SURVEYING AND POLITICS - A RELATIONSHIP OF MUTUAL
BENEFIT
Do we still fashion our own future?
Prof. Holger MAGEL, Vice President of FIG,
Germany
Key words:
In his keynote address to the XX FIG Congress in Melbourne 1994 Dr
Peter Ellyard pointed out that surveyors are “having less
and less influence on the shape of (their) future” and predicted
that the surveying profession will continue to decline in significance
if things continue as they are (cited by Foster, 1999).
The waning importance of a profession can most easily be seen in
the interest shown by young people: according to this criterion the
surveying profession is experiencing a serious crisis in Western
Europe (Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany and Austria). In Central and
Eastern Europe on the other hand the profession is still enjoying a
‘boom’ - both as a result and as a reflection of great activity in
construction and reconstruction. In Western Europe the continuing
reduction in the number of students increasingly endangers the
traditional and renowned university centres and study courses for
surveying, at the least the number of teaching chairs in surveying is
endangered. The reasons for this are still being explored - is the
growing competition or ‘blurring’ with other disciplines, study
courses and professions (e.g. in the field of geo-information), is the
continuing low level of recruitment in the public sector or are the
excessively narrow professional fields of surveyors in private
practice the cause? Were we sleeping when opportunities arose in new
markets such as town and country planning (e.g. EU structural
development programmes) or in real estate and land management? It was
significant that in the two previous international congresses in
Germany - rural 21 and urban 21 - only a handful of surveyors were
represented. Do we lack that ‘clear vision’ of our profession for
which Peter Ellyard appealed in Melbourne and which would be
fascinating for our society, for the economy, and for the current
generation of students? FIG President Bob Foster at the
InterGEO 1999 in Hanover expressed himself as follows on this point
(loc. cit.): “We devote little effort to self promotion, assuming
that the value of our work will speak for itself”. And: As a
result of technological change in our previous professional field “We
must broaden the scope of our activities. Where for example planning,
valuation and management of land are not considered ‘surveying’,
associations in those countries should seek to include them. It will
not be easy. Legislation, educational systems and institutional
arrangements must be addressed. Political considerations may play a
role”.
In my view it is less a case of ‘may play’ than of ‘play’.
Political considerations play a role ...
At the present time education centres for surveying, professional
associations and administrative authorities are working almost
feverishly on ‘clear visions’ and self promotion, in other words on
image and publicity campaigns, which are intended to reach society,
industry and young people. It now becomes in part painfully obvious
how big the divide is between surveying experts on the one hand and
politics and society on the other. The latter are needed now more
urgently then ever e.g. to consolidate or to expand new fields of
professional activities, to provide a firm legal basis for new
surveying products (e.g. GIS reference data) or to regulate a sensible
relationship between the public and private surveying professions, to
give financial support to commercial activities in other countries or
to new academic facilities, etc., quite apart from the help which is
always necessary and which they can provide and the expert
understanding which they can contribute when the need or otherwise of
university reforms is being assessed. A big paradox presents itself
here: on the one hand, as a result of political changes or global
campaigns or actual crisis management, there is a growing demand for
the services provided by surveyors and they are highly valued in
international relations and institutions, and on the other hand many
‘traditional’ surveyors have difficulty in making contacts with
politics and politicians. Is it simply chance or is it significant
that e.g. almost no surveyors are represented or play a substantial
role in German federal and state Parliaments?! How will we then
succeed in conducting the necessary ‘lobbying’, now indispensable in
democratic societies, for sensible university training, for the
abolition of professional or market structures which are obsolete or
biased towards one side only, for the tremendously important political
decision on the use of surveying reference systems for the booming GIS
markets etc.? It still appears to be often the case - and this is
above all widespread in university and academic circles - that
politics and political activity, and particularly contact with
politicians, are regarded as being somewhat disreputable and at the
least are little loved. I believe that this attitude is wrong and
damages our profession and professional prospects. I should prefer to
make an appeal that we should all - and not only the ‘functionaries’
of our profession - depending of course on individual possibilities -
continually seek to have contact with political life and with
politicians as representatives of our society and to convince them of
our indispensable services to society. It is only through continual
contact and by establishing interest and personal involvement on the
part of our political contacts that we can be successful; that means
that we must invite politicians to attend our national and
international congresses and give them the opportunity to speak and to
take part in discussions. This will enable them to become acquainted
with our concerns and with our profession. It is of no use whatsoever
when we continually assure each other at our meetings of our
importance. It is other people, the decision takers in politics,
industry and society, who have to be aware of this. In one country it
will be the surveyors employed in the public sector who find it easier
to influence politicians, in another it will be the surveyors in the
private sector and in private practice who have easier access to
politics. Other contacts with politicians should also be
systematically be developed, e.g. by inviting them to university
conferences and in reverse by the attendance of surveyors at political
congresses on future development etc. In this way we can make it clear
to those engaged in political life that we can make, both nationally
and internationally, a major contribution to the physical and social
development of states on the way to a better fairness and a higher
quality of life. We are concerned here either with tasks of
reconstruction (e.g. Kosovo), or of transformation (e.g. countries in
transition), or finally and generally with development tasks in
developing countries.
Every surveyor knows or should know: his services are not
politically neutral or free of value judgments - his contribution e.g.
to the implementation of a sustainable development in the
comprehensive sense of RIO 1992 (including the theme of ‘Women’s
Access to Land’) are formative policy based on democratic values!
Surveying services are naturally also susceptible to political abuse -
who is not aware of that! There are enough examples of this. Surveyors
must not therefore carry out their role mechanically but should advise
on policy openly, responsibly and on an ethical basis, and should act
in each case in the light of the actual circumstances of the task and
of the country concerned. It is only through this critical dialogue
between politics and surveying that a relationship of mutual benefit
will emerge. This demands from the surveyor that he is not only a
‘homo technicus’ but is also a ‘homo politicus’. The universities are
called on to prepare students in this respect much more than they have
done hitherto.
The FIG shows us the way - catalogue of future tasks
There is no doubt about it: this political work which will be
indispensable in future must be carried out at the national level with
fresh energy every day by every one of us. It is however a great help
that the countries and member associations can rely on the FIG and can
obtain ideas and points of reference from its successful
supra-national political work. What the previous and present Bureaux
have achieved in this sector in recent years with their commissions,
Task Forces, hosting member association as well as with their FIG-UN
Liaison Director Ian Williamson is the best, because it is the
clearest, example of the fact that Surveying and Politics can become a
relationship of mutual benefit. By way of example can be mentioned the
Bogor and Bathurst Declaration, the Memoranda of Understandings (MoU)
with UN authorities, participation in global campaigns and much more.
In this global (socio-) political engagement our profession is
challenged across its entire depth and growing width in the sense of
the Singapore vision of the FIG and covered by the impressive variety
of the themes of our 10 commissions.
Against this background I should like in future to see the
following policy for surveyors:
- Seeking, continuing or deepening the dialogue with national and
international politics and with institutions concerned with
politics.
- Better understanding of, and possibly influence on, changes in
society and politics (Dale, 2000). For this we must also think and
argue ‘more politically’ and sell our services better.
Dale: “Local professional bodies in particular need to target
politicians and the general public and explain to them why
investment in geomatics brings wealth.” (loc. cit. 2001)
- Obvious and serious involvement in and implementation of major
global and national political campaigns, e.g. by observing the
principles of urban governance, secure tenure or quite generally the
objectives of RIO, Istanbul II etc. in the exercise of our
profession. Ethics and morality are here an indispensable component
of our understanding and engagement!
The two FIG documents, FIG-AGENDA 21 and Women’s Access to Land, are
a very important contribution to building a better world.
- Extending university education to cover skills outside our
particular discipline and to provide a broad general overview. The
objective must be a well grounded specialised generalist. The FIG
commissions as well as member associations can be helpful here. FIG
academic membership and the FIG Foundation are becoming of
increasing importance for many member associations and their
universities.
- Achieving a fair balance between all branches and facets of the
structure of the surveying profession (e.g. between the public and
private sectors in national and international engagements) by a
collegial consciousness that we are all in the same boat and by
objective information and by presentation of examples of best
practice (Magel, 1999).
- Providing greater opportunities for further education and
additional qualifications for member associations as well as locally
in the regions and drawing attention to central opportunities(e.g.
the new course for a Master’s degree ‘Land Management and Land
Tenure’ at the Technical University of Munich). This is a major
function of the FIG Surveying Education Database.
These are my wishes - with them Bob Foster’s demands in Frankfurt
in 1999 (loc. cit.) will perhaps also find fulfillments:
“We must embrace the whole spectrum of surveying in its broadest
definition and we must speak to the world with a single voice of
clarity and unity.”
It can gladly be asserted of Theo Bogaerts, at the
culmination of a successful academic and scientific career, that he
devoted himself in notable manner to the building of “a better and
fairer world” - and he also did this in the context of international
FIG activities.
Literature
- FOSTER, B. (1999): 21st Century Challenges for the Surveying
Profession. ZfV 12/1999
- DALE, P. (2000): Surveying Engineering and Global Land
Management. ZfV 5/2000
- DALE, P (2001): Capacity Building in Geomatics. Geoinformatics
April 2001
- MAGEL, H. (1999): Vermessungswesen vor neuen Herausforderungen -
Chance für den Freien Beruf? ZfV 4/1999
CONTACT
Univ. Prof. Dr-Ing. Holger Magel
Vice President of FIG
Chair of Land Readjustment and Land Development
Technische Universität München
Institute of Geodesy, GIS and Land Management
Arcisstrasse 21
D-80290 München
GERMANY
Tel. + 49 89 289 22535
Fax + 49 89 289 23933
E-mail: magel@landentwicklung-muenchen.de
25 March 2001 - 6 December 2004
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