Primary education

Super Tuesday’s come and gone but the nail-biting drama of the American primaries goes on. Despite the glut of campaign coverage, the horse-race bets and microanalysis, the only clear fact about this political carnival is the uncertainty of the outcome. This year-long process has been applauded as a purer democracy than any, for engaging every citizen in the high-stakes business of choosing a president. Candidates are tested across everything, policy minutiae thrashed out and positions taken on each issue that matters to the electorate. By the end of the protracted campaign, they know exactly where each candidate stands, and both parties have gone through a very public soul-searching. Maybe our own political parties should watch more closely, and realise that more conversation is a good thing. These internal tensions can be productive; can strike sparks that generate real change.

The process of primary elections to select nominees emerged out of a desire, a century ago, to minimise manipulation by political bosses. And this election, more than any, has affirmed the who-woulda-thunk-it opportunities of American democracy, overturning old complacencies. Rudy Giuliani, ‘America’s Mayor’, was decisively booted out and Mitt Romney for all his money and charisma has been more or less bested by John McCain, not to mention that other Republican wildcard, Mike Huckabee. Barack Obama, once dismissed as the stuff of mere dreams, is now neck-to-neck with the mighty Clinton machine. The possibility of a complete overhaul is inscribed into the very constitutional blueprint of the country. This open-field politics means that a people who voted Bush twice can now consider the possibilities of Obama, in this ritual purging. No matter how complex the calculus is, it’s clear that the issues that dominate the election have been generated, state-by-state, from the grassroots upwards. No wonder the rest of the world is absorbed by the spectacle of this election.

Elections in our own multi-party parliamentary democracy have a similar electricity. But what’s perhaps missing is this rousing sense of participation and conversation. Political parties pick the key themes and players, and their internal processes are cordoned off from the general public. Whether it is the Congress’s feudal chain of command, or the BJP’s council of elders, or the CPM’s Politburo, there’s no question of such a ground-level referendum. Change takes a long time rippling through and party hierarchies are entrenched, as argumentative voices are silenced as dissidents — or forced to split off and form new parties. Inner-party democracy and more expansive terms of debate would be welcome improvements to our own political compact.