Britain – A Democracy?

What’s a democracy? The developments in Britain raise the question whether Britain should be considered a democracy.

Britain – a democracy?  I

The United Kingdom has 650 parliamentary constituencies and the candidate with most votes in a constituency becomes its member of parliament. All other votes get thrown in the bin. These voters are represented by someone, whose agenda they do not share.  For example, with party A getting 29%, party B 28%, party C 27% and various small parties the remaining 16% – party A’s candidate would get into parliament. In that constituency, a minority of 29% gets 100% parliamentary representation. Theoretically, this pattern could take place throughout the country. And 29% of the population would get 100% of all MPs.

This system has, for many years, produced stable parliamentary majorities, which in turn, enabled many governments to run the country, without having to constantly compromise with coalition partners.

Is it truly democratic?

Britain – a democracy? II

British politicians working to deliver Brexit, constantly argue that “the People” have voted for Brexit and therefore, the only democratic thing to do, was to deliver Brexit. That, of course, is misleading: The vote was 48.5 vs. 51.5, which means that virtually half of all those who voted, are Remainers. Would the result of 50% minus one vote for Brexit vs. 50% plus one vote against Brexit, have meant the country has decided against Brexit? No. In both cases, it shows that “the People” are divided.

But even that 50/50 result was only achieved with the help of a campaign permeated by lies and deceit. Lies are common in politics but let us not delude ourselves that this is democratic.

David Cameron and his government failed to prepare the Brexit referendum and clarify the ramifications of a Brexit outcome. Moreover, they said that the referendum would be only consultative, whereas, it is now presented as binding. The British political class seems to treat the whole process like a game of poker – you win some, you lose some. Only, if it is but a game of cards, how exactly should one reshuffle the cards, once Britain has left the EU?  

The United Kingdom has a government acting irrevocably, on the basis of a badly prepared referendum, a campaign saturated with false information and an undecided and torn electorate – a democracy?

Britain – a democracy? III

Britain’s High Court has ruled that Boris Johnson acted lawfully, when he got the Queen to shut down parliament for a few weeks.

Britain’s unelected prime minister – who was put into Downing Street, after Theresa May’s resignation, by 92,000 members of the Conservative Party in an internal vote of party members only – has gotten the unelected Queen to close the elected parliament of the country.

It might all be lawful, but democratic?