The Davos Speech: Will our principles determine our pragmatism, or will pragmatism leave principles behind?
PM Carney's Davos speech is certainly one for these times. I welcome it and take a certain pride in it. (Though read on, there is a significant “but" to come.)
It is remarkable to hear this degree of relatively unvarnished clarity from a political leader, something we have grown simply to never expect. We anticipate the thuggish, cruel, narcissistic incoherence of Donald Trump, the tyrannical egotism of Putin, Xi and Modi, or the duplicitous timidity and just blatantly empty (often toxic) partisanship of the rest. What we crave and need is thoughtfulness, and a refusal to take up the acrimony, hyperbole and viciousness that has come to dominate political discourse. Imagine, if you will: intelligence, with a helping of courage and integrity, and even just plain common sense.
The PM calls it out in ways that are evident to the masses, but ignored by the elites. He does speak of and to the world "as it is". And he essentially trashes it. We need that. For there is undeniably so much that is broken and full of betrayal in that world. And he is right on so many fronts: we have been living within Havel's lie, nostalgia is not a strategy, a world of fortresses will be poorer, more fragile, and less sustainable, and we must apply the same standards to allies and rivals (yes, to dream of a world of consistency).
And he is of course right that the "old order is not coming back." What he misses though - and it is a big miss - is that there are billions of people, everywhere, who do not in any way want that old order back anyway. (There are of course very different understandings of what it offered and for whom, depending on where you live, including whether you have a home to live in, whether your land has been stolen, who you are, how much money you have invested in the stock market and, thus, how you are treated.) They never put the greengrocer's sign in the window and pretended all was good and right. They knew that was far from reality. They knew that there was no pretense that one of the cornerstones of that fabled old order - the promise of universal human rights - was on offer. They knew, and still do, that human rights have instead long been an exclusive clubhouse that doesn't even try to put the sign in the window.
But that does not mean that we rip up and jettison the expectation that is at the heart and foundation of the promise. For while PM Carney has now repeatedly told us to eschew longing or waiting for "a world we wish to be", I will not go there. Because when it comes to universal human rights, we simply can't.
We do need realism. We need new strategies and wider allies. We need to be more resilient and self-reliant. And we certainly would benefit from both strengthened and new norms and institutions.
But that cannot only be to make sure that our prosperity grows and grows, that our militaries are strong and effective, and that critical minerals are more readily exploited.
It has to be, in my view, marshaled towards, certainly not the world "as it is" and not either the world we "wish to be", but with singular, determined focus on the world we know, in our heart and in our souls, "must be". It is not about giving up on dreamy idealism, it is about digging deeper into conviction and solidarity.
That is where I want and need to hear more. Alongside the growing list of new (not always problem free, lets be clear) trade deals and strategic economic partnerships, where are the new human rights action and resource strategies, and the new alliances and networks to lift up the vital role of DEI as it comes under withering attack? Who is stepping in to staunch the death and suffering unleashed by genocide and repression? Who is going to save the planet from climate doom? None of that is nostalgic fancifulness, it is necessity. The old order didn't give a dam, we know that. Will the new order, or is that too much wishfulness?
And so I cannot countenance that alongside this disavowal of the old order, what is on offer so far is deepening economic ties with China which leave human rights off the table, the embarrassing notion that our PM might actually be prepared to join Donald Trump's Gaza "Board of Peace" or the fact that we continue to keep our land border closed to those who face his vicious war on migrants and refugees.
The PM ends by reminding us that we have the capacity to "act together". Indeed. In our neighbourhoods and across the country, and by reaching out to longstanding global partners, and with peoples and nations we have overlooked and abused.
He insists as well that our way forward must and will be "principled and pragmatic". I could not agree more. It is the only way we move. But, that is where we need to hear more. Just where are we headed with our pragmatism? We need confident reassurance that principles are indeed the lifeblood of the new order and the pragmatism is all about how to get there.
