Kidnapping the Political Mind: Stockholm Syndrome of Croatian Voters

LOCAL ELECTIONS AND ECONOMICS OF SURVIVAL
6. May 2021.
Written by: 
Damjan Stanić
Fourth year student in Political Science at the Faculty of Political Science in Zagreb

Politics in Croatia is usually perceived in a reductionist way – as a mere struggle for power. Once the elections are over, voters become unfree again and some other persons decide upon their fates, persons more “qualified” to decide what’s good for the citizens than citizens themselves. To paraphrase Rousseau, we could say that Croatian citizens are free only when, using the institute of voting, they choose who will govern their “free” will in the times that follow. However, the reality is worse. Even in the moment of voting, Croatian citizens are not completely free – they live in a permanent condition of established democratic non-freedom, as Herbert Marcuse would say.

In order to fully understand why the Croatian citizens, who are voters as well, are truly disabled to realize their own political freedom, it is necessary to analyze what is the vision of politics, but also of the complete political system and the apparatus of power (whether in a state, county, city or municipality), that is trying to be presented as the only correct one. In fact, not only is this vision trying to be presented as the only correct one, but it has also been existing as a vision without an alternative for more than thirty years. It is a vision that views the society as an irrelevant factor unrelated to political – the political belongs to those in power, and only to them, and they dispose with it in their own discretion. Although they are simply temporary holders of the apparatus of power, in this way they manage to personalize the impersonal apparatus of power and transform their de iure temporality into the de facto durability.

How are they doing that? Apart from the fact that they understand government through the prism of the feudal system of vassal relations, our “virtuous leaders” on all levels of government have positioned themselves as the ones who give us what doesn’t belong to us and what, as a matter of fact, they shouldn’t even consider giving to us, but they have decided to be merciful and, after showing mercy upon our miserable lives, have given us, as Frane Petris would say, the blessings of heavenly springs – those same springs from which only they are allowed to drink. In other words, the system belongs to them, and only them, and we are those that not only need to exist beyond the system, but also feel the obligation and duty, in appreciation to those who we may thank for the illusion of freedom, to perceive the political as something separate from us, completely external to our being. No matter how nauseating this may seem when stripped to the core, the fact is that this form of domination represents our political and social reality.

Therefore, it is completely logical to ask ourselves why the citizens don’t make the change themselves. Why are they, almost like in a Hegelian dialectics of master and slave, continuing to stay subjugated and thereat happy and grateful as being subjugated? The answer is quite simple actually, no matter how unpopular it might be. Croatian citizens are suffering from the advanced stage of Stockholm syndrome. Various crippled structures have through the years collectively kidnapped the entire society as a whole, and every single member of the society individually, and have annexed the political reality to their particular, either party or individual, interests. It is an abduction of consciousness that has been alienated from the citizens. Those who decide to stand against these twisted praxes of privatizing the public interest are characterized as mad – they are the ones breaking the norms of social existence and not the ones who sense duty towards the kidnappers of their own consciousness. This reductio ad absurdum is a logical succession of economization of politics that has been reduced to the ancient but never more relevant quid pro quo - “you provide me with permanent and undisturbed stay in power, and I’ll make sure you and your family have all the necessary preconditions of existence (like a secure work place and regular salary)”.

As long as the property of all of us, the common good of the community, will be perceived as demonstration of the good will of those in power who dispose with our destinies, our rights and our freedoms, that have been handed over to our “sovereigns” in a warped form of social contract, we as citizens will never be fully able to realize political liberty. That is why the very act of voting in elections is not an expression of our free will, but an act of final submission to the one or those who control our lives through remote controls. If we don’t want to cut short this line of existence, our free choice is merely an illusion. That little bit of consciousness that is left sends us a message that a vote against our own existence isn’t possible because it negates us as a person and thereby the choice simply doesn’t exist.

To make the paradox even grander, by permanent attempts to preserve our own existence shaped into a space of everlasting political non-freedom we undermine our own personality and eat away at our own existence. How to untangle this Gordian knot of antipolitical modus operandi, of those in power as well as ourselves? Our perception of politics needs a radical cut – distancing from the perpetuated conceptions imposed against our will and interest but with our blessing isn’t enough; we need a complete separation from what was and what is. The citizen participation is crucial, but not just the participation in terms of voting. It is necessary to understand that the state, county, city and municipality all belong to citizens and as such they cannot be something external to us, regardless of the fact that we are constantly trying to be deceived by that conception. When numerous candidates shout countless promises to give us “the moon” from all the TV channels and billboards during the election we have to shout back: “the moon” isn’t yours to give. Only then is it possible to slightly open the door to political freedom that has been patiently waiting to return home.

If we wait for the system to change itself, or worse, if we wait for “them” to change the system, we will remain enslaved. When Marko Vučetić calls Zadar a captured city of its ruling party, HDZ, it is an image well known to all of us even if we never visited Zadar in our lives. Each and every one of us has an example from our local environment where some HDZ, IDS, SDP, or some other parties have subordinated an entire city (or municipality, or even county or state, it’s of little importance) to them and their survival, in a manner that even Darwin’s Galapagos birds wouldn’t be ashamed of. As long as we remain faithful to the system tailored in this way, we’ll be offered the “choice” between the candidates well suited for the existing system – we’ll be able to “choose” among various saviors ready to replace darkness with yet another darkness, and vice versa. The real change comes only when every single one of us succeeds to free our own political consciousness from this permanent slavery and realizes that politics belongs to every member of the society equally – only when those who are offering real change, those whom the system doesn’t favor, see that the time has arrived to implement the change, it is possible to expect small steps forward, and it is only with a departure from previous practices that it is possible to begin healing the patient whose name is politics.

Therefore, these local elections are not crucial because, accepting the perverted language of economization of politics, the “electoral offer” essentially doesn’t differ at all (with a few honorable exceptions), but these elections should be the first step in rescuing our mind so that we could regain our own political freedom. So, use these elections to strike out your own but imposed existence and choose people that you believe, deep inside your soul, don’t belong to the structures that are keeping you hostage. Choose those that have at least some goodness in them that is manifested in the care for the general and not individual. If we truly are social and political animals, as Aristotle claimed, then these elections should be understood as the substance itself of who we are, and they should guide us in removing the chains that restrain the ontological realization of ourselves.

Annals of the Croatian Political Science Association

Croatian Political Science Association
Faculty of Political Science
Lepušićeva 6, 10 000 Zagreb

email: anali@fpzg.hr
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