Our world and democracy … What democracy?

The late British leader Winston Churchill reportedly made one of the most eloquent political claims of the contemporary era when he said: “The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”

If this iconic leader of the so-called free world and Western democracy has such a view of the political principle that democracies have sought to promote — or rather, impose — across the world, can some of us in the “third world,” which is accused of being backward, not be excused for being less than naively fascinated with the ideals of democracy as they are manifesting themselves today?

Here, I reference another example of critique, of the Soviet Union, attributed to an American journalist during the Cold War. The journalist asked a Soviet politician about the lack of democracy in the USSR. I am, of course, paraphrasing the conversation.

Journalist: Democracy means holding elections and having political parties, and you do not have that in the Soviet Union.

Politician: We do have a party and we have elections at various party levels. We elect officials, from local councils to the presidium.

Journalist: But you have only one party. What options do citizens actually have?

Politician: It is true, we have one party. But the difference between us is marginal, as you have only two parties in America. You don’t have much broader options than us.

This dialogue may seem somewhat absurd. It could indeed be seen as totally illogical under normal circumstances, but if we were to brush over the historical developments of the 20th and 21st centuries, we would find the following.

First, absolute choices are available to voters under normal circumstances, during times of peace and a desire for coexistence. However, the electorate is often denied such choices under other circumstances, when the authorities are facing an external threat or they sense a domestic threat.

For example, despite being a democracy, the US did not hesitate to detain innocent Japanese nationals after Pearl Harbor in 1941. Most Republicans saw nothing wrong with Donald Trump refusing to acknowledge the presidential election results in the fall of 2020, although those elections were held during his term. Moreover, the majority of Republicans continued to support him after he incited an attack on the Capitol building (the heart of US democracy) on Jan. 6, 2021.

Second, democratic systems (under normal circumstances as well) are broadly tolerant of the “radicalism” of marginal forces, nihilistic factions or anarchic groups. However, what are known as “establishment” parties share ideological assumptions and are usually governed by networks of higher interests that often go beyond diverse political choices. Thus, when these higher interests impose themselves, effective alternatives essentially disappear.

For instance, in Britain, antisemitism (as Israel defines it) accusations have become a sword yielded against anyone who objects to the violence in the Gaza Strip, which even US President Joe Biden has called “over the top.” The two major British parties, the Conservatives and Labour — the right and the left, respectively — have a shared interest in rejecting the characterization of what is happening in Gaza as a genocide, despite the fact that nearly 30,000 people, most of them civilians, have been killed since the attack on Oct. 7.

Remarkably, the BBC is not the only one that insists on using “soft” terms to obscure who is behind the violence. Bombardments become “battles” and victims “die” rather than being killed. In fact, Israeli newspapers like Haaretz appear more objective and bolder in their coverage, characterization and analysis of the events in the Strip than serious British newspapers.

Third, the societies that have experimented with electoral democracy are gradually straying further away from the spirit of democracy. They are veering away from its foundations of coexistence and tolerance, which guarantee the right to choose, hold those in positions of power accountable and protect the independence of the judiciary.

Thus, we see that some electoral democracies are in crisis, either as a result of the spread of ethnic, religious or sectarian populism — as in the case of India, Hungary, Italy and even the US — or because they have made “hysterical” bets on an untested option as they seek an escape from reality, as is the case in Argentina today ... and as had been the case in Brazil under Jair Bolsonaro.

Fourth, the future of coexistence and international compromise seems threatened not only by the distortion of democracy as a principle, practice and conviction, but also by two major emerging threats.

One is the so-called demographic bomb, with all its deadly implications for migration, asylum, desertification and scarcity of resources.

And the second is the technological bomb of artificial intelligence, which follows the communications revolution and the rise of information technology in diminishing the role of humans in cultural interactions and limited cultural fusion.

Today, humans are gradually transforming, in the best case, into consumers and spectators. In the worst case, we are becoming mute and deaf puppets that are unable to resist — or are even unaware that it is in our interest to do so.

We are now prisoners in a world we were told had been subjected to our free will. We now find ourselves incapable of electing a town president or a village mayor or getting news that is not fabricated or information that is not falsified

• Eyad Abu Shakra is managing editor of Asharq Al-Awsat. X: @eyad1949