The concept of ‘social licence’ is fashionable but nebulous. Let’s try to pin it down. “I hereby grant Company X the social licence to explore for and extract coal seam gas.” Ha ha, I hear you say, you can’t do that. Well, obviously not. Who can, then? Just as obviously, it’s a majority of adults who give their informed consent. Social licence arises from the process we call voting. We are all quite accustomed to it. Politicians gather in parties that formulate policies and put them to the test in elections. They then proceed to implement those policies in a way we hope would be consistent with what they originally offered. If they don’t they get kicked out the next time around.

So why is there this recent thing called ‘social licence’ that’s promoted as being something different from the normal licence derived from that entirely familiar policy/election/legislation pathway? Let me take a stab at the answer. Social licence is something that exists in that parallel universe where the folk who lost the popular vote still insist that their pet cause does not really have public approval. It’s just the opposite of my first point. “I hereby refuse Company X the social licence to explore for and extract coal seam gas.” The correct response is just the same: “Ha ha, you can’t do that.”

A record breaker in the art of typing many words without saying anything.

Not a word why CSG is good or bad, or why it has been compared with the drug 'ice'. The exact same article could have been written replacing 'CSG exploration' with 'twerk dancing' or 'tea drinking'.

Can anyone here explain the actual pros and cons of CSG?

I was confronted by this on VoteCompass and had no real answer to the question whether "There should be fewer restrictions on coal seam gas exploration".

Can someone here tell us please what ARE the current restrictions on CSG exploration?

Not knowing really anything about it, assuming CSG mining only affects the area where it is mined and its use only affects its users (or am I wrong to assume this), my VoteCompass answer only depends on whether or not the autonomy of individual farmers/land-owners is respected, whether or not they may refuse to using their land in that way. However, the same would apply to any other mineral: if the land is yours, then nobody else may enter it uninvited disturbing your peace. It's that simple, now some facts please?

We've been her before.

See discussion thread

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=5714&page=2

An interesting idea. What is a "social license"? Is it the approval of the majority of the community, or is it granted by the virtue of an idea regardless of the immediate approbation it may enjoy?

The idea of a "mandate" has become commonly used by politicians seeking to imply a social license for some program or other policy idea, especially those which are contentious, or that might be poorly regarded by a sectional interest that the Government of the day is loathe to offend. The mandate is not a justification of an idea because it is inherently good, it is an appeal to popularity - what some in the media like to disparagingly call "populism" when politicians from the side they don't support do it.

The problem, as the author points out is that whether an idea is good or bad, or sometimes good and sometimes bad is less important than the "social license", or popular mandate. As a result, the arguments become simplistic and limited and very few people ever know more about the subject at issue than slogans.

We really need to look at a better way of doing politics.

Social licence is obtained by complying with the law, any nebulous attempt at intimidation is just more of the Lefty minorities born to rule mentality. Lefties don't produce anything useful but feel they have some "divine" right to control those who do.

An excellent example of Kohlberg's stage 3 of moral development