Bärbel Mauch
 Democracy as a Precondition for integrated Development
 
  1. The ECLAC Proposal of "Changing Production Pattern with Equity"

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The central idea of the ECLAC development conception for Latin America is the simultaneity of technical progress, social development and democracy on the way to integration into the world market. ECLAC assumes that a modernisation strategy which intends competitiveness on a high level of technical progress and on increasing productivity requires a minimum of social equity and political participation. Therefore social equity and democracy are not only compatible with a modern market-based economy but are conditions for the achievement of this competitiveness.
     
  1. The Conception of Democracy
The ECLAC conception of democracy transcends the usually dominant idea of political institutions regulating the liberal market. Democracy is understood in a triple sense:
  1. democracy as the aim of development meaning societal and personal self-determination,
  2. democracy as an institutional arrangement to introduce development processes in a consensual way and
  3. democracy as a social process of increasing equity.
Democracy in this sense contains three institutional levels:  

This concept of democracy is part of the tradition of the Latin-American social and participative understanding but refuses its populist and corporalist elements. ECLAC emphasises the importance of the formal and institutional aspects of the democratic system.

There is an integral interrelation between democracy and social equity: Democratic representation of all sectors of the society is a requirement for social equity, increasing social equity increases the legitimacy of the democratic regime and helps to stabilise it.
 

  1. Democracy and Competitiveness

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ECLAC recognizes the problematic relation between these two sectors of its development conception: The aim of integration into the world market requires the improvement of the production patterns which comprises professional politics. It follows from that that the political actors do not take into account the needs of the population any more and the possibilities of political participation are limited.

Furthermore institutional innovation of the enterprises and of the societal sectors which are confronted with the integration into the world market involves increasing social imbalance. Consequent democratisation is the only alternative to these developments. ECLAC calls for consensus-building as the right measure to handle the challenges and reach a minimum platform of agreements. This consensus-building takes place on two levels: the enterprise and the society.

     
  1. Reform of the working relations
The use of modern technologies and the aim of increasing productivity require a basic restructuring of the education system and a reorganisation of the enterprises. Workers have to be seen as real employees who should identify with the aims of the enterprise and participate in different ways, especially in the increasing productivity in form of participative wages: "Participative wages serve the economic transformation (because they contribute to increasing productivity), social equity (by increasing the security of the jobs) and democratisation (by strengthening the social cohesion)" (CEPAL: Equidad y Transformación Productiva, Santiago de Chile 1992).
     
  1. Concertation in the Society
The reform of the education system has to do justice to another task: The educational sector has to give social values and ethical norms and to form a civic conscience and civic responsibility. These qualities mark a modern civil society which is a condition for long-term development. Competitiveness and economic growth are necessary for the functioning of a civil society. The formation of citizens with sense of societal responsibility requires the active participation in a common project as is proposed by ECLAC.
     
  1. Reorganization of the State
Apart from the importance of the market-managed process ECLAC attaches conclusive value to political regulation in the transformation to compatibility of democracy, social equity, and competitiveness. In contrast to neoliberalism the ECLAC conceives a powerful development state which has to intervene selectively in favour of the productive base of the society.

Towards the aim of changing production patterns with social equity the state has to be restructured substantially: The inclusion of those groups which have been excluded previously from the political process is necessary to prevent that economic development , i. e. the integration into the world market, progresses at the expense of social equity.

Institutionalised interaction between state and private actors is a condition for reaching this aim and implies a far-reaching decentralisation of the political administrative machinery.

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