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Experts ask: Is world democracy under threat?
Author: Lynne Rippenaar-Moses
Published: 27/09/2018

​​​Is world democracy under threat? This is the question posed by a number of leading researchers across the world, including South Africa, focused on democracy in the book Democracy under Threat: A Crisis of Legitimacy?.

The book was edited and co-authored by Prof Ursula van Beek, the founder and Director of Transformation Research Unit (TRU) at the Political Science Department at Stellenbosch University. TRU focuses on examining South African democracy comparatively in the regional southern African and global contexts from a political, economic and social perspective. The volume is the latest addition to a series of four books on democracy produced by TRU. 

“We have been working on this book for the last two years," says Van Beek, “and our research has shown that democracy is under threat from a number of factors, amongst them globalisation. Democratic nation-states are no longer fully in control of their own economies as they are tied into – and rely on – the global economic system. In addition, globalisation exposes citizens in individual countries to more severe economic and social risks. In the labour market this translates into reducing the scope and generosity of social protection systems."

“At the same time, global technological advances call for highly skilled individuals. The latter are more mobile and generally financially better off than their less skilled fellow citizens who have fewer job opportunities and whose earnings are not increasing much either. This disparity evokes resentments that can lead to populism." 

“Therise in populism is also a response to the growing inflow of migrants and refugees, which the open borders of democratic nation-states facilitate. The populist tendencies have spread even to the most established democracies; the election of Donald Trump as President of America is a good example of people who feel marginalised and who are thus ready to support a populist candidate promising them a better life." 

However, says Beek, it is important to understand that populists are not anti-democrats. In most democracies populist political parties continue to function within the structure of a democratic system. 

“The damage populists do is that they erode the liberal values of democracy through their rhetoric and attempts to undermine liberal institutions to better serve their own ends."

The cracks in the foundation of democracy has been showing since 2008, when countries across the world were hit by the financial crisis that originated in the United States with the collapse of the Lehman Brothers investment bank. 

“Up until then democracy was the very symbol of human wellbeing. The financial crisis dashed the hopes of many around the world that democracy would bring a better quality of life for everyone, especially for those in the global south". 

As noted by one of the authors of the book: “the economic consequences of the financial crisis, such as persistently high unemployment rates coupled with stagnation and even recession, austerity measures, deterioration of income distribution, and increasing poverty, to name a few, are all known too well. Concurrent with global economic slowdown, certain political developments raised not only eyebrows but also, and much more importantly, fears about the well-being of consolidated democracies."

Following in the footsteps of the previous volumes in the series on democracy, the latest book focuses attention on five younger democracies (South Africa, South Korea, Chile, Poland and Turkey) and the well-established democracies of Germany and Sweden.      

Having studied these countries for close to 20 years, the authors found that of the five younger democracies, three have not fared well at all. Turkey has become an authoritarian state, Poland has a populist leader, and South Africa is “struggling in the aftermath of the ruinous rule by former President Jacob Zuma".

“The three countries have suffered a set-back to their democracy. In the process, South Africa has experienced a rise in radicalism between 1995 and 2013 with support for democratic rule declining and support for non-democratic rule on the increase."

The book, says Van Beek, also touched on the impact of “the global screen culture of television and the internet" and how social media influences democratic votes. 

“One of the lessons of this study," van Beek added, “is that there is something democracy might learn from diplomacy where the manner of communication is of utmost importance. Instead of shouting at each other, we need to start communicating with each other across these big divides."

While there is concern for the current threats to democracy in countries across the world, Van Beek says that their book is still “more optimistic than other books that have focused on democracy of late". 

“There has been some data and other studies indicating that the youth in the United States and Western Europe do not care about democracy, that they are disengaged. Our data shows that the youth are still pro-democratic and interested in democracy. And while our data shows how serious the situation is, it is not beyond hope."

Photo: Lynne Rippenaar-Moses​