Democracy becomes populism
when the people think wrong
Our politicians today do not want to represent the majority’sperceptions and interests. International political careerattracts more than the national and politicians prefer tofollow international elites along, writes Jan Tullberg.
In the case of groups with social problems our politicians
prefer to treat them as helpless victims.
A problematic situation is by no means impossible to get out of. However, the person may
instead have trained him/herself into inability. He/she can no
longer help him/herself but hopes for help from others.
Responsible people in important positions for the social system
should not suffer such helplessness, but we see more signs of
how that happens. The EU Commission President Jean-Claude
Juncker summarized his view in this way:
We know what everyone needs to do, but we do not know how to
survive as politicians if we do."
According to their analysis, the error is not in the leaders
but in democracy. From the citizen perspective, one is struck
by the many destructive ideas of the politicians. To a large
extent, they make decisions that counteract what they declared
themselves willing to do.
Migration contains a number of systematical errors. The UN
Refugee Commission, with constant lack of money, takes care of
refugees for SEK 5,000 per person per year. Different
governments have bureaucratic asylum systems that take care of
migrants for 200,000 per person per year. Only the Swedish
migration system costs more per year than the two largest
international systems cost together (UNHCR + World Food Program).
The latter take care of real refugees who, in actual sense,
"move to safeguard their lives". Sweden instead addresses
resettlementers who want to upgrade their existence to a higher
standard. In general terms, if you talk about effective help and
helping those with the greatest needs, you are opposed. Calling
the system humanitarian and generous is empty advertising chat.
If you want to solve a problem, it's wise to start early before
it has grown into a big problem. Moroccan street children get
older and violent, but both police and social authorities are
apathetic concerning permanent criminals who should be handled
before being recruited by criminal leagues. In the suburbs it
becomes increasingly difficult to get witnesses. The “dialogue
police” is increasingly emerging as a retreat policy. Citizens
are forced to get used to coexist with the criminals. It is
becoming increasingly apparent that the police fail to maintain
their violence monopoly.
Despite large allocations to the armed forces, a number of
European countries are unable to defend their borders from an
invasion by unarmed immigrants. The principle "no more violence
than necessity demands" is replaced with "no violence even if
required." In Sweden, coercion may only be used against those
who are in the "custody" for expulsion. The parliament has also
decided that children should not be put in the custody, which in
practice means that families with children can penetrate "with
us unable to do anything about it".
Did nobody
understand this when the situation developed? At times our politicans realized
that something might be wrong, if there was no difference between getting yes
or no on an asylum application. The definition of "a regulated
immigration" is, of course, that a NO must also mean NO. Another stupid
rule is never to send a criminal to his homeland if he is at risk of death
penalty for his crime.
Swedish authorities do
not want to be involved. Sweden, however, is involved by the presence of
criminals and violent people who walk freely around here until the day their
home country agrees to the Swedish code of conduct.
In order to prevent
people from drowning in the Mediterranean, rescue operations such as Italian
Mare Nostrum and the Swedish Coast Guard were started. But when people in sea
need are picked up, they are strangely not sent back to their port of departy,
but into Europe.
We are following the smugglers'
plan. The asylum seeker now hopes for the cooperation between the smugglers and
those charged with stopping illegal immigration. As a result, the operation
becomes completely counterproductive.
More people get a free
ride into Europe and more die during transit. Even though it's not only wrong,
the "rescue policy" continues. The consequences for Swedish society
are ignored in favor of a series of insignificant procedural rules and the peoplesmugglers.
In an American TV
movie, the villain is released if the police failed to read his rights or if
the search query was incorrectly written. Today's spokesmen are no problem
solvers, but opportunists who care for themselves and they take no risks of
tramping other rulers on their toes.
Problems need not be
resolved but can be denied. In today's globalized world, a host of events take
place that the authorities do not consider themselves able to control, but it
seems like the situation with an alcoholic, who prefers to give up when confronted with
the temptation to escape from responsibility. If he thinks that the rent is an
unforeseen expense, it's good to invest that money in a purchase of more
alcohol.
The modern decision
maker looks at migrant flows and crime with the same impotence. One journalist
proposed a "power of attorney investigation" to highlight the
inability of decision makers.
The former social elite could also make bad decisions, but they were still driven by an interest in making the best for the Swedish people. It seems clear that today's elites lack that interest.
Todays representatives
want to serve their own interests, not those they represent. Revolt may not be
the correct word for the behavior, the word "betrayal" fits better.
Politicians do not
want to represent the majority with their perceptions and interests. An
international political career attracts more. Why can’t the voters
just be silent and applaud?
Another task is to appoint him/herself as a
representative of a minority, claiming that it must be protected against the
prejudices of the national majority.
It is becoming increasingly clear that democracy must either be
abolished or that the term must be interpreted differently.
Of course, it is not
just a new macro perspective that is behind the new attitude but also more
personal factors. A hundred years ago, a retailer in our parliament was a
representative of the bourgeoisie and a social-democratic raillroad worker
remained a worker even though he had a parliamentary place. Now their successors
are broilers who are molded and shaped in various youth organisations. They
represent no group other than their own.
Having children of your own is a project that takes a lot of time and effort that
could otherwise have been invested in your own political career. Not having
children can therefore be an advantage in the competition and it is not
surprising that a number of European top politicians are childless. For
example: German Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and the newly elected French president Emmanuel Macron, Luxembourg's Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, Scottish Deputy Nicola Sturgeon, British Prime Minister Teresia May and Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven.
However, the benefit
of the childless career can have a negative effect on how to handle the
mission. Having children and grandchildren may create an interest in community
development in the longer term.
Will the society be
tolerable for the decendants of the politicans? Missing that perspective
increases the risk of longterm liability. There are, of course, childless
people who show a great social responsibility and parents who miss it, but
there seems to be a reasonable hypothesis that parenthood has an impact on
decision-makers' societal views.
Clearly, democracy is
not a stable indestructible system. It can be threatened and fall. It is not
only threats from small extremist groups, but also threats from the top
(elites).
The political leadership
can be benevolent for democracy when the people agree, but they change their
attitude when people have other plans for the future than the political elite.
Then democracy loses its charm and is called populism.
JAN TULLBERG Jan
Tullberg is a writer and lecturer in business administration. He is the author
of the book
The original article in Swedish at:
