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The democratic overthrow and why we need it
By yaman | June 2, 2007
What is unique about elections in Syria? Much has been said by foreign advocates of the American project in the Middle East regarding recent presidential and parliamentary elections in Syria. Condemnations resound, as if they are original or perceptive, when in fact they are mere restatements of facts that are widely known and acknowledged by citizens and regime supporters alike. All of these condemnations are invariably based on an implicit contrast between elections in Syria (understood to be non-democratic) and elections in America and Europe (understood to be democratic). The function of the electoral procedure in Syria, however, actually belies this contrast and might even give us important insights into the way elections function today in the so-called democracies of the world.
Let it be clear: there was no choice in the recent Syrian elections, and many reports surfaced that some of those who did show up at the polls did so because they were coerced or intimidated into doing so. Few outside of the government dispute these facts. The structure of Syrian law itself makes authentic and free elections nearly impossible (see the Damascus Declaration for National Democratic Change). However, I am not so interested in the procedure of these elections, since there is little to be said about this that is not already known and acknowledged, but rather in their function which, despite the shortcomings of the procedure, is essentially unaffected. Given the general understanding that the electoral process is not actually democratic, then why does the Syrian government even bother to go through the ceremonial procedure, the results of which are always known in advance, despite melodramatic delays or other fanfare?
Indeed, it is unclear what sort of legitimacy it is that the Syrian government believes it acquires through such processes. Nevertheless the process gives the government a “mandate” to function for another term, the duration of which power is exercised arbitrarily and without reference to the people or their attitudes. That is, the electoral process appears only to punctuate periods during which the people do not have access to governing power. They are consulted only at regular intervals during which they can be consulted once more to renew (or reject) the “mandate.” Effectively it is an authoritarian system which is authorized by the people’s vote (be it a fraudulent vote or not). This is the function of the elections, regardless of whether or not they are genuine, free, or whatever other conditions might be placed on them in the ideal formulation.
In this regard I think the function of the Syrian electoral procedure discloses important information about democratic politics elsewhere. This process, as it is played out in Syria, might in fact be one of the purest manifestations of the system of government which appears to prevail in other parts of the world, including America.
In America, elections are held every two years for the House and 1/3rd of the Senate, and every four years for the Presidency. The idea is that at these intervals “the people” are consulted and the government (or rather, parts of it) is reconfigured to more accurately reflect their wishes. However, terms are staggered for the opposite purpose; while “the people” should be represented, they should not be entirely trusted, and thus only parts of the government can change at certain times. While some people take this to be a good way to ensure stability (in other words, the status quo), what it means more precisely is this: a senator, elected by “the people” 6 years ago, operates on the basis of the people’s choice at that now past moment in time, rather than the choice of “the people” today, or yesterday, or any of the days and years between the election date and the present. The same principle applies for members of the House and the President.
Short of impeachment (which happens at the behest of similarly elected ‘representatives,’ not the people), there is nothing to hold this “democratically elected” Senator, President, or Congressperson accountable to their constituency and its changing moods. Even if they turn wildly unpopular on day 2 of their term, they retain their office for another 6 years. Furthermore their actions during that term are still accepted as “legitimate” (by virtue of their being “elected”) even if those actions are at a sharp contrast to what the people are saying or feeling during that entire term, after the elections are over. This means that their “legitimacy” does not reside in “the people,” but in the process. To this effect if one can show that the process occurred, then legitimacy in some sense is secured–whether this be in America or Syria, the legitimacy of that process itself aside.
This very characteristic, that of legitimacy residing in the process of elections not the people, is what undermines today’s democratic systems and leaves doubts as to their democratic nature. I mentioned earlier the “democratically elected” Senator who could do virtually anything he/she desired to do during his/her term in office, irrespective of the people and their changing attitudes. I think this phrase itself (”democratically elected”) confirms this idea that political “legitimacy” is endowed by the process, and not the people.
We have heard, for example, of the “democratically elected” government. These qualifiers are used essentially to give legitimacy to whatever that government might be doing. Usually it is invoked at a time when there is significant resistance to its policies or direction, exactly that in-between time I have been focusing on. This positive description is always meant to give rights to power to the government in question, because at some point in the past it was “democratically elected.” It is often invoked at a time when, if new elections were to be held, it is likely that an opposing government would be “democratically elected” in place of the one which calls itself “democratically elected.” If it is not the popular support of the people now on the basis of which they will act, then they will act on the popular support of the people at some point in the past. What should be recognized though is that any “people” that is not now, is no people at all; the people of the past are a process.
While we hear about the “democratically elected” government, we never hear about a government being “democratically overthrown.” This, in fact, besides being the exact opposite of bringing a government to power, is also an exact reversal of its basis for legitimacy. Since a democratic overthrow occurs spontaneously at the whims of the people, there can be no systematic, periodic, or predictable process for it. The closest American politics may have seen of the democratic overthrow in recent times might be the recall election that removed Governor Gray Davis from office. Even though the recall is a “process,” it is still fundamentally different because in a democratic overthrow, the process is a tool of the people, the way in which the people’s will is facilitated, while in an election, the people are a tool of the process, a way of facilitating those in power.
This is where American democracy begins to approach Syrian democracy. If elections are to be understood simply as a way of delegating power and excluding the people from its exercise for a fixed interval of time, then there is little but cosmetic difference between the two, since the people are still effectively excluded from power. One needs to look no further than the current state of affairs to see this pattern actively in play: the current President has a 30% approval rating, but he is still President. 72% of Americans disapprove of his war, and 63% want to see withdrawal by 2008, but we are still at war, and there is no plan for withdrawal in sight. The only legitimacy on which his tenure and his war rest, then, is “the people” of November 2, 2004, not the people of today.
We see the same anti-democratic democracy in other parts of the world, too. In Israel, over 100,000 protesters in the streets of Tel Aviv could not bring down PM Ehud Olmert. In Palestine, people often refer to the “democratically elected President Abu Mazen” in order to bolster his position vis-à-vis Hamas, even though Hamas, too, was “democratically elected” to the legislature. In Lebanon, PM Fu’ad Sanyurah’s government is constantly hailed (by outside and factional forces) as “democratically elected,” but when the opposition took to the streets demanding, among other things, new elections, their efforts were declared a “coup attempt.” That a “democratically elected” government could call new elections un-democratic is, indeed, rather startling.
Together these governments understand their grasp on power to be authorized by past support, not maintained by current support (or, often, and more importantly, we understand their grasp on power to be authorized in this way). This is the meaning of “democratically elected.” In a truly democratic political system–one in which the people’s moods, opinions, and wishes are dynamically and continuously manifested and re-manifested, rather than at timed intervals during which they can be effectively excluded from the process–a concept of “democratic overthrow” is essential. The agency must be with the people to overthrow, not with the leaders to resign, to call for new elections, or to wait until the next elections. After all, the democratic overthrow is not simply the democratic election of the next government. It is its opposite in form and effect.
Without a concept of the “democratic overthrow,” these systems do not differ from the system in Syria, in terms of the function that elections have: to exclude the electorate from the power process until the next elections. This is not an apologia for the dismal and unjust state of affairs in Syria; it is a critical look at the shortcomings of other supposedly democratic systems and the ways in which even they fail to accommodate, and in many cases repress, popular will. The case of Syria is a good case for pointing out the resemblance between these systems because the Syrian government makes no pretenses about representing the people’s will during its term–it has a free hand after elections. In this sense it is a pure example of this power structure.
In other places where a similar structure prevails, it is often obscured by an illusion of the people’s direct control over the government. Recognizing this illusion for what it is is a necessary prerequisite for solving the problem of the powerless electorate, which is much more serious than a simple distinction between “representative” and “direct” democracy. It is possible to have a representative system over which the electorate still maintains total and direct control, but it is not possible to have a democratic system in which representatives are only held accountable every few years. The latter is “democratically elected,” while the former can be democratically overthrown. A “representative democracy” which allows for the total exclusion of the electorate from the political process is not still democracy; it is closer to the Syrian system.
It is the “democratically elected” government which we have in America today, and that is what we must work towards changing. The President does not have a democratic “right” to perpetuate the occupation of Iraq because he is the Commander in Chief by way of his election in 2004, if the people today oppose this war. To suggest he does is anti-democratic. Closing this loophole is the chief concern of the democratically elected/democratically overthrown divide, and working for a permanent democratic condition, one which revolves around the people not the institution of elections, is the way to overcome it. If the American adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan have taught us anything, after all, it is that elections do not necessarily make an inclusive or democratic political system. Much of the time, they simply rubber stamp a set of leaders, and are the very means by which the electorate is disempowered.
Maybe this is where Syria and America have most in common: for all those disillusioned or opposed to the political system, boycotting elections seems to be the best vote.
Topics: Comment |
June 5th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
You’ll find that your critique has a lot in common with Carl Schmitt’s view of liberal democracy.
June 5th, 2007 at 2:06 pm
In its criticisms of liberal democracy as we know it, yes. But not in its normative suggestions (Schmitt, a supporter of Hitler, advocated a powerful sovereign who could override the normal political system).
June 5th, 2007 at 4:06 pm
Yes. But I can think of enough historical scenarios where this kind of criticism led precisely to the sorts of consequences that you want to avoid.
Another political theorist whose critique of representative institutions resembles yours is Rousseau. I don’t know if his “normative suggestions” amounted to the reign of Robespierre, but it still looks like a recipe for disaster to me.
I don’t find Rosa Luxemburg any more appealing.
June 5th, 2007 at 4:53 pm
I can’t tell if you are criticizing me for saying what I’ve said because it might empower others who have different intentions, but if you are, it sounds pretty close to what the Syrian government accuses dissidents and activists of before tossing them into prison: “weakening national sentiments in a time of national emergency.”
June 5th, 2007 at 8:55 pm
That’s a bit drastic, but maybe I, too, was rather drastic. It’s a little preposterous to say that I’m acting like the Syrian government; I definitely wasn’t saying that you were acting like Schmitt.
I was criticizing your critique of liberal democracy. Obviously I don’t think that you are “weakening national sentiments” (or anything equivalent to it). I just think it’s good to be aware of the pedigree of one’s critique, which you obviously are. I certainly don’t want to see you imprisoned or to stifle your criticism of the current political system. But I have a right to disagree with you, no?
June 6th, 2007 at 9:12 am
I did not mean to align you with the Syrian government. You seem to be criticizing the fact that somebody might run with some of these criticisms to support some unrelated ignoble purpose (I guess this is why you said it was close to Schmitt, and later used the example of Rousseau and Robespierre). I am saying that this is close to what a state might say about one who criticizes it, especially in ‘times of emergency;’ it happens in the US (calls for withdrawal are somehow ‘aid and comfort to the enemy’) and it happens in Syria (calls for democratic reform are twisted to be part of a Western/Zionist conspiracy). In either case the original claim is mischaracterized to undermine it as something that supports some other unpopular or unworthy cause. This is how I interpret your reference to Schmitt.
June 6th, 2007 at 10:17 am
I disagree with your critique of liberal democracy tout court, but, mainly because I’m lazy, instead of making a substantive argument against it, I have so far pointed to some of the things that make me nervous about it - the affinities to Schmitt’s critique of liberalism, as well as Rousseau. Both Schmitt and Rousseau remain very theorists, including for many people on the left. It’s probably a fallacy to believe that their ideas alone led to people doing terrible things; but given certain historical experiences related, one might be justified in advocating caution and noting affinities.
Anyway, I think we’ve talked enough about these extra-diegetic issues! You’re not Carl Schmitt; I am not the Syrian regime.
June 6th, 2007 at 10:18 am
“very theorists” should be “very important theorists”
“experiences related” should be “experiences”
June 12th, 2007 at 10:18 pm
Interesting post.
What about the fact that in Syria people are not allowed to express their views and feelings vis s vis government policies and actions?
What about the fact that people in syria have no political choice at all in the first place, so they cannot elect who they believe is most suitable to hold office and represent them.
What about the fact that Syrians are not allowed to form political movements, groups or parties and publish their own journals to convey their thoughts to the general public.
While your analysis of the shortcomings of the political process in liberal democracies is good, it should not divert attention from the greater evils of our own system and process. There is absolutely no moral equivalence that you can draw here.
June 13th, 2007 at 4:06 am
Highly interesting article and discussion. I have not read Schmitt and only read Rousseau’s Social Contract, just to say at the outset. Yaman there is another matter which perhaps you have not considered much in your call for a mechanism of Democratic overthrow. Who is to say that the people are the best judge of their own interests? Plato believed democracy itself was destructive while Aristotle thought it was the least evil form of government after Tyranny and Oligarchy.
A lot of people have very little interest, let alone knowledge, of the political process within their own countries. How can we stop these critical masses from falling prey to demagogues and polemecists. How can you protect these people from themselves? Recently I had read an interesting idea put forward on the Daily Star of all places. Still it was interesting because it mentioned one writer whose name I can’t remember believing that traditionally politics was always about two cities Jerusalem and Athens. Politics and religion are seen as two diametrically opposed systems for which a balance and separation of sorts was necessary. This “Muslim Third Way” introduced a third city, Medina. Now we have to understand the reference to an Islamic state model in its purely theoretical and historical understanding rather than contemporary so called “Islamic” states and “Caliphates”. The idea was that the rulers followed the Shari’a as a Constitution of sorts, custodians of a law for all men so to speak.
I don’t know whether it is possible to move beyond the historical and contemporary baggage which has encumbered these terms, but rather than dismissing it out of hand as pre-modern thought (remember modern politics itself would trace to classical Greek Democracy) what could be of use today? I’d be very interested in your views. I myself am not an advocate of Islamic government, but my interest was triggered after reading a book by a certain Muhammad Asad on Islamic government. In such a system, democratic overthrow would certainly be compatible as well since the ruler is simply a custodian.
June 13th, 2007 at 12:40 pm
Philip, All the points you have mentioned are very important and quite incriminating of the Syrian government. I was not attempting to draw moral equivalence between the two, or to offer excuses for the Syrian government (or the American one for that matter). I think it is closer to a structural equivalence in form, and especially in the function, of elections, that I was trying to point out.
June 13th, 2007 at 12:49 pm
Wassim, I have reservations about your objections to the ability of the people to use the democratic system. For one, I don’t think access to a political voice should be limited to people with an education or training or whatever you would look at to ‘draw the line.’ Even the most unintelligent, uneducated people have needs in their lives that must be addressed by the political process. Second, the point you raise about the people not being smart enough to use the democracy or make wise decisions, besides being one of the classical rationales against democratic institutions, is one that does not disappear for non-democratic systems that are responsive to the people. There will always be political, social, or economic problems that affect the people that they will not see or understand, either because they are ignoring it or they don’t believe it’s there, when it is. This does not change if they actually get the vote or not. But, remember: the only reason one has for not participating in the political process and paying attention to it, is if one is in a luxurious or comfortable enough position to live in an isolated world disconnected from the one surrounding them. Social needs, I think, would compel participation, attentiveness, and a smart press, so the problem as you’ve phrased it would either eventually disappear, or always be there, regardless of the political institutions in place. I haven’t read anything by Muhammad Asad (well, except parts of his translation of the Qur’an), but I’ve heard he’s an interesting fellow. His son Talal Asad’s work I have been very briefly exposed to, but it looked very interesting and very important so I hope to follow up on that soon.
June 18th, 2007 at 2:56 pm
Wassim,
I, too, read that Daily Star op-ed. It was by Dalia Mogahed, “Between Jerusalem and Athens, a Muslim ‘third way’” and it cited Noah Feldman’s book After Jihad. The problem is that I can’t access the full article anymore; I think they are demanding money for perusal of their archives. As someone with an (amateur) interest in “political Hebraism” as well as Athens in the imagination of Western political theorists, I was intrigued at first by the re-casting of this debate. However, there were some things that really bothered me about Mogahed’s piece. Does anyone have access to the full text?
June 18th, 2007 at 3:11 pm
I’ve now re-read the full piece (thanks, Yaman!), and my beef was not with Mogahed but with Feldman. I think “Jerusalem” is rather narrowly conceived, given the wide variety of associations it has had for European political writers of all stripes - from Martin Luther to William Blake to Moses Mendelssohn.
November 22nd, 2007 at 9:15 am
hmmm… interesting. There is something in the analogy, but I don’t agree with the conclusion (”boycotting elections seems to be the best vote”). In a situation where african american voters, among others, are being actively disenfranachised, again and again, this seems like a form of capitulation. Is there any evidence of progressive reforms that occured in liberal democracies as a result of boycotting? just letting the affluent and conservative have an even bigger say doesn’t seem very wise.
The idea of irregular “democratic overthrow” sounds good but it doesn’t have such a good history. Without procedures how can you distinguish between a true democratic overthrow and an authoritarian leader and his supporters staging a coup? don’t a lot of dictators come to power in the name of “the people”? The later stages of the French Revolution were highly democratic, in a sense, with a lot of popular involvement, but they were also the periods of mass executions and terror.
So maybe there is a way of enhancing representative democracy and making it more responsive to people’s continuous needs? how about participative democracy, like in Porto Alegre? that seems like a better solution than boycotting.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/South_America/Democracy_PortoAlegre.html
November 22nd, 2007 at 10:08 am
one more note - you said ” 72% of Americans disapprove of his war, and 63% want to see withdrawal by 2008, but we are still at war, and there is no plan for withdrawal in sight. ”
I’ve been following this, and it seems the democrats have tried several times to bring up bills for ending the war or at least to downscale it, but they don’t have enough votes in the Senate to overrride a Bush veto.
So instead of boycotting, wouldn’t it make more sense to strengthen those who are trying to end the war, rather than the Romneys and McCains? What’s the alternative?