Let's all call it quits!

In some ways I understand it, but why is it so inevitable that when a leader of a political party loses an election they not only resign the leadership but they eventually resign as representative of the electorate that they just won.



Mr Brumby said emphatically after the election that he would stay on until the next election yet here he is today saying that it is better to get out of the way all together - and now at great expense and inconvenience the people of Broadmeadows have to go through a by-election to choose another representative.

No wonder people feel disillusioned and disempowered in the electoral process.

Diarmuid O'Murchu,a Catholic priest in a monastic community in the USA, said the following in his most recent publication, Adult Faith:

Governance as exercised across the contemporary world is an inherited patriarchal strategy, based on a top-down chain of command. It is inherently disempowering for the majority of humankind, and for most people it seriously undermines their development as adult selves.

He goes on to talk about democratic disempowerment and drawing attention to the fact that really just a very few people actually exercise power. Yes the people have the power to choose government and dispose of government if they are disatisfied, but the so-called "power of the ballot box" is a very thin veneer of what power is all about.

He then goes further describing the relationship between the powerful elite and the masses as one of co-dependency - the powerful elite need the masses to be passive, allowing them to exercise the power they have, and the masses need the powerful elite to be active because they realise the really don't have any power.

I am still working on many other ideas he raises in his book, but these words made me wonder about the authenticity of the ring of truth I seem to hear in them.

What do you think?