In this editorial for the Deccan Herald, policy researcher Yamini Aiyar warns against the tendency to problematise the bureaucracy only as a means to undermine democratic processes.
As she writes:
“Too often, debates on State capacity veer in the direction of setting up a false dichotomy between democracy and efficiency (conflated with State capacity). “Too much democracy”, the argument goes, with its attendant chaos caused by necessary rules of deliberation-negotiation and consensus-building, can become an impediment to State capacity. Indeed, this is the ruse that has been used to legitimise strongman leadership across the globe.”
Such demonising of bureaucracy in the name of “efficiency” is often used as a way to circumvent institutional mechanisms for deliberations on matters of policy, the author argues. As she concludes: “The expectation that a less democratic, low-capacity State can endow itself with the capacity to do what the State ought to do in a complex and unequal social setting is a falsity spurred by a deep desire to legitimise undemocratic political regimes.”
Read the full article here.
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