Almost all journalistic forecasts for 2024 emphasize that this will be the year of the elections. Every year they are, since elections are called in all of them, here or there. But the concentration of calls to the polls scheduled for the year that has just begun is extraordinary. There will be elections in some seventy countries, whose combined population is around 4 billion people, half of whom, around 2 billion, have the right to vote.
Of those 2,000 million, the majority, about 900 million, will be Indians, since India is already the most populated country in the world: in 2023 it will overtake China and exceed 1,428 million inhabitants, three more, right now, than the country. which we used to call “the Asian giant”. Whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has distinguished himself for his populist and religious drift, will obtain a third five-year term depends on the decision of those 900 million.
In terms of number of voters, India succeeds the European Union: some 400 million citizens will be able to elect the new European Parliament between June 6 and 9. This will not be just another election: a victory for the European People's Party could lead to its alliance with far-right formations, whose principles do not always coincide with those that have characterized the EU since its founding. The Spanish voter has sometimes considered the European elections as something distant, even alien; and yet, this year's events are transcendental for the community's future.
That said, the elections that will cause the most media noise will probably be those of the United States, which at the moment are shaping up to be another fight between two elderly fighters: the current president, the Democrat Joe Biden, and the Republican – but more Trumpist than Republican – Donald Trump. They will be held in November and will attract 160 million voters.
The list does not end here. The British will also be consulted, since Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has already announced his desire to bring forward the elections, in which he is thirteen points behind, according to the latest polls, against the Labor Party's Keir Starmer. And the Mexicans, who will choose between two women, Claudia Sheinbaum and Xóchitl Gálvez, for the presidency of a country with a proven sexist tradition, where the number of fatalities in the war against drug trafficking already reaches 350,000. And the South Africans, who could put an end to the majority of the ANC, the party of the much-missed Nelson Mandela, in power for thirty years...
The corny refer to the elections as “the festival of democracy.” Therefore, this year we would be facing a continuous party, like a bakalao route, in which parties would be linked with dance halls, festivals with festivals and discos with afterhours at polling stations around the world. But there are not only reasons for satisfaction. Among the many elections of 2024 are those in Russia, Iran and other countries in which the democratic ritual is pure farce, a mask for authoritarianism with moth-eaten imperial or theocratic ambitions.
In parallel, populism and the extreme right are advancing everywhere, also in countries with a good democratic record, such as the United States, the leader of the so-called free world, the country with the most economic power and the greatest military spending, where the deterioration of the system is manifested in different levels. Starting with the two candidates already mentioned, who disqualify each other, Biden recalls the ominous and extensive list of judicial cases in which Trump dabbles, and he assures that he is not physically or mentally fit to govern. And continuing with an electorate that gives Trump an advantage in the polls and celebrates, complicit, each of his bravado, lies or accusations, transforming them into an avalanche of new donations of funds for the tycoon's campaign.
Francisco de Quevedo said that “in the ignorance of the people is the sure dominion of the princes.” Today perhaps he would add that his downfall may also lie in such ignorance. This 2024 will be the year of the elections, yes. But, for all that has been said, it will also be the year in which voting will take place dangerously in the global democratic party. Hopefully the hangover from said party isn't monstrous.
