People in many countries are losing faith in politics as
usual. Some are returning to the politics of an earlier age, voting for
neo-fascist parties such as Golden Dawn in Greece and Jobbik in Hungary. Elsewhere,
those calling for transparency and direct democracy, whereby those elected should
represent the people rather than powerful vested interests, are achieving
success. The most newsworthy example was in Italy, where a party led by a
professional comedian emerged as the largest single party in the 2013 general election
although elsewhere, the Pirate Party, which originated in Sweden, is seeing
electoral success in a growing number of countries, with Iceland only the most
recent. In the England, the UK Independence Party is now in third place in
opinion polls, despite revelations from e-mails exchanged by its senior
officers that it is so desperate to have semi-coherent policies on a range of
topics that it
is considering buying them from sympathetic think-tanks.
History, especially that of Europe in the first half of the
twentieth century, reminds us that a failure by politicians to manage an
economic crisis can lead to a rejection of conventional political parties so,
to some extent, what is happening now should not be a surprise. But history
also reminds us that the importance of these developments should not be
underestimated. No matter how justified it may seem to describe parties such as
UKIP as being composed of “loonies and fruitcakes”, this rather misses the
reason why a disillusioned electorate has lost faith in conventional politics.
Two recent health-related events typify this view. The wave
of revulsion that followed the shooting of 20 children and six staff in Sandy
Hook Elementary School, in Connecticut, seemed to many people to be a game
changer. The National Rifle Association attracted ridicule when it suggested
that the best way to prevent more deaths in school shootings was to arm
teachers. Opinion polls shows overwhelming support for tighter gun control
measures, with 92% supporting the closure of loopholes that enable those buying
firearms at gun shows to avoid background checks. Yet, when even such a modest
measure such as this reached the Senate, it was defeated. 43 of the 46 senators
voting against it had received
campaign donations from the National Rifle Association. They found every
excuse possible, no matter how incredible, to justify their failure to act against
products responsible for the murders of over 8,000 Americans every year. Having striven relentlessly to prevent any
research that might challenge their position being undertaken, they ignored or
dismissed what did exist, such as that showing a clear
link between the laxity of state-level gun control laws and shootings.
Bizarrely, a few days later, many of the same senators, who had rejected what
they saw as intrusive surveillance by the federal government, rushed to condemn
the FBI for failing to identify the Boston bombers before they acted.
About the same time, the upper chamber of the UK parliament
was debating another health-related matter, the regulations requiring NHS
services to be opened to competition. Ministers had offered copious
reassurances that the Act, from which the regulations flowed, meant something
other than what it plainly said. When the regulations confirmed its true meaning
they claimed it was a mistake and, after scattering a few words such as
integration almost at random, claimed to have fixed it. Legal opinion, not
refuted by the government’s response that sidestepped the key issues, confirmed
that the revised
version was effectively unchanged. A major campaign was launched to ensure
that peers were aware of this and the concerns of by health professionals
and their representatives, some of whom seemed finally to have woken up to the
threat being posed. Yet as in the US Senate, the government dismissed the
evidence. A subsequent detailed legal analysis
suggests that the speech by the minister introducing the regulations was
incorrect in almost every respect. Despite overwhelming opposition by those who
had studies the provisions, the government was successful, leaving those
responsible for managing the NHS struggling to reconcile the regulations with
ministers’ stated intentions. Quite why so many peers supported this obviously
flawed legislation remains unclear but, as with the US Senate, a growing number
of people are asking questions about the financial
links between the private healthcare industry and some of the most eloquent
supporters of the Act and the subsequent regulations.
Politicians are meant
to represent the views of the people, not powerful vested interests.
Unfortunately, at times, they seem to echo the suggestion by Bertolt Brecht when he
observed that, as the East German communist party had lost the confidence of
the people, “would it not be simpler if the government simply dissolved the
people and elected another?” Maybe they should reflect on this if they don’t
want to join the Communist Party of the DDR in the dustbin of history.
