Referenda - Lessons learnt so far

Matteo Renzi played with the fire and got burnt. He linked his political future to the outcome of the referendum held yesterday in Italy on the subject of Constitutional reforms and he collected the resistance of the Italian voters. And this begs the bigger question here. Have leaders across the world lost the ability to predict the desires of their voters or have voters become so volatile in their views, which renders them essentially unpredictable? Or is it maybe that leaders do not really care about what voters in their respective countries want, as they have probably already pre-emptively committed themselves to a common Globalisation Agenda, which is rather inflexible, rendering the rest to be "show" for internal consumption?

Not too long ago, it was another European leader, namely David Cameron, who underwent the exact same process. He put himself to the judgement of the British voters, again in a referendum, whose outcome would essentially prolong or terminate his own political career. But what is that element that converts political figures to become political gamblers? There is just something that does not seem to be adding-up here. Could it be the genuine lack of leadership that makes them outsource critical decision power to the masses, when essentially those unpopular decisions run the risk of displeasing a large number of voters? I still know of a time where one would hold a referendum only when 100% certain of the outcome of it and would only seek public endorsement as a form of re-affirmation to the common cause. Nowadays, referenda resemble a "coin-tossing" game, where leaders submit themselves to a 50%-50% game of chance that also determines their stay or not in power.

And while this would be probably considered to be malpractice, if consistently applied by executives or managers of large corporations, who would always defer important corporate decision making to Shareholder Meetings, in politics it appears to be perceived as a noble act of "public participation" in the rendering of important decisions on subjects, which in the majority of cases have been caused, designed or implemented by the very leaders asking for their absolution through referenda. This is just too easy and pardon my audacity, too childish. Every time things get tough in politics leaders resort to referenda to get the answer. Which in a way confirms my deep belief that today there is essentially no need for strong leaders but a need for efficient managers. Leaders of the past were driven by their political vision to improve something within their own countries, but nowadays with the definition of "countries" being revised, the scope of politics has inevitably been affected. In this sense, how can the leaders of individual countries shelter their own political vision related to their own country within the vision or the pre-agreed agenda of a wider political construct like the EU? The answer is simple, it can't. This is also explaining the lack of "drive" in today's politicians, who seem to understand their job as being "pushers" to the implementation of agendas that were designed without them or around them and for them. This makes it also easy to let go of power, assuming there is some level of decency left in them and assuming that their political ego is tameable.

In conclusion, I feel like the evolution of the job of Prime Minister or President has followed the patterns of evolution of the industrial labour. First it was the worker, who was required to display some minor type of skill or judgement in the performance of his duties then later-on industrial automation replaced these skills. The same happened to the professional caste of politicians. Genuine leadership skill and ability has been sacrificed to the evolution of the domain. Which basically means, everyone could do the job today. Look at Tsipras, Cameron and Renzi. All young fellows whose profile is nothing short of the profile of the average human being. Colourless, untalented and not particularly gifted. Oh yes, and easily replaceable. Inter-changeable by design. Let me make one prediction for the future, assuming there is one. With our political fate being essentially reduced to a YES and NO choice, the politician of the future is probably still a Beta version of some type of AI in some lab out there, whose algorithm is being fine-tuned to the needs and requirements of globalisation...