Constitutional dictatorships – OR: is the era and ethos of 'strongman' governments gone for good? (1/4)

IT has been a year since a new government voted in by the people of Sri Lanka brought the issue of types of political leadership into the forefront of reflective civics.

- By Wijith DeChickera

In the dark years preceding this unprecedented regime change, the Aragalaya ('people's struggle') critically engaged with a 'strongman administration' that promised much but delivered little. It also ended in ignominy despite the hype and hoopla of its apologists.

The issues that led up to our island-nation defaulting on its sovereign debt repayments and subsequent bankruptcy brought on widespread introspection on what failures of governance in the past three decades and attendant leadership styles led to the country's abysmal fate.

This has prompted academic research, as well as armchair curiosity, seeking to understand the issue of failures in governance by surveying the scarce literature on political leadership. And also by appropriating lessons still to be learned about the mirage of political messiahship which fails to live up to its promises.

It has led to assessing the contribution of leadership styles to failures in government over the past three decades and more as well as critiquing the 'strongman' style of political leadership based on personal ambition fuelled by the attractiveness of 'Great Man' theories.

Critics of the style have striven to evaluate the most pertinent aspects of other leadership approaches in search of the holy grail a holistic framework for a fresh take on political leadership in Sri Lanka today, arguing inter alia as to why 'strongman' administrations need to be a thing of the past.

Perhaps no more pressing a time than when past presidents who came into power through parliamentary procedure rather than a poll, and on the broken back of the Aragalaya then (one they broke through heavy handed policing) are accusing those who defeated them democratically of implementing a constitutional dictatorship.