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Merit based Vs. geography based polls?
The world today is surging ahead with daily advances in the fields of science, medicine, engineering, software, and technological innovation. This is augmented with cutting edge research, institutional reforms, and application of modern management concepts and dynamic knowledge to revolutionize the world in almost every field of human activity.

Surprisingly, whilst every other institutional or industry counterpart has modernized itself, the political institutions around the world are still stuck in a 17th century flawed mindset of geographic centricity.

Fractious segmentation of the community based on geography and sectarianism has entrenched the parochial over cosmopolitan; the zealot over the rationalist; the proselytizing over the ecumenical; ethnocentricity over universality; superiority over inferiority; and sectarian over the deistic.
This is the root cause for much of the world’s social, religious and ethnic unrest, as geographic- centric electoral systems promote sectarianism and divisive lowest-common denominator politics and the increase of internecine wars over cultural and social differences.

When the world analyses the underlying causes that ripen the conditions for community dissent, it will recognize that the geographic centric electoral system is one of the prime culprits. The Westminster model has subliminally primed the politicians to be obstructionists by calling the minority group the “opposition”. No wonder that we have a parliament that fosters oppositional thinkers instead of much needed parallel thinkers’.

Prejudice and discrimination are the twin based evils inside the geo-centric model. This enables extremists to exploit festering sectarian divisions to advance destabilizing agendas and create a cycle of oppression and repression. This creates the ideal breeding ground for terrorism to take root, and for militancy to replace moderation, and for bullets to replace the ballots.
If one examines terrorism-rife states like Ireland, Philippines, Indonesia, Middle East, and Sri Lanka, geographic segmentation takes center stage with sectarian issues at the forefront.

Race and religion are emotive issues, and human beings, however enlightened or educated they may be, are easily manipulated and provoked to act irrationally. Mischievous third parties can, with little effort, divide a peaceful nation on an emotive sectarian issue.

Recent world history is dotted with examples where human beings have descended to levels unimaginable, committing brutal acts against their fellow men in the name of religion and race. The blame for violence shifts on a predictable pattern from community to community, with all revolving around an aspect of geo-centric sectarianism.

In Northern Ireland it is a religious denominational issue, with one Christian group against another Christian group - Protestants versus Catholics. In Iraq, it is a case of Sunni Muslims versus Shiite Muslims. Similarly in Sri Lanka, it is between two closely related ethnic groups, the Sinhalese and the Tamils, and soon the Moors and the Malays, the Buddhists and the Christians could follow. In all of the foregoing cases, the opposing groups have common genealogical roots and share similar cultural practices. Yet they are easily provoked and divided on language, caste and religious issues.

It is clear from observing all of the sectarian conflicts around the world that there is no solution that has brought a sustainable peace to any party that has pursued solutions based on perpetuating the flawed geographic model.
Until the penny drops on this insight, the world is doomed and destined to keep spinning the wheels of the peace wagon in one place with no real movement towards a permanent resolution. Lamentably, the role of peacemaker usually falls upon the politicians wielding legislative powers, who have a conflict of interests. The politicians can rarely see outside their geographic constituency blinkers, and thus can never advocate a solution that goes against their interests.

The current practice of segmenting voters into groups based on their geographic domicile must be replaced by creating functional constituencies around vocations clustered according to economic, social, cultural and ecological activity. The proposed system encourages alternative social alignments that will build constructive consensus based politics instead of destructive tribal identity based politics.

This new approach will disperse the geographic territoriality; transcend opportunistic parochialism; and foster overlapping economic, environmental, social and cultural interaction to help create new positive linkages that crosscut the present ascriptive identities and lead to the establishment of a functional meritocracy.

Although sociologists of everyday life will no doubt continue to distinguish character traits and work ethics of different nationalities and ethnic groups, individual identity in the 21st century is now more dependent on the chosen profession and the workplace, and the global trends affecting each vocational field. Consumers and job seekers have little tolerance for Puritanism, paternalism, orthodoxy and fundamentalism.

The trans-constituency Vs. narrowly conceived group identities
The geographically elected politicians and the governments they form will never be able to see the real cause for their inability to serve the needs of the community and country, as the political institution is unable to remove the 17th century geographic blinkers. Cynics point out that even if they do realize the need to jettison the antiquated geographic constituency model, they will not correct the foundational error underpinning the institutional failure, for it will mean that the politicians will be out of a job under a functional constituency system! Self-interests will propel them to hang on to a system that does not serve the interests of the community!

Experience, expertise and educational qualifications will determine the choice of candidates for each functional constituency, as the peers are unlikely to elect anyone of a lesser calibre. The nation will move towards a merit based political culture under the proposed system.

Ancient kula system of division, society was organized on vocational lines
Under the ancient kula system of division, society was organized on vocational lines, and unlike the present divisions in the caste system, the old caste system did not have a superior / inferior distinctions, but more admiration for each individuals’ prowess in their areas of expertise, much the same way one admires a musician or a cricketer or an artist or an architect for their talents and craftsmanship, with recognition for their acumen.

The classic class struggles will not get perpetuated, as no opportunistic politician can tap into real and imagined frustrations of the rural masses who aspire for the lifestyle of the urban elite. For there will be no such geographic catalyst to create such a polarity in the community. Instead, individuals will identify themselves as belonging to a particular economic sector, instead of a geography, and thus will vent their frustrations about the lack of policy support or market development initiatives to improve their domains. Instead of the present blanket across the board unifying themes of dissent, the functional constituencies will narrowly focus on the economic sectors that are flourishing and those that are languishing.

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