Lecture
Это окончание невероятной информации про демократия.
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may be perceived as an imperfect form of government or one that contradicts the divine order:
Christian criticism: In traditional Christian thought, power comes from God, not from the people (Romans 13:1 – "there is no power but of God"). Democracy undermines the principle of the divine institution of authority.
Islamic criticism: In Islamic theology, true authority belongs to Allah, and laws must be based on sharia. Democracy, in which legislation is formed by people without divine guidance, is considered a usurpation of God's authority.
Buddhist and Taoist approaches: They see in democracy an illusion of control that gives rise to disorder and passions, whereas harmony is attained by following the natural order.
Western democratic institutions are often proclaimed universal, but this provokes criticism for several reasons:
Disregard for cultural differences. Western democracies impose their standards on countries with different political traditions, ignoring historical, ethnic and religious particularities.
Double standards. The very countries that promote democracy themselves violate its principles, for example by interfering in other states' elections or supporting authoritarian regimes for the sake of economic gain.
Contradictions between democracy and human rights. In some cases democracy leads to the infringement of minority rights when decisions are taken by the majority without regard for individual freedoms.
In many countries democracy exists only nominally and is used as an instrument for legitimising power:
Sham elections. The authorities use administrative resources, control the media and restrict the opposition, while preserving the appearance of democratic procedures.
Manipulation of public opinion. The democratic process turns into a spectacle in which the key role is played by propaganda rather than by real choice.
Corruption of the elites. Political parties and institutions work in the interests of the oligarchy rather than of the people, which results in the retention of power by a small group.
Liberal democracy, based on a combination of democracy and a market economy, is criticised both by its opponents and from the standpoint of alternative models of government:
Economic inequality. Democracy provides no protection against the concentration of wealth, and elites gain the opportunity to manipulate the system in their own favour.
The substitution of oligarchy for democracy. In reality, large corporations and financial groups exert greater influence on policy than ordinary citizens.
Ideological dictatorship. Although liberal democracy proclaims a plurality of opinions, in practice certain ideologies (for example, political correctness, globalism) become dominant, suppressing alternative views.
A crisis of effectiveness. Lengthy bureaucratic processes and the striving for consensus impede rapid decision-making in critical situations.
Criticism of democracy has been a key part of democracy and its functions.
Plato is considered one of the most ardent opponents of democratic rule in Ancient Greece.
From antiquity down to the modern era, democracy has been associated with "rule of the people", "rule of the majority" and free choice or elections through direct participation or elected representation respectively.
Political thinkers have approached the criticism of democratic political systems from various points of view. Many do not necessarily oppose democracy by its simplest definition — "rule of the people" — but rather seek to question or expand this popular definition. In their work they draw distinctions between democratic principles that are effectively implemented through undemocratic procedures; undemocratic principles that are implemented through democratic procedures; and variations of the same kind. For example, some critics of democracy would agree with Winston Churchill's famous remark: "No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time." Other critics may be more willing to describe existing democratic regimes as anything but "rule of the people".
Leading contemporary thinkers in critical democratic theory include Jürgen Habermas, Robert A. Dahl, Robert E. Goodin, Bernard Manin, Joseph Schumpeter, James S. Fishkin, Ian Shapiro, Jason Brennan, Hélène Landemore and Hans-Hermann Hoppe.
Critics of democracy have often sought to highlight democracy's inconsistencies, paradoxes and limitations by contrasting it with other forms of government, such as epistocracy, plural voting or sortition. They have characterised most modern democracies as democratic polyarchies and democratic aristocracies; they have identified fascist moments within modern democracies; they have called the societies created by modern democracies neo-feudal; while others have contrasted democracy with Nazism, anarcho-capitalism, theocracy and absolute monarchy. Among the best-known critics of democracy are Plato and the authors of the Federalist Papers, who were interested in establishing a representative democracy in the early United States instead of a direct democracy.
One such argument is that the advantages of a specialised society may be compromised by democracy. Since ordinary citizens are encouraged to take part in the country's political life, they have the right to influence the outcomes of public policy directly through the democratic procedures of voting, campaigning and use of the press. As a result, public policy may be influenced to a greater degree by the opinions of non-specialists and its effectiveness may therefore be compromised, especially if the policy is highly technical and/or the general public is insufficiently informed. For instance, there is no guarantee that those who campaign for the government's economic policy are themselves professional economists or possess academic competence in this particular discipline, regardless of whether they were well educated. In essence, this means that a democratic government may not deliver the very best for the greatest number of people. Some, however, have argued that this should not even be the aim of democracies, because a minority may be subjected to serious mistreatment in the pursuit of that supposed aim.
The contemporary American philosopher Jason Brennan makes similar points about democratic governments. Brennan's main argument against democracies is the problem of voter ignorance and irrationality. Brennan argues that "the democratic system encourages them [voting older citizens] to be ignorant (or, more precisely, does not encourage them [voting older citizens] to obtain information)". Throughout Brennan's book Against Democracy he explains the various problems of voter incompetence and proposes an alternative system of government known as epistocracy.
The French revolutionary syndicalist Hubert Lagardelle argued that French revolutionary syndicalism arose as a result of "the reaction of the proletariat against idiotic democracy", which he claimed was "a popular form of bourgeois domination". Lagardelle opposed democracy for its universalism and believed in the necessity of the class separation of the proletariat from the bourgeoisie, since democracy did not acknowledge the social differences between them.
Plato's Republic presents a critical view of democracy through the narration of Socrates: "Democracy is a form of government that has no proper governance, but is pleasant and varied. In it there exists a peculiar sort of equality — one that equalises equals and unequals alike." In his work Plato lists 5 forms of government from best to worst. Assuming that the Republic was conceived as a serious critique of political thought in Athens, Plato argues that only Kallipolis, an aristocracy headed by reluctant philosopher-kings (the wisest of men), is a just form of government.
Plato rejected Athenian democracy on the grounds that such democracies were anarchic societies without internal unity, that they followed the impulses of citizens rather than striving for the common good, that democracies cannot allow a sufficient number of their citizens to have their voices heard, and that such democracies were as a rule governed by fools. Plato attacked Athenian democracies for mistaking anarchy for freedom. The absence of consistent unity in Athenian democracy led Plato to conclude that such democracies were merely an aggregate of people occupying a common space, rather than a form of political organisation.
According to Plato, other forms of government devote too much attention to lesser virtues and degenerate into other forms, from better to worse, beginning with timocracy, which overvalues honour, then oligarchy, which overvalues wealth, followed by democracy. Under democracy the oligarchs, or merchants, cannot use their power effectively, and the people take over, choosing someone who plays on their desires (for example, by staging lavish festivals). The government, however, grants the people too much freedom, and the state degenerates into the fourth form, tyranny, or mob rule.
John T. Wenders, professor of economics at the University of Idaho, writes:
"If we base our critique on the definition of democracy as government based on the will of the majority, then this form of government may have certain predictable consequences. For example, Fierlbeck (1998: 12) points out that a middle-class majority in a country may decide to redistribute wealth and resources into the hands of those they believe most capable of investing or increasing them. Of course, this is only a critique of a subset of types of democracy that mainly use majority rule."
US President James Madison devoted the whole of Federalist No. 10 to a sharp critique of democracy and proposed republics as a far better solution, stating: "…democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths." Madison suggested that republics are superior to democracies because republics are protected from the tyranny of the majority, stating in Federalist No. 10: "The same advantage which a republic has over a democracy in controlling the effects of faction is enjoyed by a large over a small republic."
The Founding Fathers of the United States intended to answer this criticism by combining democracy with republicanism. The Constitution would limit the powers of a simple majority.
Machiavelli advanced the idea that democracies would tend to satisfy the whims of people who follow false ideas in order to entertain themselves, squander their reserves and fail to combat potential threats to their rule until it is too late.
Machiavelli's definition of democracy, however, was narrower than the present-day one. He suggested that a hybrid system of government incorporating aspects of all three principal types (monarchy, aristocracy and democracy) could break this cycle. It is argued that many modern democracies with a separation of powers represent this kind of hybrid government. In modern democracies, however, there is usually no direct correlation with Machiavelli's idea, owing to the weakening of the separation of powers or the erosion of the original function of the various branches of government. For example, the modern executive branch of the United States has gradually been acquiring more and more powers from the legislature, and the Senate no longer functions as a quasi-aristocratic body as originally intended, since senators are now elected democratically.
Some have attempted to argue that the Coase theorem applies to political markets as well. Daron Acemoglu, however, presents evidence to the contrary, arguing that the Coase theorem is valid only when there are "rules of the game", so to speak, that are enforced by the government. But when there is no one who can enforce the rules on the government itself, there is no way to guarantee that low transaction costs will lead to an efficient outcome in democratic countries.
For several centuries scholars have studied inconsistencies in voting, also called voting paradoxes. These studies culminated in Arrow's impossibility theorem, which suggests that democracy is logically inconsistent. This is based on a particular set of criteria for democratic decision-making that are inherently in conflict with one another. Charles Plott characterised this situation metaphorically:
The subject began with what seemed to be a minor problem with majority rule. "It is merely a mathematical curiosity", some said ... But intrigued and curious about this little hole, researchers, undaunted by what might be irrelevant, began digging in the ground nearby ...It now appears that they are uncovering a giant cavern into which almost all of our ideas about social action can be poured. Almost anything we say and/or anyone has ever said about what society wants or should get is threatened with internal inconsistency. It is as though people have been talking for years about things that "in principle" cannot exist, and a great effort is now needed to see what objectively remains of the talk.
Charles Plott (1976) Axiomatic Social Choice Theory, p. 511
Jason Brennan, author of Against Democracy, discredits the democratic system and proposes an alternative form of government known as epistocracy. Instead of giving everyone the right to vote, an epistocratic system would give a vote only to those who are competent. Only citizens with an elite political understanding would have a say in government. Brennan's entire argument for preferring epistocracy to democracy revolves around the problem of voter ignorance. Brennan believes that voter ignorance is a serious problem in America and the chief objection to democracy in general.
Часть 1 Democracy as a political system: its advantages and the proof of its impossibility
Часть 2 Criticism of the aim of democracy - Democracy as a
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