Newspapers have been suffused with so many negative examples of so-called democratic leadership of late that it was a refreshing change to see two notable Indian leaders put the interest of their nation beyond their own political careers.

By rejecting the post of prime minister, Congress Party leader Sonia Gandhi cleared the path for India to be led by Dr Manmohan Singh, a man she and many other Indians believe would do a better job of governing the vast country.

Gandhi's move to give way to Manmohan, a former finance minister and architect of India's economic reform in the early 1990s, will also spare India from divisive splits over her eligibility as leader in view of her Italian roots.

The other leader whose actions have stood out over the past week happens to be Gandhi's former rival, the outgoing prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee. The Bharatiya Janata Party leader accepted his party's stunning defeat last week with humbling grace.

"My party and alliance have lost, but India has won," he said.

This is the kind of exemplary statesmanship that politicians everywhere ought to learn.

It is certainly apt that the reaffirmation of the supremacy of democracy as the best form of government has come from India. It is, after all, the world's largest democracy, and arguably the most vibrant.

The country's commitment to democracy is a jealously guarded principle and its political arena has been distinguished for its ability to accommodate parties of all persuasions and ideologies, from the left-wing Communist Party of India to the rightist Hindu party, the BJP. This is unique to India and not seen even in Western countries where democracy is supposed to have originated.

Which brings us to the question: What is it about India that makes democracy thrive even as it flounders in so many other non-Western countries?

The 'argumentative' Indian

The arguments for the failure of democracy to take but a superficial form in most countries are far easier to arrive at. A common explanation is that democracy is unique to a Western philosophical tradition which began in ancient Greece.

This form of government is said to be an alien introduction to states created by Western colonial powers and therefore still sits uneasily with established local practices.

Yet this is an argument that can be easily discredited. India, as a nation state, is as much a product of 20th century decolonisation as many other former colonies. In terms of diversity, few countries can match its potpourri of racial and religious groups.

Shedding some light on this matter was Nobel laureate Amartya Sen who, while speaking at Cambridge University just days after the BJP upset, cast new light on the way democracy is popularly viewed.

Departing from his usual domain of economics, Sen delivered a provocative lecture entitled 'The Argumentative Indian' in which he attributed India's success in embracing democracy at its liveliest form and retaining secularity despite a deeply religious populace, to his countrymen's dedication to speech.

Here lies the secret to India's success: Indians may be garrulous, verbose and long-winded, said Sen, but this was essentially the practice of public debate and discussion which has rooted the tradition of democracy in India.

While democracy has always been linked to the freedom of speech, Sen took this argument one step further by saying that the constant exercise of this freedom is as essential in bringing about democracy as in keeping it alive.

By Sen's reckoning, the common definition of democracy has overlooked this fact for a long time.

"Democracy is not just about voting (rights) but also about government by discussion," he said.

Indeed, without public reasoning, how can there be participatory government?

Ending the monopoly

The power of popular discussions, said the celebrated economist, has also led to the emergence of inclusive secularism in India distinctive from the exclusive form that is often practised in Europe.

In supporting this, Sen highlighted the historical fact that religious tolerance was already evident in India some 2,500 years ago during the lifetime of the ascetic Buddha, and during the rule of 16th century Mughal Emperor Akbar Khan who was famed for his passion for inter-religious debates.

It is still very much the reality in present day India. Today, the Hindu-majority state is headed by a Muslim president while its government is led by a Sikh prime minister. The leader of its largest party, Congress, is a Roman Catholic born in a foreign land. Which other democracy, Western or otherwise, can lay claim to such diversity?

In contrast, debates over secularism in Europe are at a stalemate over the controversial French policy to ban displays of religious symbols in school. It is hardly a model for democratic and secular tolerance.

An underlying theme in the developments in India and Sen's incisive reading of the factors behind the success of democracy in his home country, is the unequivocal reclaiming of democracy as a concept which belongs to no one culture or civilisation certainly not what is collectively known as the West.

To debunk narrow-minded viewpoints, there is a need to change the one-directional focus of history. As Sen pointed out, there is as much evidence of public participation in government in India as there was in ancient Greece.

Religious tolerance has been part of Indian everyday life as early as 1st century BC when it became home to Jews, Parsis and peoples of other religious persuasions fleeing persecution in the West.

Rightly, Sen dismissed Samuel Huntingdon's claim in his infamous treatise 'The Clash of Civilisations' that tolerance is a quintessentially Western value.

Finally, in order to allow Asian pride in its rich tradition of enlightened government to grow, the debate has to be removed from the grip of autocratic leaders who have monopolised interpretation of 'Asian values' to serve their own political ends.

As demonstrated by the Indian example, 'Asian values' should not be confined to narrow interpretation of Confucian principles which discourage discussion of matters which challenge the status quo but rather should be expanded to include observation of what we know today as basic rights and freedoms.

The freedom to voice an opinion, the freedom to disagree, the freedom to open-minded discourse, and the freedom to choose leaders and to discard inept ones. These are some of the values that we should all embrace.


YAP MUN CHING, a former malaysiakini journalist, is currently pursuing further studies in the United Kingdom.