The way society behaves requires development and maintenance of institutions which are beneficial to frame certain behavior expectations and values in the society. Most people would be taken aback if there is a glaring statement made about controlling and conforming to certain ideas and behavioral values. The same is even critical in the arena of politics where constantly ideas and values are propagated to the society in order to maintain a certain degree of control and social order.
Institutions come in various shapes and can blur the statement of conformance and control, such as in the platform of market behaviors; or even the idea of accepting certain laws in the juridical system. There is a distinct key feature of democracy whereas each member of the society is given the same right for a vote, save for eligibility. In some ways, limitation and expanse of the meaning of this eligibility may restrict democracy for what it is, for example a provision where voting rights are only for the men; or that voting rights are not equally distributed basing it instead on racial or other criteria that hinders a person or a group of people from having the access to voting rights.
A full democracy would assume non-discriminatory to its voters. As much as one would like to equate this equality with fairness, it could impose a conundrum in non-ideal situations. A full non-discriminatory policy against voters assume that all able minds would act rationally and are responsible residents of a nation. This puts everyone at the same par regardless of their history, the local political arena and situations and the pressing needs of the nations.
In a situation where social order may rank higher than the individual interest, discrimination could be seen as a better way to deal with the situation, allowing a social order in the form of political and economic interest of the nation to take place. There are however many instances where this ‘temporary, situationbased’ discrimination prolongs which leads to corruption. In some cases, the corruption that utilizes voices of the many and popular policies seen to be benefitting the masses can be tackled by changing the electoral system.
A first-past-the-post system for example could undermine the minority voices in the country and in order for debates to take shape a temporary proportional representation could be a viable solution until a perceived fairness is expected to have taken place. The drawback for this electoral system would be the efficiency of the government as debates and counter-arguments will need to take form prior to execution of solutions.
This is the arena where institutions can thrive, driving and shaping the opinion of many using a common cause, negating the negative connotations with politics and to downplay any ventured interests if they were to be done via political platform. An institution can debate an issue with different and equal member’s participation to come up with a perceived better solutions in harmonious way.
The main question remains, how do we find that common cause, and which version of truth is used as the yardstick of its worthiness.