So the news is still full of bad stuff, but I detect a change in people’s reactions to the bad stuff, in that calls for transparency and accountability keep mounting.

Here are a few of the current stories that prop up hope that there is a substantive shift going on, and not just in this country.

Amrit Singh writes today on Huffington Post how the U.S. may soon face some measure of accountability for the secret “extraordinary rendition” program and torture undertaken post-9/11.  She tells a bit of the story of Khaled El-Masri, a German citizen whom the CIA and Macedonian government detained and tortured. El Masri tried to obtain justice through the U.S. courts, but the government got his case dismissed by invoking “state secrets privilege.” El-Masri  has now taken his case to the European Court of Human Rights. While the U.S. is outside the jurisdiction of the ECHR, the court will need to determine Macedonia’s liability, and to do that, it will need to determine the role of the U.S. and form a judgment of the actions of the U.S.

On the same issue, the UK is launching a government inquiry into its role in rendition and torture. Many are hoping it will be done in such a way as to provide a model for how other governments should investigate their roles, as well.  All of that is good for transparency; I’ll hope the inquiries result in recommendations for, and actions to effect, accountability as well.  Otherwise in the UK, there’s been a coming clean about Bloody Sunday, that day in 1972 when British troops slaughtered 13 Northern Ireland demonstrators. A 12 year investigation determined that British soldiers were wholly to blame, and that determination has helped a lot of families heal some very old wounds.

The Roman Catholic Church, which has verbally made some progress in moving toward transparency and accountability in its multinational pedophile priest scandal, is also being challenged about financial transparency and accountability in Germany.  SpiegelOnline carries this report about enormous assets controlled by bishops, though just how much can’t be determined.  The bishops have no requirement to make full financial disclosure to the German government, nor do they even let the faithful in their own diocese know how much and what kinds of wealth they control.  And while there are clear indications that the amounts are, in most dioceses, quite large, and some of the bishops enjoy a lavish lifestyle, the rank and file of the church are going through major cutbacks.  So again, more of people calling for transparency and accountability.

The BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill cataclysm: good heavens, where to start?  Fortunately, the news is full of stories demanding transparency and especially accountability within and from BP.  Even the numbers of right wing politicians who’ve sought to protect BP is dwindling, as the catastrophe grows ever larger.  With all the different articles out there I’ll restrain myself and link only to this one.

May turning of the tide toward transparency and accountability become a great sea change, even to becoming its own Age.  Coming soon: a report on efforts to achieve more transparency and accountability in Vermont.

Peace.

Deborah Alicen

Peace.

Deborah Alicen

But there’s something I’m not yet seeing in the articles and analyses I’ve read so far, and it is a crucial point, so I offer it now as a retired psychologist who had the privilege of working with hundreds of sexual abuse survivors.

To date, every time a Vatican spokesman or other defender of the Pope opens his mouth, what comes out is a clear demonstration of how much they do not comprehend about the experience of sexual abuse; and, more to the point, how little they attend to what’s necessary for healing from sexual abuse.

Here’s a quote from Bishop Gerald Kicanas in Arizona, which concludes a Huffington Post story here, posted today.

“Cardinal Ratzinger, as the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, was always receptive, ready to listen, to hear people’s concerns,”  said Kicanas. “Pope Benedict is the same man.”

That pretty well sums up all the comments I’ve seen offered in defense of Benedict: that he’s been attentive, and often, much more so than others in the Catholic hierarchy. Indeed, the same article that ends with the above quote also mentions his having headed up important changes in how the Church responds to cases of pedophile priests. So from the perspective of those who are speaking out in defense of the Pope, he is a shining star, a role model, of  responsible ecclesial attention to the problem of pedophile priests.

And that is why they may as well be from Mars: in their world, all they see is that they have a problem, and that they are doing things to address the problem responsibly. What they see is that they, and specifically Benedict as Cardinal Ratzinger, took action to deal with their problem of pedophile priests.

To their credit, their recognition that they do indeed have a problem of pedophile priests is an improvement over pretending there was no problem, or at least not much of a problem, with pedophile priests.  We can think of them, then, as having made the leap from, say, one of Jupiter’s moons to the nearer realm of Mars, but they’re still not seeing what’s true for the victims of pedophile priests here on the surface of planet Earth.

What absolutely floors me in this situation—and I’m referring to the whole  sex abuse scandal that’s been hanging around for decades, not just the newer revelations from Europe—is that the Church appears to have not taken the step of learning from sexual abuse survivors and their advocates what is necessary for healing from that horrendous trauma.

Bishop Kicanas spoke of how receptive Benedict XVI is to listening to anyone’s concerns.  Listening isn’t enough.

Here’s the disconnect in a nutshell: from the perspective of the Vatican, they have listened and taken action to rectify their problem with pedophile priests.  But from the perspective of the victims, beyond a bit of listening they haven’t taken action toward effecting healing of the victims.

The Vatican does not show any awareness, in its public statements, that the problem crying for attention is, “What must we do to help these children of God to heal?” rather than, “What can we do to rid the Church of the scandal of pedophile priests?”

Jeff Israely‘s opinion piece posted on Time.com goes a step further than others I’ve read in calling for specific actions from the Vatican that would help the victims:

Rather than state another mea culpa for the sins of the abusers, the Pope must simply and publicly seek forgiveness for himself — and other bishops — for what we might call the sins of ignorance and denial and administrative malfeasance that some critics say border on the criminal.

I’ll note first that many critics say the malfeasance is criminal.  But to the point of Israely’s piece, public penitence and would be another major step forward toward giving victims what they need to heal.  But more is needed yet.  Here are some specific actions victims and survivors need to see in order to believe the Vatican “gets it,” that it puts their healing ahead of its concern over their scandal.

• As new cases arise, act quickly. Immediately provide counseling for the victim and his or her family; immediately report the case to law enforcement authorities; and immediately provide for the alleged perpetrator to have a thorough psychological evaluation.
• For pending cases, arrange for quick dispensation.  Draft canon lawyers from around the world, if necessary, to speed the church trials of priests known to be pedophiles. The case in Arizona, highlighted in the HuffPo piece here, screams to victims of clerical abuse that the Church doesn’t care about their healing.  There’s no excuse for letting a case drag out for years on top of years.
• Establish absolute transparency in dealing with pedophile priests.  Too often agencies dealing with any form of child abuse hide behind the confidentiality rightly accorded the victim to avoid their own actions being scrutinized.  What’s necessary is to have an open process making the Church’s actions visible, while maintaining the victim’s confidentiality.

The Church aims to be Christ to the world’s suffering people.  To do so it must do everything possible to emulate Jesus the Healer.  Many good people in the Church do their utmost to do just that.  It’s time for those in the Vatican to come down to Earth and do the same.

Peace.

Deborah Alicen

In short, Australia is way ahead of the U.S. when it comes to health care. While some Aussies are losing patience with Kevin Rudd’s lack of leadership to reform the system there, the system there is already universal. No one there has to worry about going bankrupt or becoming homeless due to medical costs. How civilized is that? Father Dave had some major health concerns himself last year and said worry about money was never part of the picture. Imagine that.

As someone with a doctorate in psychology, I can state with a high degree of clinical certainty that people who are recovering from major illnesses and surgeries will have faster recoveries and fewer complications, generally speaking, than people who are dogged by money worries while they are recovering. What that means is they incur fewer medical expenses than people who do have money worries because of medical expenses. Will we ever bring reason to bear on health care in this country?

Here’s the original post:

Oh, would that I were getting on a plane to actually fly to Australia!  Alas, this is instead a revisiting of the subject of Australia and its bureaucracies.  In some of my posts from many months ago, I looked a little at Australia’s election of Kevin Rudd, a long-time bureaucrat, and speculated–or maybe fantasized–that he might be able to inject a large dose of reason and professional practice into Australia’s bureaucracies.

I decided it was time to check in on the situation Down Under and see how it’s going.  I came across this article by Gary Sauer-Thompson about the politics and problems achieving health care reform there.  Many similarities with what’s happening here with health care reform.  No matter what reason and sound medical practice may dictate, there are irrational politics to deal with.  Early in his piece Sauer-Thompson cites this article by Ross Gittins at the Sydney Morning Herald. (And I cited Gittens in this post in May 2008.)  Gittins posits that the Rudd agenda suffers from lack of prioritization. Be that as it may, health care reform is encountering huge hurdles in the U.S. even though President Obama has made it a top priority.

I really haven’t read enough to offer any cogent analysis at this point, but I’ll do a bit more digging (I have a ‘secret’ connection in Oz) and perhaps have some analysis later.  My guess, regardless of the reasons for the problems one country to another, is that both are better off under current leadership than under previous leadership.  That’s not to make room for anyone to rest on his laurels, just acknowledging that we’re all still ahead of the game compared to a couple of years ago.

Peace.

Deborah Alicen

As I regularly refer to Franz Kafka, this item on some of his unpublished papers got my attention this morning.

Part of Kafka’s genius was in seeing, and making the picture accessible to others, the crazy-making, and sometimes downright evil (e.g. Nazi), abuses to which bureaucracies so often are given. In doing so he has also imparted a measure of sanity to those caught up in the hidden and unresponsive machinations of one bureaucracy or another, by showing them (us; me!) that no, you aren’t alone, this happens to a lot of people, and it’s been happening for a long time, because the powers-that-be enjoy their power just a little too much. And sometimes a lot too much.

Read The Trial and The Castle if you haven’t already, and be astonished by how relevant they are to interfacing with present-day bureaucracies.

Along with the others mentioned in the CBC News article, I also hope these papers soon become available to researchers, and their content to the public.

Peace.

Deborah Alicen

A couple of months ago I ran a story about the promotion of ethics in civil service in Nepal. It appears we can look for that to continue following the abolishment of the monarchy and the nation having been declared a democratic republic.

I am far away from an expert on Nepalese politics, but as someone with expertise on how change happens in all sorts of systems, I expect this is a tender time in Nepal, with hopes running high and opportunities opening up. The thing about opportunities opening up, however, is there are usually opportunists about who are all too willing to make use of a time of transition to create gain primarily for themselves. We’ll hope the new Constituent Assembly has a firm grasp on the situation and that things are thoroughly on the upswing.

Click here to read a very positive report on the developments from United We Blog! for a Democratic Nepal.

Peace.

Deborah Alicen

The operative word there is “apparent.”

Time will tell the story, of course, but there’s a news item today–or technically, tomorrow, given that it’s now tomorrow in Australia–that gives pause regarding Rudd’s position relative to his bureaucrats. The Down-under Herald Sun informs us that Rudd has rejected the advice from bureaucrats in four of his departments in favor of accepting the advice of one of his agencies.

A leaked Cabinet document revealed that Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was warned by his own department that FuelWatch could lead to “a small overall price increase” in the pump price.

Three other departments — finance, resources, and energy and industry — also argued against the scheme.

Treasurer Wayne Swan went into damage control, arguing the advice was “academic”.

He said the Government preferred the advice of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

“We backed it because there was strong advice from the ACCC — the consumer watchdog,” he said.

“It is true there was some bureaucratic advice against FuelWatch. I don’t believe it was well-grounded.

What makes this so interesting is the speech Rudd delivered not long ago to his senior bureaucrats about the importance of a professional bureaucracy, and its operating in [my words] a way that serves the public before any political ideology. Granted, there was the suggestion, however subtle or blunt, that Australia’s bureaucracies have not operated the last several years in a non-partisan fashion and that it needs to become grounded in sound, non-partisan policy and procedure. So perhaps there is a failure in four of the five agencies involved to be thus grounded.

But one must wonder about Rudd’s going against the advice of four of his senior bureaucrats, when he extols the value of a properly professional bureaucracy.

As I said, time will tell. For now it’s a very interesting wrinkle in the realms of bureaucratic reform efforts.

UPDATE 5/30/08: The Rudd administration has backed off its earlier stance. From AdelaideNow:

THE Government has backed down on parts of its controversial FuelWatch scheme, giving rural and regional areas the chance to opt out.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said local governments in the bush were free to disregard the price monitoring service.

“FuelWatch works best when you’ve got lots of petrol outlets,” he told radio 3AW in Melbourne this morning.

“In rural and regional Australia, where you have less petrol outlets, they have an opportunity to opt into the FuelWatch scheme if they want to, through their own local authorities, or remain outside the scheme.”

Peace.

Deborah Alicen

I also chatted with my departed Papa, it being Memorial Day Weekend and he having served in WWII. He made it through the blitz in London and the liberation of Paris in one piece, and spent the next five decades raising a family and making more difference in more people’s lives than most of us could imagine. George Bailey had nothing on him.

I was also thinking about someone for whom no day or weekend was made to honor.

I come across a lot of information as I gather material for this blog that I simply don’t have time to post, given the need for a regular income and an occasional full night of sleep. There’s one story I located the end of last week that I planned to post over the weekend, but I wasn’t able to figure out how to do justice to it. I have finally realized there is no way to do justice to it—or more importantly, to the young woman whose story it is. We can’t humanly do justice to Ashley Smith, who died at age 19 in a Canadian prison.

Where things went wrong or Ashley was when she was incarcerated at age 16 for throwing crab apples at a postal worker. While in prison she acted out—not surprising for a 16-year-old who’s been imprisoned for throwing crab apples—and wound up with a 6 year sentence.

According to various reports, all available online, she struggled with mental and emotional instability, and who among us at that age wouldn’t, in those circumstances? But for some reason or reasons known only to God, prison guards who saw on a prison monitor that she had “tied something around her neck” in a “segregated” cell didn’t think there was any reason to check on her. She died of asphyxiation.

There were clear rules, regulations, and protocols.

Not just one, or even two, guards failed to follow them.

Three guards and one supervisor were fired.

How do four responsible adults fail to follow protocol with a teenager who has a long history of instability?

Moreover, where were the mental health people? How did Ashley wind up spending so much time in segregation? How could anyone have imagined that wouldn’t have contributed to her instability? How could anyone have thought a 19 year old in those circumstances might not want to kill herself?

I wasn’t there, and with even the most well-adjusted teenagers, there are times every responsible adult around them has thoughts of throttling them, so I’m not faulting anyone for what they may have thought of Ashley’s behavior, or how they may have felt toward her. But thinking and feeling are one thing, and acting is quite another. In Ashley’s case, there were many people who did not act according to the protocols issued to them.

Sometimes bureaucrats succeed even where bureaucracy fails. In Ashley’s case, it was both bureaucracy and bureaucrats who failed her.

In memory of Ashley Smith. Peace.

Deborah Alicen

Two somewhat different takes on Rudd’s speech are found in Melbourne’s The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald, though both Ross Gittins in the SMH and Michelle Grattan in The Age seem to agree that the passing of the John Howard approach to bureaucracies and bureaucrats is a good thing. Even so—and perhaps I’m not reading him correctly—Gittins seems to suggest that Rudd’s commitment to building bureaucratic processes that aren’t driven by ideology is questionable:

A clear message to emerge from that speech is that Rudd is more a bureaucrat than he is a politician. As a consequence, he – and his Government – is low on ideology, but high on bureaucratic “process”.

On some of the touchstone ideological issues, Rudd is surprisingly uncommitted. “Policy design and policy evaluation should be driven by analysis of all the available options, and not by ideology,” he told the assembled troops. “I do not have an ideological preference for the public sector, nor for the private sector,” he said.

A bit later he refers to Rudd as “lacking ideology.” As a student of bureaucracies and the history of bureaucracies, I don’t see his commitment to policy and process based on “all the available options” rather than ideology as a negative. That is, after all, what we wish to see return to the likes of the U.S. Department of Justice–policy and process that are consistent across the board, rather than favoring one political ideology over another. I would suggest, however, that while we prefer our bureaucracies not be ideologically driven in the way the Bush administration departments have been politicized, advancing the idea of policies and processes that are responsive to their constituencies, as Rudd seems to have done, is expressive of an ideal, and in that way is putting forth a non-partisan ideology. Lacking a clear partisan ideology doesn’t mean that he’s “lacking ideology” altogether.

While Grattan awaits the proof in the pudding, she seems less concerned than Gittins:

A major difference between Rudd and John Howard is their attitude to the bureaucracy. When Howard became PM, he immediately got rid of one-third of the departmental heads. He was suspicious of the public service. His brother Bob once told me this went back a long way. “Our family in the 1940s and 1950s was very anti-public service … If he has a grudge against two groups, it’s the public service and academics.”

Rudd is just the opposite. He sees the public service as a strong source of ideas — albeit one that has been beaten down recently. He insists (the proof of this pudding will be in the eating) that he wants robust advice, not just what the bureaucrats think the Government wants to hear. That doesn’t mean he’s fully happy with the current service. He has made it clear he wants a more creative, in-touch bureaucracy, with new blood.

While both Grattan and Gittins write of Rudd’s wanting to see greater professionalization of Australia’s bureaucracies such that they become responsive to those they are meant to serve, Gittins does make note of an important omission in the list of stakeholders whom Rudd mentioned as being necessary to that process: labor unions. I would agree that labor unions are one of the constituencies that ought to be heard during Rudd’s reformation of bureaucracies.

This was a fine piece of reporting by KATU’s Thom Jensen last summer, and I’m grateful for the way it succinctly presents the kind of bureaucratic insanity I’ve been highlighting here. Anyone who’s ever been caught in such interminably grinding cogs will recognize the Bureaucratic Anthem: “That’s How It Works.” That is what firefighters were told when a bureaucratic snafu by Counterintelligence Woman in the Boise office of the U.S. Forest Service deprived them of thousands of dollars in pay.

But here is something that works in a very different and far better way: bringing light to bear on bureaucratic abuses. After discovering the video I contacted KATU for an update, and Tracey Lam reported back that the firefighters have now all been paid.

Here’s the clip:

Peace.
Deborah Alicen