Elections, fantasies and acceptance
“It is again confirmed that we do not know ourselves and that we take our fantasies for real,” a Turkish friend wrote to me on Monday. It is difficult to feel just how much many Turks hoped that, at last, they would see an end to the slide towards greater autocracy and towards greater distance from the European Union.
My wise friend’s despair was expressed through the acceptance of the harsh reality born of elections and referendums. When we see the depth of the rift between different world theories, and most still stick to their own interpretations of events, then it is certain that division will worsen.
Our elections should not reveal such a rift. They do not have the weight of a choice between greater authoritarianism and the restoration of democracy, between the “West” and “Something Else,” as we are steady on our road of democracy and membership of the European Union. But the prism through which each of us sees and interprets events magnifies every difference, “confirms” every bias, crushes every serious discussion and effort to reach consensus on dealing with problems.
SYRIZA accuses Kyriakos Mitsotakis and New Democracy of “autocratic” behavior, while New Democracy presents SYRIZA as synonymous with chaos. All claim that only their side is fit to govern, all will see the election result as confirmation of their beliefs.
For some, the people will act wisely, for others, they will be victims of fraud. Reality, in other words, does not bring convergence, it simply confirms our hopes and fears.
In our elections the clash is between a government which managed much under difficult circumstances but made mistakes in serious matters, and an opposition whose main concern is to demonize its opponents and present itself as capable of magical solutions. This is what our opposition parties have always done, with the exception that with today’s electoral system, a prolonged inability to form a viable government may bring us to the very serious dilemma of “stability or chaos.”
And so, our elections are as important as those in Turkey. And yet, again we will not all see things this way. The future is upon us and we still do not share the same present.
