A year ago, I had done an analysis concluding that a political party needs to invest a minimum of 4 Billion INR every year to field candidates for elections.
If you add the cost of maintaining an office, protest marches/rallies, salaries/bonus/incentives to the party workers etc, this figure could easily reach 10 times this sum. Even in USA, the Presidential Election alone is a Billion Dollar Industry.
Then why are we so shy is concluding that Politics is a Business?
i see politicians as businessmen….
1) both invest in areas where they can get maximum bang for their buck,
2) can go to any lengths to prevent losing their territory
3) and most importantly try to stay away from controversy and negative news as much as possible.
now the only way to get the best deal is to get the best deal from them is to play their fears against them…
become so much demanding and vociferous that politicians can no longer treat you as votebanks or constituencies as personal fiefdom.
“All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing” – Edmund Burke
3 replies on “Political Business”
You’ve only looked at USA and India, and the obscene amount of money spent in the former. How about a look at the democratic processes in other countries – Western European, Asian, Australia – whether it’s the same as in the US, or vastly different? 🙂
@amit…
i really don’t know about the rest of the world and would greatly appreciate if this theory holds true in other countries as well
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