Richard E. Rubenstein, professor of Conflict Resolution and Public Affairs at George Mason University. Photo: Jonathan Borg

Politics based on the personalities – and moral character – of its main actors has led deep structural problems to go unacknowledged and fester, according to an American conflict resolution expert.

Richard E. Rubenstein, professor of Conflict Resolution and Public Affairs at George Mason University and a visiting professor at the University of Malta, is a regular visitor to the island and will this evening deliver a lecture on his latest book, Resolving Structural Conflicts: how violent systems can be transformed.

In an interview with the Times of Malta, he explained how ‘structural conflicts’ in seemingly peaceful societies – like class division or criminality –were increasingly ignored in favour of politics analysed in terms of “good and evil actors”, whose good character or character flaws became the main driving factors.

“That’s usually not true. You can’t understand the actors’ motivations and character without considering the system,” he said.

“‘Partisan moralism’ pictures everyone as either very good or very bad. We see this again and again: one side says they didn’t choose to fight, they were forced to fight because the other side is inherently cruel or deceitful.

If it’s all about personality, you never get to the questions of the unforeseen costs of the system, including political corruption

“The more you analyse it, the more the ‘bad’ character tends to resemble the devil, recreating the idea that people do bad things simply because they are bad.”

This, Prof. Rubenstein argues, is particularly the case when people lose trust in the political class, as with the election of Donald Trump in the US. With his opponents more focused on his character and unable to offer effective solutions, Trump was able to harness that distrust of politicians to convince people to give him a chance.

Prof. Rubenstein sees certain parallels in the Maltese and broader European context, questioning whether certain problems have similarly gone unacknowledged in favour of person-ality politics.

“Some people believe Europe as an economic entity has become a sort of casino where everything is for sale. With the gold rush going on, material values are seen as all important, assumptions are made that a rising tide will lift all boats, and the attitude to development is to have a good time while you can,” he said.

“The question to ask is, what kind of analysis there is of this system, which is generating a kind of devil-may-care attitude to economic development and possibly leading to unforeseen costs, in-cluding political corruption at all levels. If it’s all about personality, you never get to those questions.”

The solutions Prof. Rubenstein proposes inevitably go back to unequal – “elitist” – systems, which he says are designed to allow for peripheral change while safeguarding the core and the position of the elite.

His own work in the field of conflict resolution, which has included high-level forums at the UN, includes bringing experts and stakeholders – “People don’t talk to each other very much” – together to first agree on the problems and then to begin devising creative solutions.

In the shorter term, he adds, change can also come from the grassroots level if people are willing to tackle structural problems head-on.

“There is a lot of creativity going on about social and economic experimentation at the local level: community-owned economic enterprises, worker-owned companies, ecologically sound programmes for local development. The system may be very hard to change nationally, so start locally and see what works.”

Prof. Rubenstein will deliver a lecture on resolving structural conflicts, organised by the President’s Foundation for the Wellbeing of Society, this evening at 6pm at San Anton Palace. To attend, call on 2148 4662 or send an e-mail to pfws.opr@gov.mt.