Collapse in politics’ credibility: Participate or accept the outcome

NOW that the first round of accusatory grandstanding is coming to a close — the blood-letting comes later — a dispassionate assessment of what the election means for our body politic and how it shapes our lives rather than political parties’ ambitions might just be possible. It would certainly be desireable. 

It might just be possible to step away from the base tribalism that has afflicted, and still afflicts, this State since its inception. It might just be possible, and certainly prudent, to try to grade our political process against the incumbents’ predecessors, their targets and their international peers. And society’s — in a general, neutral sense — hopes.

That assessment would be pointless unless it considered how individuals and communities interact with the national political process. A participatory democracy is after all dependent on participants, activists, champions, who will challenge received wisdoms, rattle cages and come up with more attractive, more effective alternatives to the tried-and-failed orthodoxies now no longer even threadbare.