The question I want to consider here is what can be done to improve internal democracy in the political parties in Guyana? As Jeron Mimpen claimed in the opening sentence of his paper (“Intra-party Democracy and its Discontents” – 2011), “The debate on the benefits of internal party democratization is inconclusive. Both sides of the debate seem to provide valid arguments, but neither are totally convincing”. However, the tradition has been for all our political parties to have a highly formalised and centralised structure consisting of groups, districts, regions, national secretariats, etc. These are usually combined with meetings and conferences at the various levels, in which the membership is expected to participate in policy making, elections of party officials, propaganda exercises, etc. Of course, the process is very much controlled and directed by the parties’ central secretariats, although they would have us believe that the parties are policy directed democratic institutions, which give proper priority to the interest of their members and allow for in-depth membership participation and citizen involvement in national policy making. That being the case, intraparty democracy should be of interest to them.
In my view, all the usual talk about democratic centralism, factionalism etc, is less the result of any ideological commitment and more related to the fact that these notions allow the ruling oligarchies to keep the troops in line and to lock themselves in the positions of power and authority in the parties. However, to really become inclusive and open organisations, the first – even if symbolic- act of parties such as the PPP and PNC must be to publicly jettison the archaic and autocratic Leninist concepts, which combined formal aspirations towards democratic principles with a high degree of formal and informal centralisation. Where high participation is usually channeled to the endorsement of positions pre-selected by a party leadership that is difficult to remove; except by constructed resignations.
The next important step that parties with liberal aspirations need to take is to relax their rules of membership. For example, the PNC constitution stated that members are “obliged to promote and defend the programme, principles and policies of the party at all times”, while those of the British Labour party simply state that it will have as a member anyone who “subscribes to the Party’s Principles and Objects and accepts this Constitution.” Relatedly, the rules attempt to stimulate openness and discourse: “Labour believes in a democracy in which all people can participate in decision-making on an equal basis wherever their interests are affected. To function effectively, democracy requires access to information and analysis through a media that is under diverse ownership and underpinned by effective freedom of information legislation. A commitment to democracy requires equality in political competition: with proportionate resources being available to all parties within the political system” (2009 – “Constitution of the Labour Party”).
There are many other suggestions of how we may overcome the stultifying atmosphere of closed party systems. Some have argued that public funding for political parties can have considerable positive effects on the development of internal party democracy. But this is a national constitutional issue and here I am focusing on intraparty issues. Parties could adopt on-the-spot secret ballots as a regular mode of doing business; give greater authority and safeguards for groups, districts and regions to chose their own officials, formulate their own policies and mobilise at all levels for the adoption of such policies; liberalise or simply eliminate rules on crossing the floor; facilitate proportional representation of minorities in all organs of the party; invite not only card bearing members but individual and organised party supporters to participate, if not vote, in party policy making forums, and adopt multicandidate primaries in choosing important party and national leaders.
I want, however, to pay special attention to some policies that could help to mitigate the effects of oligarchy. After all, although I believe that membership discontent and pressure is vital if changes of the sort I suggest are to become real, such pressure must be first directed at reforms which liberalize the oligarchy, for it is some form of the latter that must be tasked with making the changes.
Since Robert Michels identified the “iron law of oligarchy” in 1911, a whole range of recommendations relating to the design of organisations, the characteristics of members, the motivations of leaders, and the nature of the external environment, etc. have been suggested as capable of reducing the debilitating consequences of oligarchy in social organisations. In my opinion, Seymour Lipset, et al. point to one of the most important. Their study showed how the accidental development of political competition within trade unions and other social organisations allows them to avoid the consequences of oligarchic control if not the fact of it. In the organisations studied, the members were of relatively high status vis-à-vis the leaders and felt that they should have a say in policy making. (Lipset, Seymour M, et al, 1956 “Union democracy: The internal politics of the International Typographical Union” New York Free Press).
What we can deduce here is that organisations that wish to mitigate the effects of oligarchy should encourage the establishment of temporary/permanent internal interest groups, private and public open debate and optimal information flows. Primaries that allow for the full participation of the broad mass of the general membership can also aid the process. The Lipset study also suggests that organisations themselves can create a culture of contestation: empowering their members by training them to contest leadership directives.
One study of the Southwest Industrial Area Foundation, a network of community organisations in the United States, suggests that “oligarchy need not inevitably lead to the outcomes that are typically expected. The IAF achieves this via two interrelated steps. First, it builds in its members a strong sense of personal capacity. Added to this is an internal culture, developed through training and reinforced through ritual, that encourages members to confront authority, not simply in the political world at large but also inside the organization” (Paul Osterman, 2006 “Overcoming Oligarchy: Culture and Agency in Social Movement Organisations,” Administrative Science Quarterly).
Each of the suggestions above is problematic in its own way. For example, while useful, primaries can be a threat to party stability if the loser group becomes permanently obstructionist or splinters off into a new party. Then again, it might be thought extremely utopian of me to believe that the entrenched oligarchs in our older political parties will voluntarily teach members to challenge their authority! The point, though, is that strategies exist that can help to make our political culture, parties and general environment more open and democratic, even if, at the end of the day, membership and mass pressure is the central requirement for their implementation.
