Scruton Lectures 2021 - Jonathan Sumption on Democracy

In conversation with Charles Moore and Chris Patten.
Held at The Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford on 27th October 2021.
Please obtain the relevant permissions before re-uploading any Roger Scruton Memorial Lectures video.

[@sirwinston2659]

It is an utter tragedy that we never got to see Scruton and Sumption have an actual conversation together

[@youdoyouandletsgetalong1374]

Sumption is a great man.

[@RevRMBWest]

And he is also a very gracious man.

[@Lawsonsco2012]

I could listen to Sumption speak forever.

[@joshyboy3730]

Sumption has a legendary intellect. Wish I'd watched more of him during the lockdowns

[@tom5216]

I have always been in awe of Jonathan Sumption’s intelligence and understanding of things in general.

[@johnhauber6458]

Every sentence is a memorable quote!

[@richardwills-woodward]

Britain has very different history to continental European countries. Sumption seems to lump GB in with the rest of Europe. The differences are black and white they are so vast. The UK was the first industrialised country due to its institutions that were so different to the rest of the world. The US was born from this and both countries continued huge growth until Britain [relatively] slowed during and after the second world war in particular. Most of the world had no countries until the 20th century. Most were kingdoms or no-man's land at war with others. The reason the home of parliamentary democracy is under threat is because the Left has abandoned the concept of losing elections. They wish to use tech to assert control. Trump is a reaction to this, so is Bolsonaro and Le Pen et al. If the Left were not trying to destroy our lives, now through Net Zero, none of this would be happening. Democracy is under attack and so a strong man (or woman) is required as we are at war....for our liberty and entire future. Without Britain, there would be no concept of [modern] democracy. There would be no liberty nor freedom of speech, nor common law, contract law as it now presents itself. Britain was the beating heart of the modern world. It is (as a matter of recorded history) not just another European country. Britain changed the planet. This is not taught. This is not known amongst so many young people. Indeed even Churchill is only favoured by 20% of young people according to recent surveys. Utterly horrendous. We are in a fight for that adversarial, normal, democratic times in the UK. Does this bring some undesirable side effects? Yes. But there is no solution other than to fight for our heritage, history, culture and way of life. There is no better alternative in human history. I do not want an EU way of life or future, I do not want even an American one. Neither do I want an Asian one of any variety. I want the one with foundations that whilst life changed, were permanent for hundred of years. I want my property rights respected, I want common law to prevail, contract law to keep its meaning, recourse to law that actually refers to past cases (as common law would) and not decide what the law [should] say in some woke moral vacuum. I wish to have my freedom to move where I wish and when I wish without Net Zero being the proxy to create Berlin style communist 'zones' as is proposed in Canterbury and Oxford where you'll be fined for driving out of a designated zone unless you leave the city and access a ring road to make journeys of a mile increase to 5-10! I want the country that arrests and imprisons criminals. I want a country where you weren't tense to walk down the street incase some foreign mad man comes and stabs you. I want a country where showing pictures of Mohammed doesn't get you put into exile through threats of having your head chopped off, and that threat to be supported by cowardly MP's by their silence. I want a country that rejects invasion by foreign entities that bomb, rape and stab our citizens. Even this is asking too much today. This is why democracy is falling apart. People are not supported, defended, or even able to live free lives from government and minority cultures that are less civilised and antithetical to our own, where law is not applied equally to all, but selects and is lenient on all but the majority and ignores its historical precedents and freedoms. Morality and progress on rights is eroded and used as a weapon against the majority. I could go on. The West is disintegrating through ignorance and programmed weakness and even mental health issues which I cannot begin to understand. Not many years ago, any threat to British liberty and people would have been stamped out. Today, it is encouraged. Everything Britain built is seen as bad. I would like to know what cultural alternative has delivered more for the planet and the happiness of people not only in this country, but on Earth as a whole. More was done in 250 years through this island than the rest of human history combined. But that is evil apparently. It is not enough. We were not enough. We must be extinguished and destroyed for 'the other', for something else. No-one has any idea what that something else is. I know what it is though. It is anarchy, chaos, communism and so many people seem to want this. I have never been so afraid, concerned, tense in every day life as a business person. With all of British history, the moment we have now would be alien just 25 years ago. How can 1,000 years of constitutional development and liberties appear to be eradicated in just two decades with the full support of most MP's. Honi soit qui mal y pense. Domine dirige nos.

[@EricM_001]

From across the Atlantic, thanks to all involved for this interesting talk. The only disappointment was seeing the servants signaling obéissance to authoritarianism via their pointless muzzles of compliance.

[@EppingBlogger]

Presumably Sumptuon was referring to Brexit when he sought to make the point that referenda are only valid if they address a clear issue. But it did that. It was the attempt of the political class to over rule the vote that made it controversial and long drawn out. I was disappointed he made that point because, despite my qualifying comments earlier, I felt able to follow and accept his case. He makes it worse by using the dreadful example of PR put forward by Clegg as a justification for the current syatem. His proposition that any system other than what we have would be more authoritarian and less democratic is ridiculous. Was he tired towards the middle of his address; I don't expect so but how else to explain his analysis. The current UK system does not even get rid of unpopular policies; when the alignment of the Westminster parties is so close, any vote for any of them makes no difference to the big issues. That is why they were all so outraged by the Brexit vite - how dare we rebel! What we need is not more of the current authoritarianism, not more of the curent style of democracy but we need a much more competitive system so the current stale, old, oligololistic, similar parties can be overturned. The low and declining voter turn out suggests my analysis is agreed by the voters. The bigger difficulty today is that any hypothetical "populist" government would be ground down by the opinionated civil service, NGOs, Quangos and the MSM.

[@alexanderclose400]

" It was the attempt of the political class to over rule the vote that made it controversial " That's because the same people who voted to leave had also voted in that political class. The point was that without a clear piece of legislation to be voted on, there was a clash of sovereignty between the two forms of decision making (parliament vs referendum).

[@EppingBlogger]

@@alexanderclose400 There was no clash of sovereignty or constitutional principle. The people had decided to leave and Parliament's duty was to implement that. While there might have been marginal issues of timing and the exact way EU law was taken over by UK law, etc (on which Parliament and the Executive were duty bound to use their resources to deliver a full Brexit asap), the delay for several years after June 2016 and the reservations on Brexit (NI, fishing, financil contributions) was not acceptable and was and remains contrary to the referendum result. I appreciate that the political class disagreed with the referendum result. That is why we needed that referendum and we need the ability for the people to force further ones in the future.

[@alexanderclose400]

@@EppingBlogger There was a moral duty perhaps, but no legal or constitutional one. You can't vote in a load of remain parties then be annoyed that they try to block a referendum, which has no constitutional place in Britain. Parliament is sovereign, even though the referendum is a more crudely evident expression of will. These were contesting mandates. Hence why it took a general election to resolve it. In my opinion that predictable clash caused by the referendum was a disaster as now we've set the precedent of the courts interfering in political decisions.

[@EppingBlogger]

@@alexanderclose400 Our constitutional arrangements are not all recorded in one place and they develop and evolve, perhaps too much and perhaps a more rigid arrangement would be better but when the referendum legislation was passed it was stated in clear terms by the PM and other parties and MPs did not resile from it, that the result would be enacted. The failure of the Conservative Government to present clear, complete and effective exit legislation and without delay was a breach of the promises given. The repeated attempts by other parties, the MSM and individuals to prevent Brexit ought to have been dealt with effectively by the government. Individual MPs had a clear duty to scrutinise, seek improvements but them to agree Brexit legislation. I woukd draw and analogy with the duty of Peers to agree legislation presented to them by the HoC which implements a clear government policy from their election manifesto. In both cases it is the peolpe's will that is uppermost.

[@tradwifeuk2117]

Anarchism capitalism - rules but no rulers. In a homogenous population the rules are enforced by ostracism. It’s getting ‘the homogeneous’ critical thinking culturally trained population is the rub.

[@EppingBlogger]

I suggest that we have not had democracy in Britain since about major/Blair. While mtheir administrations did not start the problem they raised it to a high level and it is this: the MPs and political syatem have little empathy with the people, little connection with them and despise their views. They simply know they are right and, as a self-appointed elite, they should do as they see fit to change the world to their model. It was not economic problems or fear or a lack of optimism among the people that caused our decline in democracy. It was a decision by the political class thet the country was ungovernable so we should hand over to the EU authoritarian bureaucracy. In that structure the political class found they could do as they wished without accountability. There simply has been no significant decline in UK economic circumstances but we have seen extreme promises by politicians whiuch they did not deliver and were never likely to be able to deliver. On fear, we see another story. Booker wrote how the political class used fear to suborn the people: CJB, F&M, now MMGW. All designed and used to put fear in the people and Covid has been a godsend to them. All risks are elevated to a new fear. In short, the problems of democracy, which are very real, are the result of wilfull actions by the international political class and in particular their UK branch. The people must revolt and chose, what they like to condemn as "populism". I am not sure why Sumption referred to the rationality of the people callinbg on the government to save us from Covid. That is not what happened. The state and the "nudge unit" (aka propaganda unit) and the hand maidens in the MSM campaigned for ever more government. It was not a spontaneous public demand, indeed many objected to it. We do not hold governments responsible - they volunteer then apply whatever conytrols they fancy imposing.

[@evolassunglasses4673]

All Liberal Capitalist Democracies in the West are heading in the same direction on all the big issues particularly with mass replacement migration. Democracy = rule by international finance and the forces of open borders Globalisation

[@douglasjones3105]

Another wonderful lecture by Jonathan Sumption. Sceptical about the number of 'likes' though: 238 for a video that has had nearly 10k views, really? That pesky algorithm works in mysterious ways...

[@RobMcGrath0]

Maybe that is about average since the number of dislikes on videos has been hidden? I don't think people indicate positive or negative as much as they used to.

[@EppingBlogger]

Acceptance of the decisons taken by the democratic process is undermined by arroc=gance of the ruling majority and the unified political class. For decades now the Westminster parties have much more emopathy with each other than withg the people they are meant to represent. This is a significant part of the causes of democratic degredation in Britain.

[@markmartens]

"The opposite of democracy is some form of authoritarian government. Of course it's perfectly possible for democracies to confer very substantial coercive powers on the state without losing their democratic character. But there must be a point beyond which the systematic application of coercion is no longer consistent with any notion of collective self-government. The fact that that point is hard to define does not mean that it doesn't exist. A degree of respect for individual autonomy seems, to me at any rate, to be a necessary feature of anything that deserves to be called a democracy." Jonathan Sumption, 'Roger Scruton Memorial Lectures', Oct 2021.

[@hatidjesabri7326]

Lord Sumption mentions two main reasons as to why democracies generally decline: one is the unfulfilled expectation of a brighter future and the second is fear. I haven't heard him address the decline in the humanities in general and what used to be referred to as a liberal education, in particular and the ensuing lack of critical thinking. Isn't that also a major factor?

[@bbyng7316]

Listen to his latest talks? He mentions it here though, the decline of our culture is from within. This will cause democracy to implode.

[@loz6441]

It's true that many people yearning for a 'strong leader' would accept a dictator, but others are fully in favour of democracy , and just want a prime minister who uses their parliamentary majority to get stuff done (especially their manifesto commitments), instead of just dithering and wasting time.

[@MrDavidht]

Excellent talk until Climate Change was raised without proper definition in the context of the lecture as the Earth's climate has been changing for 4.5 billion years. What does he see as the issue of Climate Change, was he talking about the so called issue of acheiving net zero and does that relate to CO2 emmisions? Whatever he means he seems to believe that the UK has to set an example to the world. A view of the elite in my opinion and reinforced by the COP26 conference with its private jets and limousines. I would like his view on the current and all too foreseeable energy crisis and its impact on working families from his Oxford eerie as a man who was once the highest paid lawyer in the UK.

[@bbyng7316]

Fascinating listening the two men together;the one a journo; the other a wise scholar.

[@kennethpaultargett5483]

Absolutely Fascinating... Brilliant Mind........

[@elizabetamedvedeva]

Good - Charles Moore put in his place on the Supreme Court adjudicating on the Article 50 TFEU case.

[@EppingBlogger]

He does not doubt that actions on Climate Change are necessary and economic growth is needed. This is an outrageous intrusion into disputed policy issiues which is unbecoming a talk about a great libertarian. At this point I log off.

[@user-tj9bg6tz2p]

Wonderful speech by JS. Every sentence a gem and not a wasted word.

[@kooliz]

Socrates would have given a thumbs up

[@annbrown4056]

Great man, great words. But who decided to film the guest speaker from a side view! Bizarre.

[@tconthejazz1]

I would love to see Lord Sumption in discussion with Clarence Thomas

[@oliviawoods5418]

Me too - that would be fascinating I’m sure.

[@loz6441]

If there hadn't been a Brexit referendum in 2016, and the Conservatives had become a Brexit party in a few years (as Sumption suggests), there would probably still have needed to be a referendum on leaving the EU, which would then have been even more divided along party lines, so I'm not convinced that would have been better.

[@johncourtneidge]

Sad that my comment has, twice, been deleted. Just what Jonathan Sumption bewails.

[@RevRMBWest]

The Education system in this country is a disaster; the Church in this country is likewise a disaster; the collective Television Media is something too of a catastrophe; the Civil Service also seem self-serving; so what can be done. I think that the solution is not authoritarian government; that is what we have - all of these institutions, seem to me, to be too centralised; and that is the problem. The answer is delegation: the art of good government as well as of good leadership is delegation.

[@danremenyi1179]

As a former political science student about 50 years ago I am impressed by Sumption description of democracy i.e. it is defined more by how we resolve disputes than by anything else. At the end of the day the institutions of state can mean very little. It is the flow of intent between people and institutions which really matter. On the other hand Charles Moore's contribution was rather poor.

[@markmartens]

"The polling evidence which I have cited suggests that democracy is now increasingly vulnerable in the countries that gave birth to it. Why has that happened? The chief enemies of democracy are economic insecurity, intolerance, and fear." [Not 'human nature', Jonathan Sumption'? Not 'our drive for Mastery'?]

[@cecilefox9136]

A brilliant lecture!

[@sammyling8804]

I hope Mr Sumption would travel to California, many young people may appreciate enlightenment

[@paulworthington8666]

The reality-aversion brigade, in their shallow, fretful efforts to deny the inevitability of mortality, condemned large numbers of old and ill people to deaths in bitter isolation, without the comfort of those who loved them even into their final hours. This was a crime against humanity. The quality of death is important.

[@madfish369]

Brilliant Sumption as always. Only complaint I have is the silly cameraman who kept the view on the back of his head when he's doing the talking and is the guest. Silly fool :)

[@mikelewis2533]

Great example of where the intuitive and agile mind of someone like moore is abke to cut straight through the boxy clinical mind of someone like sumption. Sumption is a great man, but is the sort of person you should consult, moore is the sort of person you can confidently delegate to.

[@mikelewis2533]

Also interesting how he answers the question on global democracy by talking about how britain might have stayed in the EU. The EU becoming a nation is not global democracy... there is more than europe. There are already such sized nations: USA, China, India etc. Its mich easier to envisage a european democracy than a global one!

[@RickDelmonico]

To compare the relatively low income of the modern politician to their corporate counterpart is foolish due to the greed of the modern c-suite class. These managers and administrators routinely make about five hundred times the salary of the average employee.

[@sonnyvarioni1654]

Is this Burkean Libertarianism?

[@deanedge5988]

I'm sorry but no-one came here to endure Chris Patten's opinions.

[@HampsteadOwl]

I think perhaps that you missed the point of Lord Sumption's lecture that democracy is imperilled when we decline to endure and engage with opinions with which we might disagree.

[@hcleskov-fischer6033]

I can endure his opinions, but he demonstrated what a shallow windbag he is by attempting that joke about Charles Moore and elites. He really doesn't get it, does it?

[@CS-cn6bh]

He is a champion of refusing to accept the result of the ref- a most distasteful man.

[@ketherwhale6126]

FGF-1 inter nasally will lessen symptoms of Parkinson’s- as of recently discovered May 2022. Angiogenesis medicine.

[@FiveLiver]

42:28 What a prize mug!

[@sonnyvarioni1654]

Sumption places far too much trust in MPs. It's naïve. His claim that absent a referendum the Tories would have become an anti-EU party within ten years of 2016 is laughable.

[@angusmcangus7914]

Lord Sumption looks as if he suffers mildly from St.Vitus Dance. Nevertheless he has delivered a superb lecture which should gain a far wider audience than it will probably have here. Millennials and Gen Z-ers should pay attention to what he has had to say. One bone I'd pick with him, however, is his seeming acceptance that the climate fanatics are right. In reality the science is far from settled and we need a serious, open debate about it.

[@999dayslater]

I always notice this! (His twitching). I wonder what it is.

[@terrid6349]

Agree climate fanatics are mostly just poorly informed fanatics.

[@bbyng7316]

Making personal remarks is the height of bad manners? Clearly you were not well brought up.

[@stanwizz2351]

Is the finger pointed at the 21st century even attempted to be addressed?

[@ketherwhale6126]

Good news for 🇨🇦

[@RickDelmonico]

Militaries must enforce climate policy and military is the largest consumer of petroleum. This is the paradox of control in action. Conserve good policy along with value and incentive structures. Progress is best employed when the results are optimized for the common welfare.

[@siquq]

Outstanding lecture.

[@859902]

Good to see Patten giving credit where due for making the country governable

[@richardsmith1799]

Naughty citizens, listen to your betters.

[@sadwingsraging3044]

He has no problem calling out the risk averse problem not long after calling out the solution to the problem. Men like Trump.

[@IK-wc4od]

Democracies fail when there is no homogeneous demos. Even the ancients knew it, Aristotle and Plato both wrote about it.. countries with many peoples in them can only be governed by tyrants. Lee-Kuan-Yew said the same about his own country, Singapore. His own people, he said, due to their group differences and in-group preference must be governed with a firm hand. Its thinkers like this man, that have made the English no longer a significant political force in England.

[@alihill4659]

A real shame to have a talk like this polluted by the likes of Chris P. Actually, it's an utter disgrace. Speechless.

[@yankeegonesouth4973]

I admire Mr Sumption greatly and am but an intellectual grasshopper in his eyes. However, the conventional comparison he makes between the 13 colonies and the EU is a poor one. For one, regardless the ethnicities of the inhabitants, the systems of gov't in each original colony were all inherited from (and innovations upon) the Westminster system. Despite all the talk of not everyone speaking English, there was no serious challenge to the dominance of the British culture amongst the colonists. The many German speakers were not behind a push to make their language official. Paul Revere in his legendary midnight ride did not say, ”The British are coming!” since he and all those he notified considered themselves British, the dominant culture of the colonies. The better comparison, rather, is to India, which shares no single language, contains regions of vastly different cultures and ethnicities, and was essentially created by a foreign power. I agree with Sumption that it is possible for the EU to become one country eventually, but I think it much more likely that this would need to be imposed upon it by military rather than elite culture or bureaucratic force.

[@Cotictimmy]

Do we actually have 'Universities' any more? I think we now now have money-seeking institutions led by C.E.O.'s (still described as Vice Chancellors) who have little interest in elite education, academic freedom & free speech, but EVERY interest in boosting their student count and hence their elite business exec status and commensurate elite compensation. They're not ALL like that by that's where the incentives have led many. If Chris Patton's favourite novel is [also] Middlemarch, then I exempt him from my comments above. 😀

[@harrietbrown8807]

1.09 "I personally think that right to abortion is absolutely essential to any civilized society in modern condition". No, sir, killing with law's blessing is a sign of barbarian society. GOD IS.

[@RickDelmonico]

Command and control from the ivory towers only functions well in a small number of applications. Social emergent properties are far more likely to yield viable solutions because of the distribution of consequential knowledge. The deciding factor for the common welfare of any community is the well regulated constitution of the social order best regulated by wholesome family unity along with practical wisdom, a moral compass, ethical values and incentive structures. Swearing; as in an oath. If this includes the name of God, (the unpronounceable name), it could be a problem. Commandment #3 of the Ten. Cursing; as in calling down a punishment from the creator God. Vulgarity; as in crude, insensitive language. No laws should be arbitrary or capricious. If you want people to respect the laws, create respectable laws. All legislation should have an expiration date, we don't need an overaccumulation of stupid laws. Wealth does not make the expert. Power does not create justice. Control does not increase obedience. Only love can heal. Results are the entire thing. Cause and effect as a tree of fractal propagation. This is the problem with unjust law, you get stupid behavior. The limitations of liberty lie in the failure to unite. No Democrat understands Democracy (mob rule). All Democracies commit suicide in about fifty years. The value and incentive structures require a slow, deliberate system of checks and balances to sort out the mischief and stupidity. The rule of law, (all equal under the law), must be married to justice and fairness. There must be enough transparency to prevent corruption and a powerful form of accountability to prevent incompetence. Journalism must be insulated form the manipulation of leaders. Emergence and emergency as surprise events are mostly unpredictable. Politics is a dirty business. Tricks and manipulation are far too common.

[@RickDelmonico]

Complicated: Solutions from experts. Complex: Multiple safe to fail experiments that point us in the direction of success.

[@kimjin-hyub3413]

Why the fuck he is is shaking and vibrating ?

[@GKo2024]

Sumption misses the key point of true democracies as opposed to autocracies: a true division of power that cannot be reneged upon and cannot be 'overruled' by the governing class. The dialectic nature of true democracy keeps everyone on their toes and forces people to compromise: to represent the plurality of public opinion as good as possible. None of this is the case in the UK. It takes him 35 minutes to arrive at the point that people in power are removable. Well, in the UK they are not, with a FPTP system and substantial district gerrymandering not every vote is worth the same and the majority of votes in each election is completely thrown out. No wonder, referenda were popular because in referenda every vote would count. With this dysfunctional system that assigns different values to a vote depending on where a person lives more high-flying conceptions of democracy that Sumption espouses have little basis in fact. One does not need to look far beyond Eton and Oxford's PPE's to see where the 'elites' that determine the political power of the present and future are coming from: these 'elites' have zero interest in popular opinion (beyond weaponizing them for their own purposes) and hundred percent interest in the self-perpetuation of their power. Having a degree in Classics, as nice as it may be, does not prepare you to solve complex technical problems that modern societies need to deal with in a rational way, as we have seen amply. Thus, there is little of a meritocracy and a lot of chumocracy amongst the ruling classes. The best evidence for that is that they cannot 'fail', there is nothing BoJo can do that would lead to his permanent rejection or ostracism. This should give pause for thought. Professionals who fail will have to bear consequences, the only consequences booted out politicians have to endure is a slight dent on their egos, if any. It is astonishing that Sumption does not appear to realize that this status quo is the true enemy of democracy. If people (particularly young people) see that they cannot contribute to the political process - particularly when they see that their future is being squandered by the old generation - then they will find other outlets, but with an ageing population the interest in 'revolutions' converges to zero, thus leading to the stagnation and entrenchment the UK experiences.

[@HerneHunter]

Let it be known Jonathan Sumption made a point here of defiling Scruton’s legacy. A remainer who bitterly maintains the rotten and meaningless status quo.

[@matcampbell6482]

Moore is so painfully out of his depth here. Whatever you think of Sumption (I'm less a fan of the route he's taken since leaving the bench) he deserves someone more capable of following his train of thought and generating useful discussion.

[@yvettegilroy8313]

Beg to differ. Moore was a very effective interlocutor and exposed many weaknesses in Sumptions train of thought. I have been a great fan of Sumption throughout the Covid debacle, but found him to be quite muddled and out of HIS depth on this topic. Not a good tribute at all to Sir Roger Scruton

[@notlimey]

The Chancellor made more sense than the speaker.

[@willhovell9019]

What is about these Alexander D'piffle Johnson hair cuts ? The introduction by the worst editor of the Telegraph of modern times , is the usual twaddle.

[@lucianopavarotti2843]

Charles Mooron.

[@lucianopavarotti2843]

@TheRadetzkyMarch Radetzky MadMarch hare