Word: systemic
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...into disregard after the 1997 financial meltdown proved that crony capitalism thrived in the absence of democratic checks and balances. In Thailand, as in many parts of Asia, members of the educated élite bristle at the notion that Western-style democracy is a one-size-fits-all political system. "You can't expect us to have a European- or American-style democracy here," says PAD member Visitchai Kemajitpan. "We should have our own Oriental democracy...
...South Korea to Thailand and Taiwan. But such mass protests were designed to overthrow dictators, not democratically elected leaders. In much of Asia, political frameworks now exist to remove incompetent rulers at the ballot box, making street rallies to throw the bums out largely unnecessary. Of course, no electoral system is perfect: vote-buying in villages, for instance, plagues some Asian countries. But it is only by going through several electoral cycles that democracies can consolidate and grow...
...Often, the media is muzzled, if not silenced outright. In 2007, at least 17 journalists were killed in Asia for doing their job, while in Pakistan alone 250 reporters were detained by security forces, according to media watchdog Reporters Without Borders. "Pakistan's inability to institute a democratic political system stems from the failure to build institutions that can moderate conflict," says Ayesha Jalal, a historian at Tufts University in Massachusetts, who specializes in South Asian politics...
...Across much of Asia, the courts are viewed as compromised, as in the case of Pakistan where the country's former Law Minister Aitzaz Ahsan describes the judiciary as "handcuffed." The rich and powerful are seen as finding their way around the judicial system. "People have an image that there's no equality under the law," says Choi Jang Jip, a political-science professor at Korea University in Seoul, referring to perceptions in South Korea. The stakes are higher in Thailand, where the former ruling People Power Party and two of its partners were banned last month in what critics...
...Three's Bailout I can't understand why there's no talk in Congress about moving auto manufacturers' health-care systems into the federal system in exchange for an equity investment that - as journalist Thomas Friedman has suggested - requires the hybridization of their entire fleet [Dec. 15]. The federal system includes several large health-care units. Why not take Detroit's health-care needs off the automakers' hands and develop a single-payer system before rolling it out on a national scale? Not having to worry about the medical needs of personnel would make Detroit automakers better able to compete...