India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative • Hacker News Board

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#31

Post by whatshisface » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:06 AM UTC

shipp02 wrote: post #14

rayiner wrote: post #7

Modi has the highest approval rating, according to western pollsters, of any leader in the world. India’s elections are free and fair. That’s all democracy requires. Democracy doesn’t mean western democracy or liberal democracy. Shadi Hamid has done excellent work on this issue: https://www.brookings.edu/books/the-problem-of-democracy-ame... ; see also https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jan/18/the-problem-of...

The Guardian article is interesting because it helped untangle the idea of liberalism and democracy in my mind. How did they become so deeply linked?

Democracy means that people can vote. Liberalism means they get to choose who to vote for.

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#32

Post by mmooss » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:06 AM UTC

BowBun wrote: post #6

recursivedoubts wrote: post #3

thank goodness i live in a country in which the government doesn't attempt to control the narrative around democracy

Before someone bites the bait - this comment is sarcastic and 100% of democratic societies spend resources to control the narrative around their government/country/whatever. 100%.

> 100% of democratic societies spend resources to control the narrative around their government/country/whatever

That's like saying 100% of people lie. Yes, but that's meaningless - people range from highly trustworthy to miserable frauds. What the democratic societies actually do, and the consequences, is what matters.

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#33

Post by mmooss » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:08 AM UTC

0xDEAFBEAD wrote: post #9

BowBun wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Before someone bites the bait - this comment is sarcastic and 100% of democratic societies spend resources to control the narrative around their government/country/whatever. 100%.

It doesn't help that the nature of "democracy" is itself endlessly contested. E.g. both supporters and critics of the way Romanian courts have treated Georgescu seem to claim they are "defending democracy". There are important advantages to a social contract which is simple and unambiguous.

> It doesn't help that the nature of "democracy" is itself endlessly contested.

It's not really; I've never heard someone say that, in fact. The nature of propaganda is to make everything uncertain, and then everyone is frozen and nobody has done wrong.

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#34

Post by rectang » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:08 AM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #7

Modi has the highest approval rating, according to western pollsters, of any leader in the world. India’s elections are free and fair. That’s all democracy requires. Democracy doesn’t mean western democracy or liberal democracy. Shadi Hamid has done excellent work on this issue: https://www.brookings.edu/books/the-problem-of-democracy-ame... ; see also https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jan/18/the-problem-of...

The definition of democracy as "free and fair elections" alone is subject to tyranny of the majority.

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#35

Post by mmooss » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:08 AM UTC

blackeyeblitzar wrote: post #10

0xDEAFBEAD wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't help that the nature of "democracy" is itself endlessly contested. E.g. both supporters and critics of the way Romanian courts have treated Georgescu seem to claim they are "defending democracy". There are important advantages to a social contract which is simple and unambiguous.

I am pretty shocked at that Romanian court ruling though. It seems like the entire questioning of the election outcomes was motivated by EU leadership not liking the result of democracy. The decision to not stop at redoing the election but to then ban the candidate seems motivated by the fact that opinion polls show him to still be winning even today despite the alleged “election interference”, months after he won th…

Isn't it Romania, and not the EU? Also, what do you do about election manipulation? 'Nothing' isn't an acceptable answer.

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#36

Post by mmooss » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:10 AM UTC

jongjong wrote: post #15

As I get older, I realize increasingly that there is a huge gap between how most people think the government works and how it actually works... Also, the government and other entities which benefit from the incongruity spend a massive amount of effort constructing narratives to obscure the discrepancy in the public eye. If you boil it down and peek beneath the many layers of complexity and misdirection, reality is di…

> the good news is that generally, when the system is forced to change to become more transparent

Is that what is happening now?

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#37

Post by kaycey2022 » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:10 AM UTC

What is the problem the article is pointing out? A "democracy" index based on the "feelings" of some chosen experts is always going to be biased and problematic. Anyone getting the short end of that stick, if they were organised enough and had the resources, would fight against it irrespective of whether the rankings were justified or not. A large part of soft power is narrative control. There is nothing objective about narrative control. Which means powerful countries which weild a lot of soft power have managed to effectively control their narrative. And their narrative likely has little convergence with reality. No system should realistically expect the subjects to just cede control without any benefits accruing to the "controlled". So countries seeking to increase their own soft power will and should try to control their own narrative. It is easily one of the bigger captain obvious moments I have come across.

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#38

Post by alephnerd » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:10 AM UTC

mmooss wrote: post #28

rayiner wrote: post #7

Modi has the highest approval rating, according to western pollsters, of any leader in the world. India’s elections are free and fair. That’s all democracy requires. Democracy doesn’t mean western democracy or liberal democracy. Shadi Hamid has done excellent work on this issue: https://www.brookings.edu/books/the-problem-of-democracy-ame... ; see also https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jan/18/the-problem-of...

> India’s elections are free and fair. Are they, when people opposing one candidate are jailed? > That’s all democracy requires. That is certainly false. Democracy isn't mob rule, or as the saying go, it's not two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. Democracy is about self-determination for each person; if people in minority don't have self-determination, it's not democracy at all.

> Are they, when people opposing one candidate are jailed?

And pray tell who that candidate is and what was their platform?

> Democracy isn't mob rule, or as the saying go, it's not two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner. Democracy is about self-determination for each person; if people in minority don't have self-determination, it's not democracy at all.

And what is the definition of minority to follow? Caste? Religion? Ethnicity?

Each one of these intersectionalities are represented in Indian electoral politics at the local, state, and national level.

The BJP itself lost it's supermajority in the Lok Sabha (Parliament) after Muslim voters in UP flipped to the Samajwadi Party in the 2024 election, and the opposition parties have won major state elections such as in Jharkhand.

In fact, after the 2024 election results, Indian electioneering is starting to stop using the "Hindu-Muslim" trope because it's been overused, and the primary swing voting bank at this point is women, as was seen with the results of the 2024 General, Maharashtra, and Delhi elections.

> if people in minority don't have self-determination, it's not democracy at all.

I agree with you that Majoritarianism is NOT democracy.

But minorities are not uniformly opposed to the BJP either. Lower caste Muslims (Pasmanda) tend to lean towards the NDA (BJP's coalition) [0] and Muslim women have begun to lean in favor of the BJP due to women first welfare schemes [1]

Furthermore, assuming the BJP is India and India is the BJP is an extremely reductive take on Indian democracy that was clearly proven wrong in the 2024 General Elections. If it was then the BJP would have won a hypermajority ("Abki Bhar 400 Paar"), but got a severe drubbing forcing them to build a coalition with secular JD(U) in Bihar and TDP in AP.

[0] - https://carnegieendowment.org/2024/02/09/mapping-muslim-voti...

[1] - https://www.deccanherald.com/amp/story/elections/india/lok-s...

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#39

Post by kaycey2022 » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:11 AM UTC

whatshisface wrote: post #30

vmurthy wrote: post #2

A few things that stand out (not that it's that shocking!) - Narratives matter -- a lot . Second order effects of such subjective rankings are real . Imagine getting a credit downgrade because someone perceives the democracy to be under threat - "the government had reverse-engineered the ranking, strategically identifying procedural tweaks that directly boosted India’s scores in Delhi and Mumbai—the two cities evalua…

Statecraft at its finest? Next, I'll hear that KPI manipulation sets the standard for good engineering...

The real question is why did anyone even think KPIs were effective in the first place.

Re: India's Battle to Control the Democracy Narrative

#40

Post by jongjong » Wed, Mar 12, 2025, 1:13 AM UTC

mmooss wrote: post #36

jongjong wrote: post #15

As I get older, I realize increasingly that there is a huge gap between how most people think the government works and how it actually works... Also, the government and other entities which benefit from the incongruity spend a massive amount of effort constructing narratives to obscure the discrepancy in the public eye. If you boil it down and peek beneath the many layers of complexity and misdirection, reality is di…

> the good news is that generally, when the system is forced to change to become more transparent Is that what is happening now?

Well compare things now with how they were during feudalism. Things are a bit better for the average person.

The problem we have now is that the population is extremely propagandized/delusional due to powerful media, made possible by technology. But the same technologies can also create more transparency... Or the technology may cause more skepticism which is also good; e.g. As AI generates fake videos, people will adapt to be more skeptical.