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the rice of extremist parties and
politics populism protests the poor
economic performance of some democracies
and the messiness of democratic politics
stands in stark contrast to the seeming
tidiness of societies and better
economic performance of some non
democracies
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that is the democratically elected
parliament of Taiwan and their
legislators getting very excited about a
recent budget bill debate this and other
recent global events have made
frustrated citizens of democracies ask
the question is democracy failing to
deliver the goods is democracy in crisis
is democracy at a tipping point
I remembered very very clearly as a
young kid growing up in Manila
Philippines when the military and the
soldiers with their tanks rolled in my
neighborhood streets to set up a
checkpoint as President Ferdinand Marcos
declared martial law and established his
dictatorship
I remembered very very clearly when my
father together with the neighbourhood
men were all called down to line up on
the streets being vetted and patted down
by armed soldiers as a little kid the
fear of being so helpless in that kind
of situation is simply simply unbearable
yes democratic politics is messy our
demands are so many and we're very noisy
our economic performance it's not
particularly great but democracy is
still the best system of large-scale
governance anywhere surveys have shown
us globally that citizens of democracy
support their democracy even in Taiwan
this young democracy of Taiwan where we
just saw that very interesting clip
journalists love to report that stuff
it leaves Taiwanese kind of shaking
their head and even some nostalgic about
the authoritarian era but
surveys upon surveys conducted by my
colleagues at Taiwan's election study
centre shows that Taiwanese citizens are
very supportive of their democracy
global survey conducted by the Pew
Research Centre in 2017 also shows that
majority of Democratic citizens support
democracy countries like the United
States Canada UK Germany France
Australia majority of their citizens
support democracy even in our own
neighborhood of the asia-pacific the
young democracies of Indonesia South
Korea and the Philippines majority of
their citizens also support democracy
indeed this support for democracy is
justified because the democracy delivers
the goods when we compare democracies
and non democracies on average
democracies are wealthier they have
higher level of human development
democracies are less corrupt citizens of
democracies are happier and healthier
and citizens of democracies enjoy more
human rights so why didn't all the
complaints and grumblings about the
failings of democracy the pessimism
about democracy in part it is because of
the perception of the gridlock and
stalemate in democratic politics the
unresponsiveness of public policy
politicians that seem to be detached
from everyday lives and do not listen to
the common people which leads to
political alienation and in some way the
response is the rise of populism and
extremism which leads to further
pessimism and the fear that democracy
may be degrading yes the rise of
populism and extremism may degrade
democracy it may even threaten democracy
but if we look at it from another
another perspective it actually shows
that democracy is quite resilient the
resilience of democracy is evidenced by
the voices of the silent rational
majority during elections and voting
time yes
these populist parties and extremist
parties may have gained some ground in
some democracies but overall these type
of political parties find it difficult
to form government on their own and if
they are part of a coalition often find
themselves needing to compromise to come
up with acceptable policy constrained by
their other coalition partners and even
pay the price in a succeeding election
non-democracies often witness large
slings and volatilities in their
policies like a pendulum unhindered
unencumbered unconstraint checks and
balances and accountability are simply
absent in non-democracies democracies
provide credible constraints and
credible commitments in order to limit
these wild swings in policies history is
full of examples when non-democracies
get their public policy so wrong with
disastrous results
China's Cultural Revolution where more
than 500,000 people died more than a
million people persecuted and sent to
labor camps shows to us the weakness and
critical flaws of a government of the
one or of the few that is unresponsive
and accountable and unconstrained
in contrast the simple use of majority
voting that we use in democracies for
decision-making allows us to be correct
more often than we are wrong
elections and voting are away
democracies make decisions in like an
economic market we're in the democratic
political market offers us many options
many choices all on the table for all of
us to choose from the richness of the
variety of options for us shows how
dynamic our democracies are and in the
process of selecting the silent majority
wins and often times it is the median
voter that wins and this position is
more tolerant and more moderate of
course this is not to say that the
median voter or the voter cannot be
influenced a society change values
change voter preferences will change but
radical changes in the median voter
position hinges on two things the vote
and the vote now what do I mean by this
simply put if all of us vote then
societies but the societies middle
position will win out and that often is
the median voter position more moderate
and more tolerant
however if only some of us vote most of
us do not vote then the voices of the
few will drown out the voices of the
many the median position of a small
turnout election is very different from
the median position of a large turnout
election so when a surprise election
result do pop up often times one the
reason it's low Turner so why do we
blame democracy when we should actually
be blaming ourselves for not going to
vote during election day
now what about institutions and
structure of government we
constitutionally engineer
and create these institutions to come as
close to the values we hold dear and
associate with democracy but what are
these values responsiveness
representation accountability equality
checks and balance these are just some
of the values we associate with
democracy throughout the centuries we
have created different types of
institutions to maximize these values we
associate with democracy just look at
the world's democracy and the variation
in institutions and structure of
government parliamentary presidential
multi-party two-party democracy is a
continuous experiment even the basic
institution of elections and voting
allows us to achieve responsiveness
representation and accountability but
all of us have to vote if not the voices
of the minority will drown out the
voices of the majority and the Sean
Penn's character in the movie all the
king's men said if you don't vote you
don't matter institutions matter it
constrains us it gives us choices of
options and therefore determines
outcomes we create these institutions to
achieve democracy we adopt these
institutions as close to the values of
democracy that we hold dear just look at
the democracy around the world the
variation and the richness of it no one
type of institution will do that job
though but having said that we know that
there are some institutions that will
help us achieve accountability
responsiveness and
senator Venus better than others we know
there's a clear difference between
parliamentary and presidential systems
between two-party and multi party
systems between proportional systems and
majoritarian systems between prime
ministers and precedence research and
political science have shown to us that
multi-party proportional parliamentary
systems do a good job at achieving
accountability representation and
responsiveness the choice of these
institutions reflect our values but
remember societal values change and
evolve through time in history
institutions then need to be adjusted
and tweaked in order for contemporary
societal values to be reflected on them
and that these institutions are fit for
purpose the problem is when we hold on
to these institutions some institutions
like old tools that are increasingly
obsolete and believing that they are
still the only effective tool to solve
modern problems like I said democracy is
indeed a continuing experiment we never
really arrived at democracy for
democracy is not a destination but
democracy is the journey we take
together as a people as a nation as a
country this image serves to remind us
that non democracies that is
unrepresentative unaccountable
unconstrained government of the few or
of the one is far more disastrous than
the government of the people for the
people and by the people
democracy ain't perfect but we should
never let the perfect be the enemy of
the good
I agree democracy may have its problems
but believe me the alternatives are
worse thank you
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