As a student in a remote part of India in 1960/ 62, I had a personal admiration for two of the then BIG world leaders. One was our own Jawahar Lal Nehru; and the other was the charismatic John F Kennedy (JFK) of the US. We did not have TV's at that time, and the radio was the all important home communication device. Once I had heard a great and spirited speech on Democracy, being delivered by JFK. It ran something like this ...
"The heart of the democratic faith is in the dependency of government, upon the consent of the governed. The grand right to every man and woman to have an equal voice to select ones own government and, thus, to shape ones own laws, is a RIGHT, unique to free democratic societies"
And, as a youngster (aged about 13 yrs in 1962) I had been influenced by the local politics (I lived in Kerala State, where we had a Communist government), and had a greater feeling for Communism than Democracy! But this great speech created and kindled tremendous interest in democracy. From that time till today my ideas and actions have all been dictated by the diktats of Democracy
Over the years, writings of personalities/ economists/ historians ... had great influence; two of them being: The Affluent Societies by Kenneth Galbraith, and ECONOMICS by Nobel Laureate, Paul A Samuelson.
Looking back today, I wish to observe and infer the following:
(1) Democracy tends to breed a sense of equity and self respect in every citizen; yet the very same democracy, by virtue of the same token, allows Capitalism to ultimately dictate the world ... something like the Communist dictatorship of the "proletariat"
(2) These and the other various wordly experiences, within this 59 years of my life, have made me wonder if Capitalism (which thrives in democracy) would ultimately lead us to (what we call in Thermodynamics, through the principle of ENTROPY) the "heat death of the universe"!!!
Hope to hear about the feelings and experienced views of the members of this forum
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