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The spectacular debut of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the Delhi elections has heralded a new era for Indian politics – the dawn of a new alternative, born out of an extraordinary anti-corruption movement and a deep disillusionment with the mainstream, and not from the standard considerations of caste, class, territory or race.
Across the globe, in the Middle East post the Arab Spring, in the United States deep in the midst of the financial crisis or in Europe, where parties premised on a myriad issues ranging from global warming to euro-scepticism have proliferated, the emergence of an alternative political voice - often problematic and reactionary, but sometimes refreshing as well, cannot be missed.
Across the globe, in the Middle East post the Arab Spring, in the United States deep in the midst of the financial crisis or in Europe, where parties premised on a myriad issues ranging from global warming to euro-scepticism have proliferated, the emergence of an alternative political voice - often problematic and reactionary, but sometimes refreshing as well, cannot be missed.
The best known of these alternatives is perhaps the Tea Party in the United States, a grassroots political movement that began in 2009 to tap into the sentiment of Americans deeply unhappy with the government. It found support from star Republicans like Sarah Palin and John McCain during the election contest and fought on planks of reduced government, fiscal responsibility and strident opposition to the Obama administration’s sweeping changes to healthcare. In the years since its inception the Tea Party has come become hugely influential with 43% in a recent survey assessing that it held too much sway on the GOP, moving the Republicans far too much to the right.
Across the Atlantic, euro-scepticism seems to be a common thread for the emergence of political formations in Europe. The UK Independence Party, from being a grouping of just 6 people during its inception in 1994 has become Britain’s 4th largest party more recently, tapping the growing league of euro-sceptics who’ve opposed the country’s integration with the euro zone for the fear of undermining their own sovereignty. The party won about a quarter of all votes cast in local council elections across England earlier this year resetting the political landscape of the United Kingdom which heads for a general election in May 2015. According to the New York Times, the level of popular support drawn by the UKIP has “not matched by any insurgent party in an electoral contest with the mainstream parties, mainly the Conservatives and Labour, since Labour’s rise in the 1920s.”
In Germany too, yet another euro-sceptic formation – a grouping of German intellectuals and doctorates called the AfD is making waves. The party fell just short of the 5% threshold needed to win seats in the German parliament but has been getting respectable crowds at public meetings according to reports. It is now preparing for European parliamentary elections next year and hopes to cash in on the growing resentment about costly bailouts to countries like Greece, Italy and Portugal which it wants out of the euro zone.
There are then the other single-issue, reactionary configurations that have surfaced. Italy’s anti-establishment 5 star movement has “flourished amid the corruption and cronyism of Italy’s mainstream parties, riding a wave of recession-fuelled dissent in last February’s inconclusive general elections that saw it take the most votes of any single party in Italy, excluding those cast abroad” wrote the Financial Times about Beppe Grillo’s party that’s predicting a victory for itself in the European elections next may.
Much of this European ‘alternative’ is evidently right-wing, and has expanded on unidirectional posturing of anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim rhetoric. Whether it’s the UK’s BNP, or Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party in the Netherlands which is vocally xenophobic or Greece’s Golden Dawn which has risen to near 15% support in opinion polls according to the Wall Street Journal – and has been dubbed neo-fascist.
In the Middle East conversely, old political despotism has been obliterated but a thriving new alternative brand of politics that’s emerged has impelled the rise of radical political Islam.
Viewed from this global prism, what we’ve witnessed with the AAP in India is exceedingly positive. While still small in influence, and seen nervously by cynics as embodying a left of centre ideology that’s out of sync with India’s aspirations, AAP has got a rousing welcome even from corporate honchos for its clean, non-communal image. But as argued, for many across the globe, the ‘alternatives’, unfortunately are mere reactions to the establishment, and not representative of the fundamental change that AAP seeks to offer.
“It is not the extreme right that is on the march in Europe...but a much wider rejection of mainstream, established politics” according writer Jamie Bartlett quoted in the New York Times.
The gist of that argument sounds right from an Indian perspective too. Because the extreme right is on the march in India helmed by Narendra Modi. But posing a formidable challenge to that is the emergent ‘alternative’ the AAP- that promises clean, pro-people politics.
And the common thread between the two, as has been the case across the globe is a serious disenchantment with the current government.
