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Madagascar Madness - A global phenomenon?

I wrote this article in response to a well thought out and written discussion on the current political turmoil in Madagascar, with which we are all too familiar based on our stint on that beautiful island during their last civil war between 2001 and 2002. The key question raised in the note from my colleague was "What do the Malagasy people want?" Following is the response I wrote to him which delves deeper into the origins of democracy and the suitability of this rather amorphous concept to different parts of the world.

"I think it is a good article which well explains the differences in development in different parts of the world. The problem has always been to transpose the ideals of democracy from western nations to developing and underdeveloped parts of the world which unfortunately encompass most of the southern hemisphere nations except for the British colonies settled by European and predominantly anglo-saxon settlers. A second issue is to define democracy properly, and this depends on the voting systems utilized and rules and regulations governing the democracy, such as the Constitution. For argument sake, a democracy may exist where the president is re elected and stays in power for 40 years or 8 terms. If the Constitution allows him to do so by not limiting the terms of his office one could argue that it is still a democracy.

Democracy, when first defined as a concept, was a very limited concept in Athens anyway as only Athens born men had the vote, excepting women, slaves, foreigners etc. The first principles of democracy would have been more likely developed in Greece because of the inclement weather, longer nights and the social life around the market place or agora, where men used to congregate to discuss issues. This would have been less likely in northern Europe, with a harsher clime and fewer year-round opportunities for gatherings of able bodied males.

This issue of environmental including any climatic factors, does seem to have played a big role in the evolution of democracy. Democracy means government by the people, but for the people to govern they clearly need to be sufficiently educated and aware of the concept and what it means to them, as you state in your essay. Northern Europe, according to some anthropologists, was blessed with the right climate that allowed for more successful animal husbandry and growing of grains and cereals, allowing for a more rapid settlement of land and a move away from the nomadic lifestyle, and creating the seeds of organization, structure etc.

I think the driving force for democracy has always been mercantilism, and not the other way around as many would claim. You will hear the statements that democracy is good for business, and if a democracy is robust and healthy, then business will flourish. Off course this is correct, but it confirms the objective of democracy in the first place was not to create the vote for everyone and make them feel empowered for its own sake. I truly believe that democracy has developed and is promoted to support the on-going development of business, something which the USA is a strong proponent off.

I take as an example how books, study and research came to be. It came through specialization of tasks to allow some individuals to become more selective in their choices in life and move away from agricultural tasks. The thinking time and processes in turn allowed for philosophizing on multiple and varied topics, including how to make processes more effective and efficient. The western world has become so successful at this that in the space of 12,000 years, from 99.9 % of populations being involved in agriculture and daily survival, that figure has dropped to something in the low teens I guess which is an amazing reversal. A major example of this in practice is the fact that many well to do families in the Middle Ages used to "donate" one son or daughter to a monastery, for religious reasons, but in effect in support of a developing body of humanity dedicated to philosophy and learning.

Democracy is a result of this process. The new industries and systems require thinking, well educated people, and most off all, stable environments. We have learnt that there is no point in destroying ourselves each 50 years, because at the same time we destroy all the institutions of higher learning, our art, our intelligentsia, and we end up back at square one. The main point here is that we have learnt from bitter experience, as you point out, 500 years or so, and therefore our reactions are naturally based on that experience. You cannot have a highly intelligent person and at the same time tell him that he can't think for himself. Communism found out the hard way.

In other parts of the world they have been saddled with concepts of democracy which we were ourselves struggling with 150 years ago in Holland and the rest of Europe, and which we, through institutions such as the IMF, Worldbank and UN, try to tell other countries they should accept. It's not much different from a father telling his son not to do something based on personal experience.

A second issue is that the promoters of such democratic concepts do not always appear to handle things very honourably. What are we to make of one of the older democratic nations, France, using people power ie democracy, to turn away from absolute monarchy in the 1790's, basically propping up dictatorships all over Africa, and providing them a one way ticket out of trouble and a chance to get back each time things go badly. That's not democracy, but it is mercantilism. Hence the breakdown of concepts such as Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite, which are definitely in short supply in many former colonies and other parts of the world.

I think the key issue where we have all gone wrong is that the drive to efficiency and greater outputs from our agrarian days has made us believe, based on past history, that it is fair and reasonable to expect ever greater outputs and increases in, for example, our personal wealth as well as national wealth, ie GDP. It is as if there are not supposed to be any limits, and the curve keeps going up. A good friend described this as a fallacy and used the Easter Island Syndrome as a good example of where the wheels come off. As humans we have an amazing belief in our own ability to keep cranking output out more efficiently, including by utilizing cheap and plentiful resources from other countries which we exploit, such as in Africa or through genetic engineering or exploitation of the universe. Stephen Hawkings' urgent request for increased space exploration and a way off the planet Earth is a tacit confirmation that the way we are programmed towards the greater production of goods, rather than the production of the greater good, will possibly create another Easter Island crisis on earth at some point.

It's a real pity, because we know the various philosophical concepts and we are able to discuss, fine tune and apply them very well. However, as long as the primary motivator of the majority of the human race is greed, and as long as the major driver of development is mercantilism under the creed that everything can only increase indefinitely, then we are much like alcoholics in denial. While singing the praises of democracy to the great "unwashed", we surreptitiously vow obeisance to the gods of infinite mercantilism which are sitting in the wings, holding out promises of yet more gold to be found, but always in the far distance. Marx was quite correct in calling Religion the Opiate of the Masses, a most apt observation in the 1850's. I would firmly state, however, that Democracy is the present day Opiate of the Masses.

In the end it may not be as much a question of "what do the Malagasy want in terms of democracy" but more a of "what do we want the Malagasy to have as a democracy". I am wondering whether we are being disingenuous and hypocritical in terms of claiming to focus on the former rather than the latter, because we are collectively still very much supporting exactly the opposite of our public proclamations.

It is possible that the ideal of more being better, which the European ancestors rightly identified as a major motivational factor to simply survive another harsh European winter, has run its course, similar to the idea that Religion is the Opiate of the masses, or that democracy is universally applicable regardless of environment and conditions and any motivations. A clear example of this is when Hamas won democratic elections in Palestine and the whole world erupted in indignation because the end result of a theoretically appropriate democratic process culminated in a result which was unpalatable to some major players in this world.

Before we get to the point of vilifying democracy by itself as an unworkable and outdated concept, in a similar manner as we have discarded many other concepts of polity in the past, we may want to consider first whether it is the concept of mercantilism as developed in the western world that needs to be re examined and re adjusted, both at a macro and micro level. As Gordon Gekko said, Greed is Good, and I think that's where we need to start our examination to make a conscious break from past patterns and find a new way of dealing with the challenges ahead. This should not mean throwing out the concepts of democracy as there may be an urge to do after debacles such as the public humiliation of Members of Parliament in the United Kingdom, and on going saga which prompted the Archbishop of Canterbury to make some very public comments about democracy recently, a point well made.

Rather, this would be a good time to figure out whether democracy in its current format, internationally touted as the panacea for all ills, is in need of fine tuning and needs to be adapted to different environments, considering the origins of the concept and the original drivers, which may have served their time.