Edit: I mean if someone was arguing against Democracy, this would be one of their best arguments to support their position.
I am not arguing against Democracy. I hope I don’t get misunderstood.
It's a very, very bad idea to hold a referendum along the lines of "vote no for the status quo, vote yes for, erm, something, we'll let the Yes side make up some stuff about unicorns and cricket playing vicars for you". The vote should have been for a realistic deal, with article 50 notification contingent on having agreed said deal in principle. People had _no_ idea what they were voting for, and that's entirely Cameron's government's fault.
That doesn't mean that referendums are necessarily bad in principle, though.
In Ireland we have quite a few of these, but generally the government will say what it intends to do with a Yes result. When people voted yes on the abortion referendum, say, they weren't just voting for "more abortions, please" in the abstract, they were told ahead of time what would happen if they did vote yes.
I'm not entirely sure what you're referring too?
I have no insight into how significant that concern would have been in practice, only that it reached the news.
And that's how you get Brexit.
I think this is one of the three major factors that got it anywhere near a 50/50 outcome: 1. Voting on something as vauge as can be, 2. lies and manipulation, 3. single lever problem
"In March 2017 the Scottish Parliament authorised the Scottish Government to seek to hold a proposed second Scottish independence referendum."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposed_second_Scottish_indep...
"The agreement reached was that Northern Ireland was part of the United Kingdom, and would remain so until a majority of the people both of Northern Ireland and of the Republic of Ireland wished otherwise. Should that happen, then the British and Irish governments are under "a binding obligation" to implement that choice."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Friday_Agreement#Status_o...
Really big changes ought to have a higher bar than just a simple majority. A 2/3 majority is a much higher bar to overcome, and in the case of a referendum, it would mean the result represents the consensus view of the people, not just one side in a bitterly divided close fight.
Achieving a reasonably objective assessment of what the required majority should be would be very hard, though.
Anytime a simple majority can have such a large impact, it's probably a bad idea.
It might not be tyranny of the majority in the classic sense, but it's "tyranny of the half plus one."
If anything being able to occasionally execute on controversial things like this seems like an argument in favor of democracy. How often have we heard of X or Y is easier in a dictatorship because the approximate half of the population that disagree can just be steamrolled and progress can happen without them? To me things like Brexit are proof that democracy can be just as versatile when it wants to.
The main complaint about the whole process was that it was far too ideological instead of being benignly technocratic.
Regardless of opinions, this plays out like a bad marriage and divorce. Joining the EU requires good will to get in, but there's no amicable way to leave. Why would anyone join now seeing these circumstances?
Once you're in, you're in for life. Ride or die. Might as well join a gang.
The UK didn't revert to WTO rules in their trade with the EU. Instead, they got a deal that gave them fewer trade barriers with the EU than most countries have to deal with.
The complainers are trying to get all the upside with none of the down.
Because the world is moving to being dominated by the big 3 trading blocs: US, EU and China. All in an environment where the WTO is diminished and bilateral relationships become the norm.
If you are outside one of these blocs increasingly you will become weaker and more irrelevant for trade and services. And far less able to defend your interests.
Again, when the trading interests of a country are pitted against its other national interests, conflict is most often what comes next.
Leaving the USA, the Civil War cost many lives and resulted in still being in the USA. That didn’t stop Puerto Rico wanting to join the USA.
Otherwise, agreed :-)
A referendum is great at giving legislators or executives a priority -- my home state of New Jersey has been working on marijuana legalization for years, but it's largely stalled in the statehouse. The 2020 election featured a ballot question on legalization, and the overwhelming "yes" (more than 2/3 of the electorate supports the move) helped kick off another round of legislation (that, in a sadly predictable pattern, seems to be stuck once again).
[0] https://www.axios.com/electoral-college-by-vote-per-capita-4...
The current EC implementation is terrible however. Small states already get massive overrepresentation in the Senate, they don't need a second system to weigh in their favor.
I very much want to see one person, one vote, with approval voting (i.e. pick ALL the people you're happy to see being president, the winner gets the job) being used for presidential elections.
Too often minorities are suppressed.
Plus, voters are terrible at understanding the long-term implications of what they think they want.
Tyranny would be if you couldn’t vote them out of office.
“Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays instead of serving you if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”—Edmund Burke
I don't understand why. Licensed or not, they're going to drive. If they're in the country illegally, they're not gonna care they're driving illegally. Isn't it safer for others on the road if they're made to take the appropriate tests and have insurance like everyone else? If you're involved in an accident with an undocumented person, isn't it better to be able to get their insurance information?
In this case, I think the voters really are being dumb. Or they're being fed a pack of lies, such as getting driver's licenses will make undocumented aliens eligible for other benefits.
Maybe these legislators are able to see both sides of the issue and believe that giving driver's licenses will be a net benefit to their constituents. Even if those constituents don't realize it themselves.
Also, there’s nothing stopping another initiative campaign to repeal the law. If the people voted it repeal it, it would be repealed. That doesn’t sound like tyranny at all.
It could be argued that having failed to get your own way in the established electoral system, inventing a new unstoppable electoral system is undemocratic.
If you are going to have a referendum it should require a supermajority because the turnout is never going to be good enough for a real consensus.
If you left everything up to the public, there would be 0 taxes, free education, healthcare, housing and monthly paychecks of a $1000 for everyone. But that's a terrible idea, and it doesn't get implemented anywhere, because you literally choose people to represent the population and to make sensible decisions.
Haha. My beloved country has free healthcare, education and government social grants for women mostly and a lot of free actual legit housing for the poor. Don't get me wrong, the whole thing is crashing in slowmo for a few decades now because we really don't have anyone driving the vehicle but Jesus. I'll never abondon ship though.
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I still wouldn't want to live there.