Democracy can have many forms, some more authoritarian than others. And it being able to morph into a different form as the conditions change is very much a feature, not a bug.
Democracy (from Ancient Greek: δημοκρατία, romanized: dēmokratía, from dēmos 'people' and krátos 'rule') is a form of government in which political power is vested in the people or the population of a state.
I would go so far as to say few of our so-called democratic countries are actually so. But one thing is for certain, a democracy can't be authoritarian by definition.
The problem with this etymology based political argument is twofold:
demos in Ancient Greek demokratia were blocks of assigned citizenship, so it is operationally closer to an electoral college than some idealistic "power to the people" interpretation of the term
who are the people? in Ancient Athens, "the people" ruling the demokratia were the male land owners... about 60% of the people in the city were excluded, most of them being slaves
Democracy now is a hugely complex ongoing negotiation, not some simplistic "dictionary says" naïvité. Go read Democracy in America, Aristotle is a bit outdated.
One thing that's worthwhile to understand, but very difficult to mentally reconcile, is the way in which Americans have the ability to redefine words to meet the need of branding.
In a very real and genuine sense, to most Americans "democracy and freedom" is simply whatever the USA does. This sentiment is then, after the fact, stitched into acceptability by these sorts of intellectual deflections.
It is understandable. The Netherlands is democracy to comes closest to ancient Athens. Twenty different political parties represented in parliament. A people who for 500 years have never agreed upon anything.
If Athens is legitimately a democracy then I am confused how you can come to the conclusion "one thing is for certain, a democracy can't be authoritarian by definition."
Athens killed Socrates using an authoritarian law after all.
This makes no sense. Why can't a population democratically vote for authoritarian laws? As long as the people have the ability to freely vote, the laws actually passed are irrelevant.
Second, only men could vote in Athens. Do you consider that to be acceptable in a democracy?
It's commonly taught in grade and high school civics classes that, since the Declaration of Independence, the US has a tradition that certain rights are unalienable. It's a direct statement that there is no way to separate or sever those rights from a person.
It's a whopper of a run-on sentence, but it's in there: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Athens itself killed Socrates for violation of speech laws and yet they are considered a democracy. This would be a violation of the First Amendment which would be considered an unalienable right that the Declaration of Independence was talking about.
There is an interesting point, "deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed". If the governed consent to an authoritarian law, why would they cease to be a democracy? If 100% of voters voted to ban wearing the color green, they wouldn't be a democracy?
I think you are basically saying democracy means good policies and authoritarianism means bad policies so you cannot have authoritarianism and democracy, but that just isn't the definition of either of those words.
Yes governance power can take many forms but when it changes, it's no longer democracy.
If anything a better analysis comes from the book Logic of Political Survival. The selectorate and the winning coalition are much smaller than previous generations because of the massive accumulation and consolidation of wealth. So they dont have to do jack shit for the majority of people because theyre irrelevant in gaining or holding power. The majority of Americans hold and wield absolutely no political power in placing anyone in power. And then are surprised when they get wrecked. Or maybe theyre not surprised because they simple dont know how much theyre country is getting looted
In principle I agree that change is possible and good under democracy, but your comment seems wildly out of touch in the present context.he change that I see happening in the USA now does not seem like a change of democratic form, but a move away from democracy, because a lot of core rights/freedoms/structures are under threat: freedom of opinion, freedom of the press, right to protest, and maybe we'll see free and fair elections get weakened too before this process is done.
You can have the core things you mention in other political systems and you can have democracy without them. Those are characteristics of the particular form(s) of democracy currently in place in most of "the west", not of democracy itself.
> maybe
I know, it's more exciting to play the worst scenarios in one's head, but… _maybe not_?
> I know, it's more exciting to play the worst scenarios in one's head, but… _maybe not_?
I don't know where I read this recently that russians never believe that something good can happen and americans never believe something bad can happen. It feels so real these last couple of years. You are obviously having democratic backslide and going into a bad place, but the absolute inability to realise this (at least from a large segment of the population) looking from the outside, is bordering on the absurde. There have been many dominant empires that fell. It is the peak of hubris that it can't happen to you.
David Sacks might be interested to know his title is now "Zar".
Democracy can have many forms, some more authoritarian than others. And it being able to morph into a different form as the conditions change is very much a feature, not a bug.
Democracy (from Ancient Greek: δημοκρατία, romanized: dēmokratía, from dēmos 'people' and krátos 'rule') is a form of government in which political power is vested in the people or the population of a state.
I would go so far as to say few of our so-called democratic countries are actually so. But one thing is for certain, a democracy can't be authoritarian by definition.
The problem with this etymology based political argument is twofold:
demos in Ancient Greek demokratia were blocks of assigned citizenship, so it is operationally closer to an electoral college than some idealistic "power to the people" interpretation of the term
who are the people? in Ancient Athens, "the people" ruling the demokratia were the male land owners... about 60% of the people in the city were excluded, most of them being slaves
Democracy now is a hugely complex ongoing negotiation, not some simplistic "dictionary says" naïvité. Go read Democracy in America, Aristotle is a bit outdated.
One thing that's worthwhile to understand, but very difficult to mentally reconcile, is the way in which Americans have the ability to redefine words to meet the need of branding.
In a very real and genuine sense, to most Americans "democracy and freedom" is simply whatever the USA does. This sentiment is then, after the fact, stitched into acceptability by these sorts of intellectual deflections.
Americans want a strong leader.
It is understandable. The Netherlands is democracy to comes closest to ancient Athens. Twenty different political parties represented in parliament. A people who for 500 years have never agreed upon anything.
IIRC ancient Athens was a direct democracy, which the Netherlands are not (and is technically a constitutional monarchy).
Liechtenstein and some Swiss cantons are the few remaining examples of direct democracy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_democracy#Examples
If Athens is legitimately a democracy then I am confused how you can come to the conclusion "one thing is for certain, a democracy can't be authoritarian by definition."
Athens killed Socrates using an authoritarian law after all.
This makes no sense. Why can't a population democratically vote for authoritarian laws? As long as the people have the ability to freely vote, the laws actually passed are irrelevant.
Second, only men could vote in Athens. Do you consider that to be acceptable in a democracy?
It's commonly taught in grade and high school civics classes that, since the Declaration of Independence, the US has a tradition that certain rights are unalienable. It's a direct statement that there is no way to separate or sever those rights from a person.
It's a whopper of a run-on sentence, but it's in there: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
This still doesn't make sense.
Athens itself killed Socrates for violation of speech laws and yet they are considered a democracy. This would be a violation of the First Amendment which would be considered an unalienable right that the Declaration of Independence was talking about.
There is an interesting point, "deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed". If the governed consent to an authoritarian law, why would they cease to be a democracy? If 100% of voters voted to ban wearing the color green, they wouldn't be a democracy?
I think you are basically saying democracy means good policies and authoritarianism means bad policies so you cannot have authoritarianism and democracy, but that just isn't the definition of either of those words.
Yes governance power can take many forms but when it changes, it's no longer democracy.
If anything a better analysis comes from the book Logic of Political Survival. The selectorate and the winning coalition are much smaller than previous generations because of the massive accumulation and consolidation of wealth. So they dont have to do jack shit for the majority of people because theyre irrelevant in gaining or holding power. The majority of Americans hold and wield absolutely no political power in placing anyone in power. And then are surprised when they get wrecked. Or maybe theyre not surprised because they simple dont know how much theyre country is getting looted
In principle I agree that change is possible and good under democracy, but your comment seems wildly out of touch in the present context.he change that I see happening in the USA now does not seem like a change of democratic form, but a move away from democracy, because a lot of core rights/freedoms/structures are under threat: freedom of opinion, freedom of the press, right to protest, and maybe we'll see free and fair elections get weakened too before this process is done.
And none of that seems like a feature to me.
You can have the core things you mention in other political systems and you can have democracy without them. Those are characteristics of the particular form(s) of democracy currently in place in most of "the west", not of democracy itself.
> maybe
I know, it's more exciting to play the worst scenarios in one's head, but… _maybe not_?
> you can have democracy without them
Wholly disagree you can.
> I know, it's more exciting to play the worst scenarios in one's head, but… _maybe not_?
I don't know where I read this recently that russians never believe that something good can happen and americans never believe something bad can happen. It feels so real these last couple of years. You are obviously having democratic backslide and going into a bad place, but the absolute inability to realise this (at least from a large segment of the population) looking from the outside, is bordering on the absurde. There have been many dominant empires that fell. It is the peak of hubris that it can't happen to you.
How you can have meaningful democracy without those features?