I think the problem with democratic governments today is the fact that they're winner-take-all. And it's taken to such a extreme that even city governments which have been more socially liberal in the past decade are being overruled by state governments being dominated by socially conservative politicians. They claim that such actions are "needed" to "preserve order." Yet, what I'm seeing here is the antithesis of order since to overrule a city government which is closest to the community of citizens they represent is inherently anti-democratic. This has been a common thread through this election cycle in the United States where communities that are clearly not in step with their state governments are being forced to conform. I'm just waiting for the same social conservatives to make it a mandate that corporations have to abide by government approved "social conventions" to just negate the non-discrimination clauses in employment contracts (just as a way to ensure total compliance to their view of reality). Because the only solution I see for any of this is a radical form of local democracy with proportional representation at higher levels of government to take hold and overturn the current system as it is.
Wealth doesn't matter in itself as much as the distribution of total wealth (and relative wealth). Humans are social animals, they don't just want something to munch and some cover over their head (not to mention that millions don't even have those), they want to do at least as good as what's perceived as average for their society.
Particularly chilling are the responses to the question of how essential it is to live in a democracy. They graph the answers by the decade in which the respondents were born:
* U.S.: 1930s: 75%, 1980s: ~30%, with a straight line between them.
Democracy doesn't feel like democracy when people with your culture (political party, part of the country, etc.) lose power. When some other culture is running the show and antagonizing you every day, non-democratic solutions can look pretty appealing. You might be willing to do anything to fix the situation. You justify it, because the alternative is WRONG in your mind.
BTW, this applies to both sides. Don't imagine that one culture in your country -- especially your own -- is immune to this sort of thinking.
But this is not a problem of democracy. It is a problem of radicalisation. Everything is fine as long as all sides are confident that the other side consists-despite disagreement-of decent people. Up until recently it was quite rare in the west for an election outcome to instil an end-of-days kind of fear in 50%+ of a country's population. It happened in the US and it may also happen in a lot of European countries soon, where what we would have called fascism in the good old days, is on a steady rise.
Certainly, it seems appealing and, worse, people feel disenfranchised when they see polls that show the majority of people support something while the government rejects it (because people of a higher economic class or special interest side against it). This leads to them not participating in the system, which leads to further feelings of disenfranchisement. It is a negative feedback loop.
Democracy only works if people actively participate and make their voices heard. Not voting, campaigning, etc. only leads to further entrenchment of the lobbyist nightmare.
Further, rejecting democracy because "your side lost" is idiotic. When your side loses in a democracy, you get to try again in however many years when hopefully your side's arguments bear out in the negative impact of actions of the other side. When your side loses in a military dictatorship, if you try again, you go to jail.
> Democracy doesn't feel like democracy when people with your culture (political party, part of the country, etc.) lose power
In fact, that is exactly what democracy feels like! People have different preferences (as they always do) and so they take a vote, majority wins. It happens on every level, from national declarations of war to a bunch of people deciding on which movie to watch. And it has a very long track record of people dealing with it with no problem.
Every election in history on every level has had a loser. I know that personally: I didn't get to see the movie I wanted on Friday.
What is undemocratic is treating losing like a catastrophe or failure of the system - that is the system. That is democracy.
What is your culture? America is a melting pot of many different cultures. One dominant culture, and many sub-cultures. When the dominant culture is not curtailed we see all sorts of problems, which academia has enumerated. So the dominant people in the dominant culture feel powerless. Because when they are not in this position, according to academia, bad things happen. Take that how you want to take it. Governments are okay with this because they want to dis-empower people, in order to control and manage them better, and this is but one way of doing that.
In 1930, people would have had living memory of the disaster of the Great War ( WWI ). That puts democracy in the role of a nearly-untried but apparently improved solution.
Remember that the inspiration of Burke wasn't that Liberalism failed but that the French Revolution was pretty hard to take.
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Was this not a problem with democracies in the past?
If only we had used the time, to craft tools that will keep a minima of society, science and education going even in troubled times.
What are you referring to? If you mean economics, the major democracies are wealthier than ever.
* U.S.: 1930s: 75%, 1980s: ~30%, with a straight line between them.
* U.K.: 58 - 30% (with a jagged line)
(See the graphs in the article for more.)
BTW, this applies to both sides. Don't imagine that one culture in your country -- especially your own -- is immune to this sort of thinking.
Democracy only works if people actively participate and make their voices heard. Not voting, campaigning, etc. only leads to further entrenchment of the lobbyist nightmare.
Further, rejecting democracy because "your side lost" is idiotic. When your side loses in a democracy, you get to try again in however many years when hopefully your side's arguments bear out in the negative impact of actions of the other side. When your side loses in a military dictatorship, if you try again, you go to jail.
In fact, that is exactly what democracy feels like! People have different preferences (as they always do) and so they take a vote, majority wins. It happens on every level, from national declarations of war to a bunch of people deciding on which movie to watch. And it has a very long track record of people dealing with it with no problem.
Every election in history on every level has had a loser. I know that personally: I didn't get to see the movie I wanted on Friday.
What is undemocratic is treating losing like a catastrophe or failure of the system - that is the system. That is democracy.
Remember that the inspiration of Burke wasn't that Liberalism failed but that the French Revolution was pretty hard to take.
Yascha Mounk and Roberto Stefan Foa, “The Signs of Democratic Deconsolidation,” Journal of Democracy
http://www.journalofdemocracy.org/sites/default/files/Foa%26...
I haven't dug into it, but you might find it interesting.
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