Is democracy a failure? (1861)
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
But I'd much rather have it than any system of forced social roles, where there is one person or small cabal of people who make the decisions and everyone else knows their job is simply to obey.
In my (admittedly anecdotal) experience, democracy rarely seeems to come to any consensus that is acceptable to everyone, but rather serves as little more than a moral battering ram that the 51% can use to impose their will on the 49%. Perhaps one day people will realize that democracy, given its cultish appeals (e.g. "but don't you know other systems are worse!?") is simply barbaric.
Maybe technology will render nation-states obsolete within my lifetime. I can only hope.
the solution is to make the pie arbitrarily large.
Democracy and religion share beds, occasionally, I might even say they were married on upon a time. Barbarism indeed.
Science says that a human being is a collection of genes which are formed at conception; it can't say anything about abortion, murder, capital punishment or self-defense. Those aren't topics on which it is competent: all it can do is inform discussions thereon, by affirming, 'yes, we are talking about a human being in this case, but in this other we are not.'
You simply can't address every issue with an appeal to science.
I honestly think social science is only slightly more scientific than astrology.
But even were it not, science is not capable of answering questions like what one ought to do. Sure, A & B disagree; it's interesting why they do; maybe they're both wrong; maybe they're both partially-correct; but what should be done about it? Science can only say what is, not what ought to be.
You have to make some philosophical assumptions (e.g. utilitarianism) in order to even think that science can provide direction, and even then you will get bogged down in questions like, 'what is the greatest good for the greatest number?'
As an aside to the downvoters: don't downvote if you think I'm wrong; please share how you think science can answer a question like 'ought we execute murderers.'
In Denmark, we never have to wait for long. Whenever those in power want to pass something big or important in parliament, they seek a broad support - otherwise, it'll just get repealed whenever they lose power.
Everything certainly isn't perfect here (yes, it can be darn annoying when center parties hold too much power - but then again, it is a stabilizing factor), but healthy mechanics can get you a long way with democracy.
I feel a lot of people in this thread point out cases where democracy doesn't work. That's easy. But maybe it would be better to look for cases where it does work and learn from it.
To take your example of Denmark; Denmark has less population, and half again as much area as Massachusetts. Comparisons between the US as a whole, and individual European countries don't always make the most sense; the more appropriate comparison would be to the EU, to have the same kind of multitudes of disparate people under a common banner.
We have again a situation where 51% crushes the 49%.
Also, in some countries, there are way more than 3 factions (over a dozen in Belgium and the Netherlands), making it less likely that the same subset of parties will find itself in agreement every time.
The effect of having that many factions is that the majority part of parliament will always take the minority opinion into account because they know that, in the next vote, they may be part of that minority.
Of course, that is not a guarantee; I think it is part of a nation's culture. Other countries may value the short-term "let's win this vote" way above the longer term "we have to live in this country together".
That certainly seems the case in the USA, where "in four years time, we might end up with the shorter straw." doesn't seem to play a big role in politics (?anymore?)
The literal consent of the governed is necessary for government to be legitimate.
i have been in it also, and it works just fine. i certainly do not like to be in a minority where the majority gets what it wants and the minority is steamrolled.
Imagine Hal doesn't want Bill to build a fence (to make it fun, let's say Hal isn't even going to be impacted by the fence, he just doesn't like Bill).
How does consensus handle this?
Our current system tells Hal to sit down and shut up about what Bill does on his property. If consensus is the norm, Hal has a veto on Bill's fence.
An answer about requiring people to be reasonable in a consensus government is not very satisfying, people aren't reasonable.
our current system does NOT allow Bill to do whatever he wants on his property.
Of course not. My point was that it doesn't give Hal a veto over anything Bill might want to do.
You say 'democracy, given its cultish appeals (e.g. "but don't you know other systems are worse!?") is simply barbaric'. Does your "quote" rebut itself as you seem to suggest? What is your non-barbaric alternative to democracy?
To be fair to American democracy as originally described, supermajorities were required to make big decisions (Constitutional amendments). And power was decentralized between branches of government and layers of government (state and local governments had more authority than the federal government on some matters). This design was amended and eroded over the years. One of the consequences of the movement toward a simple-majority democracy is the 'battering ram' effect you're (justifiably) complaining about.
Or just create new ones …
I don't think that they were wrong in this regard. If we look at the demographics of the house of representatives, they do not come close to making a parallel of the demographics of the country. If representatives were selected at random, we'd have 51% women in the house, we'd have people from all economic backgrounds according to the current wealth disparity instead of only the wealthy. We'd need to actually focus our resources on education if we agreed that really anybody can be selected for representation. If the pool of representatives was large enough (larger than we have now, which is a limitation put in place to make party control easier), then random selection should always result in a representative body that is actually representative.
Several years ago I helped cofound a worker owned for-profit software and design cooperative. Its constitution was formulated around a mix of product incubation and consulting in support of labour solidarity through cultivation of progressively more interesting/motivating/challenging work. It was founded after we had all quit our high-performing and very profitable agency whose non-technical/non-creative ownership cut one too many corners on the sustainable systems that we were working on. Typical anti-flow type management decisions with arbitrary deadlines, death marches, and silly promises to clients despite solid contracts (which I had written and negotiated directly with the clients and our lawyers).
In the new co-op that us engineers and designers from the old company formed, there was growth early on, and a plan to expand to new cities/markets because the cost structure was horizontally scalable by design. This was before boutique remote app studios and incubators became commonplace (at least before all the really big agencies tried to get in on it, e.g. Sid Lee, Ogilvy).
Lo and behold, it turned out there were just barely enough members who wanted to take a more employee/entitlement oriented tack (as opposed to entrepreneurial) vs the other half. These members were of the same local cultural and linguistic background (the socially dominant one), whereas the rest of us were from all over. The locals formed a "cabal" of sorts and pushed for spending lots of money on a swanky office, vetoed horizontal expansion and denied the right to work for one of the members who had just moved to a new city as part of the previous plan (by voting to refuse to allocate some of our mandated work to him).
The original vision fell apart and was replaced by something more parochial. The more "ambitious" cofounders all left and the co-op continues to thrive in its own way today but as a shadow of the dream we had in the beginning.
An autocracy would not have endured these trials so early on. In top-down mode, the boss gets to enforce focus. Certainly not good if the dictator is not benevolent, but the experience provided for a lot of reflection on governance.
Reminds me of this explainer video I saw recently from CGP Grey: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs&t=344s
No matter the exact loci of power, there are always gradients between the points, and forces that can bring imbalance are very hard (perhaps undesirable) to control.
If I could reach into peoples' heads, there's a solution: "mind your own damn business". If we didn't care so much what other people did, then we wouldn't disagree so much. And in general, I think the world would be a better place if more people did this. But some fraction of issues will always affect multiple people (that's the whole point of government, after all).
And besides, nobody's yet invented a mind-control ray, and it would be pretty icky if they did. (There's a certain irony to altering peoples thoughts so that they care less about what other people think...)
For instance, any decision that will last for generations and impact profoundly in everyone's life, like secession or a "Brexit" should require slightly more votes than a majority one. Unfortunately it's only typically used by parliaments, courts and senates for constitutional change, never for popular vote on issues.
Simple majority has the advantage that it's fair. If you're going to start claiming that decisions that will "profoundly impact everyone" need higher than majority you're just going down the road to totalitarianism. Anyone can claim a decision they think they're on the losing side of is too important to leave to majority decision making. Then it's just about ramping up the threshold until you win.
(I think) In democracy, voters are less likely to compromise. This is result of weak discussion between >1m.
But likely technology (as always) will come to rescue before democracy. This is in reference to rise of renunciations, AirBnB etc.
Supermajority voting on all legislation & referenda? After all, 2/3 of the population forcing 1/3 to obey a law is much more reasonable than 51% forcing 49%.
And making amendments take a 3/4 vote is even better: if 75% of people think something is a good idea, then it probably is.
America (and the few other remaining non-proportional systems) suffers from this problem much more than the more advanced democratic systems. If America is all you know, you shouldn't generalize too much.
Secondly, for spectrum decisions (e.g. what tax rate we should have, how much to spend on defense and education, etc) getting as close to 51v49 for the decision is probably the most equitable outcome.
If Clinton wins the election in a few days, then at the end of her first term, you're looking at 32 years of only three families in the Whitehouse. If she wins a second term, then that's 36 years - almost two whole generations. It's symptomatic of how little things change at the top.
To be a big gun in US politics, you need so many connections and so much money that only a few people can do it. This election has had a two-year electioneering cycle, a ridiculous expense. The notion that 'anyone can become president' just doesn't pan out in reality.
We can already see a similar thing happening in America with different ethnic groups not getting along well together. I think this will only get worse over time.
Pro Trump and anti Trump camps are really about how a significant number of whites are not getting along with a significant number of Hispanics (and other ethnic groups).
Please stop. I dont want to have disagreement. I dont want to have this endless debate. I want to be left alone. I dont want people to make descision for me. I want to spend my brain cycles in my work. Not this. Please stop.
Objectively, it can be seen that this is completely untrue. No understanding or empathy is strictly required by democracy. Democracy only requires that you obstinately stick to your preferred viewpoints and shout down those who disagree with you. This can be seen in the legislative chambers of nearly every Western-style democracy on the planet. Specifically:
- in Canada, the hallmark of former Prime Minister Stephen Harper's rule was a complete rejection of anything outside his personal ideology, even when his ideology flew directly in the face of fact or public opinion.
- in the US, we are seeing someone who most certainly suffers from Narcissistic Personality Disorder not only excelling in politics, but may soon come to hold the highest public office and command of the world's most powerful military.
The days of good-old collaboration and working together for the common good back in the 1950s were a short-lived phenomenon created by the shared experience of surviving the deadliest conflict in human history.
Those days are over.
Yes, it's required. Democracy is compromise. The people need to be highly intellectual to make their roles in the society balance between what they want and what society (other people) want them to be. Without understanding of difference, everything breaks down easily. See what happened when us bomb other countries with simply unbelievable execuses. You can see that people having no understanding of outside world basically do not afraid to use violence to make their thinking a reality...
Being "Highly intellectual" is therefore not a requirement to participate in a democracy.
Just look around you, man. There are stupid people everywhere.
Aldous Huxley, Brave New World Revisited (1958)
However I dont agree with the "...new kind of non-violent totalitarianism..." Our democracies are non-violent only if you obey. Otherwise they use violence and force to lock you up. Most people in prisons are there for victimless crimes like drugs. That is not a non-violent system in my opinion.
Letting the people vote is a not an equivalent statement to let the people rules.
Condorcet has shown how voting systems can be unfair, and a quick look to every elected assembly from the G20 is showing a clear non representation of the demography of the people in the assemblies.
We do not live under democratic systems, neither was USA in 1861. These are Republics. And Plato was firmly convinced that democracies were bad. After all he was sponsored by the wealthy ones that hated the people to have power.
However I used the word in the way how it is used nowadays by public. I am from Europe and people here will tell you we have "democracies".
Perhaps it's less of a democracy then we think it is, but it's not wrong to call the US a democracy.
http://www.anorak.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/huxley-or...
(The creator, Stuart McMillen, felt compelled to remove it from his own website. He explains: http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/blog/cartoon-blog/amusing-ours...)
...except the police officers murdered in Dallas this year didn't wear riot gear on purpose and the violence started when a sniper started shooting officers. Some crazy person executed two officers in Iowa three days ago.
I'm not advocating riot gear, but there are holes in your narrative.
These reasons don't fit into "because The Man" narratives without some explanation.
They're not fighting a war, and acting like they are only increases popular resentment.
How does can an officer covered head to toe in riot gear, carrying military equipment, jumping out of an armored vehicle, engage with the community?
"Humans who are vastly over-prepared for the threat they face"
Again, these are people who want to go home to their families.
"acting like they are only increases popular resentment"
Valid point. But the riot gear itself was a reaction to throwing stones or molotov cocktails. Sniper fire appears to be a reaction to the riot gear...
"How does can an officer covered head to toe in riot gear, carrying military equipment, jumping out of an armored vehicle, engage with the community?"
Valid point. Lets ask a similar question. How can a protester throwing stones or shooting people engage with the institutions they are trying to change?
> "Humans who are vastly over-prepared for the threat they face"
> Again, these are people who want to go home to their families.
I said “or two” for a reason. Vastly more civilians are killed by police than vice-versa.
> Valid point. But the riot gear itself was a reaction to throwing stones or molotov cocktails.
Reaction or not, it's not appropriate in many situations where it's deployed.
> How can a protester throwing stones or shooting people engage with the institutions they are trying to change?
They are a tiny minority of protestors.
Sure, but their job is literally go find the most dangerous people in the country, and make them give up their freedom.
Imagine yourself outside the headquarters of a gang of meth cooks, known to be armed and high. Unfortunately, yeah, people get shot. Lets not pretend like these are kind, innocent people. I know sometimes their relatives will say that on tv[1]. Imagine what its like to deal with hardcore criminals on a regular basis.
"it's not appropriate in many situations where it's deployed"
I agree. The problem is, how do you know in advance? Peaceful protests can turn violent in the blink of an eye. When they do need the gear, they needed it 5 minutes ago. I would love to hear a solution that doesnt involve the police running back to their cars, right at the moment that things get out of hand.
"They are a tiny minority of protestors"
Agreed. But again, how to know which ones? Now you can see why they want to monitor social media(not taking a position here). If 99 people are saying, "grab a coat and join us for a peaceful protest", and 1 is saying "grab rocks and head the park", well, now maybe we know who to watch.
1. http://wncn.com/2016/11/03/parents-of-pizza-hut-robbery-susp...
Is it more likely that a police baton ends the peace, or a protester's stone? Is riot gear offensive in nature, or do the police wear it to defend themselves from violent attack?
> Police murdering unarmed citizens with their arms raised.
While that has certainly happened, you are referring to Michael Brown, who did not, in fact, have his arms raised and was, in fact, beating the police officer who shot him.
> The mass imprisonment of citizens who's only committed what most people consider a minor offense.
I suspect you blame Drug Prohibition (and I agree that it should end immediately), but that's not actually true: http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/releasing-drug-offenders-...
Looking at what people actually go to prison for, it often seems like stuff we'd want to send people to prison for: murder, assault, theft, rape, fraud. Maybe we might look at why Americans commit so much murder, assault, theft, rape and fraud?
[1]: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/11/0...
[1]: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/dakota-access-pipeline-s...
That, and the other incidences of protestors using firearms is something anyone managing a protest of this scale cannot control. As long as the leadership involved condemns the gun violence, and the protestors do what they can to stop people from escalating the situation, they cannot be themselves in the wrong.
It is a very common tactic to plant radicals in peaceful protests who will use violence as an attempt to ruin the reputation of the movement, mainly by distraction - "oh, someone shot at the police, they are all violent monstrous scum now, and nobody should listen to their grievances anymore" was used constantly during the occupy protests, and many of those offenders were later found to be plants by either private or even police agencies to break up the protests and destroy their message.
You can argue that consent should make the act legal, but that doesn't make it non-violent.
Only if selling sugar, rifles or skateboards is violent.
Unless you can personally claim ownership of those people, among other things you're claiming ownership* of, there is no aggression (initiation of violence) taken upon your person or things when someone is destroying their life.
If you can personally claim ownership of those people, and society as a whole, then you are correct and the selling of the drugs would be an act of aggression towards yourself.
* The act of withholding something from others.
The one where they were shooting at cops, you mean? True, that part didn't get a lot of coverage.
Ranked, reasons for incarcerations go:
1. Violent crime
2. Property crime
3. Everything else
Where "violent crime" is comprised of those crimes we all agree are violent --- particularly: domestic violence, which accounts for a plurality of all incarcerations in major metro areas.
The overwhelming majority of incarcerated felons victimized somebody else. It's also worth considering that the majority of those incarcerated for property crimes victimized those people in society least able to absorb the harm: rich white people live in low-crime neighborhoods with 2x the police coverage.
Read "soldiers, policemen, lobbyists and advertisers"?
To give some examples, consider what happens within the news media. If you don't think news outlets that rely on advertising money to function tailor their messages to present a world view that lines up with the wishes of advertisers, perhaps you'll find this interesting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHa6NflkW3Y
As for the influence of advertisers on the general public, I'd argue the only reason its big business is because it works. However, I believe it works differently than just through the obvious ads we see around us, the most effective forms of advertising appear to be the ones that don't look like advertising at all, I'd put this under the category of 'cultural norms'. Advertisers have a large indirect influence on cultural norms, and (aside from the basic things we need to survive) it is often by aiming to meet those norms that we find ourselves spending money.
Politicians then use advertisers to manipulate masses to ensure power for themselfs.
In my country people in last elections elected an Olygarch, multi billionair, who controls whole agriculture, all main media, medical and other industries and now he is writing laws that suits his needs and stealing billions in "donations" from us. How is this possible? How was he elected in democracy? How is it possible that he has support of majority of people? Because he has very good PR, advertisement and propaganda team.
Anyone who hasnt seen "The Century of Self" documentary, please watch it, it will open your eyes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJ3RzGoQC4s
But republics always were the favorites of savvy aristocrats to keep their collegial rule. If one looks closely at the English state, there's a Republic there since the days of the Magna Carta, whatever way they dress it up. Many a "monarch" terminated with extreme prejudice when getting too big for his britches ;-)
Also, we need better ways to keep our leaders in check, i.e., more transparency.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schulze_method#cite_note-Frenc...
It's from the 50's but it's a shockingly accurate picture of our modern world with advanced propoganda, globalism etc .. and it's free here https://archive.org/details/galaxymagazine-1952-08 .. enjoy :)
I'm still tending to think Huxley didn't have the full picture and populations still have some amount of free-will.
1. Iron law of oligarchy (1911 - 1700 words on wikipedia): "all complex organizations, regardless of how democratic they are when started, eventually develop into oligarchies."
2. Dictator's handbook (2011) - Or CGP Grey's summary: rules for rulers (2016 - 18 minutes): "Bad behavior" is emergent from power structures rather than human weakness. From democracies to dictatorships, organizations select for Machiavellian and psychopathic behaviors.
I can't recommend these enough. This life altering perspective takes <30 minutes to go over - plus potentially several days of despair.
The problems with the world are not user error. How can technology help?
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy 2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs
His videos on elections are particularly relevant these days!
If you really want to go deep study game theory. IMHO it offers very satisfying hard mathematical explanations for at least some of these things.
I consider it and its related fields (evolutionary informatics, complexity) to be among the greatest intellectual achievements of the 20th century. These fields are grossly under-taught. You generally won't hit them unless you study economics, ecology, or evolutionary biology.
If there is an answer to any of these awful paradoxes, it is going to be found in these subjects rather than in any form of conventional or even unconventional politics, religion, philosophy, etc. These are just rearrangements of the deck chairs.
I'm in no way suggesting that one vote should be valued more than another one, but that people should be doing their homework and researching properly the benefits and consequences of their decisions...
Having a majority of the population voting with the gut can lead us to disastrous results...
You should also note that in most democracies this is already accounted for. The people who feel they didn't do their homework simply do not vote, and leave the decision on others.
I lived in a communist country, and we had a system that was controlled by, ostensibly, the experts (the party members). It was a disaster.
In practice, democracy works; it doesn't work in theory, because you're wrongly comparing it to some fictional system which makes ideal decisions (whatever that is). It works in the U.S., it works in Switzerland. Those are some of the most developed countries in the world.
I am just a concerned person, since most of the candidates spend too much time discrediting their opponents, rather than discussing about their proposals.
The electoral process had became a reality show rather than a mechanism to choose a representative, and it is saddening that people are picking a candidate because of a catchy slogan, rather than because of their proposals...
Given the relative pointlessness of the process is it surprising that it turns into a beauty/uglyness contest?
I don't like this line of reasoning, because I do believe the issue is much more fundamental: people want different things.
Now, there is an argument that if people do their research properly, they will have known all the consequences of their decisions. And hence everyone will have the same ordering of concerns from "most serious" to "meh". That's not true for the fact that consequences and the future are really really hard to predict. Not to mention that "what exactly are good things" is still very subjective. Look into philosophy, there are a gazillion moral frameworks, even if you just pick Utilitarianism, it's still unclear what constitutes "utility".
This election shows more than any other that people will bend the facts to fit their feelings. The well educated just have more tools at their disposal to lie to themselves about it. Everyone works primarily by their gut feelings and everyone rationalizes it after they've made their decisions internally and unconsciously.
If after this election you can't step back and see this then this is further proof to me that the system works and works well, because it keeps tyrannical well researched experts in check from their own irrationality. It's not an accident that an overwhelming majority of well educated experts who write the policies that drive a country support free trade and globalization, while real people who are not disconnected from the real world and who actually feel the effects of those policies do not.
It is a mechanism that places the process, the system, above the ruler, and provides a strong and formal mechanism for replacing the old ruler with the new one.
Totalitarian states nearly always descend into chaos and violence when the dictator dies. Without clear succession rules, they rarely have an undisputed successor ready. Monarchies are historically more stable, but every so often a ruler dies without an undisputed heir, or one is such a blatantly bad ruler that civil war breaks out. Some dictatorships are able to maintain stability and prevent revolutions or civil war with more or less extreme repression.
Democracy is meant to solve all this. There is no need to take up arms against a bad king, if you know he or she will be replaced in 4 or 8 years. People who were at least consulted about the choice of ruler (in the form of elections) are less likely to dispute the ruler's legitimacy. Succession isn't disputed, because it's the system and not the ruler that chooses the successor.
Revolutions and civil wars are bad, they used to kill millions every other generation. The system we have maintains itself with minimal repression. So yes, one down side of democracy may be that people get to decide about issues they don't really understand. It's totally worth it.
You say that like it's a good thing. Every 4 years we are called to legitimize the next crop of corrupt politicians sold to the financial interests. We can even choose who we like best between two corrupt candidates. Yay, democracy!
I don't think voting is the greatest thing. Voting silences the minority, instead of integrating it. Voting is blunt. Stamping a paper every four years don't make someone involved or responsible for a country.
Another vice of the voting election system is that one candidate might have a foreign policy I like but an educational platform I hate. That would force me to pick which is more important for me, say, education or world politics. It's sad to choose between two things when both are essential. My political will is so poorly expressed such by kind of voting, it's as if I am only allowed to say part of what I wanted to say.
The vices of voting that you mention are more an artifact of a first past the post, two party system: over time, any idea that has a plurality will get all of the influence. Any idea that never has a plurality will never have any influence.
In a system with proportional representation and a tradition of coalitions, over time, an idea that has 20% of the vote will gravitate towards about 20% of the influence. With many parties to choose from, the choice for your educational platform may not be automatically bundled with a choice for a foreign policy.
Or you can look back on history, and look at countries who have done things differently, and realize it is by far the best system we have had.
If you want to live a full lifetime in peace and security and health. Be born in a democratic and capitalist country somewhere in the past 70 years, and you maximize that chance. Any other time and place and the chance of a good life drops quickly.
To other commenters in this thread, describing democracy or capitalism with words like "disastrous" or "complete failure" or "elite rule", please some perspective.
You can compare it to what has happened before and console yourself that of observed past histories, this situation ain't so bad.
Or you can imagine what has never been, and try to create a society better than has ever existed before.
There was once a time when democracy of modern form had never been tried, outside of some rugged mountain towns in the Alps, and yet those in the face of tyranny had the gall to try something new. Isn't that an example we should emulate?
And this is what we should continue doing. In no way did my comment indicate we should just be quiet and think it is not so bad.
But at the same time, this is the best we ever had. Calling it a failure is like calling an olympic gold medallist the worst athlete in history. Even if this is the 1920 olympics and the times set there will be a laugh when compared to the 2020 olympics.
Someone with so little perspective will not be able to change the world for the better. "Imagine what has never been" does not do much unless it is well grounded in reality. (edit: "Someone" here was not directed at @kobeya, but to those refer to democracy/capitalism as failure)
Failure simply means "my standards are higher than this."
There's nothing wrong with being so audacious as to have standards unmeetable by any past accomplishment. I call that a progress-oriented mindset.
It is worth reflecting that, although a lot of people complain that people are 'voting for a slogan' or similar, there is evidence (mainly the outrageous success of democracies vs. non-democracies) that the average voter does actually have some idea what is going on.
It is also a subtle and interesting fact that if a large group of people are voting essentially randomly, then they will cancel out. In this way, a person voting with no thought for policy will probably cancel out another person voting with little thought. A 52-48 type margin can mean that 96% of the population had no idea, and the 4% that knew what was going on voted unanimously in favour. The point being that a vote can be sliced up theoretically so that ignorant voters have less influence than might be expected - and again, the practice of democracies suggests this tends to happen more often than intuition suggests.
Democracies throw out some cruel decisions, but that usually means the interests of the voters are being served rather than democracy failing.
You're quietly assuming a lot there. Let's stop after the first sentence -- "At some point, someone has to evaluate how good or bad the decisions being made by the political apparatus are." Ah! So you're proposing monarchy?
But no, you're not, because you then introduce the fictional "average voter", thereby fitting democracy into the "someone" framework.
I think this is a bad way of looking at it. Democracy isn't a "someone". Democracy is an aggregation mechanism. You contrast having everyone vote with only having a subset vote; but you don't question the assumption that the only aggregation mechanism is the standard sort of voting.
If you ask me, there's one aggregation mechanism that looks like it could actually improve upon democracy, and that's futarchy. Of course, it's untried. But the point is that there are more degrees of freedom here than you seem to realize.
Anyway, on this context you are just begging the question. There's no novelty in there for the democratic process, just for the technocratical one.
Technically true, but you're glossing over another way to approach this fact; we can reduce the number of "decisions being made by the political apparatus" as close to zero as practical.
But yes, I tend to agree, but this entire thread is largely just a restatement of the last few hundred years of left wing/right wing thought. Minimal regulation, markets, voting, these are all traditionally right wing positions. Regulation of markets by small groups of experts, distrust of the population, the desire for elites to keep a check on the people, these are traditional left wing positions. There's not much new under the sun.
> We have been so accustomed to hear from infancy eulogies of the wisdom which shaped our Constitution, praises of its perfection, hymns to its symmetry and strength, that to doubt its fullness of all excellence has come to sound like sacrilege.
Some things never change.
"Ok kids, we're going to play a game called 'I get a unique power but you can never take it away no matter what!' starting now!"
A badly adapted one. Every virus that gives us real trouble does that because it changes.
The states had already voted to secede (or not to) earlier in the year. The Confederates had even provisionally elected a president, Jefferson Davis, on February 18th. The secession crisis started after Abraham Lincoln was elected in November of 1860.
The nation really was falling apart, hence the lamentation of the republic being just a collection of states in the editorial.
This is, to me, perhaps one the strongest strengths of our Republic. Different ideas and values can be thrive in different areas at the same time, and we can test and experiment with what's true and right.
It's still better than nondemocratic systems I guess. But that's a terribly low bar to pass. That's not something to be proud of.
Everyone always says that it's the best system of government that has been tried. Well maybe we aren't trying hard enough! There are other systems, and here are a few that are my personal favorites.
My ideal system of government has no politicians. It forms a parliament or congress just like normal, but the representatives are sampled randomly from the population. Ideally they would be filtered for IQ or education, but this is optional. And then they would debate and vote on issues, without having party loyalty, and without having to pander to the general population. It's sort of like direct democracy, but the random sampling lets it scale to much larger populations.
I also really like the model of the supreme court. I have to say that every supreme court decision I've looked into, they seem remarkably rational and competent. They aren't perfect of course, but it seems so much better than congress. Statistics show that even biased judges tend to become much less biased by the time they retire.
I'm not sure how they accomplish this. My guess is the lifetime appointments, and the structure of the court being to debate issues extensively, and for the judges to at least try to weigh them objectively. I would love to try a system of government modelled after something like the Supreme court.
There is futarchy, proposed by Robin Hanson. The idea is to use prediction markets to make predictions about the future, like whether policies will actually work. Then voters can vote on values ('I approve of Brexit, conditional on it being predicted to increase median wages.') But they bet on beliefs.
Another idea I like is the "Ideological Turing Test". In this case representatives can vote on policy just like normal. But they have to pass a test that proves they fully understand the other side's point of view. By writing arguments for the other side of the argument, and blinded reviewers not being able to tell if it's authentic or not. This would be complicated to implement without people gaming the system, but I think it's worth a try.
There is also alternative voting systems. These are just small modifications of regular democracy. They modify the voting system so you can vote for third parties without being punished for splitting the vote.
Citation needed.
If judges were so great and neutral then why does the US have a collective fit any time one needs to be replaced? It's taken for granted that the judges are all extremely biased and the decision making of the court can be (and should be) swayed by selection of appointees.
I never said that judges were perfectly unbiased, just that they tend to the same opinions over time. Republican nominated judges tend to look indistinguishable from democrat nominated judges by the time they retire.
Democracy provides useful data: which topics society agrees on, which topics they disagree on. For the ~51/49 (controversial) cases, instead of enlightening ourselves, we just blindly take the majority choice. This is not the way a scientific society should be approaching government.
Also "democracy as a failure" is a common trope that is used by those who perceive the election isn't going according to how they planned. "They are not voting the way I like, therefore democracy has failed" or if the election or polls go the expected way then "democracy and clear minds prevailed again!".
One interesting thing I found about the current election is the role the media plays. To control people in a dictatorship is easier, you just make criticism and dissent punishable, nationalize all the media and it is all simple and easy. In a Democracy controlling is a bit harder, but is still done over the media using sophisticated and not-so-sophisticated methods. Related to that my favorite quote so far comes from CNN's Chris Cuomo talking about the emails: "it’s illegal to possess these stolen documents. It’s different for the media. So everything you learn about this, you’re learning from us." It is as if, there was a tiny crack in the matrix and the underlying code was exposed for a moment.
See [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent:_Noam_...
Seems to be available full-length on YouTube: [http://youtu.be/YHa6NflkW3Y](http://youtu.be/YHa6NflkW3Y)
The other book I like is "Age of Propaganda: The Everyday Use and Abuse of Persuasion" by Elliot Aronson and Anthony Pratkanis
Fortunately we have options that aren't the failed states of the 20th century, we need a democratic economy and a democratic workforce. Those are the only solutions to this problem, and if you spend enough time looking at the problems and their causes, it becomes readily apparent why this is so.
Democracy is not a failure, if you believe democracy is a failure, you're saying that your ability to control your own life is a failure. The problem is the structure on which modern democracy has been built.
Interesting, I would interpret democracy as the ability for others to control my life; the ability for the majority to gang up on a smaller group and impose laws which benefit the majority in lieu of the minority.
Interesting, I'd disagree though. Say you live in a fascist society or a feudalist society, you get absolutely no say. Democracy allows us to make decisions that influence our own life, however we must obviously respect the fact that we live in a society with other people, and they must be respected. Beyond living in a vacuum, we have no real way to ensure absolute individual freedom, however a completely democratic society is one way of reconciling the thirst for individual freedom with the necessity of cooperation with others.
>The ability for the majority to gang up on a smaller group and impose laws which benefit the majority in lieu of the minority.
This is absolutely a valid concern, which is why I believe in a rigid groundset of rules on which all laws and rules must comply (consitutions/bill of rights) which respect the rights and liberties of individuals to ensure they have maximum freedom with respect to other individuals in society. This isn't a groundbreaking idea, but I do believe we need to re-evaluate these approaches in a modern context, as most countries were established in a time before progressivism was dominant.
These are hardly the only alternatives. In case you haven't noticed, the other people here aren't implicitly contrasting democracy with e.g. monarchy; they're implicitly contrasting it with anarchy (probably anarcho-capitalism).
Again, there's lots of possibilities out there. Personally I like the idea of futarchy, though it's untried. But that's not the point; the point is, there's a lot of degrees of freeom here.
In my opinion, anarcho-capitalism is merely feudalism, with some brainwashing for people to accept their fate. There's a reason some prominent anar-capitalists want to be differenciated from anarchists.
There's also a reason all anarchists want to be differentiated from ancaps ;)
Remember, "capitalism" is an overloaded term. Sometimes it means what you describe, and sometimes it means the free market. Make sure you know what sense it's being used in in a given context, or you can't have a meaningful discussion! In the case of anarcho-capitalism, it refers to the free market. (But even though that works out in this case, you really should be wary of reasoning based on names.)
I want to preserve the culture I grew up in. I want everyone to contribute to society. I want a culture where what you get is what you worked for. I don't want "diversity" or a bunch of people from other countries to move to the town I grew up in.
Having moved to California from Iowa, I can totally understand how Californians value diversity and equality (not necessarily equal opportunity) above all else. But where I'm from, people value equal opportunity and hard work. It's very hard to see the merit in one culture, being from the other.
In my mind, it would be an absolute travesty to allow the distant majority to vote for the destruction of the culture I grew up in.
Yet you have moved to California? Can you hear the irony?
>> It's very hard to see the merit in one culture, being from the other.
You don't have. You just have to accept other people think differently and want different things to you.
Consider what might happen if Clinton win and more corruption scandals appear about her, or if Brexit is halted somehow. Things are getting less stable over time.
How is diversity diametrically opposed to equal opportunity and hard work? From what I can see you can have all of the above without any issues.
>Having moved to California from Iowa, I can totally understand how Californians value diversity and equality (not necessarily equal opportunity) above all else. But where I'm from, people value equal opportunity and hard work. It's very hard to see the merit in one culture, being from the other.
Can you phrase your political philosophy in terms of real proposals rather than thought-terminating cliches? When I hear the term "value" or "values", I reach for my gun.
I am however not saying that a purely democratic society would eliminate all of societies ills, I'm saying it would make many of the constructs which perpetuate these sorts of problems would become non-viable.
That's probably because you're thinking in terms of how things actually are, rather than in terms of vague emotions tacked onto political buzzwords. A classic mistake.
Centralisation of power is the issue, it doesn't matter if that centralised power is held by governments or by large corporations, the end result is a tilting of the playing field in favour of those with the most power.
Yep, but you have exact same right to control life of others, so things are balanced.
> the ability for the majority to gang up on a smaller group and impose laws which benefit the majority in lieu of the minority.
Constitution and court protects us from abuse, so don't worry about minorities in Constitutional Democracy.
What you are thinking about would be volunteerism/Non-aggressionism.
Democracy is about balancing individual freedom with the demands of living in society. There is no other system of decision making which even attempts to reconcile these two adversarial relationships (individual vs. society).
>What you are thinking about would be volunteerism/Non-aggressionism.
I fail to see how you could have an undemocratic voluntary society. I'd argue democracy is the backbone of a voluntary society.
No it's not. Democracy does not inherently balance individual liberty with societal necessity. In fact, democracy says absolutely nothing about individual liberty or societal necessity at all. Democracy is a form of government that holds regular public elections. It is not anything else. It might be argued that democracy is a necessary condition for liberty, but it is certainly not a sufficient one.
Democracy is a group of people co-operating in a system through equal representation. This does not require a state apparatus or government.
>It might be argued that democracy is a necessary condition for liberty, but it is certainly not a sufficient one.
Solely sufficient? Absolutely not, that's what I'm saying, but yes it is a necessary condition. It's is the sustinence on which liberty grows.
I think that's too strong. Some dictatorships have more liberty than some democracies. Democracy increases the odds of liberty immensely, but is neither necessary nor sufficient.
A voluntary system is basically the opposite. Every who wants to participate in something, can choose to do so. Or choose not too. You don't vote on what should be done, and then force everyone to go along with it.
Majority rules is force. You go along with the decision of the group or else. Whereas voluntaryism is zero force. No matter what the group decides, how many people vote for it, you never ever use force on anyone to make them go along with the group.
Thats fine if you think that using force is necessary for the greater good of making society better.
There are lots of good arguments for why the government threatening people with guns, in order to get them to pay taxes, for example, is needed in order to get anything done at all in society.
But don't dress it up in pretty words and call it "voluntary". Voluntary is the absence of force. It is the idea that no matter what I do, as long as I don't directly harm another people, noone should use force against me.
Participatory Economics: https://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~wright/Published%20writing/Alterna...
What is Mutualism? : https://c4ss.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/what-is-mutualis...
Anarcho-Syndicalism https://libcom.org/files/Rocker%20-%20Anarcho-Syndicalism%20...
The Conquest of Bread (Anarcho-Communism): https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/petr-kropotkin-the-c...
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12878457
Capitalism solves this problem with bankruptcy & business failure. People whose beliefs are shown to be false lose their businesses and are forced to work for other people whose decisions turned out well. Conversely, capitalism introduces problems with inequality and forced servitude that democracy solves. Democratic government serves as a check on the ability of the economic winners to pull the ladder up after them and use their economic power to impose their will on the people.
This is behind much of the tension between big business vs. big government. You have two power structures (five, actually - the press, the military, and the academy form the other pillars) that work in opposition to each other, each according to different rules. I'd argue that the biggest problem facing America today is that business and government have gotten too cozy with each other while the press and the academy are getting eviscerated, which is letting them manipulate the voter through control of information.
And how often does this work in real life?
Ah, excellent idea. Put the same people who elected Clinton and Trump in charge of the most complicated emergent system in the world. What could go wrong?
> a democratic workforce
"We voted for you to work on this cotton plantation, so get to it! We also have a democratic economy, so you don't need to worry about getting payed anymore!"
> if you believe democracy is a failure, you're saying that your ability to control your own life is a failure.
That's interesting, because last time I checked I didn't control my life via a democracy.
Based on the fact that you're using a very new account, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume this is some sort of incoherent troll bait. If not, this is a strong contender for the dumbest comment I've ever seen on HN; just slap the word "democratic" on random topics and pitch it as an alternative economic system, no further details required.
The people that placed them on the frontstage already are in charge of it? If you think the people decided on these two I'd say you misunderstand the process by which these two reached the forefront. A very small minority selected Clinton and stacked the odds in her favor for selection, as to the rise of Trump, I'd say that's perfectly representative of the type of misdirected anger that rises out of repeated failings of the system. Remember the individuals Trump was running against? Trumps a protest vote, and a terribly dangerous one at that. Choosing between three different people put on your plate by people you don't trust isn't a failing of democracy, it's a failing of the underlying system.
>"We voted for you to work on this cotton plantation, so get to it! We also have a democratic economy, so you don't need to worry about getting payed anymore!"
You fundamentally misunderstand what I'm saying here. I'm not proposing elected slavery, and truly fail to see how you reached that conclusion. I don't know what part of my pro-democracy comment implied I believe in forced labor, but I'm interested in hearing what process you went through in your mind to reach that point.
>That's interesting, because last time I checked I didn't control my life via a democracy.
I'd say your ability to vote, and decide mutually with other people the form society takes is your life being controlled by democracy.
First off, there's no secret cabal of billionaires that's "in charge" of the economy. Let's dispense with the conspiracy theories.
Second, the group of people that has a disproportionate amount of economic influence (i.e. bankers and the extremely wealthy) generally supported Clinton and rallied extremely hard against Trump. I don't blame them; Trump's policies are bad for trade. But let's not pretend that they're both some sort of globalist illuminati puppets or something.
> I'd say that's perfectly representative of the type of misdirected anger that rises out of repeated failings of the system
You mean the sort of misdirected anger and other irrational motivations that would completely dictate the behavior of a "democratic economy"? Don't put your money where your mouth is; put someone else's money where your mouth is, and vote!
> I'm not proposing elected slavery,
Interesting, because that's the only meaningful interpretation of "democratic economy".
> I'd say your ability to vote, and decide mutually with other people the form society takes is your life being controlled by democracy.
Besides this statement being more or less incoherent, it also doesn't have anything to do with your earlier statement that
> if you believe democracy is a failure, you're saying that your ability to control your own life is a failure.
There is no connection between the decisions I make for myself and the decisions imposed on me by the whims of a political majority.
Not at all what I'm trying to say, I don't think there's a shady room where rich people come to smoke cigars and plan out the election, in fact you actually agree with what I'm saying in the very next sentence:
"Second, the group of people that has a disproportionate amount of economic influence (i.e. bankers and the extremely wealthy) generally supported Clinton"
I agree, which is why I said Trump was a protest vote, a naive attempt at hitting back at the system whilst still completely supporting it. I don't know how you think I'm sitting here talking about illumaniti when you demonstrably agree with me about capitalist influence on the election?
>You mean the sort of misdirected anger and other irrational motivations that would completely dictate the behavior of a "democratic economy"? Don't put your money where your mouth is; put someone else's money where your mouth is, and vote!
I don't think you know enough about a democratic economy to be attacking the idea, evidently since you're still believing that I think a democratic economy can exist in a capitalist system.
>Interesting, because that's the only meaningful interpretation of "democratic economy".
Then I think you're very poor at reasoning, can I suggest "The Conquest of Bread" it's a great book that might help you on your journey to understand what I'm saying.
> Politicians are bought and sold, and we see an undemocratic group of very powerful individuals influencing legislation and pushing around politicians and manipulating public opinion.
The problem is not minority. The problem is overreaching government. Keep government specific and small.
But your vindictive like attitude is what makes government overly powerful. Your "union-infested economy" solution is worse than what we are facing.
False premise. This is simply not true in any way, shape, or form. The bottom 90% of people have drastically more control over production than the top 10%. That's why the single richest company in the world, Apple, is a consumer products company.
> it's the workers directing the production
There's a very obvious conflict of interest there, because the workers aren't the only ones who have things that need to be produced. "You know, Ivan, making bread is really tedious; let's go back to making AK-47s instead." This is why if you go on Ebay and type "soviet surplus", you can still buy crates of Mosin Nagants and Nixie Tubes to this very day.
Planned economies are terrible at producing what needs to be produced, and excellent at overproducing things that don't. Whether you think market economies are impersonal or not, they are undoubtedly extremely efficient at meeting people's needs; no more, no less. Deviating from optimum production levels costs companies money.
This is an unproductive comment. If you say something and you aren't understood, the better response would be to explain.
(I, for one, also have no idea what you might mean by a "democratic economy".)
Co-ops, probably.
One in which we workers are rid of all absentee bosses and run enterprises ourselves, democratically. Hence "democratic economy".
Common trusts and co-ops are both "capitalist institutions". They both rely on private ownership and voluntary transactions. Not sure what you mean by "democratic confederations of localities".
But I do think that despite the above your underlying point is fundamentally correct here; both commons trusts and co-ops work perfectly well under existing rules. It sounds like, aside from the democratic confederations thing, what eli_gottlieb wants is not a different system of rules, but rather to kick the existing system into a different equlibrium. (It really seems like these socialist types tend not to distinguish between these...)
Well, I'd love to know where you draw the conceptual boundaries between systems. Lemme guess: it's only not-capitalism when the state controls everything?
The countries with the highest quality of life are Social Democracies. Places like the nordic countries and the 'new world' anglo countries excluding the US.
It's bizarre just how much the US has demonised the concept of socialism in its political dialogue.
It really isn't an either/or proposition; you're only taking the absolute extremes of the concepts. If it was such a proposition, where does the switch take place? At what point would a nation 'flip' from being 'socialist' to being 'capitalist'?
Canada (20% foreign-born) and New Zealand (25% foreign-born) are in similar boats. However, your statement is also pretty offensive to kiwis, of whom 15% are of Maori stock - indeed, the relatively harmonious relations are rightfully a source of pride to the kiwis. Both of these countries also deal in bilingual politics (Australia does not).
I'm less knowledgable on the makeup of the Nordic countries, but it's worth pointing out that only two western democracies have a higher rate of immigration than Australia (excluding the year of Syria crisis migration). These countries are Spain and Norway. As for Sweden (usually the go-to country for these discussions), looking now, and excluding the Syria crisis, 14% of Swedes were of foreign birth, equivalent to the US, and two-thirds of these were born outside the EU. While, yes, Sweden doesn't have the latino or black analogues in their national background like the US does, they're not as culturally homogenous as most people think.
In short, I think you're talking about the stereotypes in your head rather than the actual nations. Handwaving it away with "meh, they're all the same in those countries" is an egregious error - after all, if what you're suggesting was true, then Portugal and Ireland (95%+ local-born, single culture) would be powerhouses.
Why stubbornly claim capitalism is a failure when America is not capitalist? It is not laissez faire capitalism, like Chomsky says, it is a nanny state, where government bails out failed business. That is not capitalism.
Classical liberals and libertarians of course run with a different -- IMHO utopian -- definition of capitalism which puts the emphasis on the act of individuals trading goods with each other. From my perspective it's an ideological smoke screen which papers over the reality of the asymmetrical distribution of power that arises naturally out of the particular 'natural rights' of property that classical liberalism embraces. And they were embraced historically precisely because of that distribution of power -- during an era of expanding colonialism, imperialism, and enclosure.
To put it another way -- the US may not look like a textbook laissez-faire capitalist society that a Friedman, Hayek or Randian would advocate -- but the unjust power structure of the US and societies like it are what actual-existing capitalism _creates_. It is capitalists who rule, and capitalists who made it that way.
I'm so tired of this kind of thinking. It seems to come from people who don't have much contact with a good cross-section of society, such that they can maintain the illusion that things are fine, that (for example) Brexit or Trump was a stupid decision.
These decisions are actually democracy at work, in a positive sense. A large raft of society in the UK and the USA have been neglected, trod upon, bullied, and exploited for decades. And they have finally had the opportunity to kick back and they have taken that opportunity. It's destructive in one sense, but you have to consider that without precisely this kind of upset, no-one would pause to think about these people for a moment, and things would continue to get worse for them.
These people aren't racist (well, no more than those who voted the other way), they're not idiots, they're not some sort of cesspool of poorly educated fools, they are making an informed rational decision to kick back. They're furious. They want to be heard.
I think so many of my friends don't get it, because they don't realise that the vote for Brexit turned out that way precisely because it was designed to annoy them. If you don't get Trump, you don't get Brexit, chances are you are exactly the beneficiary of decades of globalisation and free trade, widening inequality, that have crushed the people below you. Try trading places with them and see how you feel then.
If you're not grasped this by now, you should definitely make an effort to broaden your social circles.
If you watch this video and think "wow, Michael Moore's lost it", then you have a long way to go:
If people could rank their preferences then people like Bernie and Bloomberg would actually run without fear that they might "take away votes from Hillary" and therefore help Trump. In fact, the two-party syste would give way to something better. Only the party elites would NOT want this... but after this election, even they probably do.
When everyone is upset and there are many points of view there is no common way to move forward but there are many hot heads that are willing to shoot first and ask questions later. Imagine a million hot heads without a common goal but the willingness to fight and we can see chaos with out results.
People get upset at the "do nothing congress" because they can't get X done but people aren't willing to admit that the reason is that voters have sent individuals with very diverse ideas to try to get things done. Voters are the ones that are pushing them to not compromise any idea or be punished by being voted out. I can see a future where one person that can use social media very well can push people to vote in ways that we consider distasteful now. What will happen then? Groups will erupt with opposing view and many will be ready to fight.
We've heard allegations that the voting system is rigged but that's very unlikely. We have laws and watch dogs that prevent that in any significant way. We don't have the same for social media but we know that it's possible to manipulate it, even by foreign powers, and that's not illegal worse yet it's hard to impossible to prevent. It's hard to even contemplate how that effects a democratic system.
The founding father created a representative government because they knew that rule by majority can be as distasteful as government by a monarchy or emperor. They thought a functioning government needs representatives that can sort out what's needed. With everyone having a voice that's going to get extremely difficult. Social media is about to let the US test out its governmental system, lets hope it can pass the trouble ahead. Can the US stay together as a nation?
I really hate an idea that minorities must live as majority wants. The assumption that majority is always smart and able to make wise decisions is completely wrong.
Unlike others, I actually think that some form of democracy exist even in authoritarian countries. I lived 22 years in Uzbekistan, then 9 years in Russia. I can say for sure that almost every dictator appeals to masses. Mediocre people (masses) is always their primary audience. For example, in Russia, tzar Putin perfectly represents mentality of majority of people in Russia. People actually love the style he speaks and acts. Dictator won't last long if he looses support from majority. I wrote about this here:
https://www.quora.com/Why-do-people-living-in-totalitarian-s...
(I was surprised this answer got a lot of upvotes)
Also, I noted that even when masses don't like their current government's ideology, they jump to another mediocre idea.
For example, the mob in Uzbekistan is attracted to radical islam as opposition to current secular dictatorship. So if current secular regime in Uzbekistan will fall, then masses choose to go back to 15th century as an alternative. The mob in Uzbekistan certainly won't choose liberal market economy with highly developed technology sector attracting international capital. The backward silly ideas of islamic clerics are much, much, much closer to the mob.
Another example, next after Putin'ism in the priority queue of ideologies in Russia are: communism, and right next after communism is national-socialism. So there are a lot of people who oppose Putin because he is not true communist or do not fully support national-socialism. Again, there is no "liberal market economy with highly developed technology sector attracting international capital" in their queue of ideas.
I can't even imagine the masses go to the streets demanding relaxing regulations for businesses, reducing government spending, attracting international capital.
I guess in US republican party is relatively popular because of religion. Remove strong support of religion in the GOP and after that their popularity will probably drop 10 times.
In Europe, masses a bit smarter than in Uzbekistan and Russia but still they are demanding nanny state, taking money from high earners.
I spent a lot of time and effort to escape poor government policies supported by masses. I born and lived in Uzbekistan, then moved to Russia, then to Sweden, then to the Netherlands. So I'm not afraid to say to entire society - "fk off, you are all wrong, I'm leaving!". I already did it 3 times!
For example, I left Sweden because of ridiculously high taxes and really big nanny state.
I see decentralized democracy as a solution. For example, I would support an idea of small federal government and pretty independent states. So that voters can vote for laws only in their states (with rare but inevitable exceptions). It would be competition between states and eventually people with certain ideas would concentrate in particular states. Some states would be more socialist, some more capitalist. Head of federal government should not be a single person but rather a group of persons from each party.
I think Switzerland is closest example to this.
In such country, you can easily move between states with different laws, taxes, ideologies. It's far easier than moving between countries if you are disagree with prevailing political sentiment (what I'm doing right now).
Switzerland is a working example https://fee.org/articles/the-secret-of-swiss-success-is-dece...
What I hope will take of is Seasteading http://www.seasteading.org/
- is representative democracy a failure (in contrast with direct democracy[1])
- is a two-party system a failure (in contrast with a multiparty system[2])
Dictatorship is what came most natural to our animal ancestors, so we tend to rationalize it while condemning the "Zumutung der Komplexität".
But are they stable? Dictatorships tend to embrace the conservative point of view, which produces usually overpopulation, raging nationalists (the bottled up anger redirected against the guys next door) and religious fanatics. So if this economic surplus, aka innovation is not imported (or even more dangerous constantly produced)theey unravel rather fast, usually by the forces they called upon to stabilize.
There is no inbuilt re-juvenation without weapons. So every new App - any new product or production methode, disturbing the equilibrium, can blow up such a social powder keg.
The seperate problem usually associated with democracys, is that the fullfillment of all wishes in the wests way of life, is rather self-destructive on society. <Anecdata Begin> I have several couples i know who really looked forward to having grandkids, after raising (quite large) familys. And in the west this just doesent happen any more. Nothing more depressing then seeing those baby-boomers and there bottles all in tears about "What went wrong with there kids?" <Anecdata End> It doesent make the situation better, that democracys have a tendency to import large swaths of people from dictatorships - mostly for economic and sociological reasons.
Winston Churchill
https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=United+States+...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Republic_of_Central_Am...
[2] If you play the Paradox Interactive video games Victoria or Victoria II, it is named the United States of Central America there as well.
We have the technology to make congress obsolete.
The English royal system has persisted with relatively little discontinuity from 1066 AD to present, some 950 years.
Unless you've other criteria for "success", in which case you might care to consider what those might be.
I've found William Ophuls to be an interesting point of entry. His topic is politics within a context of ecological limits, but he has classic training (he's strongly influenced by Plato), direct experience (positions in the US foreign service), and an excellent grasp on modern (mostly 20th & 21st century) thought on ecology, limits, and the interactions of these with polity. His bibliographies are excellent, and worth publishing on their own right. I'd recommend his 1977 Ecology and the Politics of Scarcity and his more recent Plato's Revenge. The former focuses more on the ecological case, the latter more on the questions (with very few answers suggested -- he's really exploring the problem space) of how you'd construct a polity, given environmental, psychological, and social limits.
I'm also starting to form some new thoughts on the role of religion as something of a social glue in vast empires over which communications might take weeks, months, or years, but in which a plausibly predictable level of trust would be found. Religion-as-trust-glue strikes me as a fundamental aspect. Curiously, instantaneous communications (and the monitoring and management that entails) allows for a near-total breakdown in such trust.
If success is defined as social stability and wealth then there seems to be a direct correlation between localism+direct democracy and success, with Switzerland being the canonical example.
There are extensive periods of discontinuity intermixed there, whether it be fracture and civil war, invasion and synthesis with various steppe peoples, the taking on of Buddhist Chakravartin mantles, etc.
The Ship of Theseus is a profound question.