An interesting phenomenon took place this year, that of democracy at work but not working for many of its adherents. The definition of democracy can be “a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.”
There have been times when a government didn’t get the result they wanted and so they brought out the propaganda machine and waited until they were confident of getting the desired result, or they did deals to make sure that their will prevailed.
In Denmark, a second referendum was held after voters rejected the Maastricht Treaty. A deal was done giving the country an opt-out of the Euro and home and justice affairs, and the second referendum was successful. In Ireland, a second referendum was held after the original referendum had rejected the Nice Treaty. Again, concessions were made and the second vote passed. Ireland also had two votes on the Lisbon Treaty.
In a BBC article on June 28th, it referred to the above examples and said: “In each case, the unanimous approval of EU members had been needed for treaty changes, so the whole process would have stalled if the referendums had not passed.”
The UK, as a whole, voted on being in or out of Europe in the vote on 23rd June 2016, and Brexit was the outcome with 48% voting to stay in and 52% to leave. Some of the 48% didn’t like the verdict at all and there were street protests and marches. Democracy hadn’t produced the verdict that they wanted – and expected! Although it was a binding UK vote, some parts of the UK who voted to stay in the EU thought that they ought to be allowed to remain as before. In a Daily Express article dated 28th November 2016, headed “This remorseless drive to overturn referendum result”, examples were given of famous British leaders who still hang on to some sort of hope that it was all a big mistake. It’s amazing what the human mind will come up with in order to get democracy on their own terms.
Then we saw street protests across the USA after Donald Trump was elected as the new President in November 2016. Democracy was again fine but only so long as the right result was reached and to many across the USA, this hadn’t happened.
Winston Churchill wryly observed: “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.” So, what form of government is best – perhaps a benevolent dictator? The definition is: “A benevolent dictatorship is a theoretical form of government in which an authoritarian leader exercises absolute political power over the state but does so for the benefit of the population as a whole.” But who would be the dictator? Human nature being what it is, no human being would, or could fit the bill, and so we get back to democracy as at present.
But there is a time coming when Jesus Christ will reign on earth as King of kings and Lord of lords, and He will rule with the best interests of everyone uppermost in his mind. He will execute justice and usher in the Millennium (See Isaiah 11:1-5). At that time, there will be some initial teething problems but as soon as earth’s inhabitants realise it is for the best for everyone alive, then resistance will cease and democracy will be forgotten, as the perfect form of government—true Theocracy—will be enjoyed for 1,000 years.
It shouldn’t be too long now!
