Stalin Road

 Back in September, I was in Colchester visiting relatives when this picture was taken:

There's a post-war estate that contains Churchill Way, Roosevelt Way, and - more controversially - Stalin Road.

This was featured in the local newspaper back in 2009, when it reported that only four out of thirty households responding to a poll wanted the name to change. It was back in the newspaper the other day though, in a more recent article that partly repeats the older one. This article was also reprinted further afield. However, this also gives more detail of the debate at the time.

First, it reports a tweet from the council (which I haven't located) according to which changing the road name would require consent from 75% of the residents. (It's not clear whether that's 75% of those who vote, or 75% of all residents - making abstention an effective no vote.) That's interesting, given that I've been teaching majority rule lately. Here we have an example of bias towards the status quo, as often used in cases of constitutional entrenchment.

Second, it reports disagreement over who should have standing here. One resident is quoted as saying, "it should be our decision" because it is the residents who would be inconvenienced by a change of address. On the other hand, another letter argued that the name is an embarrassment to Colchester (and even Britain) and that residents don't have the right to choose the name of their road. (For the record though, I think the latter point is something of a non-sequitur. The residents here didn't choose Stalin Road. Their objection is to having the existing name changed.)

This is also interesting, given that I've recently been discussing the so-called 'boundary problem' with students on my democratic theory module. This is a case where it's not clear what the relevant 'demos' is. If not the residents of the road in question, then who should it be? Everyone in Colchester? Everyone in Britain? What about residents of the former USSR?

On voting in UCU strike ballots

 Strikes are currently taking place at many UK universities, with staff protesting over workloads, casualization, and (in pre-1992 institutions) further cuts to the USS pension scheme. These grievances are not new and have been discussed elsewhere before, for instance here and here. But there’s been less discussion of the ballot (voting) system that’s led to the strikes, which is pretty interesting in its own right.

 

A legal mandate for industrial action requires that more members vote in favour of action than against it, but also that at least 50% of members participate (vote) in the ballot. This is intended to ensure that there is wide support for action. Without some provision like this, a small number of workers might claim a mandate for action simply because of low turnout. But this requirement also produces some rather surprising consequences.

 

In ballots last year, a number of universities narrowly missed this turnout threshold, meaning no mandate for industrial action even though a significant majority of votes cast were in favour of it. For instance, at the University of Southampton, 491 out of 998 members voted – only eight short of the required turnout. This means there was no legal mandate, even though 348 of those votes (71.5% of valid votes) were in favour of strike action. (These figures all focus on votes for strike action, rather than action short of striking, and on the USS dispute in particular. Further, all figures are from November 2021, though a number of universities that narrowly missed the threshold subsequently held a second round of ballots.)

 

Matters were even closer in some other cases. The Newcastle University was just six votes short (619 out of 1,250). At the University of Manchester, the threshold was missed by a single vote (1,094 out of 2,094). This despite, respectively, 80.1% and 77.7% of those votes cast supporting strike action.

 

These figures reveal that some media coverage has been misleading. For instance, the BBC reported that staff at 58 universities voted in favour of strike action. While it is true that only 58 secured the necessary turnout, this overlooks the fact that a majority of votes cast at every university were for strike action. (The lowest level of support for strikes was 61.6% at the University of Reading.)

 

This isn’t simply a case of ‘near misses’ though. These figures also reveal some surprising consequences of the 50% turnout requirement. For instance, Reading did secure a legal mandate because 50.6% voted, albeit with only 61.6% of those (31.2% of eligible voters [228 out of 731]) favouring a strike. In contrast, Newcastle did not secure a legal mandate, because only 49.5% voted, even though 80.1% of these (39.7% of eligible voters [496 out of 1,250]) favoured a strike. This seems strange, to say the least.

 

The oddity of these rules is even more apparent if we consider some possible ‘what if’ scenarios. As noted above, Manchester was only one vote short of the turnout threshold. Had just one more person voted, then they would have the necessary mandate. But this would be the case regardless of how that person voted. Even had they voted against the strike, their single vote would not have stopped yes from winning, but would have met the turnout threshold.

 

In fact, support for strike action was so strong that it would still have won even had an extra 576 of those who did not vote instead voted against strike action. Again, it’s puzzling that a vote of 807-to-231 in favour of strikes fails to achieve a mandate, but 807-to-806 would do so. Why should more people voting against something give it a mandate it otherwise lacked?

 

This isn’t the end of the strangeness though. As we’ve just seen, one more person voting against a strike would have resulted in a legal mandate (807-to-232). But this mandate would have been lost had one of those 232 opposed to strike action abstained, rather than voting against it. So, not only can voting against a strike give it a mandate, but not voting at all might serve to block strike action!

 

Ordinarily, we expect abstention to be a ‘neutral’ option, between yes and no. In this case though, it was abstentions – rather than no votes – that blocked strike action where ballots failed. It might well be that some members realised that not voting was their best chance to avoid a strike and acted accordingly. (And, perhaps, some others voted no – making a strike more likely – because they didn’t want to block a strike in this manner.) However, if this was the case, then this strategic abstention might have backfired.

 

As it happens, the strike ballots that failed to secure a legal mandate did so because of low turnout, rather than low support from those that did vote. But things might have been otherwise. It could have been that turnout thresholds were met, but that the vote was a close one. In that case, there might have been a narrow victory for strike action that would have been overturned had strategic abstainers voted against it.

 

This means that some union members are faced with difficult choices, even if they know what they want. It’s clear what those in favour of strikes should do – they should vote yes to strike action. But opponents of strike action are faced with a dilemma. It isn’t obvious whether they best promote their cause by voting no or by abstaining. Either option might unwittingly create the strike mandate that they sought to avoid.

 

While the working conditions that have led so many academic staff to vote for strikes are the main issue, the success or failure of strike ballots is often the result of voting rules, rather than whether workers support strike action. The turnout requirement makes strike ballots harder to pass, but also has some rather surprising results.

 

Post-storm fallen tree

I was forced to cancel a lecture last Friday due to Storm Eunice. 

It's not the first time I've known campus to be closed due to inclement weather. I had assumed that, in these post-pandemic days, classes would generally be moved online rather than cancelled. That is what many people did, but unfortunately my personal laptop chose the day before to die. (I think/hope it's a charger issue rather than the laptop itself, but don't have a spare to test it.)

Local damage is not as dramatic as some of the pictures that I've seen online, but there are a few broken/fallen trees around, including this one that blocked my route to the local shops on Saturday:

As I said, not the most dramatic, but this picture might be useful for lecture slides when discussing freedom and obstacles. If someone were to put a barrier across the path, then this would be a restriction on my negative freedom. A fallen tree, however, may leave me unable - but not unfree - to walk down to the shops.

Novax Djokovic

Still on the subject of celebrity role models, but back to vaccination again, tennis star Novak Djokovic has confirmed not only that he is unvaccinated against Covid but also that he would rather miss future tournaments instead of getting jabbed. While he claims not to be anti-vaxx, and to be open to the possibility of vaccination at a later date, it’s unclear what might change his mind at this time.

The Zouma-cat affair

I've blogged recently about footballers as role models. I was talking about vaccination, but this kind of thing has been in the news over the last week or so, since the story broke about West Ham's Kurt Zouma mistreating his cat. In this case, the PFA has acknowledged the responsibility of players for influencing society. 

Despite being fined and condemned by his club, Zouma still played for West Ham against Watford, though he was then absent against Leicester - apparently due to unrelated illness. His brother, Yoan, has however been suspended by Dagenham for his part. (I haven't seen the footage, but I gather Yoan filmed it.)

Controversy around the issue no doubt reflects the widespread (self) perception of Britain as a 'nation of animal lovers' though - as Julian Baggini points out - there's an element of hypocrisy in this, given many people's indifference to animal suffering in other cases.

Still, this serves as another example of the responsibilities of footballers in the public eye.

Ugly freedoms

A colleague recently shared this guest essay from NY Times on the ways in which freedom is appealed to in order to block things such as the teaching of critical race theory. It argues that freedom can be used to exclude and harm minorities, rather than being a right for all. 

It's a shame that this is too late for this year's iteration of PAIR1004, but it's something that might well be useful in future.

Disappointing though that the NY Times refer to the author as 'Ms. Anker' even while describing her as a professor. (I don't know her, but she seems to be an associate professor.)

A striking question

Once again, academics - or, at least, some of those who are UCU members - are voting over strike action. I'm not going to go over the grounds for this, nor the bizarre (but legally mandated) voting system - though I may blog on that another time. Right now, my attention is on the ballot paper:

There's perhaps some ambiguity over what 'prepared' means here. I suppose someone may be prepared to strike over one issue but not another, based on (what they see as) the justice of the cause or chances of success or whatever. 

 

However, one might have no particular desire to go on strike, yet be prepared to do so in solidarity with others (assuming they want to). In that case, one might reasonably answer yes, one is prepared to take action. If everyone were to do that though, then they would all end up engaged in strike action that none of them actually wanted, simply because they were all prepared to do it.

(For the record, the photo is of my ballot paper, but I've already returned it now.)

Merry Christmas

 I gather that 'elf on the shelf' is popular at this time of year, so here are some elves that I made last year:

 

Parts are almost all from Northstar's Frostgrave/Oathmark lines, though I did use a few GW bits including the old Bretonnian shields (featuring stag faces, which I gave a red nose).

One day I hope to use them in an Xmas-themed Frostgrave scenario, though I've not had the chance yet.

Attempts to lower the voting age in Canada

Canada will soon debate a private member's bill, sponsored by NDP MP Taylor Bachrach, proposing to lower the voting age to 16. I don't know its prospects of success, since it seems that there have been similar attempts in the not-so-distant past. Still, this may be useful for discussion on my democratic theory module next semester.

 

In a separate, though related, matter it seems there's a current legal challenge to the current threshold. It's argued that this minimum is an unjustifiable breach of Section 3 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which states that "every citizen of Canada has the right to vote in an election of members of the House of Commons or of a legislative assembly." 

 

I don't know much about Canadian constitutional law, but it's not obvious that lowering the minimum voting age to 16 would be much of an improvement. If every citizen has this right, and citizenship starts from birth, then presumably there should be no minimum voting age. Any age threshold will exclude some citizens who are below that age.

 

Perhaps exclusions of the very young may be justifiable breaches of this right, though this still leaves a question as to at what point this is justifiable. I've heard proposals to set the voting age at various points from 12 to as low as six before. If any of those are remotely plausible, then even 16 would be unjustifiable.

New Zealand to withhold cigarettes

New Zealand is poised to ban anyone born after 2008 from purchasing cigarettes or tobacco. This is an interesting move. It means that those currently able to purchase these products will still be able to do so, but those not yet able to do so will never be able to do so.

 

This could be seen as some form of age discrimination, but it could reflect the view that it's easier to justify withholding freedom from people that do not have it than to justify withdrawing a freedom that people already have - an asymmetry defended by Andi Schmidt.

Kimmich update

I recently mentioned the footballer Joshua Kimmich being a high profile vaccine refuser. (Perhaps I should describe him as merely vaccine hesitant, since his comments suggested that he hadn't ruled out vaccination in future.)

 

I've just seen that he's been ruled out until the new year, following a Covid infection. This isn't actually that far away now, so I hope it's not too serious. Still, perhaps stories like this - rather than stories of refusal - send a better public health message.

Raising the age of marriage (and voting)

I've been teaching on marriage this week, the focus being on same-sex marriage and arguments for abolishing marriage, but I had missed the news that there are moves afoot to raise the minimum age in England and Wales from 16 to 18.

 

It seems this is mainly to prevent children being forced into marriage, which doesn't seem particularly controversial. Nonetheless, even if this doesn't really impact my current teaching, it would be relevant next semester when I look at arguments regarding the voting age. It's often said that if 16 is old enough to get married (etc) then it should be old enough to vote. This argument is undermined though if 16 year-olds are deemed not old enough for other rights.

 

That said, David Runciman's suggestion of lowering the voting age to six has been in the news again lately. I don't know his views on marriage, but I assume he doesn't think that six year-olds should marry, so the two rights certainly don't have to go hand in hand.

Footballers and vaccination

I commented recently about Callum Robinson refusing the vaccine. It seems that he isn't the only footballer to be vaccine hesitant. German international Joshua Kimmich says he isn't vaccinated yet and has concerns about it, though he claims not to be an anti-vaxxer. 

 

If we think that people have a right to refuse vaccination, then that presumably applies to professional sports stars and other celebrities. However, there is a potential issue that high-profile refusers like these will influence others to delay or refuse vaccination, as irrational as it seems for people to follow the lead of footballers rather than health professionals.

 

Perhaps it would be better to keep quiet about these cases or, at least, to increase coverage about those who are vaccinated.

Teaching political theory in a pandemic

This semester, I'm once again teaching our introductory political theory module (PAIR1004). This year, it's a mix of historical and contemporary views but with the overarching theme focusing on freedom. While it's not a module about current events, we thought that we could emphasise the topicality of these discussions, given how freedom keeps coming up in debates over lockdowns.

Here's a brief outline of the module content:

1. Introduction. What is politics? Where do we find it? If politics is about the power to command, then the University itself is a political institution, much like the state. Is there a difference – with respect to freedom and obligation – between the government telling its citizens to wear face masks and the University telling its students to do so?

 

2. Hobbes on the establishment of political society. The state of nature as a lawless free-for-all (like the scramble for toilet roll or petrol). People have no rational incentive to keep contracts, or do anything for the benefit of others, such as wearing face masks, unless we institute an all-powerful sovereign authority to resolve collective action problems.

 

3. Locke on limited government. Locke imagines a more peaceful state of nature – one of liberty, but not licence – in which people mostly respect the rights of others but, since each is judge of his/her own case, disputes may arise – e.g. if I think you should wear a face mask to protect me, but you do not.

 

4. Rousseau on the general will. If facemasks are in the general interest, then the general will may be for everyone to wear a face mask. Those who refuse to comply are ‘forced to be free’.

 

5. Mill on the harm principle. There should be complete freedom of self-regarding action. For instance, society has no right to prohibit activities such as drinking, gambling, or homosexual intercourse, provided that all involved are consenting adults. But society may interfere with conduct that threatens harm to others, such as drink-driving or not wearing a face mask.

 

6. Negative and positive liberty. What are the ends of liberty? What things constrain it? Does a mask mandate reduce liberty? On the negative conception, probably. But, on the other hand, does some people’s refusal to wear masks also reduce the liberty of others? Possibly. If ‘freedom for the pike is death for the minnows’ then how should we adjudicate between competing freedoms?

 

7. Republicanism. The opposite of freedom is not interference, but arbitrary domination. Consequently, law is compatible with freedom, provided it is not arbitrary. For instance, a mask mandate is not arbitrary interference and therefore does not abridge republican liberty.

 

8. Consent theory. According to consent theorists, to consent to membership of a group, such as a state or a University, is to consent to the rules of that group. Thus, if the University’s code of conduct requires the wearing of masks, then members of that University have an obligation to do so in virtue of their consent.

 

9. Other accounts of obligation. Obligations need not be grounded in consent. We have various ‘natural duties’ which include not harming others, for instance by refusing to wear a mask. We may have particularly strong obligations towards those with whom we share community ties, such as members of a family, nation, or university. According to fair play theory, if others make sacrifices for our benefit – for instance, wearing a mask – we may have an obligation to reciprocate.

 

10. Politics in times of emergency. During the recent pandemic, governments have instituted various measures – such as mandatory face coverings, curfews, and lockdowns – that (seem to) abridge our ordinary freedoms. When and why are these measures justified?

 

Our reading list is mostly unchanged, since we can illustrate the application of ideas to the pandemic in class, but an interesting looking collection on political philosophy in a pandemic (Amazon affiliate link) has recently been published. If I were to teach a course like this again, then I might make use of that, but I didn't have time to redesign the course from scratch.