The perils of negative selection: From Trump's 'Kakistocracy' to India's 'China envy'

November 2024. Confronted with the prospect of Donald J Trump’s decisive victory in the 2024 presidential election, a 181-year British weekly newspaper, printed in magazine format, declared Kakistrocracy as their “word of the year”. What if Kamala Harris had won instead? Let’s not go there. I might add that the difficult word in question, which has not at all caught on, was more a case of sour grapes than cheekiness. For this venerable blab sheet, now known more for its style than substance, was among the many which opposed his presidency. The global media, by and large, still does.But back to the word. Kakistrocracy. What? To the millions, rather than the very few, who read the said rag, let me explain.Of the worst, by the worst...Yes, we've heard of democracy, meritocracy, aristocracy, theocracy, even mediocracy. Incidentally, I have often used the last variant instead of the more frequent mediocrity. The difference? Well, mediocrity is merely a fact, a circumstance, both mental and material, which we come across ever so often. We might even describe it as the general human condition. And mediocracy? That’s a bit more damaging. It is the rule of the mediocre. Again, we might pass it over as the norm rather than the exception.But Kakistrocracy? The megalogue in question revived this rather arcane (fit for Shashi Tharoor?) kind of word, rather unfairly I think. Especially considering that they did so exclusively for Trump’s second term in office. 120477778But what does the darn thing mean? Well, Peter Bowler in The Superior Person's Book of Words (1985) describes it as the government run by the worst, least qualified, or most unscrupulous. Made up two Greek words, kákistos (κάκιστος), which means “worst” and krátos (κράτος), which we easily recognize as “rule” given the frequency in English as the suffix cracy. Put together, the two, literally, add up to government by the worst. But, surely, President Trump’s cabinet, indeed, his whole team so far, does not qualify or deserve to be described by this pejorative epithet. Is it just English churlishness, bordering on bitterness, then? Perhaps, I would venture to suggest, on being proved repeatedly wrong? Not just about politics, but economics, its supposed forte, too.No wonder I called this an instance of sour grapes than cheekiness. But let that be for a moment. The more serious issue is of what, borrowing from Darwinian evolutionary biology, our political theorists, often short of both ideas and words, have characterised as “negative selection”. China envyNegative selection, in a nutshell, is how autocrats and authoritarians preserve power. By surrounding themselves with duds and duffers. So that they always end up looking good, if not better. It is also their way of clinging to power, by hook or crook, as long as possible.But, in this example, what is sauce for the goose is not quite sauce for the gander. For goose here refers to authoritarian regimes, while gander to democracies. Closer home, we seem to suffer from “negative selection” partly because of what I have called our “China envy”. We, too, long for a single party, single leader, even single god type of society which, luckily, is nearly impossible. For Jambu Dvipa or Bharat that is India, seems to have been chosen precisely to embody the opposite. Plurality rather than singularity. Even if we are happy non-dualists. medium120477898Indian pluralism is civilizational rather than merely social or political. It abhors the monopoly of power, which all great leaders secretly long for—or if we are talking about the goose—openly assert. So what do we do instead? Centralize power. Weakening ministers and ministries. Encourage the personality cult. Persuade the populace to put their stamp of approval on one leader alone. Press the button on the electoral voting machine blindly. But the Indian voter is not blind. Even to recognize the face of the great leader you must be sighted. Our electorate is endowed not just with keen eyesight, but also with sharp hearing, smell, taste, and touch. All of these, operating at once, even without the benefit of a highly developed or trained mind, translate into feeling, rasa, the essence of truth felt in the heart.To run a large country, an important economic, military regional power such as India, which is also the most populous nation in the world, we need multiple tiers of competence and leadership. In all walks of life and arenas of human endeavour. Even in Bollywood, as heroes age, the cast of supporting actors becomes more important, helping to draw dwindling audiences to theatres or eyeballs to OTT screens.Similarly, our political leadership may be in no mood to retire. After all, 75 is just a number. But, then, 240 is also just a number, as is 273. Or for that matter 300+ or even 400 paar. No doubt, India is far from being a Kakistrocracy. Our political class if replete with astute, intelligent, hardworking, and competent leaders. But let alone a meritocracy, we are also far from being a society that promotes excellence and punishes incompetence.Incidentally, those in India who suffer from the aforesaid “China envy” probably do not wish to acknowledge that the China Communist Party (CCP) is based on the simple dictum of perform or perish. Sometimes, literally.If we are to rise to the challenges of our times, we must reverse our deeply entrenched proclivity for negative selection, substituting it, instead, with positive selection. Instead of rewarding nonentities and nincompoops, placing them in positions of power and responsibility, we must encourage and reward talent. If we are really committed to Viksit Bharat, India’s growth trajectory, that is the least we can do.