Don't just settle, make it right

Professor Tan Sri Dato' Dzulkifli Abdul Razak
Learning Curve: Perspective
New Sunday Times - 04-09-2011

The writer examines flaws in the British society brought to light in the aftermath of recent riots in the United Kingdom

ONE would least expect that "moral collapse" is pinned down as a contributing factor to the recent British riots. Prime Minister David Cameron was quoted as saying that Britain must confront its "slow-motion moral collapse" following the four days of riots across London and other major cities in the United Kingdom.

As wildfire burnt out of control, five people were left dead and at least £200 million (RM978 million) in property were lost, with thousands facing criminal charges.

Cameron seems to associate moral collapse with what he termed a "culture of laziness, irresponsibility and selfishness" which, he alleged, fuelled the unrest.

"This has been a wake-up call for our country. Social problems that have been festering for decades have exploded in our face," he said implying criminality and lack of personal responsibility — and not racial tensions and poverty — as part of the social problems which sparked chaos.

A "culture of laziness, irresponsibility and selfishness" in the context of moral collapse could have been identified many times over in previous chaotic situations.

Think about the decision to invade Iraq for instance or the recent phone-hacking scandal leading to the closure of News of the World (NOTW)!

A report in the International Herald Tribune (1HT) (July 19) described the hacking of a murdered young girl's phone as "seedy, unethical and sometimes criminal behaviour at the company's newspaper", Rebekah Brooks, the head of the News International, a British subsidiary of News Corporation which owns NOTW, and one of those arrested, is more categorical: "This is not just about one individual but about the culture of an organisation."

Does this not sound like a case of "slow-motion moral collapse" as well? After all, like the riots, Cameron too had to rush home from his overseas trip to take charge of the crisis, special parliamentary sessions were called, and some resignations and arrests were also recorded.

The main difference between the two cases is perhaps the phone-hacking scandals involved high profile personalities whom politicians can be beholden to. These personalities have all the means to shift blame by using brute force of publicity in order to pacify, if not confuse, the public.

This is more so when political links have also been implicated. Otherwise, as suggested by the front page headline of IHT: "If accused, News Corporation will often just pay out." A Culture Of Settling But Not Making It Right, screamed another headline.

Cameron was right when he noted: "Moral decline and bad behaviour is not limited to a few of the poorest parts of our society. In the highest offices, the plushiest boardrooms, the most influential jobs, we need to think about the example we are setting."

However, it is obvious that the pronouncement on "moral collapse" is primarily triggered by and directed at the poorest sector of society despite the denial that poverty and racial tensions have a role in it.

It is, of course, easier to blame it on the mob mentality of youngsters of impressionable age — usually of migrant origin — as part of the looting crowd. It is much harder to equate phone-hacking and wiretapping with "looting" of information as a practice among journalists.

In this regard, under the interesting title The Cameron Collapse, Roger Cohen writes in the opinion page of IHT: "The culture of the UK as a whole has been reeking pungently of late — its venal, voyeuristic, reality-show-obsessed, the me-me-me nature thrust under the magnifying glass by revelations about what the tabloid press would do to satisfy the prurience of its readers, hacking into phones at any price, even the phone of a 13-year-old murdered girl.

"The sordid dance of Cameron and (Rupert) Murdoch has ended, revealing deep flaws in British society that are also deep problems in Western societies as a whole."

The full significance of this statement must be well understood by Murdoch who admitted, but largely ignored, during the 2009 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland that: "We've been living in the Western world way above our means. We've been on a great binge and it's come to an end; and we have to live through the correction."

That end is now here, going beyond just the successive material and tangible collapses, due to the ultimate breakdown of the very fabric of society that was once rooted in uncompromising moral standards, ethics and intangible values.

Our hope is to "fast-motion" appropriate correction, before the world is forced to shut down just like NOTW. Or left in chaos just as in the UK recently.

* The writer is the Vice-Chancellor of Universiti Sains Malaysia. He can be contacted at vc@usm.my