When the state uses violence to suppress personal liberties, it sends the message that it is acceptable to violate the rights of others.
There are many reasons why the situation in Zimbabwe is disturbing. One of these is the dissolution of that social contract between a state and its people and its serious consequences for democracy.
“A government of the people by the people” implies a social contract between the state and the people where each has obligations to the other. This includes our moral code, the standard of behaviour that we are obliged to uphold. Laws dictate these socially acceptable standards of behaviour. Individuals are inclined to accept these obligations if they feel there exists a social contract binding them with other individuals and with the rest of society in general.
According to this notion, the state is formed as a consequence of our collective recognition that a legitimate force is needed to perform such “social contract” functions as providing police, courts and the military. On this basis, the people are obliged to pay taxes to the state and abide by its rules in exchange for the protection they get from the police, courts and military. In turn, the state is obliged to protect the people. In theory, there is both mutual agreement and obligation between the state and the people. It requires confidence among ordinary people that the state has integrity, that it can be trusted to act in their best interests. It requires a respect based on an understanding that these obligations are a function of a relationship that at its core is voluntary, where power is lent to the state by the people.
However, when the state implements and enforces unjust and unpopular laws, it violates the social contract. When it uses violence to suppress personal liberties, it sends the message that it is acceptable to violate the rights of others.
It could be argued that the prevalence of violence and the ubiquitous distrust in today’s society is a consequence of the undermining by the state of the moral force of the social contract. In such a scenario it does not take much to reorient institutions meant to “protect” the people to become instruments of harassment and intimidation where the state cannot be said to be using its force legitimately. We need look no further than South Africa’s past. The role of the courts, the military and the police in suppressing legitimate concerns raised by the African majority is well documented. Every conceivable instrument of coercion and suppression was unleashed to protect the interests of the minority regime. That a simple declaration, “the people shall govern” ? which envisaged the inclusion as equals in this social contract of all the people, irrespective of their race, class, gender, and social origin ? could be considered treasonous bears testimony to the moral bankruptcy of apartheid.
The stigma the crime of treason carries, and the vagueness of its reach, makes it a notorious instrument of arbitrary power and political repression. Derived from English law, treason included, “to compass or imagine the death of our Lord the King”, or to “levy war against our Lord the King in his realm”. Imagining the king’s death became a principal instrument by which “treason” was employed in England for the most drastic “lawful” suppression of political opposition or the expression of ideas or beliefs distasteful to those in power.
Some countries have tried to minimise this inherent vagueness. For instance, treason against the United States “shall consist only in levying War against the States, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort” (Article III, Section 3 of the US Constitution). The omission of any provision analogous to that of plotting the king’s death prevents the use of treason trials as a political instrument. Mere expression of beliefs is not deemed treasonous.
Local history is replete with incidences where the powerful have employed treason indictments against individuals who stood up to them. In a sense, in toying with the idea of treason, the ruling Zanu-PF is resorting to the same old tactic to complement its strategies of intimidation and harassment. Developments in Zimbabwe bear testimony to attempts by the ruling elite to manipulate the social contract for nefarious objectives. Trust between the state and the people it is intended to serve has been damaged, the social contract desecrated. How do citizens accept the moral force of a social contract under these circumstances?
Instead of being outraged by the machinations of Zimbabwe’s ruling elite to undermine democracy, the South African government has resorted to the usual prevarication and obscurantism ? arguing that, while the elections were not entirely free or fair, they are legitimate and credible ? whatever that means. Accordingly we need to ask: how many people should actually die before we condemn state-sponsored terror for the abominable barbarism it is?
The official observer mission of both the South African government and the African National Congress were willing to pronounce the elections credible despite thousands of voters being turned away and driven from the polling stations; despite thousands of voters being illegally struck off the voters’ roll; despite thousands being displaced from their constituencies by violence, thus losing their right to vote as a result of immoral and unconstitutional laws forced on them by presidential decree; despite the two years of state-sponsored terror preceding the poll; despite the clamping down on free activity in the media. By contrast, both local and international media were quick to declare that these elections were neither free nor fair.
How should ordinary Zimbabweans, and other Africans for that matter, view our claim to lead an African Renaissance when we seem unwilling to openly affirm their human dignity? Perhaps we are expecting too much. After all, South Africa has become the home of fictitious plots and breeder of bizarre theories and conspiracies. Those who have lost public trust and are politically desperate often find refuge in imagining plots and instituting charges of treason. They need to be reminded of the fragility of the integrity of the social contract.