Month: January 2012

http://www.voanews.com/english/news/usa/Obama-Praises-Georgia-as-Model-of-Democracy-138359529.html

This article is basically a fluff piece which covers President Obama giving Georgia a pat on the back for its democratic reforms. Essentially the country has engaged in many anti-corruption programs, and a policy of ‘institution building’ designed to increase the ‘democraticness’ of domestic politics. The 2003 Rose Revolution was enormously important for the establishment of a procedural minimum of democracy, but beyond that, some reforms apparently needed to be made.

What is particularly interesting are the benchmarks which the USA has set for Georgia to increase its democraticness. This is apparently the American definition of what democracy entails:

“”The importance of making sure that minorities are respected, the importance of a police and system of rule of law that is being observed”

Georgians have commented that US support in these efforts were crucial. This brings me back to my post on self interested democratization. There are ulterior motives other than humanitarian ones at play here.

“Mr. Obama also thanked Georgia for its contributions to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.  And he said cooperation going forward will include a high-level dialogue to strengthen trade relations, including the possibility of a free trade agreement.”

As we all know, or more accuratley, what some of us know, the UBC AMS elections occurred this past week. The elections are an admirable attempt to make the relationship between the student body and the UBC administration more democratic, allowing anyone with a CWL to cast their vote as easily as it is to log into the system and click a few buttons from the comfort of your home or starbucks. Issues range from the new SUB, rising tuition fees, administration of the student newspaper, the U-Pass, and most importantly, the Whistler lodge (which may be sold). Presumably all these issues are important to the student body, some more than others, but you would be hard pressed to find a student who had none of these as concerns. I submit to you then, anyone who is reading this, did you vote? If so, then hooray for you. If not, why not? It was exceedingly easy for you to do so, you probably spent more time on facebook during your morning class than it would have taken to vote. There are posters everywhere, it is hard to miss the fact an election is happening, and if you’ve been at UBC for a while you should know they happen every year. You don’t even need to cast a vote for candidates themselves if you don’t know them, you can only answer the referendum questions. (say NO to selling the whistler lodge). Why again didn’t you vote?

Apathy. That is what the election strategy was, reducing voter apathy among people who know you personally or people who may vote for you given the chance. At a base level, it wasn’t a clash of ideas over certain issues, it was a clash of who could mobilize a larger number of students, not necessarily convince them. This is a result of extremely low voter turnout. The 2012 AMS elections saw some of the lowest turnouts, according to an AMS elections article. When turnout is this low, simply getting people to vote is more effective than championing one view of certain issues.

This was clearly demonstrated by this article: http://ubyssey.ca/elections/2012/01/27/which-bog-candidates-supporters-were-campaigning-with-a-laptop-in-totem/

Campaigners for Silley, realizing this strategy was effective, were patrolling common rooms with a laptop and internet connection getting people to vote, or voting for them. These were people who wouldn’t have voted anyways was the rationale. Likely most had no idea what they were voting for, and just wanted to be nice and do a favour for the friendly people with the laptop. I think I will find little disagreement among you that this is not ideal democracy.

And neither is this! http://ubcstudentmedia.wordpress.com/2010/03/25/ams-election-fraud-2010/

Basically this is confirmed widespread electronic voter fraud for the AMS elections of 2010. People were able to exploit a loophole in the programming and cast as many votes as they pleased. The results favored some candidates by a wide margin. No re-election was done. The article suggests that this has been happening for years. Democracy? Not by any definition. Definitley not mine.

Maybe this is why people are apathetic about AMS voting. If people can manipulate the results, if it is nothing more than a popularity contest for mobilizing voters, then why vote?

I didn’t vote.

Participatory Democracy

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Participatory+democracy+quiet+revolution/6059122/story.html

This is a very interesting article which meshes well with some of the themes of the Collier and Levitsky article. Essentially it calls into question the efficacy of representative democracy in that representatives no longer has a firm grasp of the will of their constituents. The article frames this with the Occupy movement, claiming that this shows that people want a more active role in the decision making process and are doing so by staging mass, nationwide demonstrations like these. The increase in communication technology, it is argued, makes the full range of participatory democracy much easier to achieve. “The winds of change will blow and strong ideas will emerge from the voices of the people.”

The term being examined is democracy with the prefix “participatory”. This may seem a bit redundant as the existence of democracy presupposes elections, which by nature entails the participation of the electorate by voting. The analytic differentiation the author is trying to make is the difference between democracy through representatives and through direct action. In this sense, the article adds participatory onto democracy to describe a more active role for the electorate. Direct participation through assertive public opinion in the policy making process is what the article is advocating. The Occupy movement, for example, showed participation in the sense of public outcry against poor financial regulation.

The term itself is not a diminished subtype of democracy as the increased level of public input would suggest a more democratic system. Rather it is more of an expanded definition, seeking to differentiate from other types of democracy. Whether this is a different type of democracy or a different degree is up for debate.

Limited Democracy

http://www.livemint.com/2012/01/22212649/India-to-review-economic-secu.html?atype=tp

This article relates to my previous blog post regarding the government in Myanmar. As was previously discussed, the government in that country is attempting to make reforms to liberalize itself and give it a more benevolent image internationally. The regime, however, is still not considered to be a full democracy by western standards as it is missing several key human rights and fair contestation components which seem essential for that definition.

This article deals with the increasing liberalization of the country. In revealing the history of democracy in Myanmar, the article states,

” landmark elections in the nation in November 2010 that ushered in limited democracy”

Limited democracy was an improvement from what was occurring before, yet elections were still being held. While this may satisfy some procedural minimums for that definition, simply the existence of elections, apparently this article believes that even after “landmark elections” which made the system free and fairer, the state of affairs was still “limited” in nature. This is what Collier and Levitsky would call a diminished subtype of democracy, having less than what “democracy” on its own wold entail. The degree of “democraticness” is decidedly lower than other defining prefixes, and this is plainly evident by adding the ‘limited’ modifier. The government of Myanmar is still controlled by the military, yet presidential elections are still held. Perhaps “military democracy” would be an apt definition as it captures the essence of ‘limited’ while giving increased information as to why this is the case.

So here’s a pretty sobering graph..

Green: Iraqi Civilian Casualties

Blue: Afghan Civilian Casualties

Grey: US Casualties in both Wars

Red: September 11th Victims

“Operation Iraqi Freedom” , it seems, was a bit of a misnomer. True, US troops are finally out of Vietnam, sorry, i meant Iraq. And they have left a ‘functioning parliamentary democracy’ in their wake, but we should not forget that this was the least of the effects the ‘war on terror’ had on Iraq. As I elaborated in my previous blog post about Myanmar, democratization is a ultimately a self serving motivation. It seems that helping a ‘country in need’ to ‘transition to democracy to free it from the clutches of a tyrannical dictator’ immediately adds a shining veneer of legitimacy to the wanton destruction of a nation’s infrastructure and social fabric for gains other than humanitarian ones. This trend is hardly new in history. Even democratization itself can be the self-serving motivation for somehow promoting democratic transition abroad. We saw it done in the Cold War, where democratic regimes were propped up by the United States around the globe simply to counter the spread of Communism. It was the apparent basis for the Korean War, and later, Vietnam. Democracy for the people by the people is never the endgame for foreign support of democratic transition. We live in an anarchic international arena. Realist interpretations are the only ones which make any sense. The second which democracy in a country doesn’t work for the foreign power, it is entirely expendable. We saw this in Iran. The democratically elected government was going to nationalize the foreign owned oil industry, much to the opposition of USA and British interests. Result: the CIA stages a military coup to overthrow the perfectly legitimate government of Mosaddegh and install the fiercely autocratic one of Pahlavi. Democracy is simply a buzzword to legitimize foreign action. In Iraq, the stated objective was to free the Iraqi people from the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and to install a democracy. Interestingly, the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein wasn’t a problem for the US when Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew their autocratic Iranian Pahlavi puppet government and started becoming a problem. In fact, the US funded and supplied intelligence to Saddam Hussein throughout the Iran-Iraq war to counter Iran’s growing power. Democratization wasn’t even on the table at the time, it didn’t serve any US interests. This is also around the time where the atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein took place, which were the basis of the evidence that he needed to be overthrown… only some 30 years later.

I feel I might be being a bit cynical, but the evidence seems to suggest that democratization always has an ulterior motive. If those motives are absent, then western democracies couldn’t care less if people are being oppressed by a dictator. If they are being made to feel guilty by international or domestic pressure to take action against said dictator, they do it for PR reasons, not out of the goodness of their heart. There is always a motive. Democratization by governments in a realist international arena is a self serving behavior. If you believe that this is being done for humanitarian purposes, explain how it is only done when convenient and opportune.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia-pacific/myanmars-foreign-minister-says-countrys-democratic-reforms-will-be-gradual-systematic/2012/01/25/gIQAVjHoPQ_story.html

This article wasn’t neccesarily reporting on any major event regarding democracy, it was more of a procedural piece commenting on the progress Myanmar, formerly Burma, is making towards democratic reform. The history of democracy and human rights in Myanmar is particularly appalling,  but it seems the country is looking to increase its international reputation. In today’s liberal democratic dominated world (at least economically), it seems that a credible attempt to transition to democracy truly helps the cause of an authoritarian state. The regime right now is military, yet elected, something Levitsky and Collier might call, “military democracy”, definitely one of their diminished subtypes. Yet its release of political prisoners and pledge to hold free and fair elections, with several of these former prisoners as candidates, seems like a credible attempt at democratic reform. As a result the EU has lifted visa bans against Burmese officials, a positive step for international diplomacy, doubtless. The Myanmar government, however, says that a transition to free democracy will be “gradual and systematic” and will undoubtedly face some challenges. Chiefly among those countries looking to help Myanmar through this process is India. Its democratic neighbor, India has a lot to gain from positive relations with Myanmar. Firstly, democratic peace theory would state that they would never engage militarily, and secondly, warm relations would be better for controlling the extremely permeable border between the two countries, which is a locus for smuggling, narcotic, and other clandestine operations. The last line of the article however, situated it into a context which was completely absent from the rest of the text.

Energy-hungry India and China are competing for access to Myanmar’s large natural gas resources.

It is obvious the author threw this in because he thought it would be a key issue. It just goes to show that democracy isn’t being spread simply for its own sake. Surely, a democratic Myanmar would favour the world largest democracy over the world’s largest one party ‘democracy’ in doing business with. Democracy can be a political tool for pursuing other ends. It is not simply a humanitarian endeavor most of the time. The democratization efforts of the USA after WWII were simply to counter the spread of communism. The same pattern can be seen here. Democracy is seen as a normative ‘good thing’ and installing it can often mask any ulterior motives which a democratic government would offer.

http://ibnlive.in.com/news/pak-parl-passes-prodemocracy-resolution/221411-56.html

This article is brief but very interesting, especially in relation to the Democracy with Adjectives article which we read this week. Essentially, the Pakistani National Assembly has recently passed a bill which is dubbed a ‘pro-democracy’ piece of legislation. Essentially it was in response to the recent scandals which have plagued the Assembly and the seemingly undue influences of other branches of government on the legislative one. The bill was hugely controversial, the entire opposition walked out of the vote in protest, yet it passed with the necessary 2/3 majority.

It seems ironic that a bill called a ‘pro-democracy’ bill can even be proposed in a National Assembly. By black and white definitions, this is entirely redundant as the very existence of a National Assembly presupposes the existence of a democracy. Collier and Levitsky, on the other hand, highlight the fact that democracy can have extremely malleable definitions, depending on a wide variety of analytical categories. From free and fair elections to the rule of law, the necessary requirements for the ‘democracy’ label vary depending on the context in which it is used. It is rare, however, that a government which fancies itself a democracy would acknowledge the fact that it is not a complete democracy and undertake steps to fix this, through democratic channels. The irony in Pakistan is that a pro-democracy piece of legislation was passed in a democratic fashion in order to make the system more democratic! This turn of events makes it obvious that there are varying degrees of democracy. It is not often, however, that a limited democracy implicitly expresses its limited character.

The content of the bill was more symbolic in nature as opposed to legislative. It called for support of the supremacy of parliament as the sole legislative power, the continuation of democratic contestation, and respect for the separation of powers between the traditional three branches of government, executive, legislative and judiciary. “Authority is to be exercised through the people, and the parliament is the repository of the collective wisdom of the people of Pakistan.” This seems like a draft of a constitution, but is merely a re-statement of practices which are already entrenched. Various other political tensions were the cause of opposition to this relatively straightforward bill, not expressly the provisions it made. It was seen as an attack on other branches of government.

In my second semester of third year, I had the opportunity to go on exchange to Sydney Australia. This was a fantastic opportunity for a variety of reasons but i suppose the one most relevant to this course was that I was able to see first hand how Australian politics differed from Canadian. It was a really good comparative experience because of the noted similarities between the two countries. Namely, both are parliamentary democracies based of the Westminster system, both are federal systems of governance, and both occupy the ‘middle power’ status that lies between superpower and insignificance. I also had the fortune of being in Australia during one of their elections. I noticed that politics seemed to have a more prominent role in everyday life in Australia than in Canada. I am comparing the two countries the way they are at election time of course. For example, dinner conversations, or debates occurring on a Friday night over a beer seemed to focus on the latest outrageous move of Julia Gillard or the controversial refugee issue more so than it would in Canada. People in general seemed more well versed in the current national political issues and seemed to take sides more readily than I observed at home. These were young people, between the ages of 19-25, and the vast majority of them were not political science majors or even liberal arts students. Yet they seemed more interested in the issues at hand than I noticed in Canada. This is not to say that they had more cosmopolitan views, far from it. Everyone had an opinion and I heard some of the most boorish arguments regarding politics as I have ever. Everyone seemed to follow politics. Is this because Australian politics are simply more exciting? Are their leaders more charismatic and putative? Does the media pay more attention to politics? All of these are reasonable arguments but are very hard to quantify to make an effective comparison to other Westminster democracies. As the title of this blog entry suggests, I am taking the mandatory voting angle on this issue. Yes, every qualified voter in Australia has a duty to vote. Failure to do so results in some sort of punishment, usually a hefty fine in the hundreds of dollars. Not everyone votes, of course. I was able to see some striking cases of voter apathy. Some couldn’t be bothered to go to a polling station and preferred to take the fine, despite the fact the polling station was shockingly close to the college I inhabited. For the most part, however, people went to vote. They made a day of it. Friends would go and vote together and then take that opportunity to socialize, grab a beer (as Aussies love having an excuse to do), or go to dinner. It seemed like a genuine cultural difference that was brought about by mandatory voting laws. The election I saw received a 93% voter turnout compared with under 60% in Canada. Presumably the fines levied from the remaining 7% went a long way to paying for the immense cost of an election. This is one of the arguments for mandatory voting, but not the most convincing by far. As I previously mentioned, I think this makes people more genuinely interested in politics, and Australian culture as a result reflects this. When socializing with friends, the upcoming election can always be a topic to discuss as nobody can conceivably cop out of the conversation by saying “I don’t vote” without sounding irrational and lazy. Professor Nyblade’s post about declining civic participation saw education as being both the problem and solution for this trend of voter apathy. I argue, however, that by situating it in a social context, politics becomes something which one internalizes and at some level, ironically, it doesn’t feel compulsory anymore. I feel like in Canada, you cast a vote if you feel strongly one way or another, given that voting is not mandatory. Since there is no obligation, or coercive measure, people might not talk of politics as much in preparation for an election, as they have no real reason to if it is outside their bounds of interest. Essentially, optional voting means that people are only exposed to politics and think about issues if they choose to. In Australia it seems it is more or less unavoidable.

There are arguments against mandatory voting, however, and I also got to see those in action as well. I was pretty shocked when some people weighed into a political conversation over dinner who knew less about Australian politics than I did! These were presumably people who just liked hearing their own voice and would have participiated in any conversation regardless of the topic. Their lack of knowing the first thing about any of the important issues indicates to me that they would not vote if they weren’t forced to. As much as I am an advocate of civic participation, there are people who steer clear of politics for good reason, both for themselves and the polity at large. For the most part, these people just cast their vote in a way to be deliberately controversial, picking a fringe candidate, usually the radical equivalent of Canada’s marijuana party, just to say that they did. This is a problem in Australia precisely because these are not wasted ballots as they might be in Canada. Many of the Australian Houses, including the federal senate, use a proportional representation scheme to allocate seats. This means that if 5% of the idiots pick the idiot party, then the idiot party has 5% of the seats, even if they don’t have a majority in any one area! In Canada, the idiot party wouldn’t stand a chance in our first past the post system, both because they cant get a majority, and that the idiot party’s voter base rarely turns out to vote.

Maybe I’ve sounded a bit elitist and aloof in this last paragraph but it was to prove a point. There are arguments for and against mandatory voting, but all in all, I believe it is better to have everyone talking about politics, even the idiots, than have nobody care. I feel that the mandatory voting system that Australia has serves to increase civic participation both by increasing voter turnout, but more importantly, tricking people into talking about politics in a social setting, which makes them care. I hope to return there some day, and mail in my Canadian ballots.

@akpeepre

Hi! I read your personal introduction and here’s something I stumbled across. Or more accurately, StumbledUpon, not too long ago. Your interest in environmental politics and also winter sports I feel might be in conflict with this particular video. Do u think this is an unwarranted clearing of forests or just plain awesomeness that we will see this winter? I myself lean towards the awesomeness angle, but maybe you think otherwise. Trust Red Bull to do crazy stuff like this. Anyways, here it is. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zO09FC_ThFo

@mandy34

I’ve got a friend that is really into abstract paintings alot like the ones you posted. I really like them by the way. I’m sure you are drawing inspiration from a few of the same sources but i thought I might point you in the direction of one of my friend’s favorites. His name is Jeff Soto, and he does alot of trippy sort of abstract paintings. Yours immediately reminded me of him. His are a little creepier and use colour blending alot more. I don’t know a ton about art by the way. Maybe you know his work already, but if you don’t, maybe it can give u some ideas? Here are a few of his paintings. Jeff Soto

http://www.barnabys.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/soto.jpg

http://designyoutrust.com/wp-content/uploads7/JeffSoto9.jpg

http://www.triggermagazine.com/images/jeff_soto_6.jpg

@karen89

Hey! I noticed on your blog that you really liked to travel. I am the same way. The best time of my life I spent on exchange in Australia, the second best was travelling through Europe. I found this incredible video a while back, and you seem like the type of person who would like it. It makes you want to just drop everything and leave! enjoy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BrDlrytgm8

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16387117

This situation, in my opinion, goes to show how liberal democracy is the first victim of any sort of crisis. In this case, the Hungarian Fidesz Party has passed a new constitution which lifts some of the checks and balances which are typical and necessary for a liberal democracy.  Apparently it also rewrites electoral formulae in a way which benefits the Fidesz Party, increasing their chances of being re-elected.

The governing party holds 68% of the house, but recent polls have put their approval ratings at a mere 18%. Demonstrations have been popping up in Hungary on a range of issues relating to the people’s non confidence in the party, the new constitution only being the most recent.

The party was elected during the beginning of the financial crisis on promises to ‘create a million workplaces’ but so far has produced next to no growth. It is only the latest in the trend where people are willing to elect non-democratic parties during a crisis, and are willing to risk democratic freedom to alleviate some sort of economic woes. The prototypical example of course being interwar Germany and their election of the National Socialist Party. This is an important trend to analyze when studying democracy and its viability. It would seem that democracy works best when things are going smoothly, but when things go wrong, it becomes a luxury that is often sacrificed for ‘the greater good’. The situation in Hungary is an extension of this. The financial crisis has caused people to invest their hopes in a fringe party, with less than democratic ideals, in the hope that it can improve their economic situation.

In reading this article I had a few thoughts about my own education and how it has affected my own personal views and behavior regarding democracy. The education I have received in the political science department at UBC has served to make me far more cynical about politics than I had been previously. I think it is one of those topics where ‘the more you know, the less you wanted to know’. This is especially true in taking units and doing research which pertains to the state of democracy, especially in the United States. In my nearly 4 years at the University, I have mostly been exposed to information which has decreased my perception that a fair and free democracy exists in Canada and the United States. The amount of power that special interest industrial lobbies have over policy makers, issues such as gerrymandering, reports of electoral fraud, the power of transnational corporations and financial institutions, and the military industrial policy making complex are all topics which my Political Science education has exposed me to, and have served to lessen my perception that democracy is working well. I argue then, that a political science degree might even discourage educated people from entering politics at all because the material learned in that education may make it seem like a futile exercise. When big business (as just one example) has such a massive degree of influence over our policy makers, it lessens the desire to run for office, vote, or participate in politics in any way. In fact it encourages going into commerce, as it seems commercial interests have, in many instances, more power than democratic ones.

That being said, a political science has definitely made me think critically about politics, and increased a student’s ability to critique news outlets, political statements, and better deconstruct the motives behind particular action. If the motivation to engage in politics is there, then civic educated students are in a far better position to effect change than, ‘the uneducated masses’ or at least more able to spearhead that political change. Therefore, despite the fact that i believe a political science education makes one more cynical about the efficacy of democratic means, it places these people in a position to understand a state of affairs and effect change.

In sum, the optimal way to increase civic participation would be to provide this sort of enlightening education but somehow include a subtext that democracy is the driving force behind a country’s politics. As far as my education has gone, it seems that the realist explanations of democracy are far more convincing than the idealist ones. Maybe its just me whose cynical, but if this is a widespread belief, which I think it may be, we can only encourage political participation by changing the situation which makes students disillusioned with democracy, or somehow change students attitudes through a different style of education which emphasizes democracy’s strengths as opposed to the ways in which it is deteriorating.