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Today, we hear increasingly about a crisis of confidence in governments. While the pace of history accelerates, democratic governments often find themselves in a deadlock. Scholars now consider a growing percentage of countries to be failed democracies.

The progress of democracy in our world is fundamentally linked to improving the quality of human life. The promise of democracy is that the citizens themselves know how to achieve such progress in the best possible way. If that promise is met with disappointment, then democracy is in danger. But what can we say about why democratic systems often fall short in their efforts to improve the quality of the lives of their people?

There are four elements that could help strengthen democracys effectiveness in meeting this central challenge: improved constitutional understanding, an independent and pluralistic media, the potential of civil society and a genuine democratic ethic.

The current challenges to governance should be seen less as problems of democracy and more as problems of constitutionality. But constitutional revision especially in developing countries is not an easy undertaking. One problem involves the poor understanding of comparative government systems. This subject is not part of most curricula. In developing and developed countries alike, the media rarely explains the logic or the options of constitutional change. Even when a referendum is held to validate such change, most people are neither prepared nor willing to express a considered judgement. The result is that the governments in power often have an open field. As a result, the first step to improve democratic governance is a better public understanding of constitutional principles.

It is easy to say that we want a government of, by and for the people and governments should be servants of the people and ultimately responsible to them. But this does not mean that most governmental decisions must be made by an enormous range of far-flung participants: by vast plebiscites, popular referenda, public opinion polling or the number of hits on a blog. Such misapplied versions of democracy can produce irrational leadership choices and poorly informed policies.

Sometimes efforts to impose simplistic popular democracy can create voids of governance, which can be exploited to dangerous ends and one can see this in various countries in the developing world. But then, who should make various governmental decisions? A simple response would emphasise the idea of balanced authority, including the concept of healthy federalism. For increasingly diverse societies, a constitution that divides and balances power is essential.

In discussing constitutional challenges, it is impossible to ignore the recent revival or creation of new theocratic political parties in the Muslim world. The question involves how theocratic principles of governance can operate constitutionally in increasingly secular political environments. It seems essential that such principles should be regularly tested by the electoral process if only so that the Muslim world can have a better understanding of the secularisation processes, which are inherent to democracy. And democratic principles, in turn, must respect the broad diversity of faiths and cultures.

Finding the right constitutional balance is no easy matter and we can make a grave mistake if we think that one size can somehow fit all. Effective constitutions must be adapted to a variety of cultural and demographic realities. But it can be done. One recent example is that of Tunisia, where after intense and arduous negotiation, a promising new constitution received broad public support. The central point is that we cannot build better democratic performance over time without a better understanding of constitutional values.

A second key variable for enhancing democratic effectiveness is the critical role of competent and independent media voices. We often forget that democracy in Ancient Greece required a highly compact community living within the sound of a criers voice, as Aristotle said. Under such conditions, face-to-face dialogue could foster a sense of trust and political accommodation. But these ideal conditions are now only rarely obtained. Populations are much larger, more widely scattered and far more diverse. They can most easily be mobilised around vivid but superficial symbols and negative propositions. Often what counts most in our extended societies is not what one is for, but whom one is against. In such circumstances, polarisation and an impasse are constant risks.

Nor can we rely on advancements in communication technologies to overcome the obstacles of distance and diversity. In fact, new media technologies have often made matters worse. From the development of written language and the invention of printing to the development of electronic and digital media, quantitative advancements in communication technologies have not necessarily produced qualitative progress through mutual understanding.

To be sure, each improvement in communication technology has triggered new waves of political optimism. But, sadly, if information can be shared more easily as technology advances, so can misinformation and disinformation. If truth can spread more quickly and more widely, then so can error and falsehood. Throughout history, the same tools the printing press, the telegraph, the microphone, the television camera, the cell phone, the internet that promised to bring us together have also been used to drive us apart.

The age-old promise of democracy is that social cohesion and public progress could be achieved through consensus rather than coercion. But genuine democratic consent depends on dependable public information. The danger in the age of the mass media is that information also can be misused to manipulate people. All around the world, authoritarian rulers increasingly use the media to coerce the consent of the governed. Having said that, our technologies alone will not save us. But they should not ruin us as well. It is not the power of our tools, but how we use them that will determine our future. Among other things, this means prioritising the role of the independent media and, indeed, of a multiplicity of independent voices. Demographic pluralism must be reflected in healthy media pluralism.

At a time of democratic disappointment, we must re-emphasise the immense potential of those non-governmental institutions that we refer to as the civil society. Too often, our thinking is trapped in a false dichotomy. We talk about the public sector and the private sector. But we often undervalue the third sector: civil society.

The civil society is powered by private energies that are committed to the public good. It draws on the ancient, classical link between democracy and the publicly-committed citizen. It includes institutions of education, health, science and research, embracing professional, commercial, labour, ethnic and arts organisations. However, the civil society, if not self-conscious, can also be a source of establishing the hegemony of a dominant ideology, regardless of its democratic value. A self-conscious civil society seeks consensus through genuine consent. It can experiment, adapt and accommodate diversity. It can, in the fullest sense, be of, by and for the people. It can, in the fullest sense, only be a remarkable source of support on the condition that is it sustained, accepted and encouraged by the government.

At the heart of a democratic ethic is a commitment to genuine dialogue to achieve a better quality of life, even across new barriers of distance and diversity. This involves the willingness to give and take, listen and bridge the empathy as well as the ignorance gaps that have so often impeded human progress. It implies a pluralistic readiness to welcome diversity and to see our differences not as difficult burdens but as potential blessings.

The ultimate requirement for any effective democracy is the capacity to compromise. Social order rests either on oppression or accommodation. But we can never find that balancing point where the interests of all parties are recognised unless competing leaders and their diverse followers alike, are committed to finding a common ground. That common ground is the global aspiration for a better quality of life built upon opportunities that will provide genuine hope for the future. Democracy can only survive if it demonstrates across years and across the globe that it is the best way to achieve that goal.

The writer is a freelance columnist based in Islamabad.

Email: [emailprotected]

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Making democracy work - The News International

WASHINGTON President Trump has performed a service of sorts to our debate over how the United States views itself and its role in the world.

He has reminded the democratic left and the democratic right note the small d that they share more common ground than they often realize about the importance of democracy, the gifts of modernity and the value of pluralism.

Trump has done this by articulating, fitfully and inconsistently, a dark worldview rooted in nationalism, authoritarianism, discomfort with ethnic and religious differences, and a skepticism about the modern project.

His lack of constancy makes it difficult to judge exactly what he believes. We commonly describe his contradictions as the product of administration power struggles between Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller, the populist nationalists, and James Mattis and H.R. McMaster, the representatives of a more conventional approach to foreign policy.

On the days when Trump pledges allegiance to NATO and our allies, we see Defense Secretary Mattis and national security adviser McMaster winning. When he veers off this course, disses our allies and goes in for apocalyptic pronouncements about the state of the world, we declare senior White House aides Bannon and Miller triumphant.

Optimists about Trump insist that the grown-ups, as Mattis and McMaster are often (somewhat obnoxiously) described by the old foreign policy establishment, will eventually limit the damage Trump can cause us. Pessimists point to the occasions when Bannon and Miller prevail.

Trumps European trip, including his meeting with Vladimir Putin, was a high-wire act precisely because of the presidents unpredictability and his allergy to briefing books. For Trump, everything is personal, which means hes subject to being easily played. Foreign leaders know that flattering him is the way to his heart and that his deepest commitments appear to be to his business interests. This approach to Trump has worked rather well so far for the Chinese and the Saudis.

But to the extent that Trump does have a gut instinct about the world, it seems closer to Bannons. The presidents spontaneous outbursts, his Twitter revelations and his reactions to individual foreign leaders point Bannons way.

Trump has spoken with far greater affection about Putin, Saudi princes and the right-wing nationalists now in power in Poland than of democratic pluralists such as Germanys Angela Merkel and Frances Emmanuel Macron. In fact, both Merkel and Macron sound more like post-World War II American presidents than Trump does.

Trumps speech in Poland on Thursday might, in a very limited sense, can be seen as a compromise between the administration factions. The president committed himself to the Western alliance (a win for Mattis and McMaster) but was otherwise gloomy, backward-looking and Manichaean.

The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive, Trump said. Do we have the desire and the courage to preserve our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it? If we fail to defend what our ancestors passed down to us, Trump warned, it will never, ever exist again.

To which one might respond: Yikes! On the whole, Trumps words sounded remarkably similar to Bannons pronouncements in a speech to a traditionalist Catholic group in Rome in 2014. Bannon spoke of a Judeo-Christian West that finds itself in a crisis and confronts a new barbarity that will completely eradicate everything that weve been bequeathed over the last 2,000, 2,500 years.

This dire view should remind the democratic left and the democratic right that while they have disagreed on many things and many aspects of American foreign policy over the last two decades, they share some very deep allegiances. These include a largely positive assessment of what the Enlightenment and the modern world have achieved; a hopeful vision of what could lie before us; a commitment to democratic norms as the basis of our thinking about the kind of world we seek; and a belief that ethnic and religious pluralism are to be celebrated, not feared.

This, in turn, leads to a judgment that alliances with fellow democracies serve us better than pacts with autocratic regimes that cynically tout their devotion to traditional values as a cover for old-fashioned repression and expansionism.

Democrats have many reasons for opposing Trump. But its Republicans who have the power that comes from controlling Congress. Their willingness to stand up to a president of their own party could determine the future of democracy and pluralism. He is, alas, a man whose commitment to these values we have reason to doubt.

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EJ Dionne Jr.: Both sides know the power of democracy - La Crosse Tribune

New Zealand is not immune from international trends and cannot afford to be complacent about its democracy, writes Sir Geoffrey Palmer

New Zealand is one of the worlds oldest and most stable democracies, and Kiwis are justifiably proud to live in the first country in the world to adopt universal suffrage.

But we cannot rest on past deeds. In modern times, New Zealands democracy is neither as healthy nor as safe as it could be.

At the last election, more than 700,000 enrolled electors didnt vote. This included more than one-third of under-35s.

A recent survey by Massey University found widespread discontent among voters even those who support the current Government.

About half of those summed up the countrys mood as 'discontented. About half agreed that political leaders are out of touch with the people. About half wanted a complete change of government even though Labour supporters were under-represented in the sample. More than two-thirds thought the system of government was either completely broken or working but needs to change.

These results were mirrored in a recently published Ipsos poll, which found that more than half of those surveyed thought that political parties and politicians didnt care about them.

The Massey research also gave some insights into why voters are discontented and mistrust politicians.

Most were concerned about rising inequality, and in particular about a housing crisis that is locking many young New Zealanders out of home ownership and leaving some with no shelter at all. Health and the environment were also big concerns.

The prominence of the environment is unsurprising at a time when New Zealands waterways are being managed in ways that scarcely reflect Kiwi values and sometimes dont even reflect the law.

In earlier times, these levels of discontentment might have been reflected in lower popular support for the Government. But times have changed, and the political system isnt working as it used to.

What we appear to be seeing particularly from younger people is disconnection from and mistrust of all political parties, and from the entire system of government. Those who feel economically disenfranchised also feel abandoned by politicians and politics.

Voters have little understanding of how New Zealands system of law-making government works, and therefore little understanding of how their input might bring about change.

We have already seen in Brexit, and remarkable election results in the United States, France, and Britain how this discontentment can play out in novel and unexpected ways.

Rather than wait and do nothing, wouldnt it be better to tackle voter discontentment head on?

There are four main reasons for voters switching off from politics.

First, there is a lack of information. Voters have little understanding of how New Zealands system of law-making government works, and therefore little understanding of how their input might bring about change.

This is not surprising: there is no single document a New Zealander can read to find out how New Zealands system of government works, and despite the recommendations of the 2013 Constitutional Advisory Panel very little effort is made to explain how things work. Civics education is limited, and public education almost non-existent.

Second, New Zealanders have largely turned away from political parties. Parties used to have large numbers of members, who had opportunities to debate and discuss the partys policies. This created a very direct link between voters and Parliament.

Now, only a tiny fraction of New Zealanders belong to political parties. Citizen participations has reduced markedly, making the political system less connected to the people.

New Zealand now has cadre parties, and tiny numbers of people in the professional political elites exert the power. This is not the type of representative democracywe once had.

Third, there has been a long and sustained decline in the political media. Newspapers used to carry detailed accounts of parliamentary debates and political issues, and broadcast media used to focus on lengthy current affairs interviews. Media understood their responsibilities to inform the public and hold government to account.

As competition has increased, news media have become more entertainment- and celebrity-focused, and media staffing and resources have become more stretched. Long-form journalism about current affairs has largely disappeared, and parliamentary and political coverage have been reduced to sound-bites, often focusing on the sensational or bizarre. Information and accountability have been sacrificed.

Its true that a vast amount of information is available online, including records of parliamentary debates and select committee hearings. But people do not know what to make of it and cannot devote the time and effort to find out what it all means.

In this transformed media environment, politicians go to great lengths to secure media attention and to control the ways in which they are perceived. Significant taxpayer resources are devoted to managing politicians images and to manipulating media coverage and public opinion. Public disenchantment with political processes might be reduced if less effort was spent on persuasion and more on involving voters in policy decisions.

Long-form journalism about current affairs has largely disappeared, and parliamentary and political coverage have been reduced to sound-bites, often focusing on the sensational or bizarre.

A fourth reason for public disenchantment is the rising influence of money and professional lobby groups. In the absence of mass membership, political parties now rely for funding on donations from trade unions, corporations, and wealthy individuals. In such a situation there are risks that the voice of ordinary people will be drowned out by the interests of those with money.

New Zealand has some safeguards in place to limit third party spending on election campaigns and to promote transparency about political donations. But it is difficult to escape the conclusion that election outcomes depend at least partly on which party has the most money. There is a case for tightening political donationand election spending regulations, and for increasing regulatory oversight of political parties. But how likely are existing parliamentarians to support such measures?

New Zealand needs democratic renewal. This means encouraging civic literacy, so people understand how government works, and how they can have influence. And it means rebuilding trust in the institutions of government, by reconnecting the governors with the governed.

Democracy means more than having a vote every three years. It means having genuine opportunities for informed participation in the business of government, so that laws and policies reflect the wishes of the people.

Internationally, some democratic countries are finding new ways for government to engage with citizens, and involve them in decision-making. In Ireland and Iceland, for example, randomly selected panels of citizens have been involved in drawing up constitutional reforms.

These are efforts at deliberative democracy a democracy that informs its citizens and involves them in decision-making, instead of reserving all power for an elected elite.

One of the principal aims of the codified constitution that Dr Andrew Butler and I have proposed (which we have called A Constitution for Aotearoa New Zealand) is to strengthen understanding of New Zealands system of government, by gathering all of the main laws in one document which people can easily find.

A second aim is to promote discussion and debate. Do you agree that New Zealands democracy could be made stronger? If so, how? What should change?

Tell us your views at http://www.constitutionaotearoa.org.nz/.

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Democracy is in decline, so what can we do? - Newsroom

I find it odd that President Trump has sent his voter fraud champion, Kris Kobach, to collect social security numbers, dates of birth and party affiliations for every registered voter in the U.S. Trump isnt inclined to do so much as release his tax returns, while Kobach refuses audits of Kansas elections.

Voter fraud, gerrymandering, intimidation, drug laws, mass incarceration - all are tools the right wing uses across the country to deter poor and minority Americans from participating in our democracy.

Widespread voter fraud is a lie perpetuated by the far-right to justify laws that specifically target minority voters to ensure that less of them show up at the polls on election day. This not only favors the GOP, but also white nationalists, white supremacists and the Klu Klux Klan.

Democracy is the most valuable thing the U.S. has to offer in this world. It needs to be vigorously defended against people like Donald Trump and Kris Kobach.

DAVID HEWITT, Topeka

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Letter: Corrupting democracy - Topeka Capital Journal

Turkey was undeniably transformed by last Julys failed coup. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, having barely survived an attempt on this life, has become a Turkish Muslim messiah in the eyes of his supporters: he is the unchallenged leader of the nation, charged with reinvigorating the Muslim umma, the global Muslim community. Opposition has become blasphemous. Those who refuse to support him are anti-Turkish and anti-Muslim and therefore enemies of the state. This is terrible news for Turkeys democracy, which requires a healthy opposition to survive.

Erdogan, a right-wing leader, first came to power as prime minister in 2003 through his Justice and Development Party (AKP). He became president in 2014. In that time, especially during the last decade, he has delivered economic growth, which has helped him increase the AKPs vote share. More insidiously, he also demonized electorates unlikely to vote for him, including seculars, liberals, social democrats, leftists, and Kurds. This strategy built Erdogan a large base made up of conservatives and political Islamists.

After 2014, Erdogan strove to transform the Turkish political system into an executive style presidency in which he, as president, would consolidate the powers of head of state, head of government, and head of the ruling party. This seemed a tall order; Erdogan needed to win a popular referendum to change the constitution before he could become omnipotent, but his AKP had never received more than 50 percent of the vote.

Almost two years later, Erdogans presidential ambitions were reanimated through a crisis that threatened to destroy him entirely: the July 15 coup attempt. Before that, Erdogan had already been one of Turkeys most powerful leaders. By surviving an attempt on his life and subsequently defeating his enemies, especially the Gulen movementa former ally that seems to have played a key role in the couphe only gained in stature, which he then leveraged in a snap constitutional

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How Erdoganism Is Killing Turkish Democracy | Foreign Affairs - Foreign Affairs