‘Everything is easier in dictatorships’: Ski boss oddly commends China on 2022 Olympics
- Let’s face it, democracy is great, but it is also a deeply flawed system in practice
- China’s infrastructure project efficiency is admirable, even if living in an authoritative regime is not
PUBLISHED : Friday, 08 February, 2019, 12:36pm
As politically incorrect as this may sound, Gian-Franco Kasper has a bit of a point.
The 75-year-old honorary International Olympic Committee member stirred up controversy earlier this week by declaring that “everything is easier in dictatorships”, noting that “dictators can organise events such (as the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing) without asking the people’s permission”.
The head of the International Ski Federation also denied climate change and denounced immigrants, but that is another story altogether.
Putting aside the countless pitfalls of authoritarian regimes such as human rights violations, lack of freedom and liberty for its citizens, Kasper has an interesting, albeit crude, argument (he back-pedalled on Friday and clarified his comments).
Democracy, seen as the shining light that will guide the world’s political spectrum through the 21st century, is a deeply flawed system. It looks great on paper; however, as we have seen lately, in practice it is an entirely different story.
A system built on public consultation and elected representation sounds amazing. But one only has to trot out a few examples (Brexit, Donald Trump, Rodrigo Duterte, Catalonia and the fact that voter turnout has been dropping across the planet for more than a quarter century) to make a viable counter argument.
Elections, referendums and general public consultation processes have turned into circus acts and drawn from the point, “for the people, by the people”.
The US government is mired in an extended lockdown as a Republican president tangles with a Democratic House while Theresa May is taking flak from pretty much every direction in the UK right now over Brexit.
Meanwhile in Canada, the Liberal government desperately needs to build and approve more pipelines to help its sagging economy, and also spur investment in more clean tech projects, but misguided public sentiment and outcry won’t let a drop of oil get anywhere these days.
Having covered China for years now, part of me feels slightly torn at times. I’d never want to be born and raised in a country where one political authority reigns supreme, but sometimes I wish there was another way around the debilitating bureaucratic nature of democracy.
Kasper was applauding China for its planning and progress in hosting the 2022 Winter Olympics (most nations are notoriously behind schedule leading up to games), adding dealing with the Communist Party is easier than dealing with other Western or European nations – and he’s probably right.
Modern China has never been accused of stagnation of any kind, that’s for sure, unless you’re talking about human rights or the general lack of its citizens’ freedom.
The inefficiencies I’ve witnessed growing up in Canada, where political parties spend as much time governing as they do trying to get elected, or trying to stay in power, seem unbalanced. I know the answer is not an authoritative regime, but I don’t think the answer is the pluralist democracy I’ve lived in for the majority of my life.
I spent my formative years in British Columbia watching major public infrastructure projects move at a snail’s pace, get bogged down in election cycles, and ultimately end up in massive cost overruns, if they were even completed at all.
Case in point: Surrey, a major city outside of Vancouver, has spent years trying to bring light rapid transit to its community. Finally, the federal and provincial government came on board, but then the citizens voted in a new mayor who declared they’d rather have a SkyTrain line extension running from Vancouver, which costs billions more and would send the entire process back to the drawing board.
Vancouver also held a referendum a few years back on installing a transit tax to help the region upgrade its transportation infrastructure. The issue was consistently ranked as the top worry on voters’ minds, but when the time came to approve a 0.5 per cent sales tax, they shot it down with great glee as a middle finger to government inaction and overspending in a horrible catch-22.
During the lead up to the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics, I watched my hometown go through a myriad phases: first there was the initial excitement, then the anger at things like a new SkyTrain line from the airport to downtown, then two weeks of total fun, followed by years of negative press and a massive political hangover.
Councillors, mayors and elected politicians of all walks of life got kicked to the curb for supporting projects that went over budget, and the whole event cost way more than I think anyone expected.
China does not have these problems when it comes to the 2022 Winter Olympics, or in hosting any major sporting event for that matter. The country’s efficiency on a bureaucratic level is second to none when it comes to anything large scale.
Just look at the Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macau Bridge or the New Silk Road. Back home in Vancouver, they’ve been pondering the idea of building a bridge to Vancouver Island for decades, but no government will ever get enough power to will such a project through to completion (let alone the planning stage), even though it would be a boon for British Columbians in so many ways.
I know suspending democracy to get certain things done quickly sounds like the worst slippery political slope ever and by no means am I saying a free society is not the way to go, but, man, could this beater of a political ideology use a shiny new upgrade.
https://www.scmp.com/sport/article/...s-ski-boss-oddly-commends-china-2022-olympics
