David Marquand in New Statesman:
For Burke, Bromwich tells us, the relationship between the people and the political elite was that of patient to doctor. Popular disorder was a symptom of a malady disturbing the body politic. The statesman’s task was to interpret it, as a physician’s task was to interpret a physical symptom. Repression was rarely the right medicine; therein lay the meaning of Burke’s vicious attacks on the British government’s inept handling of the disorders in the American colonies. But though wise doctors listen to their patients, they do so the better to understand the symptoms. At the last resort, it is their responsibility to rely on their professional judgement to decide how the disease should be treated. To do anything else is to betray their calling. In the same way, members of parliament must make up their own minds how to represent their constituents. They should listen – but they should also listen to other representatives of other constituents. They owe their electors their independent, un-coerced judgement of what is best for the country as a whole and not just for their constituency. That is what it means to be a representative: representatives are not delegates. This high view of the relationship between electors and elected, Bromwich argues, was shared by James Madison, the most intellectually fertile of the founding fathers of the American republic.
It is an arresting thought. Amartya Sen’s democracy – democracy as public reasoning – is impossible without social spaces in which reasoning can take place. With all the manifold failings of today’s American republic, the complex checks and balances that have been central to US federalism from the beginning offer a template for a system in which Sen-style democracy could flourish. I like to think that if Burke were to return from the grave, he would campaign for a British constitution based on the principle of devolved power. He was, after all, the great champion of what he called “the little platoons”, which he saw as the nurseries of public affection.
More here.
