Remember the ancient Indian parable about the blind men and the elephant? One animal was perceived as many things. For the man who felt the trunk, the creature was a snake. The ear felt like a fan. The leg, a tree trunk. The broad side, a wall.
In Malta, we have the opposite problem. We have four different crises that many persist to discuss as though only one.
We have a Constitutional crisis, a crisis of the State, a crisis of government, and a crisis of political parties.
The dark vast scandal at the heart of Daphne Caruana Galizia’s assassination has exacerbated and underlined each of the four crises. But it has been the mechanism by which the veil has been torn apart. The trigger, not the cause.
If we don’t keep the different crises distinct in our minds – however much they might overlap in events – we could end up with unrealistic expectations and disastrous demands and choices.
I believe it’s the idea that it’s all one big mess that has led some otherwise intelligent dissenters to adopt an apocalyptic view: that the best thing that can happen is an economic crash that brings the entire rotten edifice down, so that we can begin to build a just society on a new foundation.
The wish is not malign. It’s driven by a wish for national survival. Nor is it peculiar. The anti-Donald Trump talk-show host, Bill Maher, has expressed a similar wish for the US. He says the US can survive another recession but not another term for Trump.
In both cases, US and Maltese, the wish is well-meaning but ignorant. The historical record is clear. Bad economic crashes boost authoritarian leaders.
And, in any case, an economic crash will not resolve four different crises. Nor will legal reform. Nor will new political parties. There’s no magic bullet for four different issues. So let’s take them one at a time.
We do have a Constitutional crisis, although not in the usual sense. Normally, a Constitutional crisis refers to variations of a problematic situation that the Constitution does not envisage, and so cannot resolve.
Our crisis is different. Our institutions are not being pitted against each other without any clear rules that would resolve the conflict. What we have is a long-standing systemic weakness that has been brought to breaking point.
Breaking a problem into its parts and sub-parts is the first step towards a solution
Essentially, we have a contradiction in our institutional arrangements. We have the general setting of a parliamentary democracy. But our Prime Minister has been vested (in practice) with the powers of an executive President. Such an executive requires different checks and balances.
We’ve muddled through with this weakness since Independence. The weakness has been no doubt exploited to a greater or lesser degree since 1964. But, since 2013, it has been so ruthlessly and brazenly exploited that practical weakness became a structural crisis. In the current situation, we need urgent reform, not gradual improvement.
However, the Constitutional crisis is separable from the crisis the State is in. Its very legitimacy is in question.
In the last few days alone, we have learned that Parliament has broken its own laws in not presenting audited accounts (among other things).
The Attorney-General has been found, in a sentence read out by the Chief Justice, to have violated the rights of the leader of the Opposition. As for the Police Commissioner, he does not enjoy the confidence of either Chris Fearne or Robert Abela, one of whom will be our next Prime Minister.
The crisis of State is not the same as the government’s crisis. Given the news, we don’t need to belabour the rotten stench emanating from Castille or Joseph Muscat’s disgrace.
Remember just this. In any other country, Castille would currently be treated by the police as a crime scene – searched, pored over, with comprehensive interrogations of important staff, including the current Prime Minister.
And the crisis of government is not the same as the crisis of the Labour Party. The new leader does not just have the task of regaining the confidence of disillusioned Labourites. He will also face the problem of not destroying the morale of those who still believe the problem is one of a few bad apples.
We have yet to hear of what the assassination investigation will reveal about the Electrogas power station, and what another magisterial inquiry will conclude about the Vitals Global Healthcare deal. It will take luck, as well as deft political skills, to deal with the fall-out if the revelations are those most observers expect.
It’s not just Labour that is in crisis. The two smaller political parties, Alternattiva Demokratika and Partit Demokratiku, have been virtually invisible and unheard in the current uproar – unlike the groupings of Graffitti, Repubblika and Occupy Justice.
The Nationalist Party has deliberately taken a step back – but had it taken a step forward it might well have attracted some of the mass protests’ ire. The PN does not emerge from this episode with strengthened authority – as the surveys show.
Distinguishing between crises might seem like a columnist’s luxury. Are the problems, taken together, still not large? Yes, but distinguishing between the crises makes each more manageable. Breaking a problem into its parts and sub-parts is the first step towards a solution.
It helps avoid apocalyptic thinking (“Only an economic crash can save us!”). It helps avoid unrealistic expectations of institutions like the European Commission – it can help us address some crises but not all. It helps us evaluate just how realistic and honest our leaders and would-be leaders are.
And it helps us see that, yes, there is one step that would address all four crises in a symbolic but significant way: Muscat must go immediately. Now.
That small step would show everyone, in Malta and the world, that we have the full measure of the long road to recovery.