Having lived for the vast majority of our existence as a species under a system of government which depended on a chief of some type – a tribal chief, a king or a dictator – we live now in an era in which democracy is the most widespread political system. It seems to have taken over. I am though concerned about its longevity and how firmly rooted it is.

It is worth noting that the original UN constitution made no reference to democracy until the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the cold war. It was only in 1999 that the UN’s Universal Declaration of the Rights of Man was modified to include:

“the right to full participation and other fundamental democratic rights and other liberties inherent in any democratic society.”

But we can see from recent events in Western countries, even those with a strong tradition of democracy, that democracy can go wrong. Difficulties emerge in part because of the party system. A major party is resistant to the normal pressures of natural selection, even when it no longer actually responds to the wishes of the people and the circumstances of the times. This is in contrast to the position of independent MPs who are much more easily removed. Parties will have money, investments and a party structure, all there to assure the continued existence of it and its philosophy in their darkest moments. So then it has an inertia which is difficult to stop. Its self-belief creates an impression of invulnerability. In turn, this discourages the formation or the growth of other parties or the departure of its supporters to join a new party, for fear of finding themselves in the political desert. Obviously even a party (or an organisation) with a long history can finally disappear. But the process is not straightforward. Normally it follows a period of tension which stretches the elastic until it finally breaks. It is similar to the evolutionary process of ‘Punctuated Equilibrium’. Dinosaurs dominated the world for almost 200 million years until a catastrophic change in the climate suddenly removed them. In turn, this allowed some other little animals to replace them, which had not until then made much progress: primitive mammals, our ancestors. The dinosaurs never made it back.

And it might just be that we are now in a state of change in the political climate which will initiate yet another era. Recently we have seen political earthquakes in Europe. In Germany, Austria, Italy, Poland, Hungary and other countries we have seen the growth of extremist parties which, until now, were at the margins or simply did not exist. In France, miraculously, a new party of the centre won. But elsewhere the traditional parties have not succeeded in recognising and suggesting solutions for the problems perceived by the voters to be important. And so democracy suffers. It suffers because when there is not a choice which speaks to the voters, they have a tendency to lose their faith in the system and not vote, because it’s not worth the bother, or they vote for extremist parties as a protest. Disenchantment with democracy has also arrived in the UK. According to a series of surveys, the proportion of our fellow-citizens who support an authoritarian leadership of our country - a ‘strong man’ - has increased from 25% in 1999 to 50% now. Those under the age of 25 are much more critical of democracy than the corresponding age group was 20 years ago.