A visit to Sheffield

Me and my friend

What a happy 24 hours! I caught a train and went straight to the stage door of the Crucible. And there after forty five years was my university friend, famous, bringing enjoyment to so many people including me. Miriam* had invited me see her in Me and My Girl in which she plays the Duchess and to have lunch. It seemed to me that she'd not changed in all this time, but then perhaps that's because she's hardly ever been out of public sight. I'm accustomed to her face as she's not to mine, yet we slipped into conversation as easy as it had always been with her when we were at university. "As I was saying..." when a near lifetime intervened. In the evening I sat in the stalls and was as happy watching the musical as at the party after carnival last February in Ano Korakiana. Me and My Girl is a tale that works in England especially; class divisions surmounted by love, a high point being the end of the first act when toffs, at first aghast, then hesitantly enthused, are drawn into the Lambeth Walk. Of course I knew the tune - everyone does - but I'd never seen it in its original setting, a musical which played from 1937-1942 (the year I was born) - bearer of the most resonant of class mixing narratives - including ours. My programme reminded me

...that it was seen three times by the King, George VI, and its tunes went round the world...Me and My Girl is about the clash between culture and class, love versus duty and of course, being true to one's roots, as well as having catchy tunes. At the heart of it is the song and dance number which Lupino Lane -  music hall character over a century, archetypal cockney costermonger - created, entitled The Lambeth Walk. The dance acts as a social mixer...becoming so popular in Berlin that a leading member of the Nazi Party apparently denounced it as 'Jewish mischief and animalistic hopping'.

I remembered a film clip I'd seen years ago referred to in my programme. In 1942 Charles Ridley of our Ministry of Information, purloined extracts from Leni Riefenstahl's grandiose celebration of Nazism and edited her ridiculous and hideous pictures of goose stepping stormtroopers so that they seemed to taking two steps forward, one step back, three steps forward, to the, by then, famous tune from Me and My Girl - rather good propaganda, especially as The Lambeth Walk was already popular in Germany, though officially condemned.

In the Crucible the audience was enraptured - prolonged clapping, cheers and whistling, as the number ended - and then after a crafty pause - was encored into our applause. There were other famous tunes - The sun has got his hat on, Leaning on a lamppost; lots in between; the cast working brilliantly together; entertaining us with songs, dances and jokes - verbal and visual - to an ever-enthusiastic audience. It was silly, sweet, innocent and good, and people, including me, had a happy evening.

After the show Miriam and I had a light supper, shared memories and promised to stay in touch. On Saturday morning, still in Sheffield, I strolled the town, chilly and windy; enjoyed a favourite treat, a tray of chips in curry sauce eaten outside the chippy. As time for my train approached I wheeled my bicycle down High Street. There was a demo outside Barclays, chanting against bonus payments for their rogue CEO with handheld posters - 'Rage Against the Bankers'. Further down the street, just opposite Boots, I was drawn to a violinist playing beautifully to the street. I listened, pretending it was age and the chill wind that made my eyes water so, until she gathered her things, including a deserved pile of small change and immeasurable pleasure. I felt light headed and light footed as I headed gently down to the railway station.
*Miriam's captured - in so far as that's possible - rather well in this extract from an Australian blog commenting on her performances there a few years back. I notice that her brave - far braver given her standing and the fact of being Jewish - stand against the expropriation of Palestinian land for Jewish-only communities. The idea of Miriam having to defend herself against even the imputation of anti-semitism (a vice deserving the seventh circle of hell) is a sign of the knot apologists for Israel's present actions have tied themselves in trying to fend off those who oppose her policies in Gaza. It's like accusing me of paedophilia for loving Richard and Amy.
** ** **
Monday I cycled into campus to sit in on a talk by my colleague Tony Bovaird on trends in co-production - ideas about public service provision drawing on the work of Elinor Ostrom on the government of common pool resources. The day was arranged for members of the Japan Local Government Centre on a two day visit from London. Tony made a point of signalling a greater sense among people in business that were things the public sector can do better, and a greater recognition within the public sector that there are things business can do better, and that if both long opposing sides could work together....he gave Emma Harrison's A4e as an example of public-private mutuality, pointing out that Harrison was child of a piratical capitalist that had cut swathes through the UK steel industry.

Prof Tony Bovaird at Priorsfield

...and here's LGIU's briefing on the Localism Bill.
In Ano Korakiana's there a meeting on Tuesday evening to discuss the future of education in Greece, Corfu and the village with implications for the future of the village's kindergarten and primary school, hardly fifty yards from our house on Democracy Street.

Σύσκεψη πραγματοποιήθηκε σήμερα το απόγευμα στα γραφεία της Δημοτικής Κοινότητας Άνω Κορακιάνας, με πρωτοβουλία του Τοπικού Συμβουλίου και τη συμμετοχή του Διοικητικού Συμβουλίου του Συλλόγου Γονέων του Δημοτικού Σχολείου και του Νηπιαγωγείου του χωριού και κατοίκων. Η συζήτηση αφορούσε το Δημοτικό Σχολείο και τις προοπτικές του στο προσεχές μέλλον. Σύμφωνα με τις δηλώσεις του Αντιπροέδρου και των μελών του, το Τοπικό Συμβούλιο εγκαινιάζει έτσι, ένα νέο τρόπο «ανοικτής» λειτουργίας, προσέγγισης και συνεργασίας με τους κατοίκους. 

There was a meeting on 15 January at the offices of Ano Korakiana's local council of the school parent's association and other residents to discuss prospects for the school. The vice president and council colleagues supported a new way of  'open' operation, involving collaboration with residents.(Excuse my translation)

I am so aware of the vital role of a school in the sustainability of a village and before that the importance of young families being able to afford to live in the village when house prices have become so high because people like us buy homes there.

30 January 2011 - apprehensions about the future of the school in Ano Korakiana

The school in 1939 with 130 pupils

Digging

I woke to pattering on the dry earth dreaming it was Sunday. Flea, the cat, paused at the door of the conservatory before tip toeing into the garden. She's pondering rain we've not had for nearly a month. She scurries over to the flower border and works her way fastidiously beneath the intertwined greenery of honeysuckle, verbena and trailing wisteria to lurk where damp won't reach. Our water butt's already brimming.

Yesterday I worked on our allotment - on and off. Some gardeners, often with the help of their families, including toddlers riddling stones, have been making stalwart and enviably impressive progress on their plots since the allotments opened on 12 June.

Working our allotment on the VJA from Simon Baddeley on Vimeo

On Sunday afternoon, I took the video camera with me and made a record that I shall enjoy using as part of a before-and-after diary of progress. Right now I'm very much 'before'. At the Sons of Rest pavilion on Saturday those present agreed to defer setting up an allotments association and arranged to have a larger and better publicised meeting in the community shed on the allotments on Saturday 11 September. On Saturday about twelve turned up - typical of first meetings. Though few, we were optimistic about being able to form an association and a management committee to oversea the collection of rents due to the City on 1 October 2010 and carry out the other tasks that Clive Birch, who was there with Christine Brown from the Birmingham & District Allotments Association, outlined for us, handing round a model constitution. Rachel and I, community activists over years in Handsworth, have made an informal pact to be supportive but not to get involved. We really don't want to distracted from the work needed on our adjoining plots. Yet the incident of the missing beehive is already attracting my attention, and I find myself discussing it with other gardeners. The plotholder next to the one with the beehive complained about it on the grounds that he was allergic to bee-stings.

I understand the complaint was considered by one of the council allotment officers and it was suggested that the beekeeper moved to another plot. Not wanting to get involved in repeated movement of her bees the beekeeper has taken her hive to a local apiary. Gardeners I've spoken to think this an unfortunate precedent. We already miss the hive, good for the vital process of pollination. I'm allergic too stings, but regard that as my problem not the bees' or their keeper's. No doubt this will be an issue for the association when it's formed. (see: June 3 piece on popularity of bee-keeping)

* * *

Honey sent us a composite of Katerina, Eleni and Vasiliki, dear neighbours, who've been saying nice things about Alan's work which is now focused on the porch below the near completed balcony.

Email from Honey earlier in the week:

...Leftheri has asked Alan where he can get a cornice mold like the one he used for your balcony. I'm surprised at how all the neighbors come and admire the work being done. The old woman across the street has gotten so enthusiastic about it, she has offered you a 6 foot plant with purple flowers that climbs. I told her that you didn't know yet what you were putting on the pot spot and you could tell her when you come. You are still having your heat wave? Ha! First it's nonstop rain, now a long hot summer. You'll probably come here with a good tan. From England!

Reply:

Dear Honey... Good things make more good things. It’s not just a porch, stairs, railings and balcony...What a joy to see our dear neighbours together. Next time you see them send our love and let them know how we look forward to being with them again...those people whose kindness we value so much laughing together in front of Alan’s porch. I think there’s an energy in the village at a bad time for Greece that goes with the news that the old band building is going to be restored and there’s a real prospect that the football pitch down by St Athanassios will be made playable, and a fine new wall around St.Nicholas Church on the way into the village, and then there’s all the improvements in a time of unprecedented recession being carried out on different houses in Ano Korakiana.

*** Corfucius publicises a rather good new free service advertising events on the island. WhatsUp-Corfu@live.com

** ** ** My friend and colleague Prof Tony Bovaird has gives predictions about the impact of public spending cuts in the UK - his blog giving an opportunity to narrowcast what he couldn't cover in Tuesday's broadcast interview on BBC Midlands Today. There's 'bad news and good news'.

...Of course, you may well be able to turn from the Big State to get some help from the Big Society. But there’s likely to be bad news there, too. The recession has increased the number of people volunteering to help out others – but reduced the capacity of third sector organisations to use them productively, because they too are short of funds to organise themselves.

So, some tips:

• Don’t get ill (just protecting NHS spend won’t be enough to provide the likely number of future users with current service quality levels).

• Don’t let anyone you depend on for support get ill (or leave the neighbourhood).

• Be (VERY) nice to your neighbours (you may be needing them a lot more in future).

• Start saving – if you need any public service in the future, you may well not be able to get it or you may have to pay a large part of it when you do get it.

• If you’re young, start learning a foreign language (you may need to go abroad if you want a public sector job in the future – or a public service).

• Take up ‘easy access’ leisure activities like walking and birdwatching – anything that requires public sector provision, like swimming or sports centres, may be too expensive for you or too far away from you in the future.

It’s a pity that the coalition government parties don’t want to talk about these inevitable consequences of their decisions. The new era of ‘transparency’ is being spun as fast as the previous era of ‘transformation’...

** ** ** On gardening our allotment Paul Peacock sends me reassurance - of sorts 'Keep it up buddy - it's a marathon, not a sprint.'. I follow his podcasts on starting from scratch. We'll meet up on Thursday.

** ** **

Sir Muir Russell's report on the Climate Research Unit's (CRU) email leak/theft, though supportive of the science, will do rather little to erode the accelerated scepticism that followed last year's scandal at the University of East Anglia.

Climate science is a matter of such global importance, that the highest standards of honesty, rigour and openness are needed in its conduct. On the specific allegations made against the behaviour of CRU scientists, we find that their rigour and honesty as scientists are not in doubt

The second of the three key findings is positive for CRU:

In addition, we do not find that their behaviour has prejudiced the balance of advice given to policy makers. In particular, we did not find any evidence of behaviour that might undermine the conclusions of the IPCC assessments. The report does find that issues relating to openness.

But we do find that there has been a consistent pattern of failing to display the proper degree of openness, both on the part of the CRU scientists and on the part of the UEA, who failed to recognise not only the significance of statutory requirements but also the risk to the reputation of the University and, indeed, to the credibility of UK climate science.

We find that CRU’s responses to reasonable requests for information were unhelpful and defensive.

The biggest criticism relates to the 1999 WMO report:

…the figure supplied for the WMO Report was misleading. We do not find that it is misleading to curtail reconstructions at some point per se, or to splice data, but we believe that both of these procedures should have been made plain – ideally in the figure but certainly clearly described in either the caption or the text.

* * * On the Greek economic crisis there have been two competing 'narratives' about the Greek economic crisis - one os the story of a corrupt top-heavy public sector; the other is the story of a debt crisis precipitated by feckless banking practices:

...There are two key reasons why the Greek narrative has become a time-worn cautionary tale of people living beyond their means, rather than a case of financial irresponsibility on the part of bankers and investors...

.

Strolling with my mother

We've been on favourite walks - to Dunlichity, to the head of the Nairn near Dog Rose and along the shore of the Moray Firth, on the remains of the old Inverness to Aberdeen Road and to Cromarty in the rain

* * *

E-mail from my colleague Tony Bovaird re Paper on National Indicators for a Thriving Third Sector:

I'm delivering a paper at APPAM in November on some research we recently did on developing a national performance indicator for local authorities, which attempts to assess their contribution to the environment of local third sector organisations. It's a complex issue and I think it raises some important issues for those of us who work at the interface of public sector and third sector issues. I'm attaching a draft of the paper and would be delighted if you had any comments. I'm taking this chance to circulate you on the old School of Public Policy list server, as I notice that, peculiarly, it still lives on, after 1 August! Best, Tony

My reply:

Dear T. A bold piece of pioneering methodology. I wonder if it would pick up any of the diverse ways Birmingham City Council people have helped or hindered endeavours with which I've been associated as member or initiator over the past 30 years living in Handsworth? I see it as both a practitioner and as a part-anthropologist, part-historian, in terms of myriad incidents, some pivotal, and personalities, often near infathomable. The end results are measurable in cash for projects on the ground. Something happened because the LA or someone or some group in it exercised agency. I worry that the performance management approach keeps us, in this area, in the world of getting better at knowing the costs but no closer to knowing the values, better at assessing quantity but no closer to understanding let alone measuring things to do with quality. How would your method add to our understanding of what made the Good Friday Agreement look and feel like a success and other peace making initiatives not? Best S

Tony's reply:

Hi Simon. Interesting. I think that such indicators are not really very suitable for mega-authorities like Birmingham - they depend on a close relationship between the local authority and the local third sector (in general), which in a city of 1m is never going to happen. So, it's not a surprise that Birmingham has NOT chosen this to be one of its 35 target indicators! (Although it has chosen it to be one of its local priorities, which will feature much less strongly in the CAA judgement). You mention the influence of "myriad incidents, some pivotal, and personalities, often near infathomable" - that sounds very much like the kind of context in which complexity theory becomes an interesting approach - have you explored that? It's something I've been interested in for some time - it gives a very different flavour to evaluation activities! "The end results are measurable in cash for projects on the ground". In the case of Birmingham - but it's true of many, if not most LAs (though rarely so true as in Brum!) - the end results are MATCHED FUNDED projects on the ground but not normally major changes to mainstream budget allocations. This is one of the greatest puzzles - I think 'scandals' would be better - of modern UK local government. I'd love to find a way of exploring it further. "I worry that the performance management approach keeps us, in this area, in the world of getting better at knowing the costs but no closer to knowing the values, better at assessing quantity but no closer to understanding let alone measuring things to do with quality" I think this was true up to the 1990s but has long since not been the case. Actually, I think the opposite is now becoming a real worry - so many of our evaluations focus on quality, and few have any real handle on costs - this has been a major source of embarrassment for the 20 odd evaluations carried out in recent years for CLG under the LGMA Evaluation Partnership. I find it's less surprising to me now that the guy who first came to fame promoting Activity Based Costing is now the Professor of Leadership Development at Harvard Bus School! "How would you method add to our understanding of what made the Good Friday Agreement look and feel like a success and other peace making initiatives not?" The approach outlined in this paper is not designed to do that, nor would I be very comfortable with a PI approach that looked at specific cases. The strength of PI-based approaches lies partly in the protection given by the 'law of large numbers' - major variations between 149 LAAs are generally unintended and therefore they are interesting to observe and explore. (Of course, when intended, that's fine - but then it's interesting to ask if they are generally as LARGE as was originally intended!). In exploring the narratives thrown up by such questioning, good explanations will often come emerge, from which we learn. But often it is a case of "fair cop, we should have been more careful/thoughtful/imaginative ... we will now attempt to influence the behaviour of our staff and partners to get this indicator back onto a more desirable trajectory". Looking at something like the Good Friday Agreement, we are dealing with specific cases and comparative performance indicators are of no interest. Of course, if we were to look at the ending of colonialism in Latin America in the 19th century or in Africa in the 1950s and1960s, there would be enough cases to make some comparisons interesting. Although I'm a bit sceptical of cliometrics (and I always regarded the Fogel-Fishlow dispute about pork barrels leaving New Orleans in the 1840s as the nearest Economic History ever gets to slapstick), I have been impressed by those historians who can use some statistics very tellingly - e.g. Braudel, Andre Gunder Frank, Putnam). Now, as far as quality goes, I'm enjoying reading Sennett's latest book - The Craftsman - but I'm a bit distressed that he never mentions Pirsig, whose ideas are so similar to his. What approach do you normally take to quality. Best from a sunny Tuebingen, after a super bike ride through the forest! Tony

Me:

This is a lovely reply. You touch on things I know and things I don't - and for the latter I'm grateful. Yes you reminded me of someone I did know of, but had not read for ages - Braudel. And yes, he does use loads of fascinating quantitative material to explain things about social and economic life that would have been passed over by narrative histories. I first came across this approach with Giedion's work 'Mechanisation takes Command'. I feel reproached that I had for a moment there suggested you put quantity before quality. You are way outside that old debate. Sorry. I have just come across - in Borders - amid biographies of Hitler and Kathy Price - a fascinating book about the work of the Audit Commission by Duncan Campbell-Smith. My mum had to drag me away to supper (I'm staying with her in the Highlands but we make forays into Tesco land for provendor). This isn't quite the scholarship we are discussing but it runs parallel to the efforts needed to sustain our understanding of what works and worked and what doesn't and didn't. Its esoteric unless you are in our area, but reading its last chapter (I have bought a cheaper used copy off the internet) I felt a buzz of excitement at the project of place shaping, of decentralisation and empowerment that went beyond the words and ideas sprinkled around so liberally by Hazel Blears and her people. Much of my early life my narrative histories taught me about the good that attaches to accruing power into the hands of competent government; the domesday book and Norman governance and the crowns control over wayward church courts, before that the Romans ('what have they ever done for us') with their great public projects, roads , aqueducts, city planning; the work of Henry VIII with Star Chamber, and then our (not yours?) Empire growing to protect our trade monopolies but accompanied by works even grander than the Romans. This is all from my Ladybird Books of history, right? Then I learned how often attempts to give away power were fraught with peril - among these was Gladstone's destruction of the Liberal Party over Home Rule and then - god help us - Partition. Against this we can balance rather poignant flag lowering ceremonies over numerous colonies that in many cases chose to remain in a Commonwealth, the spread of the franchise, and most recently the Scottish, Welsh and N.Irish Parliaments and Assembly - for which, but for Iraq - Blair would be most remembered. My point is that devolution and empowerment are projects fraught with hazard and risk. Delegation spares no delegator responsibility for its consequences. I now realise that allowing and encouraging greater choice at local level feels incredibly dangerous to our leaders. The Japanese taught me this when I was in Tokyo the other day and dared to give a talk (long planned) on 'England, its own last colony'. Of course Chris G had sensibly advised me not to use that title, so I spoke about the Challenge of Central-Local Relations in the UK, or something like this, and got a round of applause and lots of lovely chat after, from a group of high- flying civil servants. Of course decentralisation permeates modern democracies - but how do you prevent local choice exacerbating the gaps between rich and poor? I thought about depravity and deprivation and the US civil rights movement and the lurking 'folkish layer' that Thomas Mann describes underlying fascism, and the Balkans and the 'many headed monster', the mob. Is this something in my genes -this lack of trust in 'the people'? My great great grandfather Sir Henry Maine said 'Democracy is just another form of government', 'stop worshipping the people with the same fervour that royalists worship the king - as though they are the source of some divine right and have some innate wisdom'. He argued that democracy can only be made to work by the constant and ingenious application of well informed interventions to keep it working properly (Persig? Zen and the art of democracy maintenance?). 'Worst form of government - except for all the others' etc. Your research is in line with and supportive of the continuing work of the Audit Commission. It need not be the hammer of localism, but it can play a vital role in showing what works and what doesn't. It can hold the balance, especially when supported by endeavours like yours to measure the quality and quantity of support for third sector activity. These are methodologies for empowerment, inventions for the next stage of democracy. I sound like a Victorian believer in progress. Well yes I am! If that ex-market trader Lyons can come up with prescriptions for 'place shaping' he's a hero in this fragmented messy world! This is a fascinating journey and there's plenty of room for academics preoccupied with the minutiae. I guess this is why I subtitle my blog 'Democracy Street' - the banality of good (written in Greek). I'm back-referencing to Arendt's brilliant phrase for which she took so much flack - the banality of evil. I so want your research to pick up the gods of small things, small acts and connections, some recovery of Yeats' 'ceremonies of innocence', though we musn't - and can't - be innocent any more. Ceremonies of good governance at the level of the street, the neighbourhood, the village, the allotment, the bowling club, is what we need to invent. Peter W said everyone would have to work out their own Barnett Principle at local level before you could make a Local Income Tax work, and since we don't trust it at national level I do wonder ... Enjoy your holiday. Thanks for the chance to be confused aloud. Best, Simon (Scotland until 12 August)

Note: Much can be learned on the subject of giving away, receiving and taking power by study of the abandonment by Great Britain of the Corfu Protectorate in 1864. How I wish I could discuss this with Theotokis. or Gladstone.

[back to thr future: 1/01/09 I'm going to have to start digesting Jonathan Davies' thinking about hegemony vs. governance]