In a recent speech, Hizbullah's leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, extolled the virtues of what many refer to as "consensus democracy," promising that if he and his allies in the March 8 Forces prevail in the next election, they will not exclude the opposition from Cabinet. That might be a noble sentiment, but not when the electoral mechanism has been jury-rigged in such a fashion as to eliminate the suspense from all but a few contests, denying the Lebanese an opportunity to join a genuinely democratic process - and so a chance to begin learning the habits and responsibilities of participatory citizenship. It is one thing to argue that Lebanon and the Lebanese are not yet capable of managing the implications of winner-take-all politics, quite another to do so while taking no measures aimed at rectifying that situation.

It would be ridiculous to lay all of the blame on Nasrallah: He is but one of several actors in this play. Lebanese politicians have generations of experience at misleading their constituents, and none of the dramatic events of the past three years has caused them to change their ways. For most of them, the overriding goal remains the maintenance of their own affluence and influence, an ambition best served by ensuring that the traditional currencies of Lebanese politics - feudal economics, tribal social structures, and sectarian politics - remain the only means of exchange.

For these cynics, the advent of truly adversarial politics (as opposed to the Potemkin facade that has long hidden both shameless horse-trading and Mafia-style turf wars) is a mortal threat. They prefer to keep most Lebanese convinced that their votes are irrelevant, that accountability is an impossible dream, that whatever alterations take place around the edges, real power will never really change hands. But the test of a democracy is not whether people are allowed to vote: It is whether their consent is honestly sought, accurately measured, and consistently obeyed. Lebanon's new election law will not even pretend to address the first two requirements, so there is little reason to expect that those who created it will seek to accomplish the third.