I tried Understanding Democracy, but Failed Miserably

I Tried Understanding Democracy, but Failed Miserably

When many countries claim that they practice democracy, I felt that if I could look at them just a wee bit below the surface, I would understand what that vaunted form of government could be, in the details. This post is the result of such mental wanderings amongst democracies, countries that call them so. 

To start with I needed to understand how to define democracy. I got help from today’s (September 13, 2025) newspaper, in particular from a column on the editorial page. In that, I read, “... [D]emocracy, which is defined as ‘rule of the people, by the people, for the people’...” authored by someone who had been rubbing shoulders with people in the highest echelons of democratic power in India. Oh, I was so ignorant that a president of the US has power over language, so much so that he can define a word! That was Abraham Lincoln in his Gettysburg Address in 1863.

Abe, as honest as he was supposed to have been, might not have known the antecedents of democracy. Athens is considered the cradle of democracy, at least by Eurocentric people. I am no expert to vouch on the legitimacy and the correctness of the claim that in what is now the plains of the Indus River, people followed procedures of democracy and valued institutions of the same. The period may not have been too far ahead or too far behind Athenian democracy. Yet, given people’s penchant for revanchist revisions, it is not too difficult go down that slippery slope without exit ramps.

Democracy, I came to understand soon after I started thinking about it, is not one thing. That is OK, as it leaves me room to locate a base for comparisons among the various competing as well as conforming forms of it. The simplest example, I believe, comes from Germany. We have Christian Democrats and Social Democrats. I could maybe understand the first of the two: Christian Democrats. To be practised among Christians. It is, then, quite easy to see what Social Democrats stand for: nothing Christian!

What is the understanding of democracy that most people harbour under? Whatever it may be, it does not go beyond voting in an election. The politicians too understand it in a similar fashion, “More people vote for me and my party in an election than for the other party and its candidate. Therefore, I am more democratic than my opponent. So also my party.” That is one more category of democracy − Majoritarian democracy. This may also be called nominal democracy, “nominal” defined numerically.

This idea has been taken to the extremes, like if you desist from voting, you must have had a reason and that reason shall not go beyond disapproving all the candidates in an election. Hence came the no-brainer, NOTA – None Of The Above, a phrase (duly abbreviated) made for filling in the ballot paper. How is NOTA different than not voting at all? Don’t answer that as you cannot convince me. To come clean: I have not yet voted in any election anywhere, not because of NOTA.

The United Kingdom is a democracy, and has been one since the Magna Carta, they say. The United States does not agree. It says the US is the first modern democracy (effectively sidelining Athens). I do not see a whole lot of things common between these two so-called democracies. How can there be, when the US was merely a colony of the UK when it began?Even when the US got its independence, it did not know whether to adopt the UK model without the king or design a new model for itself. It ended up being neither, like changing horses in midstream. To buttress my point, its National Anthem was penned by a Scot! That is how the claims of being a democracy by both the US and UK become irreconcilable.

France is a democracy. Its president is not titular; has real powers in the international arena and also on domestic, through the power to appoint the prime minister who handles them.Now, there is also the European Commission. We come to the curious case of Japan. It is a monarchical democracy, not much unlike the UK. The funny thing, though, is its constitution was imposed on them by the US!

South Korea? No matter who wrote it, the constitution of South Korea is a capitalist constitution. It allows financial power to control national economic policies. It is a democracy of untrammelled financial powers. Chaebols, have you heard? If you want something softer, it is a capitalist democracy. Does that make any sense to you?

Australia and Canada are two peas in a pod. They are democracies, yes, but beheaded! Their Head of State lives in London!

We can go to South America and Mexico and explore the various forms of governments available there. I suspect they would all be in some measure and form of mix-n-match of the governance structures mentioned thus far. Many nations of Africa keep playing whack-a-mole; a democracy props up here; try giving it a whack and it disappears, only to appear elsewhere. It could be a dictatorship or a monarchy and keep playing this for long and one would never get bored.

I come to one nation, the process of the writing the constitution of which is something truly consultative, not only among its own people, but among many nations around the globe. South Africa.

It was guided by one of the best statesman of our times, Nelson Mandela. Man, do I have a boatful of appreciation for him. He followed his concern for humanity and remained its standard bearer in the apartheid-free South Africa. Yet, the constitution that was developed has not survived in its pristine form, what with the successors of Mandel being Mbeki, Zumaand the mining magnate Cyril Ramaphosa (I left out the insignificant one who held the post for just one year right after Mandela). I would not be surprised if the next president of South Africa is, drum roll please, Elon Musk! 

Coming to my own neighbourhood, South Asia, it is a model of nations that are democratic only in name; I include India in it. There are some basket cases and I would not name them. If you considered Singapore, coughing without covering your mouth could put you in jail. Some democracy that.

Come to India. The alliance named National Democratic Alliance surely is democratic! The other major grouping of parties named United Progressive Alliance (UPA) is truly progressive! Yeah, I own the sprawling Sri Ranganathar Temple in Sri Rangam, and we could negotiate a price if you wished to buy it! All the other parties that appear to represent various slivers of people have all been localized, even the grandiose sounding All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK).

I went around the world, but in about a few hours. This is neither too long nor too short. Like Goldilocks porridge (did you notice the bias for blonde hair?). So, I conclude that democracy cannot be defined, and it is too varied. The exceptions to any definition with reference to any nation would make all other nations that claim to be a democracy blush! No democratic nation can be freed from the influences of selfish demagogues, or capital.

The situation has never been any different all through history. Therefore, no country can be stopped from calling itself a democracy. 

Let thousand flowers bloom!

Raghuram Ekambaram