Democracy isn’t the problem - Parliamentary Democracy is!

If like me, you are both intrigued and despairing in equal measure at the recent state of politics I’m right there with you comrade. Recent events – Brexit, Trump, Labour, Boris, etc, – I don’t even have to go beyond single words and you know exactly what I’m talking about. That in itself says more about the politics of personality or slogan rather than the deep and meaningful politics we crave.

With 24-hour rolling media it seems we live and breathe politics and recent (closer to home) events (cause our media seem to ignore those events outside of Europe, well except for Channel 4 that is) have heightened our senses regarding politics and issues connected with them.

We are bemused and despair at what the hell’s going on in the US – Trump and gun law; we are confused and sceptical at what has just passed as a coup in Turkey and the subsequent ‘purge’ of anyone that doesn’t share similar thoughts to Erdogan; we are saddened and bewildered by mindless attacks in France and Germany yet almost desensitised to events in Syria and Iraq whilst almost oblivious to news from Israel and Palestine whilst wars in Africa just don’t register.

We are disappointed and frustrated by Brexit; insulted and angry by Labour MPs who ignore the wishes of their membership; aghast and humoured by the appointment of Boris as Foreign Secretary and closer to home we wonder how long Martin and Arlene can continue to do the foxtrot before someone’s toes take a beating. Even ‘down South’ we’ve seen Fine Gael-is brewing & Fianna Fail-out mention those three little words, no, not I love you but rather, ‘A Border Poll’! Oh and a small matter of another independence referendum in Scotland – 2017 is the latest betting.

This is the moment that an OMG, WTF followed by an LOL is necessary because it is surprise, followed by confusion followed by laughter followed by YCMIU – that’s ‘Yee Couldn’t Make It Up’ to me and you. Right now, politics is anything but boring, on one hand I am intrigued (and somewhat excited) yet despairing and TBH, very much disillusioned (yip, I know, so disillusioned I’m fecking well wasting time writing about it). You see, I kinda gave up on the old politics thing a few years ago and let me explain why.

I have spent most of my life working in the voluntary sector and had an avid interest in politics for most of my life – no this is not the moment I point out that I’ve published a book on the peace process and I won’t mention that the title of the book begins, ‘the things people say’ either, nor that if you simply just google my name it will appear in a search. Nope, that would just be blatant and rampant marketing! Just not going to go there!

So as I was saying, I had a strong interest in local politics, particularly between the early 90s and mid ‘naughties’ when much of our political discourse was extremely challenging and events were often out of our control and still had the propensity to have devastating impact on lives and communities throughout the land, but as the devolution came and went, came and went, came and went and then became embedded, things settled down and began to gather stagnation.

We saw one term of Stormont (settling in period), followed by a second (consolidation of relationships), through a third (trying to make it work) and now (if I’m not mistaken) a fourth (which is now the ‘we can’t keep kidding the public, better get our act together’ phase) where the election of a number of independents and/or non-mainstream parliamentarians is a sign of a growing discontent with what has been described as the ‘political elite’ (which is a feature across many western democracies) but which as Pink Floyd might choose to call them, the ‘comfortably numb’.

As someone who has worked in the voluntary sector I’ve seen politics creep slowly into almost every facet of voluntary sector life – not only existing within the formal institutions of our chambers – council or assemblies for that matter – but in other local governing bodies, boards, committees, panels, groups and so on.

We cosy up with politicos as if they are some kind of rare species that we need to have the ear of, we treat them as if they are better than us and should ensure they are not annoyed or critiqued, we have endeared them to such an extent that they have been blessed with powers that has us pandering to them and we have ensured that effective local decision-making is not always about best practice but what suits at a given time in a given context that keeps voters on-side at the risk of losing sight of the true notion of public service.

This seemingly state of flux, confusion, bewilderment and despair that has beset even our own local politics never mind that of a UK, ‘Down South’, EU and across the pond variety has resulted in our almost-resignation to all things Parliamentary.

We have in effect, through our efforts to ensure democracy works (which is more about us saying, hey look how civilised we are as compared with you lot with no democracy) have given over all power to the idea and concept that Parliamentary politics is the only form of public engagement that works - parliamentary politics is or certainly from my perspective has certainly become egotistical, corrupt, bureaucratic, overly-funded yet lacking the power and the will to bring about real and lasting change.

Think about it for a second – a politician can get on with his or her job without supervision (once elected no-one really supervises them, not even the select committees set up to make them accountable), they don’t need a licence to practice, they require no qualification and can utter all sorts of murmurings without genuine recourse and will be offered protection by their own party till it blows over (unless their party doesn’t like them).

We are almost to blame for the state of our democracies because we have become enshrined to them and entombed by them, unable to really think about other ways of successfully engaging people in public life to bring about necessary change.

It’s only in recent years have we seen some signs of change – there are many campaigning groups who operate outside of parliamentary politics who bring about change and quickly at that without becoming mired or bogged down in procedures – Avaaz, Change.org, 38 Degrees and so on. But this is not enough. I’m not suggesting for one second that we purge all politicians and relieve them of their duty tomorrow, nor do I advocate ridding each of the states on these islands of their respective democratic homes.

However, for the sake of those who come behind us we really need to think about democratic structures that go well beyond the parliamentary incendiary devices we have created, nurtured and cling too – the kinds of devices where every whip-about we toddle along to a local school (ah the irony of going into a place of education where no education is required) to vote back in humans with pre-set ideologies to deal with a diverse and complex set of challenges that have no ideological boundaries thus requiring a greater variety of platforms (for dealing with shit) that are not reliant on a first past the post or a proportional representation mechanism.

If we want to encourage young people to become the future ambassadors, leaders and guardians that we all long for, that we crave, that we all profess to support and where they can nurture, protect, fight for and advance the society we wish to see rather than the one we just about exist in then we better let them into a little secret - Democracy isn’t really the proble, Parliamentary Democracy bloody well is!