Global turbulence impacting democracies worldwide
John F Kennedy, very prophetically said “The ignorance of one voter in a democracy, impairs the security of all.” It is a very apt commentary, encapsulating, the present-day plight of democracies across the globe. From the USA, across Europe, India, Japan, and Australia, there is ongoing turbulence, affecting all democracies. Today, elections in democracies, are not just about right-thinking people exercising their franchise to select a capable leader, but most ironically, it is a multi-stakeholder venture, involving, clandestinely operating organized religions, bulk voting religious groups, fundamentalists and extremists, thousands of NGOs and their foreign donors, media houses peddling fake news, film actors, sports stars and corporate lobbies, to select a weak, pliable and amenable leader, with weaknesses and frailties. The recent rise of an independent polling industry, saw opinion polls also, becoming a contested feature of campaigns, with politicians challenging or endorsing opinions, according to whether or not they were in their favour.
Every democracy is facing a leadership crisis; there are no strong leaders anywhere, and existing leaders are simply unable to address issues like the migrant crisis bolstered by religious fundamentalism, surging unemployment, massive technological transformations due to the advent of artificial intelligence and robotics, that is threatening to exacerbate the unemployment problem, soaring inflation, hyper-expensive costs for medical treatment, hospitalization and medical insurance, narcotics trafficking and human trafficking, and, proclivity to get involved in protracted military conflicts. The rise of innumerable private actors who operate beyond the traditional governance structures, the constant privatization of public tasks, public-private partnerships of various kinds, and digitalization have created serious leadership and accountability issues. In addition, the massive influence of multinational technology firms, operating beyond the reach of nation-states and fiscal jurisdictions, makes clear that existing forms of democracies, are redundant and can easily collapse. Western universities, that used to advertise exorbitantly expensive educational courses in leadership excellence, strategies, and transformations, have no answers or solutions to address the failing leaders, and disastrous leadership styles, affecting their own countries. Whether, it is the USA, UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, or India, there are no leaders, only pleaders, seeking to continue in office, at all costs. Recently, on July 08th Pope Francis expressed deep concern about the current state of democracy and issued a warning against populism during a brief visit to Trieste in north-eastern Italy. He lamented the global health of democracy without specifically naming countries. Addressing the rise of populism and nationalism across Europe, Francis echoed concerns previously voiced by bishops ahead of recent European parliament elections. He noted the grip of far-right parties in countries like Italy, Hungary, and the Netherlands, cautioning against polarizations that impoverished societies and criticizing self-centered power dynamics.
Europe’s unprecedented migrant crisis, which has caused a major demographic crisis coupled with violent fundamentalism, has created a galaxy of flummoxed political leaders, desperately struggling for a solution. Among the Europeans there is talk of the “retreat of democracies”, and people seem to appreciate what a confident Chinese President Xi Jinping recently proclaimed that China is “blazing a new trail” for developing countries to emulate. It is a path that includes politicized courts, intolerance for dissent, and predetermined elections. Decades of democracy have left the Europeans with Hobson’s choice – either switch back to authoritarian monarchies or get gobbled up by foreign migrants seeking to impose foreign ideologies, laws, customs, and compulsory change of faith. There are no political leaders but only political spectators. Celebrated American poet W B Yeats, observed this trend when he wrote “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity”.
The United States of America, often touted as the epitome of democracy, has also been affected by the virus of the “decline of democracy”. The USA is facing an acute leadership crisis, which is unprecedented. Brookings in their October 17, 2023, article titled “Understanding Democratic Decline in The United States” identifies two major forms of democratic erosion in its governing institutions: election manipulation and executive overreach[1]. But many see it as a ‘leadership crisis’, according to nearly 85% of respondents to a joint Harris Poll-U.S. News survey, conducted in December 2023. A much larger share (85%) agree with the statement, “Even great leaders are not suited to handle all crises as some require a new crop of leaders to emerge with new skill sets.”
As democracies attempt to negotiate complex international agreements to address the immense political, economic, and social challenges of the twenty-first century – particularly climate change and mass migration strategy employed by fundamentalists, the lack of dynamic and strong leaders, to handle the crisis, is acutely felt.
Even a strong and capable leader of the world’s largest democracy, Mr. Narendra Modi, could not muster 400 plus seats to propel the country into a pre-eminent position. The electorate was sharply polarized by foreign religious followers, and their single point agenda to replace him with a weak leader. The fragmented Hindu votes, could not be mopped up by Mr. Modi, as voters were lured by the Opposition parties, with petty freebies, while the organized foreign religion followers had a single-point agenda of displacing him.
While authoritarian regimes solely depend on one strong leader, democratic governments are a group dance by an assortment of mild personalities of mediocre capabilities. In a country like India, burdened by a massive but fragmented electorate, having organized foreign religions assiduously working on toxic polarization, powered by foreign money, fake narratives, social media manipulations, and instigating narco-terrorism; pygmy leaders are in abundance, who will succumb to any kind of proposal that will enable them and their families to grab power.
Democracies are also super expensive to run. For example, India is perennially engaged in some form of election or other, either a Parliamentary bypoll or Rajya Sabha election, Assembly, MLC, University Syndicate, Students election, cooperative banks election, government employee’s election, Police association election, and so on, which are all politically controlled. The enormous expenditure wasted on these elections is never disclosed, it would be a mind-boggling sum.
Recent elections held in India in 2024, have exposed the fickle-mindedness of the vast electorate. The nation despite ascending in global rankings on all parameters, including the human development index and related indices, meant nothing to the electorate. One half was hankering for freebies; another sizeable section was indulging in bulk voting as per dictates of foreign-appointed priests, and a section of the educated elite preferred to go sightseeing rather than exercise their franchise.
The disappointing election verdict, has deep ramifications, affecting every national policy and international relations. There was visible frustration among the fractured Hindu community, that their concerns about the liberation of Temples, protection from religious conversions by proselytizing foreign religions, failure to block the well-orchestrated and co-ordinated refugee influx from Bangladesh, and their naturalization on the strength of fake identification documents in different sensitive locations across the country, massive drug-trafficking, failure to spell out a compulsory national population policy, and many other sensitive issues, was perceived as leadership weaknesses. Despite 10 years of continuous rule, none of these issues received even cursory attention and rankled a sizeable section of the Hindus. The resolution of every issue cannot be outsourced to the Judiciary. A leader takes the bull by the horns, dilly-dallying does not get admirers nor their votes.
Mr. Modi has to address the threatening issues that people are afraid of – waves of Bangladeshi and Rohingya infiltrators threatening to completely overthrow democracy, the inability of the Border Security Force (BSF) to handle the infiltrator influx, unabated terror strikes in Kashmir on security forces, threat of a conspiracy to create a new nation in the North East, Temples being looted and destroyed in many States, scourge of drug-trafficking throughout the country, badly needed overhaul of the bureaucracy, revamp of judiciary and enacting a national population policy. A streak of dictatorial tendencies can quickly resolve many of these issues, but democracies are not designed to handle such cancerous outbreaks. A political leader, sometimes, has to don the mantle of a superman, to rescue his nation, defying all odds. A dash of brazen authority, like in dictatorships, is needed in democracies, it is like the stimulating grains of caffeine in coffee, making every sip invigorating and refreshing.
Note:
1. Text in Blue points to additional data on the topic.
2. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of PGurus.
Reference:
[1] Understanding democratic decline in the United States – Oct 17, 2023, Brookings
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