3 Ideas to Improve/Sustain Democracy

Miscellaneous General
1

No matter what the political system whether it be one rooted in austrian economics and excercised under a libertarian structure or our current system, if the people are not the focal piece of interest, and if that interest is not to fully educate and value the importance of a well learned individual (especially in matters corruption, history, and values)… then no matter what the system it could at any time revert into an unheathy government. A government that influences the people instead of the other way around. Here are some of my ideas which intend to strenghen the people’s ability to speak out, protest and increase public oversight over government actions.

Firstly, I would love to see a set of 10 Commandments engraved on a granite rock enshrined on the front entrance of every school property in America.
(There is no religious association… I just call them 10 commandments to give you an idea of the principle behind it. That being; ten guidelines you should cherish and practice throughout your life for the betterment of democracy. Call em 10 rules to maintain freedom and inhibit tyranny.)
Ten Commandments that say such things as:

  1. Dissent is the highest form of patriotism
  2. To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public.
  3. All governments, should be viewed as inherently evil; a system that always naturally falls into a fascist state unless guarded against by a vigilant populace constantly on guard for any sign of corruption.
  4. they that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety
    5.All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.
  5. The media can sell you lies especially if multiple primary media venues are concentrated in the hands of few rich men (Aherm “Michael Ruppert”).
  6. We as a nation are opposed to Secret Societies. There is something inherently evil about Secret societies and we need to come to grips with this.

…8,9, 10

It would serve as a constant reminder to never take blind patriotism too far. And help our children realize from a young age that politicians are very much so susceptible to corruption and that governments don’t mean well, quite the opposite, they can easily be ran by greedy individuals with their own selfish interests. That Nazism can happen here in America just as anywhere else in the world.

And I whole heartedly believe that any government official who does not approve of such an innitiative is a treator to America. For limiting our student’s understanding of the sheer extent to which any governments can betray its populace.

I would much rather recite these than the pledge of allegiance.

Secondly, there ought to be a mandatory school class, similar to health class for example, that teaches students how to best participate in the democratic system and how to make their voices heard. It would teach things similar to the “10 commandments” above. But it would also teach us how to rally up, learn about all the venues made available explicitly for our democratic usage. Students would learn practicle skills and methods like proper investigation techniques in case they find something awry is going on.

For example, here’s one quote which should have particular emphasis in our children’s classroom:

“Why am I so bent on conversation? For pleasure first, pure selfishness, but also because conversation is a school for thinkers and should be a school for democrats. When one finds supposedly educated people arguing heatedly over matters of fact and shying away from matters of opinion; when one sees one’s host getting nervous at a difference of views regarding politics or the latest play; when one is formally entertained with information games or queries cut out of the paper about the number of geese in a gaggle; when the dictionary and the encyclopedia are regarded as final arbiters of judgement and not as fallible repositories of fact; when intelligent youth is advised not to go against the accepted belief in any circle because it will startle, shock, and offend - it is time to recongnize, first, that the temper of democractic culture is tested at every dinner table and in every living room - just as much as at school, in the pulpit, or on the platform; and second, that by this test and despite our boasted freedom of opinion, we lack men and women whose minds have learned to move easily and fearlessly in the perilous jungle of ideas.”
-Jacques Barzun, Teacher in America

Thirdly, WhisleBlower museums should be erected across the country. The museums would encourage the population to recongnize and cherish the brave undertakings of those few who spoke ought against corruption. We constantly praise hollywood stars, athletes, and the rich and famous, isn’t it time we turn our attention to those who truly do hold American/Noteworthy values at heart.

No Philosophy Forum?
2

Upon reading this I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to chuckle or scream - but feeling in a rather equitable mood this morning I took the benefit of the doubt that this wasn’t tongue-in-cheek a bit, and had a hardy laugh. Because I have to ask what society in its right mind would tolerate words assailing its very existence be put up for all to see - constant reminders of dissent rather than cooperation? The impulse of individuals is to be selfish and optimize their own gain at the expense of others, whereas the purpose of a society is to temper such impulses for the sake of “a greater good”. I’m not fully dismissing some of your very valid checks and balances - and I actually think your whistle blower commoration has merit - but to think that schools of kids should suddenly be applauded for being as disruptive and challenging of any and all authority isn’t going to improve but rather hinder progress in education, as the neanderthals start to beat the pulp out of eachother and others. Without cooperation and acknowledgement of authority, there’s only a social darwinian “might makes right” default. How does that improve/sustain democracy?

3

I have no interest in democracy, and the sooner it collapses, the happier I’ll be.

4

Opposed to Secret Societies???

Folks, I think this country went through that phase over 170 years ago. The “Know Nothings” or American Party as I remember. :slight_smile:

5

Inquisitor? So sayeth the one-eyed man in the land of the blind (would you maintain that view if you were on the weaker/dumber/needier side of the spectrum?)

6

It is still tyranny whether one man or a whole group of them try to take what is rightfully mine and assert themselves as “my” rulers. Democracy is tyranny no less than monarchy or dictatorship - in fact, monarchy may be the lesser of the evils.

The idea of cajoling the masses into schools to educate them in economics so they will be good citizens is one that I frankly find distasteful. Better to give them absolutely no say over the property and lives of others to begin with.

7

Is this the way you would expect Rothbard or Mises to endorse (as in “what would Jesus do”)? Or would they instead accept that there will always be some form of governmental structure - and all the coercive mechanisms - and then espouse methods for keeping collective intrusion at bay, thus maximizing individual freedom within the inevitable ruling system (of one kind or another)? (I would love to see this answered by an actual member of the academic staff of this site - since I think it would clarify a lot of misconceptions thrown around by its active forum participants about the nature of man as individual and within a group (as exposed by the definition of rights defined by Locke vs. Rousseau, too)).

8

By “democracy” I assume your talking about a representative democracy or as it used to be called during the Revolutionary Era a “republican form of government”? Since there are no functioning pure democracies in the world currently that I know of. What other form of government* protects peoples rights better than a republic?

*Keeping in mind anarcho-capitalism isn’t technically a form of government and will probably never come to fruition.

9

same wavelength - that there’s always going to be some form of government, and therefore why not “the worse one, except for every other that’s been tried” democratic republicanism? It seems that many (even those who are deafening by their silence) feign the promotion of anarchictic concepts - while all the while knowing there’s no point in discussing such a never-and-never-will-be extreme (so why waste time with such ramblings?)

10

That’s exactly what I mean to say: democracy is good, it simply needs the tools to make it live up to its potential. I merely want to bring about the tools to insure that the individual is made well aware of his responsibility as a citizen. And we are all responsible to seek objectivity and understanding in all things. We need not dissent but we do need to value great efforts made by those who have sacrificed a good part of their life to help society remember and recongnized government misdemeanor where, when and how it took place so we can prevent it from reoccuring. Accountability is important no doubt and this is what I mean by dissent. I don’t want to set up a system that encourages the individual to be disruptive and rebellious. I want to set up a system of open mindeness. There is tremendous information that isn’t being taugh in school. For example documentaries like “The Century of The Self” by Adam Curtis should be regular viewing material in schools. It teaches of manipulations and how we need to be watchful of underlying or secondary objective when we are being fed propagandistic information. Of course we need to recongnize propaganda in the first place. And the majority of American students aren’t privy to this type of valuable information every citizen should be well aware of.

All I’m trying to do is offer tools that puts emphasis on collaboration . Sort of like the popular Salons of the enlightenement period where people would congregate to discuss matters of science and politics. We lack these venues now-a-days. Actually we don’t necessarily lack these tools, we are merely not using them to the extend we should. The internet for example is a great tool to further our understanding of human nature and seek out ways to design an environment that will best make do with the limitations and shortcommings of human beings. Few frequent this message board for example, but millions are actively frequenting message boards for entertainment purposes. And since intellectuals makeup a small portion of the entire population, it is important to have things like Whisleblower museums to help the general population become a little bit more wary of their own involvement and what is expected of them.

Our collective psyche is caused by our environment. If our environment (what we see, read, and absorb) should be of the sort that it constantly reminds us of our capabilities as individuals and as groups we are one step closer to a healthier society. Unfortunately our current environment breeds seperation and disdain for one another, the left and right dichotomy for example categorizes and barricades the human mind into sectors. We need to shed and break down shuch barriers by introducing and making to people privy to information that tyrants would rather have censored. Information that “would help society better manifest its purpose of tempering unwanted individual impulses.”

11

I, for one, appreciate where you’re going with all this - but in a matter of a minute’s clicking of just CNN U.S. news just now: Manhattan giveaway mayhem human stampede; Vegas motel poisoning w/ anarchist manual found; and frozen fish mysterious pills recall. So I ask - what to do in a society of vast complexity, and individuals who obviously pose a threat to others? Just dismantle government and let the chips fall where they may? Not you, but Is that what others are saying is sane?

12

No, it’s what I expect Inquisitor to endorse.

Seeing as Rothbard was an anarchist, and Mises believed in secession down to the individual level, I’m not sure what to say about the above.

BWF89, assuming that a state must exist, I still would not favour a democracy. Just a Randian ultraminimal provider of law and order whose powers derive from a constitution. The reason is, there would be nothing to vote on, at least not in an obligatory sense.

13

How exactly would that work? Do you mean a state whose only powers were to enforce contracts?

14

Given that it’s an ultraminimal state (and a voluntarily financed one; see Rand on this), pretty much. Anything more than that and I see democracy as no more than another form of plunder. I think Bryan Caplan has some good work on why democracy does not function in the same way as markets do.

15

The best ideas I’ve read on how to improve democracy involve the use of prediction markets, e.g. Robin Hanson’s futarchy. Basically, these markets can aggregate private information and make accurate predictions using market mechanisms. Hanson’s idea consists of people voting on what they’d like to have (defining some after-the-fact social utility function), with prediction markets used to select the best means to achieve these goals. Hanson seems to support private law, but I think he is one of those who believes it would lead to collusion and worse tyranny than we have now, so futarchies are his idea of how to make democracy less terrible than it is.

Of course, even prediction markets don’t completely deal with the knowledge problem, and the externalities (tyrannies) of democracy are still present.

16

The problem with democracy is two-fold: 1, majority rule can violate the rights of minorities, and 2, political decision-making, especially democratic decision-making, is divorced from the economics of policies. When an individual or family wants to buy something new, they have to look at the checkbook or budget and see if they can afford it. When a ‘democratic nation’ wants to add something new, there’s no direct connection to how much the new policy would cost, how it would affect the national budget, or what it would do to the taxes or borrowing of the nation.

If there were some way to fix that disconnect (and I’m not sure that there is), then you might be able to at least fix the 2nd problem. But the first problem still exists, and can only be mitigated by less democracy or restrictions on democratic rule.

17

The best way to improve democracy is to totally eliminate it.

18

The best way to improve a car’s gas mileage is to make it a giraffe?

19

I agree with Inquisitor concerning that democracy is still a tyranny, just of the majority. I also realized that our country was largely a grand experiment, one with many wonks, and even though it was executed, still was far from perfect, whatever that may be. One thing I don’t think people (outside of Libertarianism) see is a historical perspective in regards that not only was this country founded as an experiment, but just because it was something new and done very few times before in the course of history (Ancient India, Greece, Rome..), does not nessesarily make it an end all be all system nor a vast improvement.

It makes it different than others, but by now, it should be well past apparent the system to which this country started out with, and has developed over the few centuries of it’s existence, is far from perfect and in fact may need to be either changed with radical reforms or restarted from scratch, under a different model.

I’m not sure what that model would be, although I see Inquisitor’s possible model as favorable.

This might be a little off topic, but one thing I have seen as of late, since switching to Ubuntu from Windows on my PC, is the FOSS movement (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_and_open_source_software). I find it interesting as it seems to be (or have/had) lowering the required capital needed for production to enter a market (in this case, software). It also goes a step further in reducing barriers to entry (people who worked on other projects on which reliable, older & borrowed code are used).

In turn, people derive both non-financial (experience, credentials, networking)& financial benefits (same as non-financial benefits, in addition to possible profits thereof). This creates a negative cost, so it’s still worth it to enter the market, and regardless of profit, you get plenty of competitors.

Admittedly, I might be poking stuff with a stick I barley know (I’m only just getting serious in reading on economics), but I still see it as an interesting development. Taken to it’s extreme, I do believe you could come up with a system akin to superconductive capitalism, or at least a movement to that effect in a specific market (for this case, again, software). It would be interesting if that could applied on the local, state & federal levels, although I’m not sure if they would specifically exist as such if such a movement were possible / plausible.

If it did, dare I say it could represent a new monetary system that even now, humans show signs of progressing too. A new monetary system where possibly it’s not about the “things” that determine wealth (since we can assume that everyone’s basic needs would be met), but about what you can do for others.

Again though, I could just be staring at the stars without knowledge of the constellations :D.

20

A car is a good, the better mileage the better. Democracy is bad.