The idea that decision-making powers should be as close as possible to the people affected by those decisions.
Talk of decentralisation is very fashionable in political circles but few politicians ever deliver real empowerment to people and their local communities. Tony Blair’s first Labour government devolved power to new politicised establishments in Edinburgh, Cardiff and London but few people would say that they had more real control over their lives.
Subsidiarity is an ugly word that describes a beautiful idea. It should inform all discussion of decentralisation. Defined in the 1931 Catholic encyclical ‘Quadragesimo Anno’ – ‘On Reconstruction of the Social Order’ - Pius XI describes the thinking behind subsidiarity:
“Just as it is gravely wrong to take from individuals what they can accomplish by their own initiative and industry and give it to the community, so also it is an injustice and at the same time a grave evil and disturbance of right order to assign to a greater and higher association what lesser and subordinate organisations can do. For every social activity ought of its very nature to furnish help to the members of the body social, and never destroy and absorb them”.
Subsidiarity works on a number of levels. It reminds all governments to devolve as much power as possible to families and other people-sized institutions. It warns centralised states to give more power to localities. In America the doctrine of subsidiarity is enshrined in Tenth Amendment to the US Constitution. It states that:
“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.”
Subsidiarity is an idea that usually - but not always - recommends decentralisation. More controversially it argues that environmental issues such as climate change are properly decided by multilateral institutions operating at a global level.
Michael Howard’s idea of subsidiarity
In one of his first speeches as Conservative leader, Michael Howard powerfully stated that conservatives are opposed to any kind of excessive concentrations of power:
“No one should be over-powerful. Not trade unions. Not corporations. Not the government. Not the European Union. Wherever we see bullying by the over-mighty, we will oppose it, and stand up for people's rights and freedoms.”
Mr Howard should have added that the scope for people to exercise responsibilities – as well as “rights and freedoms” - should also be protected because the over-mighty can also rob people of humanising '3D' duties to one another.
[Access more about subsidiarity in Catholic social teaching here].
Comments