The problem with Democracy
Posted: February 4th, 2009 | 9 Comments »Well, the situation is not as bad as it was a couple of months ago. This time we got lucky, and seem to have ended up on the right side of the vote. But I think our democratic systems has an increasing number of flaws that will need to be addressed in the near future. What are these issues?
- All voters have the same weight
Let’s make a parallel with Wikipedia here. I already wrote that giving all users the same power was not right. Wikipedia seems to get ready to do something about it, and we need the same process to happen in society. The big question is of course how? How to reward someone who read all the political programs with care vs someone who is just voting based on (partisan) TV ads? How to detect the “relevant” citizens, and how do we define relevancy? One idea would be to give all newborn a points capital, that can increase in a very restricted number of cases, and decrease following a predetermined scale. A bit like driving license in France.
Let’s say we get ten points at birth. The vote will count for ten unless a person is found guilty of a crime. At the opposite, voting often or getting elected (i.e. showing commitment to the democratic system) increases the weight of one’s vote. Being a mayor gives one hundred points, a deputy one thousand. Being the president gives a million points as that person knows how the system is working, has headed it for several years. It simply makes sense that his or her vote counts more than the street guy who doesn’t care about politics and votes because a candidate “looks nice”. - Democracy is built around (increasingly) irrelevant boundaries
I have lived in Switzerland for almost 15 years now, which means I left France that same number of years ago. Why is it I can’t vote in Switzerland, and can in France? What qualifies me to make a decision that will impact the French daily life, something I do not experience. Why can I vote and don’t have to go through the consequences of my vote? At the opposite, why can’t I participate in the elections that affect me directly? National borders are, slowly but surely, becoming totally irrelevant, heritages of a past way of life that is disappearing. Populations are moving around, cultures get mixed, distances are abolished by technology. We need to find a better way to connect citizens with their zone of relevancy. Why not come up with a system that counts the number of days spent in a country? If I split my time between two countries, why can’t I get half a vote in each for example?
Another boundary that should be questionned is age. In today’s society, with such a major shift (the web) happening two decades ago, it might be arguable that a 16 years old could give a more informed vote than a 80 years old. Not because he is smarter, but because he probably understands the challenges and the possibilities of society much better than someone who has never had to send an email in his life. There is no easy solution here, but it’s worth thinking about it. - Democracy is too manichean
We always need a winner and a loser. But is that what really reflects the reality when you have a country voting 51% for a candidate, 49% for another? Why not come up with a better working system, one that allows for two persons with contradictory opinions to work together? The boundaries between political parties are getting challenged in France (Sarkozy hired socialists in his government) and in the US. But why not find a way to embed that concept into the system directly? Didn’t we all dream of having Al Gore involved in some way after the 2000 election? Should he be silenced because he had a few hundred votes less than the other guy? Why are these few votes ending up counting more than the millions of people who were rooting for him? - Too many people don’t vote
This one probably has some solutions thanks to technologies. There is a need to find a way to have voting follow the new ways of life. You should be able to vote while on a trip, or at the hospital, or while working. It is already possible but still too complicated (because mostly paper based). There is a need for a more direct link between voting and voters.
I also believe there is an issue with reporting here. We don’t have enough feedback on the result of our votes. Obama seems to want to change that (think weekly YouTube address, websites dedicated to more transparency) and it is a welcomed development. But an effort should be made to give voters the impression their vote make a difference – good or bad. I used to work at the UN on financial reporting systems, and noticed that more transparency create more involvement. There is an opportunity here to lure those who deserted the democratic system back into the picture.
“Democracy is too manichean >> But why not find a way to embed that concept into the system directly?”
Well, I live in Belgium and they have this kind of system: political-parties-mix-government.. After elections in june 2007, they spent one year trying to have a government – I’m sure it’s the only reason why Belgium was in international news last year :p. One and a half year later the situation is still not clear.
Of course it’s not as simple as in present it here but the concept needs optimization… :-)
True, collaboration needs collaborators I think ;) and sometimes it’s hard for opposite views to work together. The Swiss are pretty good at that actually, seven wise men and women make the decisions together, and are able to move forward despite different political and cultural backgrounds.
Excellent post Laurent!
In “All voters have the same weight”, you make a very strong and interesting statement: people who do not care or understand enough about the subjects on vote shouldn’t be given a lower weight.
On one hand you propose to give more weight to regular voters. But, usually, the most regular and consistent voters are in the extreme spectrum and follow dogmatically party lines, thus making regular voters weight relatively more than non-regulars would reinforce extremes.
On the other you propose that representatives of the political establishment get a higher weight than the “people on the street”. But this is also problematic:
1. representatives of the political establishment have already a disproportionate voice in making and enforcing decision (sometimes in full disconnect with democratically expressed opinions, but they are rarely held accountable before the end of their mandate.
2. representatives of establishment have (personal and/or ideological) vested interests which do not necessarily represent the needs or best interests of society.
One possible solution to this could be introducing a “civic permit”: have all voters take a 2-hour course including factual introduction on a given subject, fair exposition of the different points of view and the implication of each choice. Then take a test ensuring that every voter has achieved a sufficient factual and relative implications understanding level (hopefully, over time, votes based on pure party dogmatic lines would decrease). Those flunking the test don’t have the right to vote on that subject but are not segregated over time.
Thanks for adding up to the conversation, great points you’re making. Filtering “democratic relevancy” is really a core issue.
I agree with you that frequency is typical of extremes. But maybe such an incentive could change that and get more people involved? I’m not sure either, but it’s an intriguing idea, and still you stick to a basic principle: more implication means more weight. It’s hard to find some negative in that reasonning I think.
Then about having more weight when you were part of the system, my point was based on using experience as a scale to rank people. But it’s true that, on the other side, it would tend towards conservatism. Bush would have voted for maintaining the crap he created, and giving him more power would have become negative (but could he have become president in the first place with such a system?). I guess there is definitely room for refinement.
The problem I have with “civic permits” is to find objective things to say to the “trainees”. But it’s a tempting idea. Show voters the track record of the candidates, their program, etc…
Agreed: participation and implication is always more valuable than indifference.
I guess “civic permit” would suit better Swiss style politics with regular topical referendums. Definitely more difficult for individual candidates, yet again, engage people through active listening and “testing” on all individual candidates they would normally “black out” in their usual media consumption may bring some change and value in the process…
So back to participation and implication :-)
This articles ideas are very high and out of sight of most states.
Democracy in it self has been shown to work. It has been shown to exist and has proven it self in many countries over a long period of time.
1. Democracy means that EVERY MAN shall ave the right to be free. Everyman shall have an equal right to choose their leaders. Just because someone is less versed in politics or the way of society doesn’t mean they are less versed in another area of life. Look at for example a pastor of a church. Paid full time by the church and focuses on the study of god. NOT politics or democracy. What shall be his reward? Some people hate the church and some people love the church. Whom shall decide the points rewarded for being a pastor? The haters or lovers? The country could be then again divided. You have a valid argument, but a scued view. All voters must have the same weight or we will once again have an inner party and outer party and the MINORITY will NOT be able to speak for it self and represent it self.
3. Manichean? I disagree. We should require that the party voted in pull from the other parties as well, but look at the U.S. There are only 2 true parties to pull from. Look at Germany with tons of parties. Germany has a better system than the U.S., but the U.S. is still a good system. When things go wrong, the Democrats get voted in. When things go wrong with the dems, the repubs are voted in. In the end it will balance it self out. As for where did Al Gore go? I imagine Gore had enough “swing” to tell Bush he wanted in, but he decided to focus on something else. Obama is now doing the same as Bush, not letting his counter part help out. If they wanted to, they could have done a JFK where they invited a bunch of their counter parts into the office for the plain fact that each candidate wants to do some good in the world.
4. The current U.S. Voting system is very corrupt. Thanks to the introduction of NON-Tech. There are several cities and States who have people that are dead on the day of elections rise again and vote. This causes corruption and needs to be fixed, but has not been done yet. Why? Because both parties need the dead to vote again. Sad, but true. I think we should innovate in this field.
As Churchill once said: “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.”
Scott excellent point in one, though in our modern societies, most countries and states use a majority vote (with thresholds set at 3% to 5%) vs. proportional vote (every vote counts), thus silencing that very MINORITY.
I guess the main idea of the discussion is to engage people and make them feel involved, specifically in direct democracy actions, rather than disenfranchised thanks to “winner takes all” rules and attitudes.
Thank you Laurent for the quality of your blog that I have just discovered.
Great discussion initiated here.
The limits of democracy are due to the underlying nature of man who operates it.
- Getting elected requires seducing the crowd which is everything but a rational exercise.
- Once elected, the game is about being re-elected instead of executing the right job. This is again about seducing the crowd.
Today’s challenges require a consistent, persistent and continual leadership in order to execute the right job focused on the long term.
Nothing can be built in the long run as long term constructions are often about short term sacrifices and leadership continuity.
The cornerstone of democracy is education.
Education elevates the crowd in order to understand the long term, make rational decisions, accept personal sacrifices for the benefit of the community, resist intellectual shortcuts, build opinions and fight media pressures.
Are democracies able to educate properly the crowd?
We understand here that we are in a catch 22. Democracy relies on education which relies on democracy.
There are past examples of dictatorship that drove nations to more progress.
These success stories are probably exceptions rather than the general rule.
Dictatorship are unstable, unreliable and unpredictable.
Democracy is probably the best imperfect system created by the imperfect man.
Democracy as we know it today is probably the basic ground for a Democracy 2.0 that remains to be invented.