I look upon the period since 1967 essentially as a period of transition, in which the emergence of new social and economic forces in the last two decades has compelled parties to search for new identities based upon a greater ideological clarity and a greater programmatic cohesion. It is because this process is taking place swiftly in some parties and not so swiftly in others, that we are witnessing a certain loosening of the norms of internal party behaviour. Defections from political parties were a facet of the same phenomenon. In my view political parties in the seventies will have to shed the kind of ideological amorphousness which had come to characterise them in the last two decades. There has to be a closer connection between the social and economic tasks of the seventies and their political expression in the ideologies and programmes of the political parties. This may happen deliberately or by the interplay of factors among which it is some times not easy to distinguish the essential from the extraneous. One can, however, have no doubt that unless clearer outlines of party ideologies and programmes are presented before the people, the party system may suffer. I see encouraging trends in the party system despite the confusion that appears to prevail today. A process of analysis and introspection is going on in all parties. As a result of this I think the politics of the seventies will be more closely related to the urgent questions of social and economic policy, not only in thought but also in action.
There are people who wonder whether our democratic system will be able to perform the complex and challenging tasks of the seventies. Some are openly sceptical in view of the trends of violence and of the growth of ideologies repudiating parliamentary system. The happenings of the last two and a half years, particularly the large scale defections and disorders in our legislatures seem to have aroused a great deal of pessimism. While I do not wish to minimise the significance of these factors for our still young democracy, I do feel that the critics have not given due credit to the fact that despite serious social and economic tensions following the successive droughts, the country held the General Elections in 1967 more or less peacefully, and with a large voter turn out.
