ArpitGarg's Weblog

I was talking to one of my seniors at office about current state of politics. It got me thinking about the ideology in a democracy. We have been brought up in a society where we came to know how much our forefathers had to struggle to achieve the democracy that we live in.

We have learned that political ideology can be broadly divided into left and right with a center. Left leans towards communism, right leans towards capitalism. Let me take an example of India. Historically we have seen Congress and BJP as left and right parties. Over the years they have grown center-left and center-right.

Today, I don’t see any stark difference their ideologies. Whatever keeps them in power. Congress introduced MNREGA and BJP has continued with it. BJP might very well give loan waivers to farmers before 2019 elections. Both the parties have benefited selected business houses in their own capacity. Both are against electoral reforms and hate scrutiny of donations to political parties.

Makes us wonder is there any classical ideology left in politics? In the sense that does society at large support such ideologies of left/right/center? Coz political parties can only adhere to such ideologies as long as people vote for them. In US, right and left has sustained for decent amount of time, given two party system and high percentage of registered members. In India it has moved to a scramble all too soon. Number of regional parties, based on anti-Congress plank, have mushroomed in last 30-40 years. Their ideology is not left/right but is to uplift certain sections of society.

Advent of Trump, an amalgamation of left right and center, signifies a landmark event in democracy. Democracy anyways is a recent experiment on how to run the society. About last 200 years or so. I believe it’s still in a development phase and will take another 200 years or so, to judge the pros and cons. Maybe we will see a new societal system altogether, who knows.

One thing is for certain, the era of discrete left and right might already be over in major democracies of the world.