrowed to the view that local government had no right to exist except through laws determined by the national government (Widdicombe 1986, 46). Most essays, post 1945, have followed the approach of Mill which concedes a limited role for local government as expedient in ensuring better government within the framework of the national state. A substantive, and widely quoted, defence following this model by L. J. Sharpe (1970) argues that local authorities ensure both participation and more substantive democracy. Subsequently Jones and Stewart (1983:10) set out criteria for the importance of local government as ensuring diffusion and diversity as opposed to centralisation in British policy making and

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economy in resource utilisation and, importantly, that local government ensured 'democracy and self government in a society which cannot afford to entrust control over bureaucracy to only twenty-one ministers and 650 MPs'. These are views with some substance but they require further development. Such studies whilst expressing opposition to the top down restructuring of local government in Britain do not get to heart of the ethical issues concerning the concept of liberal democracy that such a direction creates. They are what I have termed expediential justifications in that they suggest that the value of local government is largely to secure good governance for the nation but not that it has an ethical right to exist per se. I have attempted in Chandler (2008; 2010) to develop the argument that local government has an ethical raison d' être in ensuring that geographical communities ought to be free to develop policies that do not substantially damage the well being of other communities. However, this line of argument does not perhaps go far enough given the complexity of a globalising world and a retreat in 2016 in the USA and Britain into irrational nationalist values. This paper attempts to provide a rationale for local government that lies more at the heart of the ambiguities in ethical constructs of liberal democracy. Direct democracy As argued by Rousseau, Toulmin-Smith or De Tocqueville the most perfect form of democracy is a direct democracy where all those affected by a problem or opportunity together to debate the issue and reach ideally a consensus on the outcome but may be obliged to put the proposed solutions to a vote. Direct democracy perhaps can be said to exist in many closed communities such as the boards of companies or partnerships in professional organisations where each governing member is recruited to the decision making body on the basis that they have equal status with its exiting members. Such bodies are, however far from democratic in any wider sense being in most cases closed to the many whom they command. In a few cases the ideal image of democracy was and is still practised as De Tocqueville observed in small town politics in New England where every member of the community has the right to debate in the town hall on each matter that is seen as a concern for that community. It may arguably also linger on within Britain in decision making for small parishes that have not established a representative parish council. Within the European Union there is some recognition to these principles in the doctrine of subsidiarity that argues that decision making should be handed down to the smallest unit of governance capable on its own of making that decision without affecting others or undermining basic human rights.

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It is the contention in this paper that local participatory governance as direct democracy should be the founding basis of social organisation and that local government is a central institution securing this goal. A central value of local government is to serve as a corrective against the dominance of liberal democracy by elites. Within small communities it is possible to develop policy structures that are in essence democratic in that they ensure each member of a community has the opportunity to voice their opinions concerning any issue that concerns that community, and through face to face discursive dialogue become more informed about the matter in question and more able both to inform and change the views of others or themselves and restructure their ideas to create some element of consensus on the resolution of communal problems. Currently these ideas are also reflected and enlarged within the thoughts of critical realists such as Habermas whose ethics of discourse form throughout his writing a central theme for resolving conflict. This may be adapted from Habermas (1990) as quoted in Edgar (2005: 158) that individuals affected by a policy proposal have the right to put forward for consideration their views including their subjective attitudes, desires and needs and to critically question the ideas forwarded by opposing interests. This view must however be guarded by the need to ensure that decision making is informed by serious consideration of an individual's or organisation's views and may best be ensured through face to face debate leading in such a forum to the forging of a consensus as to how to face a specific problem. The problem faced by Habermas is how that consensus and face to face discussion can be achieved. As Outhwaite (2009, 165) concluded 'A final area of anxiety around Habermas work is almost too familiar to mention: His reticence about practical issues of political organization'. This consideration on the role of democracy at the community level may, nevertheless, be able to provide substance concerning the possibility of practising discursive decision making. Such a system would debate and resolve policy issues following the discursive ethic suggested by Habermas. Where a community concerned with an issue that also affects other communities and involves too many citizens to make face to face discussion possible it may at least be persued and forwarded with reference to debates among delegate members of the smaller constituent communities. It may, therefore be suggested that local, that is community, government is to be valued as it is the most optimal method of securing effective democracy open to all who may be affected by a community decision making process provided this is organised through a system of discursive debate open to all its eligible adult members.

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This may seem to be a rather bizarre and wholly impractical statement of the value of local government in that it is a reversal of the universally practiced ethic that values the nation state as the sovereign unit of political structure and forms of policy development. However, the proposed formula may be difficult to achieve but it is, given the argument of the importance of subsidiarity and democracy and its relation to liberty and community well being, more ethically rational than the framework of the top down nation state. It is suggested that many of the problems sketched above are not insurmountable and many are even more intractable in current systems of liberal democracy based on centralising nation states and globalised capitalism. Although these issues appear to be obvious reasons why the idea of establishing governance from a geographical community perspective is clearly untenable, it may be asked whether this is really the case or simply a consequence of the construction of society in the actual world in which we are socialised rather than in a world that ought rationally to be more amenable to the well being of all. As indicated in the following sections, despite the obvious and superficially damning critique of the case for local government as a central core to ensure any attempt at an ideal of democratic governance, there remains much to the favour this idea over any competitive top down frameworks for securing effective democracy. Communities as a subjective concept In the real world based on independent nation states or on intra-national regional and global institutions, it can be argued that a return to solving all political problems by debates in small geographically determined communities is wholly impracticable and is, indeed, less viable in the 21st century given globalisation of transport and media than it was in Rousseau's day. How can communities be identified within an increasing globalised world relating to overlapping communication, travel and inter-reliance relationships between individuals or family groups? Individuals are concerned not only with matters affecting their geographical communities but also their interest communities, that may centre on their work place on which they are dependent for their income and capital or on leisure interests that for many may be far more their focus of concern than their geographical community. The concept of a geographical community for many individuals is moreover a highly subjective and changeable impression rather than any fixed and permanent state of mind. Indeed, many geographical communities are composed of people who may have little or no connection with their close neighbours let alone the village, town, or the sprawling urban conurbations that cover the earth. It also may be claimed that in a globalising

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and inter-net connected world local government that is based on specific geographical areas is in contrast to other communities of interest an increasingly redundant concept. Further objections to the idea concern what is often viewed as the inward looking 'not in my backyard' conservatism of prosperous community leaving the poorer communities to fend for themselves in a morass of poverty and unequal life chances where those without resources for self help are obliged to gravitate to ghettos of poverty. No one should, however, argue that communities any more than a nation is some objective entity that is ordained from the physical workings of the world we inhabit. Communities are highly fluid entities made up of differing levels and subject areas and individuals usually owe allegiance and duties to several communities such as their work place, leisure activities or the geographical area in which they live. This melange of communities may also be constantly subject to change and on occasion can clash with one another. However, this is not any reason to reject the concept of the geographical community in preference for the nation state. The governance of society in general relating to the necessities of life, liberty and conduct cannot be met by reference to the work place or our pass-time associations as these tend to be specialised entities where we are free to join or leave. Geographical communities are, however, entities that we must all inhabit and for most people have a considerable, if not always realised, impact on their life world. Moreover, compared with our adherence to a nation state or for that matter a supra-national entity, it is a unit from which we can and do easily move to a differing community if the one we have chosen does not meet our needs. Communities are interdependent and can do little that affects the community alone. In earlier essays that I have published on the value of local government I suggest that the institution 'local governments ought to determine and implement those policies which do not infringe the interests of those outside their area and represent the views of that area to other agencies where its policies affect others' (Chandler, 2010:18). However, this may leave a rather limited and vulnerable world for local government in an inter-connected world. There may be a few rather minor activities that can be subject to local discursive democratic governance. The now well reported case in Sheffield of local residents taking direct action to prevent the felling of trees in particular neighbourhoods of the city by an arms length company dealing with street maintenance on behalf of the City Council is clearly a dispute that ought

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to be resolved at the neighbourhood level. However, there are many elements of local governance in a city that have implications outside the boundaries of neighbourhood or even city and regional governance that cannot be governed through direct discursive democracy. These would include education, housing, social security, many major planning issues and aspects of law and order such as cyber fraud where both the implications of any local neighbourhood decisions on such matters may affect many outside its geographical boundaries. It could be argued that any approximation to direct community based democracy would leave the community forum with little to discuss but minor details, whilst wider matters of, using Mill's term, principle, would have to be subject to representative forms of governance with all its ills and problems. However, there are many examples where small sovereign states can successful supply most of the needs for their communities. Small principalities such as Andorra, Lichtenstein or San Marino or Singapore have such a capacity. Similarly a few genuinely federal states such as Switzerland have cantons with small populations but nevertheless substantive powers. Whilst these areas are perhaps too large to have direct democracy of, for example, a parish meeting, they may have the capacity to ensure that their citizens can be heard so that they may help steer policies in their micro nation far more substantively than the citizens of large national states. A further objection to greatly increasing the powers open to small communities is that many would lack the resources to provide services for their members. However, within a globalising world where many tasks are provided under contract to local authorities by multi-national firms, the issue of whether there is insufficient expertise or funding in such communities to run services such as refuse collection and disposal, health care, social security or highways maintenance does not arise. In a competitive capitalist environment the expertise may be bought in and implemented under terms laid out by the community. Moreover, as in France, communes or townships can voluntarily gather together for the supply of many services in communauté de communes in order to benefit from economies of scale. Such organisations can be established with the consent of local populations through contracts with private businesses or may even be owned as public companies through common ownership of participating communities. Similarly in the United States many small townships create local partnerships and tailor made arrangements for sharing power either with their neighbouring communities or with county or state governments.

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The sphere of action for many communities can also be greatly widened by the removal of many of the undemocratic restraints placed on them by central governments concerned with secreting policy making as their rightful monopoly. Within Britain, for example, this would allow community local governments the freedom to criticise and campaign against central government dictates. They would also work within a framework in which it would would be expected that community governments should also have powers of competence in that they can undertaken any activity which is not harmful to other communities. This would embrace a strengthened capacity to raise local taxes as far as its citizens would permit and to use funding not simply for supplying social services but in competition with the private sector to establish enterprises that bring further revenue into that community. Extending democracy from the locality to the region The preceding arguments that communities can have the choice to act in concert with other communities to fulfil their needs using economies of scale may be argued to have done little more than kick the argument further down the road given that a need for cooperation among many communities must be based on some form of representative rather than direct democracy. As Robert Dahl (1967) has argued individuals do not inhabit just one geographical community but inhabit structures he likens to Chinese boxes that are contained in cases of ever increasing size. Relatively few larger liberal democracies follow the trend in Britain seek to divide local authorities into large single tier authorities rather than systems of local community government, town and county/ departmental tiers and regional tiers. This problem leads to the development of some form of representative governments above the first tier level whose policy making cannot be undertaken by direct democratic principles other than through the problematic use of referenda or governance through the internet. It may, moreover, be pointed out that in most open societies, in practise, community government is determined not so much by debate among independently minded citizens but through the capacity of the media and of those delegated to powerful positions to manipulate society into party groups and factions. As Copus (2004: 288) observes in relation to the British political system 'Parties fail to reflect or address the range of views on local issues that exist within and across communities of interest and place'. In practice on a larger scale multi-national private companies may exert greater influence over the life world of citizens. Most private companies are organised on a managerial hierarchic model are designed expressly to undermine the liberty of the

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individual within its organisation or, in many respects society in general by their capacity to widely advertise their self proclaimed virtues in aiding our lives when in reality their aim is to transfer value from ourselves to their profit. Perhaps the greatest threat to community based governance is that citizens may easily be managed and manipulated by larger non-governmental agencies that seek to establish a life world based on ever increasing and ultimately unsustainable consumption. This is, however, as shall be observed later, not a problem that would only face community governance but is one that affects most of the world's nation states. Nevertheless, a representative system can be arranged so as to be far more sensitive to community values as a bottom up, rather than as in most systems, top down systems of government. A sense of community interest may be retained if the members of these representative bodies are chosen by the communities into which they are divided. It could also be expected that delegates to higher tier legislatures are mandated to represent the views of their community on a particular issue and may be recalled if found to be wanting in this task or be different people for different issues. Moreover, it can be expected that initiatives taken by representative bodies stem from proposals backed by reasoned argument from their constituent community organisations. It might also be possible in certain circumstances for communities to opt out of conforming to the consensus of majority of communities of communities if their action does not seriously damage the interests of their neighbours. How democratic are community democracies? It may be argued that communities based on direct democratic principles will, become dominated by wealthy internal or external individuals and more potently corporations and parties. The extent to which a community that determines its polices through discourse and eventual consensus does not, of course, entail that every individual within that community ends up having an equal weight in framing the policy outcome. The framework can at best ensure that the views of those who wish to participate in the decision making process are heard, seriously discussed and then, subject to the decisions of others in that community as to its value, may become an element in framing the eventual policy outcome. It must also be accepted that for many, in a geographical community the subject of the policy debate will be of little of no interest and not worth the time and effort they must make in intervening in the debate. Thus, discussions of policies in communities will often be made by a minority of activists concerned with the subject in hand rather than a majority.

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Voluntary abstention from debate by individuals with little knowledge or interest in an issue should not, however, be seen as some form assault on democracy but a virtue. We should not necessarily impose our ideas on others when we are not exactly concerned or affected by the issue in question or have the sense to realise we have no understanding of the problem and no interest in seriously learning about the issue. Referenda in this respect rarely end up with sensible answers and are inimical to finding consensus between contending parties. A problematic concern with a framework of idealised democracy within a community may also be the problem that even in a closed circle of neighbours discussing issues that affect themselves alone, certain individuals will may be more in a position to impress their views on that neighbourhood polity than others. In some communities neighbours could be the employers of those within their community and can enforce exclusion from debate for their dependents. Even more seriously in this context is the possibility that individuals or groups are prepared to use physical violence to bully or cow others to their will may become the norm in certain communities. For example the power of the Earls of Egremont over a village such as Petworth in the 18th century or, as of now, the influence of the National Trust currently. This objection perhaps reflects the findings of 20th century community studies empiricists such as Floyd Hunter (1953) or Robert L Lineberry (1977) who revealed the influence of business groups in determining the fortunes of cities in the United States. Properly constituted a system of community governance can, however, be no less susceptible to the dangers, if dangers they be, of becoming dominated by their well resourced citizens seeking only their own advantage to the detriment of the community as a whole. The use of violence should be outlawed and policed within both the community and of wider communities of communities. The issue of whether large employers in a community should be able to exert substantial influence in local decision making because of their economic importance for that society is a matter that citizens must debate among themselves. It may well be the case that local citizens agree with local employers that what is good for the business is also good for its employees in the community. In other cases local interest may rightly strongly object to business interests demanding major reorganisation of what is a predominantly rural and residential community from extending industrial developments within their midst. However the re-imagining of the role of discursive local governance may also have within it the seeds of redress against the inefficiencies of globalised trading systems. There are many examples where failures

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in the globalised market have been in part countered by community based establishment of services on a voluntary basis that are geared to supply locally required essentials as required by that neighbourhood. For example, community pubs are becoming for frequent when multi national provision fails, towns that have been deserted by supermarkets can have their services replaced by local initiatives that may also be far more likely to receive products that have been created locally. It may always be the case that factionalism may well be the case in community gatherings but it can be attenuated. Firstly few party members actually accept every word and thought of their political leaders and perhaps will be even less inclined to do so if they are exposed to the rigorous of debate and compromise. Moreover, it can be ensured that in a community in which debates are a regular occurrence there may be less capacity for factions to demand loyalty from their followers and expel them from any political influence if they do not follow the factional interest. West European States could at least evolve less disciplined party systems on for example the United States model. A further criticism of a democratic community based mode of governance can be that power in such circumstances will flow more to those who are charged with executing the decision of the community rather than being an equal distribution of power among the general assembly. Such a danger is, however, by no means simply a community concern but also a central element in determining unequal power distribution within nation states. Indeed it could be argued that the executive members of a community government if selected by residents and removed by them, if need be, is far easier within a small community rather than a large polity. The individuals in charge of implementing the decisions of the community can be far more readily questioned by those who directly receive the services that are provided and also far more readily contacted as many will live and work within that community. Equity An even stronger argument against the democratic capacities of community governance is the overbearing power of corporate business interests that supply the needs of most citizens in determining the supply and cost of food, fuel, transport and in many countries health and social care. In this context the issues of political socialisation and the framing of political values through Lukes's (2005) reflections on dimensions of power and non-decision making or the subjectivist critiques of

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Habermas concerning the shaping by capitalism of the life worlds of individuals or from Bourdieu's perspective their 'habitus'. The possibilities afforded by discursive democratic government is seen by Habermas as an essential antidote to shaping by others of the unconsciously held assumptions that the elite dominated so called mass media imposes on individuals. Given the inequity in resources of large companies or parties that would undermine a discursive neighbourhood model is that many decisions affecting the community would involve financial obligations that are beyond the capacity of all but the wealthiest neighbourhoods to raise from their own resources. The arguments so far advanced for community governance may be criticised as being highly conservative in nature in that it may result in wealthier communities in deciding to remain as they are and, more negatively, lock out any opportunities for badly resourced communities to have the means to improve their lot. Such problems have been widely observed and theorised in the United States (See Williams,1970 or Hunter, 1953). Adopting an extreme new-right position it may be argued that communities must survive on their own resources but such a position leads to serious inequalities between communities and may lock citizens in many in such communities with little chance to improve the well being of themselves of their children. A more ideal democracy, heeding the new liberal arguments of T. H. Green or Hobhouse must be such that it provides individuals with an equal capacity to improve their lives. If there is a strong ethical imperative favouring some form of Rawlsian redistribution of resources to less resourced communities from those who enjoy greater prosperity then some system of governance of considerable size in area and population must be in place that can realistically have the power to enforce egalitarian measures on those communities that will ensure as a consequence that some communities must surrender local resources to their neighbours. The issue of equality from a wider perspective is central to debates on the extent to which societies should embrace or reject private as opposed to forms of common ownership and also the extent to which a few individuals are enriched by inherited rather than earned wealth. It might be expected that greater participation in local governance can provide a greater consensus in society in relation to these debates and to some extent allow communities to set their own level of tolerance to differing forms and depth of inequalities. A more powerful discursive unit for debate in the form of a community government will educate more citizens to realise the extent to which power can, without regulation, lie within those who can command mass media coverage. It may also be far more apparent to activists in the community forum of

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whether some members who may be seeking to promote or even buy support from others. There are many examples of communities that have attempted to campaign against unwanted business intrusions within their community and within more powerful local democracy it will be far easier to block unwelcome developments. This is a problem that is of course an issue affecting not just local communities but large centralised states and needs further discussion on how a community centric system, any more than a centralised national system of sovereign states can overcome the problems of localised poverty and decline, which leads on to the following section. Is the localised system any worse than present normality? Whilst this study is an apologia in favour of community government, this paper is also a critique of the concept of nationalism that in practice underwrites most political systems in the world in a generally irrational and adverse manner. Whilst there are many problems in dividing society into geographical communities and placing these in the centre of policy development and the determination of political ethics, such development is far more rational in terms of moral and ethical values than a division of the centre of decision making based on nation states. In the realists' view the value of a political institution is based on the extent to which, whilst far from perfect, how far that system may alleviate the inevitable consequences when applied in societies where self interest rather than altruism is the guiding principle, knowledge is at best uncertain and often simply ignored and rationality is based on myth rather than any quest to develop ideas based on the most probable outcomes for one self or others. In this context it may be argued that many of the problems that are likely to beset community governance are just as much apparent and sometimes more venal in a global systems of governance. Government based on national states that claim to be liberal democracies hardly approach a semblance of genuine democracy where each citizen has a right at least to be listened to. The issues concerning how nation states are formed is as irrational as that of the formation of any small geographical community even though conflict relating to such division is far more dangerous and intractable than any conflict based on community values. Moreover, it is a concept that whilst dominating the divisions within the liberal democratic world that are sovereign over policy making has far less ethical foundation than community as a building block of democratic equality. Within the nation state even for liberal democracies power is placed in the hands of

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policymaking elites as opposed to any discursive egalitarian group of citizens. The irrationality of support for the nation state and Woodrow Wilson's concept of the rights of the nation state in terms of political theory is when unscrambled a matter of wonder why the vast majority of individuals cling to the assumptions that they should owe such states allegiance or believe their rights democratically are safe guarded by entities that have largely been founded on conquest and submission and propaganda forced on citizens by small coteries of political elites. The UKIP slogan 'we want our country back' during the European referenda campaign encapsulates a tragic sense of how the concept of nationalism has been used by elites to ensure many downtrodden sections of British society are led to believe that they might have, as individuals, any control over the decisions made by small self-appointing elites of national policy makers with whom they have in reality no communal interests what so ever in common. Nationalism as an ideology is a highly irrational concept that undermines guidance on ethical and social values based on rational argument in relation to how humans should relate to themselves. For many individuals ideological indoctrination of the values of a particular nation is based on biased folk memories of history and frequently embedded in such 'false news' is a highly divisive tribal mentality that seeks to show that the particular nation is somehow superior in its values and worth than its many rival states. Moreover, this ideology serves as a valuable means through which policy elites making in nations convince the majority of their citizens that they have superior worth to the inhabitants of other nation and thereby feel they get some reflect wellbeing and sense of purpose from such irrational sense of superiority. Why do we have any satisfaction from the success on the football field or athletics because some freak who can run very fast and, whom we will never meet, is a member of the nation, ethnic group or religious group which we happen to have been born in to? In such a context nationalism appears to be a more irrational and potentially dangerous element of political motivation than support for a smaller interest or geographical community. Nations States just as much as local communities are beset by problems of inequality among resources inherited by their citizens. The possibility that decisions on principles that bind all people and the conduct of all communities, can start at least from discussions at community level and then advances by delegates from each community who can be recalled by lower level forums within the 'Chinese boxes' of communities, may be more capable of reaching democratic consensus than top down steering of societies by small well resourced elites. Such a system will

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also be more democratic as if based on the principle that each community should not be involved in decision making for more distant communities who have little affect on them. The principle of tolerance should be respected . If the concept of a nation is irrational for all but a privileged few, there remains however the issue of determining the overall rules of the political game, that is the fundamental ethical principles that must underpin such a discursive system. The essence of a more harmonious and equitable society throughout the world must in the final analysis be created by the evolution of rational principles of action based, as is much of the United Nations charter on human rights, on commonly held values of respect for life, freedom speech and assembly and a commitment to a measure of equity in the share of the planets resources and tolerance for the behaviour and beliefs of others in so far as it does not harm others. As centrally highlighted in this paper, a rethinking of the relationship between democracy and liberty systems may go a long way to ensuring that as far as possible ensure each person can engage in policy debates that affect themselves to ensure as greater measure of distribution of power as is possible. The conclusion to this paper is that local government properly constituted should be valued primarily as the most effective means of ensuring democracy as the right to be involved in decision making that affects our interests. This is, however, far from being a standard alone cure all position for world society. Securing this ethical claim is also dependent on ethical resolutions to other issues that affect our life world. The idea runs counter to several well entrenched and often not consciously held beliefs central to political thought and practise. In particular it requires the abandonment of the irrational but pervasive inclination to view the world in terms of the primacy of identification to a nation, race or religion as a determinant of institutional systems for determining policy. Secondly the value of community should be set within a ethical systems that cannot accept substantive inequity between individuals and hence communities. There is of course the realist issue of how can this be secured through a society based on community politics from a discursive democratic base. This is an issue cannot simply be viewed as establishing some institutional setting such as a greatly empowered United Nations or regionalised blocs such as the European Union. Central to discursive democracy on a world scale is that through globalisation interconnections and greater learning the essential values of co-operation, equality,

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and toleration are infused throughout society. We are some distance from achieving such an ordered world. Conclusion The paper argues that one of the central and most neglected arguments concerning the role of local government is that such institutions when built from the decision making for the smallest community units ensure that citizens have at least the potential to ensure their views are taken into account relating to issues that affect their lives within a geographical community and have some influence in ensuring that their mature views following discourse with others in their community can be represented in cross community debates. Such a design is the closest that can be designed to ensure that democracy, as a means of ensuring policy decisions on matters that affect individuals, are developed to give each person as great and as equal contribution as possible to forging outcomes based on debate and discourse favourable to themselves and the demands and needs for co-operation within a community. The paper does not, however, argue that a bottom up system of democratic structuring resolves all issues. Such a system must be embedded in a society in which the flow of ideas and information takes place across communities and, indeed, where many individuals may be resident in more than one geographical community and also will be members of many interest communities whose membership are drawn from numerous communities. Such an arrangement will also, as is the case with any system of fair and equitable decision making arrangement also be based on ethical values of tolerance and a capacity for a 'good will' that there own specific interests must also not override the interests of others.

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