Greetings Earthlings!
Our estimable host Erik Kain has invited me to be part of the main page. It seems to be a tradition for people to drop their nicknames and adopt a more formal full name. Pat Calahan became Patrick. RTod became Tod Kelly and so on. My full name is Anantharaman Muralidharan. Given that my name is so long, it would be better if everyone stuck with calling me Murali. First, a few things about me: I am a Masters Student studying political philosophy at the National University of Singapore. I have served in the army in the Singapore Armed forces as a conscript, and I did my undergrad degree in the cell and molecular biology.
My political views are strange in certain respects. I am a Rawlsian, and a libertarian. This would set me up as a kind of liberaltarian and would not be an unfair characterisation of my views. Yet, when it comes to democracy and civil disobedience, I come off somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun. Erik characterised a tension between libertarianism and democracy in two posts. While there was some pushback against Erik’s characterisation of libertarians, I actually agree with Erik’s basic point. Once we get stable minimal government, what role is there left for democracy? Of course I embrace this line of reasoning, which probably pisses all the other libertarians off and makes the social democrats jump for joy. The neo-liberal/liberaltarian monster is here and I am he.
I wish to thank Erik deeply for giving me this opportunity to post here, and it is a great honour to join him as one of the gentlemen at the league. Also, part of the reason why it is such an honour is because of the commenters themselves. We have a great commentariat here and this is why I continue to come back even if I don’t always have the time to say something.
So, to start off, here is a question I would like to ask the League: What is your true rejection for Democracy?
I will give a few reasons as to why democracies could be deeply problematic:
1. Pace Jason Brennan, democracies inflict incompetent electorates on its residents and are therefore fundamentally unjust.
2. Arrow’s theorem shows that representative democracies are irrational.
3. Guido Pincione and Fernando Teson argue that public deliberation in democracies is often irrational
4. Even in theory, democracy, as far as consent by the governed goes, is a farce.
5. We have better possible alternatives such as liberal constitutional technocracy and epistocracy (see attached Brennan PDF)
The question is about what it would take for you to reject democracy and the above are some considerations that might just be sufficient. For me, my true rejection of my scepticism about democracy would be if we found that the institution of unconditional universal suffrage was better than any others at ensuring that the social institutions complied with the principles of justice. i.e. the justice of democracy is entirely second order.
If you guys think that this topic has been beaten to death and beyond already (or even if otherwise), consider this an open thread.
(Edited at 1 am for formatting (GMT+8[/efn_note]
Welcome!Report
I suppose that before I list my true rejection, I’d have to state what it is I would be rejecting (or keeping, sans the true rejection), and frankly, I have a very difficult time even defining “democracy.”
If we’re talking about pure majoritarianism, then I already reject that.
If we’re talking about some admixture of “majority rule and individual right with a smattering of concern for minorities and with several veto points that check the majority rule in the first place but don’t do it too much,” then I have great difficulty teasing out the mechanical features (veto points, majority rule, some workable guarantee for individual rights and acknowledgment of invidious distinctions against minorities (for lack of a better word) imposed by civil society) and the normative features (how much is “too much,” how arbitrary does a distinction have to be before it’s invidious.
If, however, you were to ask my true rejection of the current governing structure of the United States (I’m a unitedstatesian), then I would have to consider what is a workable alternative for reforming that structure and what are the realistic alternatives for leaving and setting up shop in another country. I’m not so sure what the answer is.Report
I’ll put it more precisely:
What is your true rejection for unconditional universal suffrage (hereafter called UUS)? You can keep the other checks and balances etc. What would it take to say: letting every adult vote is a mistake. Especially since its all fine if you get the right to vote but it may not be worth it if Nobby Nobbs also gets to vote as well.Report
I don’t have one. This is a tricksy spots for my precious.
I think unconditional universal suffrage (letting every adult vote) is a mistake (in the sense that it has significant negative consequences). I just don’t think there is a reasonable alternative that doesn’t have other, equally bad or worse, significant negative consequences. Indeed, most of the others that have been tried have more significant negative consequences.
Personally, I don’t regard it as a necessary condition for a working sociopolitical organism. I regard it as a necessary condition for *our* sociopolitical organism, but that’s another story.
In the case of truly limited government, you don’t need universal suffrage because you don’t have to necessarily worry about people feeling disenfranchised because they have other power roles available that are equally (or potentially more) effective. I don’t need to feel disenfranchised by the fact that I can’t vote if voters can’t change tax rates and I have a lot of money. I don’t need to feel disenfranchised if I can’t vote if abortions don’t happen because everyone is part of the Church of Unity and I’m the archbishop. The more government does, the more likely you’re going to get dissatisfied subgroups if you don’t have universal suffrage.
This is one of those “it’s hard to get there from here” things.Report
I don’t have one. In fact, I’m in favor of mandatory universal suffrage (As long as NOTA is always a candidate and/or some sort of run off voting is in place). Is it politically or technically feasible from the starting point we currently occupy? I’m not sure. Likely not.Report
Thanks for the UUS clarification. I haven’t given it a lot of thought, andI’m not sure what my true rejection would be.
If we argue against unconditional universal suffrage, I guess I would have think on what “conditions” would characterize any alternatives to UUS. I’m really against racial- and gender-based conditions (I believe most people in the US are, at least in theory).
I understand the theory behind property requirements, and in certain limited situations–like a homeowners’ association that parcels the money out to fellow condominium owners–I think it’s an okay condition, but I see society as too much of a complete whole to say those without x amount of property ought not vote.
Literacy requirements (i.e., knowledge about government and policy)? I’m not sure: who gets to determine the rules? who gets to enforce them? Also, in the US at least, literacy tests have a pretty dark history.
Education / expertise requirements? Almost the same as above, but again, who decides who gets to be an “expert”? What kind of check are we going to put on them?
Probably the only alternative I can think of offhand is some sort of “weighted vote,” wherein those most affected would have more of a say than others. But I have no idea how such a system can be worked out in a manner that I would consider fair. Also, there would be manifold questions, such as how can we know ahead of time who will be affected by what issue and to what degree?
I think I agree with Mr. Kuzinicki’s comment below that “democracy” is often what’s resorted to when other things fail.Report
There’s something about Noam Chomsky and Pat Robertson cancelling each other’s votes that appeals to me.Report
There is this.
Practically speaking, it works most of the time, which is a point in favor of not overestimating some of the badness of UUS. Parse that last sentence twice.
The problem, of course, is when it doesn’t work… which is typically also in the worst possible scenario(s).Report
I’m not sure I have one. My view is that behind the veil, I would reject any type of government that didn’t grant me and my cohort the right to shape policy via elections and legislation.
I admit this view is open to challenge.Report
Awesome.Report
Welcome to the League Murali, good to see another non-American in the group.
As for the substance of your post, I can actually grant points 1 to 4, the problem comes down to alternatives. Epistocracy sounds fine in theory, but I have no confidence that a sufficiently robust political institution exists to create a test upon which an epistocracy could be based. Gaming that test would become the central focus of every political institution and interest group in the country.
My best candidate for a replacement to democracy is Futuarchy because it sidesteps the competence issue by only having people vote on the government’s terminal preferences, rather than on policy specifically. Still, there’s still a lot of work to be done before it can be tried out.Report
I suppose my true rejection of democracy would be the existence of a large and diverse non-democratic state that for a period of, say, sixty years preserves the freedoms of those who live within it to a greater degree than modern, first world democracies do.Report
You’re setting the bar too low. A reluctant dictator (one who has power but chooses to use it sparingly) can run an excellent government, better than any majoritarian one. It’s the law of large numbers: Democracy tends to produce average governments, because it averages the preferences of voters. But with a dictatorship, you can get extremes, both good and bad.
The problem, of course, is the problem of succession. People don’t live forever, and there’s no guarantee that the next dictator will be reluctant. He may even be enthusiastic.
So you need a period longer than sixty years to judge the success of a non-democratic government. You need to watch it through several successions.Report
Greetings fellow Earthling!Report
Congrats Murali, I’m utterly thrilled that you’re a front pager!Report
I’m down with constitutional republic separated into smaller and smaller units of democratic efficacy. I just don’t think direct democracy works at as large a scale as we have in the U.S. On the other hand, give me the power to decide with my neighbors what’s best for my neighborhood.Report
Cool. We as a neighborhood have decided what’s best for us is to pillage your neighborhood.Report
Bring it.
My neighborhood has guns.Report
Are you talking about the “War on Drugs” or the “War on Crime”?
(zing)Report
What is your true rejection for unconditional universal suffrage (hereafter called UUS)? You can keep the other checks and balances etc. What would it take to say: letting every adult vote is a mistake.
It’s a difficult question, because my view is that democracy is what we resort to after everything else has failed.
We try democracy after we’ve given up on (a) leaving stuff the hell alone, (b) letting people buy and sell it, (c) referring it to experts, and (d) forbidding it on principle.
Democracy is what we do when we don’t know what else to do.Report
In this frame, universal suffrage would be sort of a prerequisite for justice.Report
Jason, what do you think of Scott Adams’ new government?
The Internet has come of age at exactly the time we need it to form the platform for a new system of government. A new and properly engineered government could be immune to financial corruption and more efficient at matching economic resources to opportunities. That sort of change would be enough to turbo charge the United States’ economy for generations.
In a reengineered system of government, I like the idea of states operating as test sites for social and economic programs. In some ways, that’s the opposite of how things are operating now. For example, the federal government is clamping down on California’s state-legalized medical marijuana industry. Does that look like a government system that is worth keeping?Report
I don’t agree that the system should be scrapped.
Even if I did agree, I wouldn’t support Scott Adams as the Transitional Leader. Even just having to capitalize the word “Leader” makes my skin crawl.Report
Don’t forget e) letting the guys with the weapons decide.Report
Ni Hau Murali. Gonshi.
Next you can help me with my (non existent) Pinyin. 🙂
As for your OP, I agree with everything, especially being right of Atilla the Hun. I’ve even used that line meself a time or three. 😉
Fortunately as an American I don’t have to reject democracy since we don’t even have one. We don’t even have the next best thing, but we (mostly) are allowed to spit on the sidewalk here and chew bubblegum.Report
I don’t think this critique gives enough weight to the critiques of democracy given by the public choice school. Even if we could determine which citizens were more intelligent or oral than the rest without that process being perverted to serve some interest or another, it wouldn’t appreciably improve electoral results because the central problem with democracy isn’t that we have an uninformed or unintelligent electorate. It’s that responsibility is so diffused that no one has sufficient incentive to take enough care in casting their vote.Report
I’ve considered the issue you raise, actually quite recently, Murali, and remain provisionally satisfied that universal sufferage under the rule of law, with durable and effective supermajoritarian limits on the exercise of majoritarian power so as to secure minority rights, is the least bad of the spectrum of practical options for self-government. Post-Englightenment western-style liberal democracies are the best form of actual government yet devised to pursue that ideal. They all fall short, but they’re a whole lot better in that respect than than dictatorships of elites.
I’ve flirted in the past with the idea of epistocracy (actually, I did so when I was at about your point in life — having completed bacchalaurelate education and moving on to the next level of educational attainment). If applied with universal good faith it has some real advantages to reccomend it, but universal good faith is not a practical possibility and even if it were, disproportionate power granted to even a broadly-defined cadre of elites will eventually flunk the test of legitimacy. See, e.g., France’s Committee of Public Safety, the Republic of Venice.
Oh, and welcome to the front page.Report
Thought experiment.
What if government actually was separated powers?
Let’s say we let the men vote for the Presidency and Governors, but the women vote for the Congress and the Legislatures. Demographic majorities in any city can vote for the Mayor, but only minorities can vote for the City Council.
Only atheists or agnostics can vote for federal judges, but only the religiously-affiliated can vote for state judges.
Better… worse… or about the same?Report
Worse, much worse.Report
Ugh. I hate it. No branch of government is really legitimate and you’ve set them at war with each other even worse than with division of powers and a common electorate.
I have similar distaste for the idea of minority-apportioned voting districts, and for similar reasons.Report
That’s what I figured you’d both say.Report
The neo-liberal/liberaltarian monster is here and I am he.
so i guess you are a cobo then?
colonized brown.Report
so i guess you are a cobo then?
colonized brown
Huh???Report