The Real Economy Is Inclusive

I want to talk about “talk.” On Monday I spent an invigorating three hours with Jim Zacchero’s Canadian Studies 2200E class at King’s University College. The students listened respectfully, but you could tell that what they really wanted to dialogue about was the Occupy Wall Street protest. They are captivated by it. After feeling alienated from the system, they found it fascinating to watch people trying to change it through peaceful means. When asked what I thought of it all, I informed them of my agreement and respect for the protests but that it would be wasted effort if these same students didn’t start engaging and being part of the process. To be successful, the Occupy Wall Street movement will have to discover a way of getting these keen young minds out on to the field.For those particular students, part of the effectiveness of the OWS movement was the respectful way in which it was attempting to prompt civic engagement. The perpetual critics aside, Zacchero’s students perceived this as part of the movement’s legitimacy, and it is.We’ve become so used to rank partisanship in politics, ideological punditry in the media, and cruel invectives from disenchanted citizens, that the idea of a “civil” engagement has become novel. The real economy recognizes this and encourages it because it’s the best way for society to voice its concerns and fix them at the same time. Civil engagement is civil society’s greatest gift to the future, and that has been precisely what has been lacking of late.Civil talk isn’t necessarily the same thing as “public” talk, which is something we can get from ideological call-in media programs at any time and is often as far away from civility as you can get. Public rants are a process of venting; civil talk is the process of engagement and the need for compromise.The philosopher Hegel once astutely observed that since the pages of history devoted to peace are mostly blank, the preferred model for our public talk is war. That is increasingly what we have now, and yet Canada is one of those countries that demonstrated remarkable dialogue, respect and compromise through most of its years. Because of that we avoided much of the violence witnessed in other regions of the world.For a society to truly be progressive and imagine its way into a more successful future it simply must find ways in which to engage in civic diplomacy. It’s as much about listening as it is talking. The best kinds of leaders are those who talk as a result of listening.  Listening to the most of the leaders of the various protest movements has revealed a willingness to engage the status quo and find overlapping strategies that can correct some of the financial and political wrongs of our era. They don’t seek to remove the Wall Street types but to place them in the proper perspective of a truly prosperous nation. They know well enough that free enterprise is essential to job creation and the creation of wealth, yet in an age when wealth is going increasingly to the few and job creation is rapidly becoming just a phrase they have every right to the question the system. Those taking the hard to the protesters are, by extension, defending the status quo. For the media this can be a cancer and for politicians it can be a death knell. Yes, people have the right to protest or to protest the protesters, but it shouldn’t blind us to the reality that it is really the status quo that is on trial, not those who speak against it or defend it.This is something the real economy understands but to which the fake economy is blind. If the status quo results in financial monopolies, deeper unemployment, abominable pollution practices, escalating poverty rates, and the gradual decline of the middle class, there is a certain ethical failure that is revealed. By protesting a system that produces such injustices, those demonstrating in the streets have a certain moral underpinning whether their opponents like it or not. Most of the respective powers of the day spoke out against the civil rights marches or Gandhi’s peace demonstrations, but they couldn’t ultimately prevail against such protests because the flaws in those systems were readily apparent.For this reason alone, the OWS movement should be given a hearing, even if the protesters are yet in the process of defining their purposes. Polls reveal that most citizens are fretting about their financial futures and that they believe both governments and corporations have rigged the game against them. They might not take part in the OWS movement, but it actually reflects the reality of those polls. Those opting to criticize the movement outright are taking on a huge portion of the public as well.It’s time to stop looking at the protesters and start looking at the disenchantment of citizens in general. They are disillusioned and worried and dissing the practices or behaviours of the protestors offers no solution to the greater malaise. A respectful civil society’s voice is inclusive, collaborative, and is, above all, solution-oriented. This is precisely what many of its opponents are worried about – they like the “solution” they already have because they personally benefit from it. The true test of a society’s inclusiveness is not that it makes everyone the same but that it can deliberate despite the differences. These protests have overall behaved respectfully and desired dialogue, and because they represent the larger concern that most citizens endure, they deserve a listening ear.