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WORLD CITIZEN LETTER: 549
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WCL 549 March 2007
Democratic deficits
"Democracy is a system of government in which those ruled are, in some proportionate measure, willing and able to participate in decisions that affect their lives." The means that are used to make this possible are varied, complex and often very difficult to shape adequately. But without them, there will be deficits that make democracy ineffective or even impossible. The definition also has implications that need examination, because they are not often pursued to logical and necessary conclusions. Thus it may be simple to appreciate the need for a parishioner to have a say in the way his own parish is run; the progression to larger units of government becomes often far more complicated: custom and history of administration almost always lag behind in adapting to changing economic, financial technological and social circumstances.
Democracy is a relative, not an absolute term. This is made very clear in any examination of democratic history. A society may start, as most have done, from a hierarchy, but is likely, over time, to broaden the ruling group to a point where it can be described no longer as a monarchy or a tyranny, but has become an oligarchy. Sometimes this has occurred with relapses to a previous state, but sometimes, as in the case of several states in Europe, there has been progress towards democracy. There is a case to be made for giving societies a numerical value - say 40%, 50% or 60% democratic; and following that, the likely implication would be that only those having over 50% could be termed democracies. Unlike, for example, the United Nations where the assumption is sometimes made that all members are, ipso facto, democratic.
Britain, as an exemplar, began as a number of tribal kingdoms which were reduced, over centuries, to a single monarchy in England, which, despite imperialist ventures into Wales, Ireland, Scotland an France, developed a broader system of representative government. That was of an oligarchy dominated by land-holders, who in time challenged the monarchy and in the 17th century, overthrew it. The resulting restoration did not shift power away from the land-owning oligarchy. Nor in such times did any politician or ruler suggest that democracy was a feasible system of government. That is only very recent.
The progression towards a wider participation in government gathered pace during the 19th century in Britain. Apart from a brief flirtation with radical ideas in the mid-17th century English republic, the first time that any serious demand for democracy arose was with French revolution of 1789. It became clamorous in1830 with the first Reform Act and the People's Charter in Britain. The second Reform Act of 1868 and successive legislation saw greater and greater popular participation and by 1900 Great Britain could reasonably be termed a democracy without protest.
Nevertheless, over half the population had no direct voice in decisions of government affecting their lives. That was not remedied until 1928 when all adult women had been given the right to vote. Nor was the system of administration seriously democratic: powers of the House of Lords prevented full popular say in decisions of government. A monarchy retaining a minimum of political power but a degree of influence and residuary powers also militated against full democracy. A more serious deficit lay in inequalities of education, wealth, social standing and living conditions that prevented full access to decision-making on the part of a majority. A theoretical democracy was in fact still deficient.
Furthermore, the world of which Britain is a part had moved on while the British struggle for democracy was taking place and that created or transformed democratic deficits in ways still unobserved by the majority. The rise of vast alliances in which decisions are taken by governments often far away in temper or attitude from their electorates has brought new challenges. Decisions affecting all Europe now have to be taken by Europeans as a whole if they are to remain within the definition of democratic. Even more significant in an interdependent world, democracy often has to be not merely local, regional, national and continental, but also global.
To give one pertinent and striking example, when two "democratic" leaders, George W. Bush and Tony Blair, launched an attack on Iraq in 2003, the people who were most to be affected, i.e. the Iraqis, had no input into the making of that decision. The chaos that has been heaped upon the unfortunate population of Iraq as a consequence of that decision was in no way one that they chose. Nor are others peoples in the region or even further afield in any way responsible for those decisions that might well lead to wars engulfing their own countries and the rest of the world. The nominal claims of Blair and Bush to be democratic are false but that remain unobserved by their nationalist followers.
There are other unobserved effects on democracy of the growth of an interdependent world. Unrestrained economic development fostered and hastened by governments everywhere will lead to global climatic change and environmental destruction. "Democracy is a system of government in which those ruled are, in some proportionate measure, willing and able to participate in decisions that affect their lives." Even if the world were to reform its political system to provide access and input to governmental decision-making the problem of billions of monolingual people would remain a formidable obstacle to democracy. World citizens everywhere deserve better than this.
Assuming that one could tentatively measure the degree of democracy and assign a figure of 100 to the ideal of "full" we cannot suggest that anywhere near that figure is attained in more than a handful of small communities. Nor can the world hope to achieve a full democracy while billions remain ill-educated, poverty-stricken, disease-ridden and living in conditions of intolerable hardship or uncertainty. Even in the fully developed democracies the democratic index may not exceed 70 or 80 at a generous mark. Our rough and ready use of the term democracy may satisfy our crude political fumblings but the incessant criticisms of political leaders in those societies indicates how little we reckon them.
John Roberts
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