2024 may be politically one of the most fateful years for the planet in recent memory. Elections will be held in most of the world’s major democracies: India, United States, Indonesia, South Africa, Bangladesh, Taiwan and Britain, to name a few. At one level, this is just a coincidental alignment of electoral cycles. But the idea of close to two billion voters consciously shaping their future is an exhilarating one. There is also a bit of foreboding, about whether this marvellous act of political agency will measure up to the problems that confront the world.
The case for foreboding about these elections is strong. None of them is going to be an ordinary exercise in casting the vote. None of the predicted outcomes looks rosy. Democracy in the US is extremely polarised. The range of possible trajectories for American democracy is wide, most of them not palatable. Donald Trump’s candidacy could induce a constitutional crisis even before the election. A close and highly polarised election could make it difficult for America to take the critical decisions necessary for its own domestic stability and for the global order. The election results may not be accepted as legitimate.
The choices on offer are generating less enthusiasm. Joe Biden is running on a nominally strong economy, a renewed emphasis on industrial policy and a green transition. And yet this record is not strong enough to convince voters that Bidenomics has cracked the long-term cost of living problems in housing and healthcare, elitism and inequality. Support for the war in Ukraine is eroding and the war in Gaza has damaged Biden’s credibility both domestically and abroad. Whether a second Trump presidency can actually address the economic resentments that are fuelling his rise to power is an open question. It is more likely to erode what remains of institutional quality in the US; it will also likely use the culture wars to deepen an authoritarian turn and consolidate xenophobic nationalism.
In India the outcome looks more certain. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is, at the moment, most likely to return to office, giving India the advantages of stability and continuity. Some of the deep structural problems of the economy, particularly the transition to high quality high productivity jobs, will remain. But there is arguably enough momentum to sustain six per cent growth on the lower bound for a while. This could give India leverage in the global order. And state capacity will continue to expand.
The Opposition is still not able to project itself as a governing coalition, or tap into the aspirational space Modi is occupying. But we should not be under any illusion that the return of the BJP will be the deeper and more irrevocable consolidation of both communalism and authoritarianism. This is not in the future: It is the record on which the BJP is running. You just have to look at the erosion of checks and balances, the new spate of legislation that empowers government over citizens to an unprecedented degree, the institutionalisation of a discourse of violence, and the assertion of majoritarianism with impunity.
Yes, this is not all there is to the BJP, as supporters would argue. But it is too monumental a consequence of its possible victory to brush aside as one of those small imperfections we can live with. So we may end up in a paradox: It could both be true that India’s power grows, even as it slides into authoritarianism. The stability of electoral outcomes will disguise a deeper constitutional change.
Although Joko Widodo is still a powerful political force in Indonesia, the country will be facing its first post-Joko election. South Africa is also looking at a critical election: A country that is looking at a severe economic and governance crisis may be edging towards an era that finally signals the end of the overwhelming dominance of the African National Congress. The outcome of the elections in Taiwan could potentially be a factor in how the Chinese define their relationship to Taiwan and redefine geopolitics.
These elections will result in significant changes one way or the other; in some cases, democracy itself might hang in the balance. But the deeper worry about this year is the deep mismatch between the demands of domestic legitimation and what the planet requires for its future. For o thing, nationalism is going to be a major preoccupation in these elections. It is a measure of a loss of progressive possibilities that so much of politics globally is now dominated by arguments over membership, historical memory, restoration of the past and searching for ethnic enemies. Recent history has given the lie to any claims that politics is not ideological. But it is an ideology that operates in a psychological register. Citizens need to feel good about their societies, and need to be made part of a larger cause. A combination of instant pride and fear are irresistible emotions in politics. Even questions of the material conditions of existence can be framed through identity, history and memory. Nationalism is the theodicy of the moment. Lack of nationalism provides an explanation for so many things: Deindustrialisation to lack of civic amenities to anxieties over culture.
Modern democracies rely on the nation-state form, in which questions of membership, identity and collective pride become inescapable. But so many of the world’s pressing problems cannot be solved by a return to the collective narcissism of nationalism. We may not get World War III, but the prospect of far-reaching wars has increased to an unprecedented degree: Russia upended the global order with its claims on Ukraine. Ethnic cleansing seems to be again acceptable: from Nagorno Karabakh to Gaza. Sino-US tensions are still not in a zone where we can be complacent about how they could disrupt the surface calm in world politics. The profound changes in technology and reorientation of economic models across the world requires new global coordination. The world did quite poorly during the last pandemic on global cooperation. And in 2023 it did briefly cross the two degree centigrade mark for global warming. It is the first time that shipping has been disrupted in the Panama Canal due to drought and the Suez Canal due to war.
The choices voters will face are not easy. None of them are showing a clear pathway of how we prevent ourselves from sleepwalking through multiple crises. We hope that democracies can, once again, engage in a monumental act of retrieval: Redeem the future instead of being stuck in the past. Happy New Year.
The writer is contributing editor, The Indian Express
In 2024, tough choices for voters everywhere
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01.01.2024
2024 may be politically one of the most fateful years for the planet in recent memory. Elections will be held in most of the world’s major democracies: India, United States, Indonesia, South Africa, Bangladesh, Taiwan and Britain, to name a few. At one level, this is just a coincidental alignment of electoral cycles. But the idea of close to two billion voters consciously shaping their future is an exhilarating one. There is also a bit of foreboding, about whether this marvellous act of political agency will measure up to the problems that confront the world.
The case for foreboding about these elections is strong. None of them is going to be an ordinary exercise in casting the vote. None of the predicted outcomes looks rosy. Democracy in the US is extremely polarised. The range of possible trajectories for American democracy is wide, most of them not palatable. Donald Trump’s candidacy could induce a constitutional crisis even before the election. A close and highly polarised election could make it difficult for America to take the critical decisions necessary for its own domestic stability and for the global order. The election results may not be accepted as legitimate.
The choices on offer are generating less enthusiasm. Joe Biden is running on a nominally strong economy, a renewed emphasis on industrial policy and a green transition. And yet this record is not strong enough to convince voters that Bidenomics has cracked the long-term cost of living problems in housing and healthcare, elitism and inequality. Support for the war in Ukraine is eroding and the war in Gaza has damaged Biden’s credibility both domestically and abroad.........
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