POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

The Challenge of The Qur’an ~ 332 ~ oligarchy. In the 18th and 19th centuries, people rose in great rebellion against monarchic government. But free of the yoke of kingly rule, they found that they were not much better off in that they had to resign themselves to rule by a select group of ‘representatives of the people’, while the old monarchs had laid claim to being ‘representatives of God on earth.’ This was the only difference between the two. Even the so-called ‘representation’ of the people is open to question. Take the example of the British conservatives who, in one year, won a decisive victory, winning an overall majority of 144 seats. In terms of votes, however, the conservative share of the vote (43%) has fallen since 1979, i.e. as far as seats were concerned the conservatives had won a massive overall majority. But, as far as votes were concerned, they could muster only 43%. Could this be said to be truly representative of the people? Man’s failure in this field has been summed up in these words: “The history of political philosophy from Plato until the present day makes plain that modern political philosophy is still faced with the basic problems.’19