Democracy Vs.......................??

[dray]

I have posted this one in one of the sundry Doklam related threads in Chinese section in reply to one Chinese member....would love to hear other aspects, additions, agreements, disagreements, opinion on this topic from all members. @scorpionx @nair @Sky lord @SarthakGanguly @Levina @gslv mk3 @SrNair @Nilgiri @Skull and Bones @jetray @full metal @Joe Shearer @hellfire @HariPrasad @MilSpec @fsayed @Rajaraja Chola @Mr.Nair @SOUTHie @utrash @Stag112 @ranjit @arp2041 and all others irrespective of nationalities.

Please read this 20 year old article on LA Times, you may have a better understanding as why India can never catch up China (provided China is not in turmoil because of "color revolution"). Taking a long view, India is between a rock and a hard place: without a revolution India will be what it has always been; with a revolution there may not have a country called India as we know of.

Uneasy reading for any Indian, but it may help to cure some insanity.

How China Beat India in Race for Success

http://articles.latimes.com/1997/aug/10/news/mn-21296

Okay...let's dig deeper, shall we?

What is the most important factor for long term success & growth of a country, is it industry, HDI, economy? None of these, it's the political system in place that decides the fate of a country in the longer run, it forms the very important foundation of a country, and we know the consequences of a weak foundation. Democracy has certain flaws, its takes time to build the system with all components in place, ours is 70 years old and still improving itself continuously, the decision making and especially implementation is slow in a democracy, it tends to avoid hard economic decision that might offend people...etc. But among all its faults, it has a basic difference with any non-democratic systems; be it a dictatorship, monarchy, religious state, or communism...that is, in a democracy the political system is separate from the ruling regime, in a democracy the ruler or regime may change, and they do change through votes, but the political system remains intact, thus ensuring long term stability with near zero risk of the whole system crashing down to dust, provided the system has matured to a reasonable degree with checks & balances to prevent any hijacking...which we have already achieved.

A non-democratic system; be it a dictatorship, monarchy, religious state, or communism has its strengths, provided the people in power are a capable lot. In this system the decision making and especially implementation is faster, it can take hard economic decision without worrying much about whether it might offend people, etc. In short, democracy's weaknesses are its strengths, but then...democracy's strengths are its weaknesses. With all its positive sides, a non-democratic system has a shelf-life, an expiry date, it is short-lived, unstable, and it ends, and when it ends, everything it has built come crushing down with it. Because, unlike a democracy, here the political system and the ruling regime are inseparable, the ruling regime itself is the political system, and it creates a large void when it ends...there can be a possibility of peaceful transfer of power, but that rarely happens, and even if it happens, a major disruption is unavoidable. And we can see examples of it all across the world.

India has built a stable democratic political system after decades of improvements & necessary modifications, and all the stake-holders have learned to respect it, we won't have to worry about a meltdown of the political system that forms the very basis, the foundation of our nation, and now we can focus more on all other important aspects of our country. The weaknesses of a democracy mitigates as it gets matured, and the results of which have started showing in our country.

But China is yet to build such a stable political system, it has built its nation on a weak foundation that is bound to go away at some point in time, CCP won't be ruling China forever, and the transition will be a major disruption...if not a complete meltdown. And then China will have to build a new political system from scratch, most likely a democratic one, and it would need to spend decades improving & perfecting it...with all the expected disruptions in its economy and social structure during the transition process that may take decades to become a stable one.

I will end this post here by quoting a paragraph from your link:

"China, which followed the Soviet model that lifted Russia from a big but backward agrarian state to a global superpower before its 1991 collapse, granted total power to the Communist Party; Beijing continues to crack down severely on any form of dissent".

And Russia is yet to become a democracy in true sense even after so many years, there will still be a void after Putin.

 

[Stag112]

China has money, but not the ideological weight the Soviet union carried. While that makes China far less powerful internationally, nationally it is stronger than the Soviet union was.

It is indeed an interesting question, how long will the communist party monopolize power in China? I would like to ask this to a Chinese poster, but all we have are chestthumping trolls here. Plus it may not be safe for these people to touch such blasphemous topics. The CPC spends hundreds of billions on controlling its people, can a challenge still emerge?

Without an economic meltdown that seems unlikely a challenge to CPC also seems unlikely. And even in such a scenario of an economic meltdown the CPC will try to direct the energies of Chinese people outward by getting into military confrontations with foreign powers.

Coming back to India, our system remains slow to move. Certainly less competent. Consensus also is slow to market. But our system makes our foundations strong. I have to hope this will keep us in good shape long term.

 

[HariPrasad]

I have posted this one in one of the sundry Doklam related threads in Chinese section in reply to one Chinese member....would love to hear other aspects, additions, agreements, disagreements, opinion on this topic from all members. @scorpionx @nair @Sky lord @SarthakGanguly @Levina @gslv mk3 @SrNair @Nilgiri @Skull and Bones @jetray @full metal @Joe Shearer @hellfire @HariPrasad @MilSpec @fsayed @Rajaraja Chola @Mr.Nair @SOUTHie @utrash @Stag112 @ranjit @arp2041 and all others irrespective of nationalities.




Okay...let's dig deeper, shall we?

What is the most important factor for long term success & growth of a country, is it industry, HDI, economy? None of these, it's the political system in place that decides the fate of a country in the longer run, it forms the very important foundation of a country, and we know the consequences of a weak foundation. Democracy has certain flaws, its takes time to build the system with all components in place, ours is 70 years old and still improving itself continuously, the decision making and especially implementation is slow in a democracy, it tends to avoid hard economic decision that might offend people...etc. But among all its faults, it has a basic difference with any non-democratic systems; be it a dictatorship, monarchy, religious state, or communism...that is, in a democracy the political system is separate from the ruling regime, in a democracy the ruler or regime may change, and they do change through votes, but the political system remains intact, thus ensuring long term stability with near zero risk of the whole system crashing down to dust, provided the system has matured to a reasonable degree with checks & balances to prevent any hijacking...which we have already achieved.

A non-democratic system; be it a dictatorship, monarchy, religious state, or communism has its strengths, provided the people in power are a capable lot. In this system the decision making and especially implementation is faster, it can take hard economic decision without worrying much about whether it might offend people, etc. In short, democracy's weaknesses are its strengths, but then...democracy's strengths are its weaknesses. With all its positive sides, a non-democratic system has a shelf-life, an expiry date, it is short-lived, unstable, and it ends, and when it ends, everything it has built come crushing down with it. Because, unlike a democracy, here the political system and the ruling regime are inseparable, the ruling regime itself is the political system, and it creates a large void when it ends...there can be a possibility of peaceful transfer of power, but that rarely happens, and even if it happens, a major disruption is unavoidable. And we can see examples of it all across the world.

India has built a stable democratic political system after decades of improvements & necessary modifications, and all the stake-holders have learned to respect it, we won't have to worry about a meltdown of the political system that forms the very basis, the foundation of our nation, and now we can focus more on all other important aspects of our country. The weaknesses of a democracy mitigates as it gets matured, and the results of which have started showing in our country.

But China is yet to build such a stable political system, it has built its nation on a weak foundation that is bound to go away at some point in time, CCP won't be ruling China forever, and the transition will be a major disruption...if not a complete meltdown. And then China will have to build a new political system from scratch, most likely a democratic one, and it would need to spend decades improving & perfecting it...with all the expected disruptions in its economy and social structure during the transition process that may take decades to become a stable one.

I will end this post here by quoting a paragraph from your link:

"China, which followed the Soviet model that lifted Russia from a big but backward agrarian state to a global superpower before its 1991 collapse, granted total power to the Communist Party; Beijing continues to crack down severely on any form of dissent".

And Russia is yet to become a democracy in true sense even after so many years, there will still be a void after Putin.

It all depends on human material you have. In countries like middle east and China, democracy can not success. They need a dictatorial regime to keep their people in check.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

The model of development we have seen in the history of the Western countries and East Asian countries has been development under authoritarianism/monarchy and then moving to democracy after they had already become developed countries.

Even in the USA, black people were only given the full right to vote in 1968, while America was already a superpower in 1945 and a developed country long before then.

Which is why democracy has been so successful in developed countries, because they developed first.

However, the modern crop of developing countries in South Asia, the Middle East and Africa have taken up democracy too soon, before they became developed countries. Just imagine a populist firebrand like Donald Trump in an unstable developing country. The USA can deal with it well because all the roads, hospitals and schools were built already, the social and administrative infrastructure is mature.

But what about if Donald Trump was elected in Nigeria, or India? Modi for example? Just look at the condition of democracies in the developing world right now. There is endless political infighting and the development has stalled.

 

[Rollno21]

The model of development we have seen in the history of the Western countries and East Asian countries has been development under authoritarianism/monarchy and then moving to democracy after they had already become developed countries.

Even in the USA, black people were only given the full right to vote in 1968, while America was already a superpower in 1945 and a developed country long before then.

Which is why democracy has been so successful in developed countries, because they developed first.

However, the modern crop of developing countries in South Asia, the Middle East and Africa have taken up democracy too soon, before they became developed countries. Just imagine a populist firebrand like Donald Trump in an unstable developing country. The USA can deal with it well because all the roads, hospitals and schools were built already, the social and administrative infrastructure is mature.

But what about if Donald Trump was elected in Nigeria, or India? Modi for example? Just look at the condition of democracies in the developing world right now. There is endless political infighting and the development has stalled.

Was Russia a developed country when it moved to democracy.
Usa was not a developed country when they moved to democracy or the west.
Just having money dsnt make one developed ,developed means across the fields.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

Was Russia a developed country when it moved to democracy.
Usa was not a developed country when they moved to democracy or the west.
Just having money dsnt make one developed ,developed means across the fields.

The West doesn't consider Russia a democracy with Putin essentially having a life term. Not a full democracy, just like America before 1968 where black people had very limited voting rights.

And Russia increased the most under authoritarian rule during the Soviet Union, democratic reforms caused the collapse of the Soviet Union (perestroika) and Russia has stagnated since in economic terms.

Look at all the successful democracies in the world, they all became developed countries first.

Now look at the democracies in the developing world. India, Nepal, Nigeria, Iraq, and the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa.

They have taken a gamble that they can become democracies first and then developed countries later. Whereas China is taking a path that has been proven to work before, development first under an authoritarian system.

 

[Rollno21]

The West doesn't consider Russia a democracy with Putin essentially having a life term. Not a full democracy, just like America before 1968 where black people had very limited voting rights.

And Russia increased the most under authoritarian rule during the Soviet Union, democratic reforms caused the collapse of the Soviet Union (perestroika) and Russia has stagnated since in economic terms.

Look at all the successful democracies in the world, they all became developed countries first.

Now look at the democracies in the developing world. India, Nepal, Nigeria, Iraq, and the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa.

They have taken a gamble that they can become democracies first and then developed countries later. Whereas China is taking a path that has been proven to work before, development first under an authoritarian system.

You have been saying all leading democracys,name one country which became developed and became democracy,that has been your point of argument.dont run around the bush in circles

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

You have been saying all leading democracys,name one country which became developed and became democracy,that has been your point of argument.dont run around the bush in circles

Have you read anything on this thread so far? Being a "developed country" means having above a certain GDP per capita compared to the world average.

Just having money dsnt make one developed ,developed means across the fields.

BS. Do you even know what a developed country means?

Again, the USA became a full democracy in 1968 when black people were given full voting rights. Whereas they were a superpower several decades before in 1945, and a developed country long before then.

Look at Britain. They became a developed country under a monarchy, same with the other major powers in Europe.

Look at East Asia. Japan became developed under the Imperial Japanese Empire, and then under de facto one-party rule until the last decade. South Korea and Taiwan became developed under dictatorships.

Now look at my city Hong Kong, as well as Singapore. Both developed under non-democratic systems. Hong Kong is still non-democratic today.


Turn around now, and look at the "current" democracies in the developing world. From South Asia to the Middle East to Africa. Their mistake was taking democracy too soon, and now look at their condition. Just look at the difference between China and India for example. Do you know India had a higher GDP than China as recently as the year 1990? Now look what happened.

 

[Soumitra]

I have posted this one in one of the sundry Doklam related threads in Chinese section in reply to one Chinese member....would love to hear other aspects, additions, agreements, disagreements, opinion on this topic from all members. @scorpionx @nair @Sky lord @SarthakGanguly @Levina @gslv mk3 @SrNair @Nilgiri @Skull and Bones @jetray @full metal @Joe Shearer @hellfire @HariPrasad @MilSpec @fsayed @Rajaraja Chola @Mr.Nair @SOUTHie @utrash @Stag112 @ranjit @arp2041 and all others irrespective of nationalities.




Okay...let's dig deeper, shall we?

What is the most important factor for long term success & growth of a country, is it industry, HDI, economy? None of these, it's the political system in place that decides the fate of a country in the longer run, it forms the very important foundation of a country, and we know the consequences of a weak foundation. Democracy has certain flaws, its takes time to build the system with all components in place, ours is 70 years old and still improving itself continuously, the decision making and especially implementation is slow in a democracy, it tends to avoid hard economic decision that might offend people...etc. But among all its faults, it has a basic difference with any non-democratic systems; be it a dictatorship, monarchy, religious state, or communism...that is, in a democracy the political system is separate from the ruling regime, in a democracy the ruler or regime may change, and they do change through votes, but the political system remains intact, thus ensuring long term stability with near zero risk of the whole system crashing down to dust, provided the system has matured to a reasonable degree with checks & balances to prevent any hijacking...which we have already achieved.

A non-democratic system; be it a dictatorship, monarchy, religious state, or communism has its strengths, provided the people in power are a capable lot. In this system the decision making and especially implementation is faster, it can take hard economic decision without worrying much about whether it might offend people, etc. In short, democracy's weaknesses are its strengths, but then...democracy's strengths are its weaknesses. With all its positive sides, a non-democratic system has a shelf-life, an expiry date, it is short-lived, unstable, and it ends, and when it ends, everything it has built come crushing down with it. Because, unlike a democracy, here the political system and the ruling regime are inseparable, the ruling regime itself is the political system, and it creates a large void when it ends...there can be a possibility of peaceful transfer of power, but that rarely happens, and even if it happens, a major disruption is unavoidable. And we can see examples of it all across the world.

India has built a stable democratic political system after decades of improvements & necessary modifications, and all the stake-holders have learned to respect it, we won't have to worry about a meltdown of the political system that forms the very basis, the foundation of our nation, and now we can focus more on all other important aspects of our country. The weaknesses of a democracy mitigates as it gets matured, and the results of which have started showing in our country.

But China is yet to build such a stable political system, it has built its nation on a weak foundation that is bound to go away at some point in time, CCP won't be ruling China forever, and the transition will be a major disruption...if not a complete meltdown. And then China will have to build a new political system from scratch, most likely a democratic one, and it would need to spend decades improving & perfecting it...with all the expected disruptions in its economy and social structure during the transition process that may take decades to become a stable one.

I will end this post here by quoting a paragraph from your link:

"China, which followed the Soviet model that lifted Russia from a big but backward agrarian state to a global superpower before its 1991 collapse, granted total power to the Communist Party; Beijing continues to crack down severely on any form of dissent".

And Russia is yet to become a democracy in true sense even after so many years, there will still be a void after Putin.

My take is India needs a 10-15 years authoritarian democratic rule. Something like these day where there is opposition and it has a voice but it is not able to totally disrupt the governance of the country. We need voices and representation from all sections but also a person with a big danda to move this country forward.

So we need a central govt with single party majority in both LS and RS with a strong leadership, a quasi presidential system if you will. Modi has majority in LS but you saw how because of lack of numbers in RS the very crucial Land Reform bill could not be passed. Even the GST took so much time. By current scheme of things BJP is set to gain majority in RS by 2018 end by which time it will be too late for this term but hopefully in the next term 2019-2024 the pace of reforms will be escalated further.

But what about if Donald Trump was elected in Nigeria, or India? Modi for example? Just look at the condition of democracies in the developing world right now. There is endless political infighting and the development has stalled.

Modi is the best thing that has happened to India in a long time. We hope he is there till atleast 2024. There is a saying that when your enemies (Pakistan and China) start to critisize you continuously that means that you are doing progress. The more Pakistanis and Chinese critisize Modi the more we are sure that we made the right choice.

 

[dray]

My take is India needs a 10-15 years authoritarian democratic rule. Something like these day where there is opposition and it has a voice but it is not able to totally disrupt the governance of the country. We need voices and representation from all sections but also a person with a big danda to move this country forward.

So we need a central govt with single party majority in both LS and RS with a strong leadership, a quasi presidential system if you will. Modi has majority in LS but you saw how because of lack of numbers in RS the very crucial Land Reform bill could not be passed. Even the GST took so much time. By current scheme of things BJP is set to gain majority in RS by 2018 end by which time it will be too late for this term but hopefully in the next term 2019-2024 the pace of reforms will be escalated further.

India is slowly turning into a two party democracy with NDA & UPA, and that's a good thing. Whoever wins, wins a majority vote and gets enough freedom to deliver, if they fail then people can bring the other party that looks promising, but the system doesn't collapse.

Now what happens to non-democratic systems when they eventually collapse for whatever reason...be it a communist system like USSR or dictatorships like Iraq or Libiya? It creates a void, the entire system crashes and it takes time to rebuild a credible system to replace the old one...countries get set backs for decades in such cases. Similarly, China is due for such a catastrophic disruption, CCP won't be able to continue forever unlike a democratic system, nor I believe it will voluntarily shift to democracy and allow other political parties to share the power. So what happens then?

And @Chinese-Dragon is ignoring numerous examples of non-democratic countries that never became successful, or got success but lost it all at the fall of the non-democratic system..that is the regime itself. Besides, US had the democratic system in place, it just allowed certain people voting rights later, that doesn't replace the existing system with something different or create any void. If we change the voting age tomorrow, will it change our political system completely to something untested?

 

[wiseone2]

The West doesn't consider Russia a democracy with Putin essentially having a life term. Not a full democracy, just like America before 1968 where black people had very limited voting rights.

And Russia increased the most under authoritarian rule during the Soviet Union, democratic reforms caused the collapse of the Soviet Union (perestroika) and Russia has stagnated since in economic terms.

Look at all the successful democracies in the world, they all became developed countries first.

Now look at the democracies in the developing world. India, Nepal, Nigeria, Iraq, and the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa.

They have taken a gamble that they can become democracies first and then developed countries later. Whereas China is taking a path that has been proven to work before, development first under an authoritarian system.

You are confusing democracy with universal suffrage.

USA was a full democracy before 1965. Blacks were 12% of the population and were economically insignificant.
USA was a full democracy before women had the right to vote. I believe that happened 1875-1920.

You can argue about limiting voting rights to property owning folks. It is not a popular topic.

 

[Sky lord]

The West doesn't consider Russia a democracy with Putin essentially having a life term. Not a full democracy, just like America before 1968 where black people had very limited voting rights.

And Russia increased the most under authoritarian rule during the Soviet Union, democratic reforms caused the collapse of the Soviet Union (perestroika) and Russia has stagnated since in economic terms.

Look at all the successful democracies in the world, they all became developed countries first.

Now look at the democracies in the developing world. India, Nepal, Nigeria, Iraq, and the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa.

They have taken a gamble that they can become democracies first and then developed countries later. Whereas China is taking a path that has been proven to work before, development first under an authoritarian system.

Compare like with like.

Nations in one geographical region will have shared history and culture.

In South Asia the only consistently democratic country was India . And India is growing faster, technological more advanced than any other country in the region.

In Africa, as far as I know the only consistently democratic nations were Kenya and Botswana, the rest were war torn or led by dictatorships - Nigeria had army cum democracy cum civil war. Guess the best performing economies in Africa - Kenya and Botswana

The Middle East has only one consistently democratic nation - Israel - head and shoulders above every other middle eastern state by any definition of modernity.

Even china - divided in three - democratic Taiwan is fully developed decades before communist china . Hong Kong had local democracy did it not? Just that it's foreign relations were decided by Britain and now china.

In a given cultural set up - democracy seems to deliver better results - but in the long term.
10 years - 20 years of democracy - is just crazy.

The main advantage of democracy is the stability - it is impossible to have a revolution. Citizens simply go and vote the b@stards out.

The biggest problem with other forms of government is that while it gives quick results when you have able leadership - eventually you get a bad egg and no way to get him out.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

Even china - divided in three - democratic Taiwan is fully developed decades before communist china . Hong Kong had local democracy did it not?

You do realize that Taiwan developed under a dictatorship and Hong Kong never had democracy right?

It's just supporting my argument that economic development should come first.

 

[Sky lord]

You do realize that Taiwan developed under a dictatorship and Hong Kong never had democracy right?

It's just supporting my argument that economic development should come first.

Ok, scratch Taiwan - it made a successful transition to democracy in the 80s.

But in general - comparing nations within a given geographical region with shared history and cultural values - in the long term - democracies have done better than other forms of government.

Partly because when a dictatorship or theocracy or military junta or single party rule or monarchy - breaks down - which it will eventually - a lot of the gains made are lost

So similar nations over decades do better under democracy.

There are exceptions - but the rule stands for the most part.

 

[HariPrasad]

The model of development we have seen in the history of the Western countries and East Asian countries has been development under authoritarianism/monarchy and then moving to democracy after they had already become developed countries.

Even in the USA, black people were only given the full right to vote in 1968, while America was already a superpower in 1945 and a developed country long before then.

Which is why democracy has been so successful in developed countries, because they developed first.

However, the modern crop of developing countries in South Asia, the Middle East and Africa have taken up democracy too soon, before they became developed countries. Just imagine a populist firebrand like Donald Trump in an unstable developing country. The USA can deal with it well because all the roads, hospitals and schools were built already, the social and administrative infrastructure is mature.

But what about if Donald Trump was elected in Nigeria, or India? Modi for example? Just look at the condition of democracies in the developing world right now. There is endless political infighting and the development has stalled.

Absolutely wrong.