Democracy — A Strategy for Fair Conflict Resolution« Thread Started on Aug 8, 2007, 5:37pm » --------------------------------------------------------------------------------Democracy — A Strategy for Fair Conflict ResolutionProf. Dr. Thomas Meyer, Dortmund University, Germanyread at source>
http://telegraphnepal.com/news_det.php?news_id=1698In the struggle to establish democracy and in the cases of its failure in countries outside of the European Union, opponents of democracy often raise the objection that it is in fact only a culture of the West and therefore not so suitable for the rest of the world. It is something foreign to them. In the process, reference is often made to the history of European imperialism, along with the comment that it left behind a doubtful legacy of democracy when it withdrew from its former colonies. According to this objection, the establishment of democracy is only supposed to open the door in order to secure the influence of the dominant western market economy in the respective countries. Whoever shares such objections is no longer interested in improving and stabilizing democracy, but rather can be easily recruited for authoritarian regimes.This idea completely misjudges the nature, the goals, and the possibilities of democracy and ignores the conditions and the conflict of interests which contributed to the rise of democracy in Europe. In the discussions of the 1980s and 1990s of the 20th century, political power holders, especially in Southeast Asia, raised this objection against democracy. In general, it was connected with a similar restriction on the general validity of human rights.