Dragging the people along

As I pointed out in my recent post, democracy is not so easy to measure. The sine qua non of democracy is generally felt to be "free and fair elections". But that begs quite a few questions: Can you have "free and fair" elections without freedom of the press? How was the list of candidates assembled? Is wealth a precondition for running? Have there been any implicit or explicit threats conditional on the outcome?

But there's a lot more to democracy that elections ("free and fair" or otherwise). Elected representatives should be responsive to their constituents' concerns. When those concerns are consistently ignored, there is clearly a problem.

This has been just the case with Canadian public opinion on the war in Afghanistan. According to public opinion polling conducted by The Strategic Counsel for The Globe and Mail and CTV News, since the summer of 2006, a majority of Canadians have opposed sending troops to Afghanistan. In the poll of January 10th-13th, 47% said they would like to see Canadian troops return as soon as possible, 31% said the troops should remain in Afghanistan but hand over their combat role to another NATO country, and just 17% said that they should continue their combat role against the Taliban.

Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger.
                                   — Hermann Göring

These words are chilling, not just because they were uttered by one of the top Nazis, but because they continue to be put into practice.

What're we fightin' for?

According to the government:

Our goal is to protect Canadians by ensuring that Afghanistan never again falls into the hands of the Taliban and that Afghanistan becomes a stable, free and democratic society.

Interestingly, despite the grandiose language, the supposed danger is only hinted at.

To boost support for the war, it helps to fan the flames of patriotism. And what better way than banners and decals proclaiming "We support our troops!" In several cities across Canada, including Ottawa and Toronto (where there was considerable controversy), decals have been put on police cars and fire engines.

Proponents claim that there's nothing wrong with this, that it's just expressing concern for the wellbeing of Canadian troops. But as many have pointed out, there's a political message here and dissent is being marginalized. It seems to me that putting political messages on public vehicles damages democracy.

To further stifle debate, here's General Rick Hillier, Canada's Chief of Defense Staff:

I'm not going to stand here and tell you that the suicide bombings of this past week have been related to the debate back here in Canada. But I also cannot stand here and say that they are not.

Imposing democracy

The great irony is that these anti-democratic developments are justified as advancing the cause of democracy in Afghanistan. But as Ghandi said:

The spirit of democracy cannot be imposed from without. It has to come from within.

Paint by numbers

The map on the left labels countries as free (green), partly free (peach), and not free (red) for the year 2006. The classification is from Freedom House, a primarily US-government-funded organization. Each country is scored on political liberty and civil liberty; the combined average of these scores determines how the country is classified. Cuba, for example, receives the poorest rating on both political and civil liberties, and is thus categorized as "not free".

The Wikipedia entry for democracy lists two other measures of democracy, one from the Polity IV project and the Democracy Index from The Economist. Each measure has its own scheme for measuring and weighting different characteristics felt to characterize democracies. Since the different measures assess many of the same things, it is not surprising that they show some agreement.

But democracy is not a simple thing and it is far from clear which characteristics matter and how best to weight them. For example, does a free press count more than an independent judiciary? If so, by how much? (And presumably this depends on how "free" and how "independent" they are.) What about non-traditional characteristics that may be important measures of democracy? For example, should voter turnout be factored in? What about incarceration rate? Or media concentration? Or universal health care?

Although there may be some value in overall measures of democracy, individual characteristics still need to be examined and put in context. When we do that, we may find that the global canvas no longer looks like a paint by numbers kit.

Update: 05Mar2008

No sooner had I put up this post than I saw this Adbusters press release relating to media concentration and democracy:

Adbusters Demands Canwest, the CBC and the CRTC Stop Blocking Citizen-Produced Advertising

On Monday, February 18, Adbusters lost its court battle against two of Canada's television networks that refused to sell airtime for its commercials. Adbusters claimed the CBC and Canwest Global had violated its right to free speech under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms by refusing to sell air time, but the court decided that the Charter does not apply to private corporations.

"It's outrageous that the fast food, oil and automobile industries can buy as much TV time as they want in order to promote their agendas, but citizens are not allowed to talk back," said Adbusters Editor-in-Chief Kalle Lasn in response to the ruling. "Canadian democracy will not work properly until we the people have the same right to buy airtime as corporations do."

The rejected Adbusters ads pointed out that over 50 percent of the calories in a Big Mac come from fat, called for an end to the age of the automobile, and promoted Buy Nothing Day. While Court Justice William Ehrcke ruled that private broadcasters have the right to run whatever ads they like, Adbusters feels the case raises some troubling questions.

Firstly, why are Canwest and the CBC selling as much time as they possibly can to corporations, while fighting expensive legal actions to keep citizen-produced messages off the air? Why does the CBC call itself "Canada's Public Broadcaster" if they won't sell airtime to citizens?

Secondly, why is the CRTC not standing up for public access? When they grant licences to broadcasters, why is the right of Canadian citizens to access their own "public" airwaves not being guaranteed? Thirdly, why is our freedom of speech being suppressed? Why can corporations buy airtime while citizens cannot? Why doesn't the Canadian Charter apply to the most powerful social communications medium of our age - television?

"This case goes to the very heart of what our democracy is all about," says Lasn. "A healthy society allows its citizens to walk into their local TV stations and buy airtime under the same rules and conditions that corporations do. Adbusters has been given 30 days to challenge the ruling. This legal battle for media democracy will go on."

To talk to Kalle Lasn, or Ryan Dalziel, our lawyer, about the case please contact Lauren Bercovitch (lauren@adbusters.org)

EDITOR'S NOTES

For more information about Adbusters and the global media democracy movement visit www.mediacarta.org and www.adbusters.org

[1] Canadian Media facts:

Three corporations (CanWest, Quebecor and Torstar) control 70 per cent of the country's daily newspaper circulation.

Five major media acquisitions in Canada have been approved by CRTC in the past year: CHUM was purchased by CTVglobemedia for $1.4 billion, which then sold five CityTV stations to Rogers Communications for $375 million; CanWest purchased Alliance Atlantis for $2.3 billion; Astral Media bought Standard Broadcasting for $1.2 billion; and Quebecor bought the Osprey Media newspaper chain for $414 million.

[2] Facts about Media Democracy:

More than 30,000 people have signed the Media Carta www.mediacarta.org, to voice their concerns about the way information is distributed in our society.

In the past year, a growing number of grassroots media activist groups have been formed in Canada to express a dissatisfaction with the continued consolidation of the country's media:

DemocraticMedia.org

MediaReform.ca

MediaDemocracy.ca