Subjectivity and objectivity

1st July 2005 Douglas Racionzer



Morality seems to float between ‘subjectivity’ and ‘objectivity’.

Subjectivity is a less popular word than objectivity in academic scholarship. Most of the references in books I have read do not mention subjectivity but will usually have a few references to its understood mirror opposite, objectivity. It seems to me that when we think of subjectivity we too often refer to the harshest form of solipsist psychologism suggesting that only the inner thoughts and feelings of a person are being taken as truth. We seem to use the word subjectivity in a taut pairing which places “objectivity” in direct opposition to “subjectivity” especially when this refers to “the truth of the matter” or “the facts”. Objective reality is too often used to refer to truth claims using the most empiricist of standards that all objective reality “is reducible to immediate sense experience and the reports thereof” (Drummond, 1988; p277)

I have a complaint against the use of the terms “subjective and objective” as a paired set of concepts. This is that they do not operate in the same way as other pairings such as “stop and go” or even “father and child”. These are either descriptions or formal names. Someone who has stopped is clearly not going and someone who is going is clearly not stopped. In the latter pairing, a father may also be child and a child may also be a father, but not to the same person (unless we speak of the Godhead). These are formal names, titles if you will and they express a necessary relationship in so far as every father must be a father to a child and every child must have a father (even if it is a renowned English witticism that it is wise man who knows his father).

My complaint with the pairing of subjective and objective as antonyms is that this pairing reduces the conceptual space for the words and may instead better be thought of as opposite ends of a continuum of ideas about reality and truth. It was with some relief that I noticed the words “float between” in the exam question because this allows me to place objectivity in a continuum with subjectivity.

My readings propose two aspects to the manner in which objectivity and subjectivity are deployed [1] that they invariably placed in relation to some truth claim or some fact. Indeed I cannot recall a circumstance where I have read or heard anyone discussing the objective fantasy of something or the subjective facts of the matter. And [2} that people are in some way acting subjectively and objectively. Objectivity and subjectivity are what people do. Newel argues “that objectivity attaches to persons through their actions” (Newel, 1986; p17)

Newel’s treatment of objectivity presents us with two faces of objectivity. The first is the Kantian sense of objectivity that attaches to ‘objects’ existing apart from perceptions more or less continuously in space and time called objective particulars and the beliefs, judgements and products of thought objective judgements. (ibid; p16) “Central to this picture of objectivity is the requirement that beliefs about an objective world must hold good independently of the experiences, or states of mind, on which people may rely for their assertion.” (ibid; p17)

Newel’s second face of objectivity is the one that attaches to persons in that their judgements are “associated with impartiality, detachments, disinterestedness and a willingness to submit to standards of evidence”. (ibid; p 17) In this view “objectivity becomes a quality of character applied or withheld on the evidence of what one does.” (ibid; p18)

Newel goes on to reject the first face of objectivity because it is essentially sterile and is unable to add us anything new or useful to our understanding of what things really are. (ibid; p 19) Instead we are urged to consider the socially embedded face of objectivity as it us used to deal with concerns between people.

“The route to objectivity has been historically marked by a search for some common ground guaranteeing interpersonal discussion and the settlement of differences. That an explanation of objectivity must pick out this common ground is implicit in the thesis that it is to be found in a world of external realities, but the postulation of common ground outside offered an impersonal basis and failed to be explanatory. The alternative of looking favourably towards agreement or consensus…makes access to objectivity dependent upon the things we consensually believe, trapping objectivity in the bias of agreed wisdom.” (Newel, 1986; p101)

This suggests that we regard objectivity as enacted between people in a kind of inter-subjective engagement between people. But how then can we ever know the truth if objectivity is merely some sort of social agreement between members of a social context ?

Raising questions about “the truth” and its know-ability lies beneath the surface of so much discussion around objectivity and subjectivity that it may serve us to examine various arguments concerning truth.

It is a confusing enterprise to read philosophical literature on truth. Descriptive labels abound; correspondence theories jostle with coherence theories and realist approaches mingle with contructivists, relativists seem to take issue with foundationalism. The literature seems to, to the novice, to be in a mess. This may not be a bad thing, except when you are expected to write a pithy essay for an examination question on the foundation of ethics. As an aide-memoir I often find it convenient to grasp the essentials of the various positions in a field of knowledge using boxes into which various positions can be sorted.

When considering truth, there seem to be at least four basic positions with regard to its universal and its external character that may be adopted ;


[A]Foundationalism + Correspondence [B]Foundationalism + Coherence
[C]Relativism + Correspondence [D]Relativism + Coherence

The arguments about truth that we may cram into box [A] represent a variety of theories that have been identified as; Truth is a copy (Langer, 1948) that is, truth is a mental reflection of some external substance; Truth is an image or images (Hume, 1927; Locke, 1894) which imprint themselves in our minds; Truth is a reflex (Austin in Nagel and Brandt, 1965; pp161-176), that subsists in the properties of things and situations in the world; Truth is a test (James, 1949; Pierce; 1960) in so far as truth is something that we can verify as true as opposed to untrue.

These approaches to truth are, in my experience, the most commonly held especially among fellow church-goers and those of my circle who are natural and social scientists or professional engineers and lawyers.

Vardy etal (1999) argues that “realists operate with a correspondence theory of truth” (ibid; p 15) but “Constructivists operate with the Coherence theory of truth” (ibid; p 17). We can then equate Vardy etal’s (ibid) “realism” with correspondence theories of truth and “constructivism” with coherence theories of truth.

Vardy etal (ibid) assure us that there are those who promote Coherence theories of truth within a foundationalist perspective. These coherence theory foundationalists “maintain that although the truth of moral statements is dependent upon the evidence for these statements (i.e. on coherence), this evidence should not be confined within a particular time or a particular society –instead there is or should be a single set of true moral statements…” (ibid; p 18) Adherents of these positions to truth would fall into box [B] above.

Box [D] above corrals those who are coherence theory relativists. “Such people may consider moral statements to be subjective because they depend on the views of a particular group of people” (ibid; p19)

It is the population of box [C] that reflects the position to which I am most drawn. McHugh calls this approach “Analytic Truth or truth as method” and argues… “that a finding is ‘true’ (or false of ambiguous) comes to be so only after applying to it the analytical formulation of a method by which that finding could be understood to have been produced” (McHugh, 1971;p 332)

Husserl may, according to some , have belonged to this box [C] of relativists who maintained some form of foundationalism; “Truth then, does not involve the ideal of adequation between an idea or judgement and a state of affairs; it involves instead recognized identity” (Drummond, 1988; p 294)

Those who argue for relativism from within a foundationalist perspective tend to focus on the personal ontological experience of truth over its external reification, emphasise method or process as an intentional act and seem to claim that despite the contents of moral (and other) truths being different in time and space, the methods of making sense, of grasping truth are nonetheless universal.

This methodological emphasis has a champion outside of the German phenomenological school in Bernard Lonergan (Morelli etal, 1997). Lonergan’s treatment of objectivity offers one of many arguments for the process of what he calls “self-appropriation”. (ibid; p19)
“Principally the notion of objectivity is contained within a patterned context of judgements which serve as implicit definitions of the terms ’object’, ‘subject’. (Morelli etal, 1997; p212)

Lonergan argues that objectivity is made up of three aspects;
Absolute Objectivity on the level of judgement, Normative Objectivity on the level of understanding and Experiential Objectivity on the level of experience. (ibid, 1997;p 211)

Lonerganian subjectivity is a method of self-appropriation and authentic existence and makes use of intersubjective understandings and common-sense stocks of knowledge in order to operate. (ibid, 1997; p131)

The resolution of the objectivity-subjectivity-truth debates must occur on the horizon of personal and interpersonal meaning. “Meaning is the truth about oneself which creates the preconceptual horizon for moral knowledge and experience…Meaning has a narrative structure; our being-in-the-world is a being-with others-in-the-world.” (Kopfensteiner, 1992;48)

Bibliography and References
(Please note that I have included material that I have read that may not be directly referenced in the paper because I believe that my understanding of the topic has involved a wider reading than the texts quoted)

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The South African Truth Commission- Moral Triumph?

Was the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission a moral triumph – or a failure – for the principle of reconciliation ?
The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (SA-TRC) was a state instituted, quasi-legal process which allowed perpetrators who told the truth about their apartheid crimes to receive an amnesty against prosecution from the state. It may be argued that this process was couched in the rhetoric of reconciliation but the legal procedure seems to have been something similar to a plea-bargain or what in juvenile justice circles is generally referred to as a “diversion” programme.

A first Complaint
The concept of a moral triumph (or failure) refers to the pervasive rhetoric in which the SA-TRC process was framed. Such rhetoric poses a number of difficulties, the first of which is the inability of the state, any state, to act morally or to be reconciled to anybody. The reification of the state in the question posed above, is in this case, more than a mere narrative convenience. I would suggest that state’s may correctly be regarded as legal persons but only natural (or supernatural ?) persons can act morally or be reconciled because only natural persons can love, feel hurt and forgive. A state is a legal mechanism for the marshalling of power and authority over its citizens and for the negotiation of relations with other states (through war and diplomacy). I would argue that a state cannot have feelings or thoughts but it may have interests and power.

Individuals and groups acting for the state and with its authority have identified reconciliation among South Africans as a common good. The notion of reconciliation is a socially constructed idea that requires constant and repeated actions from its adherents to account for its efficacy and relevance. The SA-TRC process at best could only act as an exemplar for the principle of reconciliation. The SA-TRC itself was made up of many situations of reconciliation and other events and then pulled together in an account of the process which sought to summarize and pass judgement upon past events. The meaning of those past events are contested by the various protagonists.

No truth and reconciliation commission can actually bring about a general reconciliation among the citizenry. Nor can it actually reclaim the common good of reconciliation. The SA-TRC can at best acclaim the importance of reconciliation and model the manner in which reconciliations can be constructed. It is up to South Africans to actually become reconciled with each other.

Having made an argument for putting the formal, state managed process of reconciliation and its role into its place, it may now be fruitful to examine what a moral triumph would be like and how such a circumstance may be achieved in social settings.

Succesfful Degradation CeremonyWhen considering the notion of a moral triumph and what might constitute such, I am drawn to the tentative proposal that a moral triumph may be the result of a social action in which the the triumphant have successfully achieved a moral degradation ceremony upon other/s. Moral triumphs would be situations where a conflict about what is morally superior in a given situation has been won by one of the parties over another. A particular version of events has been accepted and the morally triumphant is clearly “more moral” than another. Garfinkel set out conditions for successful degradation ceremonies in a short article in the American Journal of Sociology. (Garfinkel, 1956; pp420-4)

I propose here to examine the conditions of successful degradation ceremonies as described by Garfinkel and to explore how they may provide us with conditions for a moral triumph. These conditions will then be applied to the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (SA-TRC).

Garfinkel defines a successful degradation ceremony as "any communicative work..whereby the public identity of an actor is transformed into something looked on as lower in the local scheme of social types" (ibid, p420)

The conditions required for degradation ceremonies to be successful are;
that the identities referred to must be total identities. Those involved must be shown to have ultimate grounds or reasons for their actions and not merely have acted out of caprice or happenstance.

1 The work of denouncing requires that the denouncer demonstrate to witnesses that the denouncer and the witnesses share values, fundamental values.
2 The denouncer then needs to demonstrate that the denounced does not share these values. This lack of value-sharing must be shown to be a matter of choice on the denounced part and not merely as a result of circumstance.
3 The denouncer must further show that s/he is an objective spokesperson for these values and is not merely trying to gain some form of retribution.

If, as suggested in this paper, the moral triumph of the SA-TRC is dependent upon the success in achieving the conditions for successful degradation ceremonies. It would seem that the first condition was clearly met by the SA-TRC in that basic human rights as values are generally shared, establsihed in our constitution and are recognized globally.

It is the second and third conditions for successful degradation ceremonies that highlight flaws in the SA-TRC process. While much work was done to show that the perpertrators did not share the values of human rights. Little was done to demonstrate that this was a matter of deliberate and free choice and indeed much press was given to the complaints from those denounced that they were part of a command structure and were in a war situation etc... The refrain from most perpetrators such Geoff Benzine was that their superiors who gave the orders now deny that any such orders were given. Words such as “neutralize” are now generally regarded as euphemisms for killing.

The third condition, that the denouncers were objective and impartial was not achieved as clearly they and many who were commissioners as well were presented as victims of these human rights abusers. Many are on record as expressing dissatisfaction with the SA-TRC process and are seeking retribution.

Thus if we accept the conditions for succesful degradation ceremonies as laid out by Garfinkel, (and it seems that he has made a strong case for their veracity), it would seem that the SA-TRC represented only a partial moral victory in so far as it achieved fully only one of the three conditions required.

If this were the only question raised in this assignment, then our task would be complete. However, the question asks if the SA-TRC was a moral triumph or failure for the principle of reconciliation. We must therefore return to the first complaint made in this paper and consider the aspects of what it means to be reconciled and to achieve reconciliation within a society.

VignettesTo this end, I have gathered a series of vignettes which serve to explicate the notion of reconciliation. These vignettes are taken from a variety of sources and represent a meander through the concepts rather than a rigid logical march upon the idea of reconciliation.

There is a global movement within juvenile justice that seeks to bring reconciliation between victims of crime and thier perpertrators. These processes are about two decades old now and fall under the general rubric of "restorative justice"; (Zehr, 1997)
The process of reconciliation seems to require community involvement and not simply a managed engagement between victim and perpetrator. (ibid)

Family Group ConferencesThe basic design of the Family Group Conference is disarmingly simple. A young person who has committed an offense against an identifiable victim is brought face to face with that victim. (There may be more than one offender or more than one victim; a single conference deals with the effects of the offense.) Both offender(s) and victim(s) are accompanied by family members, guardians, peers, or other people with a significant relationship to the offender or the victim. These people are collectively referred to as “supporters;” they may contribute to the search for restitution and to negotiations for reparation of the damage caused by the original offense. It is this insistence on collective, community involvement in the search for reparation that sets the Family Group Conference model apart from reparation schemes run in Britain and the United States since the 1970s.The Family Group Conference is convened by an official of the justice system. This will be a police officer, a welfare worker, a representative of the juvenile court, or a representative of the justice department, depending upon the jurisdiction in which the conference is being convened.



Greek myth provides us with powerful paradigm of transformation in the story of Arestes; (Hamilton, 1940: pp240-248)
The forgiveness of Orestes
The ancient Greek myth of Orestes tells a story of the end of intergenarational pain going down five generations within the House of Atreus.
Orestes was the brother of Iphegenia who was sacrificed to the gods at the beginning of the Trojan war by her father, Agamemnon to ensure the safe passage of the Greek ships to Troy.
Agamemnon's wife, Clytemnestra avenges herself upon her hsuband when he returns ten years later, victorious from the siege of Troy. Orestes flees but must avenge his own father's murder by killing his mother. This he does but then is pursued by the Erinyes or furies, the three three avenging spirits called Alecto, Tisiphone and Magaera who seek justice against all evil doers on earth. Eventually Orestes begs forgiveness for his crime from Athena who convinces the Furies to forgive Orestes.
The act of forgiveness transforms the Furies into benificent godesses who make their home in Colonus and provide care and comfort to all who visit them.


It would seem that forgiveness not justice lies at the heart of reconciliation and tells us that the forgiver can be transformedby this process. The strict pursuit of retributive justice will require an endless process of judgement and punishment. This process even tired the mythical furies and consequently they sought to forgive and be transformed. The story of Joan of Ark offers some insight into the process of reconciliation. (Warner, 1981)


Joan of Ark and the DauphinIt is said thatin the 100 years war, the English entered France through a hole in the head of John the bold. The Duke of Burgundy, John the Bold had murdered the Dauphin's uncle and some years later the Dauphin had ensured John the bold was killedin revenge. The result of this action led the Dauphin's father disinheriting the Dauphin from the throne of France in favour of Henry's son who was then to be both king of England and King of France.

The Dauphin took the case to the Law professors at the University of Bologna who ruled that no person may be deprived of their birthright beacuse of an evil deed they have done. This laid the basis for the claim of the Dauphin to be crowned King. Which his champion, Joan ensured some years later. It also laid the basis in law for our theory of human rights being inalienable rights.

The story of Joan of Ark as a 15th Century human rights campaigner can thus be appreciated. Joan's process of reinstatement from heretic to saint took three seperate hearings up to 50 years after her death and took 500 years for the Church to recognize her as a Saint. These processes were all profoundly political and strategic showing that reconciliation may not simply take one truth and reconciliation process.

Perhaps the message to glean from this vignette is that reconciliation may take many seperate hearings and may take many generations. Expecting reconciliation to be cheaply bought perhaps cheapens the value of the crimes and their forgiveness.

The process of reconciliation may also require concerted citizen action and may require local interventions rather than one monothlic process alone; (Kokopka, 1963)

The formation of social groupwork
During the 1920's, the self-help movement spurned a variety of groups and social movements from Boys Scouts to Catholic Workers. These groups attempted to deal with local issues using smallto large groups to organize themselves. The attempt was to instill through the self-help movement a "deep" democracy at local level.

These groups were most active among immigrants in the USA and among youth and minorities. The founders of these movements were painfully aware that the scourge of fascism neede to be countered. The use of groups allowed indiviual voices and concerned to be heard and gave power to small groups of activists sseking various changes to the lives.

It was out of this process that social work came to adopt groupwork as one of its primary methods of engaging the individual and society to achieve change.

Social groupwork as an approach for developing "deep democracy" and a shared set of values and human rights may be required on an ongoing basis before we can point to our people being reconciled. (ibid; pp3-10)

ConclusionGiven the conditions for succesful degradation ceremonies as laid out by Garfinkel (ibid), the SA-TRC does not represent an emphatic moral triumph to the extent that it failed to show convincingly that perpetrators acted out of free choice in their crimes and that the accusers were neutral and objective with nothing to gain from the degradation of the perpetrators.

The vignettes point to a variety of issues that may support this argument;
1. Successful family group conferences (Zehr, 1997)require significant levels of community support for them to succeed. Questions have been asked as to the levels of community support for the SA-TRC by De Gruchy (2002) and Du Toit (2003) and others.
2. As the vignette about the forgiveness of Arestes suggests,(Hamilton,1940; pp240-8) the forgiver can be transformed by the process of reconciliation. To what extent has this transformation occurred among survivors and victims is a question that requires further research.
3. Perhaps it is still too early to draw definitive conclusions about the process of reconciliation in South Africa. The case of the rehabilition of Joan of Ark shows us that it may take many generations to achiev reconciliation. (Warner, 1981)
4. There is still much practical work that needs to be done to instill “deep democracy” (Konopka,1963; pp3-10) into the social fabric of South Africa. The social groupwork process (ibid) requires ongoing action from Government, business and the citizen sectors.

I must now return to the initial argument I made against the reification of the state. In much of the literature I have read on reconciliation and the SA-TRC, there lies a deep confusion about the power of the state or “macro-actors” in society to reflect, influence or define the actual state of affairs at an interactive or “micro-actor” level in society. Callon and Latour (in Knorr-Cetina etal [Eds] Ch 10, 1981) provide an interesting perspective on the relationship between Macro and Micro actors using Hobbe’s Leviathan as their primary metaphor. In short Callon etal argue that “macro-actors are an interconnected set of mico-actors and more durable materials who’s interests and energies coincide in particular ways to wield power and influence over themselves and others. Those parties and lobbies that wield power do so because they have been able to build many alliances through symbolic practices and secure the support of many groupings and machines and durable materials within society. This process requires ideas to bind the various groups of people and to harness the use of machines and materials together.
Callon etal describe macro-actors as having control over numerous “black boxes”, each containing the power, meanings and interests of a group or an organization. The macro-actor can rely on these “black boxes” for support in their efforts and thus they become macro-actors in society. Those supporting a set of values or ideas must be able to ensure the support of as many “black-boxes” as possible.

This process requires simplification; “a macro-actor can only grow if it simplifies itself.... It is no more difficult to send tanks to Kabul than to dial 999. It is no more difficult to describe renault than the secretary who takes telephone calls at the Houston police station. If it were much more difficult the tanks would not move and Renault would not exist. There would be no Macro-actors. By cl;aiming that macro-actors are more complex than mico-actors...[we] ...prevent the secret of macro-actors’ growth from being revealed: making operations childishly simple.” (ibid p299)

The idea of reconciliation, if it is to be a moral and social triumph, still requires that work to be done. The work of making reconciliation simple. That work of building alliances, sourcing materials and machinery and securing the support of many groupings in our society. The SA-TRC represents a start in that work but others are needed to continue from where it left off.

Bilbiography
Callon, M & Latour, B Unscrewing the big Leviathan: how actors macro-structure reality and how sociologists help them do so in Knorr-Cetina, K & Cicourel, A.V. (Eds) Advances in Social Theory and Methodology: Towrads and Intergration of Micro-and Macro Sociologies: pp277-303; Routledge Kegan Paul London 1981
De Gruchy, J.W. Reconciliation: Restoring Justice SCM Press London 2002
Doubt, K Evil and the Ritual of Shame: A crime against humanity in Bosnia-Herzegovinia in James Head; Vol 7(2): pp 319-331 2002
du Toit, F. Ed) Learning To Live Together: Practices of Social Reconciliation Institute for Justice and Reconciliation Cape Town 2003
Edelstein, J Truth and Lies:Stories from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in outh Africa The New Press New York 2002
Garfinkel, H Conditions of Successful Degradation Ceremonies in American Journal of Sociology; Vol 61: pp420-24 1956
Gibson, J.L Overcoming Apartheid: Can truth reconcile a divided nation ? Russel Sage Foundation New York 2004
Hamilton, E Mythology Mentor/Penquin London 1940
Hayner, P.B Unspeakable Truths: Facing the Challenge of Truth Commissions Routledge New York 2001
Holstein, J.A Rethinking Victimization: an interactional approach to victimology in Symbolic Interaction; Vol. 13(1): pp103-122 1990
Konopka, G Social Groupwork: A helping process Prentice Hall Englewood Cliffs, NJ 1963
Moore, D.B Shame, Forgiveness and Juvenile Justice in Criminal Justice Ethics Vol. 12(1) 1993
Parrsih, G (Ed) Leading Social Entrepreneurs:Elections in 2002 and 2003 Ashoka Washington 2004
Schreiter, R.J The Ministry of Reconciliation Orbis Books New York 1998
Volf, M The Social Meaning of Reconciliation in Interpretation; Apr 2000, Vol 54 no.2:pp158-172
Warner, M Joan of Ark: The image of female heroism Penguin London 1981
Zehr, H & Mika, H Foundational Concepts of Restorative Justice Mennonite Central Committee Akron, Penn 1997

Anti-Corruption Strategy

Social and political ethics: Power and Corruption

Assignment Examination April 2006

Douglas Racionzer

Outline and justify an anti-corruption strategy for your city/community. Defend your strategy philosophically and politically.

Introduction
One of my favourite topics in conversation is the paradigm under which traffic police across the nation operate. The abuse of traffic and vehicle roadworthy regulations as in effect, an income-generating activity for local municipalities stands as an exemplar of poor governance and criminal myopia. This “stop and fine” approach to traffic policing I will argue lends itself to corruption not least because it places poorly trained and poorly paid officials in positions of power over citizens.

In this paper I shall propose an anti-corruption strategy focussed on the traffic police in my local area, Tshwane and more specifically their perennial roadside “stop and fine” activities .

I shall use Transparency International’s simple definition of corruption :
“Corruption is operationally defined as the misuse of entrusted power for private gain. TI further differentiates between "according to rule" corruption and "against the rule" corruption. Facilitation payments, where a bribe is paid to receive preferential treatment for something that the bribe receiver is required to do by law, constitute the former. The latter, on the other hand, is a bribe paid to obtain services the bribe receiver is prohibited from providing.”

This definition and its differentiation between “according to rule” corruption and “against the rule” corruption will be discussed as it presents certain features of interest for social theory .

The philosophical underpinnings for the proposed anti-corruption strategy will be discussed. This, it will be argued, lies in stark contrast to the ideological assumptions motivating the traditional “stop and fine” approach to traffic policing. The proposed new paradigm for traffic policing will revolve around a broad ethics of virtue .

A political defence for this proposed anti-corruption strategy will be outlined along with some thoughts about dealing with the ingrained and systemic elements that may oppose such a shift in traffic policing.

Finally, this paper will explore the limitations of this proposed anti-corruption strategy especially with respect to “against the rule” corruption.

The Problem
The local traffic police operating in the Tshwane Metropolitan area often stop vehicles and search for faulty lights, brakes or other problems. They then point out the problem and say “what can we do”. This is the prompt that they are receptive to a bribe. Should you respond by asking what should be done? The police will usually say they are “thirsty” and they would like R20 for a Coke.

If you do not engage with the police at this level, they will invariably write out a fine for the various faults found on the vehicle. Should you become angry they might simply remove your licence disk or even arrest you.

The problem is fundamentally about the power these officials have over the vehicle driver. The encounter may lead in any number of well-worn directions but will almost always end in some form of punishment, fine or bribe .

Proposed anti-corruption strategy
The basic idea for this anti-corruption strategy is to integrate some of the current anti-corruption approaches as championed by Transparency International with a system that seeks to mould driver behaviour, prompting civic virtue on the roads rather than merely punishing vice, thereby shifting the focus and nature of the traffic officer’s job.

Transparency International’s use and promotion of “integrity pacts” in public tender processes seems to offer a very useful tool for application to the corrupt practices of traffic police. The integrity pacts I have looked at entail tender processes for public works and therefore we will have to interpret these models to suit the specific problem of corruption among traffic officials in the Tshwane Metro area.

The use of oath swearing coupled with the signing of integrity pacts may be usefully applied in this context. Oaths have a venerable tradition going back at least to the ancient Hittites and used variously by the Nazi’s as well as the Catholic Church as a means of controlling behaviour, more specifically ensuring loyalty. The oaths we would be proposing are not oaths of loyalty to a person or an organization but rather an oath of loyalty to the general proposal that taking bribes is always wrong.

The specifics of what constitutes bribery and what corruption means may be dealt with by reference to the new anti corruption legislation passed into law in 2004 . Section 4, 1 (a) of Act 12 of 2004 states that “any public officer, who directly or indirectly accepts or agrees or offers to accept any gratification from any other person whether for the benefit of himself or herself or for the benefit of any other person …” would be guilty of corrupt activities. Traffic officers would merely be asked to sign an integrity pact to the effect that they will not accept any gratification from another person for their own benefit in accord with this section of the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act.

How the details of this strategy, beyond the oath-taking and integrity pact may be put into practice, would involve the more technical details of transforming the current “stop-and fine” paradigm of traffic policing into a system of rewards for maintaining roadworthy vehicles and good driving. The practical outcome would, for example, entail drivers being issued with rewards for defined and specific civic virtues on the roads that may be redeemed against a variety of municipal charges.

It is a generally accepted psychological principle that the solution to a problem may be found at a level above (beneath or behind) the point where the problem is experienced. Problems are seen as “symptoms” or “presenting problems” for which an underlying process is responsible. The relevance of this truism in this case is that simply to try and deal with corruption at the level that it manifests itself would always place anti-corruption strategies in a reactive rather than a proactive stance. To this end, I propose that the ideological underpinnings that inform the corrupt practices of traffic officers need transformation.

In practical terms, I propose we enable the traffic department to mould driver behaviour using a judicious mix of five distinct tools:
1. A system that encourages the annual signing of public integrity pacts by drivers, vehicle owners and traffic police.
2. The careful and planned use of traffic fines to punish a limited and defined set of priority traffic crimes.
3. The issuing of rewards for specific vehicle and traffic virtues which are redeemable against any number of municipal charges such as rates, light and water bills, vehicle licensing, plumbing, business charges and other services.
4. The planned removal of traffic-calming measures such as speed-humps and other restrictions, commensurate with a reduction in accidents, good driving behaviours and general calming of traffic in a defined community.
5. The creation of traffic-flow systems that do not reward traffic vices, for example, taxi and bus lanes in main thoroughfares to extinguish the ‘reward’ public transport vehicle drivers get for overtaking on the left curb and so on.

The civic virtues of the road may include:
· Specific good driving behaviours, such stopping at stop streets
· Specific safe driving behaviours such using seat belts.
· Specific road courtesy behaviours, such as allowing drivers to overtake on the right by keeping to the left lane
· Specific roadworthy vehicle maintenance, such as good brakes and tyres.
· Specific road navigation virtues, such as driving within the speed limit
· Specific careful driving behaviours, such as overtaking safely

The innovation of Transparency International has been to focus on civil society acting as the “conscience” of business and state interests by insisting upon public, specific and measurable outcomes. Such an approach is crucially important in this proposed exercise. Without civil society participation, coupled with a focussed attention to details and outcomes, no change is measurable and so success or failure cannot be judged.

A suitable civil society vehicle would have to be used to drive this proposed anti-corruption strategy. The Automobile Association, Transparency International, the local taxi-owners association or even one of the civil servants’ unions may host the proposed strategy.

If no suitable civil society host for the strategy can be found, then a non-governmental organization will have to be built with this strategy as its primary programme. Single-issue organizations require specific skills and face peculiar challenges and these would have to be faced in planning for such an organization.

In addition to these problems, the main focus of the strategy is to achieve change in a state-run organization, a local authority. It is common cause that the local sphere of government is poorly led and resourced and has the most organizational problems among the three tiers of government in South Africa. There are consequently specific challenges to such an approach and its ability to induce change in the local authority traffic department is by no means assured.

In any event, the anti-corruption strategy would have to go through a number of stages:
1. The local authority needs to adopt the new strategy as part of its policy and procedures. The planning process works on a five-year cycle. Most important here is that the various income generating departments of the council must accept rewards as credit notes redeem-able against charges. A further strategic alliance would have to be forged with the provincial and national departments responsible for road safety.
2. The administration of the new strategy will have to be prepared and initial outcomes set. Outcomes would include reductions in accidents, measured improvements in driving and traffic problems. Part of the strategy would involve identifying the specific traffic vices and virtues to receive attention, the prioritising of these and defining the reward parameters.
3. Each traffic officer needs to undergo a training course where the principles of the new strategy will be taught and its practical implementation practiced. Using a variant of Transparency International’s tool of integrity pacts, each graduate would be asked to sign an integrity pact and take an oath to not engage in corruption, not to take bribes and rather promote good driving and the various defined traffic-related civic virtues.
4. A series of pilot operations will be carried out with reviews and minor changes to the strategy made. Such changes would involve administrative issues as well as adjustments to the daily regime for traffic officers.
5. The strategy is launched with publicity. The publicity must focus on the idea that people will be rewarded for specific driving and vehicle maintenance virtues. The traffic officer’s names and numbers who have signed the integrity pact would also be published in the local newspapers on an annual basis.
6. Regular public reviews in specific communities will be held to discuss the progress of the strategy. This would involve local councillors as well as traffic chiefs. A major outcome of these meetings will be petitions to alter aspects of traffic management such as traffic-calming measures, speed bumps and the creation of taxi and bus lanes.
7. A general review will be held to assess the applicability of this strategy to other areas of traffic policing. Such areas that may apply would include speed trapping and vehicle licensing.

This proposed strategy is not a short-term project. It requires a long breath and deep pockets. It is attempting to overturn more than half a century of ingrained attitudes, policies and practice.

This proposed strategy is also not a solution to the problem of corruption among traffic officials. It is rather an ongoing management system that speaks to the underlying, embedded narratives and transcripts of power relations. It is an attempt to fashion a new language of power among traffic officers. A language that seeks to account for motorists’ behaviour through this new language of virtue, rather than that of trap and fine motoring vices.

Philosophical underpinnings
The proposed anti-corruption strategy described above does not derive from one clear ethical framework or perspective. It is not merely due to an irritating bias for messy eclecticism that none of my thinking on any subject seems able to fit into any single coherent vision. A student of mine defines the strategic value of this dissolute approach in another context when critiquing the use of Kantian ethics in social work; “(Foucault) claims that the prescriptive nature of moral codes ‘is transmitted in a diffuse manner, so that far from constituting a systematic ensemble, they form a complex interplay of elements that counterbalance and correct one another…thus providing for compromises and loopholes” (Foucault, 1986, p25 in McBeath and Webb, 1989; p501)

Indeed McBeath and Webb (ibid) go on to argue “Foucault asks how the unsystematic ensembles of moral discourses have effects upon the individual as the ‘historical determinants of ethical substance’ (ibid)… That is, individuals are required to think about themselves in particular ways and perform certain reflective operations upon themselves. This means that morality is inscribed on to persons, not by the inner discourse of their own reason as Kant would claim, but by the exterior discourses of morality and what Foucault calls technologies of self… Foucault has described this state of affairs in “Discipline and Punish” (1979) as a prison without a warder. Self-formative codes of morality are inextricably linked to the effects of relations of power which are often discreetly concealed by metaphors of truth and freedom.” (ibid; p502) or in the case of traffic control: “safety” and “courtesy”.

Foucault’s insights may be applied to the anti-corruption strategy proposed here. Essentially the strategy involves re-framing the work of traffic officers to become teachers of prescribed and defined civic virtues of the road. The paradigm of traffic officials working as members of the repressive state apparatus who will transform their work into a “calling” to act as members of the ideological state apparatus. Traffic officers must become identified as arbiters and promoters of civic virtue.

Stace (1956) tells us that Socrates introduced “the identification of virtue with knowledge… All wrongdoing arises from ignorance. If a man only knows what is right, he must and will infallibly do what is right… Aristotle, in commenting upon this whole doctrine, observed that Socrates had ignored or forgotten the irrational parts of the soul.” (Stace, 1956; p 147)

It is however to one of Socrates’ other propositions on virtue that we can trace the philosophical roots of this proposed anti-corruption strategy; “ …that virtue can be taught.” (ibid; p 149) As Stace argues for Socrates, if virtue flows from knowledge and knowledge can be taught, then virtue can be taught.

Perhaps if we saw knowledge as a deeper, wider, more psychological process than simply rational and conscious thought, we could apply the principles of learning that psychology has developed. Introducing the “technologies of self”. (Foucault, 1986; p28)

In particular the work of Pavlov (1927), Watson (1913) and Skinner (1969) who promoted what is generally referred to as the behaviourist school of psychology may have some relevance here. Pavlov infamously discovered the learning process called classical conditioning. He accidentally discovered and then tested his theory on dogs that would have a bell rung whenever they were fed. After some time it was observed that the sound of the bell ringing alone would produce a hunger reaction, salivation in the dogs. Behavourists and learning theorists argue that the dogs had learned to identify food with the sound of the ringing bell.

This proposed anti-corruption strategy will generate a further learning among motorists who, through classical conditioning, will come to associate traffic police with both punishment and reward.

It may be argued that presently, the sight of a traffic police roadblock or even a traffic police vehicle produces a series of fear reactions in motorists because they have undergone classical conditioning where motorists have learned to identify the sight of traffic police with punishment and pain. Learning theory suggests that the identification of a particular stimulus such as the traffic police with pain and punishment produces an avoidance reaction. Freud argues that avoidance of pain leads on to other more complex psychological defences including avoidance, denial, projection, sublimation, repression, reaction formation and other anxiety-related processes. Levitt notes, “among the majority of health professionals, defences against anxiety are currently viewed as necessary, adaptive functions common to all of us. It is doubtful that anyone could develop into a productive, socialized adult without them.” (Levitt, 1968; p 57)

All these “normal” reactions lead motorists inexorably away from the mental and emotional processes necessary to the business of driving safely, of maintaining a roadworthy vehicle, and from civic concerns.

If this proposed anti-corruption strategy can initiate a classical conditioning that, among other tactics, offers rewards for civic virtue, then motorists would not be cued to engage in the complex avoidance reactions at the mere sight of a traffic officer and will be placed in an emotional readiness to improve their driving and vehicle maintenance so as to gain such rewards.

B.F. Skinner (1969) introduced a further aspect to this learning process. This is called operant conditioning. Operant condition seeks to shape behaviour over time using four techniques; positive reinforcement, where desired behaviour is rewarded, for example where motorists receive a reward for driving with set belts buckled; negative reinforcement, where desired behaviour is conditioned through stopping punishment when it is achieved, for example where traffic police no longer seek bribes; punishment; where undesired behaviour is punished for example by issuing fines and extinction; where undesired behaviour has no reward or punishment for example when rude and abusive drivers are ignored by other motorists and traffic police.

This anti-corruption strategy proposes that traffic police apply operant conditioning techniques to shape, over time, the behaviour of motorists. The effect of such a strategy will, if applied consistently and to clearly defined practices, be to improve traffic flows, driving and vehicle roadworthiness. Traffic police will no longer be seen as an object of fear to be avoided but will be seen as teachers of civic virtue on the roads.

When the encounters between traffic officers and motorists no longer set-up the members of these scenes to engage in a dialogue that goes “Pay me a bribe or I will fine you”. When the encounters between traffic officers and motorists are set-up to teach, support, guide and exhort motorists to practice the civic virtues of the road, then the focus of these encounters has been transformed.

When traffic police cease to think of themselves as poorly paid “income generators” for the council and begin to see their work as a calling to promote civic virtue, they will begin to take pride in what they are doing. This pride should be coupled with the oath taking which will be renewed annually at a public ceremony.

Political defence
Applying McBeath and Webb (1989) traffic officers engage in what Said (1978) describes as a colonial discourse; “When traffic officers help motorists in a goal-directed way, they want to change lifestyles and ‘personalities’ by methods of rehabilitation and guidance…. The result is political, in that the motorists’ destiny is annexed to traffic control and thus begins to exist as a series of valorised contacts with the agent of his or her subjugation. In Foucauldian terms, the traffic officer must operate at the intersection of the ‘morality of behaviours’…” (p 503-505)

Politically, the proposed anti-corruption strategy I have outlined in this paper entails the transformation of the traffic officer’s work from one of detection, punishment and control, to include exhortation and reward.

To this end, the annual oath taking and integrity pact-signing ceremonies would have powerful political value. These integrity pacts would fall under the African National Congress’ current rubric of a “people’s contract” or the Democratic Alliance’s campaign for citizen’s charters. These annual events could be used to issue medals for bravery, other valorisations and honours and would be an opportunity for elected representatives to promote in specific examples the idea of citizenship and democracy.

Promoting democracy and the liberal values of our constitution is still needed, it could be argued because the Calvinist roots of the apartheid philosophy that sought to protect the “purity” of the few elect from the impurity of the many, are still operative in our society. The practices of power remain embedded in relations between authority and citizen even though the nationalist philosophy that spawned these practices has been overturned. Morphew (1989) details the national socialist roots of this ideology and how these ideas were expressed as official apartheid policy. Indeed Mophew uses Wink’s (1984 and 1986) work on “the powers” to link political ideology to a theological reading. Something that bears some resemblance to what Scott would later describe as a “hidden transcript” (Scott, 1990).

It may be cogently argued that traffic policing is moulded from this theologically Calvinist, puritanical and nationalist apartheid stance. The new system of governance has regrettably assumed this paradigm with its focus on only punishing vice rather than rewarding virtue. The proposed anti-corruption strategy could be punted as an historical corrective to the internal colonial project of Apartheid.

Politically the creation of a system of governance that rewards virtuous behaviour as well as more efficiently punishing the transgressions of its citizens will transform a pattern of thinking in which currently citizens try to avoid punishment into a culture where citizens seek and expect rewards for civic virtue. This will create more pliable citizens, supportive of the power structures and dynamics of our constitutional democracy while championing the broader, liberal approach to governance.

The power of the local authority will be enhanced through this anti-corruption strategy because it elicits oaths against corruption from its traffic officials and it is looked-to as a source of reward from its citizens.

Other anti-corruption strategies such protection for whistle-blowers and confidential help-desks would not be obstructed by this approach.

Limitations
It may be argued that this proposed anti-corruption strategy would be less effective when dealing with “against the rule” corruption. For example, when traffic officers accept bribes to pass vehicles as roadworthy or when traffic officers accept bribes to issue drivers licences.

It seems pertinent at this point to refer to some of the ethnomethodological research about rules and the documentary method of accounting for action. “In essence, the ‘rule-governed’ model of human conduct is a very simple one. It begins from the presumption that human actors are generally equipped with an array of rules which they ‘follow’ (or by which they are guided or governed) in situations of action. The actual basis on which the actors are proposed to acquire the rules varies from theory to theory... Regardless of how the rules are acquired however, the traditional model of ‘rule-governed’ conduct works in the following fashion. The actors are treated as encountering a situation of action to which one or more of the rules they have learned or internalised ‘apply’. Their actions in this context are then analysed as ‘guided’ or ‘caused’ by the rules which they have previously acquired…The stultifying effect of this model on the development of the theory of social action can scarcely be overestimated.” (Heritage, 1984; pp104-105)

In like manner, it would be a gross misreading of this paper if the proposed anti-corruption strategy were to be seen simply as a refined method of control in the exercise of state power. As a new system of rules to be applied to motorists, this anti-corruption strategy will and must fail. It will fail because it is not a new set of rules at all but rather a new language to which the actions of traffic officers may be indexed.

In an earlier section of this paper, I referred to incidents where I have been stopped by traffic police and despite having things wrong with my vehicle; I have not been fined but rather sent on my way and told to fix the problem. The traffic officers are usually black and I have spoken Sotho with them and they seem loath to punish a white man who gives them respect and speaks their own language. From one point of view, this may be seen as corruption because a state official has received a gratification (respect) from an offender and has subsequently not fined that offender . This may however also be seen as “good policing” because the officer used his or discretion in this case .

The proposed anti-corruption strategy offers traffic officials a language through which they may account for their actions as good policing and use the negotiated character of traffic police encounters as resources for such “documentary methods”. Heritage traces Garfinkel’s use of this term thus; “Garfinkel derived the term from Mannheim who proposed that the documentary method involves the search for ‘an identical homologous pattern underlying a vast variety of different realizations of meaning… the basic idea had received very considerable theoretical explication at the hands of phenomenologist from Husserl onwards…” (Heritage, 1984; p84)

These arguments allow us to understand that Transparency International’s distinction between “with the rule corruption” and “against the rule corruption” cannot be applied should this proposed anti-corruption strategy succeed. The proposed new language that will be introduced makes all corruption rule-based and clearly accountable as traffic police work.


Conclusion
Corruption for me is more than the manner in which state employees abuse their authority for personal gain. Corruption refers to the wider state of our lives and our social reality. To be corrupt is part of the essential character of our existence. Corruption is a meaning to which any number of social actions and contexts may be competently indexed. Any action we do may be seen as corrupt if we can see that we use our positions of trust for our own gratification.

Corruption is rather a negotiated social reality in which we come to understand our actions and others as immoral or unethical. Any anti-corruption strategy must take seriously the negotiated character of social life if it is to address corruption in our society.

The proposed anti-corruption strategy outlined in this paper offers a new language and a more plastic paradigm for traffic official and motorists to work with. The language of civic virtue may offer us a means for us to become more comfortable with ourselves as a people.









Bibliography and References
(Please note that I have included material that I have read that may not be directly referenced in the paper because I believe that my understanding of the topic has involved a wider reading than the texts quoted)


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