Red Toryism in action
It may be unfair to tar Philip Blond with David Cameron’s policy proposals, but this grab bag of measures intended to “give society a helping hand” gets at a criticism I tried to articulate after hearing Blond’s talk. I wasn’t sure how Blond’s arguments would translate into practice, and the initial results look like an incoherent mishmash:
A “Neighbourhood army” of 5,000 full-time, professional community organisers who will be trained with the skills they need to identify local community leaders, bring communities together, help people start their own neighbourhood groups, and give communities the help they need to take control and tackle their problems. This plan is directly based on the successful community organising movement established by Saul Alinsky in the United States and has successfully trained generations of community organisers, including President Obama . . .Transforming the civil service into a “civic service” by making regular community service a key element in civil servant staff appraisals . . .Launching an annual national “Big Society Day” to celebrate the work of neighbourhood groups and encourage more people to take part in social action projects.
Via Andrew Stuttaford. For interested readers, here’s a link to audio and video from Blond’s appearance at Georgetown.
Jason, I’m new to the blog, but like it alot. I’ll likely post a piece in the next week or so about the Russian-U.S. START treaty, and there are PLENTY of other things I’d love to share my thoughts on. Props on the health care comments I think you’re spot on.Report
Everyone is Jason but me!Report
More seriously, I need to get one of those icons next to my name in the comments. It might help with my ongoing identity crisis.
Also, a Neighbourhood Army of 5,000 community organizers ain’t never gonna fly in the United States. Sure, we elected one community organizer president, but 5,000 of them just sounds like a legion of busybodies.Report
I personally feel the most inconsistent part of Cameron’s philosophy is his strong belief in localism, with his support of British membership in the E.U.
How is Britain supposed to devolve more power to localities when the entire country is going to become increasingly dominated by Brussels, especially now with the Euro crisis of the PIGS has led to a consensus that more “economic governance” is needed.Report
It seems to me that people calling for civic localism should be taking a much more passive role than an active role in fostering it. Don’t people sort of gravitate towards that sort of society when they need it? It seems like seriously curtailing the duties of local and federal government would clear a space for civic society to flourish.Report