Where has all the power gone?

It is a standard complaint that voter participation is declining, that turn-outs are low and consequently the democratic legitimation of legislators is not what it used to be. Hardly anyone seems to be asking the question, though, as to why; what is about voters that they have lost their commitment to or enthusiasm for high politics? The change can hardly be attributed to some inexplicable force or event or process. There ought to be some rational explanation.

Maybe there is. The hard reality is that party politics and legislatures have given away or lost or transferred a great deal of the power that they once enjoyed and have done this in the name (and practice) of better democracy. If we accept that the traditional model of majoritarian democracy is no longer compatible with democracy as defined today, but that procedures and mechanisms have been devised to ensure a concept of citizenship that – ideally – means that minorities are not bent to the will of majorities, then the dilution of party politics is a necessary development.

So what has happened is that voters have recognised that the importance of parliaments, governments and political parties has diminished because power lies elsewhere. Whether this elsewhere is entirely desirable from the perspective of democracy is open to question, especially so when we look at who the new actors with power are.

The new economic actors are obviously the most significant. Multinationals, banks, hedge funds, sovereign wealth funds, high finance are taking decisions that directly affect the lives of millions, but the latter have no voice, no capacity to influence that decision making and elected politicians appear likewise to have been disempowered.

But there is more. There has been a proliferation of other new political actors, broadly covered by the label civil society. Some of them see themselves as anti-political, in as much as they do not want to supplant elected governments, merely to influence them in one direction or another. Of course, these anti-political actors are, indeed, exercising power – less than governments, for sure – but a good deal all the same. The new political actors include pressure groups, lobbies, trade associations, advocacy groups and the like, and what is striking about their activities is that while they demand transparency and accountability from elected legislators, they don’t practice it very much themselves. Note too that the state is often enough quite happy to deal directly with civil society, by-passing politicians. The state itself is, similarly, a political actor, although it likes to pretend otherwise, through its autonomy over society and, all too often, vis-à-vis legislatures which simply cannot keep a check on delegated legislation and bureaucratic discretion.

One of the thorniest problem of all in contemporary democracy is that of the media. In democratic theory, the media constitute a vital check on both formal political decisions making and on the executive. In so doing the media themselves exercise power for which they are in no way accountable. Who has ever heard of an elected journalist, say? But the last two decades have seen the media undergo a shift towards populism and sensationalism, towards regarding the news as entertainment rather than civic activity and they are wholly shameless in denying voice to weaker political actors – in effect, the media are exercising a kind of authoritarian rule -  political power without countervailing force.

To add to this, the multiplicity of actors with access to power exacerbates the consistency problem that I discussed in an earlier entry (8 May). Inevitably, it has become much more difficult for governments to pursue an unwavering political strategy without eliciting howls of outrage from those whose power is weakened as a result.

As a footnote to foregoing, a few words about Fidesz. At least a part of the unbelievable detestation that Fidesz attracts should be traced back to its contrarian strategy. It has, indeed, generated strong party politics, helped certainly by the far-reaching political polarisation in Hungary, not to mention the barely credible mess left behind by its left-wing predecessors, which Fidesz is determined to clear up. It’s an exceptional situation, at least to that extent.

Thus the Fidesz government has launched an economic strategy that, again, goes counter to conventional wisdom; it has sought to regulate the media’s excesses; and it has launched a major reform of pubic administration. It has ignored vested interests and special pleading and has had the temerity to use its two-thirds majority to pursue a far-reaching reform strategy. In essence, it has behaved like a traditional political party implementing its mandate for change, much to the consternation of the onlookers, though not the voters who continue to give the government their support.

Who knows, maybe there is even a soupçon of envy that Fidesz has the majority and is ready to go ahead with its own strategies. Against this background, the opprobrium becomes understandable, especially as a Fidesz success will upset a great deal of conventional thinking, which will require rethinking received ideas. And that is a perfect way to court unpopularity, no one likes to rethink their assumptions.

Sch. Gy