Australia’s Voice to Parliament Argument Unpacked
It seems to me that supporters of the Voice to Parliament are not so much concerned whether the Voice works or not, as simply being in favour of the basic right of ATSI people to have it. This reveals the interesting character of the current pro-Voice argument.
The main argument for the Voice is buried in the oft-trotted out line that ATSI people have the right to input on matters that affect them. This should be more accurately rephrased as the right to extra input, given they have the same democratic representation of all Australians.
Where does this right to extra input come from?
The historical facts are that ATSI people were here first, and suffered injustice via colonisation, exclusion, poor treatment and denial of rights, which has led to present-day, entrenched disadvantage. This has been prolonged, it’s said, by a lack of voice or say on important matters. Having a Voice to Parliament therefore, would alleviate much of the ongoing disadvantage and go a long way to closing the gap.
We can boil it down to four premises that flow into each other:
- Prior occupation
2. Injustice of colonisation, dispossession and exclusion
3. (coupled with) lack of voice (leading to)
4. need or disadvantage
(C: Therefore, a voice is necessary)
I think it’s accurate to say that the Voice has been presented as a practical measure to address disadvantage.
Interrogating the premises, we can take the first two as given.
As regards the fourth, need or disadvantage certainly exists in communities however many ATSI people are also doing perfectly fine, thank you very much. Do they need a Voice?
The third premise, lack of voice, is the big one.
Some say Aboriginal people are heard plenty. Given that billions of dollars a year is spent funding various ATSI organisations, at the least we may say that it’s overstated.
Is the cart being put before the horse? Are premises being shaped to fit the conclusion?
For now, let’s assume not. What about the conclusion? Is the Voice an effective way to address disadvantage?
This is a big question, the big question of the whole referendum, but as said, not very interesting for the typical Yes voter.
If the third premise is shaky and either Aboriginal people are already being heard, and/or disadvantage is not largely caused by lack of a voice, then you’d expect the Voice to make little to no difference.
Moreover, some make the point that Aboriginal people are not one homogeneous group, and each mob needs to speak for itself. Another counter claim is that the Voice will complicate things, overlaying a level of bureaucracy on preexisting organisations. The result in both cases may be conflict and even less say or control for struggling communities.
That the Voice, by being enshrined in the constitution, will offer consistency as a permanent body immune to the whims of successive governments, is also only somewhat true because governments can still modify its structure or funding.
To understand if the Voice can really work, we need more detail as to how.
However, Voice advocates currently don’t want to go there, preferring to frame the question as a simple one about principle. Detail is to be ironed out after the referendum, assuming a win for the Yes side.
They could give us more: they could offer examples of poor bureaucratic decisions that might have been avoided with a Voice, and they could provide hypothetical examples of how the Voice would work.
We are simply being asked to consider whether it sounds like a reasonable, practical proposition.
This is where the whole thing gets perverse.
The Voice argument relies heavily on the claim it will address disadvantage, yet proponents can’t or won’t go into any depth to explain that claim.
The leading argument is not backed up, and the most compelling case is the unspoken one.
Supporters of the Voice are not interrogating whether it will work, but seem to be simply responding emotionally to the moral weight of the vague ‘justice claim’ lurking in the background. The first two premises above — the fact of prior occupation and the injustice of colonisation — actually haven’t been articulated as an argument but form the backdrop of the whole thing and are doing the heavy lifting.
The Yes camp don’t need to articulate it for that argument to be felt. In fact, to unpack it would evaporate its emotive power, expose it to interrogation and perhaps prompt people to question whether the Voice is really about solving disadvantage.
At the same time, they can’t go into the weeds regarding how the Voice would solve disadvantage because it would shift the question away from the principle, with the underlying justice claim that gives the whole argument its persuasive strength, towards the ‘how’, with its incredibly complicated landscape of, well, weeds.
How it would work will presumably, however, become more important to the voting public as the referendum approaches, and just in time, the feel-good Yes campaign will kick off in earnest with a bevy of superstar sporting heroes and celebrities ready to answer precisely none of their questions.
It’s not really about practical measures for its supporters. Is that also the case for its progenitors?
