How could a country with the largest prison population in the world not fall into at least some definition of authoritarian?
Because the prison population isn't comprised of political prisoners at the will of the federal government.
The vast majority of prisoners are there as a result of violating state level crimes by State prosecutors...having nothing to do with political opinions.
Is there a actual reason you define the country with the largest prison population as necessarily authoritarian?
Without any support for that statement, it comes of as...pretty authoritarian. As in you are right and everyone else is wrong.
It also doesn't explain why the country with the most prisons is by definition authoritarian...especially when its supported with an unrelated statement about drug offenders, which is applicable to every other country in the World. It seems you just want to call nations of laws, authoritarian governments, because you know...they have laws.
- John Ehrlichman, domestic advisor to President Nixon
You do know that drug crimes existed pre-Nixon right? Were drug offenders before Nixon not political prisoners too and only after Nixon were drug offenders political prisoners? Since Nixon's administration admitted to using drug laws to break up specific groups from organizing...does that mean only blacks and hippies were political prisoners of the drug laws and all non-blacks and non-hippies just regular criminals or were the political prisoners too even though the Administration had no issue with their politics?
For example, if drug laws were pushed to target certain demographics who generally voted a certain way, even though there is two orders of correlation removed, could they still be considered a political prisoner? What about the act where a non-political law (ignoring for the moment how to decide such a label is justified) is passed and enforced, but the enforcement is based on political grounds. In that case, the people in prison are there for breaking the non-political law, but at the same time I think that they should be counted as political prisoners.
>Is there a actual reason you define the country with the largest prison population as necessarily authoritarian?
If we assume that lawbreaking is spread throughout the entire population, the places with higher prisoner populations are places with some combination of more laws and more enforcement of laws. Would those two factors not be justified as ranking a country are more authoritarian than a country which has less of those two factors?
i think you are saying how people act is evenly distributed across the population but different areas have different laws about that action.
That is an assumption to further a point, I see no reason for that to be true because different states and suburbs are not homogeneous.
If what your assumption is correct we would have similar crime rates across suburbs within a state.
different suburbs do not have the same crime rates for say armed robbery and in a country different states would have different rates( where the laws are the same) Sometimes the rates are similar because of their lack of statistical significance I don’t know say suicide by toaster in the bath tub
I think it does hold true when you average on the national level and look at a global scale. Not every nation is equal, but there should be many nations which are close enough. The idea is that behavior that is often viewed as criminal in the US isn't significantly higher than at least one other country such as Germany, France, UK, or Netherlands yet the rate of prisoners is.
That different areas within a country might have different crime rates don't matter as what we are concerned with is the national average.
An authoritarian type of government is a government that is in power by force.
Democracy and slavary existed together. Having a prison population 1 in 125 people doesn't matter because the people decided to elect someone to make that decision.
Is it though? First rebuttal that comes to mind is that, in the US, one can legally be elected without the having the majority of the counter, valid, votes.
Another one would be that one can be elected without the approval of the majority of the people who could vote.
Yes, spend a couple of moments reading up on the EC. The rules haven't changed in a long time. Even if you don't like it, that's only how the president is elected. Federal representatives for the state are elected by getting the most votes in a district.
>Another one would be that one can be elected without the approval of the majority of the people who could vote.
Every election system that allows more than two candidates or allows people to skip voting has this flaw.
It's not even necessarily a flaw. It's good because it allows the minority a chance to not have certain views crammed on to them by the majority.
Just people a larger amount of people agree to a certain set of ideas, doesn't mean everyone does or has to. Densely populated areas have an advantage and likely different views to rural areas. What's best for one group might not be best for the other.
This is completely false, there are plenty of voting systems out there that allow for more than 2 people to run, yet still require a majority to vote for you. Here's a playlist explaining several: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNCHVwtpeBY4mybPkHEnR...
Proportionally allocating state electors would solve most of the actual problems people have with the EC, like the emphasis on swing voters.
So... it makes what the gp is saying true? It means the government is indeed by the people? I don't follow.
> Every election system that allows more than two candidates or allows people to skip voting has this flaw.
Again, how is that supposed to make gp's statement true?
GP's statement:
> The government is elected by the people [...]
That's simply handled by saying that they should vote.
>one can legally be elected without the having the majority of the counter, valid, votes
How so? If you are referring to the President, did he not win the majority of the valid votes in the population allowed to vote? You could say there is an issue with only allowing a subset of the population to vote, but most people I've seen making such a claims still believe their own limits as for who can vote are valid and have not offered me a reason as to why one method is more valid than the other.
Now, I know some people have issues with that only a very select group of people are allowed to vote for such a powerful position. But my counter point to that is where is the real differences compared to rules that say you have to be 18 to vote or you have certain legal status to vote. All of these laws can have an attempted justification made under the same argument of 'that's the way we've done it', 'it is how the Constitution says it should be done' or even 'if enough people wanted to, the Constitution can be modified to change it'.
>in terms of assigning points to the contestants
Is it actually assigning points? I thought it worked by states picking the 538 voters who will vote for president. In 2016 there was some debate on if those 538 people actually had to vote the way they said they would when they were picked, but from my memory the conclusion is that they do not. That's why I think it should be counted as the actual vote for president and not an assignment of points.
I don't think that can be called a fair "actual vote".
To me, the vote seems fair because it was the conditions to form the USA, and the USA has had centuries to change it but has chosen not to. At least, it is as fair as a vote that requires 'citizenship' to count, given that lack of citizenship doesn't stop one form being directly impacted by the decisions of the President.
> The government is elected by the people [...]
And ok, yes. Phrased my answer wrong.
He was elected by the majority of the valid votes (those of the electoral college).
He also was elected by the people chosen by a minority of the total people who bothered voting in a a valid fashion.
So no, the government isn't elected by the people. It is elected by some people, and it can be indirectly elected by a minority of the people who bother to vote in a valid fashion.
Although it is more accurate, it does seem much less readable.
What do you think of requirements to vote? Like being 18. Being a citizen. Do you think everyone should get a say, or only some people?
So people should vote for somebody, anybody, even though they'd rather not vote for any of the offered options ?
Pick the ones the less indifferent to them? Pick the ones they don't believe in the least? Pick the ones they believe to be the less corrupt? Pick the ones the least likely to cause them the most harm?
I don't know the origin of most of these people's motivation not to vote, or their lack of motivation to vote, but it is quite telling that they won't take a few hours every few years to pick who they believe should have what is supposed to be the most important and impactful job in their country.
And that, in itself, is a choice. A worrying one. A disheartening one. One that says "None of this, and none of these people, are worth even a couple hours of my life".
A choice made by many, too many, that some discard saying "That's simply handled by saying that they should vote", when they already did.
The offered options are numerous. That most people who do vote only want two of the group and thus no one else even has a chance is part of democracy in action, and perhaps a view as to what is wrong with such a system. For long term gains, people who don't vote can try to push for the most popular third party candidate to shake up the system. If enough win, they may support voting reform that will change how votes are counted.
There are also other options. For example, convincing other people to not vote. I honestly do not see why this is viewed as bad. If my argument can't convince someone to vote for the one I think will do a good job but can convince them to not vote for one of the ones I think will do a bad job, why not use that argument?
>And that, in itself, is a choice. A worrying one. A disheartening one.
Is it much different than people who skip out on jury duty instead of getting to make sure the 'facts' align with their own view of reality? People are overall too complacent, which may just be an indictment that things are still going well enough.
Not everyone chooses to vote or is legally able to. The winner is choosen from the available votes that have been cast.
At the risk of invoking Godwin's law, the Furher was elected by the people. It's a disservice to society at large to so casually brush off judgements about whether a Government is "authoritarian," especially when the question deserves a nuanced answer.
I would say the United States can be quite authoritarian, when it's given the leeway to. The militarization of the police comes to mind. Overpolicing of certain communities, the ongoing struggle for many marginalized groups to attain the same rights and freedoms as the majority, the way the United States swings it's foreign influence and military around worldwide to get what it wants, etc.
I mean our current President was elected on a platform of building a wall on our southern border to solve a completely imaginary problem, and the Government is now trying to seize privately owned property to make that happen.
Is that authoritarianism on the level of China or North Korea? No, not even close. Is it authoritarian? I would say yes, it absolutely is, and that should be a warning to future generations so it never has the opportunity to become authoritarian like China.
[1]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authoritarianism
Thou I don’t think broadly speaking experts view the states as authoritarian, 3 presidents impeached and all that !
China executes many of its prisoners.
India lacks infrastructure.
Most US prisoners are imprisoned at state jails -- not federal facilities. In fact the rate of incarceration at the state and local level combined is about 10x the federal incarceration rate. If you think it's too high, you've got to lobby your state government. The federal prison rate is actually much lower than that of other developed nations such as Switzerland, Germany, and France.
But even if the 1.5m in Xinjiang is true, China is still significantly below the US in terms of incarceration rate. And it's sad that that's the comparison we're making.
The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world (that's prisoner:population ratio.) And there's a big gap between the US and #2, and a bigger gap between #2 and #3.
> China executes many of its prisoners.
Not really, maybe around a tenth of a percent annually. It has no significant effect on the statistics (leaving out political prisoners from the count does, but even correcting for that China wouldn't be anywhere close to the US.)
Because authoritarianism has nothing to do with prison population.
Alternatively, if a country had a high rate of executions and/or "disappearing" people, what would happen to that country's incarceration rate?
Alternatively, is the term "incarceration" only applied to people convicted of a crime? Would re-education camps count towards the incarceration rate?
(and yes, it's probably got a quite high inaccuracy, but there aren't other easy to ingest sources I found)
On one hand, guards, staff,etc need to be paid. Someone being a criminal should not put extra burden on the rest of us, and our social services. Many for-profit prisons are incentivized to better serve than state-run institutions.
On the other hand, many prisons, private and otherwise, seem to play dirty rent-seeking bs with insanely low conpensation for work done, exorbiant fees for calling, visiting,or even emailing family, and systematic mismanagement.
Clearly there is a way to optimize this system, and both profit, and improve lives. Maybe someone here has a vision.
I disagree with this, criminals shouldn't place extreme burden on society, but it's our job to deal with rehabilitating them - it's a societal choice, some societies over time have forced capital punishments on any law breakers and our modern society tries to rehabilitate them.
That's a very interesting theory.
How is it you conclude the US vs Russia/China prison population is indicative of the US wrongly incarcerating "many people?" The current estimates say US wrongful conviction sits around 2-10% with an 85% conviction rate overall, meanwhile Russia has 99%+ conviction rate overall (suggesting far more corruption and wrongful convictions) and China it is estimated 90% of crimes go unreported due to general mistrust of the system.
Based on US crime rates, the majority of violent and property crimes go unsolved...hell I think murder cases are around 60% unsolved...so how exactly is it: 1) US many times wrongly imprison people; and 2) Russia/China prison population have any connection to this conclusion?
If society Z passed a law with a minimum three year prison sentence for jaywalking (pedestrian crossing a street without the right of away provided by a traffic signal), the incarceration rate may rise, but no one is wrongly imprisoned.
(replace with the war on drugs in the US, of course).
Honestly, while oftentimes human beings are terrible, humans are pretty decent otherwise... That all said, I think you'd find that laws really don't vary as much from country to country and that, outside of weird ones (like MJ illegality in the US) people will mostly adhere to laws out of convenience.
It would also appear illicit drug use in US is more prevalent than in nearly every other country.
Edit: I'm not sure how relevant this is to what you posted, but figured I'd bring it up because I think it's an important thing to note in the general conversation.
1. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/...
60% is meaningless in this context, it just shows that LEA focuses on the wrong types of crime. How many murders are unsolved? Whatever the number it is small compared to people who are arrested for whatever happens to be most convenient and profitable.