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Democracy Field Notes
Disquiet and disaffection are spreading through the drought fields of democracy. The trends demand unorthodox political thinking, a new sense of urgency about democracy’s strengths and weaknesses. But fresh democratic thinking requires different methods of saying things, of exposing silences and taken-for-granted presumptions. The academic article and the book are poorly suited to the task. [...]
Coming to Terms with the Past: The Puzzling Politics of Memory
Javier Cercas, Spain’s most celebrated contemporary writer, was recently in Sydney, where I had the great pleasure of interviewing him before an audience in the University’s Great Hall. For those who may not know his work, Cercas was born in Ibahernando, in central Spain, in 1962. Fascinated from a young age by the works of [...]
A New European Challenge to Party Politics
Is there life after conventional parliamentary politics? That’s the intriguing question on the lips of many German citizens this weekend as supporters of the Pirate Party assemble in the north German city of Neumünster to discuss tactics and policies. Their national conference will attract several thousand participants and tens of thousands of on-line supporters, many [...]
Mediacracy: Rupert Murdoch’s “Toxic Shadow State”
When Rupert Murdoch gives further evidence to the Leveson Inquiry this week it will mark another turning point in his public disgrace. The legal noose around the neck of News International, on both sides of the Atlantic, will also tighten, thanks to fresh revelations detailed in Dial M for Murdoch, a new book by Westminster [...]
Bob Brown and the Virtue of Humility
Archaeologists tell us that Sumerian kings had their face slapped once a year by a priest to remind them of the importance of humility. Medieval historians note that monarchs were sometimes forced to swear to God that they would not abuse their power. Bob Brown used his resignation speech to remind us that democracies use [...]
Israel’s “Fighting Democracy”: A Few Things That Need Saying
Günter Grass has dared say publicly in a poem what needed saying: the present Netanyahu government of Israel is a potential danger to its own people, the wider region, and perhaps even to the rest of our planet. Proof of the anti-war poem’s point came pretty quickly. During the past several days, verbal bombs have [...]
News from Athens
Wednesday 4th April 2012: a funny old day, though my field notes record that it began well. An early morning message arrives from Athens, from Periklis Douvitsas. He’s the editor of the publishing house looking after Why Democracy. It’s shortly to appear in Greek translation. “I am sending you the cover art”, he writes. He [...]
Feeling Faint in Burma
“I’m feeling a little delicate”, said Aung San Suu Kyi politely to the mainly foreign press pack, gathered like beginner pupils at her feet. She added, with a gentle smile, that “any tough questions and I shall faint straightaway”. The journalists chuckled. Charmed by her impeccable Oxford English, they were understandably thrilled to be in [...]
The Booboisie
While still on the subject of H.L. Mencken, it’s worth remembering one of his deliciously light-hearted jibes at parliamentary democracy. In the course of warning of the dangers of popular ignorance, especially in a 1930s world bristling with economic and geo-political uncertainty, he forecast in Notes on Democracy that American politics would be damaged by [...]
The politics of disillusionment: can democracy survive?
Disquiet and disaffection, like a fast-moving swarm of sticky locusts, are spreading through the drought fields of democracy. Look around, beyond the borders in which you’re living. Public disenchantment with politicians and official “politics” is on the rise everywhere, stirred up by factional infighting and mischief-making populists. Ask the citizens of Greece, or Hungary or [...]