I am not an economist to assess the economic impact of the present global economic recession in empirical precision, but as a student of political science, I have been worried about its political impact. My concern is the interrelation between economics and the democratic political system.
The Western world led by the U.S. keeps hankering about the merits of a democratic system with emphasis on free market system. But the economic crisis has started in the very backbone of the acclaimed democratic leader. Leaders of eight developed nations, followed by the leaders of the 20 economic powers, including the prominent developing countries, have been pondering over various economic ways of coming out of the present crisis. But not a single leader or thinker has given even a slight thought about the possible political causes of the crisis.
Democracy is built around the twin concepts of liberty or freedom and equality. Both these concepts were defined at the dawn of the so-called industrial revolution. Both of them were used to sever the hands of feudalism to draw the serfs from their clutches to fulfill the manpower needs of the growing industries. The French Revolution used the concept as a loud slogan and the emergence of the independent sovereign state of the U.S. used the same as the foundation of their nation. The concept of representative government gave the liberated people the right to elect their representatives to rule the state.
The British monarchy compromised its supremacy and ceded virtual power to the representatives of the people. This is in a nutshell is a description of the foundation of the spread of modern representative democracy.
Apparently, the two concepts are contradictory: full freedom gives the individual the choice of be ...