Yesterday's Observer newspaper reported on a unique global
project, Why Democracy? - whose centrepiece is 10 powerful TV films -
which aims to find some answers to the question posed. Initially developed by broadcasters in South Africa, from Saturday, BBC2 and BBC4 will show the films worldwide. They will
air in 200 countries to a potential audience of more than 300 million.
The
Observer also posed 10 questions to leading thinkers, politicians and
activists. They were:
- Are Dictators ever good?
- Are women more democratic?
- Who rules the world?
- Is Democracy Good for everyone?
- Can Politicians solve climate change?
- What would make you start a revolution?
- Who would you vote for as president of the world?
- Can terrorism destroy democracy?
- Is God democratic?
- Why bother to vote?
The films and the questions should stimulate debate on blogs across the world.
In the UK we can sometimes take democracy for granted but in South Africa they have only had it for 13 years. In Croatia, where we have worked with local politicians they have only had it for 17 years. In Burma of course the people are still struggling for it.
Therefore projects like this are still important to show why the "least bad" system of government still should be argued over and why there is still much to do to make democracy work.
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