Undemocratic Conventions
Democratic National Convention [Image:Web]
The wide coverage of the recently concluded election-year conventions of the Republican and Democratic Parties in the United States has allowed for deep comparisons with the mandatory annual conventions organised by the Caribbean political parties.
When such a comparison is undertaken, the first significant impression is the greater of degree event-management evinced in the US, with heavy emphasis on optics and surface impressions rather than on policy argumentation, clarification and explanation.
Despite this emphasis theatrics however, it is clear that Caribbean political conventions are still in their infancy, and have a lot to learn.
Significantly, the US conventions represent the end point of an internal party contest that would have spanned several primaries in multiple states. This process provides ample opportunity for public vetting of candidates and issues. As a result, US conventions have a legitimate and justifiable basis for being moments of affirmation and endorsement rather than spaces of contestation.
In contrast, Caribbean conventions are devoid of genuine democratic content. There are no policy debates, no vetting of leaders, no philosophical discussions, and no clarification of policy issues occupying national attention.
Every speaker on the US convention stage was deliberately chosen to advance a policy point. This was seen most dramatically in the now famous speech delivered by the father of a slain US Muslim soldier, whose role was to respond to Donlad Trump’s universal labelling of all Muslims as anti-American.
While several Caribbean politicians, prime ministers even, have functioned without subjecting their lives to public scrutiny, it was significant that after her more than three decades in public life, the Democratic National Convention still felt compelled to undertake efforts to make Hilary Clinton known to the public. There are several Caribbean prime ministers who are virtual strangers to the publics which they lead, yet we have never seen an annual convention geared towards repairing this democratic breach.
This is not to suggest that the US is more democratic than the Caribbean. There are several formal and features of the Caribbean political landscape which hint at deeply ingrained democratic practices. Calypso, and the natural tendency for fearless, if uninformed, commentary by ordinary citizens are cases in point. Further, the US conventions reveal clearly the domination of privileged elites, which has not yet become a feature of Caribbean politics.
However, in the main, when the absence of internal electoral competition, the absence of internal policy discussions and the poor quality of speeches, however measured, from the Caribbean convention floor are taken into consideration, one is forced to reach the conclusion that Caribbean party conferences are falling way below the democratic possibilities which they can reach.
Let us hope that our political leaders and the public at large, did not view the US conventions merely as entertainment, but used them as learning moments, for advancing our fledgling and struggling democratic cultures.
CNIDOH/AO
