Word: burnham
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Political scientists are disturbed by the steady voter decline since 1960. "We're building a huge vacuum at the center of our political system," says Walter Dean Burnham of M.I.T. He compares our 1972 turnout of 55% with Sweden's 90% and West Germany's 91%. Says Burnham: "Low turnout leads to special-interest voting. A small disciplined group can swing an election." Pollster Hart, in a major study of nonvoters published last month, was alarmed to find that young voters are not moving into the political process. "They're like a lost generation that doesn...
What really nettles Guyana's friends and neighbors is not Burnham's economic policies but the political rapprochement with Cuba. Burnham chilled relations with the Communist island in 1964, but in 1972 he not only recognized Cuba but urged such Caribbean countries as Jamaica and Barbados to do the same. Castro visited Guyana in 1975, and exchange programs began between the two countries. During Havana's Angolan offensive last winter, two empty Cuban planes returning from Africa refueled in Georgetown. Officially, Guyana has denied that a third plane, which stopped for fuel on its way to Angola...
...Burnham has tried to evoke some conspiratorial themes of his own. Guyana, says the government, is being subjected to rumors "designed to shake the confidence of the country" and to economic pressure-meaning a reluctance on the part of banks and international agencies to lend money. In fact, Guyana can show no such reluctance from the World Bank or the Inter-American Loan Fund. Guyana also claims there has been an increase in Brazilian troop strength on the southern border; Hillenbrand found no signs of tension...
More significant than any external threat-real or imagined-to the Burnham regime is the narrow, racially divided base upon which his "cooperative republic" tries to stand. Burnham consolidated his power through elections that were gimmicked in favor of the 40% of Guyana's 800,000 population who are black; Marxist Jagan and his P.P.P. draw much of their strength from the resentments of the 52% that is East Indian (the remainder are native peoples, known locally as Amerindians). The black P.N.C. retains a relative monopoly on patronage, and the laboring Indian majority believes Burnham's socialism...
Under the circumstances, it is no surprise that Jagan decided to re-enter the parliamentary arena. As Burnham moves left, he adopts positions that Jagan long and loudly held. Says Jagan: "We are not concerned with whether Burnham is doing it for purely political reasons to stay in power. We are only concerned with the direction the country is taking." Clearly, it is a direction to Jagan's liking...