The polyphonic ballot

So soon after the end of a hard-fought campaign with a nail-biting finish, the images of war and siege push themselves onto a writer trying to describe the national mood. With the result so close, the diagnosis of a polarised nation is tempting. But maybe we should reject the images and resist the temptation.

True, thousands of text messages sent by Nationalist voters, like the heavy traffic on Daphne Caruana Galizia's blog on Sunday afternoon, sounded like a variation on a single question: Has the siege been lifted?

There were times, in 17th century Malta, when another Ottoman siege was feared. Contemporary descriptions record Valletta as teeming with tense knights, all hormones and adrenaline, spoiling for a wench or a fight. The experience communicated through SMS or blog, however, spoke - at once nervously, excitedly, almost proudly - of a tension that was giving people the runs.

Baroque Malta heaved in a single testosteronic movement; anticipation was violent and predatory. On Sunday, Smart Malta heaved in a syncopated bowel movement; anticipation was a gas - toxic but also giggly.

There is a difference there worth noting. When people register their mood with irony, they are trying to mean more than words can say.

True, the campaign itself was very negative. True also that the negativity penetrated the blog discussions of a new generation arguing the issues. Some bloggers, arguing for new, inclusive coalition politics (now!) saw no contradiction in getting nasty and personal with anyone who disagreed with them.

These online debates sometimes resembled the nightclub atmosphere in a World War I harbour town - overrun with spies, double agents, masters of disguise and entertaining Mata Haris, even the occasional opinionated bar-counter bore; with the moderator as the pianist playing it again like Sam. Again, war and black propaganda suggest themselves as images.

But while the debates were polarised, the arguments were about un-polarising Malta. That is worth noting, too. Once more, the words could not keep up with what was meant.

In any case, we should be wary of projecting the polarisation among commentators onto the nation.

That is what many pundits did after Bush-Gore 2000 and Prodi-Berlusconi 2006. But the subsequent events showed that in the US cultural polarisation was driven by talk-radio hosts, cultural studies professors and some evangelical leaders - all people who live off cultural polarisation.

In Italy, it was the elected politicians who were polarised. The people they represented were not: two-thirds of them voted for very similar political programmes, edging towards the centre. While last Saturday's ballot still needs to be studied carefully, there are several indications that the close result does not reflect a polarised electorate. On the contrary.

It is not just the significant number of stay-at-homes who were not magnetised by any political party. There is also a reportedly large number of votes that expressed a first preference for Lawrence Gonzi but gave all subsequent preferences to Labour candidates. Can one classify such voters as either winners or losers in this election?

Then there are the people who voted or even downright campaigned for Alternattiva Demokratika for the local council elections but were anxious, on Sunday morning, for a Nationalist Party victory in the general election.

If this picture bears up to scrutiny, then we are dealing with a polyphonic electorate, voters able to speak with more than one voice, using their vote to manage a multiple identity that cannot be satisfied with an either/or logic.

Such a picture has important implications for our democracy and channels of dialogue. It is a polyphonic and not a polarised electorate that needs to be engaged on issues that were barely broached in this election - like those to do with civil rights - and that were not broached at all - such as a long-term approach to immigration.

A polyphonic electorate generates creative energy for discussion on constitutional reform. Not just on electoral reform, which Dr Gonzi endorsed both during the last week of the campaign and in his first public statements since taking the oath of office, but a more wide-ranging discussion on a Constitution to suit our 21st century polity.

There is also space for new structures of social dialogue. The two major national reforms undertaken during the last eight years - those carried out with a view to membership of the European Union and the eurozone - were successful in large part because they took place within the framework of innovative social dialogue, embodied respectively by the MEUSAC and NECC.

It is worth considering whether those two structures could serve as alternative models for other kinds of social dialogue - involving, in separate fora, consumer protection, sustainable development and the management of all our maritime resources, including the coasts. Arguably, such structures would further devolve power.

Embracing multiple voices, eschewing the search for easy harmony, they could serve as the most adequate communication mechanism for the polyphonic electorate.

No doubt there are other options to consider. For this reason, the Academy for the Development of a Democratic Environment (AŻAD) intends to be a full part of the ongoing conversation that the polyphonic electorate needs.

Today, in a ceremony in Brussels, AŻAD formally joins the Centre for European Studies, a think-tank affiliated to the European People's Party. Let it serve as another mark of AŻAD's mission to bring Europe into the heart of Malta and Malta into the tissue of Europe.

The author is chairman of AŻAD.

ranierfsadni@europe.com