Thanks to a combination of shrewd political tactics and powerful false narratives, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party appear to be headed toward an easy victory in the country’s ongoing parliamentary election. With that, the erosion of Indian democracy will almost certainly accelerate.
BERKELEY – India’s ongoing parliamentary election, in which nearly a billion people may cast their votes over a six-week period, should represent an extraordinary exercise of democracy. The bleak reality, however, is that the election appears poised to consolidate a decade-long process of democratic decay, which has included the decimation of liberal institutions and practices and weakening of political competition. After all, the leader who has presided over this process – Prime Minister Narendra Modi of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – remains wildly popular.
Apart from the dedicated and disciplined ground-level work by masses of volunteers for Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the fountainhead of the BJP, this popularity reflects factors sometimes similar to, but also quite different from, those fueling support for right-wing demagogues elsewhere.
As I noted in my 2022 book A World of Insecurity: Democratic Disenchantment in Rich and Poor Countries, such forces tend to find support primarily among less-educated, rural, and older populations. Yet Modi has the backing of educated, urban, aspirational youth. Whereas former US President Donald Trump, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan have struggled to carry major cities in elections, Modi had secured thumping victories in Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore.
BERKELEY – India’s ongoing parliamentary election, in which nearly a billion people may cast their votes over a six-week period, should represent an extraordinary exercise of democracy. The bleak reality, however, is that the election appears poised to consolidate a decade-long process of democratic decay, which has included the decimation of liberal institutions and practices and weakening of political competition. After all, the leader who has presided over this process – Prime Minister Narendra Modi of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – remains wildly popular.
Apart from the dedicated and disciplined ground-level work by masses of volunteers for Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the fountainhead of the BJP, this popularity reflects factors sometimes similar to, but also quite different from, those fueling support for right-wing demagogues elsewhere.
As I noted in my 2022 book A World of Insecurity: Democratic Disenchantment in Rich and Poor Countries, such forces tend to find support primarily among less-educated, rural, and older populations. Yet Modi has the backing of educated, urban, aspirational youth. Whereas former US President Donald Trump, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan have struggled to carry major cities in elections, Modi had secured thumping victories in Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore.