The Dominion TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1928. WHEN DEMOCRACY FAILS

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 110, 7 February 1928, Page 8

The Dominion TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1928. WHEN DEMOCRACY FAILS

The failure of democratic government in Spain was the dictator’s opportunity. Even so it was in Italy Both General Rivera in Spain, and Signor Mussolini in Italy, have now to face the question of providing a Constitution for their, respective countries. Each curiously enough, has decided upon a Parliament of selection, in preference to a Parliament of election. In Italy, according to a cablegram, there are to be no more general elections, political meetings, or party campaigns. “The Chamber, ’ we are told, will probably be selected from industries, corporations, and professions The democracies of Spain and Italy may in time successfully reassert their rights, and recover their ascendancy in government, but in the interim the new idea of government by institutions, in preference to government by the masses, may obtain a strong enough hold to postpone such a recovery for years. Observers of political tendencies in countries where government still renders obedience to the will of the people, have noted a curious and significant development, possessing in practical effect the rudiments of the system which the Italian and Spanish dictators are about to apply to their own countries. It is an interesting political evolution. The tendency is observable even in this young country. We began with a Parliament, and local government institutions, leaving entirely in their hands the general and local political tasks entrusted to them by popular mandate. From this we have seen the development of organisations created for the special purpose of making special representations to the governmental powers for the furtherance of special interests. We have ratepayers’ associations, trades councils, employers’ federations, dental associations, school committees’ associations, beekeepers’ associations, farmers’ associations, motorists’ associations, and so on, all actively engaged in furthering their own special aims and objects. They meet in conference, pass resolutions, and wait as deputations upon Government to forward their claims. If we were to analyse this national grouping of interests, we might probably find that there was hardly a single group in the country whose professional or trade interests were not more or less directly represented in Parliament through the activities of their particular organisation. ' In actual practice, this development is all to the good, for it places Government in convenient touch with the manifold interests of the people much more effectively than would be possible if it relied wholly on the views and information which members of Parliament could give. From this point of viewjt could be said that the democracy had intensified its efficiency. On the other hand, the willingness of the few to take up the political burdens of the many —in other words, the preparedness of the many to shelve their political responsibilities—would suggest that both Mussolini and Rivera had grasped the inherent defects of modern democratic government, while convinced at the same time of the necessity of preserving the principle by assigning definite channels through which the desires of the democracy in general might reach the Administration. The objection to their system, however, is that the representation they propose to give is selective, not elective, and in effect is an absolute repudiation of democratic government. Such justification as may be advanced for it is the contention that democracy, having failed to function, must forfeit its responsibilities to more efficient agents. It at least furnishes an excellent object-lesson to democracies where the management of affairs has been allowed by apathy to drift into the control of .interested coteries.