Brussels plans to give everyone a say in a better society

Rather than a Big Society, the EU has ambitions to create a Good Society instead. But is it just another pipe dream? Chris Bond reports.

The mere mention of the words “EU” or “European Commission” is enough to send some people apoplectic. In the UK, practically everything that comes out of Brussels – the EU’s de facto capital – seems to be treated with deep-rooted suspicion by the public.

The feeling that we are dictated to on a regular basis by a bunch of un-elected bureaucrats has been fuelled by several high-profile cases – a recent Strasbourg court ruling that the UK’s blanket ban on all prisoners voting was incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, being one of them.

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Now, the EU has come up with a new vision for a more cohesive Europe based around the idea of a Good Society. The EU Charter for Shared Social Responsibilities is being launched next week in Brussels at a conference opened by European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso.

The charter has been drawn up by sociologists and think tanks from across Europe, including Dr Mark Davis, director of the Bauman Institute, based at Leeds University – the only academic institution in the UK who has been involved in the process. Dr Davis, who will be among the speakers at next week’s conference, says that rather than trying to force its ideas on people, the charter is about looking at ways of creating a better society, one that tackles the gulf between the rich and poor and re-engages people in the political decisions that affect their day-to-day lives.

“Quite simply, our current economic and political system isn’t working,” he says. “We cannot afford for civil society to be missing in action from the debate on the future of financial markets, their regulation, and the social and environmental obligations of the key participants. So the principles of the charter are about trying to ensure the needs of the many can never again be overlooked in the interests of the few.”

The idea of this so-called Good Society is nothing new, of course. Thomas Jefferson and Plato are among the pioneering thinkers who have tried to lay the foundations for a better world in the past. But what is this modern interpretation based around and how does it differ from the David Cameron’s Big Society dream?

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“They both share similar ideals relating to giving communities more powers and encouraging people to play a more active role in their communities. And they advocate the transfer of power from central to local government and increasing support for co-operatives, charities and social enterprises that are all seen as capable of playing a much more significant role in society,” he explains.

“I see the principal difference as being that the Big Society model seems to want to promote these developments within the existing economic and social frameworks, whereas the Good Society model is about creating a whole new political economy, and the charter is part of the Good Society debate.”

But it’s a debate hampered by a feeling of alienation in the wake of the handling of the economic crisis and the MPs’ expenses scandal.

“They reinforced many people’s mistrust of a political system where they voted for a politician who then disappeared for five years. So maybe it’s time we created an alternative democratic model that involves everyone in making decisions about their lives.”

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It sounds a noble idea, but can an EU charter really make a difference given the fact that most people in the UK struggle to relate to Europe in the same way they do in France and Germany?

“There is a healthy Euroscepticism in this country, but this often becomes the default position, and whenever Europe is mentioned, some people instantly assume it must be trying to interfere with their lives. But if you move beyond the knee-jerk reaction that anything coming from Europe is bad, you find that a lot of the work being done by the European Commission is very progressive,” says Dr Davis.

“How we set about putting these ideas into practice has to be collectively decided. The challenges we face, whether it’s dealing with the financial crisis or climate change, are not unique to Britain or Yorkshire. They are shared by all European societies so it makes sense that there is an attempt to find a collective solution.”

But however well meaning it is, it takes more than a charter to change people’s lives.

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“We’re at the start of the process, rather than the end, but the idea of the charter is to improve the well-being of everyone in society. So yes, it is very ambitious but I think it should be applauded.”

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