Some Random Things

A headline on the BBC news website caught my eye: 'New working life peers unveiled'. What on earth is a 'working' life peer? How different is such a peer from any other person in the House of Lords? One can easily imagine the second clause in the headline that was lost in editing: 'Old, broken life peers quietly discarded'. As it turns out, working peers are those nominated by political parties rather than chosen by an independent commission. The reason for the media's interest is the recent controversy of people who had made substantial secret loans to political parties being nominated for peerage.

Speaking of politics, an opinion article in today's Straits Times by Tom Plate riled me a bit. (No link here because ST online is for subscribers only.) Essentially, he states that multi-party democracy is not necessarily the 'panacea to all ills' (tautology!). He goes on to list examples of where this model of governance has failed or wavered, namely Thailand and the Philippines, both of which have experienced some unrest lately, and an example of a country governed by a 'strongman' which has done very well, viz. Singapore. Plate's contention is that practices of 'good governance' are more important than the form which government takes. He then rounds up his argument by observing that China and Vietnam, both professedly Communist states, have set up public policy schools to train their government officials: a puzzling situation to him, because shouldn't the party already be 'the fount of all wisdom'?

Unfortunately, merely listing examples of the failure of multi-party democracy and counting successes (and only one, at that!) is a misleading way of conducting an argument, as pointed out by Carl Sagan in his essay 'The Fine Art of Baloney Detection'. For each example of 'failed' multi-party democracies one can cite other examples of countries that are doing very well on that model. And in contrast to Singapore, not every one-party state has been fortunate in having a leader with enough savvy to make it an economic success; Zimbabwe comes to mind, if only because the BBC has a running feud with it. Ironically, Plate's second contention, that good governance matters, rehabilitates his faulty 'evidence' for the failure of multi-party democracy. Whether a country succeeds or fails doesn't appear to depend so much on what political system it nominally follows as whether the right people are in power, i.e. whether it enjoys 'good governance'.

However, the writer is quite silent as to what constitutes good governance, other than the general feel-good understanding that it will make everyone pull up their socks and stop being inefficient and corrupt. His observation on Vietnam setting up a public policy school of its own supplies part of the answer which he could not see: good governance requires a diversity of opinion as to what constitutes good public policy. When the party's internal mechanism falls short when it comes to formulating and studying policy, external institutions such as, you guessed it, public policy schools play a role in providing feedback to those who govern. Strongmen are not necessarily always smart and with their 'hearts in the right place', as Plate optimistically hopes they might be. The history of political revolution shows that dull and unkind people with only their own ends in mind can just as easily cajole or force their way into power: political astuteness is a trait that is independent from moral virtue or economic foresight. In theory, multi-party democracy acts as a system of checks and balances, where different parties represent different views and the fight for the people's hearts and minds ensures that only the best or at least the most popular policy gets put into action. But danger lurks wherever power and influence are concerned, where politicking grossly overgrows its original role as a barometer of opinion and becomes an end unto itself. On the other hand, one-party rule or monarchical rule can succeed where there is goodwill between the rulers and the ruled, and where policy is formulated with adequate discussion and debate, both within the party and by actively soliciting the advice of the public and external experts.

To conclude, let us learn from the lessons of two neighbouring kingdoms, the kingdoms of Nepal and Bhutan, one of which is experiencing rebel uprisings, anti-monarchical sentiment, and martial law, while the other is peaceful despite having closed itself off to the outside world for most of its modern history. In Nepal, King Gyanendra's direct rule, which he justifies by pointing to the failure of the previous government to stop Maoist rebellions and by promising to reinstate democracy at a future date, has resulted in resentment and mass protests as the armed forces are used to control the population. In Bhutan, King Wangchuk's announcements of his abdication and the introduction of democratic reforms were met with appeals for him to stay on. Bhutan's political dissent, while not nonexistent, is not nearly as violent as that in Nepal, and its problems are primarily economic, as it opens up to the realities of modern trade and commerce. One might argue that Bhutan is not necessarily better off than Nepal, because of these problems, but at least with a peaceful home front they can be tackled properly: can useful anything be accomplished over the frenzy of street riots and the sting of tear gas?