The Crisis of Democracy Down-Under is Indicative of the Crisis of Democracy Around the Globe
By: Alex Goik
Tags: Politics, Democracy, Corruption, Protest, Government

The Crisis of Democracy Down-Under is Indicative of the Crisis of Democracy Around the Globe

Political turmoil and uncertainty is not that which is being felt solely by Americans.

Lights Illuminate the path to the Australian Parliament in Canberra — Photo by Social Estate on Unsplash

As of today, Friday 24 August 2018, Australia has a new prime minister.

But he wasn’t elected by the Australian public.

A leadership spill in the federal parliament has seen Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull resign — who himself ousted the previously incumbent Tony Abbot — and Treasurer Scott Morrison assume head of the Australian Liberal Party and government.

What’s worse is the fact that the country was a mere stones throw away from having Immigration Minister Peter Dutton, a man that walked out on the government’s apology to the Stolen Generation, joked about the plight of Pacific Island nations facing rising seas from climate change, and that repeatedly portrayed immigrants as criminals and dole bludgers, sworn in as Prime Minister.

All without any say from the Australian public.

If it sounds confusing and senseless—it’s because it is.

Mainstream politics in Australia has been degenerating for over a decade and the recent spill within the Liberal Party is the latest iteration of a childish and destructive political saga in which Australian leadership has become a ‘revolving door’.

No elected Prime Minister has served a full three-year term since 2007.

The modus operandi among members of the major political parties is to point the finger and blame the opposition, and indeed their own party members, instead of leading with responsibility and the advancing the interests of the majority.

For a concise assesement of the situation you can view this trending speech delivered yesterday by leader of the Australian Green’s Richard Di Natale.

A slimmer and slimmer minority of Australians have any faith in mainstream politics, and this lastest debacle has left many of us thinking “What the actual f**k”.

Even before this event, the decay of Australian political integrity has been matched by increasing levels of public discontent. The Lowy Institute’s annual poll for 2017 revealed that 79% of Australians were dissatisfied with the direction of the world and 48% with ‘the way things are going in Australia today’.

But Australia’s political criss should not be appraised as a crisis plaguing one sole democracy.

It is a reflection of the decadent state of democracy around the globe.

The End of History

In 1992 Francis Fukuyama published a ground-breaking book “The End of History and the Last Man”. In it, the Japanese political scientist argued that the end of the Cold War and the advance of Western liberal democracy signaled the endpoint of humanity’s sociocultural evolution and the final form of human government.

Fast forward to the year 2018 and Fukuyama’s claim now appears tenuous at best. But how and when did humanity’s trajectory set for the ‘end of history’ diverge, leading to what many insist is a contested world order and ‘democracy in crisis’?

Of course, Fukuyama’s hypothesis was formulated against a very specific historical backdrop, and humanity now finds itself in an entirely new scenario. In 1992 many of the developments that now characterise the 21st century were still in their infancy. The widespread adoption of the internet, advances in the realms of artificial intelligence and automation, the shift from a bipolar international system to unipolarity undergirded by US hegemony back to a multipolar order, and now the digitisation of near everything people do — no one could have predicted these changes occurring, let alone simultaneously.

It is against these contemporary trends that the mechanism behind the prevailing iteration of democracy, representational democracy, has been bent and broken.

One need not look far for proof of the crisis.

Democracy in Crisis

As recent events painfully demonstrate, the decay of democracy is a global phenomenon.

The United States is fast turning into an authoritarian and pariah state. A country fronted by a leader who uses absolute authority to pardon himself, a lack of ambassadorsto countries considered key geopolitical allies, and political institutions that seldom few have faith in.

In Europe this trend has manifested itself in an abrupt shift away from centrist politics, with public sentiment leaning towards either the far right or left of the political spectrum.

In countries once considered bastions of liberal democracy such as Denmark, Germany and Sweden the world is bearing witness to nationalist, xenophobic and extreme right groups secure increased legislative power year by year. A 2017 Bloomberg report identified divergent attitudes towards uncontrolled immigration, national sovereignty, globalization, disappearing manufacturing jobs, corrupt elites and rising income inequality as the cornerstone issues dividing communities and families across Europe.

And of course, one need not look further than the outcome of Brexit vote in 2016 for a definitive confirmation of such societal division. Although now believed to be higher than initially reported, this was a referendum in which 64% of Britain’s young people overwhelmingly in favour of remaining within the EU chose to vote, versus 74% among the 55-to-64 age group and 90% for those aged 65 and over.

On the other side of the globe in Australia from where I write to you, seven Prime Ministers have held office in the last ten years. Further, the proven influence that mining and energy companies have shaping Australia’s political landscape and on major political parties during election campaigns epitomises the government’s prioritisation of political ambition versus the interests of citizens.

“City Protest sign reads "abuse of power comes as no surprise"” by Samantha Sophia on Unsplash

The Source of Discontent

The political upheaval we are experiencing stems from overarching feelings of disenfranchisement.

People are dissociated with the prevailing political institutes, disconnected to each other owed partially to the continuous march of technological progress, and disheartened by their supposed inability to anything about it.

Democratic representation can no longer generate solutions to these problems and the system’s shortcomings are twofold.

First and foremost, it is undeniable that in the majority of countries our representatives have become co-opted by vested interests that benefit from maintaining the status quo. As wealth continues to be concentrated within a smaller and smaller proportion of the population, those in high places or with deep pockets will naturally seek to prevent meaningful policy in the majority’s interests from being introduced lest they jeopardise their position of privilege.

An inherent lack of transparency surrounding such things as campaign financing and the ties binding political representatives to wealthy constituents reduces trust in government at the same time that it prevents the formulation of policy in the majority’s best interests.

The unholy marriage between business and politics is now so entrenched that it is wishful thinking to assume that a solution will come from within the existing establishment and the voting in of new representatives as we are popularly encouraged to believe.

The second issue from which the above weakness stems is that democratic representation itself has become antiquated. This is a method of governance that was established during a time when people wrote in ink pens and had to travel for days or weeks to have their say on the issues that mattered to them.

In the previous era the ordinary person was restricted by the constraints of time and access to information that prevented them from being actively engaged in governance. People had fields to tend and children to raise and the ability of the average citizen to understand political issues was definitively tied to their social and economic standing. Democratic representation was therefore a necessity as people were reliant on the individual that could go to where politics was done to advocate on their behalf.

This way of doing democracy has served its purpose, but it isn’t doing the job satisfactorily anymore.

The beginning of the 21st century was marked by the advent of instantaneous communication, and society is now being defined by the ordinary person’s access to boundless information — all accessible by a device that fits comfortably in your jean pocket no less.

The breadth of divergent perspectives and strains of thought on any and all issues that we are now exposed to has made it illogical to throw support behind a single individual, ideology, doctrine or cause. No current political party has been able to come to terms with this development which is why novel ideas and policy are seldom forthcoming from the existing establishment.

This is also the reason why political activism among younger generations has taken a nose-dive across the globe. The young collective feels disenchanted by democratic representation, a system glaringly outdated in its current form and plagued by myriad flaws.

If these broader trends are not taken into consideration and addressed moving forward, then we can expect to see the decay of democracy gradually turn to its destruction.

Alex Goik commonly writes for Mogul News and at Foreign Affairs Navigator where he strives to offer fresh perspectives on foreign affairs, tech and China (coupled with the odd analysis of human nature).

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this text belong solely to the author and not those of their employer.