8 Democracy and Social Movements

Contents

1. Objective

2. Introduction

3. Learning Outcome

4. Nature of Liberal Democracy

5. State, Democracy and Social Movement

6. Social Movement as Democratisation

7. Social Movement as Protest

7.1  Protest against Autocracy

7.2 Protest against Marginalization and Inequality

7.3 Protests against Gender Inequality and Marginalization

7.4 Protest against Ethnic Marginalization

8. Democracy and Social Transformation in India

9. Summary

1.  Objective

The objective of this module is to introduce learners to the linkages between liberal democracy and social movements. It introduces processes like mass politics and mass movement, and the extent of interdependence between state, social movement, democracy, democratisation and de-democratisation as explained by social scientists like Charles Tilly. It also reveals the influence of social movements on democracy. This module also interrogates the democratic transformation of Indian society.

2.  Introduction

Since French revolution the world has been moving toward democratisation. Until now no other political system proved to be the most desirable alternative to the democratic system of government. Rather, democracy has become a globally accepted form of government as out of 195 states in the world as much as 125 (64%) states are found to be the electoral democracies at present (Freedom House 2016; Puddington and Roylance 2016). Since democratisation has been the welcoming phenomenon for all nation-states, some of them have been in their transition phases; other are yet to follow and still a few others reject this process altogether. Countries like China also raise counter narratives against democratic government (Habets 2015). It is argued that democratic regime often become more protective to state than its citizens, more compatible with globalisation than civilisational diversity and more comfortable with modernity than traditional morality at present. Democracy also seems to be unfolding its true character in the form of mass politics and mass movements that challenges the malfunctioning of government. When the spirit of democracy gets limited to majority rule (Mahajan 2005), dissents take the shape of social movement.

It is true that attaining social and economic democracy is a difficult endeavour as the citizens do have different interests with different socio-economic background. Further, each citizen cannot equally access all of the democratic rights. Consequently, many of them are pushed or pulled toward forming their collective actions. The push factors establish democracy against authoritarian regime while the pull factors further help democratising the regime from its earlier form. Thus, democracy, democratisation and social movements are intimately connected to one another.

The social movements and democratisation – the most significant political processes have now been strengthening global democracy in the current century (Tilly 2004). The democratization process often motivates people to form social movements which further leads toward more democratization. But not all social movements contribute to democratization; they also lead toward de-democratization.

3. Learning Outcome

In this module, we would learn about the relationship between state, democracy and social movement and how and to what extent democracy as a process promotes democratisation. We would analyse the possibility of collective action and the extent of social transformation as brought forward in democratic India. This module enables us to examine the possibility, desirability and feasibility of social movements for democratisation.

4. Nature of Liberal Democracy

Democracy refers to a direct or indirect form of government that is ruled by the people and not by a single person or by a few persons or by military force. Hence, it is opposed to the governments of monarchy, theocracy, oligarchy, anarchy and dictatorship. In all democratic countries, the most key rights are the right to freedom and equality. However, all democracies cannot ensure such rights against undemocratic possibilities in their actual operation. It is the liberal democracy which promotes such rights inalienable and intrinsic to the individuals through its constitutional or statutory declarations (Doomen 2014). It also seems to play a bridging role between liberal individualism and democratic collectivism (Schmitt 1985). Besides, it ensures that no majority in power can suppress these rights. The liberal democracy protects citizens and their civil societies from the state’s arbitrary action and repression (Diamond 1999).

4.1 Features of Liberal Democracy

Like democracy, the liberal democracy has many features. However, some distinguishable features are significant for the effective functioning of a democratic government. Thus, to begin with, liberal democracy guarantees basic human rights and civil liberties equally. The democracy can only ensure individual liberty when it follows liberalism in true sense – liberalism and democracy reinforce one another (Plattner 1998).

Second, liberal democracy promotes an electoral democracy ensuring free and fair elections. The elections are held within a particular time frame or time interval which guarantees universal suffrage with secret ballot but with open and competitive election. This ensures the will of the people as they vote or vote out their political leaders in the government. Thus, it promotes equal participation and adequate representation (Habets 2015).

Third, liberal democracy generates multiparty system, at least two parties are necessary as one in power welcomes the opposition of another. The strong opposition can question illegitimacy of the party in power. The multiple political parties not only gain control of the people in power but also become effective in making coalition government if situation so demands.

Fourth, it must have a constitution that acts like a reference point guiding and supervising democratic functionaries in all aspects of their functioning. The democratic state must guarantee personal rights, economic rights, political rights and social rights to its citizens through constitutional provisions (Offe 2011).

Fifth, it believes in separation of powers – the legislative, executive and judiciary known as trias politic principles (Vile 1989 & 1967). This separation of power not only promotes checks and balances but also prevents the concentration of power in one exclusive branch.

Sixth, it evolves a government that is accountable to the people for any wrongdoings, and for that matter it is accountable to the electorate in periodic elections.

Seventh, the freedom of press and informed public are crucial features of liberal democracy (Herman and Chomsky 1988). The role of media is significant in the functioning of liberal democracy. Media has to disseminate free and fair information to the public.

Eighth, liberal democracy also promotes the lobby or pressure groups that work for the specific issues interest groups. It particularly safeguards the minority interests against majority rule.

4.2 Limits of Democracy

Turning any form of government into democracy is not enough but how it gets transformed into a participatory and social democracy is important (Huber, Rueschemeyer, and Stephens 1997). Democracy may be the worst form of governments as was once argued by British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill (Habets 2015). Some major limitations of democracy can be deconstructed in this regard.

First, liberal democracy may develop either an oligarchic form of government (rule by the few) or polyarchic form of government (rule by many). Such negative forms may develop due to a lack of good governance (Freedom House 2015) or decline of constitutional liberalism (Zakaria 1997; Habets 2015). Unlike direct democracy, liberal democracy relies on elected representatives who more often become unreliable to the people leading to what Robert Michels called ‘a decoration over an oligarchy’ (James 1995).

Second, liberal democracy often leads to class based-democracy where the rich people control politics and power. Consequently, the bourgeois democracy perpetuates its vested interests. Vladimir Lenin, the greatest critique of democracy, therefore commented that liberal democracy is an illusion of democracy as it tends to maintain bourgeoisie’s dominancy (Chomsky 2016).

Third, liberal democracy cannot avoid the possibility of a biased media and uninformed public. The distorted information through biased media is the weakest point of liberal democracy. The links between corporations and media may disrupt the very nature of true democracy. The corporate media, in the name of liberal democracy, discourages mass views contesting elite views (Herman and Chomsky 1988; Curran and Seaton 1997).

Fourth, the liberal democracy cannot make voting compulsory. As a result, true mandate for political position is largely enchased by the vested interests. In most liberal democracy the electoral turnout declines due to increasing tendencies of cynicism, apathy and powerlessness among the people (Offe 2011). The legitimacy of the electoral system gets further corrupted for which the citizens show their lack of interest in voting.

Fifth, social conflict is endemic in liberal democracy. Since the liberal democracy ensures cultural diversities and pluralism, the political representatives coming to power make use of ethnic and religious loyalties to stay in power. In the process, when some groups become hostile to another groups, it disrupts the functioning of liberal democracy.

Sixth, it contributes to lethargic bureaucracy. Bureaucratic inertia and ritualism spoil the dynamics of democracy.

Seventh, the periodic election shortens the public policy. This is because the ruling political party in order to retain power stress on popular and short term policies. As a consequence, the long term democratic vision and mission get jeopardised.

Eighth, the decision-making behaviour becomes more economic than political in liberal democracy. The real issues of politics get diverted toward narrow economism as the voters are to be pleased with benefits that may ultimately harm the interest of people at large.

Ninth, the majoritarian tyranny is a usual outcome in liberal democracy (Deneen 2015). The minority then becomes vulnerable to the majority rule. In the name of majority, the representative government favours the elite groups who perpetuate their personal interests by depriving the masses.

Tenth, the liberal democracy often fails to stop corruption and misappropriation of public funds caused by irresponsible elected representatives as it is quite observable in the developing country like India.

Finally, it often deviates from the free and fair election (Habets 2015; Huntington 1991).The excessive use or abuse of politics disrupts the actual formation of political structure in liberal democracy. The unscrupulous politicians resort to immoral practices – use of money and muscle power in contesting and wining election.

5. State, Democracy and Social Movement: Mass Politics and Mass Movement

There has been changing relationship between state, democracy and social movements in the nation-states over the centuries. The formation of state from its early Greek state to modern state has been possible due to the changing intervention of democracy in the history. But such changes could become possible only due to the emergence of mass politics, and mass movement in the nation-states. The states and democracy are mutually supportive and disruptive of each other. Due to rapid spread of democratic rights, the state has become the target of collective action now (Tarrow 1994). The state and its policies and programs also encourage, discourage, shape and transform the process of social movements. Thus, the old variety of western and eastern states has been replaced by the modern states at present.

However, from Hobbesian contractual state to Weberian bureaucratic state, the conceptualisation of democracy has been controversial in the world. The social movements have been leading democratic state toward democratisation. However, it depends upon the democratic extent of a political regime and the degree of interrelationships among the state and social movement that has been ensuing over the time. Any political regime – democratic or undemocratic – reflects a set of political relationship between its government and citizens. The dynamics of such relationship reflect upon the action and reactions among its state and citizens over the time. However, the citizens’ collective contention can radically disrupt their relationship. The undemocratic regimes witness the civil wars, whereas the democratic regimes tolerate social movements (Tilly 2007).

Tilly (2007) has categorized the democratic and undemocratic regimes into four major types such as high-capacity undemocratic, low-capacity undemocratic, high-capacity democratic and low-capacity democratic. As per his understanding, the public politics and voices usually get restricted and coerced by the security forces in the high-capacity undemocratic state. This high undemocratic repressive government is subjected to change either by the political struggle from the top or by the mass rebellion from the bottom. Nevertheless, the multiple political actors like warlords and ethnic blocs, the multiple mobilisations like religious or ethnic movements and the violent struggle like civil wars, etc, occur in the low-capacity undemocratic state. It is assumed that the contentious politics restricted to revolution in the former category may result into multiple types of collective actions in the latter category.

The high-capacity democratic state facilitates the frequent collective actions – political party mobilizations, interest group activity, formation of social movements, etc. It also becomes more effective in monitoring the public politics and political violence. On the contrary, the low-capacity democratic state become less effective and facilitates high violence in public politics. Thus, the dynamics of collective action depend upon the high or low level capacity of both democratic and undemocratic states.

The mafia, criminal gangs, civil armed forces, external political forces, hostile religious movements, regional separatist mobilisations, autonomous ethnic mobilisations, corruption networks and so on spoil the democratic capacity of a state (Offe 2011). The leading consequences have been the mass politics and mass movements. Mass politics is the mass oriented political activity that generally occurs in a state beyond its institutionalised political settings. It occurs when a large number of people engage with political activities – seem to be spontaneous, unplanned, undemocratic and controversial in changing and challenging the established political regime of a nation-state. The extent of mass politics however depends on the dynamics of mass political parties.

The mass politics gives rise to mass movements as for instance, the way Industrial revolution occurred in the Western world. The strength and stability of a democratic state depend on its legitimacy and effectiveness (Offe 2011; Lipset 1981). The mass politics ensure a political platform to the minority and marginalized sections – the underrepresented people to gain legitimacy and effectiveness of democratic regimes. It can challenge the democratic inertia and constitutional ritualism developed in the democracy. Therefore, the civil rights movements, environment movements, anti-nuclear movements, anti-war movements, etc., get prompted by mass politics and mass movements in the nation-states. It paves the way to achieve a mature democracy of better government and better citizens. The strategy of mass politics and mass movements is also used by political parties, trade union leaders, political activists, NGOs, pressure groups and the like.

It is however argued that direct collective actions – the mass movements – usually hamper the smooth functioning of political institutions because the people in power then take policy decisions in haste without going through the merits of real political issues. Such populist politics is, therefore, considered anti-democratic in nature.

6.   Social Movement as Democratisation

Charles Tilly (2007) claims that the prospect of a democracy lies in its degree of democratization and collective mobilization. To him, the essential elements of democracy include a state and its citizens-the former controls the legitimate use of violence within a territory while the latter usually comes under state’s control and protection. The democracy promotes certain relations between state and its citizens (with rights and duties), but its democratic degree depends on the extent the former conforms to the latter’s demands. Further, a regime becoming democratic depends on whether the political relations between the state and its citizens would be broad, equal, protected, or mutually binding.

The relationship between a state and its citizens gives rise to two changing processes – democratization and de-democratization. While the process democratization refers to a movement towards broader, more equal, more protected and more consultative relations, the de-democratization process refers to its opposite (Tilly 2007). To him the democracy must include the processes of integration of interpersonal trust networks into politics, insulation of politics from economic and social inequalities and elimination or neutralization of the coercive powers – state, military elites, warlords, clans, etc.

Tilly traces the instances of social movements first in the West after 1750 and thereafter these movements have spread to the world through colonialism, trade and migration (Tilly 2004 &2007). He also explored social movement as a process of change, collective action and contentious politics. As a process, the social movement tends to have its own life cycle as it has its own reason to emerge and grow as well as to decline in due course of time. Both Blumer (1969) and Tilly (1978) have identified social movements with a four-stage process – preliminary stage, coalescence stage, institutionalization stage and decline stage. In the first stage, the social movement emerges with the public issues and discontentment, in the second stage the public issues and discontentment get publicized, in the third stage social movement moves toward its bureaucratization, and in the final stage public issues are not taken seriously either due to success or failure of social movement.

Tilly has also identified social movements with three dynamic elements – a campaign, social movement repertoire and WUNC (worthiness, unity, numbers and commitments) by which the ordinary people can participate in the public politics (Tilly 2004 & 2007). By ‘campaign’ he means an organized public effort that makes collective claims on targeted authorities. It refers to a public campaign by a group of claimants on some objects of claims. The ‘social-movement repertoire’ refers to combined forms of political action such as public meetings, solemn processions, vigils, rallies, demonstrations, pamphleteering, petition drives, associations and coalitions. Finally, the WUNC displays participants’ concerted public representation. These context-specific dynamic elements clearly relate social movement with the process of democratisation and nation building.

6.1 Democratisation or De-democratization

It is true that social movement contributing to democratisation breaks loose the autocratic rule. Its reverse process may also equally happen – de-democratization. For instance, after the World War I Weimar Republic introduced a measure of democratization in Germany, whereas Hitler’s seizure of power in 1933 was an example of de-democratization (Tilly 2007). All social movements in the process of grappling with a given situation either establish democracy or change the democracy in different ways. The polity model and mobilisation model explained by Tilly substantiate this dynamics differently.

The polity model is a system-level model by which its components, i.e., government, polity, coalitions and contenders help changing the government. According to Tilly, the French revolution is an example of this. But the mobilisation model explains the extent of collective action along with the variables like political interests, organisation, mobilisation, collective action, and opportunity. Tilly and Tarrow (2007) have further developed political opportunity structure (POS) with combined variables like open and close polity, presence and absence of allies and supporters, the divided elites, etc., at the macro-level. They also explain the variation of contentious politics from area to area and time to time.

Democratisation as a democratic process of change breaks loose the authoritarian or autocratic rule. However, the extent of democratisation is often determined by the nature of political structures and elite political action. This is also true that no political elites or autocratic authority so motto go for democratisation unless the collective action compel them to do so (Tilly 2007). But the democratisation can be activated through both top down mobilization and bottom up mobilization. This leads to two important approaches to democratization – populist approach and elitist approach. As per the former approach, democratization takes place as a bottom up process, whereas it is top-down process in the latter case. The social movements from below promote democracy by creating public space and transfer of power. On the contrary, the top-down process of democratisation may lead to new forms of authoritarianism. For instance, the labour movements in the 1970s immensely contributed in the making of welfare states in the West, but in twentieth century the neoliberal turn of the West questioned the welfare states and forced the government to stop providing such welfare.

The other processes like modernization, urbanisation or any other social change also promote both democratization and social movements because they help in increasing social networks, equalizing access to resources, insulating public politics from existing inequalities or proliferating trust networks (Tilly 2004 & 2007).

7. Social Movement as Protest against autocracy/inequality/marginalisation

Though social inequality of one or other type is omnipresent in all societies, only a few of these societies can promote social movements against social inequalities. And it is the democratic form of government that often encourages social movements as compared to other forms of government. The movements against undemocratic patterns of inequalities – gender, race or ethnicity seem to be more mobilised in the Western democratic countries than in non-democratic countries like China and Russia. Scholars like Tilly (1986), Della Porta and Tarrow (2004) and Tarrow (2005) have also analysed the undemocratic political regimes – their weakness, institutions and social structures in general.

7.1 Movements against Autocracy

Any autocratic form of government becomes despotic, tyrannical and dictatorial in nature (Celestino 2011). It is also true that protest movements whether mass-driven or elite inspired or both have been challenging the autocratic governments all over the world. However, the nature and result of citizens’ protest movement against autocratic governments is region specific and elite or mass specific. For instance, the protests against any autocratic rule organised by the elites in Latin America and southern Europe (O’Donnell and Schmitter 1986; Przeworski 1991) are qualitatively different from the protest movements organised from below – the masses in African, Asian, and post-Communist countries (Collier 1999). Some unusual protests also occur in the countries where collective action in any form seems to be under stiff autocratic control. In the countries like Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Palestine, the citizens are fighting for their democratic rights whereas the movements against autocratic rule in some other countries belonging to Arab league are becoming slow and even not being grounded with local citizens.

The host of Arab revolts – civil disobedience, civil resistance, silent protests, sit-ins, protest camps, self-immolation, social media, internet activism, defection, demonstrations, revolution, riots, urban warfare, uprising, insurgency emerged in-between 2010 and 2011 is popularly known as “Arab Spring” (Ashley 2011) and “Arab awakening” (Aljazeera 2011). Consequently, since 2010 a series of protests and demonstrations against autocratic governments occurred in Arab has been causing a network of diffusion in the Arab-majority states of North Africa and Middle East (Zhukov and Stewart 2013).

However, unlike the political protests, mass politics, mass movements and social movements that take place in the democratic world the people’s protests against autocratic governments in the Arab world reveal a unique picture. These protest movements are organised against the imported democracy-usually perceived as European strategy of democratising the Arabian world. Despite the counter movements like revitalising the Islamic regime in Arab, many protest movements in Egypt, Syria, Oman, Yemen and Morocco were also found successful against the autocratic governments. For instance, the people’s protests could overthrow the autocratic governments once perpetuated by Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia, Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, Muammar Gaddafi in Libya and Ali Abdullah Saleh in Yemen (Ruthven, 2016; Lynch 2012; Massad 2012).

Similarly many African, European and Asian countries have been confronting the challenges of people’s protest movements due to diffusion impact of Arab springs. Burma (under military rule from 1962 to 2010) could bring many political and economic reforms during 2011–2015 due to a prolonged democratic movement led by Aung San Suu Kyi and her party National League for Democracy. The democratic revolution through Facebook campaign also reached Egypt and Myanmar in 2011 (Shah 2011).

7.2 Movement against Marginalisation and Inequality

There is dearth of study on possibility and feasibility of social movements against marginalisation in the world. It is also true that the agency and politics of marginalised groups are hardly recognised and often suppressed or undermined by the dominant groups. It is normally perceived that the subalterns cannot mobilise themselves for collective action. In the developing country like India the social movements against marginalisation and inequalities are usually perceived as law and order problems. The “authentic essence and liberating presence of the subaltern groups” even in the academic discipline like sociology was largely missing in India (Garada, 2013). Indeed it has been a critical heart searching for dalit, tribal and gender in Indian sociology (ibid). Now the subaltern consciousness though has gained momentum but grapple with stiff mainstream oppositions in India. It is true that the marginalised and socially excluded groups lack strategy, resources and support to mobilise collective actions. However, their physical and cultural traits being stigmatised by the society and disapproved by the dominant groups destine them to be discriminated in accessing the resources required for survival in the society. As a result, they suffer from genocide, ethnocide, ethnic-cleansing and xenophobia often caused by the dominant groups. In order to overcome their socio-cultural, economic and political marginalisation, there has been much group specific collective action in the democratic nation-states. For instance, the unemployed persons have mobilised several collective actions in the Europe (Didier and Royall 2010). Instances of collective action against inequalities organised by women, dalits, adivasis, Muslims, elderly, young, minorities and other marginal groups are found in India (World Bank 2013).

7.3 Protest against Gender inequality and Marginalisation of Women

It has been documented across time and space that inequality based on gender contributes to large scale marginalisation of women. It is just a coincidence that women are more illiterate, poor, unemployed, homeless, or manual worker than man. The feminists reacting to such gender inequality and discrimination eventually developed the feministic ideology known as feminism in the western world. Then, in course of time, the feminism became a movement that exposed the extent as well as the reverse of masculine domination. The feminists of different types have organised social movements for gender equality, equity and equal opportunities in the society, though differently (Moosa-Mitha 2005).

Thus, the liberal feminists aim at gender equality and equal opportunity, the Marxist feminists visualize the possibility of women to have equal access to and the control of the capitalistic means of production, the radical feminists explore the ways to retaliate the masculine repression or escape from the cage of feminine subordination, the socialist feminists reject gendered based dichotomy like public–private spheres and emphasizes women’s equal opportunities in public sphere and the postmodern feminists reveal the linguistic and social construction of gender inequality and exploitation.

However, the women’s movements in different forms are often contested in the countries like India where religious diversity is tolerated (Sen 2000, Chaudhuri, 2004). But like western wave of feministic movements we can also have Indian waves of women’s movements. The first wave explicates the reformation of patriarchal practices and mobilization of women’s political participation, the second wave reveals the resurgence in women’s political activity and the third wave results in women’s right and empowerment. Furthermore, the contemporary Indian feminism delves with many unique issues (Chaudhuri 2005).

7.4 Protests against Ethnic Marginalisation

The racial or ethnic inequality perpetuated with social prejudices and stereotypes sometime result in xenophobia even in the democratic countries. The ethnic causes of unequal treatment and opportunities or mass incarceration have provoked social movements in many countries. However, in country like India, Bangladesh, Australia, Canada or Germany where ethnic diversity is prominent, ethnic conflict becomes endemic. For instance, the ethnic groups like Tamils and Sinhalas in Sri Lanka, Shias, Sunnis and Kurds in Iraq, Malay and Chinese in Malaysia, Serbs and Croats in the former Yugoslavia and Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda, Turks in Bulgaria, Greeks in Albania, Kurdish in Germany, Jews in Hungary and Hmongs in Thailand have engaged themselves in prolonged ethnic conflicts. Such conflicts also occur when the ethnic minorities challenge their concerned governments against discriminated policies and programmes (Bates et. al. 2003). For instance, countries like Srilanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Iraq, Turkey, Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Sudan, Rwanda, Philippines, Australia, Canada, former Yugoslavia, Germany and the former USSR have faced such challenges (Hagg & Kagwanja 2007). 

The politics of ethnic identity has of late become an established fact all over the world. The mass ethnic politics have led to riots, insurgency and civil war in a multi-ethnic country like India. Since its independence, India has been confronting the challenges of resolving the crisis and troubles related to its ethnicity – language, religion, tribe, caste, etc. Even the policy of linguistic reorganisation of states since 1950s could not end this problems. States like Punjab, Kashmir, Jharkhand, Telengana, Assam, West Bengal including the North Eastern states have witnessed armed conflict and secessionist movement for long.

8. Democracy and Social Transformation in India

After 1947 India became the largest democracy in the world. She also became a sovereign, socialist, secular and democratic republic. However, Indian democracy has also been witnessing both democratic and anti-democratic wave since Independence. Challenges like partition, influx of Hindu refugees, communal tensions, ethnicity, persistence of caste exclusion and tribal marginalisation have prompted collective action in many parts of India. This is despite the fact that Indian government, unlike Pakistan, had promoted administration and army free from theocratic control. The civilian control of administration and army helped promoting democracy in the beginning (Tilly 2007). However, the elitist nature of congress party in term of caste, religions and regions soon made Independent India to move toward an authoritarian and majoritarian democracy. It could not check majoritarian tyranny against minorities and elite rule against masses. Some early human right associations emerged in Bengal, Andhra Pradesh and Punjab attempted to move the country toward its democratisation during post-Independence time. They fought for the rights of the working class, small peasants, marginal farmers and landless labourer (Kothari, 1989). Another process of democratization came into being in 1967 when the state level parties suddenly stumbled on power. However, India witnessed weakening of democracy in 1970s when, faced with so many crises, Indira Gandhi declared emergency in the country. Jayaprakash Narayan’s total revolution against the authoritarian democratic regime at the centre at that time signalled the power of social movement to foster democratic values. As a corollary, the Janata government which came to power later was politically more liberal than the congress party.

The strengthening of Indian democracy through democratic collective actions continued later. These movements started pleading for right to information, right to environment, right to rehabilitation, right to life, right to self-assertion and against undemocratic practices in the country. Indian democracy emerged in its unique forms in 1990s and coalition politics strengthened the dynamics of democratisation. Now, it is also increasingly confronting the challenges of multiparty politics and rise of civil society activism in the form of anti-corruption movement. The democratic dividend is also evident in caste losing its hierarchical significance (Srinivas 2003). Media exposures of undemocratic practices have also strengthened the voices of civil society.

But, at the same time, processes related to de-democratisation due to inter-religious conflict and inter-ethnic conflicts in the country found new expressions and language. One may however argues that these are in reality expressions against the homogenising tendencies of Indian state. The sub-nationalist movements for separate state (Bodo Land, Gorkha Land, Khalistan etc) challenged the centralised politics in India. At the other spectrum, environmental movements like Chipko movement, Appico movement, Silent Valley movement and Narmada Bachao Andolan (Shah, 2004) are able to critique certain modern processes of development. Issues of gender, minority, dalit, and tribals are also finding new routes of expressions. As a result India is witnessing contrary processes of democratisation and de-democratisation. The real challenges India confronts now include separatism, casteism, religious fundamentalism, leftist extremism, along with socio-economic issues like inequality, exclusion and marginalisation.

Obviously, the ideals of democracy are yet to fully realised and actualised in India today. The studies on post-independence social change reflect both complementary and contradictory relationship between democracy and social transformation. Despite India being a large and diverse democracy, there is continuity of poverty, unemployment inequality, along with issues like casteism, communalism, and regionalism. Despite the long saga of rural development programmes and introduction of Panchayats in rural India, issues of disparity, deprivation, displacement and divide persist in rural India (Jodhka 2002; Alexander 2000; Oommen 1985 & 1984).

In liberalised India, the economic and political elites have been able to exert their influence in each and every sphere of social life. The religious and cultural minorities very often become targets of Majoritarian politics. Increasing occurrences of crimes, corruption, public violence, and public insecurity encircle us as we move towards a global society. The process of rich becoming richer is accompanied by the poor getting encircled by ‘poverty regime’ (Breman 2007) in the countryside. Rise of violence against Dalits, tribals and other minorities is a testimony to the growing culture of intolerance in contemporary India. All these prove that we have hardly made use of the democratic dividend during the last six decades of Indian independence and also allowed extremism to grow at certain pockets. We might conclude with Balakrishnan (2016) that India has failed to nurture individual and collective capacities. There has been far too little effort in public policy to create spaces where citizens interact freely and peacefully.

9. Summary

So far democracy is found to be the most desirable form of government against monarchy, theocracy, oligarchy, anarchy and dictatorship worldwide. Further elevation to democracy – the liberal democracy – also claims to ensure no majority rule to suppress the rights of minority, to oppress the movement of citizens/civil societies and to disrupt the democratic possibilities in its actual functioning. The empirical evidences however do not completely support the theoretical possibilities. The conceptual-empirical dilemma demystifies the illusions of democracy at present global scenario. It often deviates from the free and fair election, perpetuates with bureaucratic inertia and ritualism, cannot avoid biased media and develops either an oligarchic form of government or polyarchic form of government. It is a matter of concerns that the democratic regime seems to have gone far away from its true democratic spirit perpetuating with colonial legacy, western aristocracy, feudalism and national elitism in the world. In this context, we cannot think of a democracy without thinking of citizens’ safety, liberty, rights and equality. Likewise we also cannot attain it fully without collective action. The collective actions or social movement promotes democracy like political activism. It shapes and reshapes democratic government thereby exploring and extending the democratic regime in flexible and viable direction. It is just like the moving wheels without which no government can run or speed up.

Charles Tilly’s approach to democracy epitomises this facts comprehensively. Now the civil rights movements, environment movements, anti-nuclear movements, anti-war movements, etc. prompted by mass politics and mass movements in the nation-states are leading toward two important political processes – democratization and de-democratization. While the former process refers to a movement towards broader, more equal, more protected and more consultative relations, the latter process refers to its opposite. The mass movements as direct collective actions also disrupt the smooth functioning of political institutions. It so happens that the people in power then take policy decisions in haste without going through the merits of real political issues. Such populist politics is therefore considered anti-democratic in nature.

It is also true that protest movements whether mass-driven or elite inspired or both have been challenging the autocratic governments all over the world. However, the nature and result of citizens’ protest movement against autocratic governments is region specific and elite or mass specific. For instance, unlike western type, the Arab’s revolts have been causing a network of diffusion for protest movement against autocracy in the Arab-majority states of North Africa and Middle East. Arab springs revolve around many issues – local, regional, national and international. In other words, while targeting their respective autocratic governments, these movements also challenged the western politics of democratisation as countermovement.

Similarly the ethnic conflict and women’s movement also reveal unique undercurrent. There are many empirical events where the ethnic movements keep on mobilising collective actions for the provisions of affirmative discrimination, regional autonomy and ethnic state, ethnic separation and secession. However, due to lack of required strategy, resources and support in organising collective actions the ethnic minorities usually suffer from genocide, ethnic-cleansing and xenophobia caused by ethnic majority worldwide.

The women have also been uniquely organising protest movement against gender inequality and discrimination in the world. The Feminists are able to expose the extent as well as the reverse of masculine domination in the western world. The different types of feminism – liberal, radical, Marxist, socialist and post-modern are energizing the women’s’ movement differently at global scenario. Consequently, feminist waves have emerged to reveal and rectify the gender based inequality and marginalization in the society.

Nevertheless all these movements and counter movements have resulted in the democratic and anti-democratic waves in the global level. In the former wave, the changes brought forward by the reforms or revolution often lead to more democratic government whereas in the case of later, the changes brought forward by the revolution may lead to less or no democratic government. After the first, second and third waves of democratisation in 1820–1926, 1945–62 and 1970s respectively, the world democracy has been confronting a reverse wave as argued by Habets and Huntington.

In this context, the Indian example provides us a brilliant story of both success and failure of a democratic regime. After 1947 India became the largest democracy in the world. However, owing to several socio-economic, political and demographic reasons, India democracy has witnessed turbulence since Independence. The elitist nature of Indian political system soon made Independent India to move toward an authoritarian and majoritarian democracy. It could not check majoritarian tyranny against minorities and elite rule against masses. But, at the same time, fight against Emergency and authoritarian regime strengthened the dynamics of democratisation. India continues to face challenges like terrorism, political extremism, communalism, fundamentalism and regionalism. The religious and cultural minorities very often become targets of Majoritarian politics. Increasing occurrences of crimes, corruption, public violence and public insecurity encircle us as we move towards a global society.

The opening of media control since economic liberalisation also had visible impact in popularising public discontentment. Grassroots empowerment of people through local self government has extended the corridors of power to the countryside. Further, the human right associations and civil societies have been moving the country toward its democratisation over the time. Use of strategies like filing of public interest litigation (PIL), seeking information under Right to Information Act, formation of citizen awareness programmes, political campaigns, NGO movement etc., have benefitted Indian democracy. The hierarchical society traditionally based on the ritual purity and pollution has been debunked and demystified to a large extent in modern India. The democratic rules of law, constitutional safeguards, statutory commissions, political rights, legal rights, etc, have been challenging the primordial social order in the society. The democratic regime over the decades has matured enough to handle caste-based stigma, gender stereotypes and tribal isolation in post-Independent India. The political dynamics of Indian democracy with a vibrant multi party system and tolerating protest movements have brought a significant social transformation in India today notwithstanding continuation of certain issues of social, economic and political concerns.