Bastards of Democracy
Expanding thesis on Indian democracy
I am introducing a new philosophical term Bastards of Democracy to define agents - politicians, activists, intellectuals etc - of a failed Democratic systems like of India and similar 3rd world nations. The term is motivated by Joan Robinson. To give a brief history, Robinson introduced the term Bastard Keynesianism in 1960s to characterize the economics field discourse that subverted the philosophical message of Keynesian economics. Keynesian economics is as we know was the paradigm that shaped the economic policy of US & UK during World War 2 and for couple of decades thereafter.
(The precise date of demise of original Keynesian influence in academic discourse and governmental policy is debated. Some put it at 1970s Oil crisis while some put it at around 1980s when Thatcher & Reagan consolidated power. Although there is no doubt that with arrival of Reagonomics (supply side voodoo economics) and Thatcherism (TINA doctrine), the original Keynnesian philosophy was all but buried.)
What was Keynesianism or Keynesian thinking? Keynesian thinking embodied several ideas that included principle of aggregate demand, macroeconomic philosophy (spending drives income, investment drives savings on aggregate level etc), endemic uncertainty, State’s monopoly over money, irrationality & instability of Laissez faire and tied to these ideas was fundamental belief that government has a decisive role regulating economy, participating to guide as much as two-thirds of all national investment and there’s a higher purpose to life other than pecuniary goals. Keynes was also against rigid mathematical models and rather believed in economic philosophy in terms of poetic ideas. Keynesian thinking was thus antithesis of self regulating markets philosophy (markets knows the best) that had been a dominant theme up until great depression.
(Table from Macroeconomics by Mitchell and Wray 2019 ed)
What was Bastard Keynesianism? Bastard Keynesianism was born in American academic circles which entailed dilution, constriction and subversion of Keynes’ ideas with unrealistic mathematical models and dubious constraints. The mathematical models of Bastard Keynesians entailed things like General equilibrium, Philips curve, rationality of markets, marginal productivity etc which was basically rebunking of classical & neoclassical economic theory but by accommodating Keynes’ original idea of effective demand. Basically Bastard Keynesianism was subversion of Keynes’ idea by tying Keynes’ effective demand with other neoclassical tenets and legitimizing them with sophisticated mathematical models which were based on unrealistic assumptions - all of this was called Neoclassical synthesis.
(excerpts from Macroeconomics by Mitchell and Wray 2019 ed)
Keynes’ general belief was that markets can be irrational and thus government has indispensable participatory role in economic management. General belief of Bastard Keynesians was that markets knows the best although they may be slow in arriving at equilibrium, which can be more easily achieved if government provides some nudges along the way - this was principle of fine tuning the economy where government uses fiscal policy to support market economy especially during cyclical downturns.
To expand a bit, we can generalize to Bastard Keynesians in politics (politicians of post war era) who abused Keynesian economics for financing Cold War, building up gargantuan military industrial complex (which now perpetually gobbles Trillion dollars every year) and launching wars of aggression. This was also antithesis of Keynes’ thinking who believed in global harmony, peace and higher purpose of life (Keynes also believed in civilizing mission of 3rd world). In field of economics, the bastards Keynesians were economists like Tobin, Samuelson and Solow. In politics, the Bastard Keynesians were politicians like Nixon, Reagan and Neocons. (Even progressive politicians like JFK & LBJ abused Keynes’ ideas for providing tax cuts and funding wars)
Here I like to assert that the term Bastard can be generalized to any phenomenon that subverts original messaging for nefarious objectives. For example, Canadian scholar Quinn Slobodian characterizes the post 1990 Neoliberals as Hayek’s Bastards who used Hayek’s Libertarian philosophy to destroy social progress of golden age. It must be said that Hayek himself was a charlatan intellectual if not a complete fraud. Although my opinion about Hayek’s bastards is that Milton Friedman was the first bastard child of Hayek and neoliberals actually came later to the scene.
Hayek’s bastard by Quinn Slobodian
Now that we have understood the concept of Keynes’ Bastards, we can generalize this concept to bastards of Indian democracy
Shock therapy of Democracy in India
India was not ready for democracy when it got independence in 1947. Democracy is a political system which requires requisites like mature, civilized and healthy sociopolitical temperaments, social & economic stability (to a reasonable degree), a sizable middle class and national institutions to run democracy - all these are building materials of democracy - but which were nonexistent in India at time of independence and ever before. Nevertheless, the founding father of India (the agitators who protested for independence against colonial imperialists) decided to implement democracy in India.
I’ve already explained the disastrous consequences of experiment of democracy in India in past articles. Democracy ripped apart and ruptured Indian society into various factions; sub-nationalist & ethnic groups, caste & religious groups, and all kind of parochial forces who only thrived for violent confrontations and conflicts. And since Indian society was overwhelmingly illiterate and backward, the leaders of these political factions were also demagogues and deranged scoundrels who could easily manipulate and control their backward political fiefs. The result was a government which was thoroughly incompetent, corrupted and paralyzed which could not fulfill even very basic duties of governance. But all this I’ve covered in past articles. In this article, I will discuss about agents of failed Indian democracy. The kind of politicians, activists and intellectuals that originated out of this failed democracy - these I define as bastards of democracy.
The mother of Indian democracy is undoubtedly British political model as Indian founding fathers emulated a large part of British system. This is unsurprising because Indian founding fathers acquired their knowledge and lifetime experience as Colonial subjects who were educated and interned in Great Britain. Several of founding fathers actually went to British universities and they genuinely believed in modernity. And secondly, India’s legal & institutional system in past 200 years was built by British imperialists themselves. So founding fathers had natural inclination to build & improve upon the structures left by departing imperialists.
So undoubtedly, mother of Indian democracy is former British imperial masters. But who’s the father? This we don’t know. The British themselves fully understood that a backward nation like India is not conducive to democracy. In my past articles, I’ve explained how modern Democracy is a capitalist concept which emerged in Britain starting around 18th century and co-evolving endogenously with institutions of Capitalism. Polanyi’s The Great Transformation is a good book to understand this narrative.
It took centuries for modern Democracy to evolve in Western societies but Indian founding father decided to implement Democracy in one go, by stroke of a Pen & a constitution - this I define as Shock therapy of Democracy. This lead to all the disasters. Indian politicians - the bastards of democracy - sold the Democratic political model as universal theology. But there’s a difference between founding fathers and later day Indian politicians which needs to be clarified. Indian founding fathers were genuine disciples of Classical doctrine of democracy and were confident (out of sheer ignorance & foolishness) that classical theory will work in India while later day Indian politicians had no faith in classical theory at all and well understood that Democracy is a failure. But due to their pathological drive for power, later day politicians exploited the failed democracy for their own gains. In past article I’ve already explained the concept of legitimacy and how Democratic mandate in itself is not a legitimate system unless it delivers on Substantial terms. But the bastards of democracy proclaimed to have the mandate of heaven - an undisputed legitimacy to rule society.
Bastards of Indian democracy
Bastards of Indian democracy are degenerate offsprings of failed democracy and they are not a homogeneous group. They come in various ideologies and motivational aspects.
Hindutva Politicians
The right wing Indian leaders & fascistic demagogues are prime examples of bastards of democracy. A striking characteristic of these bastards is that they fully consciously understand that democracy is a failed project in a nation like India and they fully understand how to exploit and operate this failed system to their best advantage. They used majoritarian politics, religious fundamentalism, demagogy and mass violence to overthrow old conservative & quasi/pseudo liberal regimes. They best exploited the sentiments of uncivilized electorate to achieve political power. These right wing elements are textbook Pathocrats.
(Nations - even the developed ones - are governed by myths, these myths are kind of big lies. American exceptionalism is a myth for America, The productive powers of Socialism was myth for USSR, France was never defeated by Nazis was a myth for post war France, the divine supremacy of Islam is myth for middle east nations)
Hindutva politicians created a nationalist myth by fusion of Hindu religion and State government to define Hindu Rashra and Hindutva where the Fascistic politicians proclaimed themselves to be agents of god with mission of bringing divine governance to population. This religious identity of State is similar to Islamic political projects of certain middle east nations.
Hindutva Plebeians
Hindutva plebeians are extremists, members of religious militant organizations and hooligans who are marching armies of Hindutva politicians. India is a poor backward society with majority of population below 25 years of age. There are very few jobs, ladders of upward social mobility are broken and in general there are little means to build a secure life. The corruption and violence - overt & structural - is rampant which has brutalized vast amount of population. This brutalization of people, especially the young demography has destroyed their intellect and filled them with nihilism, rage & despair.
Rally of religious militias - their job entails beating up minorities (Muslims, Christians etc) and organizing communal riots
Such desperate and enraged population cannot be rational and intelligent, and thus prone to be exploited by demagogues for political purposes. These plebeians - themselves victims of structural violence & poverty - are used by right wing Hindutva politicians to inflict violence against minorities (Muslims, Christians etc) and rival political parties. These plebeians have been used for this purpose in countless religious massacres and riots in last few decades.
Founding fathers
The agitators of Independence movement especially the liberal types - people like MK Gandhi, Nehru, Ambedkar - were the first bastard children of this entire project of Indian democracy. These were mediocre leaders who lived in their Utopian dream of Democratic idealism and were disciples of classical theory of democracy. They never understood really existing democracy (heterodox theory of democracy) and how democracy is thoroughly incompatible with Indian society. Yet they drafted a Constitution which prescribed a political system - failed by its very design - to govern India. But one thing that is remarkable about founding fathers like MK Gandhi was that they never had material/pecuniary motivations or pathological ambitions for power.
Indian founding fathers lived in microcosmic worldview where agitation against colonial imperialists was the only goal of life. But how will they run an independent India once colonial masters depart? They had little idea. Their ignorance was quite evident. Gandhi was a kind of reactionary who although believed in Democracy but had no inclination towards modern industry. He believed in India as a self sufficient rural village society. How will such rural agrarian society fulfill the material needs of 350 million people? Gandhi had no plan about it. Similarly, Nehru was ignorant & naive about geopolitics and foreign policy among other things.
Indian Liberal politicians
Liberal politicians in India are not really liberal in a conventional sense and they are not socialist either although they sometimes like to masquerade as such. A typical liberal politician is a free market proponent who applies liberal (or Neoliberal) ideology in his governing principles. But liberal politics is suited for market economies where society and political class have matured, which is not the case in India. In India, liberal politicians or more accurately pseudo Liberals are reactionaries whose politics is a strange brew of populism, cronyism and demagogy to serve their short term political objectives and winning elections. Actually, this problem is common across political spectrum. All political parties operate purely on short term goals and long term consequences of their policies seldom enter their planning.
Like right wing fascistic politicians, Indian (pseudo) Liberal politicians also fully understand that democracy is a failure in India. But they see no hope in correcting Indian political system which undoubtedly has accumulated great inertia. A failed democracy carried on for nearly 80 years has developed a great inertia and at this point the people have fully bought into the theology of Democracy. A question of political reform can be viewed as undermining this holy democracy as people who have been long accustomed to this failed project will resist. It’s like a pathological relationship where battered wife loves her abusive husband no matter how much he torments her. No matter how badly democracy performs, the electorate continue to tolerate it.
Indian liberal politicians know that democracy is a failure and they know that there’s no point in any rational political program. For, how can a rational program be attractive to electorate who are uneducated and uncivilized? To counter nationalist politics of right wing Hindutva, Indian liberals have invented their own demagogic doctrine which is just as polarizing and destructive like religious populism of Hindutva. It’s called Caste, quota & reservation politics. Divide & rule. Liberal politicians on scam of social justice divide the electorate on frivolous basis of ethnicity, domicile and tribes, and present these factions with carrots of employment and other kinds of social benefits.
Indian Liberals and Indian right wingers are flip side of the same coin. Let me expound on this assertion. India after independence remained a poor backward society. Although the number of acute poor - the people who simply die from starvation - reduced in absolute numbers after independence, these poor only advanced just one rung from the lowest level of acute poverty, and always remaining at peril of sliding back in case of any emergency or bad fortune. The economy also remained backward and rural agrarian with very little opportunities of social mobility. In sum, the economic pie didn’t grow to meet the demographic demands - the national income, material benefits and productive capacity of India remained at very low level. The poverty & inequality has a strong causality in bad macroeconomic policies and competent policies are needed to address socioeconomic backwardness.
But bastard politicians that came out of Democracy had no competence and vision for substantive policy making, hence they sowed division to distract & control the population by creating and aggravating social conflicts based on ethnicity, religion and tribes. While right wing politicians made youth addicted to opium of religion, the liberals diverted youth to agitate over reservation in jobs. It was like a 100 dogs chasing 50 bones. Unless you increase the bones, 50 dogs will go hungry. But rather than increasing bones (the economic pie, employment opportunities & public goods), the liberal politicians enticed hundreds of different ethnic, tribal, caste factions with symbolic reservation in employment & universities.
The politics of polarization and division of society on arbitrary lines is antithesis of liberalism. Recall that liberalism is about positivism and economic rationality of market economy which guides policy making purely on cost-benefit analysis rather than making religious/Caste/ethnic considerations. Thus Indian liberals are not liberal in conventional sense. They are actually reactionaries of an alternative breed. Only thing that differentiates Indian liberal politicians from a right wing fascistic politicians is bellicosity. Right wing politicians are much more bellicose and readily exercise violence (literal and symbolic) against political opposition and minority groups while the liberal politicians have more restraint and discretion in their political style. This propensity for violence and radical politics makes right wing forces more effective in failed democracies like India where right wing forces seek to crush political opposition by all means.
Also noteworthy is that there is not a major difference in economic policies of Indian right wing and Indian left liberal politicians. The policies of both factions are largely exercise in incompetence, populist imbecility and borne out of short term political objectives. Other feature of policy making is of course to enrich their favorite oligarchs.
Liberal activists
Indian liberal activists are cretins cut out from same cloth of founding fathers. They are romanticists who share the grand Utopian delusions of founding fathers about Democracy. A typical Indian liberal venerates founding fathers and says - ‘I love the constitution’. These liberals are strongly religious in a sense that they believe Democracy and constitution like a universal spiritual gospel (refer to Schumpeter’s thesis on how Democracy is like a religion).
A defining characteristic of liberals is that they will blame India’s political failures, not on its inherently failed democratic structure, but solely on operational problems of the structure. Liberals will claim that Democracy is not properly working in India because it’s not implemented in true spirits (the idealistic way). If only the political agents of society start acting as idealistic Classical model prescribes - the democracy will play out well.
(Indian liberals don’t understand the requisites for a functional classical democracy. When a society doesn’t have these requisites, the classical theory will fail. The political agents are not bound by any natural laws to act as per classical theory.)
There are two more defining features of liberals. First, they will contend that failing Democracy is fixable by process reforms, by adopting ballot paper elections or some tweaks like parliamentary deliberation, transparency and other formal procedures to accommodate opinions of civil society in policy making. Second, they will contend that Democracy is the best system there is and is bound to reach its perfectible state sooner or later. But a failed system will remain a failure even if its operated with transparency and proper formality.
For how can parliamentary cretins with an intellect of a baboon demonstrate competence and intelligence in policy making just by adopting different procedures? When all the political party candidates are scoundrels and more importantly when the electorate itself is illiterate and uninformed, what difference will it make if elections in such a backward society are organized by ballot paper or electronic voting? Tweaking design or improving components of of ICE (internal combustion engine) or a steam engine cannot make them more efficient and better than modern electric vehicle technology. A dysfunctional & obsolete system cannot be much improved just by tinkering with its various parts.
Just as Hindutva Plebeians expend their youth energy on religious militancy, the liberal activists expend their youth energy on ethnic & sub-nationalist populism. Liberal activists is heterogeneous mixture of groups which agitate over reservation in employment & education for their factions or gender or tribes. Apart from democracy, reservation is supreme moral virtue for Indian liberals and every institution should be built on it. National Parliament, State assemblies, universities, public offices & enterprises and if possible even private enterprises should be created on basis of quotas. For example, 33% of Parliamentarians should be women, 50% of college students should be from designated tribes & castes, 80% of workers (including in private sector) should be State local domicile etc.
Note the great paradox of Indian liberals. A conventional liberal politician is about markets and its mechanism for allocation of resources and Labour for best efficiency. Socialist principle recognize that allocation of opportunity shall be based on competence of candidate - From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs. In a way, both market system and Socialism share a fundamental commonality. Both don’t differentiate workers on basis of religion, nationality or ethnicity.
(the difference between market system and Socialism is that latter believes in making State the owner of Capital. Capital under ownership of State will then allocate resources and opportunities purely on ability (competence) of people NOT on basis of any ethnicity, tribe or religion, and economic surplus will be distributed in egalitarian way)
Indian liberals are not free market proponents in conventional sense and they are nor socialist either (read my old article). They are creatures of failed democratic process where the policies are invented for purely short term basis to entice imbecilic uneducated population. A liberal politician can get votes by promising employment reservation to cultivate his political fief. And since all politicians do it at the same time, it leads to ethnic and social division of society which down the road create violence (reservation riots are common in India).
Reservation agitators set train on fire
Regional power players
In America, there are only two main political parties (Democrats and Republicans). In other western nations and liberal democracies, there are no more than 4-5 political parties. Apart from conservatives and Labour Party, there is usually a Green party or some liberal or Christian democratic party (as case in Europe). The political spectrum in western democracies is small and stable.
In India which has such a vast diversity of culture, ethnicity and languages, there are hundreds of political parties and regional power players - politics is war of all against all. In national parliament, there are representatives of 40 different parties. On State & regional level, there are all kinds of different parties who rule various States, and down to city and village levels. India is highly fragmented politically.
(Although, the right wing party - BJP - is the largest political party, it still doesn’t have majority at national level and in many States, and relies on various coalitions for forming government at various levels.)
These regional and smaller political parties, just like major mainstream parties, have no actual substance in governance and policies. They’re busy with parochial issues and cultivating their own political fiefs based on sub-nationalist & tribal politics (Maratha, Sikh, Cow belt vote banks etc), reservation demagogy (all these parties agitate for reservation system for their fiefs of ethnic, Caste & domicile), freebie politics (handing out small useless goodies to electorate like free smartphones or tablets), rural populism (farm loan waivers & subsidies) etc.
A feature of these small regional political forces is that they are in eternal conflict with each other. The right wing parties from cow belt region are obviously more bellicose. The Marathi politicians fight against Biharis. The Punjabi politicians fight against Harayanavis. Even the so called civilized South Indian political parties like in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka fight against each other. The Cow belt politicians from Uttar Pradesh attack leaders of Kerala. The Kashmiri politicians demand secession from India and so do certain radical Khalistani politicians.
Like liberal parties, the smaller regional parties also have a strong basis in reservation politics and which commonly leads to frictions with rival regional parties. For example, Politicians of Maharashtra doesn’t want workers from State of Bihar & UP to get employment in Maharashtra.
Democracy in its idealistic model is based on rational electorate theory that entails the idea that people are informed about their self interests and exercise their electoral power for their individualistic self interests. But democracy in a backward, highly muti-ethnic and fragmented society can be destabilizing and chaotic where factional identity Trumps individual interests. A democratic system in such an environment becomes a dog-eat-dog platform for channeling conflict and violence among all the power groups and multi-ethnic factions. So democracy, rather than producing political solutions, instead becomes a recipe for aggravating social conflicts where individual rational interest dissolves in background and battle royale among all factions becomes goal in itself. That’s how Democracy is playing out in highly fragmented and backward society like India & similar 3rd world countries.
Here, I like to draw an interesting parallel to polarizing politics of India to that of modern America. As I explained above, the Indian politicians divert people’s anger against other ethnic & religious groups. Divide and rule. In America especially since the 1970s, right wing politicians are also diverting people’s anger towards other social & racial groups. Currently there’s a White Nationalist movement which is based on scapegoating immigrants, women, blacks, gays and other communities for decline of White Americans. This politics of polarization of society was first utilized as Southern Strategy by Republicans and Nixon. It’s also interesting to note that while American politics had been largely secular in nature, recently right wing politicians are incorporating Christian nationalism in their political strategy. This is creating tremendous rollback in social progress like issues of Women rights (rollback of abortion laws is an example). Historian Brad DeLong has explained this phenomenon of White identity politics in his book and how politicians exploited it.
Why politics of modern society like America is thriving with such destructive & divisive politics which is typical to 3rd world failed democracies? I will discuss this in final section.
Indian Intelligentsia
While the politicians are worst kind of Bastards of Democracy, there’s another class of bastards who have done much harm to social progress - the Indian intellectuals & intelligentsia. The politicians regardless of political system are deceiving actors with instrumental view of everything. Especially in backward democratic nations, little wisdom and competence can be expected from the politicians. The politicians of these nations pathologically dispense falsehoods, lies & myths for purely short term objectives. It’s the duty of intellectuals to document and dispense factual knowledge to society. But they also failed in India.
The problem with Indian intellectuals is same as founding fathers, for they have been disciples of classical theory of democracy. Moreover, Indian intellectuals also helped propagate the nationalist myths of Indian independence movement against colonizers as supreme virtue and achievement. This distracted them from objectively analyzing India’s fundamental problems and exploring their remedies. The most fundamental task of Intelligentsia was honestly telling Indian society that it’s not ready for western style democracy and thus charting an alternate political model for governance. Democracy may become possible when society builds the requisite environment for it but not today. Indian intellectuals abdicated for two reasons. One was obviously their faith in classical democracy. Second, they didn’t expect the society to digest the non-feasibility of democracy. So they chose to propagate comfortable lie of democracy.
Despite the flaws of founding fathers I mentioned above, people like Gandhi were practical men and not merely empty vessels. If they had lived longer to see India’s failures, they would’ve almost certainly rejected their own political conceptions for India. Founding fathers were not fettered by pathological need for power. They may be wrong in their idealistic conceptions but their conviction for India was genuine. Gandhi only lived few months after Independence. Gandhi was genuinely shocked & horrified by mass violence in independent India where nearly a million died in communal violence. If Gandhi, by some miracle, comes back to life, he would undoubtedly see present political system as even worse than of colonial oppressors.
So ideally, Indian intellectuals should’ve been the doctors to measure the pulse of society. Within few decades after Independence, it was clear that Political system had turned out to be a disaster and there’s an urgent need to write a new social contract - a new political system for India. But by 21st century, Indian intellectuals became just as bankrupt as politicians. They either peddled the political ideologies of politicians or in some exceptions, the few intellectuals who knew where India is headed, muted themselves out of fear of political repercussions.
The crisis in democracy was dismissed by intellectuals claiming that path to democracy can be a rocky road and system should be allowed to mature & blossom. Democracy is the best system there is and it will correct itself in time. But that never happened. You can do elections for 100 more years in India but no concrete progress will result.
Bastards of Democracy in the Developed world
It’s true that problems of political democracy are overwhelmingly in poor & backward 3rd world nations but even developed and so called modern societies are not immune from problems of democracy. These problems in political democracy of modern nations became obvious and aggravated after post war golden age and with rise of Neoliberalism. The Bastards of Democracy also exist in modern developed nations and they harm their societies in similar ways like their peers in 3rd world States.
Donald Trump, MAGA politicians, Neoconservative politicians, ultra-right political groups are bastards of democracy in West today. It was bastards of Democracy which gave Brexit referendum to Britain. It was bastards of democracy which under the auspices of MAGA movement took control of America. It was bastards of democracy which weaponized democracy against its own population and against the world.
Neocon politicians weaponized democracy to launch war of aggression. So & so backward nation has to be invaded to export democracy there. Obviously, the real objectives were geopolitical & imperial, and argument for bringing democracy to these nations was just a mirage. The shock therapy of democracy in several nations in middle east & North Africa produced no actual benefits and they remained backward and corrupted societies, however millions were killed in process to implement democracy there.
There also are bastards of democracy in modern world intelligentsia. These were the people who provided the academic & intellectual backing to concept of Democracy by elevating it to level of universal theology - a nation must be democratic (& market economy) to be in the league of modern civilized nations. Anybody who resists democracy can be sanctioned & cut off from global system, and even eliminated by dispatching gunboats or Jet bombers if they are weak defenseless States (although bringing democracy to powerful non-democratic nations like China remained an obstacle).
It’s not that the non-democratic nations failed in their democratizing missions because their societies rejected the concept of Democracy. At first, the independent third world nations were much enthusiastic about political democracy after the imperial masters departed. But enthusiasm cannot substitute for realism and this was where these nations failed in their democratic projects. The problem was never democracy in itself but its compatibility (or not) with particular societies. Inclination and enthusiasm for democracy doesn’t amount to anything if your society is not conducive to it.
Let’s look at post Soviet Russia, a major case of recent experiment of Democracy. The problem was actually the shock therapy of Democracy coupled with shock therapy of markets that ruined Russian society even though Russians were genuinely inclined towards both democracy and market economy. A gradualism approach to implement democracy and market reforms could’ve been the right path for these societies but the bastards of democracy of West (the politicians, intellectuals, economists etc) proposed the Shock therapy. It turned out to be a disaster. Just because democracy worked for some doesn’t mean it will work for everyone. This, intellectuals and idealistic politicians, failed to understand in both developed and developing nations.
The bastard politicians of democracy in developed nations started acting like their peers of 3rd world - the demagogy, big lies, polarization of society and capitalizing on sentimental appeal became the norm in politics. The problem was not the lies and demagogy as such because these exists in all societies - more or less. The problem was that politicians started defaulting on substantial duties and started denying substantial benefits to the electorate. The policies which stagnated wages while skyrocketing profits & inequality, the policies which denied universal healthcare & social safety net while enormously multiplying the wealth of oligarchs, the policies which channeled public money into defense industrial complex while the public services and infrastructure dilapidated - all these policies were pet projects of bastards of democracy. Democracy was reduced to an instrument to legitimize political rule which otherwise failed to provide substantial benefits. And this is where 21st century politicians in West and the 3rd world began to converge.
It’s interesting that rise of Bastards of Democracy in West is coincidental with rise of Bastard Keynesians followed by Neoliberals. This is more than a coincidence. The Keynesian thinking saved Capitalism in 1930s & early 40s, first against the crisis of Capitalism and then against the threat of Fascism. A shortcoming of Schumpeter was that he believed Capitalism can fix itself when it was hit by great depression. But depression threatened to wipe out the entire structure of modern political State as happened in Fascist nations in 1920s & 30s. Without a modern political structure of State there won’t be any markets, and there were two possible outcomes from heaps of such society - either there’s a Socialist revolution or an emergence of Fascism. It was FDR’s New Deal & Keynesian ideas that saved the political systems of western world from both possibilities. Now West is again faced with a crisis as old systems that guided the post war world have dissolved - liberal democracy and Keynesian thinking.
Suggested reading
Parallels of mainstream political theory and mainstream economic theory
Concept of political legitimacy and theory of Democracy
Politics, Democracy, Invisible hand and Equilibrium
Classical theory of Democracy and its fatal consequences
India - Economic liberalism, Socialistic Populism and Democracy
India, Democracy and Political future
Nice read! Though the article is titled 'bastards of democracy' the takeaway for me is 'democracy is a bastard' 😁😇