Subverting Democracy

Original Post Date: 2002-12-29 Published on: ETHERZONE.COM&nbsp  Posted By: Jan

SubTitle: Ignoring the Will of the People

Today I’m going to write about something that’s been on my mind for years, but which I decided to
leave out of my book due to space – among other reasons. It is about ignoring the will of the
people. I believe there is no country on Earth where the will of the people is truly reflected.
Let me state that I am not one who believes the people always know what is right for them – but that
is another topic.

What I want to point out is that I don’t believe that there is true “democracy” out there anywhere.
By this I mean that I don’t believe there is a country where the will of the people is carried
out. I think that quite a lot of so-called “democracy” is something of a sham when you get down
to the nuts and bolts of the matter.

Firstly, let me demonstrate a highly obvious instance where democracy was subverted and yet the
Mass Media hardly said a word about it. It happened here in South Africa some weeks back. The
government had introduced some legislation allowing for “floor crossing” by elected officials.
There were those who kicked against it and said that this was an outright subversion of
the democratic process, however, they were ignored and it was signed into law by our President.

The floor crossing legislation allowed any elected official one chance, in mid-term, to go
to another political party. He would approach the political party he intended joining, and if
they accepted him, he could cross over to them while keeping the seat/position he was elected for.

This is clearly undemocratic. Imagine, for example, a Congressman elected by Republican voters,
deciding to move to the Democrats – and he is able to do so without losing the seat which he
was elected for. Clearly, this is wrong. He was never elected by people who voted for the Democrats,
so how can he now move over to them?

Well, this is exactly what happened in South Africa, especially at a Municipal and Provincal
level. Hundreds of elected officials crossed over to the African National Congress even though
they were elected by voters in other parties. Of course there was traffic both ways – but when
it was all counted, they discovered that the ANC had been the big winner.

Since the ANC came to power in 1994, they have engaged in a number of tricks which were aimed
at strengthening their hand and increasing their power – especially in provinces where they were
not in control. Thus, slowly but surely, since 1994, their grip on the country has steadily
grown. This floor-crossing legislation however was their latest, boldest and most successful
move.

But if you look at the democratic processes around the world you will see that the voters are not
really getting the deal which they are supposed to be getting. I have had lengthy arguments with
a friend of mine about the concept of Political Parties. I told him, that in my view, Political
Parties are themselves a subversion of the democratic process.

There are two problems I have with the way democracy is practised in much of the world. Firstly,
there is the problem of money. Election campaigns are inherently unfair because different
participants have different amounts of money. The money they have may not in any way reflect
their real popularity in the country. It may represent various special interests and even subtle
foreign ties to other governments. The second problem I have is the concept of the Political Party.
Everyone regards this as a very normal thing. But if you look closely at how political parties
function then you will see they introduce a new level which shields elected officials from the
voters.

I believe that if one is to truly allow common people to have a say in their government, then
their elected officials must be held directly accountable by those who voted for them. Instead,
when you elect someone who is a member of a political party, then that person is controlled by
the rules of that party. What if he were to support legislation which his party wants to push
through, but voters in his area are against?

It is my view that political parties themselves are a subversion of the democratic process. I
think that if one were to have a true democracy then it would consist only of independents.
Furthermore, money would have to be removed from the election process. Advertising should not
be allowed. There should be a strict process whereby all candidates get exactly the same
media coverage. They should be allowed to debate each other in public on an equal footing
so that they can concentrate on the issues of the day.

An elected official should be accountable to only one source and that is the people who voted
for him. They alone must decide his fate. There must be no political party structure to bail
him out if things go wrong, or to soften his fall. If he is to be a representative of the
people then he must be held accountable to them alone. He is to go into parliament and to
vote according to their will – since he is acting on their behalf. And if he does not do that,
then they must have the power to remove him.

Political parties have other negative effects – and we see a lot of that in our part of the
world. Parliament is not a place where genuine discussion takes place. Often, especially here,
the elected officials vote along party lines. It does not matter how good or bad an idea or a
law is – they vote like sheep. So parliament is not a place where discussion takes place and
where decisions are made. Instead, the majority party decides what will happen and then
bulldozes it through parliament.

If political parties did not exist then the independents who made up parliament would be forced
to discuss things and to vote according to their conscience. There would be no party lines
which blur the issues. Instead, they would be able to concentrate only on the issues at hand.

I also think that all democratic countries will eventually end up with a two party system.
It does not matter how diverse a country may be or how many political parties may form.
Eventually, through a process of amalgamation, you will find two major parties dominating
everything. I think this is a natural part of the process. In our part of the world they
have formed dozens of parties. But most of them barely function. Eventually, they start
falling by the wayside. I should point out that this is part of the philosophical concept
of “holism”. The initial thinker who came up with this was a South African President, General
Jan Smuts, who ruled during World War II. He was something of a philosopher too, and greatly
admired by Winston Churchill. Jan Smuts came up with the concept of holism. He believed that
all things tended towards a “whole”. In other words, small nations would eventually become
part of bigger nations and so on. Eventually everything would be swallowed up by something
bigger. If one looks at history one can see holism has been at work across the globe. The
concept should apply to political parties because there are benefits of scale which come
about when a smaller party becomes part of a bigger one. I have a problem with this, because
the political issues of the world are not adequately reflected by merely having two options.
Life is more complex than that, and that is why a system of independents would represent
the real world more correctly.

What I am suggesting will of course never happen. But I am curious as to whether this would not
be a massive improvement over the systems currently in place in much of the world – most especially
here in Africa?

“Published originally at EtherZone.com : republication allowed with this notice and hyperlink intact.”

Etherzone Articles by Jan Lamprecht