There should be no curbs on deliberation

The Lok Sabha Secretariat has issued an advisory to the Members of Parliament regarding the use of certain words, ranging from ‘corruption’ to ‘incompetence’ and ‘shahenshah’. Certainly, debates in Parliament should be conducted according to norms of civility and decency. However, the ‘unparliamentary’ tag for certain words causes unease, even as the Lok Sabha Speaker has said that no word has been banned from use in Parliament but will be expunged on a contextual basis.

Are our MPs a bunch of school kids who have to be controlled at every step by a rap on their knuckles? Members of the Opposition have indignantly protested against what they see as a ‘gag rule’. They, perhaps, forget that the regulation of language to prevent criticism is not an instance of logic, but of power. This is borne out by an interesting exchange between Alice and Humpty Dumpty in Lewis Carroll’s Through The Looking Glass. “I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory’,” said Alice to Humpty Dumpty. The latter smiled contemptuously, “Of course you don’t — till I tell you. I meant there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!” “But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘a nice knock-down argument’,” Alice objected. “When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said scornfully, “it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” “The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.” “The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master — that’s all.”

In some cases, what words we use to string a sentence, which sentences add up to a paragraph, and which paragraph is acceptable or unacceptable is not decided by the people, but by the police and courts. Journalists have been put in prison on the charge of having said something that might ‘endanger the stability’ of the country: an interesting example of the adage that the pen is mightier than the sword.

Whether the pen is or is not mightier than the sword is an interesting research question, but mightier matters are at stake. The perceived control of language is part of the decline of Parliament. Parliament is not only meant to pass laws — it is primarily a deliberative body. In a democracy, laws should be made after careful consideration, reasonable arguments and deliberation marked by propriety and respect for speakers, whether they are a part of the government or of the Opposition. Laws cannot be rushed through the legislature simply because the ruling party holds majority in the House. More importantly, the Opposition also represents the citizens of India. The opinion of Opposition parties should, therefore, be taken note of and respected.

The ruling party should remember that in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, more than 62 per cent of the electorate voted for parties other than the BJP. The huge gap between vote shares and seats in the Lok Sabha is an endemic problem that dodges parliamentary democracy. Until we get a ruling party that has the courage and the confidence to introduce proportional representation, at the least electoral choices of the electorate should be respected and honoured. A government hardly honours these choices if it curbs deliberation in Parliament. The minimum that legislators are owed is freedom of speech.

Freedom of speech is an essential precondition for democratic deliberation that should effectively stretch beyond Parliament to civil society forums. In February 2019, the Belgian Parliament voted to establish a Citizens’ Council in the German-speaking community of Ostbelgian. The council complements the elected chamber of parliament by discussing and identifying issues that are of concern, making recommendations to the elected House and monitoring policies that stem out of mutual agreement. The parliament is required by law to discuss these recommendations. There are other such examples found in the rest of the world.

The establishment of deliberative bodies or mini-publics encourages reflection on public issues, enables people to participate in public affairs and inspires reasonable and justifiable arguments. The philosophical justification of deliberative democracy is that individuals are dialogical beings. We can discover the truth only though conversation with others. Unless we talk to others who hold different points of view, we cannot make an informed judgement about any issue.

We initiate deliberation by putting forth our own perspectives. Through the process of deliberation, we discover shared meaning systems that encourage us to change our views and/or persuade others to change theirs. Deliberation helps in winnowing out undesirable ideas more effectively than when we don’t discuss these notions.

The objective of deliberation is not to arrive at a final consensus. Conversation is a process, it is not an end. It might sound paradoxical, but truth is always renegotiable. We can only seek the truth along with others, we can never discover it. The process of talking to others who are generally seen as ‘the other’ helps us to expand our own mental horizons. In conflict-ridden societies, conversations are even more important because they validate the standing of others as people who matter. This by itself contributes to the ironing out of senseless conflicts that arise out of the lack of recognition.

The transformation of representative democracy into deliberative democracy is grounded in the conviction that politics is too important to be left to professional politicians who chase power. This avatar of democracy recognises the competence of citizens to participate in politics. The only proviso is that there should be no restrictions on deliberation, either in Parliament or outside.