The University of Auckland Business School invites you to the launch of Professor James Allan’s new book, Democracy in Decline.
Democracy in Decline charts how democracy is being diluted and restricted in five of the world’s oldest democracies – the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. Professor Allan targets four main, interconnected causes of decline - judicial activism, the transformation and growth of international law, the development of supranational organisations, and the presence of undemocratic elites.
He presents a convincing argument that the same trends are occurring whether the country has a constitutional bill of rights (United States and Canada), a statutory bill of rights (the United Kingdom and New Zealand), or no bill of rights at all (Australia).
Identifying tactics used by lawyers, judges and international bureaucrats to deny that any decline has occurred, Professor Allan looks ahead to further deterioration caused by attacks on free speech, intolerant worldviews, internationalisation through treaties and conventions, and illegal immigration. Social and political decisions, Professor Allan argues, must be based on counting every adult in a nation state as equal.