Democracy vs. efficiency. 

As for democracy, indeed it is the most inefficient form of government. Imagine to make a decision, you have to make polls, listen to people, people must meet and talk, tell their representatives what they want, the representatives of the people should meet and again discuss, their decision must go through three readings, people must have more input, then vote on it and finally make it into law, and depending on the importance of the law, sometimes you have to call for plebiscite. Wow! That is very time consuming, expensive and inefficient. 

On the other hand in dictatorships, the dictator can make his mind in a second and what he says becomes law. What may take years in democracies to be resolved, in dictatorships can be resolved in a second. 

But dictatorships serve the interest of one person. Everyone else is treated like an animal. The wishes of people are not taken into consideration. “Farmoodand khafehshid” becomes the watchword and the voices of decent are punished severely. 

Dictatorships work only in a Confucian ideal form of the ruler. It works only if the ruler is a benevolent philosopher king. But the harsh reality is that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. We have very little examples in history of benevolent dictators. Perhaps our own Cyrus and Dario were the exceptions to the rule. But even then we may not know all the truth about them. Dictatorships have mostly been brutal and as the authority of the ruler increases, proportionately the freedom of people decreases. Hitler, Stalin, Musolini, Idi Amin, Saddam, Ghadafi, Franco, Pinoche, Mao, Marcos, Khomeini, MR Shah, were dictators. Are these the kind of rulers we want to have? 

Dictatorships are efficient, but they are not effective. If the dictator is not a thief, and if he is truly a patriot who cares about the progress of his people, he may run the country like his own hacienda and make it modern and prosperous, but at what cost? At the cost of the freedom of the people! At the cost of taking away their dignity and free will! The nation will be treated like well-fed cattle. The question is whether this is the kind of society that intelligent thinking people of the 21^st century want for themselves. 

Some dictatorships might have worked in the past when the majority of people were illiterate and could not decide for themselves. But in today’s world when every person is educated and can make responsible decisions, it is absurd that an entire nation leave their destiny in the hands of one man who in the case of Reza Pahlavi has no real life experience, has not had a job in his entire life and is not the most intelligent son of the nation.  

Democracies are not efficient but they are effective. They are effective because they reflect the will of people. They execute the will of majority and protect the rights of minority. And then majority and minority are not fixed. The today’s minority may become tomorrow’s majority. Human rights take precedence over other prerogatives.  Democracies are humane governments. They are government of people for people. 

Also let me venture and say that the inefficiency of the democracies are going to be reduced gradually as the communication improves and people can talk together through the Internet and vote online. 

The world is indeed a changing world. We cannot impose obsolete solutions on our nation that should look into the future, compete with other industrial and civilized nations and work with those who have already found their freedom and democracy. Only the humiliating stigma of being run by a dictator would make us feel a thirds world nation and add to our sense of inferiority vis-à-vis other people. 

It is time that we recover our dignity as a nation. It’s time that we walk shoulder to shoulder with other free nations and reclaim our place in the public opinion of the world. 

The road to rebuild our country is an arduous one. But there are no shortcuts. We have to educate our people who have been kept in the dark ever since. They have to learn the principles of democracy, tolerance, respect for the rights of the minorities, rule of law, freedom of expression and self-reliance. The sooner people learn about democracy the less they can be preyed upon by charlatan dictators who are nothing but wolves dressed in sheep clothing. These dictatorial regimes like the monarchists, Islamists, (MKO & IR) and communists can only thrive if people are kept ignorant. They are creatures of the night that can only fly in the darkness. Let the sun of knowledge rise. Let the people see the truth with their own eyes and hear the warbling of the of the bird of freedom with their own ears. The future belongs to the people. Let the light come in. let the truth be manifest. 

Payandeh Iran.