What mature societies compete on

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OPINION

By Crispin Kaheru

Language is a game-changer in the way societies frame their politics.

In much of Europe, North America and Australia, political parties are rarely described by themselves or by serious commentators as “the Opposition.”

They are known, instead, by ideas and governing philosophies: Conservatives, liberals, social democrats, labour parties, democrats, republicans and greens.

These labels are not cosmetic. They signal certain intellectual traditions, economic beliefs and moral assumptions about how society should be organised.

In many post-colonial societies, by contrast, politics is still structured around a blunt binary of government versus opposition. This framing is not accidental. It is imposed, and it reveals something deeper. It reveals the absence of strong ideological anchoring. It reveals the lack of what.

Take the United Kingdom. The Conservative Party is not merely opposition when out of power. It is a party historically committed to market economics, private enterprise, limited state intervention and social tradition. When it loses an election, it does not cease to exist politically. It goes into intellectual renewal.

The same is true of the Labour Party, rooted in trade unionism, social welfare and redistribution. Their clashes are not about whether government should exist, but about what kind of government best serves their society.

The US offers another clear example. Democrats and Republicans are not oppositional by default. Republicans argue for small government, low taxes, deregulation and individual responsibility. Democrats, on the other hand, argue for social safety nets, progressive taxation, and a more interventionist state. That is why, when power shifts, governance does not necessarily stall. Policies change direction, but the state continues to function because the contest is or was about ideas, not obstruction.

Germany takes this even further. Parties, such as the Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Greens, and Free Democrats, routinely form coalitions across ideological lines. In this system, opposition is not an identity. A party may oppose a policy today and co-govern tomorrow. What makes this possible is that each party arrives at the table with a clear ideological compass of what, not merely a desire to frustrate or oppose the incumbent.

Even in Scandinavia, often cited for political stability, social democrats, conservatives, and liberals disagree sharply on ideas. Citizens understand what each party stands for. Voting there is usually a choice between competing futures, not a protest against the present.

Contrast this with our politics. Emphasis is placed on who governs rather than on what ideas they bring to the table. Political identity is not “we believe in X,” but “we are against Y.” This creates a perverse incentive structure. Success is measured not by the quality of alternative ideas, but by the ability to slow, delegitimise, or paralyse government action.

The result is a politics of reaction rather than construction. Budgets are opposed not because they are flawed, but because they originate from the other side. Reforms are resisted not because better alternatives exist, but because obstruction itself becomes proof of relevance. In some cases, the collapse or failure of the state is welcomed if it weakens those in power.

Democracy is not sustained by opposition alone, but by productive disagreement, by rival answers to the same fundamental questions. How should wealth be created and distributed? What is the role of the state? How much freedom should markets have? How do we balance security and liberty?

Where these questions are taken seriously, opposition sharpens governance. Where they are ignored, opposition hollows it out.

The lesson is not that opposition is bad. Opposition without ideas is noise, while opposition grounded in ideology is progress.

The maturation of any society should, therefore, be marked by a shift in political imagination. From seeing politics as a battlefield between enemies to understanding it as a contest between visions. When that shift finally happens, elections will stop being existential crises and become what they should be: Peaceful moments of choice about the future.

Until then, politics remains trapped in the shallow cycle of government versus opposition. We remain locked in the narrow language of opposition, forever opposing, rarely proposing and ultimately delaying the very national progress we claim to seek.

The writer is a Member of the Uganda Human Rights Commission