DEMOCRACY AND POLITICAL OPPORTUNISM
DR.
RAM CHANDRA GUPTA
In
the political history of mankind democracy was tried in some form or the other
in some countries but none of the forms lasted. The first phase of political
experience was naturally tentative and forms of government changed with a high
degree of rapidity and frequency, but the general trend was towards personal
rule of either kings or emperors. The Hellenic democracy gave way eventually to
the Macedonian imperialism, though the democracy was limited in many ways. The
same thing occurred in
However,
it must be noted that democracy as possible a form of government has got a
second chance now in our modern times, or more
correctly in the last two centuries only. None believed in the practicability
of democracy based on universal suffrage a century ago. The persistent idea in
the centuries gone by was that it was necessary to bring together
representatives of group interests only and that also for the purpose of legislation
and not for regular administration or government; and the development of statutory
legislation has been very slow process.
Democracy
to reach its present position has passed through various stages; and now it
means that the State belongs to the people just as the people belong to the
State. It is a rational and moral form of collective life through which every
individual member of the community attains and is helped to attain the best
possible values of life at any time. It accordingly signifies sublimation of
the physical force that was certainly the original factor in the emergence of
the State and Government, and is still largely operative in the matter of peace
and order and international relations. In other words, the success of democracy
or government of themselves by the people will be measured in terms of
substitution of force and coercion by rational and moral behaviour
and human relations. No other form or theory of government promises this. In
earlier times democracy meant giving the people, that is, the lower social
classes of workers and businessmen, a place in the government so that they
would not feel being left out of the exercise of authority. Hence the idea of
mixed constitution, of checks and balance and of compromise and coercion was
introduced. But to treat political life as something apart from the moral and
ethical life or mainly concerned with the material interests of classes or
individuals will certainly make democracy the most precarious movement or mode
of life, too full of uneasy suspicions and rivalries. Such a situation caused
the failure of democracy in the first round. This history may be repeated if
this lesson is not learnt.
In
political history democracy in its modern sense did not come from any feeling
of loss of liberty and equality but from far more tangible factors. To mention
The
result has been that a sort of society and political order in sought in
which the distribution of power and possessions should not
be by established custom or privileges, or prescription, but by the capacity of
each for scrambling as it were in the melee. At present, therefore, liberty and
equality are more psychological than either liberal or ethical. They are in
theory assumed sublimations of the enraged feelings and emotions against
oppressive drive of privileges of some sort and are accordingly not easily
placed into any rational and ethical order of thought or conduct. It has not
yet been possible to think in terms of complete equality or liberty. What has
happened is that special privileges, for which no reasonable account can be
found, have been resented and there is the new outlook of judging each person
as any other person and without qualification. If society or the State creates
opportunities than these should be open to all and should be marked down for no
special or preferred person or persons. This may not mean equality between man
and man but only giving all an equal chance, or a chance for equal start,
though not expecting equal results.
The
real difficulty is not in admitting the necessity of a people governing
themselves but in finding the right way of doing it. In other words, democracy
is not so much a theory, which has to be established with the aid of some very
doubtful assumptions about a community of individuals, as a desirable kind of
practice that creates and follows an identity of interests of the governor and
the governed.
It
may be noticed that here no question of equality and liberty is raised. The
problem is mainly connected with the management of the numbers of individuals
considered as distinct factors having common interests. Modern states are not
city states and are composed of very large populations; adult persons in such
states form the multitude, so the problem is how to associate these persons
actively with the business of government. The solution of the problem so far
found is representation, so that government may actually be carried on by the
representatives of the people.
As
a technique, therefore, representation is very much important, and discussions
on this point have been extensive, even granting that Rousseau discards the
idea of representation as absurd because no person can be really represented in
the way he is. The debate over whom does the
representative represent rises because there is some doubt about the whole
thing. Yet it is not possible to form otherwise a government of the whole adult
population of a country, and so, some way has to be found for the active and
interested participation of the population. In the representative system at
least the majority party elected may be said to have in a way the consent of
the population to form and run a government; but then the system of election
may be such as to give very narrow difference in votes cast between the
majority and the minority, and here the question may arise whether it will be
democratic and morally justified for the majority party with a marginal
difference to govern the people.
Party
as a platform to mobilise popular support has been
accepted and used everywhere but a confusion is generally made between the
party and the people. Where, again, multiple parties exist the complexion of
the government becomes like that of a patch-work and it tends to become
unstable, while each party claims to represent the nation. Both representation
and party system that have made modern democracy workable are imperfect in a
high degree and may cause confusion, particularly in these days in which
various kinds of ideologies imtead of any definite
and tangible platforms are presented to the people who have got to make any
choice.
It
may further be considered that representatives working in a team under the
party in power keep a kind of control and domination on the minds of the people
in such a powerful manner as was not possible for the individual monarch or a
despot in the era of kingship. In this sense, democratic government maintains a
greater and more pressing grip on the people than was practicable for the
individual rulers, for their courtiers and colleagues were not in a position of
using the hypnotic influence over the people that they were the people’s own
men sent up by way of representation. Thus democracy or parliamentary, or
representative government is a hypnotic net in which people’s liberties are
more effectively enmeshed than were in the times of the absolute monarchs.
Suggestions
have been made for improving the voting system and returning the candidates on
proportionate voting and all that in order to ensure that all the top-graders
among the candidates for election may at least come into the government. But it
does not seem to make any essential difference in the total situation, because
this way of representation does not and cannot ensure the best possible
government for the people or a government that will not be somewhat removed
from the immediate contacts with the life of the people. In the wake of all
sorts of corrupt election devices, which remain in vogue during the period of
election or which the candidates and the parties usually employ in order to hypnotise the electorate, it is not possible to have a
genuine representation and ensure a fully responsible government for the
people.
Besides,
the system of having a governmental party and an opposition party involves
wastage; for however the opposition is taken it has hardly any effective voice
in the policies that are put into execution. In a way, as parties are
consolidated and insistence on party loyalties increases, the party stands in
between the people and the government as a definite political power. This may
not happen if the people are politically awake, which they are not ordinarily.
To the people, generally, General Elections are almost either a serious
business proposition that is expected to yield them some profit or a fun only.
The result is that both representation and elections have come to be
fashionable or funny, and for some profitable as well.
What
is more important for democracy than form is the spirit that manifests itself
in the daily conduct of the life of its people. Going to the polls once after
so many years to record votes gives only a holiday, for surely life is poor
without festivals. It makes all the difference: Whether this is a mere
merriment or the joy of doing a big job. Admittedly, most men have no time left
after their day’s trials of living to think over public problems. Meanwhile the
problems of the tortuous modern life grow and press themselves on the
attention.
Not
infrequently the men in power assume that whatever they do or plan to do will
be supported by popular opinion. Not that there may not somewhere some residual
objection or opposition; and even as a constitutional matter there is an
opposition party in parliament or legislatures also; but that does not prevent
an entrenched government from following its own policies and predilections. Yet
the essence of democracy is not delegation of authority by some sort of
election but rather the authority of the electors over their representatives.
But in practice, the representative system considerably dilutes this essence;
and the men in power cannot avoid being powerful when popular vigilance is not
duly exercised on their delegated authority.
In
our country this particularly happens, partly due to political illiteracy and
slave-mentality and partly due to a certain moral weakness caused by a habit of
begging. If the vote is given in expectation of favours
in return, the voter morally compromises his position and, psychologically
loses his strength to conduct himself as the virtual master in a democracy.
Abuse of power is usual; but the abuse is especially promoted if the delegates
to the seat of power are treated as patrons and not servants of the voting
public. To make democracy effective it is indispensable that no party should be
holding power continuously for a long period so as to be permanent master. To
hold power permanently is a tendency that can develop in certain conditions and
when such a party with such a tendency tries to impose its will and beliefs on
the whole people, democracy turns into something quite different. This amounts
to a reversal of the natural process of development; it forces a people back
into the primitive homogeneous community stage. The process of democratisation is to release the individual from group
consciousness and the reversal is to submerge the individual into the group
again or to sacrifice him at the altar of the State. In India the Congress
party, although its hold on the masses is now on the wane, is constantly trying
to maintain its authority and impose its will on the whole people, thereby
forcing them into group consciousness. This tendency is ominous to the success
of democracy in the country.
In
a modern democracy, government by the people only means government by the
people’s representatives. Even there, the whole people are not represented in
the parliament or the legislatures. Even after adult franchise, there are many
who do not enjoy the right to vote. If wisdom or knowledge is the standard
aimed at, it is a doubtful one. Boys and girls in Secondary schools and
Intermediate colleges are more politically conscious than the purely illiterate
old people in our country. But the former do not enjoy the right to vote. Here
a pertinent question may be raised: Do we mean by democracy in India the
representative government mostly of the illiterate folk? Let us ignore this question
and switch on to another one. Do the eligible voters, under the system, ever
become successful to return the candidates of their own choice to the
parliament and legislatures? The answer is in the negative. Then again, even
those who are returned are not carrying on the government. Some of them form
opposition, while those who form the majority party take position in or possess
the government. So, by the people means, in the first place, by the
representatives of the people, and, in the second place, by such
representatives as hold majority of seats in the legislative bodies. Thus, it
has been pithily said: “Majority is taken to speak for the whole.” But the
matter does not end here. It is not the majority party as a whole that rules
the people but it is a few fortunate leaders in it who actually wield the
power, for they supposedly command the confidence of the party.
Power
in the immeasurable quantity which the leaders receive from the people is
always a double-edged weapon. It may be used either for creation or for
destruction. As all writers on politics have stated, power begets pride and
pride corrupts human nature. Rousseau remarked that “Democracy is a system of
government for which only gods are fit.” This is the greatest weakness of
democracy; it implies uncommon powers exercised by some common men, and common
men are easily unbalanced by the exercise of such power or authority. There is
the love of power naturally active in men at all times, and the more so the
higher the intelligence of a person. There has been a lot of criticism of
Aristotle’s saying that some are born to rule and some to be ruled. But this is
not altogether untrue, and those who are born to rule may easily fall in love
with exercise of authority and lose hold on themselves.
There
is no natural guarantee provided against such corruption in those who may
happen to fancy that they are born to rule or regulate lives of men and women.
This has been the problem for all peoples in the course of history and that
history is running on still. The Congress Government in India, for example,
claiming to be appointed by Gandhiji, feel like having a sort of divine right.
Gandhiji had forewarned his followers not to be addicted to power. But it is
quite unfortunate to note that they have turned a deaf ear to their Master’s
warning. On the contrary, they are engaged in fighting a pitched battle for
maintaining their power, which they have been holding for the past twenty
years.
During
the years of struggle with the British rule, the Congress always asserted that
it stood for the whole nation and was not a party. Indeed, the Congress before
independence represented the whole nation, fighting against the alien rule.
Whatever may be said to the contrary, all flourishes of figures of speech notwithstanding,
the plain fact is that the British Government transferred its power over India
to the Congress. After independence, Mahatma
Gandhi advised the Congress to dissolve itself, partly because it was not a
party and partly because he felt that in the long run its leaders might misuse
its name. But quite contrary to his wishes, it continued as the majority party
of India. As it is with all the freedom-fighting or liberation parties of the
world, the Congress also wanted to profit by the freedom for the sacrifices
which its leaders had made in the struggle for independence. As the people
trusted it and voted it again and again into power, its leaders began to fall
in love with power.
After
its long rule of 20 years, the Congress is more after mastership than service;
it is no longer with the people in its tower of mastership. As a result, the
opposition parties are now capturing the mind of the people and the
super-snobbish attitude of the Congress in attributing to them of always
talking fantastic nonsense is gradually disappearing.
In
the fourth General Elections the prestige of the Congress was severely hit. It
lost in as many as six States and there non-Congress ministries were formed.
Within a few days, after the General Elections, the Congress ministries in
Uttar Pradesh and Haryana were also toppled down. The
Congress Government in Madhya pradesh, the central
and the biggest State (in area) of India, was also voted out after some time.
It was something shocking to the Congress High Command.
But
the non-Congress Governments, with the exception of Governments in Orissa and
Madras, have also not put up a better image of their administration. On account
of the internal rift between the various political groups coalescing to form
non-Congress ministries they have failed in doing anything good to the people.
The political situation, frankly speaking, has worsened during the past
few months. In Bihar two ministries have fallen, and the present Paswan’s Ministry is the third one. In Punjab Gill’s Ministry,
formed with the blessings of the Congress, is the second ministry.
Both the ministries are sailing in troubled waters. In Haryana,
Bengal and Uttar Pradesh State Legislatures have been dissolved, and
preparations are now being made for holding the mid-term elections in all the
three States. The position of SVD Government in Madhya Pradesh is also not
secure. Any day anything may happen. The Congress is fighting everywhere a war
of attrition.
On
reviewing the present situation in India, one will find that the political game
which is being played between the various political parties is ominous to
democracy. In every State, whether it has a Congress rule or a non-Congress
Government, horse-trading among legislators and jockeying for power are in
vogue. Everyday the news are heard of floor-crossing by the legislators. It is
not uncommon for legislators to cross the floor. It can happen in any
parliamentary democracy and has actually happened in most. In the United
Kingdom, important members like Disraeli and
Gladstone crossed floor over major issues of policy. What distinguishes
defections in our legislatures since the last General Elections is their
frequency and the absence of any perceptible considerations of policy weighing
with defectors. If legislators defect for personal gain alone, they pose a
serious threat to the stability of democratic system itself.
`Democracy may be made
safe only when party leaders keep their eyes away from the immediate pursuit of
power and ponder over the circumstances required to make effective use of it.
Power may be retained by the ruling party or the governments may be brought
down by inducing a group of men to cross the floor, but no stable alternative
can be built on shifting loyalties. Last year, the suggestion was made by the
Jan Sangh President, Balraj
Madhok, for an all-party consensus on a political
code to prevent crossing of floors by M. L. A’s and M. P’s which was welcomed
by the then Congress President, Mr. Kamaraj, but the
latter was disinclined to indicate if the Congress as a party would take the
initiative in the matter. At present, the political situation in India is quite
fluid; and the future will depend on whether the political leaders take to the
common task of reducing the premium on political opportunism or they go by the
temptation of scoring points off one another. It would be good if the leaders
of the opposition parties, including those also who have defected from the
Congress, combine together solidly, keeping off their differences at least for the
time being, and stick to the basic task of stabilizing democracy.