Cheney’s inherent vice

The talking points on the centrist news networks like CNN and especially MSNBC, constantly barrage us with talk of the erosion of norms. Trump and his administration, so the narrative goes, has engaged in systematic undermining of the norms of democracy. He tramples over the procedures and guarantees of the constitution and functioning democracies and tries to assert his personal will over the good of the nations. Not surprisingly, although not exclusively, this narrative is forwarded by disaffected Republicans, who want us to return to the “normalcy of the Bush and Regan administrations, and they even admit that Obama and Clinton were normal in this respect too. But Democrats too engage in this trope and almost daily bemoan the loss of a traditional sense of the rule of law. Mostly however, this is a self-congratulatory story line, that celebrates and legitimizes the often-unjust conditions and creeping authoritarianism of prior administrations. By making a hard and fast distinction between, Trump and the Republicans who went before him, the narrative serves to rehabilitate Republican leadership like Reagan and Bush I and II who have not fared well, in court of educated public opinion. If you watch NBC and MSNBC, there is quite a bit of Bush and Reagan worship going on. The deaths of George H. W. Bush and his wife Barbara were occasions for celebrating a kinder gentler machine gun hand (apologies to Neil Young) and an era of “reasonable” politics where members of both parties get along. George Bush’s daughter is employed by the network, and a constant stream of ex Republicans, mostly from the Bush administrations, whose homiletic praising of the virtues of Bush are far too reverential.

One of the “virtues” of the film VICE, the story of the rise and fall of Dick Chaney, is to disabuse of the notion that the expansive view of presidential power for which Trump is rightly criticized is unique or outside the norm. It has a longer history, going back as far as Nixon. The core of the republican party of which Cheney was as central operative, used notions of expansive executive power which have come home to roost in the figure of Trump. The strict distinction between a lawful republic, and the renegade Republicanism of Trump is illusory.  At the center of the film’s narrative is the rise of the doctrine of unitary executive authority, a view of constitution that in Cheney’s interpretation gives the president almost unlimited powers. While article 2 of the constitution gives the president fairly broad executive powers, the strong version of the unitary executive theory reads these in the strongest possible fashion to give the president unlimited authority over the executive branch and limiting the power of congress in a way that seems inconsistent with the separation and balance of powers. On these readings the president is the executive branch, Perhaps most troubling is the view that when carrying out his commander in chief function the president has unlimited authority. He cannot be limited by any laws passed by congress; This is the interpretation Cheney favored.

Richard Nixon famously forwarded an interpretation of unitary executive, in his assertion that the president can’t do anything illegal. As the supreme authority he is the law, What he does is always just. This seems to be a reading that is closer to the German political theorist Carl Schmitt, who gave support to Hitler not Montesquieu’s theory of tripartite government.

The film shows how the younger Chaney something of a ne’er do well like the young George W. Bush happens upon government service and meets Donald Rumsfeld, forging a political alliance largely around this notion of unitary power. When they both emerged as players in the Reagan administration this doctrine was put to good use, Reagan began the extensive use of signing orders, which some thought allowed the president to specify what parts of a law the president was going to enforce, allow him a defacto line item veto.

The most prominent use of this doctrine during Reagan was the Iran-Contra scandal, Cheney famously argued in his report on Iran Contra that the actions of the Reagan administration were legal because the president was acting in his capacity as commander in chief.

Cheney’s full use of the powers of the executive came to the fore. He redefined the vice presidency as a free-floating position neither fully in the executive or the legislative (due to its role as president pro tempore of the senate) and literally gave himself sweeping powers no previous vice president had. In many ways he acted as president. The attacks of 9/11 gave Cheney his greatest opportunity to employ his interpretation of the unitary executive. As a series of secret memos released after the fact indicated the administration in addition to spying illegally on citizens, took almost total and dictatorial powers. It was John Yoo, a rather undistinguished legal scholar picked for his views rather than his acumen. Scholar Chris Adelson sums up some of these powers

The unitary executive theory, as implemented by the Bush administration, was claimed to justify effectively unchecked presidential power over the use of military force, the detention and interrogation of prisoners, extraordinary rendition and intelligence gathering.

The use of torture, unprecedented in American history and explicitly banned by international laws the US accepted, the use of Guantanamo Bay and other places as offshore prisons in order to skirt American Law are among the darkest moments in American history. I might also add a fake justification for a politically motivated war on Iraq. G.W. Bush also greatly expanded the use of executive orders and signing statements, Bush used 130 signing statements more than any other president by far and often invoked the unitary power of the executive to justify these statements. Obama cut back on these statements, but still used executive orders and powers notably in his incursion into Syria? While he clearly stopped torture and other practices, his failure to prosecute those who condoned torture and used extraordinary powers to subvert the constitution, meant he failed to stem the tide,

Of course, what Trump has attempted goes beyond even the distorted visions of Cheney and G.W. Bush and it is scary to see what he has done; However, it is a mistake to see Trump as sui generis. The ground for his extreme notions of presidential authority was prepared by the very republicans that alienated republicans champion today, Some old republican hands like new attorney general William Barr continue to defend the unitary executive theory and use it to absolve Trump of collusion and other charges.

Vice allows Cheney the last word. He defends his actions as necessary to protect the county from foreign enemies. History and the film tell us otherwise. Not only did the invasion of Iraq have no clear link to any terrorist threat, there is no reason to believe that torture or other rendition techniques provided information that saved lives. It was evil policy badly conceived and poorly executed. If we take away anything from the film Vice, it is the insight that our present dilemma with the “erosion of norms” was long in coming and may be difficult to eradicate. The malign ghost of Cheney and his cohorts hangs heavily on us still.

LOSING FOCUS: THE WXXI CITY NEWSPAPER MERGER

 

The recent announcement of the acquisition of City Newspaper by WXXI will make a significant change in the Rochester media landscape. Yet other than a few articles announcing the change it has faced little scrutiny  No doubt WXXI has built a positive relationship with important segments of the community with the exception of right wingers who the notion of public media whatsoever, and that has given it the cultural capital to engage in a series of mergers and acquisitions. On the surface it seems like an innovative idea, Just as XXI stepped in to aid and work with the Little Theatre, it has stepped in to save the financially strapped City from going under and preserved an important community cultural and intellectual resource.

I think however there are some good reasons to be skeptical of the latest acquisition by XXI. Over the years I think that WXXI has engaged in an expansion  that is quite unique among Public Broadcasting outlets and I believe exceeded its mission to provide incisive public broadcasting. Its actions are more consistent with a large corporation which aims at integrated power than the public interest. To be sure WXXI still provides a lot of worthwhile programming, but I think it does less than it could if it actually focused on its core mission.

WXXI president Norm Silberstein praised the CITY acquisition  as providing a model of how the modern corporation ought to operate, and to have a presence over a wide variety of platforms. The closest analogue to what Silverstein describes is the vertical integration of the large media conglomerates of today. Large corporations now own tv and radio networks, including individual stations, movie studios production studios cable channels and newspapers. Such conglomerates often speak of the advantage of cross platform integration.  They also claim they need concentrated power to counter the rise of digital technologies. However critics of media concentration, which was helped along by Clinton era reforms and which has led to a large decline in the number of independent owners of media outlets, note that it results in far less diversity in ownership.  Fewer independent owners mean fewer perspective, and the increased power of large conglomerates means they can more easily pressure affiliates and cross owned companies to favor viewpoints or produce cultural products than others. Just look at the power that a media corporation like Sinclair has over its affiliates to carry must run editorials that favor the current incumbent Donald Trump. Horizontal integration has a big downside. It leads to a narrowing of the scope of political social and cultural expression in the media and a conservatism in cultural production.

Unfortunately though the years XXI has pursued a strategy which expanded its reach without really providing much in the way of increased services. As far as I can determine this type of horizontal integration of media is unprecedented for a PBS station. WXXI is a large non-profit which has about 15 million dollars a year in income. It runs a television station with several digital subchannels, two radio stations, and has agreements with several other public radio stations. But in addition to this core function it has expanded into areas are unusual.

For quite a while now WXXI has run the governmental access channel in the City of Rochester (CITY 12). When this arrangement first started it displaced public access programming until it was moved to channel 15. It receives several hundred thousand dollars a year and does very little original programming. At first it simply reran WXXI programs on the channel. This led City Newspaper writer Jack Bradigan Spula to complain about the lack of governmental offerings by CITY 12 “Your Government at Work on the Air.” While XXI has done a little bit better in recent years. It runs live broadcasts of governmental meetings and has some original programming, a perusal of the schedule for City 12 it is mostly still XXI reruns. There seemed to be a good bit of cronyism on this arraignment. Gary Walker later a public information officer for the City was originally the Vice President for Television at XXI .  However, unsatisfied with only  this contract, it also bid (unsuccessfully) a decade ago to run PEG channels in the Western suburbs of Monroe county – an area which covers a population even larger than the city. In my research I found that the mixture of Public Broadcasting and Public Access is discouraged, and rarely existed. Public broadcasting and Public Access were meant to be kept separate and to have fundamentally different missions.

Over the years, XXI has been very accommodating to the City. You won’t find much public affairs programing or controversial views on CITY 12, something you might well find on the independently run public access channel RCTV.

WXXI also has an agreement with WRUR the University of Rochester to provide NPR programming on the station. In part this was justified because the weak signal of WXXI AM didn’t reach all of the area. This arraignment came into being however, at a time of turmoil at WRUR where several on air personnel were removed for obscenity violations, and for a while shows were done on tape. Whether XXI should have a major hand in what is supposed to be a student run radio station or whether it was brought in to control unruly students are questions that have not been satisfactorily answered

The merger of WXXI and the Little Theater in which the latter is a semi-autonomous subsidiary corporation was met with a lot of fanfare. According to the announcements at the time, the merger was supposed to enhance the mission of both entities. Because both of these are non-profits there appears to be a bit of a mixture between the two boards of directors Like XXI’s takeover of governmental access, XXI’s merger with a movie theatre is unique. While there are instances of arts organizations and PBS stations having connections, nothing like a movie theatre is involved. After several years of ownership I am not sure what XII adds to the mix. Looking at the schedule of the Little it is really hard to see how xxi enhances its mission other than keeping it from the wolf’s door. XXI however, seems to use the Little to publicize its shows and get itself more recognition. The schedule includes a preview of an xxi-television series, and a movie series sponsored by xxi’s classical  featuring the use of classical music. Couldn’t some of these projects like the XXI promotion and series be done without ownership? Was XXI ownership really the only solution?

Cross ownership of newspapers and TV stations was a point of contention for many years. In 1975 the FCC instituted a rule prohibiting cross ownership of daily newspapers and television stations in the same market. They feared that such cross ownership would create a concentrated quasi monopoly on sources of information. Under the pressure of neo0liberal deregulatory interests this prohibition has been weakened. In 2017 the FCC repealed cross ownership rules. Advocates for cross ownership, like Rochester’s WXXI argue that  this is necessary to save newspapers by creating economies of scale. The questions about reducing diversity of views remains unanswered.

To be sure, CITY newspaper was not a daily and not probably covered by this prohibition, still I think it’s a matter of concern. Supporters of the WXXI City acquisition risk being  guilty of inconsistent reasoning. Say for example Rupert Murdoch bought the Democrat and Chronicle. You can bet that even if it is allowed, people would be complaining, and if as is likely cross ownership of newspapers and local stations grows, there will be concerns. Too many think however, that since WXXI is benign they give it a pass. Malign or benign however, media concentration is not beneficial to the public. Cross ownership will lead to a narrowing of the spectrum of views.

The acquisition of CITY newspaper presents another problem from an administrative point of view. CITY will remain a for-profit while being a subsidiary of the non-profit, WXXI.  As funding for non-profits have dried up this has become an appealing option. The non-profit can get distributions from the for-profit, and get more income. In the neo-liberal era in addition non-profits have been under pressure to  However care has to be taken to avoid making the for-profit entity a vehicle of the non-profit, otherwise the non-profit can lose its mission and act like a profit-making entity. I’m sure that WXXI has lawyers to advise them on the legal niceties, one wonders exactly  what kind of effect the two entities have on each other and whether the mixing of a non-profit with a for profit subsidiary will have detrimental effects. In general however, the neo-liberal influences on the non-profits sector have been negative. Non-profits with social justice missions are often be redirected to serve middle class or elites rather than the poor or those with problems they were originally meant to serve.

Over the years Public Broadcasting stations as well as the national network have faced challenging financial and political conditions, that have weakened its commitment to the social justice elements of its mandate. Never given a secure stream of funding (say like the BBC) they have had to seek outside sources of funding. And they have faced a barrage of criticism from conservatives who fear the airing of critical perspectives on our society. While the Nixon administration raised political opposition to PBS, in the Reagan era privatization efforts, cut funding so deeply that CPB (the corporation that runs PBS – not to be confused with local stations like WXXI) was forced to seek even more outside corporate funding. PBS is not derisively called the Petroleum Broadcasting System for nothing. The corporate influence on PBS has led to even more caution in airing controversial programming. The network flagship news program, was consistently the most conservative of all news shows feature commentators  and guests on from the center and right.  Later on with a more conservative head of the network, leftish programmers like ex LBJ cabinet member Bill Moyers found considerable difficulty keeping his show on PBS. Throughout the country including Rochester, attempt to show Amy Goodman’ democracy Now news show were for the most part rebuffed.

Most observers have already noted that the insecure funding of public broadcasting has led it astray from the social justice aspects of its original mission. Born of a time of social conflict, the advocates of a public television argued persuasively that many groups including minorities were virtually invisible. Not only had network TV presented a commercialized and sanitized view of US society, it had failed in its imperative to present socially significant and contentious issues before the public. Critics had long argued that the democratic potential of media like radio and later television was stifled in a purely commercial system. The establishment of a non-commercial public broadcasting system was supposed to an element and to address the pressing public problems of the time.

Certainly what is true on the national level is echoed by local stations. The endless drives for contributors and the need or local business and corporate support certainly shapes programming decisions. Although back in the distant past Rochester was the home of some experimental shows its more recent history has been less adventurous. I enjoy some of the many British imports shown on XXI and the concerts with the dinosaurs from my time, and plenty of people enjoy the cooking shows and home improvement shows like this old house, but when I think of the mission to provide controversial public affairs programming or brings those invisible on the tv broadcasting of the past into the light, it falls short. PBS retains its Frontline documentary series and XXI devotes an entire half-hour a week, to its Need to Know program, but these shows play a subaltern role. When is the last time you saw a labor union show on XXI or local shows that dissented from the gentlemen’s agreement to avoid the dirtier realities of life in Rochester, Rather than expanding to other media, I think that it ought to do more to make its local public affairs programming more challenging and comprehensive, not to run a newspaper which itself has become rather moribund and accommodating too?

WXXI has followed in this more domesticated version of public broadcasting, and while this is no doubt an element in its success in a more conservative community like Rochester, it diverges from its vision of promoting democratic discussion and awareness. You don’t see a lot of union programs or in-depth investigations of Rochester’s deep and persistent poverty.  During the long goodbye of Kodak and Xerox I don’t recall WXXI giving over a lot of time to questions of deindustrialization and vast economic changes here that generated today’s inequality. Like most of the Rochester media they treated it as a nature like force rather than a political economic one in which power is transferred.

WXXI’s domesticated version of Public Broadcasting is to my mind a bit pretentious. It brags that it is “the essential life-long educational public media resource for the greater Rochester area. WXXI engages the community with programming that stimulates and expands thought, inspires the spirit, opens cultural horizons and promotes understanding of diverse issues.” While it’s a given that most mission statements contain fluff, this one is significant for what it doesn’t say. It is a rather bland almost conservative/elitist statement of the edifying force of culture, but little about the role of public television as an agent for creating popular democracy.  But the importance of art education and cultural innovation, in which I include not just high culture, but popular culture is not simply edifying or morally uplifting, rather it lies in its character as unsettling and disruptive.  It encourages us not just to feel good, but to think critically.

While some on the right may fear a left-wing takeover of the media it has been a long time since CITY newspaper was a courageous critic of establishment ideas. It has pretty much embraced and defended Rochester’s current mayor, hardly a flaming radical, and overlooked many of her flaws and as media analyst like Rachel Barnhart have noted does very little in the way of local investigative journalism or critical analysis of city politics.

Nor do I think the seeds of any new cultural movements will emerge out of this new combination, as they did when the beats and elements of protest counter cultures were aired on Pacifica Radio in the 50’s and 60’s.  A more likely outcome is a bland homogenization of local culture, with staff cutbacks and combined services, taking whatever spirit is left of CITY’s cultural reporters and columnists.

Media are central elements in a public sphere which needs to be wide ranging and even a bit anarchic. New voices will emerge out of a less centralized and organized cultural spaces. We need a variety of voices including the ones sometimes thought to be unruly. Monopoly or at least oligopolistic control which is the norm in media now is in many ways a threat to democracy. While WXXI and City hardly will challenge the real oligopolies that dominate Rochester media, I still think it goes in the wrong direction, one of accommodation not challenge. They both need to be more open to alternative voices.  

 

 

Public Libraries: The Challenge of Commercialization

An article in Forbes magazine recently caused a stir when the author argued that libraries were obsolete and ought to be replaced by Amazon and Starbucks. Why spend tax money, he asked, when commercial providers and meeting places can provide the same services? The article, however, goes beyond economic concerns, challenging the idea that a library, a service equally open to all without regard to wealth or social position, is even a public good.

 The system of public libraries is a uniquely American invention, centered on the idea that democracy requires an educated and informed populace with access to the information and resources necessary to achieve that goal. Along with the establishment of public schools, libraries were the vehicle for the education of working-class Americans, including the wave of new immigrants. They provided reading materials and meeting places, and encouraged lifelong education. Most importantly, they did so on a free and universal basis. Rich and poor, old and young, educated or not, all could meet at the library. Newly educated professionals curated the emerging system in the public interest.

Commercialization of public spaces poses a threat to the idea of free and equal public spaces open to all. In the commercial public space, access to information depends on the financial resources to obtain them, and such places often reproduce existing social and political hierarchies, discouraging a true public sphere. Imagine a poor person or a grandparent hanging out with the hip crowd at Starbucks in a book discussion group. At the same time, internet public spaces are often influenced by commercial concerns. The aim of Facebook, in the words of one of its founders, is to put eyeballs on the screen for potential advertisers. To have Amazon or a social network like Facebook curate media is to surrender the public interest to the interests of advertisers.

Calls to eliminate libraries are ironic since libraries are still going strong. In the previous decade library usage went up over 30%. Recent cuts in funding has led to a small decline but the Pew Foundation notes that libraries are especially popular among millennials. Restoration of funding cuts would stem any decline.  They are still a vital resource for young people, the elderly, and those interested in continuing education.

To maintain a vital and informed democratic public, we must put our resources into services like public libraries and oppose attempts to commercialize and monetize public goods. It is the only way to guarantee free and equal access to information for all.

 

 

 

 






 

 
 

The further adventures of the disappearing public access channels

You may have noticed a change in the new Spectrum cable channel lineup. Public Educational and Educational Channels have been moved to a much higher tier where they will be more difficult to watch. Unless you still had analog cable service in which case you already lost these channels without a digital converter.  Then you would have to find it on channel 97.1 2 or 3. If you want to watch a town board meeting you will have to make an effort to do so.

This type of maneuver is called channel slamming. Cable operators eager to free up space for new HDTV services are exiling channels designed to serve the public interest to cable Siberia. They thumb their nose at the public.

Cable TV was not supposed to be like that. Back in the early 1970's when cable owners sought expansion of cable services from a mere retransmitter of network signals to multichannel systems. They espoused what was called a blue skies outlook. In place of the scarcity of network broadcast channels it was going to provide an abundance of channels and greatly expanded menu of choices. Long before the digital age cable was promoted as an electronic superhighway, but cable was also supposed to be different. it was to provide on the one hand a menu of hyper local services, in order to give communities that had little voice on the network-based system, and it was to provide interactive, educational informational and even entertainment programming that was not going to be modeled on the network frame. Central to those aims were the establishment of Public Educational and Governmental channels which were meant to provide local content produced by and for the local community. They were also the result of a long struggle going back all the way to establishment of the radio broadcasting system, to provide a voice for ordinary citizens who could never afford to compete financially with the large established corporate networks. The facilities equipment and operating funds to run these channels was supposed to be provided by the cable companies from franchise fees paid by these companies to local municipalities.

There is a lot more I could say about the development of public access but for the purposes of this blog what is important is the stipulation that these local channels were supposed to be carried on the first tier of cable channels. Originally that meant the first 13 channels. The idea was that the local access channels run by and for the local community were supposed to be given priority. They were to be easily accessible to all subscribers. Companies were not allowed to bump channels up to a higher l level.

 All that has changed. Cable companies quickly abandoned their commitments to public service and the promise to create an alternative to network television. In order to build audiences, they filled their channels with old reruns of network shows and followed the network model. Once cable became a big industry original pioneers who were more like small business visionaries, were bought up and ownership became concentrated in the same corporate behemoths that cable was supposed to supplant. Public access instead of being welcomed became something to marginalize. They took up space that could be used for profit If the cable companies couldn't get rid of access they could do all they could including chronic underfunding and channel slamming to make it seem useless.

 Still there were some limits. New York state cable regulations still dictate that public access channels be carried on the lowest possible tier. Section 895.4 of the regulations of the PSC states "Channels designated for PEG use shall be included in the lowest level of service offered by the cable television franchisee,"

That seems straightforward. however, the notion of what constitutes the lowest tier had been redefined over the years.  Several years ago, when access channels disappeared from the analogue service I asked the PSC about this. All sudden the notion of "basic service" was defined as the first 99 channels and not the 2-13 or 2-16 as it has been done in the past. They didn't ask any of us about that or even inform us. Other municipalities in the state protested, Not Rochester. In addition, to get access channels on the analogue service you had to have a converter box which while free at first included a charge later on.

Still when access channels suddenly switched to the 1300 tier it seemed hard to find a way to see these as first tier channels. So, I decided to call the PSC and find out. That turned out to be a mistake.

 The first thing you are told at the PSC is to contact your cable company about your complaint. They really don't want to hear form the public or be bothered by them. I had to explain that my question had to do with PSC regulations, Since the cable company didn't seem to be abiding by them I needed to talk to the regulators. So I got over that hoop. But when I told the staff person I was asking about PEG regulations she didn't know what I was talking about. I had to explain to her that the term meant Public Educational and Governmental Programming. You would expect someone in a regulatory body to know that. She didn't know the answer to my question about carrying peg channels on the lowest tier, so she put me on hold to get an answer. I never got to talk with a commissioner or anyone who specialized in telecommunications. After being on hold I got what I consider to be either an ignorant answer. I was told that the only local cable channel required on the first tier was the spectrum local news channel?

 As you might imagine I was nonplussed. This was a brand new even unique interpretation of these requirements. Even when I talked to the PSC several years ago they cited the idea that such channels must be on the lowest tier -- they just reinterpreted it. I told the staff person as politely as I could that this did not seem to be consistent with the PSC own regulations and explained to her my earlier interactions with the PSC. That didn't get me anywhere. My only option is to petition for a ruling at the PSC.  But this never leads to a resolution in favor of consumers.

 It is frustrating when the regulators who are meant to serve the public interest are ignorant of their own regulations and constantly reinterpret the rules to favor the groups they are supposed to be regulating. It undermines faith in the governments ability to protect the public interest. But this should not be surprising. Many academics who study consumer regulation and protection, speak of something called regulatory capture. Agencies that are set up to protect the consumer or the public from dangerous or illegal practices, often become captured by the very interests they set out to regulate. There is a big financial incentive for this. Once regulators leave their position, their knowledge of rules and regulations and the ways to circumvent them are in demand by regulated interests, they can get a big payout becoming lobbyists for these industries if they keep in line when they serve as commissioners.

 

Connected Communities and Purpose-Built Communities

 One of the initiatives begun by RMAPI is a project they call connected communities. It is a project to revitalize the Beechwood and EMMA neighborhoods of the City of Rochester "utilizing the proven principles of the Purpose-Built Communities framework" These principles include" the need for mixed-income housing, cradle-to-career education, community health and wellness, and long-term economic development, and ultimately reduce poverty."  The principles stated on the Connected Communities Web Site are identical with those of Purpose Driven Communities As with the collective impact model I think the evidence for these "proven principles" is limited and at best ambiguous. Moreover, it represents principles driven by foundations with a corporate agenda not necessarily in the best interests of the community and especially the poor.

 We should look beyond the fancy marketing and rhetoric and take a closer look at what the Purpose-Built Community framework is and what is the main source of its claims to success.

Purpose Built Communities is a foundation concerned with Urban redevelopment originally started by well-known financial magnate Warren Buffet. hedge fund manager Julian Robertson and real estate magnate Tom Cousins. Its aim is to replicate the so-called success of the East Lake project started by Cousins. It might give the reader pause to reflect on whether a foundation started by these men who have made so much of the financial sectors necessarily has the interests of the poor in mind. 

The East Lake project which is the underpinning of the claims involved a transformation of the East Lake neighborhood in Atlanta by Cousins twenty years ago.  In the 1990's it was one of the worst neighborhoods in the area with high crime poverty and a rundown public housing project. Cousins came in and bought the golf course in the neighborhood and put a lot of his own money into the project. 

Under Cousins direction the housing project was replaced by mixed income housing. Not all residents of the older housing were allowed back. There were strict requirements on the new housing. Felons for example were excluded. As a result 75% of the residents of the project left the area. Local public schools were replaced by Charter Schools, but here too students were cherry picked. The best ones attended the charter schools while the rest ended up in depleted public schools. Cousins also used pressure to get members of his new exclusive iteration of the golf club to give donations to the foundation he set up.

 Cousins initiatives had some success, crime went down considerably, and educational results seemingly improved, but at what cost. His plan did not revitalize the neighborhood as much as inducing a forced gentrification and resettlement program which improved the makers of the neighborhood through gentrification. 

A study led by Georgia State University Sociologist Deidre Oakley concluded that despite some marginal improvements, possibly caused by a soft rental market there, was no real change in the situation of those displaced by the East Lake project. She notes that that, at least statistically, the communities in which those homes are located are only marginally better than the old AHA projects: They still have high rates of violent crime, are overwhelmingly poor and are racially segregated. Instead of doing away with pockets of poverty, GSU's study indicates that the elimination of the housing projects simply caused most of those pockets to reform elsewhere. Pockets of poverty were simply displaced. Thus, the evidence of success that purpose built proponents cite is somewhat shaky, More recently Oakley I cited s in another article detailing the decrease in affordable housing in the Atlanta area, This will put more pressure on the displaced poor.

 Purpose Built community initiatives have not always been welcome with the alacrity shown in Rochester. A 2012 initiative proposed in Chattanooga brought widespread criticism from residents who objected to forced resettlement when housing projects would be torn down. There was little consultation with the community and little sense of how they viewed their own problems according to these critics.

 

IBM and collective impact or always follow the money

In a previous blog I discussed the collective impact model in order to discover exactly what the term describes and discuss some of the weaknesses according to critics. Here I want to ask another question. How did this model get adopted in Rochester. When you are looking at a political or policy decision of this sort it is often helpful to ask who has the power in this situation to get policies established. Power doesn't always mean just persuading or coercing someone to do what you want. It often means the ability to set the agenda for a project. If a person or group gets to set the rules they have the power to direct a process or project. How was the decision made to follow a collective impact model? It certainly wasn't the case that community partners and social work agencies got together to adopt, the impetus came from outside the community,

I mentioned that much of the impetus for the adoption of collective impact models came from foundations who were quick to adopt these models. In the case of RMAPI it seems that an IBM Smart Cities grant was the source of the initiative. IBM has given these grants to United Ways in places like the research triangle in North Carolina when they adapt the collective impact model of community services. In 2015 the Rochester United Way also got an IBM Smart Cities Challenge Grant. As part of this grant the IBM foundation seeks to find ways to get cities to address the future by making unban services more efficient. Sometimes these grants  concern ways to create greener and more sustainable cities. In other cases, like Rochester, they concern improving social services. As part of the grant IBM "contributes the skills and expertise of top IBM talent" to study critical challenges facing communities. They made a three week visit to an area and meet with "key stakeholders" to determine areas in which the RMAPI project is held back. You can imagine who the key stakeholders were. They were most likely political and business leaders, not the people effected by poverty. Most of  these recommendations have to do with questions  of efficiency and implementation of collective impact principles. Their recommendations are detailed in the report Rochester, New York Smart Cities Challenge Report.

The first thing you notice about this report is its technocratic approach. Poverty is addressed the same way a business might approach a supply problem. There is little in the way of poltical economic or sociological analysis of problems. It never assumes that power asymmetries or forms of domination have anything to do with poverty. Rather, it assumes that the current arrangements are suitable to solve the problems of poverty. Thus, the problems of poverty have to do with misalignment between services. The report claims that Rochester has sufficient social services, the problem is the way they are delivered. Thus, using the same type of principles used by collective impact. the problems of poverty are going to be addressed through a reorganization of social services using a notion of central organization. Data services like those provided by IBM will give us a greater idea of where services can be developed more efficiently, and proactive services will address populations before problems arise rather than after. This means providing support and services. to support those seeking jobs like daycare and other services to make sure that there are fewer barriers to get jobs. Using data services, the they will not only be able to share services but be able to measure results with data and guide decisions on poverty.

Let's think about this project for a minute. It certainly seems to be a top down project that essentially imports a business/technological model onto a complex social problem. It assumes that we can measure al aspects of poverty with a common measure. But what if the problems causing poverty  are not just technical but poltical. Poor people notoriously are not well organized and not effective politically. They often have a limited understanding of poltical processes not because of any inherent ability but lack of access. They have little chance to set agendas or exert influence. What if the aim of a nonprofit aims to make people better more effective citizens who have political impact. How do you measure that with a data set? This raises a more general problem with the collective impact approach which emphasizes quantitative measures of impact. It is an open question whether a one size fits all approach to data driven solutions can measure all the impacts. Nor is it clear that if we subordinate all groups to a central czar and imposed common measures, that we will not lose some of these other goals values and impacts which are not measurable in the way collective impact theories propose.

There is a second set of related concerns that revolve around the sources of poverty. For some collective impact theorists, the problems of poverty stem from system complexity and not from the organization of social power. That is they stem from problems of coordinating an economy that has many segments and elements. Addressing poverty also is a problem of coordination to address the problems of complexity. OF course, the idea of recasting poltical problems as issues of systems complexity without looking at problems of power has little chance of succeeding on the scale that RMAPI suggests. If for example an unregulated market economy in which power is distributed unequally will always generate a degree of poverty, then it is hard to see how questions of coordination help us avoid poverty. Mostly the collective impact programs stress individualized solutions to poverty. But if larger poltical economic forces continue to generate poverty then how does greater coordination of services make an impact. What is really needed are redistributive processes that counter the concentrated power of some groups in our economy,

In America today, good jobs are at a premium. Wages are stagnant and job growth has often been in low wage jobs. Work has become increasingly casual and contingent with few benefits or health. care. Some analysts have adopted the notion of precarity or precariousness to characterize the new economy. It is no longer possible to Increasingly the worker is one her own with fewer of the social supports that we had just a generation earlier. Some economists and conservatives like to see this as giving the individual freedom she needs to cope with a rapidly changing economy. For most however, it just leads to greater insecurity. The gap between the rich and the poor is greater than it has been for a century. These are not really system problems of complexity but poltical ones.  I don't see how we effectively deal with the continuing generation of poverty without addressing these larger problems.

 

Following the Wrong Map

Rochester's anti-poverty initiative RMAPI (Rochester-Monroe Anti-Poverty Initiative) is in the news again. In a story in the December 31 2017 Rochester Democrat and Chronicle Internal Documents reveal early challenges for Rochester anti-poverty initiative, reporter Patti Singer details some of the struggles RMAPI has had clarifying it's program and aims and in implementing them. Almost three years after the initiative was announced in Jan 2015 there are few if any results. Poverty in Rochester has declined 1% in the past few years but is still among the highest in the nation. Although City officials and RMAPI claim this as a success there is no real evidence that would lead us to conclude that this small amount of decline is the result of RMAPI programs or other factors like a steady if slow growth in the economy in the Obama years.

Many in the community have begun to wonder just what RMAPI does and where the money has gone. And as the title of the article indicates the exact nature of the RMAPI program remains unclear. Investigative journalists like Rachel Barnhart have attempted to find out exactly how RMAPI operates, how much money it gets and where it goes. These and others are important efforts to shed light on processes that are hidden behind layers of an organization that is not especially transparent.  What we also need however, is critical analysis of the aims of RMAPI programs.

In light of this questioning RMAPI director Leonard Brock tried to clarify the role of RMAPI.  It is not a social service agency that is it does not carry out any social work or other activity. Nor does it distribute money. It is not a 501(c)(3) corporation and does not administer funds although it has an influence over funding. According to Barnhart's research it does not even have a bank account. RMAPI is closely allied if not a part of the United Way. much of the grant money seems to go through the United way. Because it is not a nonprofit however it is not accountable to the public.

RMAPI understands itself more as an operating philosophy than a social service agency. Put another way it is an organization that aims at implementing an operational framework across a variety of agencies.  It is the tool of that policy. According to Brock that policy is something called collective impact It brings together stakeholders who he defines as leaders from business education and government to address the problems of racism and poverty.

Thus, the idea of collective impact is at the core of the RMAPI project. When we understand how collective impact operates we will more clearly understand what RMAPI does. But what is the idea of collective impact? Does it in fact provide such a powerful organizational vision that we should adopt it as the model to address poverty. Brock seems to think so. He says the RMAPI project is to be the model for all of New York State. Like other managerial catchphrases such as TQM and best practices, however.  their actual  meaning has to be unpacked carefully

The notion of collective impact is a relatively new organizational philosophy. It was first introduced in a 2011 article by John Kanis and Mark Kramer in Stanford Social Innovation Review. Collective Impact was a method of collaborative organization that is meant to address complex social problems. According to the authors it is "the commitment of a group of important actors from different sectors to a common agenda for solving a specific social problem" Collective impact is meant to be an organizational tool for bringing about change in sectors where older methods have proved ineffective. Thus, while the idea in its most direct form seems to be much like older forms of collaboration the authors argue it is a more intensive and organized form of collaboration. "Unlike most collaborations, collective impact initiatives involve a centralized infrastructure, a dedicated staff, and a structured process that leads to a common agenda, shared measurement, continuous communication, and mutually reinforcing activities among all participants." This sounds a lot like the ideas behind RMAPI. They state that all agencies and stakeholders like government and business be linked under a central directive or coordinating agency behind a common goal. It is supposed to be the centralized infrastructure to serve as what the authors call the "backbone agency."

The Collective impact outlook is based in diagnosis of the problems of social service and social change agencies in a neo-liberal era. The shrinking of state services has often lead to the outsourcing and privatizing of social services. This leads on the one hand to a fragmentation of services in isolated groups who are not coordinated or connected. On the other hand, it leads to a competition in which winners and losers are designated and governments and foundations try to guess what agencies will be best to carry out these functions. Critics of outsourcing and privatizing in the non-profit sphere have been quick to point out the destructive effects of these policies. Not only does the constant competition for funding take up an inordinate amount of time, they also change the goals of the social service sector to serve the demands of the funders who often serve more middle class and elite aims. These “reform” are ways of disciplining and shaping social service providers so they don't get too progressive or too out of line and they limit their social justice agendas. The neo-liberal outsourcing of services then can't be seen independent of certain poltical aims. Power is employed to change the goals of social services. It takes power away from groups that often have more direct grass roots contact with the poor and from justice projects and transfers it to funding agencies which often have quite different more middle-class concerns.

The collective impact outlook understands itself as an alternative to this fragmenting process, but critics are not sure that it really makes a meaningful change. The aims are not changed, just the process. Collective impact is a way of making the operation of social services more efficient and more effective. Even if we were to grant its claim that it is a better way to organize services, (something I will dispute later) it does not really have a lot to say about the goals of social services. And this is crucial. If as critics say neo-liberal policies have changed the ability of nonprofit to define these goals how does it achieve a change in goals. Further should we assume that the social problems that collective impact theorists want to address are really the result of fragmented or uncoordinated social services. Collaboration is a good thing when done correctly but it is hardly a panacea absent a clear notion of the processes and goals of social change.

Despite these questions the wave of collective impact has taken the nonprofit sector by storm. The authors promoted it extensively through their own consulting business. It has become the next big thing in the nonprofit sector. It is, however largely a top down business model. Governments, educational institutions and others have adopted it as way of organizing projects. Many foundations now require that applicant formulate a collective impact plan before getting a grant. So, no doubt this influence has trickled down to the RMAPI program. The savvy grant applicant quickly learns the latest buzz words and perhaps even believes them. This is unfortunate because as critics point out the evidence for the effectiveness and success of collective impact was based on a slim thread of two small case studies not even carried out by the authors. More recent studies have found collective impact of more limited effectiveness. Hardly the kind of robust support an idea sweeping non-profit sector would seem to require. One of the cases, an obesity reduction program in the state of Massachusetts hardly seems relevant. it focused on the changing individual behavior of students to get them to reduce their level of obesity. Perhaps in this example the focus on individual behavior can work to an extent, but it is difficult to see how a primary focus on the individual is going to be very effective in addressing the two-headed beast of race and poverty. From low wages to inaccessibility of good jobs to housing shopping and financial sector issues, not to mention structural racism, individuals face barriers that are embedded in institutional rules and practices. The individualizing approach which stresses personal qualities and responsibility is more a feature of neo-liberalism than progressive change.

Other critics of collective impact like Tom Wolff have pointed not only to its slim evidential base but to many flaws in its basic approach. It ignores years of evidence that practitioners in the field have accumulated regarding collaboration and community development. Some of these criticisms are pretty telling. First, the decision-making process that is proposed is a very top down one. It audience is the social and poltical elite who they assume are the crucial policy makers more than the community. Kramer and Kanis focus explicitly on these leaders and social service agencies as the members of their collaborative group. One practitioner claims that collective Impact is about bringing “CEO-level cross-sector leaders together”

 We have seen this problem at work in RMAPI too. Community members were included only after pressure. However, the inclusion of a few community members does not a democratic process make. A related problem with the centralization of power concerns the ability to set rules and set agendas for all. Collective impact theory tends to ignore the experience of past collaborative efforts by community organizers, Rules and agendas can often be set in a top down almost technocratic way. Just as in the neo liberal model, the top down procedure tends to exclude or discount this set of insights and act more to discipline groups.

The model of collaboration used by collective impact theories then tends to favor the status quo over change. The members of governments and businesses have interests in retaining certain elements of the status quo, or to develop leaders who follow a top down approach. While a collective impact approach tends to be limited to efficiencies with the system, the social justice component found in much traditional social work is limited. A social justice perspective is normative, or value oriented it deals with an end or goal like social equity. THat is why the problem of measuring progress is not always cut and dried. The measurement of such a value is not independent of the goal.  True social justice approaches seek social change by changing policies and process to make them more responsive and more open to problem of injustice.

Too often the kind of foundation support that is the backdrop for these efforts is sponsored by elite groups with their own agendas. Some of the foundations that have been mentioned by RMAPI have been formed by hedge fund managers who for example have interests in gentrification. While not every foundation grant is suspect, this reinforces the conception that the agenda for collective impact projects like RMAPI are driven by external interests with their own agendas.

 The biggest problem with the collective impact theory is that leaves out the major group effected by impact the people themselves. In contrast to collective impact theories community development theories look to organize and empower those who are affected by problems. They not only have to have a seat and the table they must have to power to act to set agendas and propose alternatives. Genuine collaboration also means allowing existing social service groups to make authentic contributions and contribute their experience without having their ideas rendered moot by a clumsy central agency. Collaboration must be a fair process. Wolfe and his cohorts have recently stated this clearly "We believe that efforts that do not start with treating community leaders and residents as equal partners cannot later be reengineered to meaningfully share power. In short, coalitions and collaborations need a new way of engaging with communities that leads to transformative changes in power, equity, and justice."

Taking the D And C article at face value it appears that some of the problems critics raise about the collective impact have come home to roost in RMAPI. More than 2 years after its formation the top down centralized authority seems to have great difficulty getting all groups on board. Older groups according to Brock seem unwilling to buy in to the RMAPI version of collaboration but this could just as easily be an example of the leadership disregarding the past experiences of existing groups with collaboration, The social justice issue arises in conflicts with County Executive Cheryl DlNolfo. She seems unwilling to accept the idea that structural racism exists or should be addressed by RMAPI.  Questions of efficient services and collaboration will however, not get very far without a value consensus that collaborative impact theories do not address.