Understanding SA politics using a crystal ball

Submitted by John Bond

(Complimentary crystal ball provided)

I suggest we could adapt Scott Peck’s model on religious and spiritual views as a way of understanding our political views.

Use a model that explains religion and spirituality to understand politics? Suggest that one can have an idea of a group’s political actions by using a model?

Please humour me for a moment and read on.

I recently reread Gregory Scott Peck’s book on spirituality, A Road Less Travelled. He suggests that, when it comes to religion and spirituality, humanity can be divided into four distinct groups. He defines these four groups — or quadrants, as he calls them — as The Unbeliever, The Ritualist , The Agnostic and The Spiritualist.

I had a flash of inspiration that his four quadrants could be a useful tool to understand many other human beliefs, and I set about applying the model to politics. I have to admit that it produces a very interesting and enlightening model.

But why do we need a model?

Many of us understand the economic “supply and demand” model. We may be red Marxists or belligerent capitalists, but the supply-and-demand theory gives us common ground to discuss our beliefs and persuade others that we have the solution to all economic problems. This healthy dialogue creates synergy and the whole ends up being far greater that the sum of the individual economic theories.

A map or model enables us to understand the system quickly. It provides us with a broader knowledge. We are able to view and understand areas that are hidden from our current political perspective. Most importantly, it gives us an overview of the whole political territory.

But before I blast off, remember Steven Covey’s often repeated phrase “The map is not the territory!”. There are many areas in politics that challenge my proposed theory and in those areas lie the paydirt that will enable us to understand truly the dynamics of politics. The model is just a tool, and a tool is only as good as the artisan who uses it.

Politics is a complex subject, but for me, the foundation is the extent to which we believe that politics and the state are vehicles for improving society. Let’s assume we were to ask the population of a democratic and moderately well-run country two questions.

Question 1: How strongly do you believe that politics can change things for the better?

Question 2: How do you feel the current political system is performing?

If we were to plot these on a graph, there would probably be a rough correlation between the two questions (this correlation is not important to the basic model).

The bulk of the observations or the view of the masses will shift depending on how they view these two questions. If the masses believe that politics does improve society but that the current system is not effective, the bulk or mass will move towards the top left corner of the graph.

There will be those people who have divergent views from the masses and these plots will be scattered over the graph. It is often these divergent views, particularly those in the top right and bottom left corners, that have a significant impact on the political landscape.

Let’s see what happens if we divide this graph into four quadrants and apply some names to the people who fall into the different areas. Let’s see what possible political positions we can assume.

The model tells us that those who believe that politics is a vehicle for change but that the current political system does not deliver are champion for change. If they have strong views on this, they are political extremists or those prepared to take considerable risk to change the political system.

I believe South Africa’s recent past bears out this assumption. It also tells us that those who don’t believe the political system can improve society but that the political system is working become protectors of the system. If they hold strong views, they set about abusing the system for their own ends. I believe the actions of the “war veterans” of Zimbabwe fit the bill here.

This model may also explain how a minister of religion like Allan Boesak, a man with good struggle credentials, can change from a political extremist to a political abuser. Let us assume that the political system this guy has been fighting for comes to power and he becomes a political romantic. He has changed his view on how well the political system is performing. He soon finds that conditions in society don’t improve, so he discards his belief that politics is effective and slides down the right of the graph to become a political abuser.

The state can use these two perceptions as powerful tools to entrench its position. It uses state-controlled mass media to propagate the view that politics is not effective at improving society while parading the police and army on the street to give the impression of effectiveness and power. People then become political abusers or political cynics.

So, the centre of gravity of the masses can and does move. There are many factors that can cause this movement, too numerous to discuss here. Suffice for us to look at what happens if the perceptions of the masses move.

That’s the outline of my proposed model. It doesn’t discuss whether the political position of the masses is left wing or right wing. It assumes that members of the AWB and Fapla will respond the same way. It also explains some of the similarity of the far left and the far right.

And now it’s time to get ugly. It’s time for some name calling.

What do you people think? Is this a useful tool? Does it explain some of the apparent riddles of politics and why things are often not what they seem?

John Bond is a strange old guy who enjoys bombing round the remotest parts of KwaZulu-Natal on his small, high-powered scrambler. He loves South Africa’s diversity, both in its people and its nature. He is forever thinking, reasoning and pondering and he often confounds both friends and critics with his wacky, off-the-wall ideas