“When the (good) way prevails in the state, speak boldly and act boldly. When the state has lost the way, act boldly and speak softly.”
This is how Professor Siddiqur Rahman Osmani of Development Economics at Ulster University, United Kingdom quoted Chinese philosopher Confucius as saying while arguing why democracy should not be sacrificed for development.
He was giving a public lecture on democracy and development organised by the Department of Economics and Social Sciences of BRAC University (BRACU) at BRAC Centre Inn on Wednesday (18 July 2018).
Theoretically it remains unresolved on which between democracy and autocracy promotes more growth but empirical evidence coming up from research in the last decade demonstrates that democracy does have a positive effect on growth, he said.
Besides, though there are exceptions, democracy has better promoted human development, stable growth and policies while long exposure to democracy has accentuated all of those, he said.
Though Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew argued that non-democratic systems are better for aiding faster accumulation of capital and adoption of policies, democracy should be valued for its constitutive, constructive and instrumental roles, said Professor Osmani.
Autocracies have sometimes worked through inclusive institutions, such as nationalism in East Asia, political Islam in the Middle East and Hindutva in BJP’s India but these have a toxic side effect of jingoism or hatred towards others over non-conformity, he added.
Living standards do not have to be at an improved stage in order for democracy to be sustainable, for democracy makes use of a “median voter theorem” which applies a uniform tax rate based on the median or the 50th percentile vote, he said.
This is supported by the poor for it brings a higher return and the decision maker does not worry as long as 51 percent of the votes including the median voter gives support, said Professor Osmani.