Democracy is a radical form of government and people seem to constantly forget that basic fact.
Democracy is often talked about, and often misunderstood. It is, as Churchill put it, the worst form of government except all the other ones we’ve tried. It is the reason why the West has managed to be so successful, stable, and peaceful since universal suffrage became the norm in the 1920’s. It is the source of endless frustration, some of the world’s greatest successes and its most monumental failures, but above all it is a radical form of governmental organisation. In an age where few remember the time before women were granted the right to vote it is common to take democracy for granted, and more common still to hold opinions directly counter to the spirit of democracy while considering oneself to be a democrat.
A prime example is a recent essay by Ilya Somin in Lawfare. The piece argues that disqualifying Donald Trump from running for the American presidency in 2024 is an appropriate and necessary measure to protect democracy form itself. The idea is clearly undemocratic, barring one of the top contenders for the highest office with a good chance of winning reshapes the electoral landscape in favour of incumbents at the citizenry’s expense. It is widely seen as anti-democratic when it happens in Russia or Africa yet is apparently good for democracy, actually, when it is proposed in America and of course when it benefits Somin’s favoured politicians. Genuine democracy is about letting the people choose their leaders, and to doctor their choices is explicitly anti-democratic; doubly so when it is done through non-parliamentary means as Somin suggests.
The essay is also sprinkled with anti-democratic tropes like stating that “Disqualification laws might be unnecessary if voters could be relied on to reject dangerously illiberal, anti-democratic, incompetent candidates at the polls.” Failing to understand that by definition the voters can’t make an objectively bad or wrong decision, just one you don’t agree with. This is what I mean when I say that democracy is a radical form of government, and one needs to internalise that fact to be able to write about democracy intelligently. “If voters are prone to systematic errors that could undermine the institutions of liberal democracy, it makes sense to have structural constitutional safeguards against them” Somin states, again failing to treat citizens as intelligent and worthy of having their views reflected in their state’s political leadership. If the people vote for an anti-democratic candidate, it is not an indication that the people are somehow stupid or uninformed, it is an indication that they are unhappy with how democracy is currently working.
Democracy is a social experiment testing whether the people themselves can pick a political programme for the future of their country. In the West where the experiment has been most thoroughly implemented and longest running it is undoubtedly an incredible success in the form of rich, stable, and largely peaceful societies. Democracy is a complicated, radical experiment and while it is obviously fine for people to doubt it democracy remains the least bad option we have.
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I've always been interested in politics, economics, and the interplay between. The blog is a place for me to explore different ideas and concepts relating to economics or politics, be that national or international. The goal for the blog is to make you think; to provide new perspectives.
Written by Karl Johansson
Cover photo by Edmond Dantès from Pexels, edited by Karl Johansson
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