The Best Democracy in the World: Visions of the 14 Kerat Reformer

 I had this on my FB status update: 

I don't care a wee bit if ISA is around or not, what is important is the ability to provide food on the table for my family, quality education, a roof over their head and all of these should be accessible to all. The gap between the top and the bottom is getting bigger and becoming pretty obvious.

That kinda sums up how I feel about this whole ISA thing.

Today the "14 Kerat Re-Former" talks about making Malaysia the Best Democracy in the World....

ISA repealed to make M’sia world’s best democracy: PM:

Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said Sunday the repeal of the Internal Security Act was part of efforts to make Malaysia the best democracy in the world. The Prime Minister said the repeal of the ISA was possible at this time because of the success in developing the nation, the increasing maturity of the people and the greater awareness of human rights in society. "It was not due to pressure from any quarter," he stressed at his Aidilfitri open house here that was attended by about 50,000 people. Also present was his wife, Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor. Najib said that changes to the law were part of the political transformation that the government was carrying out from the aspect of human rights. "The time has come for us to take another step forward not only in economics and education but also in upholding democratic principles," he added. He said the Barisan government would continue to champion the cause of the people "in all aspects" for their well-being. The Prime Minister said the uniqueness of Malaysia must be preserved with multiracial harmony as the country surged ahead. - Bernama Source here

Lu biar betul Pak Cik.....

Boleh masuk Harian Metro nih...

How do you measure the Best Democracy anyway....

Gerardo L. Munck in a special project for World Bank published the paper titled “Measures of Democracy, Governance and Rule of Law: An Overview of Cross-National Data Sets”

The paper aims to provide the reader with a summary of the available indices in the market Current efforts to measure concepts related to political processes face an important conceptual challenge. As the range of concepts used by researchers and policy makers interested in understanding the political process has grown, so too has the search for relevant measures. But because the concepts to be measured have not been systematically defined, measures of these concepts have frequently fallen prey to a key problem. Indicators that relate only vaguely to a concept are used as measures. And indices are created by combining indicators that are probably best seen as measures of different concepts. As a result, the validity of the measures is open to question.

 To avoid this problem, this paper suggests that it is useful to distinguish between three closely related but distinct concepts: democratic regime, democratic governance and rule of law (see Figure 1). 

The concept of democratic regime is understood as referring to the access to government offices and thus is defined, in strictly Schumpeterian terms, as a mechanism for the selection of leaders. In turn, the concept of democratic governance is seen as referring to the process whereby government make and implement legally binding decisions. Finally, the concept of rule of law is taken to refer to the manner in which government treat citizens, including those that occupy a position within the state. As I show next, these conceptual distinctions help to organize the existing data sets and to better identify what concepts are measured by these data sets. 

 Existing Data Sets: The State of the Art

The measurement of the concept of democratic regime has been a concern within academia for some time and the generation of indices in particular has been the subject of a fair amount of analysis (see Table 1). These indices have tended to be minimalist, in the sense that they do not include important components, such as participation. Moreover, though they tend to correlate quite highly, there is evidence that there are significant differences among them. Nonetheless, most of these indices are firmly rooted in democratic theory and, with some important exceptions (esp. the Freedom House Political Rights index), offer disaggregate measures as well as an aggregate measure. Beyond these indices, in recent times much effort has gone into generating measures of important elements of the democratic regime (see Table 2). In comparative terms, the measurement of the democratic regime and its various elements is more advanced than the measurement of other aspects of the political process. Source here

The World Bank as usual after getting a framework, would then spring into action to consolidate most of these indices to help folks like you and me in navigating the labyrinth of datasets...

We draw on existing notions of governance, and seek to navigate between overly broad and narrow definitions, to define governance as “the traditions and institutions by which authority in a country is exercised. This includes (a) the process by which governments are selected, monitored and replaced; (b) the capacity of the government to effectively formulate and implement sound policies; and (c) the respect of citizens and the state for the institutions that govern economic and social interactions among them.” We construct two measures of governance corresponding to each of these three areas, resulting in a total of six dimensions of governance: 

(a) The process by which governments are selected, monitored, and replaced: 

1. Voice and Accountability (VA) – capturing perceptions of the extent to which a country's citizens are able to participate in selecting their government, as well as freedom of expression, freedom of association, and a free media. 

2. Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism (PV) – capturing perceptions of the likelihood that the government will be destabilized or overthrown by unconstitutional or violent means, including politically‐motivated violence and terrorism.

(b) The capacity of the government to effectively formulate and implement sound policies:

3. Government Effectiveness (GE) – capturing perceptions of the quality of public services, the quality of the civil service and the degree of its independence from political pressures, the quality of policy formulation and implementation, and the credibility of the government's commitment to such policies.

4. Regulatory Quality (RQ) – capturing perceptions of the ability of the government to formulate and implement sound policies and regulations that permit and promote private sector development.

 (c) The respect of citizens and the state for the institutions that govern economic and social interactions among them:

5. Rule of Law (RL) – capturing perceptions of the extent to which agents have confidence in and abide by the rules of society, and in particular the quality of contract enforcement, property rights, the police, and the courts, as well as the likelihood of crime and violence.

6. Control of Corruption (CC) – capturing perceptions of the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain, including both petty and grand forms of corruption, as well as "capture" of the state by elites and private interests. Source here

Refer below our country report outputs

Source WorldBank refer here for detail country report 

The color coded column 4 indicate which percentile we are at in comparison to other jurisdiction.

To have a better view let us look at where we stand Vs the World....since Mr 14 Kerat Reformer wants to make us the BEST DEMOCRACY IN THE WORLD...


Giler dhows!

Go here for the full comparison 

Take a good look at the Global Percentiles.....go to the link above and select the respective indicator for a better view, you may zoom in using the + button on the chart.

In essence the 14 Kerat Reformer wants to be the Country with the Highest Score among all the Dark Green Countries

Bole cita ka?

Malaysia Boleh!! Hip hip horray!

Gua tak bole belah siot......

And if you noticed....Countries in the 90th to 100th Percentile are mostly very mature democratic regimes with a few hundred years of experience...

Wonder why of all the attributes he zoomed in on "Voice and Accountability" attribute. Is it because it is our weakest attribute?


But how important is that variable in our current path towards a more matured democratic regime?


As it is in 2009 according to the respective indices tracked by the WorldBank we have a pretty effective Government and if he chooses to improve further on the Control of Corruption, Rule of Law and Regulatory Quality, I sincerely believe that the other 2 variables will sort itself out....

Anyway.....dah terlanjur announce apa bole buat........

Now tell me Mr Prime Minister.....just what exactly do you mean by

"The time has come for us to take another step forward not only in economics and education but also in upholding democratic principles,"

What step forward in EDUCATION have your GOVERMENT DONE SO FAR?


Is it about the blatant disregard of our constitution by continuously pumping significant funds into SEKOLAH HARAMS(go here)?


Or is it the flip flopping PPSMI?


Or is it the backdoor funding of UEC graduates? Why not MOE money Jib.....apa lu takut kasi la duit kerajaan ke...


Or what about the Massive Mismatch in Supply and Demand in the Labour Market due to total complete absence of planning between the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Human Resource leading to high unemployment rates among our recent graduates.....


Let's not go into Economics....


Nanti lu ternganga lalat masuk dalam mulut.....kalau gua start to dissect your flaky alphabet soups policies....


Jib Jib....mung nih bengong sungguh la weh....


Hok nate anying dok beesik ko telingo mung tu koho bengong lagi.....