Democracy
at Gunpoint
By Ahmad Faruqui, PhD
Dansville, CA
Political
events have a way of intruding into your personal
life. Last month, I was touring the ruins of ancient
Greece when Benazir Bhutto’s caravan was
bombed in Karachi. Soon thereafter, General Musharraf
ominously began talking tough (again).
I felt the need to interrupt my sightseeing and
to visit Eleftheroudakis, the largest bookstore
in Athens. My target was a book, “Democracy
at Gunpoint,” by Andreas Papandreou, a former
Greek prime minister.
After having taught economics for many years in
Canada and the US, Papandreou returned home in
1959 and served as an economic advisor. When his
father was elected prime minister, he was given
a cabinet position. When a clutch of colonels
overthrew his father in 1967 (“Burying militarism,”
Daily Times, November 11, 2007), Papandreou was
sent into exile and that is where he penned the
book.
By some quirk of fate, I found General Musharraf
looking at me from the cover of a book, reminding
me of why I had interrupted my vacation. Failing
to find Papandreou’s book, I asked a store
clerk for it. He was surprised. Perhaps it was
not a best seller. Or maybe my asking for it had
betrayed an unwelcome political preference in
today’s Athens.
But then he led me to it. I was elated. It was
two inches thick but in Greek. That explained
his hesitation in offering it to me. I would have
to wait to read the English version.
A few days later, I was in London. I failed to
find it but came across a book that was laconically
titled, “On Democracy.” The author
was Yale University’s Robert Dahl. I read
it on the trans-Atlantic flight back to San Francisco.
The investment of time and money was not misplaced.
Dahl mines the past 25 centuries of political
development and lays out the conditions under
which democracy thrives. He illustrates abstract
theoretical concepts with examples from around
the globe.
Dahl reminds us that democracy originated around
500 BC in Athens and flourished for a couple of
centuries before the Macedonians under Philip
II seized all of Greece and subjected it to imperial
rule. The imperial tradition continued under his
son, Alexander, and later under the Romans, the
Byzantines and the Ottomans. Democracy only returned
to Greece in the 20th century.
After surveying the evolution of democracy in
Western Europe and later in America, he opines
that Athenian democracy worked well for small
city states but was ill-suited to the large nation-states
that emerged during the imperial period that followed.
It was impractical to gather all the citizens
in one place and to give each individual an opportunity
to express his views. Ultimately, the concept
of representative democracy was born, where individuals
elected their representatives who formed the parliament
that had the power to make laws.
The sine qua non of a democracy is the citizen’s
exercise of the vote. When elections were held
in England in the 13th century, a primitive form
of democracy came into being, albeit one that
existed in the shadow of an absolute monarchy
and one in which only the landed gentry could
vote.
As the centuries passed, democracy became more
expansive. Initially, all free male adults could
vote, then all male adults, and ultimately all
adults. This culminated in the democracy we recognize
today. Dahl calls it a “polyarchy,”
or rule by the many, since it is the polar opposite
of monarchy (rule by the one), and far removed
from oligarchy or aristocracy (rule by the few).
In Dahl’s system, a single election does
not turn a country into a polyarchy. Five other
conditions have to be met:
• Free and fair and frequent elections
• Freedom of expression, including the ability
to criticize government policies and officials
• Access to information through independent
media and think tanks
• The right to form political parties
• The right of every adult to vote
Today, several countries are functioning democracies
and some are not. Analyzing the reasons, Dahl
concludes that the single most important factor
is civilian control over the military (and police)
apparatus of the state. Nowhere was this failure
more evident than in the banana republics of Central
America during the post-war period. Between 1948
and 1982, there were 47 governments in Guatemala,
El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua. Of this number,
more than two-thirds of the governments came to
power through a coup d’etat.
Other factors for democratic success include the
presence of democratic beliefs and political culture,
the absence of a foreign power that is interested
in finding non-democratic solutions, the existence
of a modern market economy and society and finally,
the absence of strong cultural conflicts.
Against this backdrop, Dahl assesses India’s
experience with democracy. He says that there
is no country that would be a more improbable
example of democracy than India. Eighty percent
of the people belong to a single faith but (except
for some fringe elements) they are not anxious
to impose it on the other 20 percent. He says
Hinduism is a very complex faith and its caste
structure ensures that from a numerical standpoint,
no caste will dominate society. This minority
aspect of Indian culture is accentuated by the
presence of hundreds of languages and dialects
which ensures that every individual remains a
minority.
No ethnic group can dominate the political scene
without taking command of the military or the
police and this, he says, is unlikely to occur
since India has inherited the British tradition
of civilian dominance in security matters.
This immediately begs the question of why the
very opposite has happened in Pakistan. But there
is no discussion of this issue in Dahl’s
slim volume. But he provides us ample clues for
working out a solution.
First, due to the conflict over Kashmir, Pakistan’s
military arrogated to itself the commanding heights
of the state. Second, cultural and religious divisions
in Pakistan were too strong to be resolved within
a democratic framework. Third, every military
coup in Pakistan benefited from strong American
backing.
Sadly, the country that Alexis de Tocqueville
held up as a role model of democracy within its
borders chose to pursue a foreign policy that
was inimical to democracy abroad. Perhaps this
is what Henry Kissinger calls American Exceptionalism.
Where does Pakistan go from here? If one listens
to the generals, they are working diligently to
hold elections under a state of emergency. Holding
elections when dissent is suppressed went out
of fashion a long time ago but not in Pakistan.
It promises to be the last outpost of militarism.
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