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An Activist Reflects: Personal Narratives As a Tool for Social Change Ian Miles University of Wollongong

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An Activist Reflects: Personal Narratives As a Tool for Social Change Ian Miles University of Wollongong University of Wollongong Research Online University of Wollongong Thesis Collection University of Wollongong Thesis Collections 2014 An activist reflects: personal narratives as a tool for social change Ian Miles University of Wollongong Recommended Citation Miles, Ian, An activist reflects: personal narratives as a tool for social change, Doctorate of Philosophy thesis, School of Humanities and Social Inquiry, University of Wollongong, 2014. http://ro.uow.edu.au/theses/4200 Research Online is the open access institutional repository for the University of Wollongong. For further information contact the UOW Library: [email protected] An activist reflects: personal narratives as a tool for social change Ian Miles BA (Hons), MA University of Wollongong School of Humanities and Social Inquiry June 2014 This thesis is presented for the degree of Doctorate of Philosophy Certification I, Ian Miles, declare that this thesis, submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of Doctor of Philosophy, in the School of Humanities and Social Inquiry, University of Wollongong, is wholly my own work unless otherwise referenced or acknowledged. The document has not been submitted for qualifications at any other academic institution. Abstract In 20 years of activism I frequently found the quality of interpersonal relations to be so poor, and the damage to myself and others so profound, that I wondered whether struggles for social change were counterproductive. It seemed to me that projects for social change could benefit from some research into both the philosophies and techniques that had the capacity to create more ethical and productive social relations. I use the narratives of personal experience as the map for this thesis. In using my own experience as a guide I hope to show how the socially created and sustained self can use moral reflection and mutual recognition in a social context to pursue political and social change in a way that creates, sustains and repairs ethical and productive social relations. The schemes I suggest do not replace or surpass other ways of relating, but rather offer a guide for those who wish to see greater and more serious attention given to what constitutes good social relations in situations of conflict. I begin by sharing a narrative about how I decided on my approach. I then explore the idea of mutual recognition as a response to the problem of domination. In particular I explore the work of Jessica Benjamin, who anchors her work in an exploration of infant identity development. Next, I explain the approach to conflict of the Alternatives to Violence Project in New South Wales, focusing on Restorative Practices as a mechanism for the application of mutual recognition in conflict situations. The work of Benjamin and the AVP (NSW) processes are critiqued and situated in the wider context of their relevant literatures. Through this process a methodology for the project emerges. Using my own experiences, I demonstrate the self-recognition component of the mutual recognition process by giving detailed narratives of events in which I was involved. These episodes become case studies for demonstrating the techniques I have described, thereby showing that overlooked possibilities for social change exist within the narratives that construct and sustain the self. The thesis proceeds on the understanding that both social change and ethical conduct revolve around the ability of individuals to have a malleable, social and inter-subjectively realised self, and thus extends itself to the effort of expansively detailing how this may be done. Using the Restorative Practices as a guide, I then exhaustively reconstruct the events portrayed with a view to demonstrating the possible way events could unfold if I had used the processes of AVP as a means to attempt mutually recognitive relations in the situations described. Finally, I discuss some of the limitations and implications of the model I have explicated. In particular I note some limitations in using ideas of rights and justice — two ideas often central to the work of social activists — and suggest an alternative, grounded in an appreciation of the contextual nature of ethics and actualised through greater skills in moral reflection and communication. Acknowledgements My supervision team: Brian Martin, Chris Barker and Anne Collett. Brian in particular, as my principal supervisor, helped at nearly every level, and was an endless source of encouragement and support. Chris and Anne both read and commented helpfully on many areas of the thesis. The high-output writing group: numerous members of this weekly support group regularly commented on drafts. The Bingi gathering, a yearly meeting of PhD students working on issues related to social change: thanks to my fellow students, and to Sharon Beder and Richard Gosden for hosting and contributing to these events. The AVP (NSW) community, particularly Malcolm and Katherine Smith and Julei Korner, for their time and energy and ideas, which helped frame AVP into my thesis. Thanks also to Helen Carney, Ross Dearden and Alisa Percy, who also read and commented on parts of the thesis. Jo Jordan, for many invaluable discussions about Gilligan and Benjamin and the psychological elements of the thesis. Ambassador Dootch Kennedy and Karen Gough, for advice on protocols about Aboriginal aspects of the thesis. Everyone engaged in the community picket at Sandon Point. Contents 1. Introduction 1 2. Sandon Point around 2001 — a narrative 59 3. The Alternatives to Violence Project 104 4. Reconstructions 158 5. A wider context 223 6. Conclusion 233 Bibliography 267 1. Introduction The idea of writing a PhD thesis, such as that which now begins here, emerged for me in the late 1990’s, as I tried to draw from my own experience as an activist some general conclusions about why, it seemed to me at the time, activism often seemed to fail. My general thesis at the time related to how dominant constructions of reason (which I saw as ‘instrumental’, ‘technocratic’ and ‘patriarchal’) were embedded as metaphysical and ideological discourses in the culture, institutions and people, against which activists often pitched their struggle. Along with some practical impediments that brought the project to a standstill, I came to see the project as intellectually flawed, and the idea lay dormant for a decade. One of the many problems with the project, which remains pertinent to the new one that emerges here, is that the evidence from my own personal experience didn’t seem to suit the ‘constructions of reason’ model I was trying to build. The many documents, which were my primary sources, dealt with the ceaseless negotiation between (broadly) the community and government instrumentalities, politicians, scientists (and other technical ‘experts’) as we differed over how to deal with the complex problems relating to water/environmental management in the small towns of Scarborough and Wombarra, north of the city of Wollongong, on the east coast of Australia. The more I looked at the endless years of paperwork in which this battle had been fought, and the more I continued to take part in the issue as it dragged on for the better part of a decade, the more it seemed to me that, whilst I continued to imagine I saw the dread hand of the offending reasoning practices on a daily basis, something seemed to be amiss at another level. I became more and more convinced that it was not so much our reasoning and cognition that blocked progress and resolution of our differences, but our identities, personalities and emotions. There was a difference between the kind of evidence that appeared in the written statements and counter-statements of our positions, and what was happening during the face-to-face negotiations. Whilst I was not documenting the latter, it was the interpersonal interactions that interested me more. It seemed to me (or perhaps ‘seems’, 1 as it is reflection over the years which has brought this clarity to what was then a largely inchoate feeling) that personal intransigence, lack of communication skills, and in fact a lack of interest in each other’s needs and feelings were greater stumbling blocks to resolution of the issues than the different constructions of reason, or discourses, which may have undergirded our positions. This was made absolutely clear to me by my own behaviour at the final meeting of the last round of negotiations on these flooding/environmental issues (the building of the so-called ‘Scarborough/Wombarra Tunnel’) where, in a mixture of outrage and powerlessness, I uncharacteristically ‘lost it’ and yelled at and threatened a group of ‘engineers and bureaucrats’. The content of my outburst was essentially that it was pointless talking to them at all, as they didn’t listen and didn’t care. It was accompanied by a threat to disrupt the lives of one of the members of the group, in a way I hoped was roughly comparable with the disruptions to life being borne by members of the community by the project at hand. These actions represented my relative abandonment of relationship with the people and institutions involved in intervening in our community on the flooding and environmental issues that commonly involved us all, and of any attempt to discursively resolve our differences. Interestingly I have little regret or shame about the issue ending in this way, although with hindsight I would have certainly handled the issue differently. As I related the events of the meeting back to the members of the community I was representing, they too had no real problem with my behaviour. One person told me that they were glad I had expressed what I had, and that this in fact summed up community sentiment. Another commented that they were amazed that I had not had an outburst like this long ago — given the intolerable contempt with which the community had been treated for years on this issue.
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