Asia's Dithering Democracies

They called themselves the people's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), but their aims were hardly democratic. During their 192-day protest campaign, the PAD paralyzed Thailand, blockading the capital's two airports for eight days and besieging the Prime Minister's office complex for months. By the time the opposition alliance withdrew on Dec. 3, a democratically elected government had been disbanded by the country's courts and political street violence had claimed several lives. And should future polls bring back politicians linked with Thailand's ousted rulers? "The PAD will return," vowed alliance leader Sondhi Limthongkul, who earlier in the siege told his thousands of supporters to "shed your blood if it is necessary." (See pictures from the Thai protests.)

Thailand was once celebrated as a democratic oasis in a region awash with authoritarianism. Today, the Southeast Asian nation is reeling from its worst political crisis since a democracy movement toppled a military regime 17 years ago. A new government has been formed — the fourth in 2008 — but its Prime Minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva, was forced to delay his inaugural policy address because of protests by supporters of the previous administration. Hovering in the background is the PAD, which draws its ranks from the very middle class and élite that supported the 1992 democracy movement, and has as its ultimate aim a so-called "New Politics," whose fuzzy, oft-shifting aims have included the undemocratic step of appointing parliamentarians. "We're looking at a dead end politically," says Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political scientist at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. "It's hard to understand how democracy in Thailand has come to this."

That same point can be made today about many Asian nations. After the shackles of colonialism were overthrown, largely after World War II, the 21st century was supposed to herald the ascent of democracy in Asia. While parts of the region — from Burma and North Korea to Laos, Vietnam and China — are still governed by diktat, the past couple of decades have created a region that to all outward appearances is largely democratic. Over the past 10 years, some 20 Asian countries have held elections, and many have undergone peaceful transitions in government.

Yet throughout 2008, many Asians appeared to progressively lose their faith in democratic politics. In Thailand and South Korea, the streets have been convulsed by mass protests, despite elections that ushered in popular leaders in the past two years. Pakistan and East Timor are rapidly veering toward the status of failed states. Malaysia suffers from a paucity of good governance, proof that simply holding polls doesn't ensure a healthy democracy. Postelection riots shook Mongolia, while Bangladesh is trying to exorcise two years of military-backed rule with a strong voter turnout in its Dec. 29 polls that ushered the secular Awami League back to office. The Philippines, which staged the region's first People Power movement back in 1986, recently endured a state of emergency. Taiwan, where presidential elections 11 years ago marked the first time ever a Chinese society directly chose its leader, is turning against a new President in record time.

Even in India, the terror attacks in Mumbai uncovered a deep well of anger against the democratically elected government for its failure to carry out a fundamental function: protect citizens from harm. And Japan, the region's oldest democracy? In recent years the country has cycled through Prime Ministers nearly as quickly as fashion fads.

In many ways, the challenges of Asian democracy are a reflection of its youth. Democracy in the West evolved over centuries — and, even then, its proponents understood its limitations, as Winston Churchill did when he postulated that "democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms." Asia, for the most part, has raced through the democratization process in just a couple of decades. Though much of the continent considers itself democratic, only five of the 25 Asian nations polled in the 2008 survey of political and civil rights by the U.S.-based NGO Freedom House were deemed truly "free" — begging the question: Given the events of the past year, are Asia and democracy compatible?

Growing pains may be forgiven in emerging democracies. But if the current political instabilities are allowed to metastasize, Asian nations could tire of the notion of democracy altogether because it's considered too messy, ineffectual or corrupt. In South Korea, Mongolia, Taiwan, Thailand and the Philippines, a study by the governance-tracking Asian Barometer Project found that more citizens believed that the nations' recent democratic transitions had brought no improvement to their lives than those who saw positive changes. With time softening the memories of autocratic rule, nostalgia for overthrown dictators is spreading. Some are even calling for a resurgence of so-called "Asian values," a mix of paternalistic discipline and market economics that fell into disregard after the 1997 financial meltdown proved that crony capitalism thrived in the absence of democratic checks and balances. In Thailand, as in many parts of Asia, members of the educated élite bristle at the notion that Western-style democracy is a one-size-fits-all political system. "You can't expect us to have a European- or American-style democracy here," says PAD member Visitchai Kemajitpan. "We should have our own Oriental democracy."

Such sentiments weren't so controversial when regional growth rates marched upward with metronomic precision. But as Asia faces a global financial crisis, flexible and responsive leadership is all the more crucial. While the specter of economic mayhem catalyzed one of the most dynamic presidential campaigns in recent U.S. history, it has done little to spur Asia's democracies into action. Japan's parliament is unable to decide on an economic-reform package, while Malaysia and Thailand engage in partisan politics that has little to do with how to shield these export-led economies from a slowdown in the West. Indeed, Asian governance is failing in democracy's most basic undertaking: to represent the will of the people. Back when the region was poor and ravaged by war, Asia's citizens made an unspoken pact with their leaders, that economic progress could predate political reform. But, today, most Asians are fed and clothed, and a middle class flourishes. Where, then, is the accountability, transparency and justice Asians crave? Here are four areas in which the continent's democratic experiment is underperforming — and what Asia can do about it.

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