Professor Kothari has been at it before. I read his books “Democracy as if People Matter!” a few years back. His disillusionment at the failure of Democracy to deliver the dividends ia also an old hat. Once again he makes a powerful critique of prevailing democratic theory and practice in the changing global as well as Indian context. But basically, his grouse is with the political philosophers who devised the theory without evaluating the dynamics of ‘human frailty in the face of temptation’ and their failure to estimate the ambitions of political power-brokers’ instinct to ravel in a straight line of immediate expediency. We all know that the path of democratic living, be it in a commune or a national community, is a long and tortuous one, with the implicit danger of some of the campaign soldiers falling out by the wayside.

Rajni Kothari is a dreamer who held a firm belief, for a long time that democracy was a sure shot “means towards the creation of a benevolent society”. And now, in the light of his experience of India’s performance as a working democracy and the global arena awash with all the horrors of undemocratic platitudes being served, laced with the foulest smell of deceitful rhetoric, he stands disenchanted and disillusioned. Funny thing is that, in spite of the Wars being wages in the name of restoring ‘democracy and freedom’ to people who have no experience thereof and no particular hankering for it, the popularity of democracy as an aspiration today stands unchallenged. Leaderships all over the world are seeking to define (or even redefine) the principle simply to justify their own occupancy of political palaces and their command posts of power.

In the West, from whence the ideals of democracy were broadcast in the first place, the multi-party democratic processes are undergoing a serious spate of mergers, with the increased pressure in the direction of incorporation of ideologies into wider but massive umbrellas. However, in India the flow of events is in the other direction: people who have gained the least from the process seem to practicing with relish the multi-party system, in spite of the fact that their faith in the political creatures—the politicians, the parties and the legislatures, etc.—is on a downward curve.  

Truth is that democracy to man on the street, in India, does not simply mean ‘freedom fro tyranny, individual liberty and the rule of law’. We expect democracy to deliver on issues of more substantive concerns, like social justice and economic fairness. Also because of the democratic politics in India being organized around community-groupings, we expect our ‘democratic institutions to engage more fully with our tradition, identity and faith-concerns. Equally important is our concern with the ‘politics of representation’ adversely affecting our performance.          

Apart from mapping the shenanigans of our social and political elites, professor Kothari also questions the dysfunctionality of our institutional matrix and the growing influence and role of violence—be it coming from senãs, dals, or even gangs of private security guards. Kothari contends that we may all despair at the elites trying to jettison democratic processes in order to obtain efficiency of techno-management establishment, but we must also go beyond the gambit of the political and react with the non-state, non-party contributors to the national life so that the marginalized citizenry can try and breach the elitist barriers and stake a claim to their collective future. As he rightly says, far more than the political establishment of the country, an activist citizenry can rescue the sinking ship of democracy. 

One is invited to read this slim tract because there is a need to think afresh, and no room to give up but to engage, because democracy is a goal as well a process. It is not just a destination, but also a journey. Our search for a decentralized, participatory and emancipatory democracy" has to go on as if thee is no other choice.

—Savyasãcî