Before one can propose an architecture, one must survey the ruins.
The promise of democracy was grand: a system by the people, for the people, capable of resolving conflict without violence, distributing resources with justice, and holding power accountable to conscience. But promises, like buildings, can decay when the foundation is neglected. And today, across the world—and acutely in India—we are witnessing not a sudden collapse, but a slow erosion.
This erosion is not merely institutional; it is existential. It is not only about how we vote, but whether that vote still holds weight. It is not only about what laws are passed, but for whom, and by whose influence. It is not only about GDP, but about the dignity denied at the doorstep of a school, a hospital, or a courtroom.
The anti-thesis begins here—not in opposition to democracy, but in its defense. To defend something, one must see it clearly. One must name what has failed. One must examine how the machinery of democracy has been repurposed to serve narrow interests, and how the economy has been co-opted to deepen inequality rather than repair it.
This section traces three interconnected trajectories: the global disillusionment with democratic institutions, the specific historical journey of representative democracy in India, and the present crisis of political economy that binds them together. It is not an obituary—it is an autopsy. We peel back the layers to understand what has gone wrong, and why the solutions offered so far have not sufficed.
Only by confronting the failures of our age—without sentimentality, and without cynicism—can we begin to imagine what might rise in their place.
Let us now begin the descent, not for the sake of despair, but to prepare for emergence.