By Omar Shahabudin McDoom
Dr. Omar Shahabudin McDoom teaches political science at the London School of Economics where he specializes in the study of violent conflict, ethnic politics, and sub-Saharan Africa. He has held research fellowships at Harvard and Oxford universities and is the author of the Path of Genocide in Rwanda: Security, Opportunity, and Authority in an Ethnocratic State (2020). Prior to his academic career, he worked as a Policy Officer for the World Bank, a Legal Officer for the Government of Guyana, and on electoral missions for the United Nations and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. He is also an Attorney admitted in New York.
This is the conclusion of a two-part column. See Part I here: https://www.stabroeknews.com/2020/07/13/features/in-the-diaspora/a-sweet-tooth-some-bad-math-and-a-pair-of-red-underwear-an-explanation-of-persistent-ethnic-voting-and-two-party-dominance-in-guyana-part-1/
Why, in over 60 years, has no third party emerged to surpass the powerful electoral support the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) and People’s National Congress (PNC) command? Twenty-six parties have been founded to challenge them since they both began to contest elections in 1961. But not one of these parties has ever won more votes than either of them. Not even close. The two parties that have come closest tried various electoral strategies to mobilize voters without success. The United Force secured 16.4% of the vote in 1961 by using a dual class-ethnicity strategy, marrying the Portuguese business elite with the Amerindian community. The Alliance for Change managed 10.3% of the vote in 2011 with an explicitly multi-ethnic strategy, though it is not clear what portion of the Indian voter it won over. While both have been king-maker parties, neither has ever come close to being a king.
In fact, the persistent dominance of the PPP and PNC presents a paradox. The country’s electoral behaviour does not seem to match its electoral system. As students of political science will readily point out, “Duverger’s law”, as it is known in the profession, tells us that that a plurality rule – such as first-past-the-post – should lead to a two-party system. In contrast, proportional representation should favour multipartyism. We would expect then to see the formation of new ethnic parties to bid for the PPP’s and PNC’s core Indo- and Afro-Guyanese constituencies. Yet, oddly, in Guyana these particular two parties have endured under proportional representation. Why has Guyana defied expectations? The answer has to do with the historical timing of these two parties’ formation. Their foundation moment mattered.
Both the PPP and PNC were established at the time of the nationalist struggle for independence. They trace their origins then to the colonial era and claim liberation credentials. Liberation parties, and their leaders, have a special status in postcolonial party systems. They often enjoy a popularity that endures long into the post-independence period. It is a popularity that is capable of surviving even a poor post-liberation record on political freedom and economic growth. Think Mandela’s ANC in South Africa, Gandhi and the Congress party in India, Mugabe’s ZANU-PF in Zimbabwe, or closer to home, Williams’ PNM in Trinidad. Guyana then had two men and two parties who could both claim to be heirs to the liberation struggle to their respective supporters. This is the reason why both the PPP and PNC have managed to see off the various rival ethnic parties that have emerged to challenge them since their inception.
A Way Forward?
What then can be done to break the cycle of entrenched ethnic voting – and perceptions thereof – and endless electoral contests between the PPP and PNC?
The solution begins with recognizing that the problem has more to do with party practices than with people’s prejudices. Racism, while never non-existent anywhere, is not a permanent feature or incurable pandemic in Guyana. The nationalist struggle was a multiracial movement for 9 years between 1946 and 1955. The Working People’s Alliance, while never electorally significant since the loss of its charismatic leader Rodney, stands as a symbol of a desire from below to transition Guyana from ethnic to class politics. And the remarkable rise in the number of people identifying as “mixed” is a powerful indicator that the problem is more political than social. In 1946, this group represented only 10% of the population. By 2012, the proportion had doubled. A significant portion of Guyanese then seem to like each other enough to partner and parent across ethnic lines in increasing numbers. This fact is worthy of note. Contrast it with the social relations between Indians and Africans in places such as Tanzania, Kenya, and Uganda. The social segregation between these communities is stark in Africa in comparison to the Caribbean.
In the long term then, demographic change, driven by increasing interethnic unions, will help solve Guyana’s ethnic voting problem. But this will likely take several generations and span many decades. What can be done now?
Guyana’s “ethnic” problem is in fact primarily an Indian-African problem. Voting across other ethnic boundaries already takes place. Since the return to more democratic rule in 1992, the PPP, which already holds together Hindus and Muslims in a single Indian bloc, has counted on some portion of the Amerindian and Mixed vote to win. The PNC has relied on the same two groups to some extent. This is a significant portion of the electorate. Amerindians and Mixed people together constitute over 30% of Guyana’s population today. These two ethnic groups then have divided their vote between the two main parties. The PPP and PNC are already then, strictly speaking, multi-ethnic parties. However, both parties have learned to win without appealing to the core constituency of their opponent. The PNC did so by fraud between 1968 and 1985 and then by alliance in 2015. Its partner then, The Alliance for Change brought mainly Mixed and Amerindian – but an unclear number of Indian – votes to the cause of the PNC. The PPP did so between 1992 and 2011 by relying on Indian, Amerindian, and Mixed – but not many African – votes.
The PPP and PNC in fact invoke the language of multi-ethnic unity in their political discourse. If we relied solely on the parties’ public pronouncements, we might be forgiven for believing that the problem of ethnic voting results more from popular prejudices than from party choices. However, if one were instead to look at the historic composition of the two parties’ Executive/Central Committees, such a belief would be quickly dispelled. Insofar as names are indicative of ethnicity in the Guyanese context, Indians have been over-represented in the PPP’s leadership and under-represented in that of the PNC. This bias may not always have been deliberate. Ethnic homogeneity can result unintentionally through the perpetuation of social networks that bring in and prepare each new generation of party leaders. But the imbalance remains a problem that needs to be addressed
The obvious intervention point for change is the electoral system. Much has been written already on the possibilities for reform. Switching from closed to open party lists, encouraging post-election coalitions, creating a titular presidency, regulating the prorogation of Parliament, increasing the number of constituencies, setting stronger term limits, and establishing a constitutional court to adjudicate political disputes all feature among the pleas for change. Yet, for some, ethnicity is so deeply embedded in Guyanese politics that they believe no institutional change will ever make a difference. I disagree. The choice of electoral system is not inconsequential. I offer a counter-example in support of my optimism.
Trinidad and Tobago’s similar colonial history and ethnic composition – Africans and Indians are even more evenly-matched numerically – invite us to consider how and why the country’s voting patterns have differed from those of Guyana. Trinidad and Tobago has of course always had first-past-the-post. It is worth noting then that while there have been periods of ethnocentric politics, most notably between 1995 and 2001 when Basdeo Panday led the Hindu-dominated United National Congress to victory, the country’s record on bridging the Indian-African divide is much better than that of Guyana. Consider that the People’s National Movement, which governed Trinidad from 1956 to 1986, had historically counted Indian Presbyterians and Muslims among its supporters in addition to its core constituency of Africans. Consider that the National Alliance for Reconstruction, which governed between 1986 and 1991, was a genuinely multi-ethnic and multi-class coalition. Consider that the People’s Partnership, which governed between 2010 and 2015, brought together the Indo-centric United National Congress with several smaller African-dominated parties.
The point is that the electoral system can make a difference. Not that first-past-the-post is necessarily the best system for Guyana. To prescribe a system for Guyana is a technical task and beyond the scope of what I could write in this article, though I would welcome and readily contribute to any initiative to look at the question.
Nonetheless, I do believe diversification of the two main parties is the starting point on the journey away from ethnic politics. Diversification should be a stated goal for each party’s leadership. I conclude then by suggesting two concrete steps that could be taken to help achieve this. First, move from closed to open party lists. Open lists take the power to choose candidates away from a party’s central committee and give it to the people. As I believe it has been more party choices than popular prejudices that have resulted in ethnic voting, this change could help diversify the composition of the PNC and PPP. Second, require all positions on central committees to be open to vote by the full party membership and not to co-optation by a few. This would help weaken the established elite networks that, whether intentionally or not, reproduce ethnic homogeneity within each party’s leadership. A non-Indian presidential candidate for the PPP and a non-African for the PNC would, for instance, be a powerful symbol of each party’s sincere commitment to multi-racialism.
No change in the electoral system will matter of course if elections do not matter. We wait to see then if Guyana’s political leaders will respect the outcome of this election. Yet, at the same time, the incentive to forego democracy and to steal an election grows weaker if both parties believe their electoral system allows them a fair chance of winning.
I wish Guyana peace and prosperity.
