Hacker News Reader

Comment by vinceguidry | Hacker News Reader

Populism has always, from day one, all the way back in Ancient Greece, been a threat to democracy. People don’t really want lofty philosophical ideas. They want the rules most favorable to them. Been true for thousands of years and it’s not going to stop anytime soon.

The surprising thing isn’t that rule of law is being threatened. It’s always being threatened. The surprising thing is that it ever evolved at all. And despite the constant threats, it still manages to evolve, one tyrant at a time.

CGPGrey has a great pair of videos on pirate social dynamics that everyone should watch. Economic factors, not shared idealism, created the flat hierarchy.

Nobody will choose idealism that’s not beneficial to them.

View on HN

Since you mentioned a popular YouTube channel, Historia Civilis has an excellent series on the late Roman Republic, where populism plays a major role in the republic's downfall.

I'm not sure I agree that populism is, by nature, opposed to democracy. I think it is better defined as an opposition to the status quo - which very well may be a democratic government - when that system fails to address the concerns of its people. The voting process in Rome was hilariously tilted against poorer Roman citizens. The only real recourse for anyone fed-up with the senate would be to support a strongman populist who promised radical reform, because the existing voting system (public assemblies) was not effective at representing the will of the people (by design).

I think CGP Grey's video on the keys to power is another great example of this dynamic at play - you only matter when you hold a key to power. Without that, no leader will waste their time listening to you.

I'd say that populism is opposed to democracy in the same way that gluttony is opposed to health. Eating a ton is better than eating nothing at all, but the goal isn't mere survival. Populism subverts democracy, it doesn't further it.

To your point about the Roman republic, I mean sure. But democracy itself isn't and never was a mechanism to give the less affluent an equal voice to the wealthy, who always set up their own, more prestigious power structure that could overrule the lesser if needed. US Senate, House of Lords, Athenian Areopagus, the Indian Rajya Sabha, all were mechanisms to allow affluent minorities exercise disproportionate influence.

Putting the poor first, that's the aim of communism. In a republic, you have a voice. The rest of society, including the movers and shakers, still has to agree with it.

> Populism has always, from day one, all the way back in Ancient Greece, been a threat to democracy.

In Plato's republic democracy is a result of populism and is seen as one of the lowest forms of government.

Direct democracy can be pretty damn horrible and unprincipled.

Any modern system has check and balances and the process itself is important. Forcing negotiation, coalitions and making it difficult to change constitution etc. Plato had no idea how democracy can develop.

Aristotle describes this as "Polity":

See [this](https://fs.blog/2017/02/aristotles-politics/) article, and the [Politics, book 4, section XI](http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/politics.4.four.html#553)

A common monarchical canard, argued all over the world, including former colonies. Monarchism set Mexico back a hundred years.

> CGPGrey has a great pair of videos on pirate social dynamics that everyone should watch. Economic factors, not shared idealism, created the flat hierarchy.

Do you have the links?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0fAznO1wA8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YFeE1eDlD0

Thank you.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com