Crisis Of Democracy In Europe
By Farooque Chowdhury
19 April, 2014
Countercurrents.org
Democracy is falling sick in Europe. In the US, the reality is not much different. At least, for the present time, this appears the reality.
Most of the European countries, writes the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, are facing “very worrying” challenges to human rights, democracies and the rule of law. The 72-page CE report, State of Democracy, Human Rights and the Rule of Law in Europe (SG (2014) 1-Final), said: Rule of law in Europe is going through its most severe crisis since the Cold War.
Deeply embedded judicial corruption, the report observes, has been identified in “many” European states, with judicial systems in some of them being “completely corrupt.” “Senior members of the executive branch in some member states have publicly criticized court decisions,” said the report.
Thorbjorn Jagland, Secretary-General of the CE, Europe’s leading human rights and democracy watchdog, mentions the most serious challenges the European countries face: Discrimination against ethnic and national minorities (in 39 out of 47 Council member-states); conditions of detention including overcrowding of prisons (30 states); corruption (26 states); ill treatment by law enforcement officers (23 states); social exclusion and discrimination of Roma (23 states), set up and functioning of judiciary (20 states), shortcomings in migrants’ and asylum seekers’ rights (20 states), excessive length of proceedings (11 states), trafficking in human beings (11 states) and lack of freedom of expression and media freedom (8 states).
The report said: Regrettably, torture still occurs on our continent despite its prohibition under Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Citing other relevant reports it mentioned ineffective investigations into allegations of ill treatment and said: Often, investigations are not thorough, independent or prompt, and prosecutors hastily dismiss allegations. Even in the face of overwhelming evidence and a guilty verdict, sanctions are far too mild, and politicians pardon law-enforcement officials after they have been sentenced by a court of law.
The report said: Judges should enjoy professional independence so that they can interpret laws without instruction from higher-level judges. We have seen cases of compromised impartiality and independence. In nearly one quarter of all member states the judiciary was perceived to be among the institutions most affected by corruption. Some member states fail to enforce court decisions, especially those rendered against the state. In some member states, public prosecutors exercise powers that are too broad and lack transparency.
On corruption, the report said: A constant flow of corruption allegations and scandals has eroded institutional credibility in a number of member states, creating public disillusionment and significant social and political tension. Political parties score consistently low on widely publicized measures of public trust in Europe and pollsters frequently point to citizens’ concern about their institutions and representatives.
Citing recent reports it said: Parliaments must earn public trust. Disguised or corrupt political financing threatens democracy in a number of countries.
Citing evaluations the report noted lax or ineffectual financial transparency requirements for political parties and candidates, the absence of truly independent monitoring bodies, and the insufficient pursuit of violations of political finance rules.
The report added: In several member states, recurring threats to the freedom of expression arise, including interference with journalists’ rights on grounds of national security, overzealous recourse to defamation laws and violence against journalists.
On the issue of election the report noted that the composition of the election administration must not favor (or be seen as favoring) specific political parties. It said: Lack of transparency of funding for political parties and campaigns remains a problem.
The report carries many other similar observations/findings.
Do these sound Third or Fourth World phenomenon? Don’t the questions come: How can “things” like these, as has been mentioned above, happen in Europe, a continent near-full of advanced bourgeois democracies? How in a continent dominated by bourgeois democracy free expression is restricted, police can maltreat public? Are not there the famous separation of power, rule of law, check and balance? Should one believe that prisons there in the continent are overcrowded? Above all, what are the roots of these?
The report, released on April 16, 2014, doesn’t mention name of the countries as there was risk that some member-states may veto it. Is it a show of tolerance, transparency and accountability?
Still fresh is the memory of EU commissioner for Home Affairs Cecilia Malmstroem’s saying: “There is no ‘corruption-free’ zone in Europe”. She made the observation in early-December, 2013.
Malmstroem also divulged the fact: Corruption across the EU’s 28 countries costs about 120 billion euros ($162 billion) per year, a “breathtaking” amount equal to the Union’s entire annual budget. The actual figure could be even higher, she observed.
Malmstroem wrote in an op-ed piece in Swedish newspaper Goeteborgs-Posten: “Corruption undermines faith in democratic institutions, drains the legal economy of resources and is a breeding ground for organized crime.”
Corruption is part of democracy-question. In a democracy, it turns difficult for corruption to reach to a stratospheric height. The system – democracy – doesn’t work when corruption reaches to that level. The corruption-reality sends a message: A lot of “things” or a major part of the system has been sold out. It’s decadence.
Democracy on the other side of the Atlantic doesn’t appear vibrant. A number of fundamental questions are surfacing.
On practice of democracy in the US, Martin Gilens of Princeton University and Benjamin I. Page of Northwestern University found in their study: “[T]he majority does not rule – at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes. When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites and/or with organized interests, they generally lose. Moreover, because of the strong status quo bias built into the US political system, even when fairly large majorities of Americans favor policy change, they generally do not get it.”
The political scientists in their study Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens (April 9, 2014, forthcoming in the Fall 2014 issue of Perspectives on Politics) added: “[I]f policymaking is dominated by powerful business organizations and a small number of affluent Americans, then America’s claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened”.
The pioneering scientific study analyzed whether the US is a democracy, rather than an oligarchy. The study of American politics tried to find out answer to the questions: Who really rules the US? Who governs? To what extent is the broad body of US citizens sovereign, semi-sovereign, or largely powerless?
The study found: The majority of the American public has a “minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy” compared to the wealthy.
In their 42-page study report, the researchers said although their model tilts heavily toward indications that the US is run by the wealthiest and powerful, it actually doesn’t go far enough in describing the stranglehold connected elites have on the policymaking process. “The real-world impact of elites upon public policy may be still greater.”
The scientists measured key variables for 1,779 policy issues within a single statistical model in an unprecedented attempt to test “contrasting theoretical predictions”: Whether the US sets policy democratically or the process is dominated by economic elites, or some combination of both.
The researchers found: Economic elites stand out as quite influential – more so than any other set of actors studied here – in the making of US public policy. Both individual economic elites and organized interest groups (including corporations, largely owned and controlled by wealthy elites) play a substantial part in affecting public policy, but the general public has little or no independent influence.
The scientists said: Our evidence indicates that the responsiveness of the US political system when the general public wants government action is severely limited. When popular majorities favor the status quo, opposing a given policy change, they are likely to get their way; but when a majority – even a very large majority – of the public favors change, it is not likely to get what it wants.
At least a part of the system’s heart has been unveiled. One can raise many pertinent questions on the basis of the study.
“Our democratic system”, Milton S Eisenhower wrote, “rests on the premise that the mass of democratic citizens will make right decisions most of the time in response to critical issues – and that a device exists by which the majority can reverse wrong decisions.” (The Need for a New American”, The Educational Record, October 1963)
But the findings by Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page don’t show that “the mass of democratic citizens” have the scope of making right decisions on critical issues.
Defining “critical issue” is a complex task. To the working people, these are wage, health care, education, shelter, debt, working condition; and to the minority top 1%, these are profit, speculation, regulation, etc. The two are of opposite interests. In this reality, the weak suffers, and weaknesses/limitations of the system get exposed.
With these burdens on shoulder or head, the democracy preachers from the First World export their “universal” model of “democracy” across the poor world, where, in most cases, history, economy, level of economic, political and class development, institutions and practices differ widely. The “democracy” preachers organize campaigns to carry forward their holy task, and sometimes it turns armed or military campaigns – bloody interventions.
These crusaders of “democracy” yesterday accused Saddam and Gaddafi, and today are accusing this country and that country, and are suggesting a lot on “democracy”. They spend millions of their currency, their tax payers’ money, for fostering of “democracy” in far-flung countries.
Now, after going through these reports, should one utter: Thy name is hypocrisy? Should one say: Farewell, Mr. Democracy from the other side of the ocean?
“No”, poor people from poor countries should “not” dare to ask these questions. These are “forbidden” facts. The poor, people or country, “should” listen whatever is preached, and “should” learn, and “shouldn’t” question.
These facts are known to a group of scholars in poor societies. But the scholars are aware that the ordinary persons should “not” be informed these. Otherwise, there is possibility that the ordinary persons may raise a few practical questions. Even, credibility of this group of scholars may get eroded.
So, “silence” – no exposure, no debate, no discussion – is the best option.
Farooque Chowdhury is Dhaka-based freelancer.
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