Elections are bad for democracy

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/29/why-elections-are-bad-for-democracy

by kawera • 10 years ago

39 82 10 years ago

f_allwein• 10 years ago

Bit long winded, but boils down to recommending sortition, which I had not heard of. Interesting:

"With sortition, you do not ask everyone to vote on an issue few people really understand, but you draft a random sample of the population and make sure they come to the grips with the subject matter in order to take a sensible decision."

humanrebar• 10 years ago

Who decides when someone has "come to grips" with a topic? I mean, anyone who disagrees with me obviously hasn't come to grips with the issue, right?

jerf4• 10 years ago

It's very similar to jury duty. And you'd try to use similar mechanisms to keep the system fair and balanced. And it would have similar failure cases, but "system without failure cases" isn't really on the table here.

AnimalMuppet4• 10 years ago

The problem is, if I wasn't selected, and the selected group reached the opposite decision from what I wanted, it's easy for me to feel like I wasn't listened to, no matter how well the group did their job. This is a political (or maybe psychological) problem, rather than one of "what's the best process?"

protomyth• 10 years ago

We'll pick a small group of people, and feed them an education that will make them vote our way.

Sounds like how many prosecutors use grand juries in the USA these days.

rwmj2• 10 years ago

There are a ton of great alternatives. My favourite is the Demand-Revealing Referendum:

http://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbli...

323454• 10 years ago

Democracy has always been about the people being able to remove their leaders from power when they become egregiously bad. Kind of like evaporative cooling. The means by which they choose them is a second order consideration.

iamgopal• 10 years ago

I always understood election as a kind of checking power over whoever is already at the power, the ultimate authority even above supreme court and president. Only problem is its not immediate but eventual. Can mass voting system replace such authority ? [ A robotic president, which will post questions for which decision needs to be taken for polling via internet, tons of people choose from the option. ]

alain94040• 10 years ago

I propose a simple fix for major elections such as referendums and presidential elections. I call it the "really?" approach:

An election needs to get the same results twice back to back.

So for instance, you could replace the primaries and November presidential elections with that system. Vote once: whoever is first needs to win the next round to become president. Candidates may decide to drop out, or not. The public knows: if on round two, they still vote for the candidate that won the first round, that's the winner.

For the UK referendum, a second vote would have eliminated the protest vote. You see the results of the first vote, and you really ask yourself: really? Do I want this to happen? And vote one more time to confirm.

Simple system, with one huge caveat: no guaranteed outcome. But it would eliminate the need for polling, and hopefully result in better democratic decisions.

halestock• 10 years ago

I believe the technical term for this approach is called "bicameralism".

AnimalMuppet4• 10 years ago

No, bicameralism means you have two legislative bodies (for example, the US House and Senate). So in a sense it's the same thing, because a bill, to become law, has to be voted on (and pass) twice.

But bicameralism doesn't refer to two votes by the public in order to pass one referendum or elect one person. That's... something else. I don't know what to call it, but it's not bicameralism.

steve19• 10 years ago

The result would be a very low turnout on the first vote, with a meaningless result that may or may not be representative of the entire population (because everyone knows the first vote is meaningless so why bother voting), followed by a large turnout on the second vote... and then followed by howling and wailing by which ever side loses and the demanding of a third referendum.

Interesting New Zealand recently had a double/two part referendum that was reported on Hacker News (due the the complexity of changing the National flag)

kawera• 10 years ago

Unless you make voting in the first vote a pre-condition to vote on the second vote.

zepto2• 10 years ago

Not necessarily - the second vote could be a ratification of outcome the first, rather than a repeat of the question.

dragonwriter6• 10 years ago

The result would be a very low turnout on the first vote

Would it? To pass a measure is to approve a change, so there's always a side that wins if the vote doesn't pass. Opponents of a change could defeat it on the first ballot, and would likely focus effort on doing so, especially if turnout was expected to be small -- because the first vote isn't meaningless, if it fails, the measure is dead, and there is no second vote.

But because of this, supporters of the vote would also work very hard to mobilize support in the first ballot, because succeeding in it would be necessary to get to the second.

aidos• 10 years ago

The Nz referendum was a) pick a flag in round 1 and b) decide if you really want to commit to the chosen flag in round 2.

It was a sensible approach given that the flag choices were so underwhelming that nobody wanted to change in the end.

I guess it's a little different because you're voting for different things but I guess it's similar. Have a vote and then have the power to bail out.

kristianc7• 10 years ago

You regularly see this happening in France with votes for the Front National and Marine Le Pen.

What tends to happen is the Far Right parties do quite well in the first round of voting, at which point the parties who have been eliminated cross political divides to encourage everyone to shun the Far Right. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cordon_sanitaire#In_politics).

It's hard to say whether, on balance, this is a useful exercise. The FN is able to use this approach to present itself as the voice of the 'anti-establishment' Party, everyone is able to use the first vote as a pressure valve to let off steam and vote FN knowing there won't be any consequences too it, and there's always the risk that voters tire of Cordon Sanitaire entirely and just vote the Far Right in in the second round anyway.

cannam• 10 years ago

"It is also their general practice to deliberate upon affairs of weight when they are drunk; and then on the morrow, when they are sober, the decision to which they came the night before is put before them by the master of the house in which it was made; and if it is then approved of, they act on it; if not, they set it aside. Sometimes, however, they are sober at their first deliberation, but in this case they always reconsider the matter under the influence of wine."

(Herodotus on the Persians, http://legacy.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/herodotus-persians...)

jerf4• 10 years ago

You know, there is so much "Blah blah blah" about how bad democracy is, implicitly in context because "I think it came to the wrong conclusion" (which I , that I really expected the article to segue into something that basicaly amounted to "elites should just be given the power". I expected all the blah blah was trying to obfuscate this. But that's not where it went.

If you are interested in reading the whole article, please be my guest, but if you'd like to jump to the payload, use your browser search for "sortition".

(Though I can't help but point out the article undercuts its own premise accidentally. The EU, to the extent that it is even a democracy, is certainly subject to the exact same flaws described in the first half of the article! Therefore, logically, the decision to leave an organization where democracy is failing must not be so bad, even if it was made by a process that was itself democratically flawed. This does not "destroy the argument", in the parlance of the day, but it weakens this particular vote being used as the hook for the article. A vote on any other topic would arguably work better.)

nutheracc• 10 years ago

Could it be argued that an understanding of how x works is irrelevant, only the outcome matters, in that individuals who don't understand the workings of x are still able to tell if the outcome is positive or negative for them, and vote on that.

tremon7• 10 years ago

Not in this case. The full outcome of the Brexit vote will not become clear for another ten years, probably. Both sides have tried to win over voters by scheming with "irrefutable facts" that clearly showed the other side's facts were wrong.

thr329889• 10 years ago

Democracy is not failing, but elites do. You need to educate people, rather than labeling everyone who disagrees as a racist.

zepto2• 10 years ago

As someone who is actively anti-racist, I weirdly find myself partially agreeing with you.

Racism is hard to overcome and widespread. People are not either 'racist' or 'not racist'. Certainly people can be pro-racism or anti-racist in their intentions, but that is separate from how we actually act, since a lot of racism is unconscious and invisible.

Labeling actions and activities and even groups as racist is necessary, because we need to become conscious of these forces if we are ever to overcome them.

However, whether labeled as racist or not, everyone's voice needs to be heard in the political process. So where I agree with you is in using the label of racism as a tool to silence or ignore people.

kristianc7• 10 years ago

This sounds like a variation of Plato's Philosopher Kings, which uses the 'random sampling' argument to get around the obvious criticism of the elites being given the power.

The Ship of State is a famous and oft-cited metaphor put forth by Plato in Book VI of the Republic (488e–489d). It likens the governance of a city-state to the command of a naval vessel and ultimately argues that the only men fit to be captain of this ship (Greek: ναῦς) are philosopher kings, benevolent men with absolute power who have access to the Form of the Good. The origins of the metaphor can be traced back to the lyric poet Alcaeus (frs. 6, 208, 249), and it is found in Aeschylus' Seven Against Thebes before Plato.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_State

Unfortunately, many of the same criticisms apply to sortition as apply to Plato. The problem is that no-one really has access to the "Form of the Good", and no-one can accurately predict what the overall outcome of a decision is going to be over the very long run, however much they study it. In fact, as Popper argues, you're quite likely to draw the wrong conclusion and end up going horribly wrong.

On balance, I'd rather put my faith in a large number of people selected from all social backgrounds than a small number of people selected from a potentially narrow social background. There's also a sense of shared agency about the decision making. If it turns out the wrong decision has been made, what are we to say to the person who is not only on the receiving end of said bad decision, but wasn't even allowed to vote on it?

It also seems to me that one should be wary about making sweeping statements about a system that has endured for thousands of years in the wake of a decision that they themselves disagreed with.

alienasa• 10 years ago

Did you read the whole article? His most significant proposal is that modern democracies adjust their procedures to use something called "sortition" that dates back to ancient Greece.

In sortition, rather than polling the entire populace about complicated issues on which they are likely not well informed, we select a balanced random sample of people from the populace , provide them information, and then allow them to engage each other on the issue. Then we have those people vote.

This has several advantages:

1. It actually places "faith in a large number of people selected from all social backgrounds" depending on how large your sample, as opposed to letting elected politicians decide, which is the definition of "a small number of people selected from a potentially narrow social background".

2. It solves the problem where a huge number of people end up voting because of gut instinct or misinformation. Consider the passage of Proposition 13 in California which prohibits the raising of property taxes. If you poll the entire population, that referendum is going to win 100 times out of 100, because for most people the gut check decision is "no I don't want my taxes to go up". However, the correct way to consider that proposition is to get an understanding of how property taxes are used, how they are collected, what the procedures are for changing them in the legislature, etc. and then come to a determination. That determination might be "Yes", it might be "No", or it might be "we should not limit increases in property tax rates but instead limit increases to the real value of collected taxes, by accounting for changes in property values". [1]

[1] I'm not proposing that is the right answer, I'm just suggesting that you might arrive at that conclusion if you actually had time to study the issue. Almost by definition, the vast majority of people do not have that time.

reitanqild3• 10 years ago

Sortition is almost what we have elected politicians for isn't it? The default case?

Referendums are for very important cases were we suspect politicians are out of touch with ordinary people.

This has been a nagging issue in UK for years and finally they figured it was better to ask the people.

kristianc7• 10 years ago

I read the whole article, and my criticism was addressed at sortition.

In sortition, rather than polling the entire populace about complicated issues on which they are likely not well informed, we select a balanced random sample of people from the populace , provide them information, and then allow them to engage each other on the issue. Then we have those people vote.

This is utopian, and fraught with difficulties. Who decides what constitutes balanced? Does anyone elect the deciders? How can a sample be both balanced and random? Through what forum do they engage? How do we ensure a genuine discussion takes place, rather than both sides talking past each other. How do we overcome the problem that the larger the sample, the harder it will be to have a discussion? How do we prevent the media playing a role in influencing the decision making?

The referendum campaign was poorly articulated on the Remain side, and played to people's most base fears on the Leave side. Remain should have known that touting the impact of Brexit on big business would fall on deaf ears with those that feel powerless in their own communities. That's an argument for making better information available during the course of a referendum campaign. Of course, had the Remain campaign won, as it nearly did, no-one would be questioning it, just as they didn't call for an overhaul of democracy in the wake of the (equally disgracefully fought) NO2AV campaign.

milesf• 10 years ago

"No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

  - Winston Churchill, House of Commons, November 11, 1947

noam872• 10 years ago

The same could have been said of the horse until someone tried a train for the first time.

We've never tried sortition on a large scale, and on smaller scales it's already been shown effective.

A perfect opportunity to experiment with it would be the Canadian senate, IMO.

Also note: sortition is a form of democracy. In fact I would argue it's the most democratic process proposed which does not run a risk of mob rule. You still have an "elite" making decisions... only that elite is constantly changing, is made of a representative sample of the general population, and is at less risk of being easily corrupted by special interest groups.

It's actually quite beautiful and elegant: so simple, yet it addresses so many of the criticisms of every other system proposed. While at the same time it's incredibly flexible in implementation: it can be perfectly fitted to a parliamentary government structure or any other variation of already existing governments. Any country or state would be able to experiment with it without needing a major overhaul of how its legislative/executive branches operate (only how its members are appointed).

dragonwriter6• 10 years ago

sortition is a form of democracy.

No, its not. Democracy is either direct (in which each citizen has a direct vote on proposals) or indirect (in which each citizen has a vote on representatives, who either directly vote on proposals or select other officials who do.) The common element of democracy is that there is a chain of choice from the citizenry at large to the decision, what differs among forms of democracy is whether there are intermediate links on that chain, and how many, what those particular intermediate links look like.

Sortition is does not share the unifying characteristic of democracy, it is, instead, one of many forms of rule by an unelected, not-democratically-accountable elite.

and is at less risk of being easily corrupted by special interest groups.

People that aren't trying to get reelected , and which are rotated fast enough to be "constantly changing" (which also means that public attention on each of them is fleeting), is, if anything, more subject to corruption.

They may be less valuable to corrupt (since you are more likely to be renting them for a single decision than buying them for a whole extended career), but I don't think that the combined effect makes them less risk of being corrupted. At a minimum, I think that claim requires substantial support that hasn't been offered.

sevensor• 10 years ago

I see the appeal of sortition, and I'd like to see it tried. My biggest concern is that, in any transition to election-by-lot, the chosen representatives are at a disadvantage compared to the lobbyists and the national bureaucracy. I worry that these entrenched interests would find it very easy to manipulate representatives who have much less policy experience than they do.

AnimalMuppet4• 10 years ago

Sortition also may be less corruptible. If the group is constantly changing, that may be harder to corrupt than having the same representative in DC for 30 straight years.

reitanqild3• 10 years ago

Now, where is the "wisdom of the crowds" when it comes to decisions that we, "the elites", don't like?

This annoys me. There is no doubt the result would have been "very fair" if it had been remain.

What we are seeing now is IMO hypocrisy and contempt of ordinary people at a scary level.

Now, did I want Brexit? No (I had no opinion). Do I think they should have requested more than 50% of the votes? As a conservative biased person I guess so, -don't take a risk unless there is clear demand, simple as a discriminator in electronics: you want to protect against bounces and wobbling...

- but this should have been said up front, not after losing.

Edit: upvoted this for the discussion, not for the original article.

brooklyndavs• 10 years ago

Its hypocrisy and contempt coming from "elites" via the very institutions that are critical to a democracy, the media. When the 4th estate works in a neutral, non-biased, fact based way democracy can work. However, once you have major media bought and paid for by those "elites" to push some billionaire's agenda you sow distrust in media. Once the voters don't have a place to go for trusted information all bets are off...

TeMPOraL4• 10 years ago

institutions that are critical to a democracy, the media. When the 4th estate works in a neutral, non-biased, fact based way democracy can work.

I don't believe mainstream media ever worked in a neutral, non-biased, fact based way. They definitely have not been for the past few decades I've been on this planet. Maybe in the past they were more under control by various "elites", government or otherwise. Now, in the west, they are "free" - which means they actually serve Moloch[0], by writing what sells. That is, the most outrage-inducing, biased misrepresentations (and often outright lies) they can get away with.

Not sure what is worse[1], but it doesn't matter much. The point is, media isn't "a place to go for trusted information", it never has been, and if this is an institution "critical to democracy", then we have a big problem right here.

[0] http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/

[1] - "elites" at least care about something identifiably human; metaphorical Moloch does not, so the outcome may be very well something nobody wanted, including any of the "elites"

hackuser5• 10 years ago

once you have major media bought and paid for by those "elites" to push some billionaire's agenda you sow distrust in media. Once the voters don't have a place to go for trusted information all bets are off...

I don't think this is what's happening. Much of the media - especially the Murdoch/Fox empire which includes many of the most popular news outlets in the US and UK - sells anger, distrust of government and 'mainstream media' (which somehow doesn't include Murdoch's companies), and outright lies and propaganda.

IMHO, that's where much of the distrust comes from; it's nothing more complex than a propaganda campaign.

maratd• 10 years ago

What we are seeing now is IMO hypocrisy and contempt of ordinary people at a scary level.

This isn't anything new. It's the justification for all the bureaucratic layering in government. The people are too stupid/bigoted/whatever to make decisions for themselves, so we'll make it for them.

chimprich• 10 years ago

The people are too stupid/bigoted/whatever to make decisions for themselves, so we'll make it for them.

You make this sounds like a bad thing. Of course this is true; this is why we have governments rather than have everyone voting on every decision.

Many people are too stupid, or at least misinformed, to weigh up complex decisions. We don't ask people to vote on tax levels and spending plans because they'd tend to vote in lower taxes and higher spending.

This was very similar to what was promised by the Exit team: continued access to the internal market but that they would no longer have to pay for it. This was clearly not a viable strategy.

Some of the Brexit voters may have had a more nuanced view but the above situation was how most of them saw, and were sold it. (Not that the Remain campaign was that much more honest.)

This is why we vote in a government to make decisions for us. It's perfectly reasonable to conclude that some decisions are more complex than the average citizen has the knowledge or time and inclination to research so they can vote intelligently.

hackuser5• 10 years ago

where is the "wisdom of the crowds" when it comes to decisions that we, "the elites", don't like?

The crowds wisely thought the sun orbited the flat earth, and have voted for many bad decisions throughout history. Democracy is supporting their self-determination - the crowds have the power. That doesn't at all mean that every decision is a good one.

EDIT: As Abe Lincoln is quoted:

You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Well, I guess there's a little bit of hope there ...

EDIT2: Can't believe I forgot this part:

Most nations use a republican form of government, where people choose the best of them (or the best person running) to deal with these issues. Direct democracy, where the people decide issues directly, is actually not part of the system. The UK has had 3 nationwide referendums and the US none, AFAIK.

There's a good reason for that: The average person has no idea what they're talking about on most issues. They have other jobs and interests, or no interest. Do I want the wisdom of the crowds deciding how the military should be funded and structured, or do I want elected officials who have hearings, a staff of aids, who study the issue and talk to the generals ... egads, I pay a lot of attention to public affairs, but I wouldn't want that responsibility.

jerf4• 10 years ago

Ironically, if you want to talk about what the crowd believes, the crowd believes that people used to believe the Earth was flat.

The historical evidence that this was ever a widespread belief is quite weak. People generally either didn't think about it, or knew it was round.

makomk• 10 years ago

The Guardian was arguing that referendums were a bad idea back on the evening of the referendum, when it looked like Remain would likely win: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/23/refere... What's more, this latest article is an excerpt from a book that's probably been months if not years in the making.

kiruwa2• 10 years ago

This article can be summarized as "Oh no! The 'wrong sorts of people' are winning! Lets ditch popular elections."

AnimalMuppet4• 10 years ago

Or, specifically, the people voted the wrong way on the referendum. Let's stop letting people vote on referendums.

You see the same thing with the EU Constitution - the voters rejected it in two countries. That can't be allowed. So we'll do the same thing via the Lisbon Treaty, but we won't let anybody vote on that, because they might vote wrong.

mrec2• 10 years ago

Be fair. They let Ireland vote on Lisbon, and when Ireland voted wrong they were even nice enough to let Ireland vote again.

tremon7• 10 years ago

Yes, the same thing happened with the NL referendum on the EU constitution. The reason people voted "no" was because they had never been asked before, so this was their first chance to have their voice heard.

That's about the only part of the article I agree with: if you're going to do referendums, then do them regularly. Referenda are only a useful tool if the public feel they really are involved in the process. Otherwise you'll have to answer for every decision that went around them.

Nursie• 10 years ago

Ah the Guardian. It's gone into full on hypocrisy mode after the referendum fell to the 'exit' vote.

It styles itself as the voice for the downtrodden and disenfranchised, but the moment they make the 'wrong' decision it posts article after article dedicated to denigrating these same people, advocating their voice be ignored. Quite sad really.

sametmax• 10 years ago

As usual, people confuse democracy, vote, and freedom. In many coutries, we have vote. In some countries, we have a lot of freedom.

But to this day, we don't have democracy in a single country.

Democracy supposes that the people has the power. It's not the case in what we call democracies today.

You have a small group of people getting in the election pool because of where they come from and how much money they can manipulate. Then, this small group takes most of the decisions, which is what we call an oligarchy.

Voting then, is just a way to swap people from this group. In no way it puts power in the hand of the people.

Quite often people opposes dictatures with our systems to justify that if they are in that state, then we are in a democracy. The fact we have a better, and confortable system doesn't make it magically fit the definition.

For the people to have power, you would need them to want it in the first place. But most don't read political programs, most don't think hard about what their country should do, and most certainly don't accept any responsability for anything happening today in their country. They won't choose what they buy or whatch on TV according to the impact on the social life.

Hence, elections are not bad for democracy, it's just we never manage to use them to setup a democracy in the first place.

In fact, to have a democracy we would need to educate people to want it first. To make everyday's decisions by thinking about it. And to think about what society can become on a regular basis.

Right now, as most of us think and act mostly for ourself, we can't achieve democracy. Democracy cannot be brought only by using a fair political system (that we don't even have), you also need citizens.

wildmusings• 10 years ago

I, for one, am exceedingly happy that the media establishment has so loudly proclaimed their disdain for democracy in the last week. Open your eyes people, they think they can run your lives better than you and they're quite upset that you've dared fight back.

nemo44x2• 10 years ago

Sortition is just too corruptible and disagreeable I would think. You can sample a society and "educate" them but then that process will forever be under fire too.

I believe that in a democracy things should be hard to change. Changing things should take a super majority. This will lead to more compromise and possibly better results for all. If there was a 2/3 requirement to change things then there would be little room for controversial changes to occur that cause an uproar among the citizenship. There would be more cooperation because to change something you'd need to compromise with your opponent for them to get a change they want instead of trying to get a slim majority in the government by election, etc.

If this principal was applied in the first place the UK never would have joined the EU and Brexit wouldn't have ever even been an issue. In fact, many of the things a lot of people find disagreeable wouldn't have happened.

We are divided because we let our form of democracy divide us.

dingaling• 10 years ago

Whilst I agree that a supermajority is an excellent idea for changing things, it's still staightforward for politicians ( or more precisely, civil service mandarins ) to play the long-game to achieve what they want regardless. They can operate on a longer timeline than the average voter,for whom there are more pressing daily concerns.

For example, de Gaulle originally blocked the UK's entry into the EEC. So the UK went off and formed the rival EFTA with some peripheral nations, until EFTA was eventually folded into the ECSC / EEC.

By the time a referendum on remaining was eventually held, in 1975, the UK was already deep in the EEC. Change had been achieved without a majority, or even a minority.

TazeTSchnitzel• 10 years ago

If you impose too high a barrier to change, then laws cannot stay in sync with society, and that will lead to severe unrest.

mrec2• 10 years ago

Yes. I think this is a common misunderstanding about democracy. Democracy is not good because it provides the best government, or even competent government; much of the time it manifestly doesn't. Democracy is good because it provides for stable succession; if a discontented group is strong enough to stage a successful coup or revolution, then in a democracy it's probably strong enough to achieve its ends at far lower cost and risk by waiting a couple of years until the next election.

The EU was founded in large part to prevent yet another European war; that's a noble goal and for all its flaws I think the EU can claim a lot of credit for 70 years of peace. Warnings against complacency that "it could never happen again these days" are well-made and well-taken.

But we haven't had a violent revolution or civil war in western Europe for a fair while either - anything since Franco? - and I think that's largely thanks to functional democracy. Messing with that is not to be taken lightly either. You don't have to go back very far to find everyone collectively soiling their breeches every time a monarch started getting on a bit without a solid heir in sight.

nemo44x2• 10 years ago

For sure and maybe 2/3 is too high. Certainly if you impose too low a barrier you get unrest as well - as we are witnessing across democracies today.

I would love to see a study that uses the scientific method to determine what the best percentage is for keeping the most people happy. My gut tells my 70% is too high and 50% is too low but that's conjecture.

Rexxar• 10 years ago

The goal of democracy is not to be good but to be fair. Democracy gives people what they deserve and in the long run they will try to make what is good for them. Making mistakes is the only way to learn (individually or collectively) so we shouldn't care too much for each error.

hackuser5• 10 years ago

(Excerpting from another post:)

Most nations are republican democracies, not democracies. People choose the best of them (or the best person running) to deal with these issues. Direct democracy, where the people decide issues directly, is actually not part of the system. The UK has had 3 nationwide referendums and the US none, AFAIK.

There's a good reason for that: The average person has no idea what they're talking about on most issues. They have other jobs and interests, or no interest. Do I want the wisdom of the crowds deciding how the military should be funded and structured, for example, or do I want elected officials who have hearings, a staff of aids, who study the issue and talk to the generals ... egads, I pay a lot of attention to public affairs, but I wouldn't want that responsibility.

Note also that while elected officials are very human and imperfect, their credentials and experience are far above average.

xlm1717• 10 years ago

Our voting system worked well for decades, but now it is broken.

Now that the elites don't get the desired result, it's broken.

The beatings will continue until morale improves!

Lidador• 10 years ago

Qualitative Democracy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5cCyAqCkIw

Elections are bad for democracy

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