How would ‘real’ democracy look like?

Today, democracy is equated with representative government based on free elections of political elites that rule on the citizens’ behalf. This system, referred to as “representative democracy”, has been the dominant one in the West for the last two hundred years and is now being exported across the world and promoted as the only possible […]

Today, democracy is equated with representative government based on free elections of political elites that rule on the citizens’ behalf. This system, referred to as “representative democracy”, has been the dominant one in the West for the last two hundred years and is now being exported across the world and promoted as the only possible alternative to outright dictatorship.
But this system is now in a deep crisis. In established representative democracies, the trust in political elites and conventional institutions is crumbling. Participation in elections is shrinking, and political parties are losing their members. In our ‘developed democracy’ of Nigeria, just of recent, the streets boiled as millions protested against unpopular and brutal austerity policies imposed on them (on the recent oil subsidy removal) from above. And currently The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) embarked on strike two months ago to compel the Federal Government to implement the agreement reached with the union in 2009. More and more people are now realising that their elected representatives do not represent them. Rather, the Federal government only bow to the dictates of the big banks, the financial institutions and the multinational corporations and their powerful lobbies. In this situation, the ballot has little meaning because we
have no real choice. We can only change political elites that rule us, but we do not have the right to decide upon the development of the society in which we live.
A real democracy, however, is a direct and participatory democracy, in which all citizens have the possibility and the right to participate in the decisions that affect our lives and our communities. While the powers that be and mainstream media and pundits argue that such a citizen-based democracy is not possible or even desirable, there exist in fact a range of new institutions and experiments as well as some old ones that show that a direct and participatory democracy is both possible and feasible today. These democratic innovations however scattered and limited could, if improved, strengthened and spread, be tools for a radical democratisation of society.  

Saidu Gidado Idris MNIM, Gwarinpa Estate, Abuja <[email protected]>;