BUSINESS DAY TV: Political culture remains very much a key weakness in SA
Pat Thacker of the Economist Intelligence Unit, speaks to Business Day TV about the 2016 Democracy Index results.
Pat Thacker is from the Economist Intelligence Unit. BUSINESS DAY TV: SA dropped two places in the 2016 Democracy Index, coming in at 39 out of 165 countries. Now the ranking puts it in the flawed democracy category along with 56 other nations. Joining us now on the line from London to talk about the global survey is Pat Thacker, of the Economist Intelligence Unit. Pat … such an interesting topic, I want to start off, though, with the global rise in populism that we saw in 2016 — what does that tell us about democracy? PAT THACKER: It tells us really a lot of things: a year of global democratic recession and what you saw evidence of was clearly two big landmarks last year, Brexit and the election of [Donald] Trump. And what has become evident last year as the year went on there was a growing popular dissatisfaction, particularly in the developed world, with the key institutions of representing democracy, which is in a fracture, I would say in the democratic regression of recent year...
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