As I obsessively follow the “what next?” news, it’s heartening to see that the Biden administration has been doing what is it legally required to do in terms of having a transition team in place, so the next 2 months of handing over the reins of governance can begin. The Trump administration famously ignored the handover process that had been well-organized by President Obama, the first of many signs that he does not believe in study or homework. Yet the Biden team, in line with the basic brand of competence he made core to his campaign – and in marked contrast to the fact-free grievance rallies of President Trump – is moving already to begin appointing the experts that will help to guide the US out of the hole it has dug for itself, beginning with the pandemic response that has been lacking since the beginning.

I realized that my hesitance to publicly celebrate is likely born of the understanding that electoral democracy and liberal democracy are two very different things — a point on which there’s been a growing academic and popular literature since the end of the Cold War. There was a period when many in “the west” conflated the two, or blithely assumed that one would naturally and inevitably bring the other. That was one of the reasons that elections were held so prematurely in post-war Bosnia and Herzegovina – the illusion of free, fair and competitive elections in a country just coming out of a 3 ½ year war was ludicrous, but necessary for a west (then definitely led by the US) that wanted to show it had “fixed” Bosnia, and not only that, could quickly leave after having seen that “ballots = democracy.” (Neither scenario has turned out as many had hoped in the late 90s.)  

The less sexy part of resuscitating liberal democracy in the US will (hopefully) now unfold less ostentatiously, on the interwoven threads of an independent civil service, the legislation and institutions that form the public administration, and – hopefully – a US citizenry that is ready to stay engaged after coming out to cast ballots in the greatest numbers the US has ever seen.  There are already roadmaps out there.

One book outlines the reforms needed to plug the gaps exploited by Trump, most notably related to his own exploitation of his office through corrupt self-dealing and the open flouting of constraints on the executive office. There is a list of 277 steps President Biden can take without requiring formal congressional approval, ranging from stopping Trump’s own executive orders, to reinstating committees and expert bodies (including those related to pandemic response), to ending the Trump administration wars against science, fact and transparency.

And in terms of the community rebuilding needed – the social capital that has been so torn over these past 4 years but which had been fraying long before that – another recent “what next?” discussion pondered how and where Americans can once again meet with and interact with “the other,” to stop seeing each other as some alien enemy, but to begin to find some common ground. One commentator noted,  “[P]eople are beginning to say, okay, what is the civic infrastructure of this country? Things as simple as public spaces in which people who don’t look like each other, and don’t think like each other can be together. There are more libraries in this country than there are Starbucks.” The infrastructure of elections, governance and civic engagement are three legs of the proverbial stool.

Without a process and progress like this the long-term victory of a Biden agenda will be far from certain. The fact that 70 million Americans voted for a president who was demonstrably ready to embrace authoritarian ends to maintain his own power base is chilling. Biden knows this, and made it clear in his victory speech that he intends to represent all Americans, not just those who voted for him.

I’m cautiously hopeful that this learning process in the US will translate into more mature democratization policies abroad, including better identifying and supporting partners who share the values we’ve now seen are so critical to a liberal peace. As a Biden administration sets out to rebuild American diplomacy, as a part of that process they would do well to recognize that rebuilding democracy at home should have  implications for democratization policies abroad. It’s a good opportunity for a shift in how the US engages in its democracy and human rights programming, towards one that is more constructive, more humble and reflective, and more willing to embrace two-way street approaches. (I personally would like to start by sending at  least 20 Trump voters who have expressed that they think more robust social safety net policies would turn the US into North Korea off on a study trip to Sweden.)

We’re lucky that it will only be 4 years of Trump to clean up, though one cannot discount the extent to which decades of inattention to these elements of governance have been ignored. However, I hope that in 6, 7 or 8 months, once it looks like the pandemic is no longer flooding the American map in red, once the US re-engages with the world on climate and other global challenges, and once I see that people are indeed getting engaged in libraries, town halls and local community centers, then I may drive around Sarajevo and beep a few cautious, hopeful times.

The post When Will I Celebrate appeared first on Democratization Policy Council.

Bosanski/Hrvatski/Srpski

I first met Peter over 20 years ago at what was then an annual summer conference on the topic of democracy and human rights in multiethnic societies, in the small town of Konjic, Bosnia and Herzegovina.  Those were optimistic times, as in those first post-war years there was both still the palpable relief that the 3 ½ year war in Bosnia had come to an end, and a sense that life for people – and for the country – was getting better.  The conference was a small part of that era, organized by a Bosnian professor who had moved to Norway during the war, but who was committed to bringing scholars and students from around the world to learn  from the lessons of the violent tearing apart of Yugoslavia, to be a part of the charting of a new, more peaceful path forward. There was a genuine enthusiasm among that generation, a still-held belief that human rights were not only universal, but contributed to peace and human security; and a sense that spreading liberal values globally was a good thing.

Peter had been in parts of Bosnia during the war, and, drawing on his own experience coming from a “mixed marriage” in Belfast, Northern Ireland, had a special perspective. As he travelled Europe and the world on his portable bicycle, he was  well-placed to speak to the futility of violent conflict, the predatory nature of opportunistic politicians and elites manipulating public fears and differences to create “us vs. them” realities, and the need for broad-based citizen participation in public life to push back against this unfortunate political reality. He had been posted to Derventa – a town in northern Bosnia ethnically cleansed at the outset of the war – as an observer in the first post-war election in autumn 1996.  The elections were aimed at being a step towards “normalcy,” but were quickly seen as premature, and were effectively used by the same nationalist parties that had fought the war to consolidate and “legitimize” their control in peacetime.

Peter’s longstanding work with the de Borda Institute is based on his recognition that elections, as the pinnacle of collective, public decision making, are more often than not flawed due to their very structure.  Put simply, why are people in “democratic” societies taught from an early age that “democracy” is simply majority rule? How is it that we have come to accept that 50% plus one is a suitable reflection of majority will, and the basis for a cohesive and functional classroom, village assembly, or state? And what better systems could help to ensure a less bipolar, over-simplified, winner/loser-based approach?

He has written numerous books, guidebooks, and articles outlining better options for not only elections and referenda, but all forms of decision making. This latest impressive book brings together his wealth of knowledge of the theory and intricacies of various election systems, with his practical experience in seeing how such systems are implemented. Most importantly, he explains how our reliance on flawed decision-making systems has brought us to a global democratic crisis.

He begins the book by providing an overview of election systems and variations, bringing a light-hearted yet informed voice to at times dense concepts, including single preference voting and various flavors of preferential voting. Following his explanation of these options, he explores  the issues that many ignore: who gets to decide what options should be included on a ballot in the first place, and why have we come to accept that any such vote or referendum can only be binary, with only two options, either A or B?  Instead, in a truly participatory and representative system, the process of determining a set of options to be put to a vote should be the first step, followed by the demonstration of public preference for those options.   

This leads to an explanation of the de Borda count system, in which voters are able to express their preferred rankings among a set of options. Not only does this approach allow for a greater range of options to  be considered, but it also helps to end the problem (experienced in particular by voters in first-past-the-post systems like the US or UK) of feeling one must be “practical” and vote for the horse most likely to win, rather than to vote their conscience. (This is an idea that is gaining traction in the US, particularly at the city level.) To use an example from a generic US presidential scenario, using a de Borda system one could note their top preference as the Green candidate, but then ensure their vote would not be “wasted” by noting the Democratic candidate as their second choice.

Following on his explanation of such basic principles, he then provides a series of chapters in which he  explains  how various  regions and countries where he has travelled have had less than ideal “free and fair” election outcomes than might have been possible had some other system been used. In Northern Ireland, the presentation of everything as a binary option ensures continued maintenance of binary identity politics. In the UK, the limitation of the Brexit referendum to two simplistic choices not only excluded more innovative thinking about the British relationship with the EU, but also pushed citizens into two camps that were increasingly framed as not only opponents but enemies, leading to cleavages that have divided communities and even families.  His review of the history of traditional approaches to voting in the Balkans explains the historical electoral dynamics that facilitated the outbreak of the wars, and then also what has constrained the peace – in particular in Bosnia.  He reminds a reader that China has a much longer history of voting than many countries in “the West,” but goes on to show how simple majority-decision making has been used there for the most illiberal of ends, and has constrained any semblance of more genuinely participatory communities.  

Hearing about his travels in China (cut short in 2020 due to COVID-19), I was shocked that he was able to talk about these issues there until he simply explained that he didn’t talk about voting, but community decision making. Why should some local community be forced to consider only option A (investment in a swimming pool) or B (investment in a park), when in fact people could state their preferences for both, and in addition note how they would feel about a rock climbing facility as well?  It suddenly becomes easy to think about many instances in one’s own life where this kind of openness and flexibility would  have resulted in a much better outcome for everyone.

A key value added of his book is that he forces the reader to question foundational assumptions. How can a broader historical sweep of participatory decision making practices  be considered as countries – including in a “west” that has presumed historical ownership of democratic practice  – continue to confront severe social and political trust and accountability deficits?   Why is there such a desire to over-simplify issues in a way that makes us vs. then debates inevitable? And why have societies been so slow to assess how decisions are made, and to try to improve decision-making practices, starting from the local community and moving up?

While in the past detractors (including those who benefit from the polarizing status quo) might have been able to claim that such preferential approaches are too complicated to administer, that is no longer the case, as computers become more integrated into both capturing the vote and then tabulating it. Therefore the only things preventing this are voter education, and political will.

There have certainly been missed opportunities. When the election law in Bosnia and Herzegovina was being drafted a few years after the war, Peter’s preferential systems were among the models received by the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina for consideration. Ultimately the system chosen (by the leading political parties with weak and values-free shepherding by the international community) was perhaps the worst option possible, continuing a system that not only encouraged and incentivized voting “for one’s own” nationalist party, as well as reinforcing nationalist differentiation at the expense of potential civic accountability by reaffirming the inalienable basic electoral units/districts that had been gerrymandered by ethnic cleansing in the war. Following the global financial crisis, Iceland initiated a broad public consultation on how that country’s political system could be better organized; a sweeping slate of constitutional reform recommendations was crafted yet then essentially disregarded by political parties more comfortable with maintaining a status quo they have learned how to  navigate.

There is some hope that perhaps there is an opening for new thinking: Roger Hallam’s Common Sense for the 21^st Century includes the use of randomly selected citizens’ assemblies (something that had been used in the Iceland process) – sortition – to begin to get closer to truly representative deliberative bodies able to change the sclerotic political system that have led to dire social trust deficits, as well as decisions that have failed to effectively address a looming climate disaster.

This book will be valuable for student of democratic processes, political science and conflict analysis.  I only wish the book included more stories about Peter’s travels through the various countries and continents he describes. Being familiar with some of them from conversations, and knowing about his innate gift of being able to strike up a conversation (in multiple languages) with people in a post office or a bus station or a pizza place, such person-to-person anecdotes would be a fitting reminder that at the end of the day it is people – citizens – who are affected by and must live with the consequences of election and decision-making systems that  do or do not truly ensure a meaningful voice in how decisions are made in their community or country. I very much hope that will be included in his next book.

The post Who Decides How We Decide? A Book Review appeared first on Democratization Policy Council.