In the supermarket of democracy, choice is an illusion. Is there a real alternative?

The election of Donald Trump as president of the United States has consolidated what appears to be a swing towards citizens voting right-wing, authoritarian politicians into power. Argentina and European countries have also swung right. Elsewhere, political leaders who have consolidated considerable power, such as Russia’s Valdimir Putin and India’s Narendra Modi, were re-elected.

Those who have fought for decades for democratic spaces and fundamental human and environmental rights have asked: what is going wrong?

Analysts have proposed various reasons for this: the failure of left-wing or progressive parties to deliver on their promises, the charisma and moneypower of “strongmen”, a reaction to what is seen as the intellectual snobbishness of the Left, anti-incumbency sentiment, mass brainwashing through social media posts, including about the evil “other” – such as immigrants and refugees – which builds on existing racist, patriarchal or xenophobic beliefs.

Undoubtedly, some or all of these have played a role. But there is another factor that should be considered: the inherent tendency of liberal, electoral, party-based politics to be anti-democratic.

What is being seen is not a distortion of so-called democracy as practiced for the last few decades in most countries but its inevitable outcome, especially when combined with two other factors: modern industrial or capitalist...

Read more