Regarding complex human organizations, subsidiarity is one of the most important yet frequently violated governance principles. Wikipedia writes:
Subsidiarity is an organizing principle that matters ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest or least centralized competent authority. The Oxford English Dictionary defines subsidiarity as the idea that a central authority should have a subsidiary function, performing only those tasks which cannot be performed effectively at a more immediate or local level. …
That is as good a summary as any.
So when we look at the role of government, the federal government performs those functions that can't be done well or at all by less centralized entities. In fact, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution is frequently given as an example of the subsidiary principle:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
This morning I read a piece by columnist Barbara Shelly titled When Washington fails, average citizens step up. She bemoans the vitriolic paralysis of politics at the national level but is heartened by localized efforts she sees. Colin Powell has a foundation that promotes more community involvement in the lives of at-risk kids. She highlights efforts by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (Rep) and Newark Mayor Cory Booker (Dem) to reform the Newark school system. But notice her expectations of the role of the federal government. Who is the lead in solving problems? Look at the title again:
When Washington fails, average citizens step up
She writes:
Forward movement — how refreshing. Washington is stuck and is likely to remain so, regardless of which party takes control after the November elections. But outside of that self-absorbed, dysfunctional galaxy, people are looking at the big picture and getting things done.
And later:
It’s frustrating that we can’t look to Washington to solve problems. But we can look to governors of both parties; they are the most innovative of politicians. We can look to the nation’s mayors and county executives; they are closest to the pulse of real people. [My Emphasis]
We can look to faith leaders, business people, academics, brainy college graduates and energetic retirees, including one exceptional four-star general and his dynamic wife.
In Shelly's world, the desired state of affairs is that the federal government is the chief problem solver. When that breaks down, we have to "fall back" to more localized efforts …. efforts by people who "are closest to the pulse of real people." This implies that if we can ever get past partisan gridlock, then we can revert to the natural order of things where the federal government will solve our problems … by people who are most distant from the pulse of real people.
Shelly is not alone in this mindset. She is expressing a progressive frame of mind. A couple of years ago, Brian McLaren wrote in Everything Must Change that government is the lead societal entity in confronting social problems while volunteer community efforts fill in at the edges. This perspective is implicit in the advocacy of Sojourners and Jim Wallis. If you read and listen closely, you will see this perspective is assumed in progressive discussions.
And that brings me to my final point. For the past decade or so, it has been common among progressives to speak "prophetically" against America as empire, grounded in Jesus' protest of empire. But curiously, the empire refrain has tended to be only in terms of international expansionism. That caution has merit.
But what is peculiar is that international expansionism is not the empire that Jesus and the New Testament writers seem most concerned with. Instead, the New Testament seems more concerned with the pervasive influence of empire in everyday lives … "Do not be conformed to the patterns of this world…." Ironically, those who speak most passionately about empire are frequently the same ones who advocate the loudest for centralized solutions to problems and provision for daily life from the empire. As Gerald Ford once noted, "A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have."
Subsidiarity is the principle that guides us between atomization and centralization as we pursue a more just society. While sharing many of my progressive brothers and sisters' social concerns, I reject their pervasive disregard of subsidiarity and, by extension, the unwitting embrace of empire.
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