Thus at a meeting between Havel and Klaus, the two politicians let it be known that the Czech Republic s political parties are placing their own interests above those of the public and something should be done about it if the health of the country s democracy is to improve at all. We have to start talking, chimed in Freedom Union leader Jan Ruml after a similar meeting with the President. It s certainly difficult to disagree with them. The current conditions are such that the right-wing parties are at each other s throats. It is awful to see what partisan bickering has done to the people who entered politics after the Velvet Revolution in 1989 and became the new political elite of the revived democratic system in the Czech lands.
Partisanship seems an ailment of democracy for which there is no easy cure.
It is not exactly evident how deeply this ailment has penetrated Czech democracy, nor what it is based on. It is too easy to play the wise man and say that no democracy can exist without political parties but that excessive partisanship is bad. Such statements are useless if no criteria are set for deciding what amount of party politics is healthy for a democracy. The answer to that question will always depend on one s concept of democracy. The Political Perhaps some light can be shed on the problem by reviewing some of the recent political theories on this issue.