Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/384358
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 21 SEPTEMBER 2014 Opinion 27 would invariably ignore suffering and poverty. They begin to blame and hate the victim. As we speak of solidarity we cannot forget that the essence of democracy is diversity. The nationalistic excuse to wall society in, in order to prevent the "foreigners" from "invading us", is the first step towards the destruction of democracy. Once one decides that people who look, speak, dress or appear to behave differently are not allowed in, there begins a process where more and more walls are built within each other. As these walls multiply, everyone becomes a stranger: if it's not ethnicity it is belief; if it's not belief it is lifestyle; if it's not lifestyle it will be customs, food, sexuality, body- shape, social class … anything. Inherited contradictions In Malta, 50 years on from Independence, we still speak of three major protagonists: George Borg Olivier as the father of Independence; Dom Mintoff as the father of the welfare state and its republican ambitions; and Eddie Fenech Adami as the statesman who insisted that Malta's republican independence must take advantage of a different sense of nationhood within the European Union. Nonetheless these leaders' historical legacy is also marked by significant contradictions. Notwithstanding his own liberal ambitions, Borg Olivier presided over a young democracy whose potentials were frustrated by religious bigotry and an illiberal state of affairs. Mintoff was the man who pushed an agenda of welfare and communitarian politics by insisting on social justice. Yet he found himself presiding over a wave of discord that threatened and stif led personal liberty, and where the independent republic he delivered almost lost its way. To which Fenech Adami reacted with pushing what he saw as a combination of liberal and social democratic policies, whose realization were frustrated by the fact that his conservative- clericalist Catholicism left old prejudices unchallenged, and where a deep sense of inequality quickly crept in. This came to a peak with Fenech Adami's own party opposing divorce legislation and alienating itself from the demand for comprehensive equality and civil rights. These contradictions remind us that the claim for liberty does not come cheap. Malta's independence from a colonial past is not an automatic guarantee for liberal democracy. Perhaps out of the three challenges, liberty is the most difficult to maintain because it is always taken for granted. How could liberty f lourish with no sense of solidarity? How could a society that shuns diversity remain free and democratic? The young ones For the first time since Independence, Malta is led by two political leaders who are too young to have been around in the early 1960s or even remember the 1970s. Opposition leader Simon Busuttil was five when Malta became a Republic. Prime Minister Joseph Muscat was not yet one. Unlike their predecessors, Muscat and Busuttil represent the generation that was shaped by the EU referendum. With their political positions pitted against each other over EU membership, as MEP candidates they both went on to command the highest vote in their respective parties. As Euro- parliamentarians they cut their political teeth away from Maltese shores. This cannot be ignored, especially when assessing the political context of the present and what it holds in store for the next 50 years. Since the last general elections many are still trying to make sense of where this young leadership is taking Maltese democracy. With a government with a disproportionately strong majority and an opposition that often seems to have gone in hiding, it is difficult to speculate about next week, let alone the future. Back in Scotland In the run up to the Scottish referendum, there was one issue on which both sides remained in agreement: the wealth of diversity by which Scotland and the United Kingdom retained their success and prosperity. In an interview with David Dimbleby on the BBC, Gordon Brown extolled the traditions by which a diverse United Kingdom sustains the sense of liberty and solidarity, as inherited from the English and Scottish political traditions. In turn, Alex Salmond claimed that an independent Scotland needs a diversity of people to sustain itself as a great nation. Salmond emphasized how he wants to see a Scotland that nurtures and sustains a diversity of peoples and talents, and he premises this on attracting and welcoming an even more diverse population to Scotland. From the perspective of the values of liberty, diversity and solidarity, it was evident that even when standing opposed to each other, these two Scottish leaders – as a former British Prime Minister and as the current Scottish First Minister respectively – never hesitated to emphasize the same basic ingredient of a democracy: a diverse society that sustains itself in liberty and solidarity. Where does this leave Malta, its democracy and its young leaders? I would argue that this is a crucial reminder that independence is not a day that happened 50 years ago, but a state of affairs that must happen every day. In turn, a republic is a form of governing that is a public affair and where its primacy for individual liberty within a sense of conviviality, duty and social justice, require that the public be not caught in ideological absolutes or nationalistic myths. To be Maltese or Scottish, British or European, is a consequence and not the cause of being a willing participant in a democracy that sustains diversity, liberty and solidarity. Perhaps the best way to celebrate Independence is to promise oneself to look beyond the limits of one's respective nose. Then, and only then, could we begin to have "the imaginative ability to see strange people as fellow sufferers" and do something about it! Professor John Baldacchino is Chair of Arts Education at the University of Dundee in Scotland. He is the author of ten books including John Dewey: Liberty and the Pedagogy of Disposition (Springer 2013) and Democracy without Confession: Philosophical Conversations on the Maltese Political Imaginary (Allied Publishers 2013), which he co- authored with Professor Kenneth Wain solidarity Unlike their predecessors Joseph Muscat and Simon Busuttil represent the generation that was shaped by the EU referendum For the first time since independence, Malta is led by political leaders who do not even remember the 1970s – Simon Busuttil (standing) and Joseph Muscat