What we can control
Roderick Benns is the publisher of The Advocate. An award-winning author and journalist who grew up in Lindsay, he has written several books including Basic Income: How a Canadian Movement Could Change the World.
Like most of us, I am preoccupied with current global events right now.
Russia chips away at the edges of Ukraine. China is relentless in its attempted assimilation of Tibet and now antagonizes Taiwan. But among the great powers, never did I think the U.S. would be perhaps the greatest risk of all.
As I write this in late January, it’s clear the American president should be removed from office. Pick a reason; they’re all related to him being unmoored from reality.
Donald Trump asks Vladmir Putin and other despots to join his “board of peace” while he uses economic coercion and verbal intimidation on Canada and Greenland. He just has so many imbecilic thoughts that no one can keep up.
But when the rules don’t make sense anymore at the top there’s only one thing we can do here in our own community – work to strengthen local democratic and social resilience. Because the only levers still in our control are municipal and community-level ones.
Research on community resilience and democracy shows that communities with dense social networks, good local organizing, and shared information recover better from crises and cope better psychologically. When national rules fray, local institutions become the safety net that keeps ordinary life intact, such as our schools, our volunteer services, our neighbourhoods, our small businesses, our municipal government.
Strengthening those things isn’t glamorous, but it works. Dense social networks — neighbours who know one another, groups that meet regularly, churches and clubs that share resources — are our first line of defence against the idiocy of Trumpism and the like. Practical action like voting, joining municipal committees, taking part in food drives, and keeping pressure on council, local MPPs, and MPs all matter.
Fortifying local journalism is also important. That might just mean reading local news – not just the headlines – and sending us more letters to the editor. You can also monetarily support our efforts and visit the advertisers who choose our local magazine and newspaper.
None of the above is a substitute for national accountability.
Former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, probably the most important Canadian leader since Lester Pearson when it came to foreign affairs, said: “The fundamental goal of government is to make a better world — a world that is safe from war and safe for democracy, a world that is free from deprivation and free from degradation.”
Trump doesn’t know what that means, nor does he care.
So now, in the absence of great power leadership, it is up to the rest of us. It is the practical, stubborn work that preserves democracy right where we live. It also protects our mental health; people who feel connected and useful weather shocks far better than those who feel isolated and helpless.
For now, despite all the chaos, we have places to visit, people to love, and lives to live. Because democracy isn’t only a ballot once every few years — it’s the daily practice of looking out for one another.
Municipal government is the front line of democracy. And yet, it isn’t. Unelected bureaucrats do almost all of the work of government while Council mostly acts as a rubber stamp, sometimes letting pass bylaws that threaten our democracy. And local media doesn’t cover that maybe because of how they fear doing so might affect their business.
Council would not let me make a deputation to present the other side – audi alteram partem – to Councillor Perry’s statement, available to the whole world via youtube, that Israel is committing genocide. I wanted to apprise Council of the law and provide them some easy to listen audio/video resources for the other side so they could make an informed decision on the issue. But the City of Kawartha Lakes would not allow me to be heard on the issue and so I think everyone who heard Councillor Perry accuse Israel of genocide thinks it is the position of the City. And maybe it is. But it hurts democracy to suppress alternate views. Canadaland has published a podcast entitled “What Is Happening Here” that details how not hearing the other side of that accusation is affecting our society. It’s worth a listen, as it is not only informative but also really well mixed and edited.
I had to take the City to court to quash a bylaw that would have completely undermined the right of citizens who sit on boards, task forces, and committees under Section 11(d) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms “to be presumed innocent until proven guilty according to law in a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal”. Not enough members of council either cared about or understood the threat to democracy to oppose the proposed bylaw effectively so it fell on a citizen to do it. Then, after that, instead of being grateful to a citizen who felt strongly enough about it to stand up for local democracy, Council leadership stood up in Council to condemn me and uttered verifiable falsehoods against me to mobilize bias against me in my community and to make me feel unsafe.
Democracy matters at the local level but if not enough of us stand up to fight for it, if not enough of us oppose bureaucrats who don’t want residents to hear the other side, if not enough Councillors understand the Charter or care enough about how local bylaws might impede our Charter rights, just saying local democracy matters doesn’t matter.
I’d like to see Council open its youtube channel for comments during meetings. Residents are paying enough bureaucrats that one could be spared, during meetings, to monitor comments not for insults or controversial opinions but for violations of the law like racist or other bigoted comments or threats and so on. Perhaps the City could work with KLPS and maybe the Crown on that one, to establish guidelines for monitoring comments.
Another thing the City could do to promote local democracy is hold online referenda about agenda items that affect us all. Online referenda are cheap to administer and easy to participate in and would go a long way to creating a sense of united and inclusive community.
This is an election year. Council and mayoral candidates need to be ready to defend their values and their reason for wanting to serve the people (their official role; I looked it up.). Make them play hard.