Publisher's Synopsis
Serial country assessments by multilateral institutions, repeatedly describe Jamaica as a stable democracy while pointing to the polarization and violence that have besmirched its history as an independent country. It should be pointed out that the term 'stable democracy' narrowly refers to the fact that successive Governments have been changed via the regular holding of popular (not necessarily violence-free) elections. There is no gainsaying that Jamaica's 'stable democracy' of the past 53 years has failed to deliver national development, as poverty, economic and social inequality and violent crime have remained seemingly intractable problems. It is our contention that the opportunity has thus far been missed to engender the national cohesiveness prerequisite to the truly participatory democracy integral to sustained socio-economic development Participatory democracy has been defined as a process of collective decision making, combining elements from both direct and representative democracy. This gives citizens the power to decide on policy proposals while elected politicians assume the role of policy implementation This therefore provides the citizen with an objective index by which to determine electoral choices. The consistently declining participation rates in national election to below 45 percent, over the last three represents an insidious threat to democracy. This work seeks to cohere email exchanges between a set of concerned professionals with the objective of bringing to the fore, many of the concerns of the derisively regarded 'articulate minority'.
