A good life and political rights can -and should- go together
What you need to know:
We need leaders who deliver the good life. The question, though, is how to get them in the absence of elections and competition, and how to make sure they deliver.
Last week began on an interesting note, with thought provoking news snippets flying about. This very newspaper carried a report about a visit His Highness the Aga Khan, the spiritual leader of the Shia Ismaili Muslims, had paid to Canada at the invitation of Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
The founder and chairman of the Aga Khan Development Network gave a beautiful speech at a joint session of Canada’s parliament.
Delivered in English and French, it touched on a wide range of issues and referred to research that struck a nerve.
A UNDP survey in 18 South American countries had found that a majority of people were less interested in the form of their governments than in the quality of their lives.
Even autocratic governments that improved the quality of their lives would be more acceptable for most of those polled than ineffective democratic governments.
This kind of finding is guaranteed to annoy actors in democracy activism who will insist that there should be no trade-off between political rights and a good life and that the two good things must go together.
It is, no doubt, a very appealing argument, that also disregards history and the realities of everyday life in poor or emerging economies.
Celebrated Zambia-born international economist, Dambisa Moyo, argues that in countries blighted by poverty and deprivation, pre-occupation with political rights is beside the point, and treatment of freedom as the most cherished value, an illusion. But I am getting ahead of myself.
At about the same time, I heard a young, Russian-speaking Ukrainian doctor speak on the BBC. She, unlike many Russian-speaking Ukrainians, was not terribly enthusiastic about Russia’s adventure in Ukraine’s Crimea region.
Apparently she had been invited to be deputy minister in the new pro-Russia regional government. She turned it down. Her opposition to Russia’s flexing of muscles, ostensibly in order to prevent further chaos and protect the Russian-speaking population against possible harassment, rested on a simple reason.
Many Russian speakers, she argued, were not interested in who was in charge. Instead, she said, all they wanted was to have a good life with good salaries, good housing, good health care and other such things.
So in her opinion it mattered little, whether it was the Russians or the new Ukrainian government in charge in Crimea. What she saw as a problem was that the Russian occupation risked causing hostility from other Ukrainians for the Russian-speaking community who were busy trying to provide for their families.
Bread and butter
The argument that bread and butter considerations and issues of general wellbeing are of much more importance to the average person in a poor country than necessarily the form of government he or she lives under and who leads it, is difficult to sell to those who have bought into the notion that the route to prosperity and happiness goes via the right to vote and enjoyment of full political rights.
The views of the people of South America quoted in the survey, the Russian-speaking Ukrainians represented by the doctor, and those of scholars such as Moyo whose arguments are buttressed by the experience of countries where prosperity is driving political evolution, however, suggest that it is in tune with reality in many places.
For Africa, and more immediately its Great Lakes region, it raises a disturbing question but one that must be asked: Does it make sense to pursue political rights and associated freedoms and economic prosperity with the same vigour all at once?
Some say one must not be made to choose between political rights on the one hand, and having a roof over one’s head plus access to food, health and education on the other. But what if circumstances demanded that a choice be made?
Listening carefully to debates among political and intellectual elites, and close observation of activism by those seeking political power and influence in the region shows that much time is spent discussing how to design the best electoral systems within the freest and most competitive political systems.
Obviously the achievement of these endeavours would improve significantly the game of musical chairs political succession can be and often is, when one set of politicians operating within one political party or one group within the same party replaces another at the helm of the state.
Would it necessarily deliver what the poor need to live decent and dignified lives? It wouldn’t and often does not.
It is hardly a secret that since the 1990s, when multi-party politics became the rage in Africa after years of one-party and military rule, elections-driven change in leadership has left the ordinary voters right where it found them: Mired in poverty, poor health, poor housing, and ignorance. But then so has the absence of change.
Both suggest we need leaders who deliver the good life. The question, though, is how to get them in the absence of elections and competition, and how to make sure they deliver.
Frederick Golooba-Mutebi is a Kampala- and Kigali-based researcher and writer on politics and public affairs. E-mail: [email protected]
