Question

Politics and social divisions should not be allowed to intermix. Justify the statement.

Answer 1

Solution:
Politics and social divisions should not be allowed to intermix because of the following reasons

• Voting pattern
  • Social divisions affect voting in most countries. People from one community tend to prefer some parties over others. Thus, the parties preferred by the dominant community will always have an upper hand than ones representing minorities.
  • In many countries, there are parties that focus only on one community.
• Parties catering to communities
  • Political parties and candidates in elections make appeals to caste and community sentiments to muster support. Some political parties are known to favour specific castes and communities and seen as their representatives. The demands of a community can not come at the cost of another. For instance, in Sri Lanka, the Tamils (the minority community) have experienced discrimination due to the dominance of the Sinhalas.
• Instigation of differences
  • Encouraging social differences in politics may instigate tense relations between communities. For instance, the disintegration of Yugoslavia was a result of the differences between the ethnic groups of the Serbs (orthodox Christians), the Croats (Catholics), the Bosniaks (Muslims), and the ethnic Albanians (Muslims) that made up the nation.