The Royal Society of Edinburgh 2012 Reith Lectures The Rule of Law and its Enemies: Civil and Uncivil Society Professor Niall Ferguson Thursday 28 June 2012 Report by Jeremy Watson

As Ken MacQuarrie, the Controller of BBC Scotland, said in his introduction of this year’s Reith lecturer, Professor Niall Ferguson is an academic whose work encompasses the “great sweep” of history. But it was to a small and less historic part of the Welsh coastline that Ferguson took his audience for the starting point of his exploration of “civil and uncivil societies.”

Ferguson explained that a decade ago he had purchased a house on the coast of South Wales in a rugged, windswept area that reminded him of his native Ayrshire. He had chosen the location because it was beside the sea but there was a catch. The once pristine beach in front of the property was “hideously” strewn with rubbish. Thousands of plastic bottles littered the sand and rocks and plastic bags fluttered in the wind. Drinks cans lay rusting in the dunes. Dismayed, he had asked locals who was responsible for cleaning it up and the reply had been the council. On realising that was unlikely to happen, he had set out, with black bin bags, to clean up the beach himself. However, it was too big a job for one man.

Then, Ferguson said, it had happened. He asked for volunteers in exchange for lunch and they achieved modest success. The real breakthrough came when he made contact with the local Lions Club, a charitable organisation of which he had never heard but which he found out dedicated itself to good causes. It brought organisation and, as a result, the shoreline was transformed. That had taught him the value of spontaneous community action. A dumping ground had been turned into a beauty spot again. How many other places could be transformed like this, he thought?

His series of lectures, he continued, was aimed at opening up “black boxes” and tonight’s was labelled “civil society.” Properly understood, civil society is the realm of voluntary associations and institutions established by citizens with a non-profit objective. These could range from schools to clubs dedicated to the whole range of human activities. The RSE, for example, exemplified civil society at its best, as it was independent societies such as the RSE that played a large part in the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment. At an individual level, there was a time when the average Briton or American was a member of a large number of societies, but this is no longer the case. But, Ferguson asked, how can the nation flourish without a vibrant civil society? Without civil society, society becomes uncivil, with antisocial behaviour becoming a problem for the State. And Ferguson added that he wanted to cast doubt on the notion that the new social networks of the Internet were in any way a substitute for the type of community network that helped to clear his beach.

The French writer Alexis de Tocqueville declared that nowhere had the principle of association been more successfully applied than in America. But even there, Ferguson argued, associational vitality is in steep decline. His Harvard colleague, Robert Putnam, has studied decline between the 1960s and the 1990s, finding that attendance at public meetings on town or school affairs was down 35%, service as an officer of a club or organisation was down 39 per cent, membership of parent–teacher associations was down 61% and membership of bowling leagues down 73%. In fact, most organisations which had once brought people together in the US are in decline. And there is a wider effect, with 2 some academics arguing that the decline in both secular and religious organisations is the cause of widening inequality in the US today.

And if there is a decline in the US, Ferguson asked, what hope for Europe? The facts speak for themselves. The final Citizenship Survey for England in 2009/10 makes for “truly dismal” reading. Only one in four people were found to be doing formal voluntary activity once a month - and that was usually a sponsored activity. The percentageof those people who informally volunteered at least once a month – to, for example, help an elderly neighbour – was down from 35% to 29%. Charitable giving is also in decline.

So what is happening? Putnam puts it down to the growth of technology – first TV and then the Internet – sucking the life out of traditional associational life. But Tocqueville believed it was not technology but the State, with its seductive promises of “cradle to grave” care, that was the real enemy of civil society.

But can the growing omnipresence of social media have any effect on nurturing a civil society? Ferguson thinks its effectiveness is exaggerated. Facebook, for example, allows people to share opinions on whatever they like. But take its role in the Arab Spring. Colonel Gaddafi was not overthrown in Libya because he was “unfriended”on Facebook, Ferguson said. If he had “poked” his Facebook friends about his beach, would it have been cleared in the same way that contact with a network of effective strangers allowed? He doubts it.

To see how right the “wise old Frenchman” was, Ferguson challenged his audience to count the number of clubs they are involved in. He said he is involved in three, gives to two charities, is the member of a gym and supports a football club. He is most active, however, as an alumnus of the educational institutions in which he was taught in his youth – Glasgow Academy and Magdalen College, Oxford. He also gives time to the places where his children are being educated and the university in which he teaches.

And why is he so partial towards these independent educational institutions? In his opinion, the best institutions in the UK today are its independent schools, and the one educational policy he would like to see adopted throughout the country is be a significant increase in private educational institutions, along with an attendant increase in the bursaries that allow children from poorer backgrounds to attend them.

This is not to say there is no need for State schools. There is no doubt that over the last 100 years or so, the expansion of public sector schools has been a good thing. They have produced a literate, numerate and more productive workforce. But there is a need to recognise the limits of public monopolies in education. It is private schools that are now setting and raising standards across the world. That does not mean, Ferguson said, that he is advocating either independent schools or state schools – there is room for both – only that a mix of the two would provide meaningful competition. Would Harvard be Harvard if it were nationalised? The answer is emphatically no, he insisted.

In the UK, the opposite has happened, with the universities essentially reduced to agencies of the National Higher Education Service. But, Ferguson argued, the UK’s universities still charge less than they should, even with the recent increase in tuition fees. The result? Most UK universities are in a permanent state of financial crisis. Only seven made it into the recent Times league table of the top 50 world universities, yet the UK boasts some of the finest secondary schools on the planet. This is because mediocre “free” State schooling has incentivised the emergence of a really good private system.

Change is taking place, but predominantly at present in England, where, ironically, the policies are being pursued by a Scotsman. Conservative Education Secretary Michael Gove has picked up ideas from a former “Fettes lad”, Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair, which

2 3 involve turning failing schools into self-governing academies. Numbers have gone from 200 to approaching half of all secondary schools, with some showing what can be done when the “dead hand” of the local council is removed. Even more promising, Ferguson contended, is the new breed of “Free schools” being set up by parents, teachers and others. Not selective, they remain State-funded, but they have introduced higher standards of discipline and learning. In Scotland, they are conspicuous by their absence, yet they are part of a global trend in which “smart” countries are jettisoning state education monopolies and allowing civil society back into education.

Ferguson argued that many other countries – even some regarded as bastions of welfare state provision - are much further forward in their recognition of the value of independent schools. Numbers have soared in Scandinavian countries such as Sweden and Denmark. In Holland, two-thirds of students now attended independent schools. Today in the US, there are 2000 “Charter” schools – publicly funded but independently run – providing choice in education to around two million people in some of the poorest areas. They do better, Ferguson said, because they are both accountable and autonomous.

Despite the advances made in England, Ferguson argued, there are still further steps to be taken, even by Michael Gove. They would be to increase the number of schools that are truly independent in terms of funding, and truly free, in terms of being able to select pupils by ability. There are no such inhibitions on private education elsewhere – in countries such as Sweden and Brazil, or India and parts of Africa. The problem in the UK is not that there are too many private schools but too few, and if their charitable status is removed there will be even fewer. At present, only 7 % of British teenagers are privately educated, about the same as in the US. The reason why Asian pupils are excelling internationally, Ferguson maintained, is because 25 % of pupils in Macau, Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan and Japan are privately educated. Yet it has been demonstrated that a 10 % increase in private school enrolment brings a corresponding increase in attainment.

And more private education means better education for everyone, especially as many private schools are expanding bursary provision. The 20th-Century educational revolution was in providing education for everyone. The 21st-Century revolution would be in making better education available to more students. “If you are against that, then you are for keeping too many students in lousy schools,” Ferguson said.

The bigger picture, Ferguson insisted, using education as an example, is that over the last 50 years, government has encroached far too much on the realm of civil society. Yet, like Tocqueville, Ferguson believes that spontaneous action by citizens is better than central State action. True citizenship is not just about voting and earning and staying on the right side of the law, but about participating in the wider troupe, governing ourselves, fighting crime, educating our children; in other words, clearing the beach ourselves.

In conclusion, Ferguson said it is probably clear that he believes in the benefits of independent action rather than reliance on the State. “If that is a conservative position, then so be it,” he added. Once, not least in Scotland, it was considered to be the essence of true liberalism. His argument is that the country is living through a “profound crisis” of the institutions that were once the key to our success as a civilisation; that our once vibrant civil society is in a state of decay, not because of technology but because of the “excessive pretensions” of the State. It is now time to “clear up the beach.”

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QUESTION and ANSWERS

Q: Civil society has broken down because of social networking, it could be argued. Is a significant breakdown in the ability of people to be able to communicate coherently a platform for an Orwellian authoritarian state?

A: Facebook may have contributed to the decline, but it’s not the cause, and I think Orwell would agree with me. In Orwell’s 1984, the State was watching you. Mark Zuckerberg is not interested in watching you, just in watching your inane banter. If people are using Facebook as a substitute for human interaction then that it regrettable, but it’s not State control.

Q: What are the implications for the ‘common good’ and free and equal citizenship if we move back towards a more liberal state?

A: One of the themes of this lecture has been the notion that the ‘welfare state’ is a great illusion. The consequences of the original concept of a welfare state have been unintended. When these ideas were being developed during World War Two, the founders did not envisage ‘sink’ estates in Scotland. Real cohesion and ‘common good’ are more likely to flow from getting back to a more liberal State. It is a big mistake to see the ‘common good’ as being served by a too-powerful State. What has happened in the UK is that the poor and needy have been left behind.

Q: The evidence about the effectiveness of independent schooling in Sweden, Denmark and the US is really mixed. Individuals within the system might do better, but not overall. Charter Schools do worse than state schools, for instance.

A: Statistics are churned out, but there is no substitute for actually paying the schools a visit. At Harlem Academy, the performance of the best students is way above that of the best schools in Manhattan. But schools like this can’t work magic immediately, they have to be given time. My argument is not just for more Charter Schools, but also for more diversity in educational provision.

Q: State schools are a community in themselves and play a large part in civil society today. You have not acknowledged this but surely isn’t that in itself worth defending?

A: I am not against State education; we need both. But it’s debatable whether State schools in Scotland are as good as they need to be, or as good as those in Asia. There has been a real and measurable decline in literacy and numeracy here, and the notion that Scottish schools are better than England is an illusion. It may have been the case once, but no longer. At least England is trying to do something about it.

Q: You did not mention Finland in your lecture. Finland is second in international academic achievement tables, yet it has done that without independent schools. Instead, they have given teachers high status, largely unfettered from top-down bureaucracy.

A: I am not against good teaching, but I don’t think Finland is a model we can aspire to because we can’t afford it.

Q: When you look at Britain today, there are any number of clubs and festivals bringing people together. Wasn’t the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations another example of a thriving civil society?

A: If you take the long view, you will find that community involvement is far less than it used to be.

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Q: I would challenge your statistics, as recent surveys have shown that there has been no decline of volunteering in the last 30 years in this country. The research also shows that while middle-class volunteering is healthy, working-class involvement is in decline. Isn’t the real challenge how to reverse this when there has been a decline in working-class organisations such as trades’ unions?

A: It’s correct that working men’s organisations have collapsed. This atrophy is to do with failing schools and the growth of dependency. Improving the quality of schools in working class areas will help to address this.

Q: There has indeed been a decline in civil society but isn’t it because of increasing mobility of the workforce and urbanisation? There has been a loss of communities within cities. There are no neighbourhoods now.

A: That’s wrong. There is no more mobility now than there was in the 19th Century. The most mobility in the British workforce occurred during the Industrial Revolution, when people were moving into the cities and others were forced to cross the oceans.

Q: Where is the protection for the people who don’t fit into this notion of associations?

A: One of the most interesting findings from recent social surveys is that civil society is declining fastest in ethnic communities. There is no real integration happening, and that is a problem throughout Western Europe. It was a great achievement within US civil society when discrimination against black people was swept away. The same thing is happening now with gay rights. We are moving in the right direction of a more tolerant society, but not because of central planning but because of grassroots action. There is now a President of ethnic origin in the White House, which is a sign of American-style civil society at work.

VOTE OF THANKS

The Vote of Thanks was given by Professor Alice Brown, General Secretary of the RSE, who thanked Professor Ferguson for a stimulating and thought-provoking lecture. She added that the re-establishment of a Scottish Parliament in 1999 was a real example of civil society in action and wondered whether that would emerge again in the run-up to the 2014 independence Referendum.

Opinions expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of the RSE, nor of its Fellows The Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland’s National Academy, is Scottish Charity No. SC000470

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