In a rare example of a communist movement being decisively rejected through democratic means, Nepal’s long-dominant communist parties suffered a crushing defeat in this month’s national election.

By Brahma Chellaney, The Hill

For more than a century, scholars and policymakers have debated whether democracy and communism can coexist.

Capitalism and communism clearly can: Modern China provides the most vivid example of market economics flourishing under communist rule. But whether communism can function comfortably within a democratic system has remained far more uncertain.

The tension lies in the underlying logic. Democracy rests on political pluralism, open competition for power and the protection of individual freedoms. Communist movements, in contrast, have historically sought to monopolize political authority in the name of ideological unity and revolutionary transformation. In practice, this produces closed political systems dominated by a small party elite that muzzles dissent to maintain control.

Today the world has only five officially communist states — China, Cuba, Laos, North Korea and Vietnam. None offers genuine political pluralism.

Even where economic reforms have introduced markets and private enterprise, political liberalization has not followed. China, the most powerful autocracy in modern history, demonstrates that even economic openness under communist rule does not necessarily lead to political pluralism.

Historically, communist parties that seized power did so through revolutions, coups or externally imposed regimes. Once in control, they typically banned opposition parties, making electoral defeat impossible. The Soviet Union and its satellite states followed this pattern until the Cold War’s end.

Yet communist parties have long operated legally in democratic systems. During the Cold War, communist parties in countries such as France and Italy were influential political forces. But they almost always remained opposition movements or junior coalition partners.

Against this backdrop, the Himalayan nation of Nepal has emerged as a fascinating political test case.

With nearly 30 million people wedged between India and Chinese-ruled Tibet, Nepal has spent the last three decades experimenting with democratic politics under heavy communist influence. Since the restoration of multiparty democracy in 1990, communist factions have been among the most powerful actors in the country’s political landscape.

Their influence increased after 2008, when Nepal abolished its 239-year-old monarchy and declared itself a federal democratic republic. From that moment on, communist parties became central to nearly every governing coalition.

As the country cycled through 15 governments in 17 years, communist factions remained constant players in what many Nepalis came to view as a revolving door of political elites.

But now that era of appears to have ended.

In a rare example of a communist movement being decisively rejected through democratic means, Nepal’s long-dominant communist parties suffered a crushing defeat in this month’s national election.

The result represents a political earthquake. Voters swept aside the two main communist parties that had shaped Nepali politics for years, reducing them to minor players in parliament.

The outcome also carries broader geopolitical implications. For years, China quietly encouraged “leftist unity” among Nepal’s communist factions to help cultivate a stable, friendly government there and expand its influence along India’s northern frontier. The electoral collapse of these parties leaves Beijing’s preferred political channels in Nepal marginalized.

The biggest winner from the upheaval is a three-year-old political party led by Balendra Shah, widely known simply as “Balen.” A former rapper turned politician, the 35-year-old first rose to national prominence as the reformist mayor of Kathmandu, the capital. In the recent election, voters handed his party an almost two-thirds majority in Nepal’s 275-member House of Representatives.

Nothing illustrates the scale of the political shift better than Balen’s defeat of veteran communist leader K.P. Sharma Oli in his own parliamentary constituency. Oli, a four-time prime minister and one of Nepal’s most powerful political figures for decades, lost to a candidate nearly four decades his junior.

The upset symbolizes a generational and political turning point.

Nepal’s established parties have struggled to address the country’s economic stagnation, chronic unemployment and persistent political instability. Public frustration reached a boiling point last September when waves of youth-led violence swept across the country.

During the unrest, rampaging mobs burned down major state institutions, including parliament, the Supreme Court and numerous government offices. Thousands of buildings were looted or torched, and even police officers were killed. Despite the scale of the destruction, many supporters — and much of the Western media — portrayed the upheaval as a “Gen Z revolution.”

Whatever its label, the unrest exposed a deep collapse of public trust in Nepal’s political class. The election was the democratic expression of that anger.

Nepal’s experience also highlights a broader political pattern. Communist parties, once in power, often struggle to transition from revolutionaries to effective administrators. When they are associated with patronage networks, corruption and policy stagnation, they become vulnerable to the same democratic accountability as any other ruling party — at least to whatever extent other parties are allowed to exist.

There are few precedents for communists’ electoral downfall. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, several Eastern European countries saw communist successor parties win and then later lose power within democratic systems. Outside the former Soviet bloc, however, such examples are rare.

Nepal now joins that small historical category. Voters have repudiated a political order that had come to dominate public life.

The result was less a defeat of Karl Marx than a rejection of the status quo — delivered decisively and peacefully at the ballot box.

Brahma Chellaney is the author of nine books, including the award-winning “Water: Asia’s New Battleground.”