Has democracy failed us?

Many scholars have started fundamental debate as to whether democracy has failed to evolve and to meet the 21^st century challenges (OECD, 2020). Research as shown that democracy which started in UK in 1832, through the Reform Act, may have outlived its purpose. To many it has become a tick box of seeking recognition and undeserved mandate through all shenanigans. Many now believe we should rethink democracy, regeneratively, instead embrace deliberative democracy.

Case Study 1#

There are many case studies that support such a scholarly narrative. The UK Brexit referendum is one such a case study where 73% of 18- to 24-year-olds and 62% of 25- to 34-year-olds voted to remain (BBC, 2021) but exit ended up winning by 52% because of old population usurping the young population. Democratic civil society is asking whether it makes sense for the old people to bamboozle their way through denying the young their future is democratic, when the future belong to the young generation. One may ask, if the youths were majority would the Brexit has happened?  Did Brexit took advantage of low fertility rate in UK.

Case Study 2#

In Zimbabwe although the youth represent 67.7% of the voting population, they have been deliberately disenfranchised by the politicians who take advantage of lack of opportunities, poverty and political thought ignorance. As such they have been used to unleash violence on behave of unscrupulous politicians or political parties.  A scholarly view from Mutasa and Ndawana (2024) sums it up, “Youth in Zimbabwe have thus largely been presented as at the periphery of political decision making and appear more as foot soldiers of the elite seeking to further certain political ideologies.  Whatever youth agency found is seen as an outcome of patronage”

Zimbabwean youth are failing to understand that they and ONLY they hold the key to who govern them as they are the majority. One may argue that the reason why we have the highest rate of unemployment, corrupt government and massive looting thriving, should be blamed to the youth for failing to unite, organise and self-empower to lead rather than be led by the octogenarians who are living in the past yet pretending to serve futuristic interests.

What is then deliberative democracy?

Bächtiger et al (2018), defined deliberative democracy as being, “… incorporates the requirements that deliberation take place in contexts of equal recognition, respect, reciprocity, and sufficiently equal power for communicative influence on function”

Simply put, deliberative democracy relates to a fair representation of decision-making process based on consensus, equal and fair representation. Let’s say we have 100 people 60 of them are aged over 60 and 40 are below 35; democracy based on one person one vote depending on what is in scope for the election, it means that the over 60 already has an advantage, one may ask how is it fair? Deliberative democracy would require us to take an equal representative sample on a 50:50 and deliberate until we come to a consensus.

Would this be a fair distributive outcome? Let’s debate.

Elliot Pfebve, is an academic based in UK.